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Spaces and Times

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2009

Anthony Quinton
Affiliation:
New College, Oxford.

Extract

We are accustomed to thinking of space and time as particulars or individuals—even if we should hesitate to describe them as things or objects or substances. We say ‘space has three dimensions’, ‘material things occupy space’, ‘the debris has disappeared into space’ and we talk in a comparable fashion about time. Not only do we think of space and time as individuals but, in many connections at any rate, we think of them as unique individuals. When we talk about spaces and times in the plural, when we say ‘fill up the spaces on the form’, ‘it could go in the space between the lamp and the door’, ‘there were peaceful times in the early years of their marriage’ we think of these multiple spaces and times as parts of the unique allencompassing space and the unique all-encompassing time. Kant believed that we could not help thinking of them in this way. We do, at any rate, in fact think like this and it is this conviction that I want to examine.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1962

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References

page 132 note 1 Bradley, F. H., Appearance and Reality, chapter 18, pp. 186–9Google Scholar

page 138 note 2 Critique of Pure Reason, A25, B39.

page 140 note 3 Ayer, A. J., The Problem of Knowledge, chapter V, section iii, pp. 228–9.Google Scholar

page 147 note 4 Strawson, P. F., Individuals, chapter 2.Google Scholar