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Temporal Consciousness
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Temporal Consciousness
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Temporal Consciousness
First published Fri Aug 6, 2010

In ordinary conscious experience, consciousness of time seems to be

ubiquitous. For example, we seem to be directly aware of change,
movement, and succession across brief temporal intervals. How is this
possible? Many different models of temporal consciousness have been
proposed. Some philosophers have argued that consciousness is confined
to a momentary interval and that we are not in fact directly aware of
change. Others have argued that although consciousness itself is
momentary, we are nevertheless conscious of change. Still others have
argued that consciousness is itself extended in time. In this entry, the
motivations and merits of these and other positions will be expounded and
assessed.

1. Three Models of Temporal Consciousness

1.1 Time and Consciousness
1.2 Terminology, Problems and Principles
2. A Brief History
2.1 Augustine
2.2 Locke, Berkeley and Hume
2.3 Thomas Reid: common sense champion of PT-antirealism
2.4 Kant and Brentano: the emergence of Retentional models
2.5 Meinong and Stern: the emergence of the Extensional
alternative
2.6 James and the Specious Present
2.7 Bergson, Husserl, Russell and Broad
3. Further Issues and Distinctions: Simultaneity, Immediacy and
Continuity
4. Cinematic Models
4.1 Cinematic Realism

1
 Temporal Consciousness

4.2 Cinematic Antirealism

4.3 Reid on the Proper Provinces of Sense and Memory
4.4 Further Diagnoses: Crick and Koch, Le Poidevin
4.5 A More Radical Anti-Realism: Dennett
5. Extensional Models
5.1 The Extensional Specious Present
5.2 The Discrete Block Model
5.3 Broad's Partial Extensionalism
5.4 The Overlap Model
5.5 Problems and Prospects
6. Retentional Models
6.1 Retentional Models: Motivations
6.2 The Retentional Specious Present: challenges and variations
6.3 The Retentional Stream of Consciousness
6.4 Assessments
7. Metaphysics of Temporal Consciousness
7.1 Time of Consciousness vs Consciousness of Time
7.2 Temporal Consciousness and the Metaphysics of Time
7.3 Memory, Experience and Determinacy
Bibliography
Other Internet Resources
Related Entries

1. Three Models of Temporal Consciousness

1.1 Time and Consciousness

Time and consciousness are interwoven on several levels. From the

vantage point of ordinary life and common sense, consciousness plainly
seems to exists in time. When we hear the clock strike twelve, our
auditory experience of it so doing also occurs at twelve (or at most a few
moments later). Watching a 120 minute action movie results in a two hour

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 Barry Dainton

moments later). Watching a 120 minute action movie results in a two hour
stream of auditory and visual experiences (along with accompanying
thoughts and feelings), and this stream runs concurrently with the playing
of the movie. Quite generally, our conscious states, irrespective of their
kind or character, seem to occur in the same temporal framework as the
events in the wider world – even if their precise timing is not easy to
ascertain. But this is by no means the whole story. Our consciousness
may be located within time, but there are also ways in which time or
temporality might be regarded as manifest within consciousness. Our
episodic (or autobiographical) memories supply us with access to our own
pasts; thanks to such memories our earlier states of consciousness are not
altogether lost to us: they can be recreated (or relived), albeit imperfectly,
in our present consciousness. And of course there are past-oriented
emotions, such as remorse or regret or shame: through these the past can
influence our present feelings, often in powerful ways. While there is no
future-directed counterpart of memory, we can anticipate future
happenings (more or less accurately, more or less eagerly), and
experience future-directed emotions: fear, dread, hope – and these too can
exert a powerful influence of our present states of consciousness.

The story is still by no means complete, for temporality is manifest in

consciousness in a further and more intimate way. In our ordinary
experience, over brief intervals, we seem to be directly aware of
temporally extended phenomena such as change, persistence and
succession. When we see a friend waving goodbye, do we infer that their
arm is moving, on the basis of having observed a motionless arm
occupying a sequence of adjacent spatial location? We do make such
inferences of this kind: if I see that my neighbour's dustbin is in the
middle of the road rather than its usual position on the pavement, I
(rightly) infer that it has been moved. But the case in question is not at all
like this: what we see is simply an arm in motion. (Is it for nothing that
cinema is often called ‘the moving image’?) The same applies in other
sensory modalities. When listening to a melody, we hear each note giving

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 Temporal Consciousness

sensory modalities. When listening to a melody, we hear each note giving

way to its successor; when we hear a sustained violin tone, we hear the
tone continuing on, from moment to moment. If temporally extended
occurrences such as these can feature in our immediate experience, it is
natural to conclude that our awareness must be capable of embracing a
temporal interval.

While this may seem obvious, it can also seem problematic. We can
remember the past and anticipate the future, but we are only directly
aware of what is present – or so it is natural to say and suppose. But the
present, strictly speaking, is momentary. So if our awareness is confined
to the present, our awareness must itself lack temporal depth. Hence we
are led swiftly to the conclusion that our direct awareness cannot possibly
encompass phenomena possessing temporal extension. We are thus
confronted with a conundrum: it seems our awareness must extend over
time, but it seems it can't.

In grappling with this ‘paradox of temporal awareness’ as it is sometimes

called, different philosophers have proposed quite different accounts (or
models) of the structure of temporal consciousness. Simplifying
somewhat, the most commonly favoured options fall into three main
categories:

Cinematic Model: our immediate awareness lacks any (or any

significant) temporal extension, and the same applies to the
contents of which we are directly aware – they are akin to static,
motion-free ‘snapshots’ or ‘stills’. Our streams of consciousness
are composed of continuous successions of these momentary
states of consciousness. In this respect they are analogous to
movies, which (as displayed) consist of rapid sequences of still
images.

Retentional Model: our experiencing of change and succession

occurs within episodes of consciousness which themselves lack

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 Barry Dainton

occurs within episodes of consciousness which themselves lack

temporal extension, but whose contents present (or represent)
temporally extended intervals and phenomena. These episodes
thus have a complex structure, comprising momentary phases of
immediate experience, along with representations (or retentions)
of the recent past. Our streams of consciousness are composed of
successions of these momentary states.

Extensional Model: our episodes of experiencing are themselves

temporally extended, and are thus able to incorporate change and
persistence in a quite straightforward way. Our streams of
consciousness are composed of successions of these extended
‘chunks’ of experience.

These labels are not standard – in this field there is little by way of
terminological uniformity – but they are as apt as any. All three models
are depicted in Figure 1 below. In each of the diagrams the horizontal line
represents ordinary clock-time. Although the Retentional and Cinematic
models both trade in momentary (or very brief) states of consciousness –
in the diagrams such states are represented by thin vertical lines – these
states are construed very differently. In the Cinematic case the
momentary contents seem momentary, and are static (they contain no
discernible motion or change); in the Retentional case the contents appear
to possess a brief temporal depth, containing as they do experienced
change and succession – hence the backward pointing arrows, intended to
signify the way in which the recent past is supposedly ‘retained’ in
present consciousness.

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 Temporal Consciousness

Figure 1. The Three Main Conceptions of Temporal

Consciousness.

In his influential writings on these matters William James argued that to

make sense of our temporal experience we need to distinguish the strict
(or mathematical) present from the from the experiential (or specious)
present: whereas the first is indeed durationless, the second possesses a
brief duration, sufficient to accommodate the change and persistence we
find in our immediate experience. The Retentional and Extensional
approaches can each be seen as implementing James' proposal, albeit in
very different ways.

Ascertaining where the truth lies among the differing accounts of the
temporal contents of our immediate experience is interesting and
intriguing in itself. Although most forms of experience seemingly feature
succession and persistence – even the most primitive forms if James was
correct in characterizing infant consciousness as a ‘blooming, buzzing
confusion’ – it is not easy to understand how any form of experience can
have such features. The interest and importance of the debate does not

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have such features. The interest and importance of the debate does not
end here, for each of the accounts of temporal awareness on offer has
significant, and very different, implications for our understanding of the
general structure of consciousness. In this entry we will be exploring the
principle features and motivations of the competing accounts, as well as
their strengths and weaknesses.

1.2 Terminology, Problems and Principles

Although proponents of all three approaches are attempting to make sense

of our experience of temporally extended phenomena, there are
divergences on the issue of how precisely this experience should be
construed, and on several related matters.

One significant divide is between those who believe that temporally

extended phenomena really do figure in our immediate experience, and
those who deny this. To coin some terminology:

Phenomeno-temporal Realism (PT-realism, sometimes further

abbreviated to realism): change, succession and persistence can be
directly perceived or apprehended.

Phenomeno-temporal Antirealism (PT-antirealism, sometimes

further abbreviated to antirealism): change, succession and
persistence cannot be directly perceived or apprehended.

The Extensional and Retentional models are the two principle forms of
PT-realism. Proponents of the Cinematic model can subscribe to realism,
but most do not. The task facing PT-antirealists is in one respect the
easier of the two: unlike their realist counterparts, they are under no
obligation to provide an intelligible account of how it is possible for our
consciousness to embrace temporally extended phenomena. But in
another respect their task is the more difficult. Antirealists are under an
obligation to ‘save the (temporal) phenomena’: they need to supply a

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 Temporal Consciousness

obligation to ‘save the (temporal) phenomena’: they need to supply a

credible explanation as to why it seems so natural to say we perceive
movement and change when, in actual fact, we do no such thing.

For realists it is important to distinguish the experience of succession

from a mere succession of experiencings. An experience of succession
involves a temporal spread of contents being presented together in
consciousness, albeit in the form of a perceived succession rather than
simultaneously. Hence both Extensional and Retentional theorists agree
that a temporal spread of contents can be apprehended as a unity. To
introduce some further terminology:

The Diachronic Unity Thesis: simultaneous contents can be

experienced together, but so too can contents that appear to be
successive (at least over short intervals).

Contents which are apprehended as unified in this way belong to a single

specious present. Note the ‘appear to be successive’. This is needed to
accommodate Retentional specious presents: although on a
phenomenological level these seem to possess temporal extension, in
reality they are housed in episodes of experiencing which are momentary,
objectively speaking. Extensional theorists, by contrast, regard specious
presents as extending a short distance through ordinary clock-time, in just
the way they seem to.

2. A Brief History
2.1 Augustine

The confinement of immediate experience to a momentary present has a

long and distinguished pedigree. In the preamble to his Lectures on the
Consciousness of Internal Time Husserl tells us ‘The analysis of time-
consciousness is an ancient burden for descriptive psychology and
epistemology. The first thinker who sensed profoundly the enormous

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epistemology. The first thinker who sensed profoundly the enormous

difficulties inherent in this analysis, and who struggled with them almost
to despair, was Augustine’ (1991: 3). Irrespective of whether he was the
first to dwell on such matters, Augustine's labours in Book XI of the
Confessions led him to espouse a position that is at least highly
suggestive of the Cinematic conception outlined in §1. Augustine
subscribed to the doctrine of Presentism (as it has latterly become
known), i.e., he held that only what is present is real:

What now is clear and plain is, that neither things to come or past
are. Nor is it properly said, “there be three times, past present and
to come:” yet perchance it might be properly said, “there be three
times: a present of things past, a present of things present, and a
present of things future.” For these three do exist in some sort, in
the soul, but otherwhere do I not see them; present of things past,
memory; present of things present, sight; present of things future,
expectation. (Gale 1968: 44)

Since for Augustine it was also clear that the present must be entirely
without duration, and that our perception is restricted to what is present –
‘that only can be seen, which is’ (Gale 1968: 43) – we are led swiftly to
the conclusion that we can perceive or experience only what is contained
in a momentary present.

Augustine went further. If our consciousness is confined to the

momentary present, how is it possible for us to know as much as we do
about the duration of events or processes we live through? Augustine's
solution to this problem turns on the way memory and expectation can
interact. For illustrative purposes he envisages himself on the verge of
reciting a familiar Psalm. Before starting to speak all the verses are laid
out before him in the form of expectations concerning what he is about to
say; when part-way through his performance, the reciting of some verses
is transferred from expectation to memory; as he continues to speak this

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is transferred from expectation to memory; as he continues to speak this

transfer continues until the whole of the Psalm passes into memory: ‘thus
the life of this action of mine is divided between my memory as to what I
have repeated, and expectation as to what I am about to repeat.’ (Gale
1968: 52). Analogous considerations apply over shorter timescales (the
experiencing of individual sounds and syllables) and over longer periods
(a person's entire life).

As we shall see, this reliance on a combination of momentary perceptual

experience, memory and expectation in explaining our experience of
temporality is typical of PT-antirealists.

2.2 Locke, Berkeley and Hume

Since we evidently possess concepts of persistence, succession and

suchlike, one would expect philosophers who believe that our basic
concepts derive their content from the content of our immediate
experience – philosophers such as Locke, Berkeley and Hume – would
incline in the direction of realism. And generally speaking, albeit with
certain complications, this is what we find. In the Enquiry (1690) Locke
writes:

It is evident to anyone who will but observe what passes in his

own mind, that there is a train of ideas which constantly succeed
one another in his understanding, as long as he is awake.
Reflection on these appearances of several ideas one after another
in our minds, is that which furnishes us with the idea of
succession: and the distance between any parts of that succession,
or between the appearance of any two ideas in our minds, is what
we call duration. (Chapter XIV, 3)

As it stands, the import of this passage is not entirely clear, for it is not
entirely clear what Locke mean when he talks of our ‘reflecting’ on
successions of ideas (i.e., experiences). If reflection simply means

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successions of ideas (i.e., experiences). If reflection simply means

introspection – i.e., the directing of our attention, the focusing of our
introspective awareness – then for Locke succession is something of
which we are directly aware. If ‘reflecting’ means ‘think about’ in the
sense of reason about, there is no such implication. Other passages from
the Enquiry tend to confirm the introspective construal. When explicitly
defining ‘reflection’ Locke links it closely to attentive awareness: ‘By
REFLECTION … I would be understood to mean, that notice which the
Mind takes of its own Operations, and the manner of them, by reason
whereof, there come to be Ideas of these Operations in the
Understanding.’ (II, 1, 4) The introspective interpretation gains further
support in this passage:

31 …. I think it is plain, that from those two fountains of all

knowledge before mentioned, viz. reflection and sensation, we got
the ideas of duration, and the measures of it. For, first by
observing what passes in our minds, how our ideas there in train
constantly some vanish and others begin to appear, we come by
the idea of succession. Secondly, by observing a distance in the
parts of this succession, we get the idea of duration.

Given that Locke's defines consciousness itself as ‘the perception of what

passes in a Man's own mind’ (II, 1, 19), if we can observe (and hence
perceive) succession in our own minds, we are surely conscious of it too.

The case for taking Locke to subscribe to realism looks strong.[1]

Remarks along very similar lines can also be found in Berkeley: in
section 98 of The Principles of Human Knowledge (1710) he tells us that
‘Time therefore [is] nothing, abstracted from the succession of ideas in
our minds’. Hume's position on the origin of our concept of succession is
likewise broadly similar to that of Locke. In Book 1, Part II(§3) of his
Treatise (1739) he writes:

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 Temporal Consciousness

… time cannot make its appearance to the mind, either alone, or

attended with a steady unchangeable object, but is always
discovered by some perceivable succession of changeable objects.
(Treatise: 35)

… Five notes played on a flute give us the impression and idea of

time; though time be not a sixth impression, which presents itself
to the hearing or any other of the senses. (ibid., 36)

… the indivisible moments of time must be filled with some real

object or existence, whose succession forms the duration, and
makes it conceivable by the mind. (ibid., 39)

Although Hume agrees with Locke over the origin of our concept of
succession, what he says about duration sits uneasily with Locke's
contention that we arrive at the latter concept by observing the distances
between impressions. For Hume,

… the idea of duration is always derived from a succession of

changeable objects, and can never be conveyed to the mind by any
thing steadfast and unchangeable…. since the idea of duration
cannot be derived from such an object, it can never in any
propriety or exactness by applied to it, not can any thing
unchangeable be ever said to have duration. (ibid., 37)

Since a period of (total) silence between the hearing of two sounds would
not itself contain any change or succession – at least of an auditory kind –
the concept of duration cannot be derived from this period of silence, or
so Hume maintains. For an ingenious attempt to derive a consistent
doctrine from Hume's various (sometimes puzzling) remarks on time and
temporal concepts in the Treatise see Baxter (2007); for further useful
discussion see Bardon (2007).

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 Barry Dainton

2.3 Thomas Reid: common sense champion of PT-antirealism

Thomas Reid also takes issue with some of Locke's claims in his Essays
on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1785). For Locke succession is a more
basic concept than duration – since we arrive at the concept of duration
by reflecting on the distances between parts of successions – but Reid
argues the reverse is the case. For a succession to exist at all, its parts –
either particular impressions or the intervals between them – must
themselves already have duration: for if these parts were all entirely
lacking in duration, we would be dealing with a purely momentary
phenomenon, and hence something which could not contain any kind of
succession. Hence succession presupposes duration, and not vice-versa.

Reid's second complaint concerns the role Locke assigns to reflection,

construed as the awareness we have of the contents and operations of our
own minds. Reid doesn't dismiss this use of the term as illegitimate, but
he does suggest it is a good deal narrower than the ordinary (and thus
more proper) use, which allows reflection to encompass reasoning,
judging, and remembering what is past. The latter is of particular
relevance, for Reid goes on to argue without memory to inform us of
what we have already experienced, we could never arrive at a concept of
succession. Consequently, since ‘reflection’ construed in Locke's narrow,
quasi-technical way doesn't involve memory, Locke was mistaken in
thinking that reflection – of this sort at least – could ever furnish us with
our concept of succession.

In arguing thus Reid is evidently assuming that our direct awareness is

incapable of spanning even a brief temporal interval: if it could, we could
directly apprehend successions, without relying on memory. His argument
for this assumption is succinct, and on the face of it, quite plausible:

It may here be observed that, if we speak strictly and

philosophically, no kind of succession can be an object either of
the senses or of consciousness; because the operations of both are

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 Temporal Consciousness

the senses or of consciousness; because the operations of both are

confined to the present point of time, and there can be no
succession in a point of time; and on that account the motion of a
body, which is a successive change of place, could not be
observed by the senses alone without the aid of memory.
(Intellectual Powers, Essay III, chapter V)

Since the claim that we are immediately aware only of what is present can
seem common sense of the plainest sort, it is not surprising to find Reid
endorsing it, and hence rejecting realism in favour of the antirealist
alternative. Reid recognizes that it seems equally common sensical to say
that we see bodies move – after all, we often talk in such terms: e.g., ‘I
saw her waving her arm’. In response he argues that such talk is perfectly
legitimate, provided it is construed in loose or popular sense, and not
taken strictly and literally.

2.4 Kant and Brentano: the emergence of Retentional models

So far as the perception of change is concerned, matters are by no means

as clear-cut as Reid suggests. Endorsing the plausible-seeming
Augustinian doctrine that consciousness is confined to the present point of
time does not oblige one to reject the (equally plausible) claim that
change and succession feature prominently in immediate experience.
These claims are quite compatible with one another provided the
experience of change occurs within the confines of the momentary
present. Indeed, in the eyes of some – but not all – this confinement is a
necessary precondition for contents to be experienced together. For
according to one influential line of thinking regarding phenomenal unity,
in order for contents to be experienced as unified, they must be presented
simultaneously to a single momentary awareness.

The obvious way of developing an account along these lines is to hold

that momentary episodes of sensory consciousness are accompanied by a

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that momentary episodes of sensory consciousness are accompanied by a

simultaneously existing array of representations (or retentions) of
immediately preceding conscious states, and our awareness – at a single
moment of time – of this combination of ingredients provides us with
(what we take to be) a direct awareness of change and succession. Kant
propounds something alone these lines in ‘The Synthesis of Reproduction
in Imagination’ from the first Critique (1790):

… experience as such necessarily presupposes the reproducibility

of appearances. When I seek to draw a line in thought, or to think
of the time from one noon to another, or even to represent to
myself some particular number, obviously the various manifold
representations that are involved must be apprehended by me in
thought one after the other. But if I were always to drop out of
thought the preceding representations (the first parts of the line,
the antecedent parts of the time period, or the units in the order
represented), and did not reproduce them while advancing to those
which follow, a complete representation would never be obtained:
none of the above-mentioned thoughts, not even the purest and
most elementary representations of space and time, could arise. ….
the reproductive synthesis of the imagination is to be counted as
among the transcendental acts of the mind. We shall therefore
entitle this faculty the transcendental faculty of imagination.
(A102, Kemp Smith: 133)

Kant here is concerned with the necessary preconditions for thought (or
cognition) as well as perceptual experience, and his overall line of
argument is complex.[2] However, it is easy to grasp (at least part of)
what he has in mind. Anyone who inclines to realism, but also follows
Augustine in confining consciousness to the momentary present, faces the
difficulty of explaining how we can have an awareness of succession if
our consciousness consists of nothing more than a succession of
momentary snapshot-like experiences. Kant solves this problem by

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 Temporal Consciousness

momentary snapshot-like experiences. Kant solves this problem by

offering a richer account of these momentary states of consciousness. In
the visual case, momentary episodes of visual experiencing are
accompanied by representations of recently experienced visual contents.
More generally, these representations (or retentions) allow us to be aware
that our presently occurring experience is a part of an ongoing process.

More needs to be said, but Kant supplies at least the beginnings of one
plausible-looking account of how it might be possible for us to be aware
of change and succession in the way we seem to be. This ‘Retentional’
approach – recalling the terminology of §1.1 – soon found other
advocates, and is comparatively commonplace by the end of the
nineteenth century. Brentano recognized that reaching a clear
understanding how it is possible for us to directly experience succession
and persistence is central issue for phenomenology (or ‘descriptive
psychology’ as he preferred to call it). He also recognized that a mere
succession of experiences does not, in and of itself, add up to an
experience of succession. Brentano's solution is reminiscent of Kant's:
when listening (say) to an extended tone or melody, he argued, at each
moment you are aware of a momentary sound-phase, in the form of a
momentary auditory sensation, but you are also (and simultaneously)
aware of a series of representations (or retentions) of the immediately
preceding phases. The latter Brentano referred to as proteraesthesis. In
lectures in Würzburg in 1873 Brentano illustrated what he had in mind
with a diagram, similar to the one depicted in Figure 2, which depicts the
experiencing of a melody.

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 Barry Dainton

Figure 2. Brentano on hearing a melody.

The horizontal line a-b-c-d corresponds to a continuous flow of ongoing

auditory sensations; the vertical lines correspond to the proteraestheses
which accompany these sensations at three particular points b, c an d. As
can be seen, as we move from b to c to d, the proteraestheses gradually
increase in complexity, with the result that the hearing of d is
accompanied by representations of preceding tone-phases stretching right
back to a, but no further: this is the limit of the experienced present.
Although in this last episode representations of a, b and c are experienced
together with d, these tone-phases are not experienced as simultaneous –
i.e., as a chord – rather, they are experienced as a succession. This gives
rise to several questions. How can contents which are simultaneous,
objectively speaking, seem to be successive? What is the precise nature of
the representations occurring in proteraestheses?

Brentano's views on these matters underwent several changes. In his

earlier writings, he held that proteraestheses are filled with non-existent
(purely intentional) objects; the latter are apprehended under a ‘modifying
attribute’ which results in their (seemingly) possessing a certain degree of
pastness. He came to view this is as mistake, and in later writings he
argued that the difference between the content of a proteraesthesis and an
ordinary (present) sensation lies not in the nature of the object of which
we are aware, but rather the way in which we are aware of it – there are

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 Temporal Consciousness

we are aware, but rather the way in which we are aware of it – there are
‘temporal modes of consciousness’. Initially he construed these temporal
modes in terms of differences in judgement (a represented content a is
judged be past to a certain degree); in the final phase of his thought he
opted instead for temporal modes of presentation: sensory objects can be
apprehended as past to differing degrees. See Chisholm (1981) and Kraus
(1976) for further details.

2.5 Meinong and Stern: the emergence of the Extensional

alternative

In his account of how it is possible for us to perceive a temporally

extended phenomena such as a melody, Meinong (1899) defended a
Retentional conception of time consciousness along the same general
lines as Brentano's, but he also emphasised some relevant distinctions.

Meinong points out that the temporal properties of the objects we

perceive need not coincide with the temporal properties of the
presentations (or episodes of awareness) in which we apprehend them:
e.g., objects which are past can be presented in the present. A further
distinction concerns ‘temporally distributed’ and ‘temporally
undistributed’ objects. An entity is temporally distributed if its existence
is spread over time, it is temporally undistributed if its existence is
confined to a single moment. It is natural to think that a temporally
distributed process such as a melody is perceived via a sequence of
presentations which are themselves temporally distributed – presentations
which run concurrently, or in parallel, with what is presented. However,
this natural or naïve picture is also problematic: since a succession of
presentations does not amount to a presentation of succession, something
further is needed. For Meinong, as for Brentano, the way forward is
dictated by a necessary constraint on experienced unity: for contents to
make up a perceived succession they must be presented simultaneously, to
a single momentary act of apprehension. So it turns out that, contrary to

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a single momentary act of apprehension. So it turns out that, contrary to

the naïve view, temporally distributed objects are apprehended by
episodes of experiencing which are themselves non-distributed.

The naïve view rejected by Meinong may have its problems, but it also
has its defenders. The psychologist L.W Stern criticised Meinong's own
preferred model on phenomenological grounds. We are seeking an
account of how we can directly perceive change and persistence. Meinong
locates the perception of succession in reproductions of previously
experienced contents, housed in momentary episodes of experiencing.
How can apprehending these reproductions (or retentions) deliver a full-
blooded perception of succession? The only way to achieve what is
needed is to allow successions of properly perceptual contents to be
directly apprehended. For Stern this means acts of apprehension must be
temporally distributed:

The psychic occurrence that takes place within a certain stretch of

time may possibly form a unitary coherent act of consciousness,
regardless of the non-simultaneity of its constituent parts. – The
stretch of time over which such a psychic act is capable of being
extended I call its presence-time. (1897, 326-7; cited in, and
translated by, Kortooms 2002: 43)

So for Stern the episodes of experiencing in which temporally extended

phenomena are apprehended are themselves temporally extended. The
doctrine that diachronic phenomenal unity can only exist in strictly
momentary states of consciousness is rejected in favour of a more natural
(or naïve) model of temporal awareness.

This ‘Extensional’ approach – again recalling the terminology of §1.1 –

has the definite advantage of allowing change to be perceived in as
immediate manner as one might wish for. In subsequent years it will be
defended by Mundle (1966), Foster (1979, 1982, 1991), Dainton (2000,
2003, 2008). However, although it has its advantages, this model also

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2003, 2008). However, although it has its advantages, this model also
faces difficulties. How is it possible for contents that are all experienced
together, and also as present, seemingly to occur in succession rather than
simultaneously? Meinong pointed out a further potentially significant
problem. In virtue of what are the successive phases of a temporally
extended episode of experiencing unified? What prevents a temporally
distributed awareness from also being a fragmented one? This is a
difficulty Brentano, Meinong and other Retentional theorists avoid: if the
experience of succession is housed in momentary states of consciousness,
the problem of securing diachronic unity for temporally distributed
experiencings simply does not arise. Allowing consciousness to extend
through time may bring advantages, but it is not without costs.

2.6 James and the Specious Present

The last decades of the 19th century saw the Retentional form of realism
also finding favour in Anglophone circles. James Ward's ‘Psychology’
entry for the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1886)
includes the following account of the experience of succession: ‘In a
succession of events, say of sense-impressions A B C D E .. the presence
of B means the absence of A and of C, but the presentation of this
succession involves the simultaneous presence, in some mode or other, of
two or more of the presentations A B C D. In presentation … all that
corresponds to the differences of past, present and future is in
consciousness simultaneously’. The second chapter of Shadworth
Hodgson's Metaphysic of Experience (1898) has the title ‘The Moment of
Experience’; it contains a lengthy phenomenological description of the
experiencing of a single C-tone. Arguing that the durationless present of
mathematics has no phenomenological reality, Hodgson concludes that so
far as our ordinary experience is concerned ‘the whole of it exists in
memory … the least possible empirical present moment is one, in which
the perception and memory (in the sense of simple retention) are
undistinguishable from one another.’ (1898: 60)

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undistinguishable from one another.’ (1898: 60)

Both Ward and Hodgson are cited by William James in his influential
chapter ‘The Perception of Time’ in his Principles of Psychology (1890).
It was thank to James discussion that ‘the specious present’ entered the
vocabulary of both philosophers and psychologists. James gives E.R. Clay
credit both for the term, and for recognizing that the ‘sensible present’ has
duration; he quotes him thus:

The relation of experience to time has not been profoundly

studied. Its objects are given as being of the present, but the part
of time referred to by the datum is a very different thing from the
conterminus of the past and the future which philosophy denotes
by the name Present. The present to which the datum refers is
really a part of the past — a recent past — delusively given as
being a time that intervenes between the past and the future. Let it
be named the specious present, and let the past, that is given as
being the past, be known as the obvious past. All the notes of a
bar of a song seem to the listener to be contained in the present.
All the changes of place of a meteor seem to the beholder to be
contained in the present. At the instant of the termination of such
series, no part of the time measured by them seems to be a past.

