The Role of Linguistic Analysis in Adequately Justifying a Philosophy of Time: A Critique of Graham Nerlich

Cheryl E. Fitzgerald

1. Nerlich’s Rejection of the Traditional A-Theory/B-Theory Debate

The beginning of analytic philosophy was partly coextensive with the beginning of the debate about whether time is static, in the sense maintained by the B-theory of time (also called the tenseless theory of time, four-dimensionalism, eternalism and other names). The opposing position is that time is dynamic, as argued by defenders of the A-theory of time (also called the tensed theory of time, with different versions of the A-theory being distinguished, such as presentism and the A-property theory). “Tense” and “tenseless” are used as technical terms in the A-theory/B-theory debate, which is paradigmatically exemplified in the title of Mellor’s 1987 paper in his discussion with G. Priest, “Tense, Tense and TENSE” [1987]. The word “tense” is rarely use in its normal grammatical sense in the philosophy of time. Philosophers talk of tensed or tenseless facts, tensed or tenseless propositions, tensed or tenseless beliefs, tensed or tenseless truth conditions, and the like. This is the point Mellor emphasizes about the technical use of “tense” in his article.

One might expect that Graham Nerlich, being a philosopher of physics, holds a similar position on these matters as many other philosophers of physics or scientifically based philosophers, such as Russell [1906], Reichenbach [1947], Grünbaum [1973], Quine [1960], Smart [1980], Horwich [1987], Sider [2001], Callender [2004] , Balashov [2002] and others. But in fact, Nerlich’s position is quite different and constitutes a significant departure from the traditional methodology of the debate between B-theorists and A-theorists. The article in which he presents his theory is “Time as Spacetime,” in Robin Le Poidevin’s Questions of Time and Tense. To be certain, Nerlich, like Russell [1920], Reichenbach [1927], Mellor [1999], Sider [2001] Callender [2004] and many other B-theorists, appeals to Einstein’s special relativity (specifically its four-dimensional formulation by Minkowski [1908]) as the main scientific support for the B-theory. Some have also appealed to physics in general, as did Grünbaum [1967], in order to support their thesis that the A-theory of time is not adequately justified since it is not mentioned in the fundamental laws of theoretical physics. (For a criticism of the physical or scientific adequacy of the commonly accepted B-theorists’ appeal to special relativity, see Craig [2000b]. A general appeal to basic laws of physics, such as Grünbaum’s appeal, also commonly accepted by philosophers of time, has been called into question by Craig in his extensive study of time in contemporary physics [2001].)

But this appeal to physics is not what Nerlich objects to. He is concerned with other parts of B-theorists’ methodology. This traditional appeal to physics is but one part of the B-theorists’ three-pronged attack upon the A-theory. The second prong is the charge that the A-theory is implicitly self-contradictory. This charge is primarily based upon an argument that has been borrowed in variously modified forms from McTaggart [1908], and a number of new and different arguments about the logical consistency of the A-theory. One such further charge concerns the claim that time flows or passes; the B-theorist objects this makes no sense since one can ask, “At what rate is it passing?” This question is intended to reveal the incoherence of the concept of temporal passage (cf. Oaklander [2004] for a presentation of some of these charges, and Schlesinger [1994] and Craig [2000a; 2000b] for defenses).

The point of the present essay concerns Nerlich’s rejection of the third prong of the traditional B-theorist attack upon the A-theory. As the third prong of their attack, B-theorists have also traditionally argued that the semantic content of A-sentence-tokens in natural language, such as the past tensed sentence-token ”Jane was walking”, is expressible by tenseless B-sentences. A-theorists respond to this by arguing that A-sentences convey information about A-properties (pastness, presentness, and futurity), tense operators or the “modalities” in which properties are exemplified [Christensen, 2000; Craig, 2000a]. The traditional B-theorist argument is that the tenses in natural language A-sentences do not convey any information about time that is not conveyed by their tenseless counterparts. They argue that certain types of B-sentences have the same semantic content as certain A-sentence-tokens. For instance, Smart, after appealing to physics and logical paradoxes in the A-theory, proceeds to the third prong of the traditional B-theory. He writes, “Let us replace the words ‘is past’ by the words ‘is earlier than this utterance’. (Note the transition to the tenseless ‘is’)” [Smart, 1961]. The traditional B-theories imply that tenses and temporal indexicals in natural language convey temporal information only about B-relations among events (relations of earlier, later, and simultaneity), and/or certain dates or B-positions in time.

The innovative and unique thesis that Nerlich introduces is that this third line of argument does not belong to the philosophy of time, but rather, to the philosophy of language or linguistics. He believes that he is supporting the B-theory, but I will demonstrate that his theory is inconsistent with the B-theory, and that he is, in effect, rejecting the entire A-theory/B-theory tradition. Nerlich denies a premise tacitly accepted by B-theorists as well as A-theorists. B-theorists feel it is incumbent upon them to engage in natural language analysis, since they believe the B-theory of time cannot be established if the A-theorist points out that there are certain aspects of natural language, such as tenses or temporal pronouns (temporal indexicals), that convey temporal information that the tenseless B-sentences do not convey. Nerlich claims that A-theorists often assume that there cannot be propositions that do not ascribe or include A-properties, tense operators or ascriptions of modes of exemplification, “since there is no sentence available by which to identify them” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 123]. Nerlich continues that, if there are no A-sentences that could express these propositions, then there are also no states of affairs that have or include A-properties, or that correspond to true A-propositions that have tense operators. (“States of affairs” denotes what true propositions correspond to, and is used by Nerlich in roughly the same sense that Armstrong or Tooley uses this phrase.) This common belief, held by both A-theorists and B-theorists, about natural language tenses or temporal pronouns motivated a large industry among B-theorists devoted to constructing some types of B-sentences that correspond to these alleged A-states of affairs.

