How does the past exist ? Does "the" past exist?

[j_j]

@Banno

The final part of the argument is the observation that the T-sentence, “p” is true ≡ p, provides a minimal account of what it is for a statement to be true, without introducing ontological implications.

Oh it’s minimal all right. Your “truth” is precisely the man who isn’t there. I can only experience your position on this issue as dissonant relative to your other positions.

@Banno

Looking at formal treatments of temporal logic shows that the question “does the past exist” is malformed; it’s a grammatical act that gives the illusion of there being a something - like the little man who wasn’t there.

For clarity’s sake, I will be blunt, but I don’t mean to be rude.

As I see it, your own statement demonstrates a tone-deaf reading, an indulgent deafness to context, as if conversation were a variant of Chess with Eternal Essences that you access with your Third Eye. This makes the conversation a performance for an absent God.

@Banno

But the truth of a statement is a different kind of thing to the attitude we adopt towards it, that being believing it, knowing it, asserting it, doubting it, or whatever.

For me this is just more negative theology.

Despite our disagreement on this issue, I don’t mean to give offense. We need foils, rival poets.