Aug 24, 2010
You can’t change the future.… But, so what?
In his 1964 book Problems of Space and Time, Australian philosopher J.J.C. Smart wrote,
It makes no more sense to talk of changing the future than it does to talk of changing the past. Suppose that I decide to change the future, by having coffee for breakfast tomorrow instead of my usual tea. Have I changed the future? No. For coffee for breakfast was the future.
It has been objected to me that the above argument is perhaps misleading. For, it has been said, there is quite clearly a sense in which I can change the future and not the past, and this is because my acts of will determine the future and not the past — I cannot undo what has been done.
Now I do not wish to deny that we can causally affect the future and not the past, and indeed this causal directionality of time is part of the problem of the ‘direction of time.’ Nevertheleless I would reiterate that the fact that our present actions determine that future would be most misleadingly expressed or described by saying that we can change the future.
A man can change his trousers, his club, or his job. Perhaps he may even change the course of world history or the state of scientific thought. But one thing that he cannot change is the future, since whatever he brings about is the future, and nothing else is, or ever was.
(via)
That was fun to read and it seems true. But as far as I can tell it has no bearing whatsoever on living real life.
Oh well, back to my futile existence.
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Interesting. This is an area I’ve greatly struggled with understanding–the part we play in future events, vs. God’s plan. So, if I “chose” to change from tea to coffee, I didn’t change God’s original plan, but fell in line with it? The coffee was the plan? Or am I digging too deep here?
I understand the point that the author is making but I think he is ignoring the fact that when we think of “changing the future” it is not in a literal sense as he is describing it but in a hypothetical sense. Our concept of “changing the future” is first rooted in what a situation would be like if we carried about in our usual way, then when we do something that is not considered ordinary by us, we look at what is different from our perceived idea of what the future would be like.
I’m not sure what my point is. I guess it’s that I agree with him, but still acknowledge that “changing the future” is a valid phrase to use.
Maybe a better phrase would be, “I’m changing my expectation of the future.”
But it makes discussions of God’s sovereignty much more interesting (or frustrating if you understand this physical concept and others don’t).
Bruce Ware has some Youtube videos on this concept that are pretty good..
I tend to think that we can’t choose anything that we wouldn’t choose and if we do choose something that we wouldn’t choose to spite our chooser, we still choose it..
So what seems like freedom of Will is actually a prison. We can’t do anything we wouldn’t choose..
This is exactly like “the world getting better, ” or whatever phrase you hear about that. According to scripture, the world is on a crash course for destruction. All I can do is pray God keeps my little sphere of reality seemingly calm. I do agree with the author. It is just like how we misuse words, just because everyone else does it. More evidence of our shallow existence, verses a deeper understanding of life like this author proposes.
What percentage of what your read does have any bearing whatsoever on living real life?