Nerlich’s concern is to reject this methodology, the “third prong” of the traditional argument of the B-theorists. As I will show in the next section, this methodology was not rejected by Mellor, Smart, Oaklander, Le Poidevin, Dyke and other defenders of the so-called “new tenseless theory of time.” Nerlich argues that there is no adequate justification for the belief that natural language places constraints upon our ontology of time, and that whether or not natural language has the resources to provide such a B-sentence is not an issue in the ontology of time, but has a significance confined to linguistics or the philosophy of language. “Whether or not there is some state of affairs in the world can hardly be settled by whether or not we have linguistic devices to pick it out” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124].

Nerlich does not mention any previous B-theorists, but his implications are clear. He believes that B-theorists should have confined themselves to exploring the current physical theories of time (usually assumed to be Einstein’s special theory of relativity) and exposing the logical difficulties with the A-theory. Engaging in an analysis of natural language requires B-theorists to accept a false premise. They shared with A-theorists the premise that, the B-theorist’s case is not adequately justified unless she demonstrates that tensed sentences in natural language refer to B-times and ascribe B-relations, rather than ascribe A-properties or have tenses that function as tense operators.

Nerlich holds that this premise about natural language and time is false. The correct ontology is not embodied in the syntax and semantics of natural language. Rather, it is found in the language of physics or in a logical language that exposes the contradictions of the A-theory. Nerlich, accordingly, sweeps aside the entire B-tradition in the philosophy of time that is based on the assumption that B-theorists must provide a B-theoretic explanation of the syntactics and semantics of natural language. Nerlich’s rejection of the B-theorist tradition is much stronger than A-theorists and B-theorists have yet recognized. He rejects the methodology of B-theorists such as Mellor, Oaklander, Sider, Dyke, and Le Poidevin, as well as the older B-theorists, such as Smart, Grünbaum, Reichenbach, and Russell.

This raises some serious questions. Nerlich is not more physics oriented than Grünbaum or Reichenbach. Surely, one may think, that if Grünbaum and Reinchenbach engaged in natural language analysis they must have had good reason to do so. If they did not, how could they miss such a seemingly plausible point that ontology is not embodied in natural language? What exactly did Nerlich have in mind when he claimed that no natural language analysis whatsoever should belong to the defense of the B-theory? How could Nerlich develop a B-theory if B-theorists such as Reichenbach, Grünbaum, Smart, Mellor and Heather Dyke [2003] believe this can only be done if one engages in some natural language analysis?

These questions raise issues that are more difficult to answer than one might suppose from a brief presentation of them in this section. We need to understand exactly what Nerlich is rejecting, and why other B-theorists, from the early Russell [1907] and Frege [1892], the proponents of the new tenseless theory of time such as Mellor, Oaklander, Le Poidevin and Dyke, tacitly embrace an assumption about natural language while at the same time seeming to claim that the B-theory is based on physics, or, at least, is not based on analyzing natural language sentences. This is best clarified if we show that the recent distinction of Oaklander, Mellor, Le Poidevin, Dyke, and others between the “new tenseless theory of time” and the “old tenseless theory of time” is too superficial a distinction to have a bearing on Nerlich’s critique. Perhaps it is the very radical nature of Nerlich’s position that has enabled it to go unrecognized for the past six years, with Nerlich being tacitly misunderstood as a proponent of the new tenseless theory of time [Oaklander, 2004].

After I explain how Nerlich’s theory differs from the distinction between the old and new tenseless theories of time, I shall evaluate Nerlich’s argument. I will conclude that, although interesting and novel in its own right, it is nevertheless unsound. I will argue Nerlich’s “two-pronged methodology” is unviable. Nerlich rejects the syntactic and semantic analysis of natural language as a necessary step in analyzing propositions and states of affairs. He dismisses as irrelevant all of the syntactic and semantic analyses of natural language tensed sentences in the traditional A-theory/B-theory debate. He believes that these analyses at best sidetrack him from directly evaluating “the main semantic and metaphysical aspect of the theory” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120] he argues against, a version of the A-theory. But his dismissal of the syntactic level of the debate leads him into a fundamental type of error of which he does not seem to be aware, both in his understanding of the A-theory of propositions he argues against, and his construction of a theory of propositions in attempt to refute the A- theory. The basic problem with Nerlich’s theory is that he (or anyone else using a similar method) is unable to identify the parts of propositions expressed by A-sentences and the relations amongst those parts. This leaves Nerlich in an epistemic position in which, using his “direct, linguistically unmediated access to propositions,” he is not able to discern the difference between a proposition about events in time and propositions about atemporal objects (if there are such objects) that exist. This difference in the parts of temporal and atemporal propositions is revealed by examining the verb phrases in natural language A-sentences, where one finds not merely an unmodified verb, such as “equals” in the verb phrase “equals four,” but an adverbially modified verb, the adverbial modification being the past, present, or future tense.

My conclusion is that natural language analysis is a necessary part of a theory of temporal propositions and the states of affairs to which they correspond, even if it is regulated to a secondary part after either physics or arguments for the logical inconsistency of the A-theory (or B-theory). If the syntactic analysis of natural language is ignored, as in Nerlich’s theory, an “epistemic gap” appears. This “epistemic gap is that we do not have direct or immediate epistemic access to the parts, and interrelations among the parts, of the propositions about time or events in time. We do not have a sufficiently fine-grained knowledge of the nature of propositions without the analysis of syntactic structure to get us there. The result is a course-grained theory such as Nerlich's, where he does not discern and thereby omits the temporal element that would have been recognized if he examined the syntactic structure of the natural language sentence that expresses the proposition. Even the semantic content of the artificial languages of physics and logic is explained using a natural language as the metalanguage, making an "immediate construction" of an artificial language to express propositions, without reference to natural language, impossible.

