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PRODID:-//Grails iCalendar plugin//NONSGML Grails iCalendar plugin//EN
VERSION:2.0
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTAMP:20260608T224301Z
DTSTART;TZID=Australia/Melbourne:20120405T171500
DTEND;TZID=Australia/Melbourne:20120405T191500
SUMMARY:"Time travel stories are logically inconsistent"
UID:20260609T101300Z-iCalPlugin-Grails@philevents-web-bd7db559-gt5qm
TZID:Australia/Melbourne
LOCATION:Old Geology\, University of Melbourne\, Melbourne\, Australia
DESCRIPTION:<p>Abstract:<br>David Lewis was a passionate believer in a "fourdimensional" metaphysics\,&nbsp\;in which time is a fourth dimension that is more like the three spatial dimensions&nbsp\;than used to be believed. In particular\, things distant from us in space exist\, and&nbsp\;for Lewis things distant from us in time exist in the very same sense. The emergence&nbsp\;of this new metaphysics approximately coincides with the emergence of time travel&nbsp\;fictions (which\, astonishingly\, were never told in ancient times or other cultures).&nbsp\;As part of his defence of &nbsp\;fourdimensionalism\, Lewis also defended the internal&nbsp\;consistency of at least some time travel stories. I will argue that\, even granting&nbsp\;Lewis's assumptions about time\, personal identity\, fiction\, and so on\, time travel&nbsp\;stories still turn out to harbour hidden self-contradictions. I will hunt these&nbsp\;contradictions among the "what ifs" (the counterfactuals) that are implicity true in&nbsp\;any paradigm time travel story.</p>
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