While it is not clear from this passage quite how Clay construed the
specious present, it evidently has some apparent duration – enough to
contain the seeing of a shooting star – hence its difference from the strict
(durationless or mathematical) present.[3] James claimed the latter to be
‘an altogether ideal abstraction, not only never realized in sense, but
probably never even conceived of by those unaccustomed to philosophic
meditation.’ (1890: 608) For James the only present with experiential
reality is the specious present: ‘the original paragon and prototype of all
conceived times is the specious present, the short duration of which we
are immediately and incessantly sensible.’ (1890: 631) In another

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are immediately and incessantly sensible.’ (1890: 631) In another

formulation he enters into more detail, and says something about what
this short duration contains:

the practically cognized present is no knife-edge, but a saddle-

back, with a certain breadth of its own on which we sit perched,
and from which we look in two directions into time. The unit of
composition of our perception of time is a duration, with a bow
and a stern, as it were – a rearward – and a forward-looking end. It
is only as parts of this duration-block that the relation of
succession of one end to the other is perceived. We do not first
feel one end and then feel the other after it, and from the
perception of the succession infer an interval of time between, but
we seem to feel the interval of time as a whole, with its two ends
embedded in it. (1890: 609–10)

James' specious present and Stern's ‘presence-time’ obviously have much

in common – both are intended to designate the brief temporal window
through which we are directly aware of change and persistence – but in
one respect they are very different. Stern construed this window in an
Extensionalist way, as extending over a brief interval of ordinary time.
James, by contrast, followed Ward and Hodgson and subscribed to a
Retentional interpretation. Or at least he did so in the Principles, in other
writings a different story is told; see Section 3 of the supplementary
document The Specious Present: Further Issues for more on the
interpretation of James.

2.7 Bergson, Husserl, Russell and Broad

Around the turn of the 20th century Bergson's writings on time and
consciousness had considerable influence. In his Time and Free Will: An
Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness (1899) he began his
campaign against the ‘spatializing’ of time, and in this campaign the

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campaign against the ‘spatializing’ of time, and in this campaign the

concept of duration (or durée) plays a key role. At least in his earlier
writings, this concept applies to time as it is features in our immediate
experience. For Bergson, duration is a continuous flow, immeasurable
and unquantifiable – the ‘ceaselessly seething surd at the heart of things’,
in Barrett's words (1968: 373). As such it is radically unlike the static
conception of time as a manifold of mere locations to be found in the
scientific conception of the world, whether Newtonian or Einsteinian.

Pure duration is the form which the succession of our conscious

states assumes when our ego lets itself live, when it refrains from
separating its present state from its former states … We can thus
conceive of succession without distinction, and think of it as a
mutual penetration, an interconnexion and organization of
elements, each one of which represents the whole, and cannot be
distinguished or isolated from it except by abstract thought. Such
is the account of duration which would be given by a being who
was ever the same and ever changing, and who had no idea of
space. But, familiar with the latter idea and indeed beset by it, we
introduce it unwittingly into our feeling of pure succession; we set
our states of consciousness side by side in such a way as to
perceive them simultaneously, no longer in one another, but
alongside one another; in a word, we project time into space, we
express duration in terms of extensity, and succession thus takes
the form of a continuous line or a chain, the parts of which touch
without penetrating one another. (Bergson 1910: 100–101)

Many of Bergson characterizations of duration are negative – he tells us a

good deal about what it is not, but comparatively little about what it
actually is. While this can sometimes be frustrating, there is a rationale for
it: Bergson held that any attempt to conceptualize the flux of
consciousness could succeed only at the cost of distorting the phenomena
– a doctrine which influenced William James in his later years (see

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– a doctrine which influenced William James in his later years (see

Section 3 of the supplementary document The Specious Present: Further
Issues).

In a more conventional vein, the early years of the 20th century see
Husserl developing an account of time-consciousness along Retentional
lines. Husserl attended Brentano's lectures between 1884–6; inspired by
them, he decided to devote his energies to philosophy rather than
mathematics. If Husserl's phenomenology can be viewed as a
development of Brentano's descriptive psychology, so too can his
accounts of time-consciousness. In elaborating his own position, in
lectures in 1904–6, although he begins with criticisms of what Brentano
and Meinong had to say on the topic, the position he ends up with is along
the same general lines. Husserl may not have adopted the term ‘specious
present’,[4] but he did hold that we have a seemingly direct awareness of
change and persistence amongst the objects and processes we perceive
over short intervals. He also held, plausibly, that as our streams of
consciousness flow on, we have an awareness of their so doing. As for
how this is possible, he thought it must involve past phases of
consciousness somehow being ‘retained in grasp’ in later moments of
consciousness. In this passage we find the ‘wonder of time-
consciousness’ disclosing itself to him as he hears the rumble of an
approaching coach:

The perception of the sound in the perception's ever new now is

not a mere having of the sound, even of the sound in the now-
phase. On the contrary, we find in each now, in addition to the
actual physical content, an adumbration …. If we focus
reflectively on what is presently given in the actually present now
with respect to the sound of the postilion's horn, or the rumbling
of the coach, and if we reflect on it just as it is given, then we note
the trail of memory that extends the now-point of the sound or of
the rumbling. This reflection makes it evident that the immanent

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the rumbling. This reflection makes it evident that the immanent

thing could not be given in its unity at all if the perceptual
consciousness did not also encompass, along with the point of
actually present sensation, the continuity of fading phases that
pertain to the sensations belonging to earlier nows. The past
would be nothing for the consciousness belonging to the now if it
were not represented in the now; and the now would not be now
… if it did not stand before me in that consciousness as the limit
of a past being. The past must be represented in this now as past,
and this is accomplished through the continuity of adumbrations
that in one direction terminates in the sensation-point and in the
other direction and in the other direction becomes blurred and
indeterminate. (1991: 290)

At the heart of Husserl's account is a dynamic tri-partite view of the

composition of consciousness at any instant. The three components are:
primal impressions, retentions (or ‘primary memories’) and protentions.
Primal impressions are the live, actual experiences that occupy the
momentary now. No sooner does a primal impression – e.g., a momentary
tone-phase – occur than it slips seamlessly into the past. But it does not
vanish from consciousness altogether: it survives in the form of a
retention, which presents it as past. For Husserl, retentions are a quite
distinctive form of consciousness, and differ significantly from ordinary
memories. (They are also the ‘adumbrations’ mentioned in the quotation.)
As new primal impressions dawn – as they gush forth from the ‘primal
source-point’ of the now – the initial tone-phase continues to be retained,
but as increasingly more past, until it fades from consciousness
altogether. From then on, it can only be accessed through ordinary
memory. As for protentions, these are the future-oriented counterparts of
retentions. In some cases – e.g., when we are perceiving or remembering
a familiar sequence of events – they can be quite detailed, but often they
consist of nothing more than an openness to the future, an expectation
that something will come. Or as Husserl puts it:

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that something will come. Or as Husserl puts it:

It belongs to the essence of perception not only that it has in view

a punctual now and not only that it releases from its view
something that has just been, while ‘still intending’ it in the
original mode of ‘just-having-been’, but also that it passes over
from now to now and, in anticipation, goes to meet the new now.
The waking consciousness, the waking life, is a living-towards, a
living that goes from the now towards the new now. (1991: 112)

Irrespective of how the forward-looking protentional aspect of

consciousness is to be properly understood, this is a plausible piece of
phenomenology. As we go about our business, we generally do so with an
anticipative awareness – different in different circumstances, and difficult
to describe – of where we are heading, or what is likely to come next.[5]

The broad outlines of Husserl's position may be perfectly clear, but the
details pose more of a challenge. Husserl's terminology underwent regular
changes: his wrote of ‘primary memory’ prior to adopting ‘retention’;
rather than the ‘specious present’ or ‘presence-time’ Husserl prefers in his
early writings to talk of ‘the original temporal field’; in later writings he
adopts other language: ‘primal present’, ‘flowing present’, ‘living
present’. This terminological evolution goes hand-in-hand with doctrinal
evolutions. Husserl wrote voluminously on time-consciousness
throughout his career but never found a position he was happy with for
long – in his lectures from 1907–10 he found fault with the position he
elaborated in the 1904–6 lectures – and he never published a definitive
statement of his position. His early lectures, along with some additional
material, edited by Heidegger and Edith Stein, appeared in 1928 – and in
English as The Phenomenology of Internal Time-Consciousness (1950). A
fuller picture emerges from the material on the topic gathered into
Husserliana X. For his subsequent thinking other sources come into play:
the Bernau (or L-manuscripts) contain notes on time-consciousness dating

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the Bernau (or L-manuscripts) contain notes on time-consciousness dating

from 1917-18, and the C-manuscripts contain material on the topic from
the late 1920's to the early 1930's. For an overview of Husserl's changing
views, over the whole of his career, see Kortooms (2002).

In Anglophone circles in the same period, the realist position was being
advocated by leading figures such as Broad and Russell. According to the
latter,

‘Succession is a relation which may hold between two parts of one

sensation, for instance between parts of a swift movement which is
the object of one sensation’ (1913: 65).

Immediate experience provides us with two time-relations among

events: they may be simultaneous, or one may be earlier and the
other later. These two are part of the crude data; it is not the case
that only the events are given, and their time-order is added by our
subjective activity. The time-order, within certain limits, is as
much given as the events. (1914: 121–2)

Broad was of much the same opinion. Writing in Scientific Thought

(1923) he says: ‘There is no doubt that sensible motion and rest are
genuine unanalysable properties of visual sensa. I am aware of them as
directly as I am aware of the redness of a red patch.’ (1923: 287) – a clear
commitment to realism. Later in the same work he elaborates thus:

it is a notorious fact that we do not merely notice that something

has moved or otherwise changed; we also often seem something
moving or changing. This happens if we look at the second-hand
of a watch or look at a flickering flame. These are experiences of a
quite unique kind; we could no more describe what we sense in
them to a man who had never had such experiences than we could
describe a red colour to a man born blind. (1923: 351)

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Unlike Russell, who did not elaborate greatly on these matters, Broad
went on provide quite detailed analyses of the structure of temporal
consciousness. The account developed in Scientific Thought is of a
distinctive kind. It is constructed around acts of awareness that are
themselves momentary, but which apprehend phenomenal contents
distributed over a short interval of time; a stream of consciousness
consists of dense sequences of such acts, with the consequence that the
contents apprehended by neighbouring acts largely overlap. Since Broad
agrees with Stern that our consciousness extends a short distance through
time his approach can be classed as Extensional. But since Broad also
maintains – along with Brentano, Meinong and Husserl – that our
immediate experience of change involves contents being presented to acts
of awareness that are strictly momentary, it is not an Extensional view of
the ordinary sort: for Stern and those in the Extensional camp, the acts of
awareness (or episodes of experiencing) in which dynamic contents are
apprehended are themselves temporally extended. For this reason Broad's
position is probably best classed as a Partial Extensionalism. In any
event, this hybrid approach is not without its difficulties – see Mabbott
(1951) – and in his later An Examination of McTaggart's Philosophy
(1938) Broad develops an account along more orthodox Retentionalist
lines.

3. Further Issues and Distinctions: Simultaneity,

Immediacy and Continuity
The Cinematic, Retentional and Extensional models (as sketched in §1.1)
offer different and competing accounts of the structure of consciousness
over those short intervals – perhaps no more than a second or so, perhaps
less – during which we seem to be able to experience change and
succession. Before moving on to explore these models in more detail, it is
worth pausing to register in a clear and explicit way some further
important theses and distinctions; some of these we have already

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important theses and distinctions; some of these we have already

encountered in one guise or another, others are new.

PT-realists share a commitment to the Diachronic Unity Thesis (see

§1.2), i.e., the claim that contents (seemingly) spread over a short
temporal interval can be experienced together. The various different ways
of construing the specious present reflect a divergence of opinion as to
how the Diachronic Unity Thesis can be satisfied. According to one
influential view, phenomenal unity – the sort of unity which exists
amongst contents that are experienced together – is confined to contents
which are (objectively) simultaneous. As we have just see, Kant,
Brentano, Meinong and Husserl were all of the opinion that phenomenal
unity is constrained in this manner. Miller (1984: 109) supplies a label for
this doctrine:

The Principle of Simultaneous Awareness (PSA): to be

experienced as unified, contents must be presented simultaneously
to a single momentary awareness.

Cinematic and Retentional theorists generally embrace PSA. Extensional

theorists are united in their rejection of PSA: for them, experiential
phenomenal unity is not necessarily confined to momentary episodes of
experiencing. Hence it is possible for the experiencing of change to occur
over intervals of ordinary time.

This (potential) divergence aside, both Retentional and Extensional

theorists face a problem – albeit not the same problem – when it comes to
handling the relationship between simultaneity and presence. Whatever
their other properties, the contents of the specious present (supposedly) all
seem present as and when they occur. This makes for a problem for
Extensional theorists. The contents of a typical specious present will all
be experienced together, as parts of a unified whole, but they will also
seem to occur successively. But how is this possible? Won't contents that
are all experienced together as present appear to occur simultaneously,

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are all experienced together as present appear to occur simultaneously,

rather than in succession? Retentional theorists face a rather different
difficulty. If we suppose, in line with Retentional doctrine, that the
contents of an individual specious present are actually simultaneous, at
least with regard to ordinary clock time, how can it be that they also
appear successive? In slightly more formal guise:

Extensional Simultaneity Problem: how is it possible for

contents which are (i) experienced together, and (ii) experienced
as present, to be experienced as anything other than simultaneous?

Retentional Simultaneity Problem: how is it possible for a

collection of contents which occur simultaneously to seem
successive?

At first glance each of these problems may look very serious, even
insuperable. It is not for nothing that many have despaired of finding a
coherent account of the specious present. However, when we turn to
explore the Retention and Extensional approaches in more detail, we shall
see that these difficulties may not be as serious as they can initially seem.

A further issue concerns the kind of contents to be found within

individual specious presents. Foster, himself a leading realist of the
Extensional persuasion, writes: ‘duration and change through time seem
to be presented to us with the same phenomenal immediacy as
homogeneity and variation of colour through space’ (1982: 255). Broad
remarks: ‘There is no doubt that sensible motion and rest are genuine
unanalysable properties of visual sensa. I am aware of them as directly as
I am aware of the redness of a red patch.’ (1923: 287) Broad and Foster
are committed to the following general principle:

The Immediacy Thesis: change, succession and persistence can

feature in our experience with the same vivid immediacy as colour
or sound, or any other phenomenal feature.

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or sound, or any other phenomenal feature.

The contents of Extensional specious presents – the contents apprehended

as changing – are ordinary experiential contents (e.g., sounds as they
feature in immediate experience). Consequently it is not surprising to find
that proponents of the Extensional model generally subscribe to the
Immediacy Thesis. Their Retentionalist counterparts can do so, but
usually don't. Brentano, Husserl and other leading Retentional theorists
hold that the contents of the specious present appear under varying
‘temporal modes of presentation’ (as they are often called). If the
succession of tones [C-D-E] form a single specious present, if E seem
fully or maximally present, D will appear under the mode ‘just past’, and
E ‘a little more past’. On this view, each of C, D and E are experienced as
parts of a unified ensemble – in conformity with the Diachronic Unity
Thesis – but they are not experienced as possessing the same phenomenal
immediacy.

Proponents of the Cinematic, Extensional and Retentional models are

offering very different accounts of the structure and composition of our
consciousness of over short periods of time. There is a further issue: what
is the structure of consciousness over longer intervals? It is not unusual
for us to remain awake for hours at a stretch; although the contents of our
consciousness may frequently change, we can remain continuously
(uninterruptedly) awake and aware for quite long periods. William James
is well-known for emphasising the continuity of experience –
‘Consciousness, then, does not appear to itself as chopped up into bits.
Such words as “chain” or “train” do not describe it fitly … It is nothing
jointed, it flows. A “river” or a “stream” are the metaphors by which it is
naturally described’ (1890: 239) – and James' stream metaphor strikes
many as apt. In the light of this new questions arise. How do the
momentary static states of the Cinematic theorists combine to form
extended streams of continuous consciousness of the sort we typically
enjoy during our waking hours? Indeed, can they combine in the way

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enjoy during our waking hours? Indeed, can they combine in the way
required? Analogous questions can be posed for the specious presents
posited by Retentional and Extensional theorists: how do they manage to
combine to form such streams?

While the inability to answer these new questions in a satisfactory manner

can certainly count against a model of temporal consciousness, the
situation is complicated by the diversity of opinions concerning both the
degree to which consciousness really is continuous, and manner or nature
of its continuity. James himself defined ‘continuous’ as ‘that which is
without breach, crack or division’ (1890: 237), but what he meant by this
requires some unpacking.

It is certainly possible – and quite natural – to characterize continuity in

terms of an absence of gaps: a subject S's consciousness can be said to be
continuous with respect to an interval T if S is having an experience of
some kind at every moment during T. In more subjective vein, a
succession of stream-phases belonging to S could be said to be continuous
if S is incapable of discerning any gaps between them. For James this
subjective mode of continuity was particularly important, and – perhaps
controversially – he held that it is possible for streams that are objectively
discontinuous (e.g., separated by a gap of minutes or hours) to be
subjectively continuous.

However, for James the continuity that is characteristic of our

consciousness involved more than the mere absence of gaps, whether
objective or subjective. He also held that this continuity typically involves
a (fairly) high degree of similarity in the qualitative character of one's
experience from moment to moment. Large and sudden variations do
occur – a sudden thunderclap makes a massive difference to one's
auditory experience – but these do not usually disrupt background
continuities in (say) bodily feeling, or so James argued.

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The things are discrete and discontinuous; they do pass before us

in a train or chain, making often explosive appearances and
rending each other in twain. But their comings and goings and
contrasts no more break the flow of the thought that thinks them
than they break the time and the space in which they lie. A silence
may be broken by a thunder-clap, and we may be so stunned and
confused for a moment by the shock as to give no instant account
to ourselves of what has happened. But that very confusion is a
mental state, and a state that passes us straight over from the
silence to the sound. The transition between the thought of one
object and the thought of another is no more a break in the thought
than a joint in a bamboo is a break in the wood. It is a part of the
consciousness as much as the joint is a part of the bamboo. (1890:
240)

In addition to gaplessness and qualitative similarity, James recognized a

further mode of connectedness between stream-phases: successive phases
are linked experientially. He held that each brief phase of our stream of
consciousness flows, in seamless fashion, into its successor, and that these
‘co-conscious transitions’ are themselves experienced. There is more than
a hint of this in the passage just cited, but elsewhere he is more explicit.
In the essay ‘A World of Pure Experience’ (1904) he writes: ‘My
experiences and your experiences are “with” each other in various
external ways, but mine pass into mine, and yours pass into yours in a
way in which yours and mine never pass into one another’. More
generally, James held that consciousness is not composed of absolutely
distinct component parts (i.e., individual isolated experiences), but is
‘conjunctive’:

the parts of experience hold together from next to next by relations

that are themselves parts of experience. The directly apprehended
universe needs, in short, no extraneous trans-empirical connective
support, but possesses in its own right a concatenated or

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support, but possesses in its own right a concatenated or

continuous structure (1912, 7)

To coin some further terminology, on this view each brief stream-phase is

experientially connected to its neighbours. Irrespective of whether it is
correct, James' contention certainly possesses prima facie plausibility: if
one hears a succession of brief tones do-re-mi-fa-so, it is certainly natural
to say that one also hear each tone flowing into its successor. It does not
seem implausible to suppose the same holds more generally: does not
each brief phase of a typical stream of consciousness seem to merge
smoothly and seamlessly with its successor?

Although the Jamesian emphasis on the continuity of consciousness is

widely viewed sympathetically, there are dissenters. Galen Strawson
endorses realism – he believes change and succession can be directly
experienced – but he also rejects James’ stream-metaphor as ‘inept’, and
argues that consciousness is radically discontinuous and disjointed: ‘It is
always shooting off, fuzzing, shorting out, spurting and stalling.’ (1997:
421). For Strawson there are gaps and fissures in our experience, and
these are sometimes accompanied by dramatic changes in content: ‘The
(invariably brief) periods of true experiential continuity are usually
radically disjunct from each other in this way, even when they are not
radically disjunct in terms of content.’ (1997: 422)[6] In a similar vein,
Dennett holds that ‘One of the most striking features of consciousness is
its discontinuity (1991: 356).

Pulling these points together, we can distinguish three main positions on

the continuity issue:

The Discontinuity Thesis: although consciousness is commonly

described as continuous, this is wrong: in fact our consciousness is
highly disjointed, far more so than most people suppose.

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The Modest Continuity Thesis: our typical streams of

consciousness are indeed continuous, and this involves (i) freedom
from gaps, in either or both of the senses mentioned above, and/or
(ii) a significant degree of moment-to-moment qualitative
similarity.

The Strong Continuity Thesis: in addition to the relationships

encapsulated in the Modest Thesis, the successive brief phases of
our typical streams of consciousness are experientially connected.

What divides Modest from Strong forms of continuity is the existence of

directly experienced connections – James' ‘co-conscious transitions’ –
between successive stream-phases. The experienced transitions posited by
advocates of Strong Continuity can plausibly be regarded as experienced
changes (or successions). Since antirealists deny that change or succession
can be directly experienced, they are not in a position to accept the Strong
Continuity Thesis. It is otherwise for realists: since the latter hold that
change and succession can be directly experienced, their position looks to
be entirely compatible with Strong Continuity. However, as we shall see
in due course, the situation is by no means straightforward: some realist
models can accommodate Strong Continuity more easily than others.

4. Cinematic Models
4.1 Cinematic Realism

When it comes to explaining how it is possible for our consciousness to

combine experiential continuity with the experience of change the
account offered by the Cinematic realist is appealingly straightforward.
On this view, a typical stream of consciousness consists of a close-
packed, gap-free continuum of momentary (or very brief) phases.
Although the contents of these phases are themselves momentary – they
do not present motion or change, they are akin to static snapshots – their

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do not present motion or change, they are akin to static snapshots – their
occurrence in rapid succession succeeds in generating all the change,
succession and motion we find in our experience – or so the Cinematic
realist claims. The basic feature of the model are depicted in Figure 3. On
the left we see a punctual beam of awareness, the smooth, steady advance
of which generates a sequence of momentary snapshot-like contents (of a
falling object, in this instance), only a small selection of which is shown
on the right.

Figure 3. Cinematic PT-realism: seemingly dynamic phenomenal

contents are produced by an advancing ‘beam’ of awareness.

This Cinematic form of realism does not feature prominently in the

literature – it was not encountered at all in the course of our brief
historical survey – and with good reason: we shall see shortly that it is
vulnerable to serious objections. But it nonetheless has sufficient intuitive
appeal to be worth considering. By accepting that motion and change
feature in our immediate experience the doctrine has the merit of taking
the phenomenological data at face value. It also combines a quite natural
way of conceiving of the temporal structure of consciousness – i.e., as
confined to the momentary present – with an equally natural view as to
the kind of content the resulting momentary episodes of experiencing
could have. A camera with a fast shutter-speed (e.g., 1/10,000 of a
second) will ‘freeze’ all but the fastest of motions: the facial expression

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second) will ‘freeze’ all but the fastest of motions: the facial expression
of victorious sprinter at the precise moment they crossed the line can thus
be revealed. If our consciousness takes the form of a series of momentary
(or extremely brief) ‘exposures’, won't the contents of our consciousness
be similarly static or frozen? As an additional bonus the Cinematic realist
can easily explain at least one aspect of the continuity of consciousness. If
a stream of consciousness is composed of a gap-free sequence (or
continuum) of momentary (or extremely brief) states, it is not surprising
that we can be continually aware for hours at a stretch. The Modest
Continuity Thesis (§3) is thus easily accommodated.

As for how sequences of static ‘snapshots’ can give rise to experiences

which seem to possess dynamic contents, the Cinematic realist certainly
has to provide a plausible account of how this comes about. Two avenues
may seem promising in this regard. First, even if our awareness lacks any
significant temporal depth, as it does on the proposed model, might it not
be that the continuous advance of a point-like ray of awareness will
generate episodes of experiencing which can encompass change and
succession? By way of an analogy, think of the way a needle (or any
other sharply pointed object) moved across the surface of one's skin
produces a continuous sensation of motion. Although at any one time it is
only the needle's near-dimensionless point that is in contact with our skin,
we can nonetheless feel the needle moving smoothly and continuously
from one location to another. Second, in the visual case, it is well known
that rapid successions of static images can result in experiences of
motion. The images shown on a TV or cinema screen are static snapshots,
but evidently, they are perceived as dynamic: objects on a cinema screen
are seen to move as smoothly and continuously as their real-life
counterparts. Might not the same apply to other modes of experience, and
hence to our streams of consciousness as a whole?

Unfortunately for the Cinematic realist, closer scrutiny reveals that each
of these proposals is problematic. A moving ‘beam’ of awareness could

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of these proposals is problematic. A moving ‘beam’ of awareness could

produce a period of time during which experience is continuously
occurring, in the sense that at each moment during the interval there is an
experience being had by the relevant subject, but by itself it can produce
nothing more, and – for a viable form of realism, at least – more is
required. For a subject to be directly aware of a temporally extended
phenomenon (such as a brief movement), adjoining phases of the
phenomenon must in some manner be experienced together by the
subject. As noted in §1.2, realists subscribe to the Diachronic Unity
Thesis: they hold that contents that appear to occur in succession can be
experienced together (or be co-conscious), in just the same way as
contents which appear to occur simultaneously, at least within the
confines of the specious present. But since for the Cinematic realist
individual episodes of awareness are durationless, and likewise the
contents apprehended in such episodes, it is difficult to see how the
required Diachronic Unity can be accommodated. Since ex hypothesi our
awareness does not extend beyond or between momentary episodes of
experiencing, there is no scope at all for adjoining phases to be
experienced together in the way required.

The point can be made a slightly different way. To employ the usual
terminology, a succession of experiences is one thing, an experience of
succession is quite another. Suppose there are ten people, P 1, P 2, P 3 …
P 10 standing in line with their eyes closed, but directed at a tennis game
taking place nearby. If first P 1 opens their eyes momentarily before
closing them again, followed immediately by P 2, then by P 3, all the way
to P 10, then we have a succession of ten experiences, each revealing the
on-court action at a particular moment. But there is no experience of
succession: all each person sees is a momentary still image, and these
momentary experiencings are completely isolated from one another.
Accordingly, the resulting sequence of experiences do not add up to an
experiencing of movement or change. Although it may not be quite so
obvious, the model of temporal consciousness proposed by the Cinematic

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obvious, the model of temporal consciousness proposed by the Cinematic

realist also creates nothing more than mere succession of experiences.
There are, of course, differences between the two cases, but these
differences do not affect the point at issue. First, in the tennis example
there are ten distinct subjects, whereas the sequence of momentary states
posited by the Cinematic realist experienced by a single subject. But for
this difference to matter, the momentary states enjoyed by the single
subject would have to be unified within that subject's consciousness: for if
they remain discrete, experientially isolated from one another, as it were,
there is no possibility of their combining to constitute an experience of
succession. But with the resources available to the Cinematic realist –
momentary acts of awareness, momentary contents – there is no obvious
way of creating the required unity. As for the second difference, in our
simple example there are but ten distinct experiences, whereas Cinematic
realists will insist that on their model we are dealing with a true
continuum, in the mathematical sense: we are to suppose that the
perceiving of the tennis game involves an infinite number of distinct
momentary experiences, not just ten. But as Bergson was fond of pointing
out, numbers make no difference here: the points in the orthodox
mathematical continuum are always entirely distinct from one another, no
matter how close together they may be: indeed, since these points are
densely ordered, between any two points there is always a further
point. [7]

What of the cinematic analogy itself? Isn't the fact that we see motion on
TV and movie screens evidence that successions of motion-free images
can give rise to an experience of motion? Although there is a sense in
which this is correct, it is of little or no assistance to the Cinematic realist.

It is perfectly true that perceiving a succession of still images can result in

a full-blooded perception of motion. If the stills which compose cinema
film are shown quite slowly – say 2–5 frames per second (fps) – they are
seen quite clearly as stills; if the pace picks up – to around 10 fps, they

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seen quite clearly as stills; if the pace picks up – to around 10 fps, they
start to look somewhat blurred; if the pace picks up still further – to 20 or
25 fps – something remarkable happens: the images come alive, and we
suddenly start to see genuine (and very clear, non-blurry) motion. This
phenomenon – known as ‘illusory motion’ or ‘the phi phenomenon’ was
first explored in the 19th century by Exner, and has been much-studied
since then (not surprisingly, since it underpins televisual industries). But
while it is real enough, the phi phenomenon is of little assistance to the
Cinematic realist. What the latter needs is an account of how successions
of momentary conscious states, each possessing entirely static contents,
can give rise to the experience of motion. Static images are indeed being
displayed on a cinema screen while we view a movie, but not only are
these onscreen stills not themselves experiences, they do not register in
our visual experience as static images: what we actually seem to see
onscreen are objects in motion. Phenomenologically speaking, the stills
are invisible. Given this, all the phi phenomenon clearly and
unambiguously demonstrates is that a rapid succession of brief perceptual
stimuli (each deriving from a brief on-screen image) can be transformed
by our visual systems – after a good deal of processing – into experiences
which feature motion. These perceptual stimuli are not themselves
experiential in nature, consisting as they do of showers of photons (or,
alternatively, patterns of electro-chemical activity on the surface of the
retina).

In the absence of any plausible account of how change and succession can
feature in our immediate experience, the Cinematic model cannot be
regarded as a promising form of realism. Its difficulties do not end here.
The Cinematic model certainly conforms to the Modest Continuity Thesis
– it is compatible with our streams of consciousness being continuous in
the sense of gap-free – but it is otherwise with regard to the Strong
Continuity Thesis. According to proponents of the latter, the sense we
have that each brief phase of our streams of consciousness flow into their
successors is underpinned (or generated by) the existence of real

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successors is underpinned (or generated by) the existence of real

experiential connections between such phases. It is not obvious, to say the
least, how such connections could exist if all streams are composed of
discrete momentary states that are experientially isolated from their
immediate neighbours – see Figure 4.

Figure 4. How to satisfy (and not satisfy) the Strong Continuity

Thesis.