Our epistemic access to the nature of propositions is mediated by the syntactic structure of natural language, or “deep structure” of natural languages, to avoid both the ordinary language philosophy of the 1950s [Hare, Rule, Austin, etc.], which studied the surface structure, and the semantically misleading syntactic structures, such as “It is raining” or “Both Abraham Lincoln and Santa Claus have beards.” The point is that the nonsensory nature of propositions can be grasped as a unit and understood to be true or false, but only through the mediation of natural language. Without these syntactic markers, we have only a very coarse-grained knowledge of propositions. The verbs, tenses and other adverbs, pronouns (including temporal indexicals) are necessary for a fine-grained understanding of the parts of propositions and, what Nerlich calls, the “propositional relation,” the relation amongst the parts that orders them in such a way that results in their being a proposition, as distinct from a mere list of things. To demonstrate, let us take the present tensed sentence, “Jane is reading.” A fine-grained understanding of the “is” as an adverbially modified verb, explicitly apparent with the change of tense to “Jane was reading,” enables us to understand that there is a propositional temporal element introduced into the proposition by this tense. If we fail to notice the syntactic distinctions between the tense and the predicative function of the unmodified or untensed verb phrase “is reading,” we will come to mistakenly believe, as Nerlich does, that the proposition, Jane is reading, where the predication manifest syntactically by the verb “is,” is sufficient to constitute a proposition in the sense of a truth-bearer. I will argue that such a proposition, because it lacks any temporal element, is incapable of being true or false; it is for this reason that Nerlich’s theory of propositions is unviable.

In order to understand the specifics of my arguments against Nerlich’s theory, it is necessary that I present first a background of the traditional A-theory/B-theory debate. This will clearly distinguish both the uniqueness of Nerlich’s theory and its inadequacy.

2. The Relevance of Natural Language in the History of the A-Theory/B-Theory Debate

The dispute between the B-theory (tenseless theory) and the A-theory (tensed theory) concerns, respectively, whether time consists entirely of the serial relations of simultaneous with, earlier than, and later than, or that the notions of past, present, and future are necessary metaphysical features of time in addition to or in place of the serial relations. The serial relations are referred to as B-relations. The notions of past, present, and future are not consistently fleshed out by various A-theorists; some argue that they are properties of events and objects, and are so called A-properties, while others argue that they represent sentential tense operators based on A. N. Prior’s tense logic, or variations of it.

2.1. The B-Theories, The Detensers

The general thesis of the B-theory is that the nature of time and all temporal facts can be described without the use of tensed language, such as tensed verbs and verb phrases, expressions of “past,” “present,” and “future,” etc. The B-theory argues that time is static: despite appearances, time has no “flow” or “passage,” but rather is more like what we would understand as a timeline, such that objects and events are located at times. This notion of time is referred to as the B-series, so named by McTaggart. An object’s or event’s temporal location never changes, and thus, the fact that it is located at a particular time is true at any and all times. Such a fact, it is argued, is therefore tenseless.

There was a single, looming motivation for the origin of the B-theory: Frege was deeply troubled by sentences whose truth-values were indeterminate because they varied over time. One intuition was that truth is objective and unalterable; true sentences, or specifically, what they express, never become false, and vice versa. Another intuition was that what sentences express is complete enough to be true or false. Frege referred to what a sentence expresses as a “thought;” today, we refer to it as a “proposition.” He concluded that in order for a proposition about an object or event whose existence is temporally limited to possess an unchanging truth-value, it must include in its content the relevant time, or date, of the utterance of the sentence expressing that proposition. The sentence or utterance itself “does not suffice for the expression of the thought…If a time-indication is conveyed by the present tense one must know when the sentence was uttered in order to grasp the thought correctly. Therefore, the time of utterance is part of the expression of the thought” [Frege, “Thoughts,” Logical Investigations, p. 10]. The important element is that the thought (proposition) must be complete enough to capture all of the relevant information about a state of affairs in order to be able to pick out that state of affairs alone. This has been referred to as the “cognitive content” [Salmon, 2003, p. 119] or “information value” [Craig, 2000a, p. 29] of a sentence. While we need not be Fregeans about propositions, we can agree to what Frege what at least trying to accomplish. It is necessary that such an analysis treats only of sentence tokens, and not sentence types.

With Frege began the tenseless date-reference theory, which argued that a tensed sentence refers to the date of its tokening, and the tense itself expresses a determined, tenseless temporal B-relation between the date and the event to which it refers.[1] Some notable date-reference B-theorists are Frege, Russell, Quine, Nelson Goodman, Paul Fitzgerald, Clifford Williams, and William Lycan. The purpose of this analysis by early B-theorists was to replace tensed sentences by translating them into tenseless ones that preserve the meaning of the original tensed sentences, and would, therefore, express explicitly the metaphysical reality that true tensed sentences implicitly express. The preservation of meaning requires that both of the sentences, tensed and tenseless, possess identical propositional content. However, this project was argued to be impossible by demonstrating that a competent language-user cannot infer from a tenseless date-sentence whether the event it is about is past, present, or future. Further, it was argued that from a tensed sentence alone, one cannot infer the relevant date that is part of the tenseless proposition; even a present tensed sentence requires the additional information of what date is present.

The tenseless token-reflexive theory made a slight alteration to the date-reference theory: instead of arguing that a tensed sentence refers to the date, it rather expresses a B-relation to the utterance itself. Some notable token-reflexive B-theorists are Reichenbach, J. J. C. Smart (in his earlier work), Michael Dummett, D. C. Williams, and Adolf Grünbaum. Token-reflexivity was expressed with phrases such as, “earlier than this utterance,” “simultaneous with this utterance,” and “later than this utterance.” Early token-reflexive B-theorists claimed the same goal of eliminating tensed language by translating it into tenseless language. However, it was argued that tensed sentences and their supposed tenseless token-reflexive translations also could not have identical semantic content. If the token-reflexive sentence is to translate the meaning of the tensed sentence, then the token to which the tenseless translation refers must be the tensed sentence, since it is argued that the tensed sentence possesses this token-reflexivity implicitly. But since the tenseless translation was meant to replace the tensed sentence, then presumably, there would never have been a tensed sentence in the first place for the “this” in the token-reflexive translation to refer to. It follows that it either refers to an utterance that does not exist, or it refers to itself. Since it cannot be the former, it must be the latter. However, if it refers to itself, then it cannot be a translation of a tensed sentence at all.

