The Significance of the Prior-Smart Correspondence for the Rise of Tense-Logic

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Abstract

The correspondence between Arthur Norman Prior and J.J.C. Smart was significant for Prior’s development of tense-logic. Prior was influential in making Smart sceptical about Wittgenstein’s view on pseudo-relations. Prior appears to have convinced Smart of the superiority of subsuming logical relations under the scope of operators. When Prior, however, disclosed the invention of tense-logic to Smart, it is clear from the correspondence that Smart did not find Prior’s tensed operators convincing. Indeed, it turns out that Smart warned Prior against presenting tense-logic at the John Locke Lectures. Two questions are raised with regard to Smart’s warning: Why did Smart warn Prior against presenting tense-logic at the John Locke Lectures, and why was Prior’s tense-logic so well received? An argument is tentatively given based on the novelty of Prior’s tense-logical operators to account for what Van Cleve(2016)[21]calls objectivity without objects.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationLogic and Philosophy of Time : Themes from Prior
Number of pages19
PublisherAalborg Universitetsforlag
Publication date2017
Pages63-82
ISBN (Print)978-87-7112-677-8
Publication statusPublished - 2017
EventWorkshop on time and modality in Prior’s logic and philosophy - Skagen, Denmark
Duration: 30 May 20171 Jun 2017

Workshop

WorkshopWorkshop on time and modality in Prior’s logic and philosophy
Country/TerritoryDenmark
CitySkagen
Period30/05/201701/06/2017
SeriesLogic and Philosophy of Time
Volume1
ISSN2596-4372

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