Being and Becoming in Modern Physics
Steven Savitt · 2021 · Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
This source is used as context evidence across 4 linked claims and 3 related evidence hubs. Its citation record is marked verified; that verifies the source trail, not the truth of any linked claim.
Summary
Examines how relativity bears on the block-universe vs. presentism debate, including simultaneity, temporal passage, becoming, and the relationship between physics and metaphysics.
How this source is used on the map
Direct treatment of the physics-of-time question — exactly the territory the block-universe claim lives in, without reducing the debate to a slogan.
Citation record
- Authors
- Steven Savitt
- Year
- 2021
- Publication
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Source type
- Philosophy reference
- Map role
- context
- Credibility level
- primary
- Citation status
- Verified
- DOI
- Not recorded
- PubMed
- Not recorded
- Not recorded
Linked claims
The 4D 'block' picture follows naturally from special relativity, where there is no objective universal 'now'. Many physicists and philosophers accept it.
The past is real and growing. The future is not yet. A compromise that preserves becoming.
The natural common-sense view: only what exists now exists. Hard to reconcile with relativity but not refuted.
Umbrella entry for the time question. Time, in some real sense, undeniably organises both experience and physics. Whether it is fundamental, emergent, or illusory is what's actually contested.
Related evidence hubs
Related sources
The standard reference for the relativity-based case for a block universe and a useful counterweight to overly simple 'physics proves fate' claims.
Explains what each of the time-models actually claims before any physics is brought in.
Useful modern authority for time pages because it connects physics, metaphysics, and experience rather than reducing the question to a slogan.
Gives the time-exists page a canonical anti-realist anchor rather than treating the question as only a physics issue.