It was generally accepted that the original goal of translating and eliminating tensed sentences from the language is impossible.[2] The significance of the ineliminability of tense from language is argued to be that, so long as there are some true tensed sentences, they must be true in virtue of something about the world itself, which cannot be captured by tenseless language. But with the publication of Real Time in 1981, D. H. Mellor began a new movement with a new goal for the B-theory: to demonstrate that the truth conditions of all tensed sentences require only tenseless facts, making tensed facts superfluous; if tensed facts are superfluous, then they ought to be to eliminated from our ontology. Instead of arguing that the tenseless date-sentences and/or tenseless token-reflexive sentences express the meaning of tensed sentences, they argued that the tenseless sentences give all of the facts needed to account for the truth of the tensed sentences. Both the date-reference theory and the token-reflexive were transformed according to the new goals. Some New B-theorists are Smart (in his later work), Murray MacBeath, Richard Gale (in his later work), L. Nathan Oaklander, Robin Le Poidevin, Heather Dyke, and Theodore Sider.

A common objection is that the B-theory does not account for our experience [Oaklander, 2004] that time “flows” and “passes,” nor does it account for the cognitive significance of tense. That tense is cognitively significant was demonstrated by most of the arguments against the old B-theories. For example, knowing that, “The house is (tenseless) on fire later than this utterance,” will not provide one with the needed information for knowing when to act appropriately. The insight gained from the philosophical work in indexicals provided B-theorists with material to respond to these objections. They treated tense in the way that we treat spatial indexicals, expressions of “here,” “there,” etc. The analogy of space and time is still part of the B-theory today, especially for those theorists who incorporate physical theories, such as special and/or general relativity and Minkowski spacetime into their theories. The analysis and treatment of indexicals still plays an important role in many current B-theories by harnessing the analogy of time with space.

2.2. The A-Theories, The Tensers

The general thesis of the A-theory is that there exists a metaphysically privileged time, referred to by “the present,” and it is dynamic, that time “flows” or “passes.” The general thesis has been fleshed out in a variety of ways depending on what one believes the general thesis actually means and the consequences drawn from that meaning. The consequences are not always subtle, and some A-theories provide radically different ontologies, explications of the “flow” of time, and how the theory fits in with our currently most accepted physical scientific theories. Some notable A-theorists are Richard Gale (in his earlier work), Richard Taylor, C. D. Broad, A. N. Prior, William Lane Craig, Michael Tooley, Quentin Smith, George Schlesinger, Dean Zimmerman, and Thomas Crisp.

The origin of the A-theory is largely reactionary against the translation project of the old B-theory. A-theorists’ arguments centered on demonstrating the shortcomings of the tenseless translations, especially that they are not meaning preserving, and that any competent language user who knows only the tenseless sentences about some particular event would never be able to infer whether the event is past, present, or future. It was concluded that the meaning of tense expresses something that cannot be captured by tenseless language. A-theorists share the feeling that, “language furnishes us, as it were, a sort of window on the world whereby we may apprehend the factual objectivity of tense. [A-theorists] argue that the ineliminability or irreducibility of tense in language and its indispensability for human life and action make it plausible that tense is a feature of reality as well as of language” [Craig, 2000a, p. 19]. The philosophical work on indexicals was attractive to A-theorists because they argued it proved that indexical language cannot be replaced by non-indexical language, which seems to suggest something metaphysically special about indexicality. There are two common camps into which A-theorists fall, presentists and A-property theorists.

Presentism is the purest and most radical A-theory, for it argues that the present is the only time that exists. The entire presentist ontology is exhausted by what is contained in the present; to exist is equivalent to being present. Some presentists have founded their syntactics on A. N. Prior’s tense logic, so that all tensed sentences are analyzed into sentences in the scope of some temporal operator(s), namely, “It was the case that,” “It is the case that,” and “It will be the case that.” But those who reject a Quinean treatment of sentential and existential operators argue that tense operators and the sentences within their scope are unable to provide a metaphysics of time. Instead, they restrict their theory to analyses of natural language tensed sentences.

If the presentist accepts there are true sentences about what is past, then he must likely adopt a NeoFregean or Plantingian theory of propositions, whose content does not contain the objects themselves, but contains essences, or concepts, or senses. The presentist should reject Kaplanesque propositions, whose content does contain the objects themselves, since the object of a past tensed sentence doesn’t exist in the presentist ontology. And surely such sentences as, “Hegel used to be alive,” are true for the presentist. The analysis of such sentences and the NeoFregean/Plantingian propositions they express would, arguably, reveal the metaphysical nature of the world they are about.

The radical thesis of presentism is rejected by the A-property theorist, who instead claims that the tenses refer to or express A-properties, pastness, presentness, and futurity. In other words, the semantic content of tense is a property, and thus, is part of the corresponding state of affairs. Objects and events exemplify these properties at different times, but in succession according to the directional “flow” of time. These A-properties, arguably, endow objects and events with a temporal nature, without which they cannot be part of the world. However, A-property theorists do not all agree on the metaphysical status of the future. A-property theorists who do accept the existence of the future are not forced into choosing NeoFregean or Plantingian propositions, but may adopt Kaplanesque propositions, unless there are other reasons to reject them.

One distinctive objection to the A-property theory lies in the enforcement of McTaggart’s Paradox. Briefly, the objection is that pastness, presentness, and futurity are inconsistent properties, for, when an object possesses one, then by definition alone, it cannot possess the other two. It is necessary for the A-property theorist’s explanation of the dynamic nature of time that all objects and events do possess all of these properties. But the objector argues that this cannot be explained without contradiction and/or begging the question. It is not the consensus that McTaggart’s Paradox is valid, but this has not stopped it from being a lively point of debate today.