This failure will not matter for realists who reject the full-blown Jamesian
conception of streamal continuity, but for those realists who find the case
for Strong Continuity compelling, the failure is a serious one.

4.2 Cinematic Antirealism

For the PT-antirealist it is a mistake to suppose that change, persistence

and succession feature in our immediate experience. While this standpoint
can seem wrongheaded, it can also seem the plainest common sense – or
at least a consequence of plain common sense. As Augustine and Reid
both recognised, it is very natural to suppose that we are only directly
aware of what is going on now. If the present, strictly conceived, is the
durationless interface between the past and the future – and it is
commonly taken to be precisely this – the conclusion that our

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consciousness is confined to a durationless instant swiftly follows. As

noted in §4.1, in connection with Cinematic realism, it is also quite
natural to think that the content of a momentary state of consciousness
will itself have a momentary character: in effect, such a content will take
the form of a still, static snapshot. If this conception of both
consciousness and its contents is correct, antirealism looms large on the
horizon.

Irrespective of the considerations which can make antirealism an

appealing doctrine, there remain the considerations, of a largely
phenomenological character, which strongly favour realism. Aren't there
occasions (many of them) when we see a horse crossing a finishing line,
or a car turning round a corner, or a postman walking up the garden path?
Can't we hear the explosive roar of crowd, or the sound of an approaching
car, or the barking of a dog? Can't we feel shivers running down our
spine? Claims that change and movement can be directly experienced
have a good deal of plausibility. What can be done to undermine these
claims?

4.3 Reid on the Proper Provinces of Sense and Memory

Thomas Reid believed that our streams of consciousness are composed of

sequences of momentary states; since he also believed these such states
incapable of furnishing us with an genuine experience of succession (see
§2.3) Reid can safely be classed as a Cinematic antirealist. Although Reid
recognized that this austere position on the contents of experience is in
conflict with how we normally think and talk, he also thought this
conflict could be defused.

For Reid the apparent contradiction between strict philosophical truth and
common sense (and common experience) is superficial: ‘It arises from
this, that philosophers and the vulgar differ in the meaning they put upon
what is called the present time, and are thereby led to made a different

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what is called the present time, and are thereby led to made a different
limit between sense and memory’ (1855: 236). Reid argues that our
ordinary talk of ‘seeing’ things move is intelligible, at least on its own
terms, because in ordinary life we generally construe the present in a
loose and flexible way. If it suits our purposes – and it often does – we
allow ‘the present’ to denote a period of time, rather than a durationless
moment. (There is no need for the period to be short: we sometimes refer
to the present decade or century.) And since temporal intervals can
contain change and movement, our ordinary ways of talking are not in the
least paradoxical:

… Hence it is easy to see, that, though in common language we

speak with perfect propriety and truth when we say that we see a
body move, and that motion is an object of sense, yet when as
philosophers we distinguish accurately the province of sense from
that of memory, we can no more see what is past, though but a
moment ago, that we can remember what is present (1855: 236)

So far so plausible, perhaps. But a significant worry remains. How

plausible is Reid's proposed (precise, philosophical) delineation of the
respective provinces of sense and memory? Realists will insist that it is
questionable. To illustrate, consider the case of motion. Reid claims that
‘it is only by the aid of memory that we discern motion, or any succession
whatsoever. We see the present place of the body; we remember the
successive advance it made to that place: the first can, then, only give us a
conception of motion, when joined to the last.’ (ibid. 237) If this is right,
then when (say) we see a car turning a corner, all that is ever present in
our sensory consciousness is a series of static images, each revealing the
car to be at a particular location. The car's motion, to the extent it enters
our awareness at all, exists only in memories which accompany these
momentary perceptions. But from a phenomenological standpoint at least,
this does not ring true. The phenomenal character (the ‘what it's like-
ness’) of actually seeing a car turn a corner, and remembering (via

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ness’) of actually seeing a car turn a corner, and remembering (via

recollected visual images) seeing an otherwise similar car turn a corner
are very different indeed. Not to dwell too long on the obvious: in the
perceptual case the car is clear, vivid and (seemingly) out there in the
world, whereas the remembered car is far less clear and vivid, and very
definitely in here (in the head, rather than out in the world). If the car's
motion is something we perceive, and it certainly seems to be, Reid's
antirealist analysis is lacking in plausibility.

In fact, the antirealist's predicament may well be more serious still.

Conflating perceived motion with remembered motion is one thing, but
there is an important sense in which the antirealist is not in a position to
appeal to memories of motion either. A memory-replay of a prior
perceiving of motion is itself a process which unfolds over time, and – on
the face of it – has a dynamic character: e.g., you see (albeit in your
mind's eye) the car sweeping round the corner. Since it would be odd to
hold that motion can be remembered but not perceived, the antirealist will
presumably want to analyse both forms of experience in the same sort of
way. Accordingly, your visual remembering (or replay) of the car's
turning the corner will take the form of a series of static memory- images
of the car at particular locations, and each of these images (save the first)
will be accompanied by other static images, in the form of snapshot-like
memories of the car as seen at still earlier locations. Antirealism in this
form may be a more consistent doctrine, but the wholesale elimination (or
reduction) of the moving to the motion-free has two consequences. First
of all, it is by no means obvious how our memories could have the
dynamic character they seem to possess if they consisted of nothing but
still images piled on top of other still images. Second, and for present
purposes more importantly, the Reid-style antirealist's account of
perceived motion is significantly weakened. Realists will argue that it is
not very plausible to analyse the perceived motion in terms of momentary
motion-free perceptual experiences accompanied memories of motion, but
it is significantly less plausible if the relevant memories, rather than being

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it is significantly less plausible if the relevant memories, rather than being

truly dynamic, are themselves composed of entirely static images.

Although it may well be that the most compelling evidence for the
realist's claim that motion (and other forms of change) feature in
immediate experience is straightforwardly phenomenological – that's just
the way our experience seems to be – there are empirical findings in
psychology and neuroscience which point in the same general direction.
We have already encountered (in §3.1) the phi phenomenon (or ‘illusory
motion’). In the simplest of cases – as observed by Plateau in 1850 and
Exner in 1875 – what is in reality a pair of lights some distance apart
flashing alternately, is perceived as a single light moving back and forth.
A more dramatic (and ubiquitous) illustration of the same tendency is
television and cinema, where a mere 25 frames per second suffices to
produce a perception of smooth motion. It seems that when our visual
systems are supplied with stimuli which are merely suggestive of
movement they are eager to supply us with vivid experiences of motion
itself. This is not all. Studies of the visual systems in the brain have
revealed areas – in particular the region known as V5 – which specialize
in motion-detection. Interestingly, the condition of cerebral akinetopsia, a
form of motion-blindness, has been linked to damage in the V5 area. An
afflicted patient, known as LM,

reported substantial difficulty in pouring fluids into a cup or glass,

because the tea, coffee or orange juice appeared “frozen like a
glaciar”. She could not see the fluid rising, and therefore, couldn't
establish when to stop pouring. In addition, she felt very irritated
when looking at people while they were speaking: their lips
appeared “to hop up and down”, so she had to look away so as not
to become confused (Heywood and Zihl 1999: 3).

This too is suggestive: if, as the antirealist claims, motion never features
in the immediate experience of normal human perceivers, what is it that

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in the immediate experience of normal human perceivers, what is it that

LM has lost? (For some further details of these findings see Section 1 of
the supplementary document Some Relevant Empirical Findings
(Psychology, Psychophysics, Neuroscience).)

4.4 Further Diagnoses: Crick and Koch, Le Poidevin

Empirical findings along these lines by no means definitively refute the

antirealist – alternative interpretations are possible – but they do make life
more difficult. Rather than straightforwardly denying that we directly
experience motion in the manner of Reid, the antirealist stance would be
more plausible if a credible explanation as to why we believe we
experience motion (and more generally, change) if in fact we do not. One
route, suggested by Crick and Kock, is to find (or posit) a vector-like
feature that durationless contents could possess, and which is also such as
to strongly suggest or imply movement, even though no movement is
actually present. According to their ‘snapshot hypothesis’ (2003: 122) –
in effect, a version of Cinematic anti-realism – our consciousness not only
comes in discrete chunks, the experience of motion is itself illusory:

Perception might well take place in discrete processing epochs,

perceptual moments, frames, or snapshots. Your subjective life
could be a ceaseless sequence of such frames … Within one such
moment, the perception of brightness, colour, depth and motion
would be constant. Think of motion painted onto each snapshot …
(Koch 2004: 264)

Quite what is involved, at the phenomenal level, in motion being ‘painted

onto’ a motionless snapshot is explained only by way of an analogy: a
drawing of a person in motion (running or ice skating, say) can suggest
motion, even though it is entirely motion-free. In response, realists will
point out that there is a sizeable difference, phenomenologically speaking,
between even looking at a still image which merely depicts motion, no

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between even looking at a still image which merely depicts motion, no

matter how suggestively, and actually seeing motion. By way of further
support, Koch quotes Oliver Sacks, who reports in his (1970) an
occurrence of ‘cinematographic vision’ during one of his own migraine
attacks:

I asked her to look at the picture, talk, gesture, make faces,

anything, so long as she moved. And not, to my mixed delight, I
realized that time was fractured, no less than space, for I did not
see her movements as continuous, but, instead as a succession of
“stills”, a succession of different configurations and positions, but
without any movement in-between, like the flickering of a film
(the “flicks”) run too slow. She seemed to be transfixed in this odd
mosaic-cinematic state, which was essentially shattered,
incoherent, atomized.

Koch approvingly cites Sacks' suggestion that cinematographic vision – a

form of akinetopsia – reveals the ‘nature of visual experience when the
illusion of motion has been lost’. However, this speculation is puzzling
for two reasons. The first is trivial: the designation ‘cinematographic’ is
less than ideal and potentially misleading: as we have already seen (in
§4.1), a plausible case can be made for holding that in a properly run
cinema, the stills projected onto the screen are not themselves seen as
such – all we see are the intended moving images. Second and more
importantly, given the world of difference between Sacks' motion-free
experience and our everyday visual experience, in what sense can the
motion we apprehend in the latter reasonably be construed as illusory?
The realist will insist that if motion is an intrinsic feature of sensory
experience – and it seems to be – doesn't that suffice to ensure that it is a
real feature of it too?

Le Poidevin (2007: 88–92) tentatively forwards an alternative hypothesis.

As Aristotle noted, if you stare at a waterfall for a short period, and then

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As Aristotle noted, if you stare at a waterfall for a short period, and then
turn your gaze to the bank beside it, you will see part of the bank
(seemingly) start to move in an upwards direction. This phenomenon is
commonly called ‘the waterfall illusion’ (or motion aftereffect), and the
illusory motion is of an intriguing sort. You will not see a part of the bank
detach itself from its surroundings and drift up towards the sky. Rather,
you will see the contents within a fixed and immobile region of the bank
– roughly the size of the waterfall you were staring at previously – losing
their normal solidity and becoming fluid-like. Although these contents
seems to be flowing upward, they do so without changing – at least in a
clear and unambiguous way – their location with respect to the rest of the
bank.[8] As for an explanation of what is going on in such cases, Le
Poidevin (following Richard Gregory) suggests that perhaps we can
discern here the workings of two distinct neural mechanisms. One
‘registers what we might call “pure motion”, i.e., gives rise to the
impression of motion without any associated sense of change of position.
It is this system that is responsible for the sense of perceiving motion as
happening now.’ (2007: 89) A second system, relying on short-term
memory, tracks and compares the alterations in location over time. This
second system is not concerned with telling us about presently occurring
motions, rather it gives rise to the sense that objects have changed their
positions relative to one another. Hence Le Poidevin's proposal. Perhaps
our ordinary experience of motion does, after all, consist of nothing but
momentary static snapshots – in accord with Cinematic antirealism – but
these momentary experiences seem dynamic thanks to the activation of
the ‘pure motion’ mechanism in our visual system. These snapshots do
not actually feature movement, but as the waterfall illusion illustrates,
movement – at least in the form of change of position over time – is not
required for the vivid impression of motion.

Although this is a more promising line for the antirealist to take, it also
faces difficulties. As Le Poidevin recognizes, it is not obvious that the
proposed explanation can be generalized: even if the existence of the

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proposed explanation can be generalized: even if the existence of the

envisaged twin-track neural systems could be established in the visual
case, there is at present no reason to think that there are corresponding
systems for all the other modes of experience, and as Realists will be
swift to point out, change can be heard, felt, remembered and imagined,
as well as seen.[9] A second worry concerns the character of the ‘sense’
or ‘impression’ of motion delivered by the hypothesized pure motion
system. These have to account for the very vivid appearances of motion
in ordinary perceptions, not just the rather peculiar motions produced in
waterfall-type illusions. How precisely do they do this? What is their
character? There are only two obvious options. The impressions could
themselves be sensory ingredients, of a visual kind, which are in some
way suggestive of motion. Alternatively, they could be non-sensory:
perhaps they are akin to judgements, or intuitive feelings (or convictions
or beliefs), bearing a message along the lines of ‘that thing there is
moving!’ The sensory option is problematic, for – as already noted in
connection with Crick and Koch – it is not easy to see what feature of a
still, static image could be sufficiently suggestive of motion. But the non-
sensory option is also vulnerable to an objection. Realists will point out,
once again, that perceived motion – both the ordinary kind, and the
peculiar kind associated with motion aftereffect – exists on the level of
sensory phenomena: it features prominently in our immediate experience.
If this is right, the claim that motion-as-seen can be constituted of
judgements or convictions, no matter how deep-seated or instinctive these
might be, does not seem very plausible.

These issues about temporally dynamic contents aside, there remains the
more general question of whether the Cinematic antirealist can deal in a
satisfactory manner with the continuity of consciousness. If not, the
Cinematic model itself would be less than fully unsatisfactory, even if it
could provide a credible account of our short-term experience of motion
and change. In this regard, the points made in connection with the realist
version of the Cinematic approach (in §4.1) also apply to the antirealist

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version of the Cinematic approach (in §4.1) also apply to the antirealist
version. Whereas Modest Continuity poses no difficulty at all, the
confinement of phenomenal unity to the contents of momentary states
(see Fig. 4.2) means that Strong Continuity is unattainable.

4.5 A More Radical Anti-Realism: Dennett

Given the difficulties antirealists have encountered in doing full justice to

the phenomenological considerations to which their realist counterparts
give such emphasis, they may be tempted – or wise to consider – a more
radical option. Perhaps there is a more dramatic discrepancy between the
actual characteristics of our experience, on the one hand, and our beliefs
about these characteristics on the other, than anything we have considered
up to now. True, we do talk as though we see things move (and more
generally, perceive change), and doubtless this talk reflects our beliefs,
but perhaps our beliefs are simply wrong. Perhaps our immediate
experience is in reality entirely motion-free, and our streams of
consciousness radically fragmented, but since we do not believe our
experience is like this, we do not talk as though it is.

With regard to the continuity issue, as noted in §3, a position along these
lines has been advocated by Dennett. If asked whether our typical visual
fields are fully continuous, even when one of our eyes is closed, most of
us are inclined to answer in the affirmative: when we look at (say) a white
wall, we see an uninterrupted expanse of white. In such cases we are
certainly unable to detect a beachball-sized fuzzy dark expanse lying just
to one side of the central axis of vision. But the physiology of the eye
suggests there should be a ‘blind spot’ at that location, corresponding to
the region of the retina occupied by the optic nerve which is devoid of
light-sensitive cells. As for why we do not detect a blind region in our
visual field, the standard – and on the face of it, plausible – answer is that
our visual systems engage in some ‘perceptual interpolation’ or filling-in:
our brains extrapolate from the stimuli reaching the light-sensitive cells in

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our brains extrapolate from the stimuli reaching the light-sensitive cells in
the region of the retina immediately surrounding the blind-spot, and
fabricate experience to fill the relevant region of the visual field
accordingly.

Dennett points out that there is alternative to this account. Rather than
‘making up’ experience in this manner, perhaps our brains simply fail to
notice that there is a lack of visual information deriving from the hole-
region: after all, an absence of information is not the same thing as
information about an absence. Never having received information from
this region, the brain simply works on the assumption that nothing special
is going on there: ‘The brain doesn't have to “fill in” for the blind spot,
since the region in which the blind spot falls is already labelled (e.g.,
“plaid” … “more of the same”) (1991: 335). In effect, since we have a
belief about what the blind region contains – typically, ‘more of the same’
– why should the brain go to the trouble of generating experience as well?
Dennett goes on to suggest that this treatment of spatial holes can
plausibly be extended to temporal holes (gaps in the continuity of
experience) also. Our visual experience is constantly interrupted by our
eyes darting about during saccades. We don't notice the resulting holes or
gaps in our experience, but they don't need to be filled in because we're
not designed to notice them. More generally: ‘One of the most striking
features of consciousness is its discontinuity – as revealed in the blind
spot, and the saccadic gaps, to take the simplest examples. The
discontinuity of consciousness is striking because of the apparent
continuity of consciousness.’ (1991: 356)

Although Dennett himself concentrates on explaining why we are inclined

to describe our experience as continuous if it really discontinuous, the
approach can be extended to the immediate experience of change – see
Chuard (2006). Perhaps there is no such experience, perhaps the
‘succession of static snapshots’ conception of experience, as proposed by
the Cinematic antirealist is correct. Provided these static snapshots are

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the Cinematic antirealist is correct. Provided these static snapshots are

enough to convince our brains that we are perceiving motion and change,
we will inevitably believe that this is what we are perceiving. Isn't this all
that we are required to explain?

In response realists will fully accept that we believe that change and
continuity (of the Modest and/or Strong forms) are features of our
immediate experience. What they are unlikely to accept is the Dennettian
proposal that (in effect) these features of our experience reduce to these
beliefs. They will claim – and on the face of it, plausibly – that we know
there is more to our consciousness than our beliefs about our
consciousness. We know this because we have direct introspective access
to the content and character of our experiences, and typically, our beliefs
about the character of our experiences are informed by what introspection
reveals. Hence if we believe our visual field is spatially continuous, it is
because – when we direct our attention and introspect – we find precisely
this; similarly, if we believe our immediate experience exhibits continuity
and embraces change, it is because these same features are to be found in
our experience. Prudent realists will accept that our judgements about the
character of our experience are fallible. But they will also point that our
judgements are less likely to err when they concern the more basic and
ubiquitous features of our consciousness, and – arguably – change and
continuity are among these features. The situation would be different if
the antirealist could provide reasons for being particularly sceptical about
our judgements concerning change and continuity – reasons for thinking
that our beliefs about these features of our experience are more dubious
than the belief that colour, sound or warmth are experienced. It is
certainly possible to argue – and some antirealists have (e.g., Plumer
1985) – that we know these beliefs are false because it is impossible to
provide intelligible account of how we can be directly aware of change or
movement. We will be considering such arguments when we come to
assess the viability of the various realist proposals.

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Dennett himself is unmoved by such considerations. While recognising

that we find it natural to think our beliefs about our experiences are
answerable to a distinct and distinctive realm of experience, Dennett
argues that this is misguided, that ultimately – so far as consciousness is
concerned – there is only judgement and belief:

You seem to think there's a difference between thinking (judging,

deciding, being of the heartfelt opinion that) something seems
pink to you and something really seeming pink to you. But there is
no such difference. There is no such difference as really seeming –
over and above the phenomenon of judging in one way or another
that something is the case. (1991: 364)

Dennett's strong reductionism with regard to experience is an extreme and

controversial doctrine. It may well give antirealists what they need, but
many may find the price rather too high.

5. Extensional Models
While PT-realists agree that change, persistence and other temporally
extended phenomena can feature in our immediate experience, they
disagree over the experiential structures which make this possible.
Cinematic realists hold that all our experiences of change are the product
of gap-free successions of momentary stream-phases, each possessing
momentary – and static, motion-free – phenomenal contents. As we saw
in §4.1, although this version of realism can seem appealing, it is also
problematic, in several respects. Proponents of the remaining principal
forms of realism, the Extensional and Retentional approaches, allow that
the contents of our consciousness are themselves dynamic – they can
contain or present succession and persistence – but they disagree about
the manner in which these contents exist within consciousness. On the
Retentional view, which we shall be looking at in more detail in §6, the
dynamic contents are housed in episodes of consciousness that are

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dynamic contents are housed in episodes of consciousness that are

themselves momentary. According to the Extensional view, the topic of
this section, these contents are themselves spread through (or extended
over) time.

5.1 The Extensional Specious Present

Although the Extensional model can be developed in different ways,

much of what these variants have in common can be brought out by
looking at how proponents of the approach construe individual specious
presents. For present purposes, so as to bring the essentials to the fore, it
will be useful to focus on a very simple instance. Figure 5 depicts a single
specious present with a very simple content: ‘C’ and ‘D’ are each brief
tones, which are heard and experienced in succession; this specious
present contains nothing but these two tones.

Figure 5.

Both ‘C’ and ‘D’ here denote the actual ‘live’ experiencings of tones C
and D, rather than memory-images or any other form of after-the-event
representation. The specious present they jointly compose is a (short-ish)
period of continuous experiencing, spread through ordinary time.
Although D occurs later than C, it is also experienced as following on

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Although D occurs later than C, it is also experienced as following on

from C (as indicated by the small block-arrows connecting the two).
Accordingly, what we have here is a genuine experience of succession,
and no mere succession of experiences. Since the tones are experienced
together, albeit in succession, the two are phenomenally unified, or
diachronically co-conscious – as indicated by the lower double-headed
arrow. The limits of the specious present are determined by the temporal
extent of the diachronic co-consciousness relationship.

James sometimes referred to the specious present a duration-block, which

he characterized thus: ‘We do not first feel one end and then feel the other
after it, and from the perception of the succession infer an interval of time
between, but we seem to feel the interval of time as a whole, with its two
ends embedded in it.’ (1890: 610) The specious present of the Extensional
model conforms to this characterization. Since the successive constituents
which compose a duration-block are live experiences, the Extensional
specious present also conforms fully to the Immediacy Thesis (see §3):
change can be experienced with the same force, vivacity (or immediacy)
as colour, sound or any other phenomenal feature.

The specious present, thus construed, is not confined to the housing of

successions of discrete tones: it can also house continuous change, in the
manner shown in Figure 6. Here we see a ball falling, bouncing and rising
again, all within the confines of a single specious present. The contents of
specious presents are often dynamic temporal patterns of this sort –
though of course real-life specious presents will usually have far complex
and more varied content: in addition to perceptual contents (from all five
senses) there will usually be conscious thoughts, bodily sensations, mental
images and so forth.

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Figure 6.

There may seem to be a fundamental difficulty with supposing that our

immediate experience extends through time in the way being envisaged.
Since the successive contents contained within a specious present are
experienced together, isn't there is a sense in which both tones are present
even though they are non-simultaneous? Recalling the Extensional
Simultaneity Problem (from §3), this can easily seem absurd. If x and y
are experienced together, and both x and y are present, how can x and y
fail to be simultaneous? If x and y are both occurring now, mustn't they
also be simultaneous? It is for precisely this reason that Le Poidevin
argues that change and duration cannot be directly perceived.[10]
However, closer scrutiny suggests there is no real difficulty here. The
earlier and later contents of a single specious present do not occupy ‘the
present moment’ if this is construed as the durationless interface between
past and future – the defining trait of the Extensional approach is the
rejection of the confinement of consciousness to momentary stream-
phases. Nonetheless, there is a sense – a quite different sense – in which
all the contents of a specious present could legitimately be regarded as
‘being present’: such contents possess (what we might call) phenomenal
presence, i.e., they each have the immediacy and vivacity that is
characteristic of experiences as they occur. There is no contradiction in

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characteristic of experiences as they occur. There is no contradiction in

the idea that experiences (or experiential contents) at different times can
possess this property, they obviously do: yesterday's toothache was as
vivid and real current toothache at the time I felt it as the toothache I am
currently feeling – both have just as much phenomenal presence.[11]

Returning to our main theme – the makeup of individual specious presents

– while Figures 5 and 6 capture the core features of the Extensional
model, they also have their limitations: the Extensional approach can
accommodate different views as to general character and composition of
consciousness, and these differences do not register in these diagrams.
Some philosophers hold that consciousness has an act-object (or
awareness-content) structure, so every experiencing – even the simplest –
involves two distinguishable components: an awareness (however
construed) on the one hand, and an object or content on the other. Other
philosophers reject this two-level picture, and hold that contents do not
need to fall under an awareness in order to be conscious. As we shall see
in §5.4, the Extensional model is compatible with both these views.
Divergent conceptions of the nature of perceptual experience are also very
relevant in this context. Is the moving item shown in Figure 6 a
phenomenal feature of a conscious state, or is it a physical object in
motion through physical space? Those who incline to the direct (or naïve)
realist view of perception will favour the latter answer, whereas those
who subscribe to the indirect realist (or Lockean-style representational)
view of perception will favour the former answer. In slightly more
general terms, Extensional theorists who believe that in our ordinary
perceptual experience we are presented with purely phenomenal items
(sense-data, qualia or similar) will regard the visual and auditory contents
of specious presents as themselves being phenomenal in nature. Although
most Extensional theorists subscribe to this general view of perception –
e.g., Foster, Broad, Dainton, Sprigge – there is no obvious obstacle to
combining the Extensional conception of the specious present with a
direct realist construal of perception. With this combination of views, a

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direct realist construal of perception. With this combination of views, a

typical specious present will consist of a temporally extended episode of
awareness, some of whose contents will be internal or phenomenal (e.g., a
conscious thought, a mental image), whereas others will be external (e.g.,
a bouncing ball, a moving car). [12]

Enough has been said – for present purposes at least – about individual
specious presents. The next task is to examine how individual specious
presents, construed in a broadly Extensional manner, combine to form
continuous streams of consciousness. As we shall see, on this issue there
are significant divergences of opinion among Extensional theorists –
divergences which impact significantly on the general structure of
temporal consciousness.

5.2 The Discrete Block Model

When it comes to explaining how individual specious presents combine to

form streams of consciousness, a simple and perspicuous solution is
available to the Extensional theorist: perhaps a stream of consciousness is
nothing more than a succession of specious presents laid end-to-end in the
manner of a line of building blocks, or bricks in a wall, in the manner
depicted in Figure 7 below. Here just a short stretch of a stream of
consciousness is depicted, consisting of just two adjacent specious
presents, SP 1 and SP 2, but the same experiential structure could easily
extend over longer periods.

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Figure 7.

Something along the lines of this ‘Discrete Block’ (as we might call it)
conception of a stream of consciousness has been advocated by Sprigge,
Bradley and (perhaps) Whitehead.[13] But while it has a simplicity that
may well be appealing, it is also problematic.

PT-realists are agreed that change and succession feature in our

immediate experience. To be viable on the phenomenological level, a
realist account of how this is possible must not just capture some of the
change that it is plausible to suppose we directly experience, it must
capture all of it. Let us suppose that C-D-E-F in Figure 7 are brief tones
that are heard in succession. Given that this sequence is a typical one –
with no sudden or massive disruptions in the listener's consciousness over
the relevant period – each tone will be heard as flowing into (or giving
way) to its immediate successor. The discrete block model certain
captures some of these experienced transitions: namely C-D (occurring in
SP 1) and E-F (occurring in SP 2). But what of the transition between D
and E? Since each of these tones occurs in a distinct specious present, and
(by hypothesis) there is no specious present which includes them both,
this transition is not experienced. For a sequence of contents to be
experienced as a succession, they must be experienced together, and to be
experienced together they need to be diachronically co-conscious. C and
D are thus related, as are E and F, but D and E are not diachronically co-
conscious. The tones are experienced in a sequence – D is heard first,
then E – but they are not experienced as a sequence – or to put it another
way, these tones form a succession of experiences, but there is no
experience of succession. The difficulty is serious and pervasive: Figure 7
illustrates just one instance of a ‘missed’ succession, if the Discrete Block
model obtained, every transition between successive specious presents
would fail to be experienced. Evidently, this is not a desirable result, at
least from the standpoint of realism.

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Essentially the same point can be made in terms of the distinction drawn
in §3 between the Moderate and Strong Continuity theses. If our streams
of consciousness were structured in the way envisaged, there would be no
gaps in our experience – no periods during which nothing is being
experienced – and so the key requirement of Modest Continuity is
satisfied. But the Strong Continuity Thesis requires more: as well as an
absence of gaps, all the successive brief phases which make up a single
stream must experientially connected to their immediate neighbours –
each must be experienced as flowing into its successor. The Discrete
Block model evidently falls short in this respect.

5.3 Broad's Partial Extensionalism

A very different variant of the Extensional approach was proposed by

C.D. Broad in Scientific Thought (1923). As we have already seen, Broad
subscribed to the Immediacy Thesis: he held that (over short intervals) we
experience change with the same phenomenal immediacy as we
experience colour or sound. Since change can only be directly
apprehended if our consciousness can span a temporal interval, Broad
concluded that consciousness can span a temporal interval. Given this
commitment, his (1923) account is naturally classed as Extensional.
However, as noted in §2.7, this is not the whole story: the mechanics of
Broad's account are such that is probably more accurately construed as
only partially Extensional. For Broad also held that our experience of
change occurs within momentary episodes of experiencing – a doctrine
which is characteristic of Retentional accounts.

This hybrid model is heavily dependent upon a particular conception of

the structure of experience. Broad generally worked with a two-level ‘act-
object’ or ‘awareness-content’ conception of consciousness. On this
conception, any episode of experiencing comprises two components: an
act of awareness, and a phenomenal content; experiences per se come into
being when contents are apprehended by acts of awareness. Broad starts

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being when contents are apprehended by acts of awareness. Broad starts

his analysis by proposing that acts of awareness that are themselves
strictly momentary are capable of apprehending phenomenal contents
distributed over short periods of time, in the manner depicted in Figure 8.

