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Out of Plato’s Cave


The title is lifted from an essay by J. T. Fraser in his book Time and Time Again (2007). It conveys Fraser’s conviction, a conviction shared here, that understanding time and reality requires us to redirect our thinking process. Plato describes a path out of the dark cave of confusion into the realm of truth and light, that is, from time towards the timeless. But we should “reverse course” along this path and move from the timeless into the complexity of time. Time is not one thing foundational to reality; reality rather is a series of temporal levels developed through evolution and related in a nested hierarchy driven by conflict and towards increasing complexity. This theory makes possible critical and fruitful reflection on issues like entropy, indeterminacy, and mind/body dualism. It entails embracing our position as knowers in time and the complexity of truth as temporal rather than timeless.