3. Nerlich “Purges” A-Properties from Propositions and States of Affairs

Nerlich only addresses the A-property theory. He uses the same basic semantic approach that an A-property theorist would use herself, but argues that it ends up committing her “to propositions and states of affairs in which the property of presentness [and consequently, pastness and futurity] plays no part” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120]. He argues that the A-property theory is founded on tenseless “basic structures” that falsify the theory:

A basic structure contains both a proposition and a state of affairs which exclude presentness as a [part]. [The A-property theorist’s] full account of [the semantic analysis of] A-sentences explicitly builds on this structure and fully incorporates it. So every fully explicated correspondence of an A-sentence with a state of affairs incorporates a tenseless sub-proposition and a tenseless sub-state of affairs [Nerlich, 1998, p. 122].

This must mean, argues Nerlich, that the nature of propositions and states of affairs in and of themselves, and so, therefore, the nature of time, is that they are in fact tenseless, and all tense is a mere artificial addition. Tense, he states, “would be demoted to a mere indexical, erased from our list of properties…[P]resentness [for example] properly functions in temporal language indexically, just as it does in spatial language” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120]. In this respect, Nerlich agrees with many traditional B-theorists that the nature of time is significantly analogous to the nature of space.

The basic semantic analysis that Nerlich takes advantage of, one that is presented by the A-property theorist, is as follows. This discussion and Nerlich’s essay focus only on singular propositions as distinct from general propositions that include existential or universal quantifiers and descriptive senses. For a given sentence, “John is running,” the syntactic parts “John” and “running” are both referring terms, the former refers to John and the latter to the property of running [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. In this case, Nerlich is addressing the A-property theorist who adopts Kaplanesque singular propositions, so these referents are parts of the proposition.

[However,] if the function of every syntactic part of a sentence is to refer to something, then the sentence can amount only to a list of items–it fails to identify a proposition, either true or false. So every proper sentence contains a syntactic part which does not refer…In particular the syntactic part which we call the copula [the “is” in the sentence] has two distinct functions. The important one, for us, is that it conveys…that all the items in the sentence which are referred to by its speaker stand in a propositional relation [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120-121].

The function of the copula to express the propositional relation, what ties John and the property of running together in the proposition, is not a reference to it, otherwise we should still have a mere list of referents.[3] Instead, it conveys the propositional relation; more specifically, it predicates the relation amongst the parts. The propositional relation is not a part of the proposition, but a constituent whose function is to “order the parts to one another so that a truth or falsehood results” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121], which is “the most important element in the definition of the propositional relation” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. Since it orders the parts, it cannot itself be a part. The proposition is true or false depending on whether or not it corresponds to a state of affairs; a state of affairs is defined simply as, “whatever corresponds to a true proposition” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. The parts of the proposition, John and the property of running, correspond by being identical with the parts in the state of affairs. In the state of affairs, too, the parts must stand in some relation to each other in order to compose a state of affairs. “Exemplification is the property tie in the state of affairs” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 123], to which the propositional relation corresponds. The correspondence between the propositional relation and the exemplification relation is replacement, that is, exemplification replaces the propositional tie [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121-122]. Nerlich represents these structures as shown below, where “is propositionally related to” refers to the constituent, not part, of the proposition that is the propositional relation ordering its parts.

(P1) John is propositionally related to running

(S1) John exemplifies running

“( ) is propositionally related to ( )…connects John to running in the proposition and is thereby the order among these parts in the proposition, whereas this ordering function is taken over by ( ) exemplifies ( ) in the state of affairs” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 123].

But (P1) and (S1) are unacceptable by the A-property theorist, since neither contains presentness as a part. If presentness is among the parts of the proposition, it must be tied to some other part; in this case, that is John’s running. Thus, the A-property theorist argues that the property of presentness is propositionally related to John’s being propositionally related to running. This structure is represented as:

(P2) [ ] is propositionally related to presentness

Within the empty brackets would be inserted (P1), John’s being propositionally related to running. Since presentness is amongst the parts of (P2), it must also be found in the state of affairs to which (P2) allegedly corresponds. The structure of this state of affairs is given as:

(S2) [ ] exemplifies presentness

And the empty brackets here contain (S1) [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124].

For the A-property theorist, only (P2) shows the semantic structure of a proposition, and only (S2) represents a state of affairs. (P1) and (S1) are Nerlich’s basic structures, since they contain a proposition and a state of affairs that lack presentness [Nerlich, 1998, p. 122]. It is here that Nerlich makes his straightforward and simple criticism: why look any further than the basic structures, (P1) and (S1), for the proposition and state of affairs?

We learn that (P1) and (S1) are not complete propositions and states of affairs, but [what the A-property theorist calls] propositional complexes and events. Obviously, once again, they are not complete [as presentness-containing] entities, but what disqualifies them as a proposition and a state of affairs respectively remains obscure [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124].

The only reason, Nerlich argues, is that according to the A-property theory, presentness is a part of every proposition and state of affairs; thus, of course, the A-property theorist would not accept (P1) and (S1), since they both lack presentness as a part. But Nerlich, as if raising his hand in objection, argues, but “that can hardly be a reason for denying the status [of proposition and state of affairs] for (P1) and (S1)…There is a proposition, (P1), and a state of affairs, (S1), which do not have presentness as a subject” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 123]. In short, Nerlich argues that the A-property theorist begs the question by including presentness as parts of the proposition and state of affairs.

The objection centers around what the relevant difference is between (P1) and (P2) that refuses (P1) the status of proposition. Nerlich argues that (P1)’s lack of presentness is not a justifiable reason, since the addition of presentness, as it stands, is also unjustified.