Figure 8.

The earlier and later parts of the temporal spread apprehended by the
momentary act of awareness depicted in Figure 8 are evidently
experienced together – they are diachronically co-conscious – and they
are also experienced as a succession. This spread of content is
experienced as a temporally extended whole, in conformity with James'
characterization of the specious present as a ‘duration-block’. There is
however, one significant point of divergence: whereas James held that the
specious present both backward and forward (or future-directed)
elements, for Broad it is entirely backward-looking: it stretches from the
present point of time a short distance into the past.

Whatever one may think of its reliance on a ‘momentary awareness +

extended content’ mechanism, Broad's theory has – on the face of it at
least – a distinctive advantage over the Sprigge's Discrete Block model
when it comes to conforming to the Strong Continuity Thesis. The many
experienced successions the Discrete Block model fails to register are all

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experienced successions the Discrete Block model fails to register are all
effortlessly captured by Broad's theory. This is easily appreciated with the
assistance of Figure 9.

Figure 9.

As can be seen, act of awareness A1 apprehends the tone-sequence C-D,

and act of awareness A3 apprehends the tone-sequence E-F, but the tone-
sequence not recognized by the Discrete Block model – D-E – is now
apprehended by the act of awareness A2, which occurs between A1 and
A3. Since Broad postulated that the acts of awareness form a dense
continuum (hence between A1 and A2 there are uncountable number of
other acts, and likewise between A2 and A3) the theory can accommodate
all the experienced transitions it needs to accommodate. The act-
continuum is represented in Figure 9 by the line running beneath A1-A3.

In the light of what has been said so far, it would be natural to suppose
that Broad would identify individual specious presents with momentary
acts and the contents these acts apprehend (e.g., the combination A1[C-D]
would count as a single specious present). In fact he opted for another
position. Agreeing with James that strictly durationless experiences (or
apprehensions) are abstractions, Broad insists that a viable account of
sensible duration must rest on the foundation of continuous periods of
sensing. Since he defines the duration of the specious present in terms of
momentary acts, strictly speaking temporally extended acts do not
possess specious presents; however, they do possess close analogues of
these: what is (in effect) the specious present of an interval of sensing S is

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these: what is (in effect) the specious present of an interval of sensing S is

the stretch of content that is apprehended throughout S. To get a rough
idea of what this involves, consider the continuous act of sensing A1-A2
in Figure 9. What stretch of content does the specious present of this act
comprise? According to Broad the answer is D. The earlier phases of A1-
A2 apprehend C (or parts of it), and the later phases of it apprehend E (or
parts of it), but D is the largest stretch of content that is apprehended by
every phase of A1-A2.

This feature of Broad's theory is counterintuitive, and it gives rise to some

intriguing, and arguably peculiar, results. [14] Present purposes, however,
will best be served by concentrating on two most fundamental problems
faced by Broad's account. The first worry concerns phenomenological
adequacy. Consider again tone-phase D in Figure 9. As we have just seen,
it is experienced as a whole throughout the period of sensing [A 1-A2].
Broad may reject durationless acts of sensing, but he does not reject acts
of sensing of varying extents or durations, and [A 1-A2] includes as proper
parts many acts of finite duration that are shorter than itself, and just as
[A 1-A2] apprehends D as a whole, so too do all these finite parts. In
which case, instead of being experienced just once, won't D be
experienced many times over? How could it be otherwise, given that each
of these finite parts includes an experiencing of the whole of D? If
Broad's model predicts the existence of experiences which do not actually
occur, it seems safe to conclude that the mechanism at the heart of it is
flawed.[15]

The second worry is whether Broad's model can secure the continuity of
consciousness in a way that is acceptable to the realist. At the heart of
Broad's account are acts of sensing which apprehend temporally extended
contents. Since in the case of a continuous stream of consciousness these
acts form a dense continuum, there is no difficulty with ‘gaps’ in
consciousness, and so Broad's account meets the requirements of the
Modest Continuity Thesis. It is not clear, however, that it meets the

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Modest Continuity Thesis. It is not clear, however, that it meets the

requirements of the Strong Continuity Thesis. To do so, Broad's account
must allow successive phases of a stream to be experienced as flowing
into one another – it must make room for experiential connections
between stream-phases – but this looks problematic. Returning to Figure
9, consider the extended act of sensing stretching from A1 to AN , and the
extended act stretching from shortly after AN to A2, where AN (not
shown in the figure) is roughly mid-way between A1 and A2. These two
extended acts can be as close together in time we like, but they are
nonetheless entirely distinct acts of awareness, and the two are not
experientially connected. Hence the problem. It is true that the acts
apprehend (in part) the same content, but it is not clear this suffices to
forge the required experiential links. We can certainly stipulate that the
acts concerned have the same subject, but in the absence of any
compelling story as to how this secures phenomenal continuity it is not
clear how this helps either. Nor is it clear that a viable account can be
constructed if we remain faithful to the spirit of Broad's approach.
Suppose we were to hold that the acts [A 1-AN ] and [A N -A2] are unified
by virtue of their both falling under a second-order act of awareness, an
act which apprehends first-order acts (and their contents). Since the entire
spread of content apprehended over the interval encompassed by A1 and
A2 would be experienced together, the result would be
phenomenologically unrealistic: the specious present would have twice
the duration that it has in actuality. And the difficulties do not end here:
for what unifies the second-order acts? As illustrated in Figure 10, if we
take this route, we can easily end up with a situation in which the entire
content of a stream of consciousness is apprehended as a single whole, by
a single all-embracing act.

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Figure 10.

According to one theological tradition, God's experience has the character

of a totum simul, and takes in the entire history of the universe in a single
apprehension. Since it is clear that our is experience is not of this form –
the span of our immediate awareness is measured in seconds at most – it
is clear that this way of securing Strong Continuity is a non-starter.

5.4 The Overlap Model

The problems encountered by the Discrete Block theory and Broad's

hybrid model point the way forward to a more promising Extensional
account. Recall the problem of ‘missed transitions’ that afflicts the
Discrete Block model: in the case of the succession of tones C-D-E-F,
although C and D are experienced as phenomenally continuous, E and F
likewise, D and E are not – for unlike [C-D] and [E-F] they do not fall
within the confines of a single specious present (see Figure 7). There is a
simple remedy for this problem: the omitted transition can be restored by
positing that [D-E] itself forms a single specious present – a further
‘duration block’ in the manner of Sprigge and Bradley – which for

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‘duration block’ in the manner of Sprigge and Bradley – which for

convenience we can call SP X . Since (by hypothesis) D-E is an
experienced succession, this stipulation is well-motivated on the
phenomenological level. What is more, this useful result has been
achieved without recourse to Broad's momentary-act/extended content
conception of the specious present: the account remains fully (rather than
merely partially) Extensionalist.

As Figure 11 makes clear, acknowledging the existence of SP X does not

commit us to recognizing any experiences in addition to C-D-E-F, for
SP X is composed of the second-half of SP 1 (= D) and the first-half of
SP 2 (= E). To put it another way, there is a D-type experience to be found
in SP 1 and also in SP X , but there are not two token D-type experiences,
for the simple reason that the D-token in SP 1 is numerically identical
with the D-token in SP X , and similarly for E. By holding that specious
presents can overlap by sharing common parts, phenomenal continuity
can be secured in an economical manner. As Foster puts it: ‘where the
successive patterns overlap, the experiences which present them overlap
in a corresponding way’ (1991: 249).

Figure 11.

Recognizing the existence of SP X may not incur the cost of additional

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Recognizing the existence of SP X may not incur the cost of additional

experiences, but it does involve the introduction of additional experiential
relationships. It is now being supposed that D and E are connected by the
relationship of diachronic co-consciousness, whereas previously it was
previously held that only C-D and E-F were so related. But on the
assumption that D and E constitute a directly experienced succession, D
evidently is diachronically co-conscious with E.

As this example also illustrates, the relationship of diachronic co-

consciousness is not transitive: C and D are related in this manner, as are
D and E, but C and E are not so related. This failure of transitivity plays a
crucial role in ensuring that the overlap theory delivers a
phenomenologically realistic result. If diachronic co-consciousness were
transitive, all the phases of a continuous stream of consciousness would
be experienced together – we would be back with the totum simul. The
point concerning transitivity failure was perhaps first noted by Russell in
his ‘On the Experience of Time’ (1913), where he assumes specious
presents combine by overlap to form streams of consciousness. [16] The
Overlap Model (as we can call it) in the form just outlined has been
advocated on several occasions by Foster (1979; ;1982: 255ff; 1991: 247–
50) and Dainton (2000/6: §7; 2003; 2009).

Its proponents intend the Overlap Model to capture not just the structure
of a sequences of tones, but of entire streams of consciousness. If the
Overlap theorists are right, such streams are composed of successions of
stream-phases which overlap by sharing common parts, in the manner of
C-D-E-F. However, on close scrutiny the description just given of the
structure of even this simple sequence turns out to be inadequate. By
supposing that SP X exists, in addition to SP 1 and SP 2 we capture an
experienced transition (or specious present) which actually exists, but
which gets ignored by the Discrete Block model. But does Figure 11
include all the experienced transitions which exist in the case of C-D-E-
F? Given the continuous character of our experience, probably not: for
just as D-E is experienced as an extended whole, so to is the tone-pattern

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just as D-E is experienced as an extended whole, so to is the tone-pattern

running from the mid-point in C to the mid-point in E, or from the three-
quarter point in D to the three-quarter point in F, and so on for many
(many) other cases. These ‘omitted transitions’ are easily accommodated
by the Overlap Model, as illustrated in Figure 12. This new example is
still unrealistically simplistic, for once again only a single sensory
modality is represented, in the form of a visual experience of a bouncing
ball, but it in one key respect it is less artificial.

Figure 12.

As this diagram makes illustrates, specious presents can be more closely

packed than sequence of tones depicted in Figure 11. In this new
example, each double-headed line represents a distinct specious present,
each differing from its immediate neighbours by a just-noticeable
difference. [17] Although these specious presents overlap to a very
significant degree, given that the overlap takes the form of a sharing of
common parts, there is no phenomenologically unrealistic repetitions: the
greater the extent to which two specious presents overlap, the greater the
number of phases they share. What we have here is what is needed: a
temporally extended stretch of consciousness that is phenomenally
continuous, and which includes all the experienced transitions which are
experienced. Or so the Overlap theorists maintain.

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The ‘duration-blocks’ we have been dealing with latterly are unified

episodes of experiencing, conceived in the Sprigge-Bradley manner, i.e.
as collections of phenomenal contents that are also phenomenally unified
(or experienced together). The Overlap Model can also be developed in
the context of an awareness-content conception of experience, of the sort
which Broad adopted. The most straightforward way of implementing this
‘awareness-overlap’ model is illustrated in Figure 13. Here A1, A2 and
A3 are temporally extended acts of awareness, apprehending contents C-
D, D-E and E-F respectively. Each of these acts generates a single
specious present. We further suppose that these acts overlap by sharing
common parts, i.e., that the portion of A1 which apprehends D is
numerically identical with the portion of A2 which apprehends D, and
likewise for the portions of A2 and A3 which apprehend E. Once again
we have a situation in which continuous streams of consciousness are
composed of overlapping specious presents.

Figure 13.

When the awareness-content conception of the specious present is

developed in this manner the problems which afflicted Broad's account no
longer arise. Phenomenal continuity is secured by the overlapping of
neighbouring acts of sensing (e.g., the second half of A1 and the first half
of A2 are numerically identical). As Foster notes (1979), these overlaps

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of A2 are numerically identical). As Foster notes (1979), these overlaps

also solve the problem of repeatedly-experienced contents. If A1 and A2
are discrete acts then D is experienced twice-over. But if A1 and A2
overlap in the manner indicated, D is experienced just once: by the
episode of sensing that is common to A1 and A2.

So much for the bare bones of the Overlap version of Extensionalism. For
further elaboration and discussion see Dainton (2003, 2009).

5.5 Problems and Prospects

The Overlap Model looks to be the most promising variant of the

Extensional approach. Like other Extensional accounts, it allows change
and succession to be directly experienced in a clear and unambiguous
manner, and so fully satisfies the requirements of realism. Also, by virtue
of the fact that each successive phase of an Extensional specious present
contains ordinary first-order experiences, the requirements of the
Immediacy Thesis are also met: change and succession can be
experienced with maximal (phenomenal) vividness. Further, and
distinctively, the Overlap Model secures both Modest and Strong
Continuity: not only is a (typical) stream of consciousness a gap-free
stretch of experience, but each of its successive brief phases is
experientially connected to its immediate neighbours. Kelly (2005: 231)
points out that for the Extensional approach to be viable it must be able to
explain how we manage to perceive continuous changes which last longer
than the specious present, which in turn requires an explanation of how it
is possible for specious presents to be strung together; he also suggests no
such explanation is available. The Overlap approach provides just such an
explanation.

Despite this, some critics have suggested the overlap mechanism is

surplus to requirements. Gallagher (2003) is unable to find any trace of
the alleged overlaps between specious presents in his own experience, and
concludes that the account is phenomenologically suspect. The Overlap

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concludes that the account is phenomenologically suspect. The Overlap

theorist can respond by arguing that the seamless continuity, lasting for
minutes or hours, that we find in our streams of consciousness is itself
evidence for the proposed overlap structure, since the latter is responsible
for the continuity in question:

Suppose you hear a succession A-B-C; you hear A-running-into-

B, and B-running-into-C. Since you hear [B] only once, we can
immediately conclude that the experiencing of [B] in the earlier
phenomenal present is numerically identical with the experiencing
of [B] in the later phenomenal present, and hence that you have
just experienced two phenomenal presents that overlapped by
virtue of possessing a common part. This identity not just a
reasonable inference, it is directly apprehended: the [B] that you
experience [A] running-into is one and the same experience as the
[B] that you experience running-into [C]. This overlap structure is
not, I concede, immediately obvious. We find it most natural to
think of ourselves as simply experiencing A-flowing-into-B-
flowing-into-C. The fact that this extended experience consists of
overlapping phenomenal presents only becomes apparent after
some reflection and introspective experimentation, but once thus
equipped, the existence of overlap- structures within our ordinary
experience becomes obvious. More generally, if we accept the
overlap model, then we are all continually aware of experiential
overlaps, for it is these overlaps which are directly responsible for
the experienced continuity of our streams of consciousness.
(Dainton 2003: §6)

If these claims are true, the Extensional model (in its Overlap mode) has
secure foundations. But are they? Strawson (2009: Part 5) argues, in
effect, that direct experiential connections between successive stream-
phases are invisible to introspection; for further discussion see Dainton
(2004: §4).

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(2004: §4).

In a different vein, Mabbot argues that ‘qualitative differences of content

alone determine sub-divisions within our continuous experience’(1951:
166). Finding this plausible, Phillips (2010: 189) suggests that the overlap
theory ‘looks like unwholesome food served to a man already full’.
Overlap theorists will agree that content does indeed provide a way of
demarcating subdivisions within streams – the period spent listening to
the sound of a passing plane, or watching a bird fly across the sky, etc. –
but they will insist that an additional ingredient is required. We need to be
able to explains why it is that we are only directly aware of change and
persistence over short intervals, rather than the several hours through
which a typical stream of consciousness extends. By holding that the
diachronic co-consciousness relationship only extends for a short interval
the Overlap theorist can meets this need. In the Overlap Model inherently
dynamic contents and the limited span of the diachronic co-consciousness
relationship work together in delivering (what is arguably) a
phenomenologically realistic result.

Other criticisms are directed at the Extensional specious present. One

main issue here concerns phenomenal unity. As we saw in §2.5, Meinong
(1899: 187) pointed out a potential difficulty with Stern's temporally
extended ‘presence-time’ (in effect, an Extensionalist specious present). If
a specious present extends through (ordinary) time, the parts or phases of
which it is composed – let us designate them [P1, P 2, P 3 … P n] – will
also be distributed through time. The question then arises as to what
unifies these components. If nothing unifies them, we are left with a
succession experiences, but no experience of succession. We could hold
that [P1, P 2, P 3 … P n] are unified because they fall within the scope of a
single episode of awareness A, but if we also hold that A is extended
through ordinary time, the original problem simply re-occurs: A will be
composed of a succession of phases, [A 1, A2, A3 … An], and unless

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composed of a succession of phases, [A 1, A2, A3 … An], and unless

these phases are themselves unified, we will once again be left with a
mere succession of experiencings. To avoid this we might posit a higher-
order act awareness, A*, which takes [A 1, A2, A3 … An] and their
contents its objects, and in so doing creates an experience of succession.
But if we suppose that A* is a temporally extended episode of awareness,
then evidently we have solved nothing – what unifies the component parts
of A*? – and are embarked on a menacing-looking infinite regress.
Happily, there is a simple and obvious way to avoid this regress: we need
simply hold that the awareness A which unifies [P1, P 2, P 3 … P n] itself
lacks temporal extension. If A is strictly momentary, the problem of what
unifies its constituent phases simply does not arise: it lacks such phases
entirely.

This influential line of argument leads directly to PSA, and thence to the
associated Retentional model of temporal consciousness. Although the
difficulty may seem serious, the Extensional theorist has an effective line
of reply: the argument in question can be seen as simply begging the
question. Recall the way in which the Extensional theorist construes an
individual specious present, as depicted in Figures 5 and 6: a single
specious present is viewed as a temporal spread of contents that are all
experienced together, i.e., that are diachronically co-conscious. Right at
the heart of the Extensional model is an assumption concerning the nature
of phenomenal unity. The assumption is precisely that phenomenal unity
is not confined to contents that are momentary and simultaneous, it can
embrace contents that are spread (a short distance) through time.
Accordingly, provided the envisaged succession of phases [P1, P 2, P 3 …
P n] are related in this manner – they are diachronically co-conscious, and
so are experienced together – they already constitute an experience of
succession, and nothing further is required. Now it could be that the
Extensional theorists are misguided in making this assumption: perhaps
phenomenal unity cannot extend over time in the way they claim. But
since the line of argument set out in the previous paragraph simply
ignores the mode of phenomenal unity posited by Extensional model

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ignores the mode of phenomenal unity posited by Extensional model

theorists, it fails to provide us with any reason for thinking this is the
case. In effect, the objection presupposes that that synchronic phenomenal
unity – the sort of unity which obtains among simultaneous momentary
contents – is the only mode of phenomenal unity.

Since Extensional specious presents comprise earlier and later phases that
are experienced together, in a single unified (albeit extended) state of
consciousness, it may well be that Extensional models are incompatible
with the Presentist conception of time, according to which only what is
present is real. For two phenomenal contents C 1 and C 2 be experienced
together, to be diachronically co-conscious, both C 1 and C 2 must surely
both exist. But if Presentism were true, when C 1 is present C 2 would be
non-existent, and when C 2 is present C 1 would be non-existent.
Extensional theorists will not be overly worried by this consequence,
which they will construe as a reason for rejecting the Presentist
conception of time. See §7.2 for further discussion of this issue.

Coming from a very different direction, Grush has argued (forthcoming

§5) that Retentional models have a distinct advantage over Extensional
models when it comes to accommodating certain ‘temporal illusions’. The
relevant category of cases are those where a stimuli occurring later than a
time t affects the character of what is perceived as occurring at t itself; the
so-called flash-lag effect and the phi-phenomenon fall into this category.
These instances of (apparent) retro-active causation are only found
occurring over brief intervals, but they are certainly as puzzling as they
are intriguing. Grush suggests that Retentional models can handle such
cases by virtue of the fact that what is perceived as occurring at t need not
remain constant from one specious present to another. So, for example, a
particular spot of light might be perceived as motionless in a specious
present S1 occurring very shortly after t, and that same spot might be
perceived as being in motion in a later specious present S2. This option is
not available to Extensional theorists – since on this view the spot is

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not available to Extensional theorists – since on this view the spot is

represented just once – and as a consequence there will be conflicting
perceptual experiences of what is occurring at t: the spot will be
perceived (impossibly) as both stationary and in motion. However, there
are replies available to the Extensional theorist. It takes some time for our
perceptual systems to produce an experience in response to a stimuli;
perhaps our perceptual systems make use of this time to work out (as it
were) a single coherent response to ambiguous or conflicting stimuli.
Accordingly, rather than the spot's being experienced as both stationary
and as moving, it is experienced just the once, in motion. For more on the
relevant illusions, Grush's argument, and the responses available to the
Extensionalist see Section 3 of the supplementary document Husserl, the
Brain and Cognitive Science, and the supplementary document
Interpreting Temporal Illusions.

Still more recently, Pelczar has argued (forthcoming A and B) that the
Extensional model rests on an inadequate conception of the temporal
microstructure of consciousness. An Extensional specious present is a
chunk of experiencing which extends over a second or so of ordinary
time, so it will inevitably possesses temporal parts – the still briefer
chunks of experiencing of which it is composed – and the briefest of these
parts will be strictly momentary episodes of experiencing. Since on the
Extensional model it takes an interval of time to experience change or
succession, these momentary stream-phases will not contain any
experience of change: their contents will be entirely static in character.
This is problematic, argues Pelczar, because we have good reason to
believe it is impossible for such experiences to exist. The grounds for this
are phenomenological: ‘When I have an experience as of some smooth
continuous change – when watching a leaf drift to the ground, for
example, or listening to a steadily rising tone – my experience does not
contain or decompose into a series of experiences that are not as of
change’ (forthcoming A). Since the briefest of experiences that we can
conceive or imagine contains some element of change, or passage – or so

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conceive or imagine contains some element of change, or passage – or so

Pelczar maintains – we should accept that experience is essentially
dynamic, or better: subjectively dynamic. Since the momentary episodes
of experience which feature in the Extensional model do not feature
change, it seems that Extensional specious presents are composed of
ingredients which cannot possibly exist. Retentionalist accounts do not
face this difficulty. A Retentionalist specious present is momentary
episode of experiencing whose contents are (by hypothesis) subjectively
dynamic.

If this reasoning is sound, it looks as though we have good reason for

preferring the Retentional model to the Extensional alternative. However,
there are replies available to the Extensionalist. One option is to hold
grant that phenomenal contents are essentially (subjectively) dynamic, but
hold that the briefest genuine episodes of experiencing in a specious
present (or stream of consciousness) have a finite temporal extension; on
this view momentary cross-sections of a stream of consciousness are no
more than abstractions. A second option is to reject the claim that
phenomenal contents are essentially dynamic. We may not be able to
imagine experiential contents that are entirely static, but this doesn't mean
they are not possible: perhaps our imaginations are incapable of
recreating all possible modes of experience. A third, and more intriguing
option, is to accept that experience is essentially dynamic, and also accept
that a stream can decompose into ever briefer parts, but reject the
assumption that this decomposition must terminate in durationless
episodes of experience. An alternative possibility is that the
decomposition continues indefinitely – to infinity – without ever
terminating in durationless point-like parts. In contemporary parlance,
perhaps consciousness has the structure of atomless gunk. This species of
gunk is a sort of stuff that is infinitely divisible, but not possessing point-
like parts: all the parts of a portion of gunk have proper parts, without
end. Whitehead and Broad were of the view that ordinary space and time
possessed this structure. Irrespective of whether they were right about

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possessed this structure. Irrespective of whether they were right about

this, it may be that our streams of consciousness have this structure. If so,
then they can possess an infinite number of parts, all of which have some
(usually very brief) duration, and each of these parts may have a dynamic
content. Wherever the truth lies on this issue, the temporal microstructure
of experience looks to be fertile ground for Extensionalist exploration.

For discussion of some further issues relating to the Extensional specious

present see the supplementary document The Specious Present: Further
Issues.

6. Retentional Models
Having looked in some detail at two of the main forms of PT-realism –
the Cinematic approach (in §4.1) and the Extensional model (in §5) –
there remains the third: the Retentional model. Although the Retentional
model itself comes in several variants, its proponents share a distinctive
conception of the structure of temporal consciousness. Whereas
Extensional theorists hold that our immediate experience of change and
succession occurs within specious presents which are themselves
extended through time, Retentional theorists hold that individual specious
presents lack temporal duration, but have contents which succeed in
presenting (or representing) temporally extended phenomena. As
standardly conceived, a Retentionalist specious present consists of a
complex of experiential contents, comprising an instantaneous (or near-
instantaneous) phase of immediate experience, together with a collection
of representations – retentions – of the recent past, all packaged into an
episode of experiencing that is momentary; a stream of consciousness is
composed of a continuum of these momentary episodes.[18]

In effect, whereas Extensional specious presents run horizontally along

the time-line, Retentional specious presents stands vertically, at right-
angles to it. On the face of it the Extensional approach is the more natural

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angles to it. On the face of it the Extensional approach is the more natural
way for a realist to go: the most obvious and straightforward explanation
of how we can be directly aware of change and persistence is to hold that
our direct awareness can span an interval of ordinary time. By contrast,
the Retentional view can seem almost perverse: why think that our
apparently immediate experience of change and persistence is in fact
packaged into momentary (or extremely brief) slices of experience? Since
it is by no means obvious how this can be, Retentionalism is not the
obvious way to go. Yet a good many of the most famous names
associated with the specious present – James (at times), Husserl, Broad
(in his later work on the topic) – have opted for the Retentional approach.
Before looking at Retentional models in more detail, it is worth pausing
to consider the motivations which have led such philosophers to move in
this direction.

6.1 Retentional Models: Motivations

Why think our experience of change occurs in experiences which are

themselves durationless? There are a number of considerations which
point in this direction; some of these we have already encountered, others
we have not.

For the Retentional model to be viable at all, we must be able to make

sense of the idea that duration and succession, in the forms we
immediately experience them, can be contained in episodes of
experiencing that are themselves without duration. Provided one draws
some relevant distinctions, this is by no means as impossible as it might
initially seem. The three letters ‘R E D’ can represent red without
themselves being red; and the same applies, mutatis mutandis, for ‘L O U
D’ and ‘S Q U A R E’. Generally speaking, the properties of a
representation (that which is doing the representing) and the content of
that representation (what is represented) can differ dramatically. The
distinction extends to mental representations: the conscious thought ‘the

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distinction extends to mental representations: the conscious thought ‘the

Earth's equator is circular’ succeeds in representing the geometrical
property of circularity without itself possessing this property. Bearing this
in mind, there is no obvious reason why the temporal properties of a
mental representation R need entirely coincide with the temporal
properties of the content C carried by R. Accordingly, in a more extreme
case, it may be possible for a content C to have an apparent duration of a
second or so, whereas R exists in an episode of experiencing which has no
significant duration at all. Retentionalists such as Meinong and Husserl
were well aware of the need to distinguish between the temporal
properties featuring in the contents of experience, from the temporal
properties of the experiences carrying these contents. (For more on this
distinction see §7.1.)

As for the question of motivation, common sense no doubt plays a role.

Reid's contention (see §2.3) that ‘the senses give us information of things
only as they exist in the present moment’ has a good deal of intuitive
plausibility, as does taking the present moment to lack duration, in the
manner of Augustine. Anyone who subscribes to each of these doctrines
and who also believes we are immediately aware of change has little
option but to opt for the Retentional approach. Tradition is another likely
reason. As we saw in §2.4, in his First Critique Kant maintained that we
could only have experience of the sort we have if at every moment we
also retain something of our prior experience: ‘if I were always to lose the
preceding representations (the first parts of the line, the preceding parts of
the time, or the successively represented unity) from my thoughts, and not
reproduce them when I proceed to the following ones, then no whole
representation and none of the previously mentioned thoughts, not even
the purest and most fundamental representations of space and time, could
ever arise.’ (A102) For philosophers working within the Kantian and
Post-Kantian tradition – and this includes the majority of European
phenomenologists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries – it would be
natural to start from the assumption that our experience of change and

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natural to start from the assumption that our experience of change and
persistence arises from a combination of two factors: a momentary phase
of present experience and simultaneously apprehended reproductions or
retentions of just-past experiences.

Many realists have no doubt found the Retentional approach appealing

because it offers a simple and intuitively satisfying explanation of how an
experience of succession differs from a mere succession of experiences: in
the former case, the contents forming the succession are presented
together, as an ensemble, to a single momentary awareness. Brentano and
Husserl both subscribed to The Principle of Simultaneous Awareness
(PSA) ‘No succession of awarenesses – no matter how close together in
time they come – can, by itself, account for an awareness of succession; it
must be the case that an awareness of succession derives from
simultaneous features of the structure of that awareness’ (Miller (1984:
109). As we saw in §5.5, Meinong and Husserl both argued – correctly –
that the successive phases of a temporally extended awareness of the sort
advocated by Stern needed to be unified, and both realized that a unifying
act which is not temporally extended does not face the same difficulty.
Indeed, it may well be that some theorists, consciously or unconsciously,
have found the Retentional approach appealing because of the way it (in
effect) reduces the problem of diachronic phenomenal unity to the
comparatively straightforward problem of synchronic unity. Although the
latter is by no means unproblematic – there are different accounts of it – it
is at least widely accepted that there is such a thing as synchronic
phenomenal unity.

A further, and no less deep, motivation for the Retentional view is

connected with the common sense considerations mentioned above: tacit
assumptions, of a broadly metaphysical character, concerning the
structure or nature of time itself are very relevant in this context. There
may well be no single conception of time which perfectly fits all our
common sense assumptions about it, but Presentism – the doctrine,

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common sense assumptions about it, but Presentism – the doctrine,

favoured by Augustine, that neither the past nor the future exist, and
hence that only the present is real – fits them better than most. If the
momentary present is all that is real, there is no obvious option but to
locate our experience of change and persistence in the momentary present.
(The relationship between different conceptions of temporal
consciousness and different ways of thinking about time per se is the
topic of §7.2 below.)