We need to see what virtue presentness has whereby its inherence in things alone can constitute states of affairs…[I]t is, throughout, by virtue of something’s exemplifying a property that they are constituted…[A] heap of individuals and properties [is] not a proposition…although these items form a proposition by virtue of standing in the propositional relation. There must be a constituent of the proposition (not a part of it) which orders these parts one to another so that they stand in a propositional relation. That presentneess is among the items as a part has no proposition-forming virtue. Nothing is said about another role which presentenss might play in forming propositions or states of affairs [Nerlich, 1998, p. 125-126].

Consequently, (S1) and (S2) have the same problem, but Nerlich points out a further problem. The A-property theorist claims that (S1) is not a state of affairs, but merely an event, which is defined as, “an exemplification of a property by something” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124]. Nerlich objects that if (S1) is an event, then (S2) must also be, for it, too, is clearly the exemplification of some property! “But, now, what is a state of affairs? We are never shown a clear distinction between them and events” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 125]. Again, the only distinguishing factor between them is that (S2) contains presentness, for which, Nerlich argues, no good reason is provided. Nerlich concludes, according to her own semantic analysis, the A-property theorist is committed to and builds her theory on basic structures that lack presentness, but do have the status of being propositions and states of affairs.

4. The Inadequacy of Nerlich’s Propositions

Nerlich’s critique of the A-property theory rests on several confusions and errors derivative of his rejection of the role that syntactic analysis plays. Because of this, he misunderstands some of the distinctions in the metaphysics of the theory that answer directly to his objections. Furthermore, his own theory of propositions is both inconsistent with the B-theory and unviable on its own, for his propositions are incapable of corresponding to states of affairs. Let me emphasize at this point that I am not presenting a defense of the A-property theory, for it does not follow from demonstrating that Nerlich’s critique is seriously flawed that the A-property theory is true. What does follow is that this rejection of syntactic analysis leads to, at best, confused and inadequate metaphysical theories, and at worst, false theories so wrought with inconsistencies and incoherence as to render them unsalvageable.

4.1. The Importance of Language for Metaphysical Analysis

Nerlich is unaware that there is indeed a very good reason, completely abstracted from the A-property theory, as to why (P1) cannot be a proposition, and even a traditional B-theorist would agree. I refer back to my discussion of the origin of the B-theory: a proposition about an object or event whose existence is temporally limited must be what Frege called a complete thought, possessing unchanging truth, and achieved only if the proposition includes amongst its parts the relevant time, or date, of the utterance. In other words, (P1) cannot be a proposition because it contains no temporal element whatsoever. Besides Frege’s reasons, why should this matter? There is a more intuitive and simple reason for the necessary inclusion of some temporal element. A proposition is meant to be that which is true or false, and it is argued that this is possible only if the proposition “says” something about the world or not, that is, only by corresponding to a state of affairs or not. States of affairs are concrete happenings in the world, making them worldly items. Time is a feature of the world that no concrete thing escapes, for it penetrates everything, and therefore, all worldly items and happenings exist in time. For any and every concrete event, the fact that it occurs in time and its precise temporal location are inescapable, inevitable features of its existence. A state of affairs that lacks temporality is nonsense, unless one speaks of necessary truths, such as mathematical or logical truths. Thus, if a proposition is to correspond to a state of affairs, it must include the necessary temporal element that corresponds to the event’s temporal existence. It is the nature of this temporal existence that has been the point of contention between traditional A- and B-theorists. Nerlich’s proposition is beyond tenseless; it is timeless! As far as any traditional B-theorist is concerned, a timeless proposition is incapable of capturing the temporal nature of a state of affairs, which the B-theorist argues to be a B-time or a B-relation.

Nathan Salmon, in his essay “Tense and Intension,” discusses what he calls the “simple theory” of propositions and why it is flawed; it turns out that Nerlich’s theory is the simple theory. Salmon uses the A-token sentence as uttered in 1890, “Frege is writing,”[4] and labels the proposition it expresses as p* and the context in which the sentence is uttered as c*.

According to the simple theory…p* (the semantic content of the whole sentence with respect to c*) is a complex abstract entity made up of the semantic content of ‘Frege’ and the property of writing. Let us call this complex ‘Frege writing’, or ‘fw’ for short. Thus, according to the simple theory, p*=fw. But this cannot be correct. If fw is thought of as having a truth-value, then it is true if and when Frege is writing and false if and when he is not writing. Thus, fw vacillated in truth-value over time, becoming true whenever Frege began writing and false whenever he ceased writing. But p*, being a proposition, has in any possible world (or at least in any possible world in which something is determined by the semantic content of ‘Frege’) a fixed and unchanging truth-value throughout its existence, and never takes on the opposite truth-value…In this sense, propositions are eternal…The eternalness of a proposition is central and fundamental to the very idea of a proposition, and is part and parcel of a philosophically entrenched conception of proposition content [Salmon, 2003, p. 112].

It is clear that Nerlich’s proposition, the basic structure (P1), suffers the same fate as fw. One might suggest that Nerlich rejects this eternal conception of propositions. However, there are two reasons to think that this is not the case: (1) he never argues against it, and (2) he cites the claim, without ever disagreeing, that “the most important element in the definition of the propositional relation” is that it “orders the parts to one another so that a truth or falsehood results” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120-121]. It is the ordering function of the propositional relation that gives the proposition the capability of being true or false. However, as Salmon argues, it is also necessary that the propositional content is complete enough to pick out and correspond to a state of affairs.

Why did Nerlich not pick out this issue? It is because he does not take seriously the finer details of the connection between syntax and semantics, the sentence and the proposition, particularly that the proposition must capture all of the meaning that the sentence expresses. Nerlich seems to ignore one of the strongest motivations behind the traditional debate. And that is the question: When we use tensed language to say things about the world that we all accept as true, what is it we are really saying, and what really is it about the world that makes what we say true? The language is important because the only sense in which it can express truth is that there is a real, metaphysical relationship between the language and the world, however one fleshes out what precisely that relationship is. If there is not, then one would have to accept that language never expresses truth, which would be the antithesis of any philosophical argument.

Consider the issue on a more fundamentally intuitive level: we are concerned with what we believe about the world when we believe in tensed sentences, or have any other propositional attitudes towards what they express. The question then becomes: What is the content of our (tensed) beliefs? But even when we are interested in talking about beliefs and not language specifically, we must still come back to language, since language is the primary and best tool for expressing the content of our beliefs. We are brought back to the importance of syntactic and semantic analysis of the linguistic expressions of our beliefs, first, just to determine whether those linguistic expressions correctly express our beliefs. When we have determined that they do, then, as expressions of what we believe, we believe those sentences to be true. And we must, therefore, analyze what about those sentences would make them true, bringing us full circle back to the syntactic and semantic analysis of language for the purpose of accessing the real world.

One could instead claim that the common language, our ordinary, everyday speech, is incapable of expressing truth, and a new language must be formulated. But such a formulation would still rely on natural language syntax, which is distinct from the common language, but is the foundation of it and all language. Natural language is the most basic structure of noun phrase/verb phrase syntax, as well as the inclusion of adverbial phrases. Nerlich is not, however, arguing that common language doesn’t express truth. On the contrary, it must, since he states that, “if true time is STR time…common language temporal relations…will be reducible to frame-relative temporal relations” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 128]. A reduction of this sort relies on the claim that the common language does express truth, but only implicitly, and the purpose of the reduction is to make that truth explicit. In this way, Nerlich echoes the old B-theorists’ goal of translating tensed sentences into tenseless ones. But he does not take the same methodological approach, since he is not arguing that an analysis of the syntax of tensed sentences actually gives an STR (argreeable) semantics. Rather, he argues, “If the relativity theories are correct in their standard interpretations, then time is an aspect of spacetime and ‘present’ properly functions in temporal language indexically, just as it does in spatial language” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120]. It is clear from this statement that Nerlich is arguing that the correct semantics is conditional on the antecedent premise of STR; the truth of STR, in the interpretation he accepts, would simply provide the correct semantics into which the common language is to be reformulated and reduced. But the reformulated language must still rely on natural language syntax, for sentences expressing STR relations certainly have the same syntactic structure that our common language has, namely, a basic noun phrase, verb phrase, or subject and predicate structure. If he argues that the reformulated STR language expresses the true nature of time, then this basic syntax must have the capability to express truth. Therefore, there must be a real connection between language in general, because of its basic syntactic structure, and the world; the analysis of language is our access to what is true about the world. A rejection of natural language syntactic analysis is premature and misguided.

4.2. Nerlich’s Propositions are Inconsistent with the B-Theory

Nerlich’s dismissal of natural language analysis demonstrates a deeper misunderstanding of the traditional B-theory. He mischaracterizes that, “B-theorists aim to show that tense is a superficial aspect of discourse” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. If tense is a superficial aspect of discourse, then it contributes no semantic content to the proposition. This is, in fact, what Nerlich argues as his own theory of basic structures, since his propositions do not inherit anything from syntactic tense. But he mistakenly assumes that this is the thesis of the B-theory. As can be seen from a survey of the history of the B-theory, all traditional B-theorists argued that tense does and must contribute to the semantic content of the proposition, but the component introduced is either a tenseless reference to a date or a B-relation, rather than an A-property or tensed sentential operator.

Because Nerlich assumes that syntactic tense contributes nothing to the content of propositions, he further assumes that a study of and arguments about the syntactic structure of language cannot provide a reason for introducing a certain item, such a temporal element like the property of presentness, into the proposition. But he has neither argued this claim nor provided justification for it; in short, he simply begs the question. “I dodge the critical arguments [presented by the A-property theorist against the various B-theories’ arguments that syntactic tense expresses either tenseless date-references or token-reflexive B-relations] but tackle the main semantic and metaphysical aspect of the [A-property] theory” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120]. This “dodge” effectively ignores all of the B-theorists’ arguments for the real semantic content of tense. It is because he does not undertake an analysis of the syntax and semantics of natural language that Nerlich does not recognize that tense is not a superficial aspect of discourse, but instead expresses real temporal information. It is the nature of that temporal information that is the focus of the debate between A- and B-theorists, not whether there is temporal information. The origin of the B-theory itself sprung from the recognition that propositions must contain a temporal element that accounts for the expressive tense of many sentences and fixes their truth-value. Nerlich believes that natural language analysis of syntactic and semantic features is not relevant in deciding whether the A-theory or B-theory is true. This is clearly expressed in his statement that the metaphysics of time and how we should understand tensed language is conditional on the truth of STR. Nerlich has rejected the entire tradition of the debate.

4.3. The Need to Account for Tense

All of the arguments above focus on Nerlich’s claim that there is no reason at all to reject (P1) <(John) is propositionally related to (running)> as a proposition. He is also mistaken that there is no argument for the addition of presentness to (P1) to obtain (P2) <[(John) is propositionally related to (running)] is propositionally related to (presentness)>. Nerlich effectively ignores the original sentence, “John is running,” once (P1) comes into play, but there is a distinctive feature of that sentence that (P1) fails to account for: it is present tensed. If the proposition is what the sentence expresses, then it must give the meaning that all of the relevant syntactic structure of the sentence expresses for competent language-users. The copula, the present tensed “is” of predication, certainly seems to, by virtue of being present tensed, express some temporal information about when the event takes place, whether this is a B-time or an A-time. Nerlich is aware that the A-property theorist argues that the present tensed copula of the sentence has the double duty to convey the propositional relation and, by being present tensed, to refer to presentness. “[T]he copula has two distinct functions…it conveys something…that all the items in the sentence which are referred to by its speaker stand in a propositional relation. But it also refers to presentness” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. But this is the first and last mention that Nerlich makes of this crucial distinction between the two functions; all further mention of the copula refers only to its predicative function, which on this particular theory of sentences and propositions, is to convey the propositional relation. It is of curiosity why Nerlich makes no attempt to argue against the claim that the present tensed copula refers to presentness, since it explains that (P1) does not exhaust the functions of the copula, and it is for this reason that (P2) is introduced. (P1) only demonstrates the predicative function of the copula, conveying the propositional relation, and (P2) provides the referring function, to refer to presentness. Nerlich is simply mistaken when he says there is no reason for (P2).