A similar conclusion can be reached without recourse to highly

controversial conceptions of time. Russell once wrote ‘There is no logical
impossibility in the hypothesis that the world sprang into being five
minutes ago, exactly as it then was, with a population that “remembered”
a wholly unreal past. There is no logically necessary connection between
events at different times’ (1921: 159). If the world could have sprung into
existence five minutes ago, why not five seconds, or five nano-seconds
ago? The claim that the subjective character of our current experience is
logically independent of the past can seem eminently plausible. But so too
can the claim that the character of our current experience is logically
independent of the future. Suppose five seconds from now I were to be
instantaneously annihilated by a nuclear bomb concealed under my chair.
Would this fact impinge on my current experience? It seems unlikely –
how can something that is yet to happen affect what is happening now?
But doesn't the same apply if I will be annihilated a mere five nano-
seconds from now? It seems plausible to think that it does. This reasoning
leads ineluctably to the conclusion that the character of our experience at
any one time is logically independent of our past and future experiences,
and this applies to every part of every stream of consciousness. If this is
the case, our experience of change and persistence cannot essentially
depend on experiential connections between the neighbouring phases of
our streams of consciousness, connections of the sort Extensional models
posit and require: for if such connections were to exist, adjoining stream-
phases would not be logically independent of one another. And if

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phases would not be logically independent of one another. And if

adjoining momentary stream phases are logically independent of one
another, it may well be that the Retentional approach is the only game in
town.

6.2 The Retentional Specious Present: challenges and variations

Let us suppose that for the past minute or so you have just been watching
the pointer moving around a dial; the pointer has been moving
sufficiently quickly that you are able to see it in motion. Let us further
suppose that your experience of change is occurring within the confines
of a succession of specious presents, and that each of the latter consists of
a momentary phase of perceptual experience together with a sequence of
retentions of recent experiences. For present purposes, we can think of
retentions as a special form of past-directed mental representations that
are triggered in an automatic (and involuntary) manner after each
momentary phase of experiencing. This basic Retentional model is
depicted in Figure 14.

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Figure 14.

In the bottom row of the diagram are three momentary perceptual

experiences, registering the location of the pointer at three neighbouring
times. For convenience, only a small selection of such experiences have
been shown; we can suppose that in reality you enjoyed a distinct
momentary experience for (at least) each discernibly distinct location of
the pointer as it moved from the half-past position to the quarter-to
position. The vertical column to the right depicts a single specious
present, S. This has two sorts of component: a momentary visual
experience of the dial-face (with the pointer at quarter-to); accompanying
the latter (and co-conscious with it) are retentions of the earlier
experiences, shown unshaded and in dotted outline. Again, only a few of
the actual retentions are shown in the diagram: in reality there will be a
retention corresponding to each of the momentary perceptual experiences
you enjoyed during this brief interval. We are to suppose that your direct
experience of change – in this case visible movement – takes place
exclusively within these vertical structures.

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exclusively within these vertical structures.

So much for the basics of the Retentional model. Might experiential

structures of this sort be responsible for our immediate experience of
change and persistence? Perhaps, but there are a number of hurdles which
must be crossed or circumvented.

For a Retentional model to amount to a viable form of PT-realism it must

be possible for momentary states such as S to include change, succession
and persistence in the forms in which we experience them. One difficulty
here is the Retentional Simultaneity Problem noted in §3. The contents in
any given Retentional specious present exist simultaneously – at least as
measured by ordinary clock-time – but if they are to generate the
appearance of succession they must avoid leaving the impression that the
events they represent also occur simultaneously. If a number of tones are
heard simultaneously, the result is obviously a chord rather than a
succession. In fact, it is not just succession that the Retentional theorist
needs to accommodate. Returning to Figure 14, it was stipulated that you
see the pointer moving smoothly from half-past to quarter-to. Where is
the movement in S? There may seem to be no real difficulty here: after all,
we can easily call up a moving image in our memories or imaginations –
as when we remember seeing a bird in flight, or a ball in motion – so we
know that our minds are capable of generating dynamic imagery. There
is, however, an important difference between the two cases. Running re-
plays of past experiences in ordinary memory is a process which itself
unfolds over time, but the dynamic re-plays required by the Retentionalist
are supposed to occur at a single moment. Indeed, as processes which
occur over time, remembered or imagined movements will themselves
occur within momentary specious presents, and so their dynamic
character will depend on that of retentions.

Given the requirements of realism, what characteristics must retentions

themselves possess? Retentions are akin to memories in that they re-

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themselves possess? Retentions are akin to memories in that they re-

present the past, but to fulfil the task required of them they must be more
vivid than ordinary memories. We all know what it is like to call up a
memory of seeing and hearing the falling of a tree; we all know what it is
like to actually see and hear the falling of a tree. In the case of the former
there is a visual and acoustic mental images. In the latter case there is the
immediately perceived motion and noise: sharp, vivid – LOUD – and out
there. Between these two forms of experience there is all the difference in
the world. Since it is not plausible to suppose that ordinary memory-
images are responsible for our immediate experience of change, retentions
must be a of a distinctive (and not commonly recognised) form of
experience.

Diagrams along the lines of 6.1 are commonplace in the Retentionalist

literature, and all such figures serve the useful purpose of making it clear
that Retentionalist are offering what is, in effect, a two-dimensional model
of temporal consciousness. The change and succession which feature in
our immediate experience occur within specious presents which have no
temporal extension in ordinary objective time; these specious presents do
possess a temporal extension – an experienced extension – but this exists
(as it were) orthogonally to ordinary time, along the vertical rather than
the horizontal. Opting for a two-dimensional temporal framework is an
elegant solution to the problem of how it is possible for succession and
persistence to exist in experiences which (objectively) have no duration,
but is also a source of potential difficulties. Since Extensional models do
not require the positing of this additional dimension, Retentional models
are vulnerable to the accusation that they are needlessly profligate.

The additional dimension also creates a problem on the purely

phenomenological level. There are two general options concerning the
subjective character of Retentional specious presents, we can call them
the Modal and Non-Modal, see Figure 15. Modal theorists hold that the
successive contents within a single specious present appear under

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successive contents within a single specious present appear under

different temporal modes of presentation: roughly speaking, whereas
some contents appear as fully present, others as ‘just past’, others as
‘more past’, and so on. These temporal modes do not figure in any shape
or form on the Non-modal option: on this view, all the contents within a
single specious present appear equally present, in the phenomenal sense,
as well as successive. In effect, the Retentionalist Non-modal specious
present is subjectively indistinguishable from an Extensionalist duration-
block (see §5.1), it is simply differently located with respect to ordinary
time.

Figure 15. Two conceptions of the Retentionalist specious

present.

The Non-Modal option has the advantage of ensuring that Retentionalist

specious presents feature change and succession with maximal
phenomenal immediacy – important for those who subscribe to the
Immediacy Thesis (see §3) – but it also brings a serious disadvantage. To
bring this out, let us suppose a single specious present has an apparent
duration of around one second, e.g., enough to encompass two brief tones
‘do-re’ . Since Retentionalist specious presents supposedly form a close-
packed continuum, over a period of (say) ten seconds of ordinary
objective clock-time, we will be experiencing content with a subjective

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objective clock-time, we will be experiencing content with a subjective

duration of vastly more than one minute. To simplify, if we suppose there
are a hundred specious presents per objective second, in a ten second
interval we will enjoy experiences with an apparent duration of 1000
seconds – enough (apparent) time to hear ‘do-re’ a thousand times. Non-
Modal versions of Retentionalism thus suffer from a serious problem with
surplus content: they generate more experience (or more phenomenal
content) than it is plausible to suppose actually occurs over a given
interval of experiencing.

In the light of this difficulty, it is not surprising to find that Retentional

theorists have eschewed the Non-Modal option in favour of the Modal
alternative. Since on this view only a small portion of a single specious
present is experienced as fully present, the problem of surplus content is
greatly diminished. The adoption of temporal modes also offers a
promising-looking solution the Retentional Simultaneity problem: by
virtue of appearing under different temporal modes, the contents of a
single specious present will not seem to be simultaneous, even if this is
what they are, objectively speaking. As for how temporal modes are to be
conceived, Retentional theorists have outlined a variety of proposals.

6.2.1 Broad's Later View

In his Examination of McTaggart's Philosophy (1938, vol.2) Broad

expounds an account of temporal consciousness which is seemingly at
odds with his earlier theory (see §5.3). First of all, he no longer
subscribes to the view that momentary acts of awareness (or
‘prehensions’ in the McTaggart terminology) are fictions: the new
account is built on them. The second main change is that Broad no longer
allows momentary acts to extend a short distance through ordinary time:
he now holds that they are confined to single moments. He thus trades in
his previous (partial) Extensionalism for a Retentional model. The third
new ingredient is the property of presentedness. This, claims Broad, is a

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new ingredient is the property of presentedness. This, claims Broad, is a

‘psychological’ (or phenomenal) feature which all phenomenal contents
possess to some degree. Different degrees of presentedness are correlated
with differences in apparent temporal location, with contents possessing a
high intensity of presentedness seeming more present (or less past) than
those which possess it to a lesser degree. On Broad's new view, a single
specious present can be conceived along the lines shown in Figure 16.

Figure 16. Broad's later conception of the specious present.

How does the property of presentedness work? How does one

phenomenal characteristic manage to make one or more other
phenomenal characteristics appear to be less than wholly present? The
question is of interest because the only obvious way of construing
‘different degrees of presentedness’ is in terms of different degrees of
Humean force and vivacity: a memory-image of a red balloon could easily
be described as seeming ‘less present’ in this sense than a perceptual
experience of a red balloon. But thus construed presentedness fails to do
the job required: the upper parts of the specious present depicted in Figure
16 evidently possess less force and vivacity than those lower down, but
they don't seem in the least less present (in the temporal sense) as a result.

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they don't seem in the least less present (in the temporal sense) as a result.
Since Broad is silent on this issue, he presumably takes presentedness to
be a primitive property, whose character and mode of functioning cannot
usefully be elucidated. Nonetheless, it remains mysterious how any
phenomenal property could do the work required.

6.2.2 Brentano

Brentano has rather more to say on this issue. We saw earlier (§2.4) that
Brentano was the first to expound a Modal Retentional model in any
detail, and that his views went through several changes. Initially he
sought to explain the difference between present sensations and
proteraestheses (in effect, retentions) in terms of different kinds of
experiential objects: he held that proteraestheses are composed of
intentionally unreal objects that are apprehended under a ‘modifying
attribute’ of a (certain degree) of pastness. He came to view this as an
error, in part because he believed past, present and future form a
continuum, a view which is difficult to hold onto if present experiences
are real, and past and future ones are not. In later writings he suggested
that the difference between the contents of an ordinary sensation and a
proteraesthesis is to be located in the way we are aware of them. He first
explicated these differences in temporal modes in terms of differences in
judgement : a represented content a is judged be past to a certain degree,
a content b is judged to be past to a greater degree, and so forth. In a
further change of view he rejected judgements in favour of temporal
modes of presentation: sensory objects can be apprehended as past to
differing degrees. In his essay ‘Our intuition of Time is a Continuum of
Modes of Presentation and Acceptance’ he writes:

When that which was first of all given as present appears as more
and more past it is not other objects which are accepted as

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and more past it is not other objects which are accepted as

existing, but the same objects which are accepted in a different
way, with a different modus of acceptance … only someone
capable of a presenting with different modes and of a continuously
changing mode of presentation can have a presentation of rest and
motion, of continuing to exist or of proceeding in time. (1988: 79,
82)

Thus in Brentano's mature account of the Retentional specious present,

alterations in contents themselves – a mechanism similar to that proposed
by Broad – have given way to alterations in the way contents are
experienced, and these ways of experiencing are to be viewed as basic
modes of consciousness.

This change of stance was accompanied by a further significant evolution

in doctrine. Brentano subscribed to a two-component conception of
consciousness: in perceiving an object, we are aware not only of the
object presented in perception, but also of our perceiving of that object.
Hence in any perceptual act, e.g. the hearing of a tone C, there are two
ingredients: the primary object of the act, the tone C, and the secondary
object, which in this case is the hearing of C. In virtue of this two-fold
structure, consciousness at a given moment of time is always
accompanied by a form of self-consciousness. But what of the diachronic
case? Does this mode of self-consciousness extend over time? Brentano's
views on this also underwent changes. On his early ‘object modification’
view, he held that the primary object of a proteraesthesis is an earlier act
of experiencing: e.g., a past sensing of tone C, rather than C itself. In
virtue of this, we have a continuous awareness of our own conscious acts
over time as well as at a time, although the mechanism in the diachronic
case (involving primary objects) differs from that which operates in the
synchronic case (which relies on secondary objects). However, Brentano
came to regard this as a mistake, and in his mature ‘temporal mode of
presentation’ account, the primary object of the proteraesthesis is no

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presentation’ account, the primary object of the proteraesthesis is no

longer the act of sensing C, but C itself, albeit presented under the mode
of ‘having occurred in the past’.

The reasoning behind this shift in position sheds useful light on the
motives which move Retentional theorists. Brentano believed that while
we can never know with certainty that primary objects of consciousness
exist, we can know with certainly that secondary objects exist, and are as
they appear. Accordingly, if the secondary object of a proteraesthesis
were a just-past act of sensing, we could know with certainty that we
ourselves, as the subject of that act, existed a few moments ago. But
Brentano held that we have no such knowledge: it is logically possible
that we have only just now come into existence. By making the primary
object the past tone, rather than the sensing of this tone, the unwanted
consequence is averted. For further detail see Chisholm (1981),
Albertazzi 1999 (59–65), Krauss (1976), Moran (1996).

6.2.3 Husserl

We saw in §2.7 that for Husserl the specious present (or in his
terminology, the ‘original temporal field’ or ‘living present’) is a tripartite
episode of experiencing consisting of three ingredients: momentary
primal impressions, a continuum of retentions (or ‘primary memories’),
and forward looking protentions (a distinctive kind of expectation). On
the important question of the nature of retentions, Husserl's views
changed significantly over the many years during which he wrestled with
these matters – his notes and sketches suggest he never found an account
he was entirely happy with.

In the 1904–5 lectures, Husserl finds Brentano's early account of time-

consciousness – problematic on several counts. As Husserl interprets him,
Brentano construed retentions as a distinctive kind of mental
representation – or ‘phantasm’ – imbued with a modifying temporal

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representation – or ‘phantasm’ – imbued with a modifying temporal

attribute: pastness. Husserl discerns a fatal tension here: retentional
contents are presently occurring sensory items in consciousness, but
according to Brentano, they also supposed to be ‘unreal’, by virtue of
appearing as past. How can numerically the same content be real and
unreal, present and past? Husserl also finds it ‘most extraordinary that
Brentano does not take into consideration the difference between the
perception of time and the phantasy of time’ (1991: 17) In effect, the
charge is that by building retentions out of mental images generated by
the imagination, Brentano is unable to do adequate justice to the
perceptual character of our temporal awareness – here Husserl's starting
point is the realist claim that change and succession are seen and heard,
not merely imagined or inferred.

Husserl himself thought it appropriate to regard retentions as akin to

memories, but memories of a distinctive or ‘primary’ kind: ordinary
memories, or recollections, he refers to as ‘secondary memory’. Earlier, in
the Principles, James had drawn a similar distinction, which he explained
thus:

An object which is recollected, in the proper sense of the term, is

one which has been absent from consciousness altogether, and
now revives anew. It is brought back, fished up, so to speak, from
a reservoir in which, with countless other objects, it lay buried and
lost from view. But an object of primary memory is not thus
brought back; it never was lost; its date was never cut off in
consciousness from that of the immediately present moment. In
fact it comes to us as belonging to the rearward portion of the
present space of time, and not to the genuine past. (1890: 646–7)

James went on to suggest primary memories are akin to reverberations or

after-images, that are triggered by ordinary perceptions. Husserl is in full
agreement with James' claim that retentions differ from ordinary

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agreement with James' claim that retentions differ from ordinary

memories in this respect: they are not re-presentations, since a retained
content has never been absent from consciousness. A further difference is
that ordinary memories are under the control of the will, whereas
retentions are not. However, Husserl thought it a mistake to suppose that
retentions are remotely akin to echoes or reverberations. He fully accepts
that echoes and the like are to be found in consciousness, but they are
contents of a perfectly ordinary kind perceptual kind: they are experiences
which reveal to us what is going on around us at the present time.
Retentions, by contrast, although they exist alongside presently occurring
perceptual contents, reveal the past. For this reason retentional
consciousness is ‘an original consciousness’ – a distinctive sui generis
mode of experience, quite unlike any other:

Retentional consciousness really contains consciousness of the

past of the tone, primary memory of the tone, and must not be
divided into sensed tone and apprehension as memory. Just as a
phantasy-tone is not a tone but the phantasy of the tone … so too
the tone primarily remembered in intuition is something
fundamentally and essentially different from the perceived tone …
(1991: 34)

Husserl is vulnerable to the charge that he characterizes retention

primarily in terms of how it is different from other modes of
consciousness – recollection, imagination, and so forth – and there is
some truth in this: we do not get a truly informative account of how
retention manages to present in the past in a perceptual way. In response,
Husserl might reasonable point out that this is only to be expected, if, as
he maintains, retention is a sui generis mode of experience.

In subsequent writings Husserl experimented with several different ways

of conceiving of retentions – see Kortooms (2002) for a full picture – but
one development is of particular significance. In his early lectures,

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one development is of particular significance. In his early lectures,

although it is not always evident from the lectures themselves, it seems
that Husserl conceived of retentions in terms of a general conception of
perceptual experience that he had developed earlier, in his Logical
Investigations. According to this ‘apprehension-content’ scheme,
retentions – like all forms of perceptual consciousness – are real sensory-
like contents in experience, contents that are animated by an act of
apprehension, and thus seem a certain degree past. In the years following
the 1906–7 period, Husserl came to think that it was wrong to apply the
apprehension-content scheme to retentions.

A normal perceptual content, such as a cloud-shaped white patch, can end

up being perceived very differently: for example, we might see it as an
actual cloud, or as merely part of a picture of a cloud – such cases can
legitimately be viewed as instances of ‘primary’ (sensory) contents being
apprehended in different ways. Husserl came to doubt whether temporal
appearances of a content can vary in this sort of way: ‘The primary
contents that spread out in the now are not able to switch their temporal
function: the now cannot stand before me as the not-now, the not-now
cannot stand before me as the now’ (1991: 334). He continues: ‘Can a
series of coexistent primary contents ever bring a succession to intuition?
Can a series of simultaneous red-contents ever bring a duration of red, of
a tone c, and the like, to intuition? Is that possible as a matter of
principle?’ (1991: 335) Husserl now finds it is absurd to suppose that
qualitatively identical contents can appear as both simultaneous and
successive, depending merely on how they are apprehended.

Since these difficulties arise because retentional contents are being

conceived as sensory-like items, present in consciousness, the solution
might be to find a different way of thinking of retentional contents, and
this is what Husserl does:

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The still living tone, the tone ‘still’ standing in the view of the
temporal intuition, no longer exists; and what pertains to its
appearance is not a ‘tone-sensation’ (an actually present now) but
an ‘echo’ of the sensation, a modification that is no longer a
primary content in the sense of something actually present (not an
immanent tone-now). On the contrary, it is something modified: a
consciousness of past sensation. In this consciousness, however,
no actual tone can be found, only a tone that has been. (1991: 336)

On this new view – modelled on his later understanding of phantasy-

experience – retentions are intentional ‘through and through’: they do not
have sensory-like content in the manner of properly perceptual
experience. But while this may help with some difficulties, it gives rise to
new ones. Recalling Husserl's own critique of Brentano, one might
wonder whether a specious present filled with purely intentional entities
can supply us with the properly perceptual experience of change and
succession that realism demands.

6.3 The Retentional Stream of Consciousness

Providing a credible account of the character and composition of

individual specious presents is only the first stage in the development of a
viable form of Retentional realism. The second stage is providing a
credible account of how individual specious presents combine and interact
to form our streams of consciousness. Here there is a good deal of
agreement between Retentional theorists, as well as some variation. The
basics of Brentano's account were presented in §2.4. For Brentano a
stream of consciousness simply takes the form of a dense (or gap-free)
succession of momentary specious presents: see the diagram of hearing a
melody depicted in Figure 2. In his later writings Broad adopted a similar
approach, as shown in Figure 17.

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Figure 17. Broad's later account.

The bottom line represents a continuous stretch of sensory experience, a

continuous auditory tone, let's suppose. This stretch of experience is
apprehended by dense succession of momentary acts, represented by the
full-length vertical lines. (Only a three of these are shown here, in reality
there would be an infinity of them.) Focus first on D and the vertical line
standing on it: D-A***. This line represents the content apprehended by
the momentary act occurring at D, and hence a single specious present.
This act's content represents the tone segment A-D, but the act does not
embrace the entirety of A-D itself – we are no longer dealing with acts of
awareness which reach back to the recent past. Instead, the act
apprehends a content possessing parts which seem more and more past (or
less and less present) as we move from D to A***. In the figure, the
greater the number of asterisks affixed to a content, the less presentedness
it possesses. Hence the same tone-segments occur in successive specious
presents with smoothly decreasing degrees of presentedness. If we
simplify by first considering momentary tone-phases, the phase at A is
experienced as A* in the specious present at B, as A** in the specious
present at C and finally as A*** in the specious present at D. In a similar
way, D is experienced as D* in the specious present occurring at E, and
then as D** in specious present occurring at F. Extended tone-segments

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then as D** in specious present occurring at F. Extended tone-segments

(e.g. B-C) behave in the same manner, being experienced as B**-C* (at
D) and B***-C** (at E).[19]

Broad's account explains how it is possible for temporally extended

contents to be apprehended as wholes (provided they fall within the span
of the specious present) and also be experienced as smoothly sinking into
the past. But while these are definite advantages, there is a question mark
over whether Broad successfully secures the continuity of consciousness.
Modest Continuity (see §3) poses him no difficulty: by virtue of being
dense, the envisaged succession of momentary specious presents will
constitutes a stream of consciousness which is free from gaps. But if
Broad's model is to conform to the Strong Continuity Thesis,
neighbouring stream phases must be experientially connected to one
another. In the absence of such connections – or so the proponents of the
Strong Thesis will maintain – we do not have a stream of consciousness
at all, merely a sequence of isolated momentary stream-phases. This is an
issue Broad does not address. He may have assumed that a sequence of
specious presents which (a) belong to the same subject, and (b) form a
dense continuum, cannot fail to be phenomenally unified. But this does
not follow, for the familiar reason that a succession of experiences does
not automatically constitute an experience of succession.

Although Husserl was certainly very much aware of the continuity issue,
his account of how individual specious presents combine to form streams
of consciousness is, in many respects, very similar to the pictures painted
by Brentano and Broad. Husserl supplied several time-diagrams to
illustrate the details of his theory, several are along the lines of Figure 18
below.[20]

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Figure 18. Husserl's time diagram.

The horizontal axis now represents a continuous flow of primal

impressions, the vertical axes represent a selection of retentions (and in
the case of F) protentions which accompany the primal impressions D, E
and F. (A ‘selection’ because in reality, according to Husserl, a
continuous stretch of consciousness consists of a dense continuum of
primal impressions, each of which is accompanied by its ‘comet's tail’ of
retentions and protentions.) As can be seen, individual primal impressions
are retained in later specious presents – as previously, increased ‘pastness’
is indicated by a greater number of asterisks. What goes for momentary
primal impressions also goes for intervals: D-E is retained at F in the
form of the retentional continuum E*-D**.

From what we have seen so far, with the exception of the protentional
aspect of consciousness, there are no significant differences between this
Husserlian theory and Broad's later model. But differences there are.
Unlike Broad, Husserl addresses the Strong Continuity Thesis – albeit not
in so many words – and has a good deal to say about the experiential
relationships between neighbouring specious, relationships which (he
believes) suffice to secure the kind of continuity in consciousness which
actually exists. What he has to say on this topic is difficult to interpret,
and his views underwent changes, but they are by no means devoid of

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and his views underwent changes, but they are by no means devoid of
interest.

Broad's specious presents are complex things, containing as they do

continuum-many phases possessing distinct degrees of presentedness. In
some of his writings, Husserl introduces (or recognizes) an additional
level of complexity. In a manner reminiscent of Brentano's (early) view,
according to the Husserlian doctrine of the ‘double intentionality’ of
retentions, it is not only past primal impressions that are retained, so too
are the acts of experiencing which apprehend them. Accordingly, at each
moment we have a retentional awareness not merely of past perceptual
objects (e.g., tone-phases), but the experiences in which these objects are
presented or apprehended. It is in virtue of this second level or aspect of
retention that consciousness manages to unify itself over time, or so
Husserl believed.

What does this amount to in practice? Husserl again toyed with a variety
of options, and seemed to have difficulty in reaching a settled view.
According to one proposal he considered, a retention such as E* in Figure
18 does not merely represent the momentary primal impression to which
it is directed, it represents (or ‘intends’) an entire act-phase or streamal
cross-section. In more concrete terms, the retention in question not only
contains a representation of E (the original primal impression), it also
contains representations of all the retentions and protentions that were
experienced with E. Since each of these nested retentions and protentions
themselves represent entire act-phases, and so on ad infinitum (within the
limits of the specious present) we are clearly dealing here with a highly
complicated experiential structure. Thanks to this structure, later stream-
phases retain a rich awareness of their immediate predecessors. But in
other writings, Husserl envisages the continuity of consciousness being
secured by a somewhat different mechanism:

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There is one, unique flow in consciousness in which both the unity

of the tone in immanent time and the unity of the flow of
consciousness itself become constituted at once. … The flow of
the consciousness that constitutes immanent time not only exists
but is so remarkably and yet intelligibly fashioned that a self-
appearance of the flow necessarily appears in it, and therefore the
flow itself must necessarily be apprehensible in the flowing.
(1991: 84, 88)

Husserl sometimes used the terms ‘horizontal-intentionality and

‘transverse-intentionality’ and to refer, respectively, to the stream-
unifying and object-constituting functions of consciousness. Figure 19
(which for good measure includes protentions too) is an attempt to
express this pictorially – although only a single retention and a single
protention are shown here, in reality there would be a continuum of them.

Figure 19.

Husserl refers to the upper level – the level in which consciousness

unifies itself, in which consciousness is perpetually passively aware of
itself as flowing – as ‘absolute’ time-consciousness. He suggests absolute
consciousness (or ‘absolute subjectivity’) is best thought of as a
quasi-temporal process, on the grounds that our ordinary temporal
concepts properly apply only to objects we perceive in time, and not to
the phenomenal processes which make such perceptions possible.

The introduction of absolute time-consciousness may solve one problem,

but another quickly appears. If absolute time-consciousness is itself

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but another quickly appears. If absolute time-consciousness is itself

extended through time, and is composed of momentary phases, what is it
that unifies these phases? We could posit a further and higher stratum of
consciousness, but since the same issue immediately arises with respect to
this new level, nothing would be gained. Husserl's initial response was to
hold that the flow of absolute consciousness is not an ordinary temporal
process: it is not something which extends or flows through time, it is that
within which time itself – in the form of temporal objects and processes –
arises and flows.[21]

In later writings, after his discovery of the transcendental-

phenomenological ego, Husserl's thought took another turn. Rather than
holding that streams of consciousness unify themselves over (or through)
time, he now claims that the unifying work is carried out by the ego:

Following later clarifications (1932), I have come to the

conviction that two kinds of intentionality in the proper sense do
not exist, and consequently, that a pre-temporalization in the
proper sense does not exist either. The actual temporalization that
is presupposed and achieved in the actual temporal givenness of
the stream of experiences is the temporalization of the
transcendental-phenomenologizing ego … Temporality just is an
egoic performance in every mode, an original or an acquired one.
(C17, Kortooms 266)

As usual, there are complications. Although in this passage Husserl

rejects the horizontal and transverse modes of intentionality that he
previously held to be responsible for the creation of temporal unities in
experience, it is not clear that he took the ego to be responsible for all
modes of temporal unity. There are occasions when he seems think the
most basic forms of experience possess a passive ‘pre-temporal’ flow-
structure prior to the involvement of the ego – see Kortooms (2002:
chapter 6) for more on this. This complication aside, the basic picture is

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chapter 6) for more on this. This complication aside, the basic picture is
reasonably clear. As with absolute consciousness, since the ego is not
itself a temporal object – it lies outside time, it is what creates or
constitutes temporality – and so the issue of what unifies the successive
phases of an ego (or an ego's awareness) simply does not arise.

The gain is a substantial one, but is by no means cost-free: Husserl is now

taking us deep into exotic metaphysical territory. And for those who are
prepared to follow him there, new questions arise. What precisely is the
relationship between the pre-temporal ego and the temporalized contents
of ordinary consciousness? If an ego is aware of change and succession
among such contents, it is natural to suppose that its awareness must also
be temporally extended, phenomenally speaking. But if so, we are
confronted once more with the question of what unifies the successive
phases of ego's consciousness: what prevents these phases being a mere
succession of experiencings, rather than an experiencing of succession?
To avoid this, we might hold that the ego's awareness is timeless in
character, in the manner of Husserl's own ‘absolute consciousness’. The
worry now is intelligibility: can we be confident that we can really make
sense of this mode of consciousness?

6.4 Assessments

The Retentional approach has some distinct advantages over the

alternative forms of realism. All variants of the approach have this much
in common: they compress the experiencing of change into momentary
(or near-momentary) phases of consciousness. In virtue of this,
Retentional models are compatible with metaphysical doctrines which
require precisely this feature. The most obvious candidate here is
Presentism, the doctrine that what is not present is not real (see §7.2). In
contrast, Extensional models require contents that are distributed through
an interval of (ordinary, objective) time to be experienced together, in a
single unified phenomenal state. It is not obvious that such models are

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single unified phenomenal state. It is not obvious that such models are
compatible with the doctrine that reality itself is confined to the
momentary present. Accommodating the latter doctrine poses no
problems whatsoever for Retentional models.

No less important is the Retentional theorists' solution to the problem of

diachronic phenomenal unity. All forms of the Extensional approach
stipulate that our immediate awareness is capable of routinely bridging a
temporal interval. This could be viewed as admitting an unusual – and
arguably undesirable – form of action-at-a-distance. Retentional models
are free of this heavy commitment: the only mode of phenomenal unity
such models require is the sort which connects contents that are both
momentary and simultaneous. By virtue of their conformity with PSA,
Retentional models offer an appealing reduction of diachronic unity to
synchronic unity. Again, this option is not available to Extensional
theorists, who are obliged to recognize two forms of phenomenal unity
rather than just one. Further, as we saw in §2.5 and §5.5, there are those –
e.g., Meinong – who believe that incurable problems arise if we suppose
phenomenal unity can extend over time. Though we as also saw in §5.5,
the Extensional theorists can, with some plausibility, argue that claims
along these lines are question-begging.

Confining the experience of change to momentary episodes of

experiencing may have its advantages, but it also makes for difficulties of
a distinctive sort. It might be objected that it is simply impossible for the
temporal properties of experiences and their contents to diverge so
dramatically: how could the latter be temporally extended when the
former are not? In reply, the Retentional theorist can point out that it is
widely accepted that the properties of representational vehicles, and the
contents carried by these vehicles, commonly diverge – although in this
instance there are certain significant complications (for further discussion
of this issue see §7.1). Also pertinent here is our current level of
ignorance concerning the relationship between the experiential and the

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ignorance concerning the relationship between the experiential and the

physical. Given that we are sure of so little in this domain, do we have
any real grounds for supposing that it is impossible for momentary (or
very brief) brain-states to generate experiences which possess temporal
depth on the subjective or phenomenal level?

The Simultaneity Problem (in its Retentional guise) may not in principle
be insuperable, but in addition to establishing the bare possibility of
objectively simultaneous contents appearing successive, Retentionalists
should also aim to supply an intelligible and credible account of how this
appearance is created. Retentional theorists subscribe to the doctrine of
PT-realism, and so believe that change, succession and persistence figure
in our immediate experience. We saw in §3 that some realists also
subscribe to the Immediacy Thesis, and hold that change, and other
dynamic properties, feature as vividly in our experience as colour or
shape. For deep-seated structural reasons, Retentional models have
difficulty in accommodating the Immediacy Thesis. If retentions have the
same force and vivacity as ordinary (presently occurring, first-order)
experience, as they do on the Non-Modal variant, there is the risk of
flooding consciousness with enormous quantities of surplus content –
content which we have no reason to suppose exists, as we saw in §6.2. It
is thus not surprising to find that Retentional theorists generally subscribe
to the Modal form of the doctrine, and hold that retentions lack the force
and vivacity of presently occurring contents. But this option also brings a
danger: if retentions are too unlike ordinary experience, there is a risk they
will prove incapable of doing the job they are intended to do: namely, be
the purveyors of our immediate impressional experience of persistence,
succession and change. To maintain that the dilemma is fatal to the
prospects of the Retentional approach would be premature. But Brentano
and Husserl's shifting position on the nature of retentions – recall the
appeals to unreal objects, judgements, primitive phenomenal features,
additional dimensions, temporal modes of presentation and the like – is
indicative of the difficulty of finding the right balance here, or so might

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indicative of the difficulty of finding the right balance here, or so might

purveyors of alternative forms of realism allege.

Continuity is also problematic from a Retentional perspective. As we

have seen, the Modest Continuity Thesis is easily accommodated. All the
latter requires is that there be no gaps in a typical stream of
consciousness, and by stipulating that retentional specious presents form
dense, gap-free successions, this requirement is easily met. Strong
Continuity requires a good deal more: real experiential or phenomenal
connections between neighbouring stream-phases. This is harder by far to
achieve within a Retentional framework. What is needed is a credible
account of how neighbouring specious presents are related to one another
which permits phenomenal continuity to run without impediment between
specious presents, as well as within them – or so proponents of Strong
Continuity will maintain. Yet the defining characteristic of the
Retentional approach is the confinement of phenomenal unity to within
momentary states of consciousness, which is tantamount to the denial that
phenomenal continuity can connect earlier and later stream-phases, in the
manner permitted by Extensional approaches.

So far as the Strong Continuity Thesis is concerned, Broad did not

address the objection that Retentional models atomize or fragment the
stream of consciousness. Both he and Husserl were inclined to view
individual specious presents as abstractions from full-blown streams of
consciousness, and thus incapable of leading an independent existence.
But if they believed taking this step suffices to secure Strong Continuity
they were mistaken. Rendering individual specious presents dependent on
their neighbours in the envisaged manner certainly affects their
metaphysical status, but it does not, in itself, do anything to forge
phenomenal connections between such states. Husserl saw there was a
real problem here, and at different stages of his career he ventured
different solutions. Early on he appealed to multiply-nested retentions.
But arguably, these merely increase the complexity within individual

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But arguably, these merely increase the complexity within individual

momentary specious presents, without bridging the gap between specious
presents. The doctrine of horizontal intentionality merely pushes the
difficulty up a level: how precisely do we have an awareness at one time
of earlier acts of awareness without our awareness itself extending over
time? In later writings, Husserl sought to solve the problem by excluding
the unifying agent – first in the form of absolute time-consciousness, later
in guise of the transcendental ego – from ordinary time altogether. These
manoeuvres may indeed solve the problem, but they also leave the
Retentional model reliant upon exotic and heavy-duty metaphysical
machinery. While Strawson (2009: Part 5) favours the Retentionalist
conception of individual specious presents, he does not see the lack of
direct experiential connections between successive stream-phases as in
the least problematic; but since Strawson also believes that both the
Modest and Strong Continuity Theses are false, this is not surprising.

Difficulties aside, the Retentional approach in general, and Husserl's work

in particular, has provoked interest among neuro- and cognitive scientists,
and like-minded philosophers. See the supplementary document Husserl,
the Brain and Cognitive Science for overviews and critical assessments.

For discussion of some further issues relating to the Retentional specious

present see the supplementary document The Specious Present: Further
Issues.

7. Metaphysics of Temporal Consciousness

7.1 Time of Consciousness vs Consciousness of Time

The word ‘red’ can represent the colour red without itself being red. If
the message ‘bring the red flag’ is successfully transmitted by Morse
code, red is signified by a temporal pattern rather than a spatial pattern.
To accommodate this sort of divergence the distinction is commonly

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To accommodate this sort of divergence the distinction is commonly

drawn between the content and the vehicle of a representation: the former
is that which is being represented, the latter is the entity which carries or
bears the representation. It is by no means impossible for a
representational vehicle to possess one or more of the properties that are
represented by the content it carries, e.g. bold and black, but this is not
always or necessarily the case, as just seen. Experiences can represent
temporal features – a glance at a clock will reveal the time – but they also
themselves possess temporal features (e.g., different experiences have
different durations). How are the temporal characteristics that are
represented in or by experiences related to the temporal characteristics of
the experiences themselves? In the rather special case of conscious
thoughts, there need be no close correspondence between content- and
vehicle-properties: the thought ‘I've been thinking about this for many
years’ need only occupy a moment or two. But what of the more basic
forms of consciousness, forms of the sort we have been concerned with –
patterns in sensation, sequences of perceptual experiences, and the like?
As we shall see, the content-vehicle distinction impacts upon or intersects
the issues we have been concerned with thus far in a number of
interrelated ways.

Systematic divergences between content- and vehicle-properties lie at the

heart of the debate between the Extensional and Retentional approaches.
Retentional theorists are committed to the claim that experiences which
present us with succession or persistence are able to disguise (or conceal)
their true temporal properties. Why? Because the contents of individual
specious presents appear to be temporally extended even though the
episodes of experiencing that possess these same contents are themselves
momentary or minimally brief (as measured by clock time). This amounts
to a clear-cut divergence between the temporal properties of the contents
carried by specious presents, and the specious presents themselves.

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The Extensional approach carries no such implications. For on this view,

a typical specious present is itself temporally extended, and its parts
succeed one another in time in just the way they seem to. Here vehicle
and content share their temporal properties. Or as Foster puts it, ‘we have
to take each experience to extend over a period of real time in a way
which exactly matches the phenomenal period it presents.’ (1991: 249)
However, while this precise matching may well be the norm, Extensional
theorists will want to find room to allow the apparent (or subjective)
duration of an objective interval to vary: a few seconds spent waiting at
traffic lights can seem like far longer. This sort of discrepancy amount to
another respect in which it is possible for content- and vehicle-properties
to differ. (For further discussion see Section 1 of the supplementary
document The Specious Present: Further Issues.)

The viability of the Retentional approach by no means entirely depends

on the content/vehicle distinction, but Retentionalists can and do appeal to
it when trying to overcome resistance to the very idea that change and
succession can reside in momentary episodes of experiencing. It is worth
noting that in this instance there is an unusually close correspondence
between the relevant content- and vehicle-properties. In the case of a
Retentional specious present, the relevant contents represent succession,
but they do so by appearing as a succession (rather than by carrying an
inscription ‘this is a succession’). Does this mean the vehicle must itself
be temporally extended, so as to be able to include the apprehended
succession? Not necessarily, for Retentional theorists can insist that we
need to distinguish between succession as a purely phenomenal feature –
i.e., a property of conscious mental states or representations – and
succession as a property of physical events in the wider world. This move
made, Retentional theorists can go on to argue that there is no reason to
think that phenomenal successions (and similarly for other temporal
properties) cannot reside within episodes of experiencing that are
themselves momentary. While this may well be true, it now looks very
much as though it is the phenomenal/physical distinction that is doing the

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much as though it is the phenomenal/physical distinction that is doing the

real work, rather than the content/vehicle distinction.

The latter distinction has entered recent debates by another route. The
school of contemporary ‘representationalists’ – e.g., Dretske, Harman and
Tye – hold that otherwise intractable-seeming problems can be
sidestepped by drawing on the distinction between vehicles and contents.
From the fact that the content of our experience is ‘red object over there’
or somesuch, we should not conclude that the vehicle of this content is
itself red. In a more general vein, experiences of colour are not
themselves coloured, experiences of sound are not themselves sonic. In
this manner, the problematic phenomenal properties – or sense-data, or
qualia-instantiations – retreat from the scene. They are pushed still further
away by the second main plank of the representationalist's approach: an
insistence on the ‘transparency’ of experience. By this they mean that in
ordinary perceptual experience, we have no awareness whatsoever of our
experiences themselves, we are simply aware of the (worldly) objects and
properties that are presented in or by our experiences. If our experiences
are invisible, there is no need to introduce properties of experience –
phenomenal properties, qualia, sense-data and such – in order to explain
the content and character of our ordinary perceptual consciousness.
Extending this general approach to the particular case of temporal
consciousness, Tye argues as follows. First of all, if we assume the
transparency thesis is true, the traditional assumption that it is
experiences that are related by succession or simultaneity is misguided:

The basic intuition with respect to unity through time is surely that
things and qualities we experience at successive times are
experienced as continuing on or as succeeding one another.
Consider again the case in which I have an experience of a red
flash followed by a green flash. Here I experience two colored
flashes as occurring one after the other. I do not experience my
experience of a red flash as succeeding my experience of a green

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experience of a red flash as succeeding my experience of a green

one any more than I experience my experience of a red flash as
red. (203: 96)

Accordingly, Tye holds that anyone seeking to account for our ability to
directly apprehend change by appealing to a unifying relationship
between experiences is also misguided: there simply aren't the token
experiences there to be unified; a given period or stretch of consciousness
is not composed of successive perceptions or experiences (203: 102). By
way of an alternative he offers a one experience view of streams of
consciousness: ‘The simplest hypothesis compatible with what is revealed
by introspection is that, for each period of consciousness, there is only a
single experience – an experience that represents everything experienced
within the period of consciousness as a whole.’ (2003: 97) As for the
manner in which succession itself is represented in the vehicles of
phenomenal content, since introspection provides us with no access to
these vehicles, Tye leaves the issue entirely open.

Whether or not experiences can be eliminated in this manner is

controversial, but in any event the direct awareness of change and
persistence is alive and well in Tye's scheme, it has simply been re-
located and re-described. Tye himself sees the need to distinguish
between direct and indirect phenomenal unity. Direct unity obtains when
the qualities represented in one specious present are experienced as
succeeding on from qualities in the immediately preceding specious
present; indirect unity is the ancestral of direct unity, and obtains when
qualities experienced in non-adjacent specious presents are connected by
chains of direct phenomenal unity (2003: 100). This general picture is
close to the orthodox one, at least to the extent that some experienced
qualities in a stream of consciousness are experienced as successive,
while others – farther apart in time – are not. Of course, those who adhere
to the orthodox representational theory, according to which the immediate
objects and properties of experience are phenomenal – and Russell, Broad

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objects and properties of experience are phenomenal – and Russell, Broad

and Foster all fall into this category – will see no need to adopt Tye's way
of re-conceiving diachronic phenomenal unity. [22]

Returning to the main theme, it is by no means necessary to be a sense-

datum theorist in order to believe that there are systematic correlations
between the temporal properties of experiences and their contents. If my
clock goes TICK-TICK-TICK I will hear TICK-TICK-TICK, with the
order and temporal separation of the outer events being mirrored – in a
generally faithful manner – by the order and temporal separation of my
experiences (or the contents they are carrying). Or so it seems plausible to
suppose: as external events occur they are detected (after some delay) by
our sensory organs, and when the resulting signals reach the brain they
trigger experiences, with the order of the experiences (or their contents)
reflecting the order of the relevant events.

This mirroring of basic temporal features has given rise to the idea that, in
a manner of speaking, time represents itself. Mellor starts from the
premise that seeing e precede e* requires one to have a memory-trace of
seeing e while actually perceiving e*. Since memory is a causal process,
and causes precede their effects, it is only possible to perceive that e
precedes e* if one's perception of e occurs before one's perception of e*.
Hence Mellor's conclusion:

Perceptions do not usually share the features they are perceptions

of … There need be nothing thermal about feeling heat, nothing
coloured in colour vision, and nothing (relevantly) spatial about
perceiving spatial relations … But perceiving temporal order does
demand a corresponding temporal ordering of perceptions. (1985:
144)

The general point is not new, and it applies to directly experienced

successions, as well as the memory-based ‘seeing’ of successions that
Mellor describes. James quotes Helmholtz, who maintained that the only

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Mellor describes. James quotes Helmholtz, who maintained that the only
case in which

our perceptions can truly correspond with outer reality, is that of

the time-succession of phenomena. Simultaneity, succession …
can obtain as well in sensations as in outer events. Events, like our
perceptions of them, take place in time, so that the time-relations
of the latter can furnish a true copy of those of the former. The
sensation of the thunder follows the sensation of the lightning just
as the sonorous convulsing of the air by the electric discharge
reaches the observers place later than that of the luminiferous
ether. (James 1890: 629)

The picture painted by Helmholz is plausible and appealing. If the pianist

plays the note D followed by F followed by G, the pianist's audience will
have a succession of specious presents in which D is experienced as
giving way to F, which in turn gives way to G. Needless to say, the
details of the process differ depending on the particular form of realism:
the tales told by Cinematic and Extensional theorists is relatively
straightforward, while matters are rather more convoluted in the case of
Retentional models.

There are, inevitably, complications. In the broad run of cases the

temporal relationships between and within our perceptual experiences
may accurately reflect the temporal relationships between the events we
perceive, but this is by no means always or necessarily the case. If I were
to see a star explode whilst hearing a clap of thunder (a remote
coincidence, admittedly, but by no means an impossible one), I would be
mistaken to conclude that these two events were in fact simultaneous.
Since the light from the star has taken years to reach me, whereas the
sound from the thunder has been delayed by only a few seconds, my
experience is presenting as simultaneous events that are non-
simultaneous. There are further complications on the micro-temporal

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simultaneous. There are further complications on the micro-temporal

scale. It is possible for quite striking ordering discrepancies to arise on
shorter time-scales – i.e., of few tenths of a second, with stimuli measured
in a few tens of milliseconds. In the case of the ‘flash-lag illusion’, for
example, stimuli which are in fact simultaneous appear as successive (for
more on this see Section 3 of the supplementary documents Husserl, the
Brain and Cognitive Science and the supplementary document
Interpreting Temporal Illusions).

Dennett makes much of these phenomena, arguing that on the micro-

temporal scale there need be no correspondence between the order in
which we represent events as occurring and the order in which these
events impinge on our perceptual systems: ‘what matters is that the brain
can proceed to control events “under the assumption that A happened
before B” whether or not the information that A has happened enters the
relevant system of the brain and gets recognized as such before or after
the information that B has happened.’ (1991: 149) [23] Also, over short
intervals it is possible for the brain's interpretation of what happens at a
given time to be revised or ‘re-written’ in the light of subsequent
information. Dennett goes on to argue that there is often no fact of the
matter concerning the precise time at which informational vehicles
become conscious – hence his preference for talking in terms of
‘informational vehicles’ as opposed to ‘experiences’. There is also no fact
of the matter as to which information vehicles are conscious
independently of which ‘probes’ or queries are carried out. For Dennett,
the assumption that anything akin to the Jamesian stream of
consciousness exists is mistaken. These doctrines are important parts of
his ‘multiple-drafts’ theory of consciousness, which we will be looking at
in more detail in §7.3.

In arguing for these striking conclusions Dennett relies only in part on a

variety of puzzling phenomena (‘temporal illusions’) discovered by
psychologists investigating our perceptual abilities over short time scales.

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psychologists investigating our perceptual abilities over short time scales.

He also places considerable weight on the general distinction between
content-properties and vehicle-properties, insisting frequently on the
dangers of confusing them, or supposing that representations need share
the properties represented in their contents. Phillips forcefully takes
Dennett to task for failing to recognize that the temporal case is different
and distinctive in this regard:

Experiences which represent green trees do not themselves have to

be green. Nor of course is Emily Dickenson's reference to Spring
– ‘This whole experiment of green’ – itself green! Yet it is hard to
see how this bears on the case in point. Time is uniquely common
to experience and its objects. Consequently, there is no clear
analogy at all between the representation of green in experience
(or poetry) and the representation of simultaneity or duration in
experience. Experiences do not have colour properties; they do
have temporal properties. (2009: 34–5)

Returning to Helmholtz's claim, when in the Principles James remarked

of it ‘This philosophy is unfortunately too crude’ (1890: 628) he was not
concerned with the sort of counterexamples we have just been
considering. James was making a far more general point:

Even though we were to conceive the outer successions as forces

stamping their image on the brain, and the brain's successions as
forces stamping their image on the mind, still, between the mind's
own changes being successive, and knowing their own succession,
lies as broad a chasm as between the object and subject of any
case of cognition in the world. A succession of feelings, in and of
itself, is not a feeling of succession. … what is past, to be known
as past, must be known with what is present, and during the
‘present’ spot of time. (1890: 628–9)

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James here berates Helmholtz for failing to recognize that a mere

succession of experiences does not add up to an experience of succession,
and then goes on to endorse a Retentional account of where the difference
between the two lies: the earlier and later parts of a succession must be
experienced together and simultaneously in order to be experienced as a
succession. And for the reasons already outlined, this means James
himself was committed – to the extent he was a Retentionalist – to a quite
systematic divergence between the temporal properties of experiential
contents and the temporal properties of experiences. For more on James'
views on the specious present, see Section 3 of the supplementary
document The Specious Present: Further Issues.

7.2 Temporal Consciousness and the Metaphysics of Time

Just as there are different conceptions of the nature of temporal

awareness, there are very different conceptions of the nature and large-
scale structure and composition of time itself (i.e., the time of the universe
as a whole). Can we hope to learn anything about the nature of our
experience of time from theories about time per se? This is a complex
issue, and this is not the place for a thorough investigation of it.
Nonetheless, even a cursory look at the lay of the land reveals a few
points that are worth noting.

Most of the connections between the metaphysics and the phenomenology

of time involve, in one way or another, temporal passage. The latter can
be characterized in a number of ways, but at the very least passage is
associated with the steady advance of the present, an advance which
entails that future times will become present, that present times and
events will become past, and that past times become every more past with
every passing moment. But while few deny that time seems to pass – and
indeed, that this passage is (along with dimensionality) the most obvious
difference between time and space – there are many who have denied that
time really does pass. Of these a few share McTaggart's view that time

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time really does pass. Of these a few share McTaggart's view that time
cannot pass because time does not exist. A more popular view, these days
at least, is the view that while time certainly exists, it is more akin to
space than it superficially seems. Proponents of the four-dimensional
‘Block’ universe – also known as eternalism – hold that there is no
ontological distinction between past, present and future, and that all times
are equally real. They further hold that there is no unique privileged
present time, and a fortiori that there is no such thing as a moving
present.[24] Block theorists face a significant challenge: Why does time
seem to pass if it doesn't? Part of the explanation lies in the way our
memories accumulate. Another part of the explanation lies in the
character of our experience. Time per se may not pass or flow, but there
is undeniably something akin to passage and flow in our immediate
experience, and this phenomenal passage does not require physical
passage, it can exist a four-dimensional Block universe. Or so proponents
of the latter maintain.

The Block conception of time has its advantages. It has an appealing

simplicity, and accords well with Einstein's relativity theories, to mention
but two. But the rejection of objective temporal passage is not to
everyone's taste, and other conceptions of time also have their advocates.
The main contenders are depicted in Figure 20 below.

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Figure 20. Four conceptions of the large-scale composition of the

universe.

At the opposite extreme to the 4-D Block view is Presentism, the doctrine
that concrete reality is confined to the momentary present. Presentists
deny any reality to the past or future. Coming in between these extremes
is the Growing Block model. According to the latter, the past is real but
the future is not, and the sum total of reality is gradually increasing, by a
process of moment-by-moment ‘absolute becoming’. On this view the
present is merely the most recent addition to reality; it is also the interface
between being and non-being. The Moving Spotlight model is in one
respect akin to the standard Block model: it accords reality to all times
and events, including those yet to occur. It differs from the latter by virtue
of the fact that it incorporates objective passage into the universe, in the
shape of a privileged (and constantly advancing) present – indicated by
the blue line in Figure 20. Moving Spotlight theorists agree with Block
theorists that both the future and the past exist, but they tend to hold that
present events are (in some manner) distinctive. [25]

How do these different conceptions of time accord with our competing

realist accounts of temporal consciousness? One point is more obvious
that most. If reality is confined to a momentary present in the way
Presentists maintain, then it is difficult to see how any form of the

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Presentists maintain, then it is difficult to see how any form of the

Extensional approach can be true. Our immediate experience cannot
extend through time if time itself has no extension; if earlier and later
stream-phases are experienced together, in the way Extensional models
require, then it seems very plausible to suppose that these phases must
both exist. (Or to put it another way: an experience which no longer
figures in the sum total of reality is not in a position to be part of the
same unified state of consciousness as an experience which does so
figure, any more than a non-existent brick can help hold up a wall.) By
contrast, since Retentional theorists hold that our experience of time takes
no time – objectively speaking – their position looks to be entirely
compatible with Presentism, and similarly for the Cinematic models
(realist and non-realist). [26]

Is that the end of the story? Not necessarily, for the Extensional approach
is perfectly compatible with version of Presentism which grant to the
present a brief duration. It is only Presentism of the strictest form which
is irreconcilable with the Extensional approach – for further discussion of
this issue see Dainton (2001: ch.6 and §7.8, also forthcoming) and
McKinnon (2003: §10). The same manoeuvre will be necessary to secure
the compatibility of Extensional models with the Moving Spotlight
conception of passage. The latter is most plausible when the existence of
consciousness is confined to the present, so a strictly momentary
Spotlight is problematic for the Extensional approach. It is otherwise for a
Spotlight which possesses some brief duration.

As for the 4-D Block conception, it looks equally compatible with both
views of phenomenal temporality. The Retentional theorists' momentary
specious presents can exist in universes of this sort, as can those of
Cinematic theorists, but so too can the non-momentary specious presents
to be found in Extensional models.

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But perhaps the situation is not quite so straightforward. Someone might

object: ‘There cannot be an experience of succession without genuine
succession, and the latter consists of the coming into being of successive
phases of a stream of consciousness.’ If this view could be shown to be
correct, the Growing Block theorist would have the upper hand. For if
reality as a whole comes into being, drop by drop (or slice by slice), then
so too does experience, and the experience of succession would thereby
be possible. Of course, the viability of this line of argument depends on
the initial premise: does the experience of succession require absolute
becoming? Retentionalists will reject this entirely, holding as they do that
experienced succession occurs within momentary slices of consciousness.
Extensionalists can also question the premise. If the Extensional
conception of Jamesian ‘duration-blocks’ expounded earlier were along
the right lines, then experienced succession would be an intrinsic
phenomenal feature of temporally extended experiences, and as such
would not require the successive coming-into-being of experiential
phases. Also, the earlier and later phases of a duration-block are
experienced together (they are diachronically co-conscious), and it is by
no means obvious that this relationship requires absolute becoming;
indeed, it is more naturally construed as a connection between
experiential phases which exist at neighbouring times. [27]

There is obviously more work to be done here, and for further discussion
see Callender (2008) and Dainton (forthcoming). But it doesn't look as
though there are many straightforward or simple answers to the question:
‘What do the differing conceptions of the nature of time imply about the
nature of temporal awareness?’

7.3 Memory, Experience and Determinacy

PT-realists hold that Reid drew the line between sense and memory in the
wrong place: our immediate experience is not confined to an
instantaneous present, it extends a short way through time, with

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instantaneous present, it extends a short way through time, with

Cinematic theorists, Retentionalists and Extensionalists offering very
different accounts of how this is possible. For Dennett, the debate has
been conducted on false premises, for in some cases at least, there is no
sharp dividing line between memory and experience, and the project of
trying to ascertain the temporal microstructure of consciousness is
misconceived. In support of this claim Dennett deploys a range of
intriguing examples – including the cutaneous rabbit and the colour phi
phenomenon (see Section 3 of the supplementary documents Husserl, the
Brain and Cognitive Science and supplementary document Interpreting
Temporal Illusions) – but the main line of argument can be brought out
with one of his simplest. (For the full case see Dennett (1991: chapters 5–
6, and also Dennett and Kinsbourne 1992).

In cases of so-called ‘backward masking’, if two stimuli are presented in

rapid succession, most subjects will be able to identify the second (and
later) stimulus far more reliably than the first. In the particular experiment
Dennett describes, the target stimulus is a solid disk, shown for 30 msec,
and the mask – shown immediately afterwards – is a larger surrounding
circle. Although subjects are shown both images, when queried they
report that they saw just one: the circle. The standard interpretation of this
sort of experiment, according to Dennett, is that in such cases the subject
do not experience the target stimulus: they have no visual experience of
the disk, the occurrence of the masking stimulus somehow interferes with
the normal perceptual process. However, as he also notes, there is a
second possible interpretation of the subject's responses. Perhaps the
subjects do experience the disk, but something interferes with their
memory of this experience, and so when subsequently queried they deny
having seen it. Dennett labels the first mechanism Stalinesque: since the
experiences our perceptual systems produce do not accurately reflect the
stimuli, there is a sense in which they are putting on a false and
misleading display, in a manner (somewhat) reminiscent of Stalin's show-
trials. He calls the second mechanism Orwellian: a false and misleading

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trials. He calls the second mechanism Orwellian: a false and misleading

version of recent events is being created by the subjects' memories, and so
history is being rewritten, in a manner (somewhat) reminiscent of
Orwell's 1984.

Dennett is right that the evidence thus far presented can be interpreted in
each of these ways, but what should we make of this? The natural
response would be to hold that in the absence of any further plausible
interpretations of the evidence, then either the Stalinesque or the
Orwellian version of events must be true: if the latter, then the subjects do
experience the disk, if the former they don't. Dennett maintains that this
line of thinking is mistaken. In the case described, and others like it,
neither interpretation is correct, there is simply no fact of the matter as to
whether or not the subject's experience the disk or not: ‘the distinction
between perceptual revisions and memory revisions that works so crisply
at other scales is not guaranteed application … The boundary between
perception and memory, like most boundaries, is not perfectly sharp’
(Dennett and Kinsbourne, 1992: §2.2). The assumption that there must be
a determinate ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer to the question of whether or not the
subject saw the disk is grounded, he argues, in an appealing but mistaken
neo-Cartesian conception of experience. According to this conception, for
any given subject during their waking hours the question ‘What is
currently appearing on the stage of your consciousness?’ always has a
fully precise answer, an answer determined by the experiential contents
present in the relevant subject's consciousness. In place of this conception
he offers his ‘Multiple Drafts’ model. The latter is not easily summarized,
but it replaces the familiar Jamesian stream of consciousness with a
multiplicity of ‘informational vehicles’, and tightly connects the correct
ascription of experiences to subjects to what they say and do, and hence
what they remember: ‘We might classify the Multiple Drafts model then
as first-person operationalism, for it brusquely denies the possibility in
principle of consciousness of a stimulus in the absence of that subject's
belief in that consciousness’ (1991: 132).

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belief in that consciousness’ (1991: 132).