One might argue that Nerlich is challenging the claim that the copula refers to presentness, but I would ask one to point to the place in the text where he explicitly makes such a challenge. It is nowhere to be found. At best, one could charitably support Nerlich’s arguments by claiming that they imply such a challenge. But this is of no avail, because a mere challenge would present a weaker position than what Nerlich actually presents. He asserts that tense is a superficial aspect of discourse that contributes nothing to the semantic content expressed by tensed sentences. Consequently, he is asserting that the copula has a purely predicative function and does not express any A-semantics or B-semantics that refer to or convey the temporal nature of states of affairs. Nerlich still faces the obstacle of explaining what the syntactic present tense of the sentence expresses or means if it is not contributing to the content of the proposition. His theory leaves us clueless as to what the semantic content of the proposition is that captures what the syntactic present tense expresses.

Lastly, Nerlich argues for an incoherence regarding the status of (S2) <[(John) exemplifies (running)] exemplifies (presentness)> as distinct from (S1) <(John) exemplifies (running)>. The A-property theorist claims that (S1) is merely an event, defined as “an exemplification of a property by something” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124], whereas (S2) is a state of affairs. Nerlich objects that if (S1) is an event, so must be (S2), since it is an exemplification of presentness.

Now (S2), one might think, is the state of affairs to which the token A-sentence [“John is running”] corresponds. But if we follow [the A-property theorist’s] early directives (‘an event is an exemplification of a property by something’), this is not a state of affairs but an event…But, now, what is a state of affairs? We are never shown a clear distinction between them and events [Nerlich, 1998, p. 124-125].

Nerlich argues that, yet again, the only difference between (S1) and (S2) is that (S2) contains presentness as a part while (S1) does not. Nerlich’s mistake is that he assumes that events and states of affairs are mutually exclusive, but clearly this is not the case. All state of affairs are events, but they are a distinctive kind of event because, as defined, they are “whatever corresponds to a true proposition” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 121]. On the other hand, not all events are states of affairs, but they are all constituents and/or parts of states of affairs. Since I have argued that (P1) is not a proposition, it follows that (S1) is not corresponded to by a proposition, and for this reason alone cannot be a state of affairs. Conversely, since it is argued that (P2) is a proposition, then it corresponds to a state of affairs, which is argued to be (S2).

Nerlich believes that the A-property theorist argues that what makes (P2) a proposition as distinct from (P1) is that the former contains presentness. As he states, “That presentness is among the items as a part has no proposition-forming virtue. Nothing is said about another role which presentness might play in forming propositions or states of affairs” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 126]. In the face of the whole of the A-property theory, the latter statement is simply false. All of the arguments any A-property theorist makes directly against the semantic analysis of any of the B-theories are arguments that she makes in order to establish the metaphysical reality of tense, A-properties. Her purpose is specifically to argue that the reason the B-theories are false is because A-properties are inevitably real parts or features of both propositions and their corresponding states of affairs. How can Nerlich make this mistake? Because he “dodge[d] the critical arguments [presented by the A-property theorist against the various B-theories’ arguments that syntactic tense expresses either tenseless date-references or token-reflexive B-relations, in order to] tackle the main semantic and metaphysical aspect of the [A-property] theory” [Nerlich, 1998, p. 120]. It is not that the A-property theorist claims that presentness is what makes (P2) a proposition and (S2) a state of affairs, but that she, like all traditional A- and B-theorists together, recognizes that propositions and states of affairs must contain a temporal element. She argues that that temporal element is presentness. What makes something a proposition or not is whether it has the capability to be true or false. As I have argued, both historically and intuitively, propositions are meant to pick out and correspond to worldly happenings, events in time, and so must include a temporal element that corresponds to the inescapable temporal nature of the event itself.

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[1] I leave this admittedly vague for the sake of only introducing the general thesis of the theory. But there are distinctions to be made between direct and indirect reference to the date, as well as between the substantival and reductionist theories of time. A substantival theory of time claims that time is metaphysically independent of the events in time, and that time contains those events. A reductionist theory claims that time is not independent of the events in time, but rather that a time is just a set of simultaneous events. A time would not contain those events, but is defined as that set of events.

[2] I do not wish to imply that no one today believes that it is possible.

[3] Kaplan originally used the formal relation of set-theoretical order as a substitute for the required theory of a propositional relation. Kaplan said that, a singular proposition such as what would be expressed by, “John is running,” is represented by the ordered pair <John, the property of running>. Joseph Almog, one of the developers of Kaplan’s philosophy of language, recognized the incompleteness of the set-theoretical notation as a substitute for a propositional relation. “I have followed the representation of structured propositions initiated by Kaplan…I have used the n-tuple notation for propositions. I don’t actually think propositions are sequences, in the set theoretic sense. But lacking a full understanding of the matter at present, I used the n-tuple notation as a temporary measure” [Almog, 1986, pp. 233, n. 18].

[4] Salmon actually uses the sentence, “I am writing,” as uttered by Frege. However, I do not wish to distract the current discussion by introducing the indexical “I”. For simplicity’s sake and because of the relevance to the theme of my arguments, I have replaced the indexical “I” with the proper name of the person to whom the indexical refers in this case, namely, Frege. To be certain, the indexical and non-indexical sentences are not equivalent, but it does not alter the relevance and significance of the specific section of Salmon’s essay to which I refer.