Dennett's position is open to criticism on two main fronts. He asserts that

there is no possibility that future research will uncover evidence that will
allow us to distinguish between Orwellian and Stalinesque interpretations.
How can he be so confident about what the future will bring? Second-
guessing scientific progress is a dangerous game. His argument also has a
verificationist slant, relying as it does on the principle that if there is no
possible evidence that P obtains, there is no fact of the matter as to
whether or not P obtains. When applied to ordinary material objects this
principle has counterintuitive consequences. Suppose there is a box that
cannot be opened, or probed by X-rays, ultrasound or any similar method.
Does the fact that we will never be in a position to discover what is inside
the box mean there is no fact of the matter about its contents, about
whether it contains something or nothing at all? Dennett himself agrees
that verificationism is objectionable in this sort of case, but insists that it
is legitimate when it comes to questions concerning the existence (or non-
existence) of experiences. Those who are inclined to a robust realism
about the phenomenal realm will certainly find this downgrading of the
ontological credentials of conscious experiences objectionable. For this
reason they are likely to find Dennett's attempt to further downgrade these
credentials by appealing to features of short-term experience guilty of
begging the question.[28]

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Other Internet Resources

James' Principles
Links relating to Temporal Consciousness, at Philpapers:
Consciousness and Time
Neural Timing and Consciousness
The Stream of Consciousness

Related Entries
Bergson, Henri | Brentano, Franz | consciousness | consciousness: unity of
| continuity and infinitesimals | Husserl, Edmund | time: the experience
and perception of

Acknowledgements

My thanks to David Chalmers, Ian Phillips and Graham Nerlich for

helpful comments on earlier versions of this entry.

Supplement to Temporal Consciousness

The Specious Present: Further Issues

1. Durations and Distinctions
2. Estimating the Duration of the Specious Present
3. James on the Specious Present

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1. Durations and Distinctions

In §4-§6 the focus was largely on the character and composition of

individual specious presents, as variously construed by different forms of
realism, and the manner in which these combine to form streams of
consciousness. There are issues involving the relationship between
specious presents and the wider world – in particular, ordinary clock-time
– which were not there examined. When someone claims the specious
present is typically around (say) one second in extent, what does the claim
amount to? Seconds (along with minutes, hours and days) are a measure
of ordinary, objective, public time – time as it is measured by clocks and
stop-watches. Can this temporal metric be extended to the domain of the
subjective? Can experienced duration be measured and clocked in the
same way as durations of lighting bolts, 100 metre sprints and other
happenings in the wider world? The answer (probably) is ‘to a reasonable
approximation’, but there are some complications, and certain distinctions
need to be drawn and recognized.

The relevant distinctions are most easily brought into play by considering
experiences that are directly triggered by environmental causes, i.e.,
experiences of the perceptual variety. Let us suppose that a certain event
N is of such a duration that it can be perceived as a whole (within a single
specious present), and that experience E is a perception of N. Following
Clay, let us suppose that N is shooting star, visible for around a second.
The perceiving of N is depicted in Figure 21 below, where matters are
viewed from the vantage point of the Extensional approach – we will be
considering the situation from a Retentional point of view in due course.

Up for consideration are the relationships between four temporal

magnitudes: [1] the duration of the event perceived (call this R); [2] the
duration of the proximal sensory stimulus produced by this event (call this
T) – this will usually be the amount of time a subject's sensory organs are

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T) – this will usually be the amount of time a subject's sensory organs are
stimulated in response to the perceived event; [3] the objective duration of
the experience (E) produced by this stimulus (call this O); [4] the
subjective or phenomenal duration of E (call this S).

Figure 21.

Consider first the relationship between N, R and T. On the reasonable

assumption that the perceiver of this event is some distance from the
event itself, the light generated by the falling meteor will take some short
but finite time to traverse this distance, hence the short delay between the
initial phase of N and the onset of the stimulus T – which in this case we
can take to be the light from N hitting the retinas of our subject's eyes.
Although under normal circumstances the durations of R and T will
closely coincide, there are circumstances in which they can diverge. E.g.,
if the light or sound emitted by a perceived event is scrambled,
compressed or stretched en route to the perceiver, the duration of T (and
even the temporal ordering of its parts) will be affected, and the resulting
experience will probably misrepresent the temporal properties of the

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experience will probably misrepresent the temporal properties of the

perceived event to a significant degree.

What of the relationship between T and O, the durations of the sensory

stimuli and the duration of the resulting experience? As can be seen,
although T begins at time t1 and ceases at t2, the resulting experience (E)
starts at a slightly later time t1* and ends at t2*, which is itself slightly
later than t2. These differences are a consequence of two considerations:
it takes some time for signals produced in our sensory organs to reach our
brains, it also takes our brains some time to process these signals and
produce the appropriate experience in response to them. Results from
psychophysics suggest that it can take as little as 60 msec, or as long as
500 msec, for a stimulus to reach (or produce) experience, depending on
the subject, type of stimulus, sensory modality, and the task the subject is
attempting to perform. (For further discussion see Section 2 of the
supplementary Document Some Relevant Empirical Findings
(Psychology, Psychophysics, Neuroscience).)

There is a further point to notice in this connection. The objective

duration of E is the amount of ordinary (clock) time that experience E
takes up. In this case, this duration is t1*-t2*. Why is this duration is
greater than that of T? In the general run of cases the durations of
perceptual experiences and their proximal stimuli match almost exactly. If
they did not, our experience of music – to pick just one example – would
be greatly different than it is: when performing, a violinist can safely
assume that notes played for the same (objective) duration will be heard
as having the same duration. However, in the case of very brief stimuli
the resulting experience tends to last a good deal longer than the stimulus
itself: e.g. a 1 msec flash of light can produce visual experiences lasting
from 100msec to 400msec – a phenomenon known as ‘visible
persistence’. Figure 21 serves as a useful reminder of the fact that it is at
least possible for these two durations to diverge. (For further discussion
of visible persistence see Section 1 of the supplementary document Some

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of visible persistence see Section 1 of the supplementary document Some

Relevant Empirical Findings (Psychology, Psychophysics,
Neuroscience).)

Last but not least there is S: the phenomenal duration of E, as we might

call it. This is the felt duration of E, the temporal extent of E construed
solely (or purely) as a phenomenal item. While it is not wrong to say that
phenomenal duration is how long an experience seems, this should not be
taken to mean that phenomenal duration is determined by how long a
subject judges an experience to be. Since our judgements about features
of our experience are fallible, it is possible (on the face of it, at least) for
the real phenomenal duration of an experience to differ from what we
judge it to be. No less importantly, there may be some subjects who are
incapable of making any judgements about any aspect of their experience
– many non-human animals may fall into this category. To mark the
distinction let us use seconds* (and minutes* etc.) to refer exclusively to
phenomenal durations.

Suppose there are (possible) worlds in which there are subjects whose
experience is akin to our own, but nothing resembling a physical world –
worlds of the sort described by idealists such as Berkeley and Leibniz. In
such worlds (if such there be) there are only phenomenal durations: there
are seconds* but no seconds. In our world there are (probably) seconds*
and seconds, but since we do not have a standard unit of measure for
phenomenal duration, in our everyday thought and talk about it we
naturally tend to use the objective measures. We use external time-
keepers, such as clocks or watches, to gauge the apparent lengths of our
experiences, and consequently we employ units such as ‘second’ and
‘minute’ to refer to both objective and subjective durations. Although
there is nothing to prevent our marking the distinction formally, as has
just been done here, for the most part doing so would serve little purpose:
the subjective character of the experience of looking at a blue sky for
three seconds (as measured objectively) does not, for the most part, vary

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three seconds (as measured objectively) does not, for the most part, vary
greatly; it seems reasonable to suppose that if subjective and objective
durations were often markedly out of synch we would be unable to
engage with the world as effectively as we do. That said, there are
familiar occasions when phenomenal and objective time fail to march
precisely in step. When waiting for a watched pan to boil, an objective
minute can be filled by more than 60 seconds*, as the passage of
subjective time slows relative to the wider world. There may well be
more radical examples of the same phenomenon: some hallucinogenic
drugs are reported to leave subjects with the impression that they have
had vast temporal tracts of experience (centuries, epochs) in only a few
objective hours. And of course, the discrepancy can go the other way:
while enjoying ourselves it often seems that there are fewer than the usual
number of seconds* in a minute or hour; certain stimulants are said to
have the same effect.[29]

These distinctions all apply within the Retentional framework, albeit with
a few modifications, as shown in Figure 22.

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Figure 22.

As previously, there are delays between the occurrence of the event

perceived, the stimulation of the relevant sensory organs, and the eventual
production of perceptual experience. The main difference is where
Extensional theorists hold that the stimulus T results in a single
temporally extended experience stretching from t1* to t2* which
possesses phenomenal duration S, the Retentionalist posits instead a
continuous period of experiencing stretching from t1* to t2*, and further
holds that at each moment during this period the subject is experiencing a
temporal spread of content with phenomenal duration S – only a subset of
these specious presents are depicted in Figure 22.

2. Estimating the Duration of the Specious Present

Although a good deal of empirical research has been carried out relating
to the experience and perception of time over short intervals, this research
has not generally been motivated by a desire to confirm or disconfirm one
or other of the competing conceptions of the structure of temporal

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consciousness. [30] Even so, there are a number of results relevant to the
issues discussed thus far.

One issue to have been investigated is the manner in which very brief
stimuli register in experience. It has been found that stimuli of around 1
msec need to be separated from one another by in interval of around 30
msec if they are to be perceived as a succession – a result which holds
across sensory modalities. Stimuli which are separated by shorter intervals
are not perceived as distinct – though this ‘coincidence threshold’ varies a
good deal for the different sense modalities. For more on this see Section
3 of the supplementary document Some Relevant Empirical Findings
(Psychology, Psychophysics, Neuroscience). A related topic has also been
investigated: the minimal durations of perceptual experiences.
Experiences produced by very brief stimuli are often longer, objectively
speaking, than the stimuli themselves, but how brief (objectively
speaking) can an experience be? Results from psychophysics vary a good
deal, but answers range from 25 to 240 msec, depending on the task being
undertaken and type of stimulus. See Section 4 of the supplementary
document Some Relevant Empirical Findings (Psychology,
Psychophysics, Neuroscience) for further discussion and references.

Of particular interest is the specious present itself. Realists may disagree

about the manner in which change and persistence are incorporated into
consciousness – the stories told by Cinematic theorists, Retentionalists
and Extensionalists are very different – but they agree that our awareness
appears to embrace a brief temporal interval. How long is this interval?
We have just seen that there are reasons for supposing that there are
minimal experienced durations, what is the maximum duration which can
be apprehended as a whole? In short, how long is a typical specious
present?

Attempts to answer this question face complications on several fronts.

First, there is the need to distinguish between the durations of perceptual

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First, there is the need to distinguish between the durations of perceptual

stimuli and the duration of the resulting experiences, and the fact that
these can diverge, quite markedly in the case of brief stimuli. Second, it
would be wrong simply to assume that the specious presents of different
sense modalities are of exactly the same extent, and likewise for different
subjects. Third, even if we set the possibility of intersubjective
differences aside, there is also the possibility that any given period of
experience (as measured by ordinary clock-time) can possess widely
varying subjective or phenomenal durations, e.g. a minute's worth of
experience can pass very quickly (if one is having a good time), pass very
slowly (if one is not having a good time), or seem to last an eternity (if
one has ingested certain drugs). Seconds* and seconds usually march in
step, but there are occasions when they do not.

For the purposes of a rough-and-ready estimate, however, these

difficulties may not be insurmountable. While the potential for discernible
divergences between the duration of a stimulus and objective duration of
the experience to which it gives rise can certainly be significant over the
short-term – of, say, 200 msec or below – it is less so over longer
intervals. (Otherwise such discrepancies would be more noticeable than
they are in ordinary life.) In the absence of evidence to the contrary, it is
not unreasonable to suppose that if inter-modal differences do exist, they
are fairly small in comparison with the duration of the specious present
itself, and similarly for differences between subjects. As for the
relationship between phenomenal and objective durations, there no doubt
are very real difficulties in establishing a precise metric relating the two,
and more work on this problem is very much needed, but for only an
approximate estimate such a metric may not be needed. We all know what
it is like to listen to a 3 second burst of white noise, or to gaze at a white
wall for 5 seconds or so, whilst being in a normal state of consciousness
— i.e., in an average sort of mood, free from significantly mind-altering
chemicals, and so forth. We are thus able to establish a reasonably
accurate correlation between seconds* and seconds in at least some

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accurate correlation between seconds* and seconds in at least some

circumstances, and for certain types of experience. Once this correlation
is established, we can ask of an interval of (say) 3 seconds/seconds*:
roughly how much shorter (or longer) is the duration of the specious
present? If most subjects reply ‘about half’, we could reasonably
conclude that a typical specious present is of the order of 1.5 seconds and
1.5 seconds* – a rough estimate of this sort would need refining, and
would not be valid for all subjects and circumstances, but it would also be
a useful starting point. It is because seconds and seconds* do so often
coincide that typical estimates of the specious present's duration can
(charitably) be taken as referring to both objective and phenomenal
durations.

Reluctant (perhaps) to generalize from their own experience, philosophers

writing on this topic have generally been reluctant to offer any such
estimates. Among the few exceptions, Dainton (2000: 171) tentatively
opts for a figure of half a second or less; Lockwood suggests this is on the
short side, and suggests a more realistic figure would be ‘a second or a
second and a half’ (2005: 381). Strawson goes the other way, and
suggests a figure of around 300msec (2009: 5.9). Does the psychological
literature offer anything more precise or better substantiated?

Unfortunately, while estimates are not difficult to find, they tend not to be
measures of the specious present as we are currently construing it. In
1984 Fraisse concluded his review of the literature by suggesting that we
need to recognize three ‘orders of duration’:

These orders are the following (a) less than 100 msec, at which
perception is an instantaneity, (b) 100 msec – 5 sec, perception of
a duration in the perceived present, and (c), above 5 sec,
estimations of duration involving memory. … The perception of
duration, stricto sensu, is situate at a level above 100 msec and
within the limits of the psychological present as described by W

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within the limits of the psychological present as described by W

James (1890) … The duration of the presentifiable can hardly
extend beyond 5 sec. (1984: 30)

This is an improvement on James' estimate of 12 seconds or so, but even

5 seconds is implausible if we construe the specious present in the way
we are currently doing, as the period during which change and persistence
are immediately apprehended. More recently, Pöppel writes:

The subjective present as a basic temporal phenomenon has

interested psychologists for a hundred years (e.g., James 1890).
We are now in a position to indicate how long such a subjective
present actually lasts. This numerical answer can be derived from
a number of different experiments which all converge to a value of
approximately 2 to 3 seconds. (2004: 298)

However, none of the plentiful evidence cited Pöppel cites in support of

this claim directly concerns the immediate experience of change. A few
examples will illustrate the point: (i) If subjects are asked to reproduce the
duration of either an auditory or a visual stimulus, they can do so very
accurately for stimuli which are up to 2 to 3 seconds long, but much less
accurately for longer stimuli. (ii) Subjects who are exposed to uniform
successive stimuli – such as the clicks of a metronome – will impose a
‘subjective structure’ onto them: rather than hearing a monotonous ‘click
… click …. click …’ one finds oneself hearing ‘CLICK … click, click
CLICK … click, click’ or variants thereof. This spontaneous grouping has
a temporal limit of about 2.5 seconds. (iii) Ambiguous figures (such as
duck-rabbit drawings, or vase/faces) can be interpreted (or better: seen) in
either of two ways; such changes in perceptual content occur
spontaneously, at roughly 3 second intervals. Now, these results – and
others along the same lines – are by no means uninteresting. It may well
be that the 2–3 second cycle is relevant to how our brains process
information – and relevant in ways which impact on the sort of experience

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information – and relevant in ways which impact on the sort of experience

we enjoy – but as an estimate of the duration of the specious present it is
not very plausible at all. (If this is not evident, a simple experiment will
assist. Clap your hands three times, leaving about a second between each
clap; when the third clap takes place, are you still directly aware of the
first?)

Rather more plausible is the figure of 0.75 seconds (or 750 msec) which
Benussi's tachistoscopic experiments led him to propose. Benussi was a
psychologist of the Graz school (influenced by Brentano and Meinong)
working in the early 20th century, and was well aware of the distinction
between the duration of a stimulus and the duration of the resulting
experience. Moreover, he construed the specious present in the same way
as Broad and Russell, as the maximum duration in which change or
succession can be experienced as a whole:

As Benussi proved in laboratory experiments, the time of

presentness is not a limit or a non-extensive instant … It is that
stretch of change which is apprehended as a unit and which is the
object of a single mental act of apprehension. The limits to the
content of consciousness are also the limits of the boundaries of
the field of consciousness. (Albertazzi 1996: 118)

For a (brief) description of the methods employed by Benussi see

Albertazzi (2001: 115).[31] Mabbott cites the same figure: ‘philosophers
have generally tended to believe that the psychologists have shown
experimentally that our direct apprehension of time is restricted to a
certain short duration and that they have determined the normal length of
this duration by measurement. It is usually given as 0.75 seconds.’ (1951:
156). He suggests this figure largely derives from experiments conducted
by followers of Wundt in the 1880's. Since these experiments were
intended to pin down the temporal intervals which subjects could estimate
most accurately, rather than apprehend as wholes, their relevance to our

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most accurately, rather than apprehend as wholes, their relevance to our

current concerns is questionable. Mabbot also points out that later
attempts to replicate the findings failed to do so.

3. James on the Specious Present

While James' made a significant contribution to our understanding of the

nature and character of our short-term experience of time and change, his
discussion in chapter 15 of the Principles has engendered a good deal of
puzzlement and confusion. I will briefly focus on two issues here.

The first concerns the duration of the specious present. If we take the
specious present to be the (maximal) window through which we are
directly aware of change and persistence, then it is plausible to suppose
that it is of the order of a second or so. (If need be, repeat the experiment
mentioned in the previous section: clap your hands twice in row, and ask
yourself if you are still hearing the first clap as the second clap occurs.)
But James himself says that the most important part of the specious
present – its ‘nucleus’ – is around ‘the dozen or so seconds that have just
elapsed’ (1890: 611), and that this nucleus is surrounded by a vaguer
fringe of ‘probably not more than a minute ago’. Later on he repeats the
claim: ‘our maximum distinct intuition of duration hardly covers more
than a dozen seconds (while our maximum vague intuition is probably not
more than a minute or so)’ (1890: 630)

What are we to make of this? James takes the figure of a dozen seconds
from the experiments of Wundt and Dietze which, as James characterizes
them, sought to ‘determine experimentally the maximal extent of our
immediate distinct consciousness for successive impressions.’ (1890: 612)
Both experiments, however, actually measured the accuracy with which
fast sequences of brief sounds could be accurately recalled after exposure
to them. Wundt arrived at a figure of 3.6 to 6 seconds, whereas Dietze
settled on a maximum of 12 seconds – James opted for latter. Given the

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settled on a maximum of 12 seconds – James opted for latter. Given the

nature of these experiments, James' characterization of them is certainly
misleading – or just plain wrong. Nonetheless, the fact that he was willing
to contemplate a specious present with a nucleus of up to a dozen seconds
– and a considerably more encompassing fringe – suggests that on at least
some occasions, he used the term in a very broad way, to refer to a period
of time to which we have a distinctive cognitive access, e.g., via short-
term memory and vivid anticipation.[32] On other occasions, when for
example he describes the specious present as ‘the short duration of which
we are immediately and incessantly sensible’ he gives the impression at
least of working with a narrower interpretation.[33] While the narrower,
purely sensory or phenomenal interpretation became commonplace in the
20th century – hence the adoption of it here – it may well be anachronistic
to foist it on James. It is of course tempting to think that if one were to
put it to James that within the 6–12 second span of easily remembered
past time there is an inner nucleus within which change and persistence
are directly apprehended in sensory manner he would have agreed. But
we cannot be sure.

When James' views as to the 12–60 second extent of the specious present
are combined with his ‘saddleback’ picture – of the specious present
having past- and future-directed components – it is easy to demonstrate
that absurdities follow. If this were the case, wouldn't a sprinter have a
dim awareness of the starters' gun up to half a minute before it actually
occurs? Mightn't 100 metre sprints be completed before the starting gun
even fires? (See Plumer (1985) for more along these lines.) But while
some conceptions of the specious present are undeniably problematic for
these reasons, other conceptions – conceptions which confine it to a
briefer interval, conceptions which do not entail detailed knowledge of
future events – are by no means as vulnerable to the charge of obvious
absurdity.

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The next question: where did James stand with regard to the Extensional
and Retentional approaches? There are certainly occasions when he seems
committed to the existence of duration-blocks of the sort which form the
bedrock of the Extensional view. There are also formulations suggestive
of the Overlap Model, or something not far off it: ‘Objects fade of out
consciousness slowly. If the present thought is of A B C D E F G, the
next one will be of B C D E F G H, and the one after that of C D E F G
H I – the lingerings of the past dropping successively away, and the
incomings of the future making up the loss.’ (1890: 606). Perhaps most
importantly in this connection, James is famed for his rejection of
atomistic conceptions of the stream of consciousness, a rejection which
entails the existence of real experiential connections between
neighbouring stream-phases, or so one might naturally suppose. Certainly
in his later writings he was adamant on this point, as in these passages
from ‘A World of Pure Experience’[34]:

For such a philosophy [radical empiricism], the relations that

connect experiences must themselves be experienced relations,
and any kind of relation experienced must be counted as ‘real’ as
anything else in the system. …. The conjunctive relation that has
given most trouble to philosophy is the co-conscious transition, so
to call it, by which one experience passes into another when both
belong to the same self. My experiences and your experiences are
‘with’ each other in various external ways, but mine pass into
mine, and yours pass into yours in a way in which yours and mine
never pass into one another. Within each of our personal histories,
subject, object, interest and purpose are continuous or may be
continuous. Personal histories are processes of change in time, and
the change itself is one of the things immediately experienced.
‘Change’ in this case means continuous as opposed to
discontinuous transition. But continuous transition is one sort of
conjunctive relation; and to be a radical empiricist means to hold
fast to this conjunctive relation of all others, for this is the

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fast to this conjunctive relation of all others, for this is the

strategic point, the position through which, if a hole be made, all
the corruptions of dialectics and all the metaphysical fictions pour
into our philosophy.

Given this firm commitment to conjunctive relations and co-conscious

transitions, it might seem inevitable that James would subscribe to some
form of the Extensional approach. In fact, at least in the Principles, he
seemed to do the opposite, at least on some occasions, and particularly in
the section entitled ‘The Feeling of Past Time is a Present Feeling’. He
writes ‘what is past, to be known as past, must be known with what is
present, and during the ‘present’ spot of time’ (1890: 629). Expanding on
this he cites first Volkmann, according to whom ‘A and B are to be
represented as occurring in succession they must be simultaneously
represented; if we are to think of them as one after the other, we must
think them both at once’. As clear a statement of the core principle behind
the Retentional approach as one might wish for. James himself follows up
thus:

If we represent the actual time-stream of our thinking by an

horizontal line, the thought of the stream or of any segment of its
length, past, present, or to come, might be figured in a
perpendicular raised upon the horizontal at a certain point. The
length of this perpendicular stands for a certain object or content,
which in this case is the time thought of, and all of which is
thought of together at the actual moment of the stream upon which
the perpendicular is raised. (1890: 629)

This description obviously fits the various diagrams employed by Broad

and Husserl. In fact, James here is following in the footsteps of James
Ward, whom he goes on to quote, and who clearly was advocating a
straightforward version of Retentionalism: ‘In reality, past, present, and
future are differences in time, but in presentation all that corresponds to

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future are differences in time, but in presentation all that corresponds to

these differences is in consciousness simultaneously.’ (ibid.). Evidence of
James' apparent commitment to the Retentional approach are littered
through these pages.[35]

As for what we should make of this, perhaps the only safe conclusion to
draw is that while James certainly believed in the continuity of
consciousness, and the immediate experience of change and persistence,
he was also alert to the appeal of the Retentional account of how these
modes of experience are possible. Whether he was entirely content with
this account, it is difficult to say.[36] In his later writings on these matters,
with some relief, he embraced a neo-Bergsonian position, according to
which the flux of experience defies description in rational terms:

… the simplest bits of immediate experience are their own others,

if that hegelian phrase be once for all allowed. The concrete pulses
of experience appear pent in by no such definite limits as our
conceptual substitutes for them are confined by. The run into each
other and seem to interpenetrate … You feel no one of them as
inwardly simple, and yet no two as wholly without confluence
where they touch. There is no datum so small as not to show this
mystery, if mystery it be. The tiniest feeling that we can possibly
have comes with an earlier and a later part and with a sense of
their continuous precession. (1909: 282)

Whether this amounts to pessimism or realism, it is perhaps, as yet too

early to say.

These points aside, James' various descriptions of the specious present

remain as influential as ever. Here is another:

Its content is in a constant flux, events dawning into its forward

end as fast as they fade out of its rearward one, and each of them
changing its time-coefficient from ‘not yet,’ or ‘not quite yet,’ to

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changing its time-coefficient from ‘not yet,’ or ‘not quite yet,’ to

‘just gone’ or ‘gone,’ as it passes by. Meanwhile, the specious
present, the intuited duration, stands permanent, like the rainbow
on the waterfall, with its own quality unchanged by the events that
stream through it. (1890: 630)

James clearly believed that there is an unvarying structure or mechanism

underlying our temporal awareness, as did Husserl after him. If this is
right, and if (as many believe) consciousness is essentially temporal, then
this structure (or mechanism) is an essential component of consciousness
itself, in all its forms. Hence the importance of the enterprise of arriving
at a clear and accurate understanding of the composition and functioning
of the specious present.

Supplement to Temporal Consciousness

Some Relevant Empirical Findings (Psychology,

Psychophysics, Neuroscience)
1. Motion Perception
2. Delays: how long does it take for a stimulus to reach (or produce)
consciousness?
3. Thresholds of Simultaneity, Succession and Integration
4. Minimally Brief Experiences of Duration
5. Is Experience Continuous or Discrete?

1. Motion Perception

Broad, Clay, Russell, Foster and other realists hold that motion (and other
forms of change) can be directly perceived. This notion receives some
support from findings relating to the workings of our perceptual systems
in general, and the visual system in particular.

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Just as there are regions of the brains visual systems that specialize in
colour (e.g. V4), there are other regions – V3 and V5 (or MT) – that
specialize in motion detection. What is more, some of the systems and
pathways devoted to motion are – in evolutionary terms – among the
more primitive parts of the brain. [43] Region V5 is particularly intriguing
in this respect. It seems that all its neurons are concerned with motion in
one direction or another, and none with colour or shape; and unlike V3,
the neurons in V5 are concerned with large-scale motion detection, e.g.,
of whole objects, rather than mere edges. Also, damage to V5 is
associated with cerebral akinetopsia: the severely degraded ability to
perceive motion, as found in the patient L.M. (Zeki, 1991, 2004; Rizzo et
al, 1995). The latter's predicament was characterized thus:

The visual disorder complained of by the patient was a loss of

movement in all three dimensions. She had difficulty, for example,
in pouring tea or coffee into a cup because the fluid appeared to be
frozen, like a glacier. In addition, she could not stop pouring at the
right time since she was unable to perceive the movement on the
cup (or a pot) when the fluid rose. … In a room where more than
two people were walking she felt very insecure and unwell, and
usually left the room immediately, because ‘people were suddenly
here or there but I have not seen them moving.’ … She could not
cross the street because of her inability to judge the speed of a car,
but she could identify the car without difficulty. (Zihl, von
Cramon & Mai, 1983: 315)

The difference between L.M.'s experience and our own could not be
clearer or more dramatic: whereas we are able to see things moving in a
smooth, continuous manner, L.M. has lost this ability.

There is plentiful further evidence for the contention that our brains are
more than willing to generate experiences of motion. Perhaps the most

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more than willing to generate experiences of motion. Perhaps the most

familiar is the fact that we see moving images on cinema and television
screens (and computer monitors). This may not seem in the least
surprising: aren't these devices expressly designed to show moving
images? In fact, as already noted, the images shown are stills, and the
motion we perceive is entirely supplied by our brains. Two main
mechanisms are at work in such cases. Suppose two spots are shown, one
after the other at different locations on a screen; if the interval between
them is sufficiently short, we will not discern the succession: the spots
will seem to occur simultaneously. This is due to the well-studied
phenomenon of visible persistence. When we are shown a brief visual
stimulus, the resulting visual experience is typically a good deal longer
than the stimulus itself: e.g., the visible persistence of a single 1 msec
flash can vary between 100 msec and 400 msec, depending on the type of
flash and the adaptive state of the eye.[44] This effect is one reason why
the brief gaps between successive images on a cinema screen tend not
seen. It also explains why it is possible to write ones name in the night
sky with a moving torch (as noted by both Leonardo and Newton).
However, visible persistence alone does not explain how it is that we see
motion in the clear and distinct way in which we do. If I wave my hand
slowly back and forth in front of my eyes in broad daylight, I do not see it
followed by a trail of lingering ghostly predecessors: my hand is cleanly
delineated, yet moving. This is explained by an effect first noted by
Exner. Returning to our spots-on-a-screen, if the interstimulus interval is
increased somewhat, to 20–40 frames per second (fps) something more
interesting and dramatic happens: we see the spot moving smoothly back
and forth between its left and right positions, despite the fact that all that
is really appearing on the screen are two spots of light, at fixed locations,
flashing on and off, This is the already-mentioned phi phenomenon, also
known as ‘apparent motion’. (The latter designation could be misleading:
the motion as it appears is entirely indistinguishable from the real thing.)
Evidently, our brains are more than happy to supply us with experiences

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Evidently, our brains are more than happy to supply us with experiences
of motion at the least opportunity. And happily, the effect is not confined
to spots of light: it extends to sequences of complex images (e.g.,
photographs taken in rapid succession of a swarming crowd of people).
The frequencies which suffice to generate smooth apparent motion are not
great: only 24 fps are shown on cinema screens, whereas television uses
30 fps and computer monitors 60 fps or above.[45] Online examples of the
simple two-spot illustration of the phi phenomenon are easy to find, and
are well worth experimenting with.[46]

No less dramatic, but somewhat less ubiquitous, is the phenomenon of

biological motion. As Johansson (1973) showed, appropriately arranged,
a small number of moving dots will give rise to a very vivid impression
of a moving human figure. Again, online examples are available – and
striking. [47] Morgan sums up thus:

Human vision lies somewhere between the extremes of the

[blurry] daguerreotype and the time-frozen electronic flash. We
are not normally conscious of a blur in moving objects: nor do we
see them frozen in space-time. Instead, we see recognisable
objects in motion. Motion is a sensation that cannot be
communicated by a single snapshot, but somehow, the sensation of
motion can occur without seeing an object in many places at the
same time. Motion is a specific sensation, like colour or smell,
which cannot be analysed into a separate, stationary sensations.
(2003: 61)

Since perceived motion is usually a property of perceptible objects – we

cannot discern motion in the absence of moving things – it is probably
more correct to talk of motion as a property or feature of sensations. But
in other respects what Morgan says here seems plausible.

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2. Delays: how long does it take for a stimulus to reach (or

produce) consciousness?

It is uncontroversial that the phenomenology of perception is such that we

seem to be in immediate perceptual contact with our surroundings.
‘Immediate’ here has two relevant connotations. Firstly, perceptual
experience is seemingly unmediated: we are not ordinarily aware of
anything (any mental representations or images) coming between
ourselves and what we see, hear and touch. Secondly, perceptual
experience is seemingly instantaneous in this sense: we ordinarily assume
that we perceive events as they happen, with absolutely no time-lag or
delay.

This assumption does not sit easily with what we know about the
workings of our perceptual systems. Light and sound both travel at a
finite speed – if you look at a distant star you are seeing it as it was years
earlier, irrespective of how present to you the star might seem. And when
the starlight finally reaches our eyes there are several further hurdles to be
crossed before any visual experience is produced in response to them: the
starlight has to trigger the light-sensitive cells in our retinas, these cells
have to transmit signals through the optical nerve, these signals have to be
processed by the visual centres of the brain. All this takes time.

How much time? The delay is more difficult to measure than might
initially be thought. The obvious approach is to ask a subject to react to a
signal as soon as they perceive it – by pressing a button, say – and then
subtract the amount of time it takes messages leaving the brain to result in
a muscular movement. However, the reliability of this approach is
undermined by the fact that we are able to react to stimuli before they
become conscious (‘blindsight’ is a familiar instance of this). To
circumvent the problem some experimental ingenuity is required. Libet's
well-known results, deriving from direct stimulation of the brain during
neurosurgical operations, suggest that it typically takes around half a

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neurosurgical operations, suggest that it typically takes around half a

second (500 msec) for a stimulus to work its way through to
consciousness (Libet 1993, 2004). However, these results have also been
criticized (Churchland 1981; Gomes 1998). Pockett (2002, 2005) suggests
that while as much as 500 msec may be required if complicated
judgements are being made concerning the data, in other cases stimuli can
produce basic sensations in as little as 50–80 msec. This is broadly in line
with Efron (1967), who estimates that a minimum of 60–70 msec of
neural processing time is required for simple auditory and visual stimului
reaching the brain to result in experience. In the visual case, Koch (2004:
260) estimates that around a quarter of a second is typically needed to
properly see an object (in the sense of recognizing a thing as a thing of a
particular kind).

The answer to our starting question seems to be ‘it depends’. And while
those with an interest in responding to changes in their environment in a
fast, real-time, manner will be heartened to learn that Libet's 500 msec
estimate may often be on the long side, it remains the case that a car
moving at a 100 kph traverses a fair distance in 200–250 msec, which
even under the best of conditions is the sort of time needed to see and
respond to a traffic light changing to red, or someone stepping onto the
road. Even at more modest speeds processing delays will have a
significant impact: a delay of just 100 msec mean that the apparent
position of a medium-paced moving ball – say 30 mph – will lag behind
its real position by over a metre.

3. Thresholds of Simultaneity, Succession and Integration

James posed this question:

what then is the minimum amount of duration which we can

distinctly feel? The smallest figure experimentally obtained was
by Exner, who distinctly heard the doubleness of two successive

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by Exner, who distinctly heard the doubleness of two successive

clicks of a Savart's wheel, and of two successive snaps of an
electric spark, when their interval was made as small as about one
five-hundredth of a second [2msec]. With the eye, perception is
less delicate. Two sparks, made to fall beside each other in rapid
succession on the centre of the retina, ceased to be recognized as
successive by Exner when their interval fell below 0.044 second
[44msec] (1890: 613)

These 19th century figures have largely survived the test of time. Pockett
(2003) recently attempted to replicate Exner's findings using
contemporary equipment. When shown two 1 msec flashes of LED light
in succession her subjects only began to see two flashes (rather than one)
when the illuminations were separated by at least 45–50 msec – very
much in line with Exner's results. In the auditory case, although subjects
could tell that a two-click stimulus was (in some manner) different from a
1-click stimulus when the clicks were separated by as little as 2 msec –
the stimuli were again 1 msec in duration – they could only begin to
discern two clearly distinct sounds when the separation rose to 10–20
msec, depending on the subject. This result suggests Exner somewhat
exaggerated our capacity for auditory discrimination. Pöppel's
measurements also suggest as much: irrespective of modality he found
that distinct events require a separation of at least 30 msec to be perceived
as successive (1997: 57). Hirsch and Sherrick's experiments also point in
this direction: they found that a mere 2 msec separation between sounds
was sufficient for subjects to judge that two sounds were occurring rather
than one, but an interval in the order of 20 msec was required before
subjects could reliably discern the order of the sounds (1961: 425).
However, as Fraisse (1984) notes, since it took a good deal of practice
before Hirsch and Sherrick's subjects achieved this score, a somewhat
higher figure may come closer to the norm. Hence Pöppel's more cautious
verdict may well be closer to the mark for most cases. Summarizing, the
picture is something like this:

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picture is something like this:

Coincidence (or fusion) thresholds: ~2–3 msec for auditory

stimuli, ~10 msec for tactile stimuli and ~20 msec for visual
stimuli.

Succession threshold: ~30 msec, irrespective of modality.

Pairs of stimuli which are separated by less than the coincidence threshold
are experienced as one rather than two. Stimuli which are separated by
more than the coincidence threshold but less than the succession threshold
are experienced as two rather than one, but their order is indistinct. It is
only when the succession threshold is reached and surpassed that stimuli
appear to have a distinct temporal ordering (Ruhnau 1995). The fact that
the succession threshold is much the same for all sensory modalities
suggests that cross-modal integrative mechanisms may well exist.

Why do our brains treat stimuli which arrive over brief intervals as
simultaneous? It is by no means just a matter of insensitivity. Not only do
sound and light travel at very different speeds, our eyes and ears work at
different speeds too (our ears are faster). Consequently, our brains have a
good deal to take into account when attempting to work out what happens
when and where on the basis of the information it receives from
millisecond to millisecond. For more on how it manages to do as well as
it does see King (2005), Kopinska and Harris (2004), Stone et al (2001),
Stetson et al (2006); see Callender (2008) for an interesting exploration of
the philosophical relevance of perceptual ‘simultaneity windows’.

In addition to the limits already mentioned there is what is sometimes

called the ‘integration threshold’. Distinct brief stimuli which occur
within the confines of the latter can be blended (or integrated) so as to
produce a single experience, the character of which can be surprising. If a
small red disk is shown in for 10 msec and is immediately followed by 10
msec exposure of a small green disk at the same location, the resulting

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msec exposure of a small green disk at the same location, the resulting
experience is of a single yellow flash. If a 20 msec blue light is followed
by a 20 msec yellow light, a single white flash is seen. (Efron, 1967,
1973) It is clear how long this integration period lasts, but it is probably
less than a quarter of second (Koch 2004: 256).

This sort of integration is sometimes construed as a special case of the

more general phenomenon of backward masking. Visual masking per se
occurs when the appearance of one stimuli – the target – is affected by
the visibility of a second stimuli, the mask. Backward masking is so-
called because the mask occurs after the target. In one illustration of this
effect subjects are shown brief exposures of two different shapes at the
same location, and asked name each of the shapes. When the distance
between the exposures is between 50–100 msec, the second shape is
accurately identified around 70% of the time, whereas accuracy for the
shape seen first lies around 30% (Bachman and Allik, 1976). The effect is
typically at its strongest when the mask follows the target by
approximately 100 msec, and diminishes rapidly thereafter. For a recent
review of this topic see Breitmeyer and Ogden (2000).

4. Minimally Brief Experiences of Duration

Do the various findings concerning coincidence and succession thresholds

tell us anything about the temporal extent of minimally brief experiences
of duration or succession? Probably, but there are complications.

We have just seen that stimuli separated by as little as 30 msec can give
rise to an experience of succession. However, it would be a mistake to
move directly from this result to the conclusion that the duration of the
resulting experiences are also have an objective duration of the order of
30 msec (and a corresponding phenomenal duration of approximately 30
msec*). As we have also seen, due to the phenomenon known as visible
persistence, the experience resulting from a single 1 msec flash of light

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persistence, the experience resulting from a single 1 msec flash of light

can vary between 100 msec and 400 msec, depending on the brightness of
the flash and how adapted the eye is to the relevant brightness conditions.

So what should we conclude? The literature contains a range of estimates.

Pöppel tells us that Ernst Mach, who had an interest in the discrimination
of different temporal durations: ‘observed that there is no experience of
duration for intervals that are shorter than 40 msec. Stimuli with 40 msec
duration or shorter are experienced as “time points” ’ (2004 :296) But for
the reason just given, this does not tell us how long – in ordinary clock
time – these subjectively durationless experiences last. Drawing on
evidence from a range of experiments, Allport, Stroud and other
proponents of the ‘perceptual moment’ hypothesis (see Section 5, below)
estimated that typical experiential quanta were of the order of 100 msec.
Other estimates suggest a perceptual minima of longer duration. Efron
was notably careful in distinguishing the duration of stimuli and the
durations of the resulting sensory experiences. His investigations of
subjects asked to compare the durations of immediately successive
auditory and visual sensations led him to conclude that ‘a minimal
perceptual duration is produced by all stimuli of 120–130 msec or less,
and that the duration of this minimum perception lies between 120 and
240 msec for vision and between 120 and 170 msec for audition.’ (1970b:
62). Coren, Ward and Enns sum up a confusing situation thus: ‘the best
that we can say at this time is that, depending on the specific task, the
minimum perceptual duration … is probably between 25 and 150 msec’
(2004: 351).

While Extensional models do not predict a minimum perceptual duration,

they have no difficulty accommodating it. What of Retentional models?
There is no difficulty here either. Retentionalists may hold that individual
specious presents are experiential episodes with little or no temporal
extension, but since the contents of these experiences present (or
represent) temporally extended phenomena, they too can accommodate

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represent) temporally extended phenomena, they too can accommodate

minimal perceived durations.

5. Is Experience Continuous or Discrete?

In §5.2 we encountered the ‘discrete block’ conception: according to

some philosophers (e.g., Bradley, Sprigge, Whitehead) our streams of
consciousness are composed of non-overlapping sequences of Jamesian
duration-blocks. To put it another way, our experience is chunked or
quantized. This model has its merits – it offers a phenomenologically
plausible account of individual specious presents – it is also problematic:
if awareness of phenomenal continuity is confined to the interiors of non-
overlapping duration-blocks, it is hard to see how our experience could be
as continuous as it is often thought to be.

Something superficially akin to the discrete block model has been

entertained by a number of psychologists. According to proponents of the
‘perceptual moment’ hypothesis, the workings of our sensory systems are
discrete rather than continuous. As Allport puts it, the assumption is that
‘at some stage in the nervous system, the sensory input is packaged for
analysis into successive, temporally discrete samples, or “chunks”.
Underlying this suggestion is the idea that the brain operates in some way
discontinuously in time on its inputs’ (1968: 395); also see Stroud (1955).
The duration of the chunks or moments (or frames) is typically taken to
be of the order of 100 msec.

Most proponents of this approach combine the claim that sensory

processing operates in a discrete manner with the further claim that
stimuli presented within any given perceptual windows appear
simultaneous (or are not distinguishable from one another at all); only
stimuli which are presented in distinct perceptual moments give rise to
experiences which seem successive. Thus construed, perceptual moments
are manifestly very different from the discrete specious presents of

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are manifestly very different from the discrete specious presents of

Bradley, Sprigge and Whitehead: the contents of the latter are typically
not simultaneous, containing as they do phenomenal duration and
succession. However, as Allport suggests (ibid. 396), there is no a priori
reason why discrete perceptual processing should lead to a complete loss
of information regarding the temporal order of stimuli occurring within
individual perceptual moments. If so, it is at least logically possible for
stimuli occurring within perceptual moments to give rise to experiences
of duration and succession.[48]

Although there are results which can be taken as supportive of the

discrete processing model, over the past half century or so it has gradually
fallen from favour. Efron conducted a series of experiments on auditory
and visual experience to test two hypotheses: (a) that a perception has a
minimum duration, and (b) that perceptual durations occur only in exact
multiples of this minimum (the quantization hypothesis). He found no
support for the latter: ‘auditory and visual perceptions have a minimum
duration, produced by stimuli shorter than the critical duration, and that
perceptions evoked by longer than this critical value are continuously
graded with respect to duration’ (1970: 54). In recent years the quantized
conception has found renewed favour in some quarters, e.g., Purves,
Paydarfar & Andrews (1996) and VanRullen & Koch (2003), but the
supporting evidence is less than wholly compelling. In a recent review
Kline et al conclude ‘while quantized perception cannot be ruled out,
there currently exists little meaningful evidence in support of it’ (2004:
2658).

In its standard form the perceptual moment hypothesis is in tension with

our ability to perceive motion. It is by no means clear how we could
perceive motion if (i) our streams of consciousness are composed of
discrete (non-overlapping) perceptual moments, and (ii) the experiential
contents of each perceptual moment are (phenomenally speaking)
simultaneous. For Crick and Koch, however, there is no problem here at

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simultaneous. For Crick and Koch, however, there is no problem here at

all. According to their ‘snapshot hypothesis’ (2003: 122), consciousness
not only comes in discrete chunks, the experience of motion is itself
illusory:

Perception might well take place in discrete processing epochs,

perceptual moments, frames, or snapshots. Your subjective life
could be a ceaseless sequence of such frame … Within one such
moment, the perception of brightness, colour, depth and motion
would be constant. Think of motion painted onto each snapshot …
(Koch 2004: 264)

But as we saw in §4.4, this view is not without its difficulties.

Supplement to Temporal Consciousness

Husserl, the Brain and Cognitive Science

1. Varela and van Gelder: retention without representation
2. Lloyd: connectionist retentions
3. Grush: a trajectory estimation model

Husserl's tripartite conception of the (Retentionalist) specious present has

been influential, and in recent years there have been a number of attempts
to incorporate his insights into neurobiology and cognitive science.

1. Varela and van Gelder: retention without representation

Seeking to build bridges between the cerebral and the phenomenal, Varela
has proposed that there may be important analogies between the
dynamical behaviour of neural cell-assemblies and Husserl's tri-partite
conception of the phenomenal present. More specifically, he suggests that
these neuronal ensembles can become synchronized for periods lasting

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these neuronal ensembles can become synchronized for periods lasting

around 1 second, and these transient periods of synchrony are the neural
correlates of present-time consciousness (1999: 119). Husserl himself did
not suggest that the 1 second time-scale is privileged in any way, and it is
not immediately apparent what Varela's neuronal ensembles might have in
common with time-consciousness as described by Husserl. Matters
become clearer with Varela's claim that retentions may be ‘dynamical
trajectories’, although this takes a little unpacking. (See Thompson 2007
chapter 11 for a sympathetic exposition.)

Neural networks are often assumed to be instances of the sort of chaotic

(or non-linear) systems whose behaviour has come under increasing
scrutiny in recent decades. Although such systems can react in difficult-
to-predict ways in response to the smallest of stimuli, they often have a
certain number of favoured states – states they are more likely to enter
into – and these correspond to the ‘attractors’ in the abstract phase spaces
used to describe their behaviour. The behaviour of a dynamic system from
one moment to the next depends on several factors: the system's current
global state, its tendency to move along certain preferred trajectories
through its phase space from any given location, and external influences.
So at any given point, a system's behavioural dispositions are determined
by its precise location in its phase space, and its current location in its
phase space is a function of its previous locations. For this reason a
system's current phase-space trajectory can be viewed as reflecting its
past: ‘in its current point in time a dynamical system has no
“representation” of its past. But the past acts into the present … The
present state wouldn't be what it is except for its past, but the past is not
actually present … and is not represented’ (Varela 1999: 137). Husserl's
contention that the present contains remnants or retentions of the past can
seem puzzling, even paradoxical. How is it possible for experienced
succession to be generated by contents that exist only in the momentary
present? But if a system's present state can reflect the recent past without
actually or explicitly representing it, the problem of how presently

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actually or explicitly representing it, the problem of how presently

occurring representations can perform the functions Husserl ascribes to
them is solved, or at least that is what Varela maintains.[37]

Van Gelder is another advocate of this geometricization of retention.

Commenting on how an artificial neural net can be taught to recognize
sounds, he writes:

How is the past built in? By virtue of the fact that the current
position of the system is the culmination of a trajectory which is
determined by the particular auditory pattern (type) as it was
presented up to that point. In other words, retention is a geometric
property of dynamical systems: the particular location the system
occupies in the space of possible states when in the process of
recognizing the temporal object. It is that location, in its difference
with other locations, which “stores” in the system the exact way in
which the auditory pattern unfolded in the past. It is how the
system “remembers” where it came from. (1997: §38)

Van Gelder goes on to outline a number of other respects in which the

workings of dynamical (in this case, connectionist) systems correspond to
what Husserl had so say about the structure of temporal awareness. While
these analogies are certainly noteworthy, there is a significant difficulty
with the central claim. Dispensing with anything resembling an explicit
representation of a system's prior states in its present state may make life
easier, but for Husserl the whole mystery or ‘wonder’ of time-
consciousness consists in the way the past lives on in the present. Van
Gelder recognizes that there is nothing resembling a ‘perception’ of the
past in his model, but he presents this as a positive: he suggests Husserl's
talk of perceptions of the past is confused and unnecessary, and that he
only used such formulations because ‘he had no better model of how
something could “directly intend” the past’ (1997: §40). Whether Husserl
would have agreed with this verdict is debatable.

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would have agreed with this verdict is debatable.

2. Lloyd: connectionist retentions

Lloyd is sympathetic to the overall approach taken by van Gelder and

Varela, but he finds something lacking:

Husserl's challenge to us is not to show how a difference in the

real past of a system can influence its present state – the actual
past is excluded along with the rest of the objective world at the
phenomenological get-go. Rather, Husserlian retention is the
presence (now) of an apparent past experience, the prior Now in
all its richness. So if a distributed pattern of activity is the network
Now, then retention is achieved only if that pattern is inflected by
its own prior Now-state, and not just some aspect of the prior now,
but all of it. (2004: 342)

Artificial neural nets can differ in their fundamental architecture. A very

simple feed-forward system will contain an input layer of processing
units, a single hidden layer (where the computations or processing takes
place) and an output layer. In each cycle of activity, the units in each layer
can only be influenced by units below themselves, they cannot be
influenced from above, i.e. by units closer to the output layer. Since the
hidden layer's state is significantly changed by each new cycle of inputs,
it has no way of retaining detailed information about its own prior state,
and so is ill-suited to serve as an analogue of a Husserlian ‘now’. A far
more promising candidate, Lloyd suggests (2004: 282), are the simple
recurrent networks described by Elman (1990). These comprise layers of
input units, output units and hidden units as per usual. They also,
however, include a layer of ‘context units’ whose function it is to record
the exact state of the hidden units, and feed this information forward to
the hidden units in the next cycle of processing. (See Figure 23 for a
schematic depiction.) The processing layer is simultaneously presented

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schematic depiction.) The processing layer is simultaneously presented

with the new input stimuli and detailed information about its own prior
state.

Figure 23. A simple recurrent network in which activations are

copied from hidden layer to context layer on a one-for-one basis
(Elman 1990: 184).

Because this ‘echo dates from one cycle ago, the next internal state can
enfold both present and past information. Then that new internal state,
combining present and just prior information, itself recycles … In
principle, this neuronal hall of mirrors can keep a pattern alive
indefinitely.’ (Lloyd 2004: 282). In his own research Lloyd exposed a
network of this sort – dubbed ‘CNVnet’ – to a large number of (suitably
encoded) ‘beeps’ and ‘boops’. These signals followed a fixed pattern:
beeps come randomly, but are invariably followed by boops a short (and
fixed) period of time later. With appropriate tweaking of connection
weights, the network eventually had no difficulty whatsoever in
predicting the timing of a boop after any given beep. Thanks to the
combination of recursive and predictive capacities, CVNet's hidden units
can reflect both the past and the future, in addition to the current cycle of

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can reflect both the past and the future, in addition to the current cycle of
inputs.

Lloyd does not claim that his simple networks are actually conscious, but
he does see points of similarity with Husserl's tripartite analysis of
temporal awareness. Taking things a step further, he set artificial
networks the task of analyzing each other. He created a metanet, tuned to
respond to the hidden units of the CNVnet. After the usual training
(several million cycles), the metanet proved able to extract three sorts of
information from the hidden units: the current input, the next output, and
(with less accuracy) a record of the layer's entire past state. Might these
not reasonably be taken to correspond with Husserl's primal impressions,
protentions and retentions? Moving to real rather than artificial brains,
Lloyd (2002, 2004: ch.4) argues that it might prove possible to find some
confirming evidence for Husserl's analysis in the data pertaining to the
global condition of conscious brains that can be derived – using
sophisticated multidimensional scaling methods – from fMRI scans.
Simplifying a good deal, his working hypothesis is that if our
consciousness at any one moment contains a detailed representation of its
immediately prior states, this should be reflected in similarities between
the conditions of our brain over the relevant short periods: ‘images taken
close together in time should be more similar, compared to images
separated by greater temporal intervals’ (2004: 313). And, broadly
speaking, this is what he found. To round things off, he fed the fMRI data
to an artificial neural net. His aim, as with CVNnet, was to find out
whether the metanet could extract information about a brain's prior states
from a description of its later states. Again the results were positive:
‘Overall, the analysis suggests that patterns of activation in the human
brain encode past patterns of activation, and particularly the immediate
past’ (2004: 327).

3. Grush: a trajectory estimation model

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In a series of recent papers Grush moves in a rather different, more

classical direction (computationally speaking). Although he too is
sympathetic to Husserl's analysis of the phenomenal present, he is highly
critical of the efforts of Varela, van Gelder and Lloyd. He reproaches a
tendency in all three to assume without sufficient further argument that
we can draw conclusions about the temporal properties of experiences (or
of properties that are represented in the contents of experiences) from
facts pertaining to the ‘vehicles’ of these experiences, e.g., the neural
processes which underlie them (2006: 422). From the fact that a global
brain state bears traces of its recent past it does not automatically follow
that any experiences produced by this brain also bear traces of their past.
Consequently, before it is legitimate to conclude that such a discovery
about the brain vindicates the Husserlian conception a compelling story
needs to be told as how or why the temporal features at the neural level
transfer to the phenomenal level.[38] There are more specific complaints.
Lloyd's fMRI results, Grush argues, may well be nothing more than an
artefact of the way the data was processed. As for the geometricization of
retention advocated by Varela and van Gelder, if the analysis were correct
‘every physical system in the universe would exhibit Husserlian retention’
(2006: 425)[39]

Grush's positive proposal comes in the form of the ‘trajectory estimation

model’, which draws on ideas and analyses from control theory and signal
processing – for further details, see Grush (2005a, 2005b). The core idea
is that a system (e.g. a brain) has:

an internal model of the perceived entity (typically the

environment and entities in it, but perhaps also the body), and at
each time t, the state of the internal model embodies an estimate of
the state of the perceived domain. The model can be run off-line in
order to produce expectations of what the modelled domain might
do in this or that circumstances (or if this or that action were taken
by the agent); the model can also be run online, in parallel with the

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by the agent); the model can also be run online, in parallel with the
modelled domain, in order to help filter noise from sensory
signals, and in order to overcome potential problems with
feedback delays. (Grush 2006: §4)

So far as analogies with Husserl's doctrines are concerned, a key point is

that the internal model employed by these systems is not confined to
modelling instantaneous states of the relevant domain. What is modelled,
rather, is the trajectory of the domain over a short interval of time, i.e.,
the entire succession of states that the system estimates that domain is
most likely to have been in during the relevant interval. It is this
trajectory – which is a detailed representation, and so not to be confused
with the phase-space vectors of van Gelder and Varela – which Grush
takes to be the information-processing analogue of Husserl's tri-partite
specious presents. When construed in experiential terms, an (online,
parallel) trajectory is a subject's course of experience over a brief interval,
in the manner indicated in Figure 24 below. At each of three distinct times
t1, t2, t3 a distinct trajectory is modelled, ranging from t1-t5, t2-t6, t3-t7
respectively. Within these trajectories, ‘t 3’ denotes what the system is
representing as happening at t3, ‘t 2’ denotes what the system is
representing as happening at t2, and so forth. These trajectories extend a
short way into the past, but also include projections (or expectations)
about the likely future course of experience, and in this manner reflect the
protentional aspect of Husserlian specious presents. As for the temporal
scope of these retentions and protentions, Grush suggests around a 100
msec in either direction is a plausible estimate. As in previous cases of
diagrams of this sort, for the sake of clarity only a small sample of the
actual representations is depicted; in reality the representations are being
produced continually, generating a gap-free continuum of trajectories.

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Figure 24.

Leaving aside their predictive capabilities, the trajectories (or specious

presents) Grush's systems produce from one moment to the next are not
simply passive reflections of current and past sensory inputs. When
producing their internal models of their environments, many controlling
systems – e.g., those used as navigational aids on ships – have to rely on
external sensors which are supplying partial, fragmentary or less than
entirely accurate information concerning what is going on around them.
Our brains are typical in this respect: the signals they receive from our
eyes, ears and skin are very difficult indeed to interpret. To help
circumvent these obstacles, engineers build a variety of sub-systems into
control systems whose task it is to make the best of the imperfect
information available. For example, these sub-systems will smooth out
irregularities that are likely to be due to imperfect sensory data rather than
sudden and dramatic alterations in the external environment, or fill-in
holes or gaps by extrapolating from the available data in the most
plausible way. To accomplish this, the relevant sub-systems will often
themselves possess internal models of likely courses of events and likely
external environments. In effect, in modelling current trajectories, these
control systems rely on models they already possess. As a consequence of
this active or interpretive stance, there is no guarantee that the trajectories
generated by a system will remain constant or consistent over time. Since
each trajectory represents a temporal interval, it is quite possible that later

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each trajectory represents a temporal interval, it is quite possible that later

trajectories will re-write or supersede earlier trajectories, simply because
the relevant control systems have more (and perhaps better) information
to work with. This ‘re-writing of the past’ is illustrated schematically in
the diagram above. What the system is representing as happening at t3
undergoes a change between t3 and t4 – the change is signified by the
switch to bold font + underlining – and as can be seen, the revised version
of t3 is preserved at t5.

Grush argues that the abilities of his systems to generate different (and
incompatible) trajectories at different times is a positive boon, for it
allows his model to accommodate a variety of ‘temporal illusions’. One
such is the cutaneous rabbit described by Geldard & Sherrick (1972). The
experiment involved devices capable of delivering controlled brief (2
msec) pulses to the skin being fitted along the arms of subjects.
Surprisingly, when the devices were clustered in just three tight
configurations – and the wrist, the elbow and in-between – and five pulses
were delivered to each location, rather than experiencing three tight
clusters of pulses (one at the wrist, one at the elbow and one in-between)
subjects report feeling a succession of evenly spaced pulses starting at the
wrist and terminating a the elbow (and often seeming continue a bit
further). There are several questions that can be asked about this, but
perhaps the most puzzling is: what is happening at the time of the second
pulse? Although this actually occurs at the wrist, it is felt further along
the arm, but at the time the second pulse occurs the brain can't yet know
that pulses further along the arm will be delivered. A similar problem is
posed by the colour phi phenomenon (Kolers & von Grünau 1976,
Dennett 1991: 114–123). When two differently coloured spots were
flashed on and off for 150 msec each – with a 50 msec gap – subjects
reported not only seeing a single spot moving back and forth (rather than
two distinct spots flashing on and off), they also saw the first spot
suddenly changing in colour mid-way along its path. Evidently, at some
level the brain is ‘deciding’ that it is more likely to be confronted with a

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level the brain is ‘deciding’ that it is more likely to be confronted with a

single spot of light that is both in motion and changing its colour than two
flashing lights of different colours. But how is the brain able to impose
this interpretation of events on experience before the second flash even
occurs? Grush's trajectory model has no difficulty explaining what is
going on in such cases. In the case of the rabbit, the second pulse is
initially represented as occurring at the wrist. But as the brain updates its
models in the light of subsequent sensory information and its own
expectations as to the likely scenario confronting it, it alters its verdict
and starts representing the second pulse as occurring further along the
arm, as part of an evenly spaced succession. And when subjects are
subsequently queried as to what they experienced, it is the later
representations (or trajectories) which get reported – the earlier
representations are not remembered. The colour phi phenomenon is
susceptible to an analogous interpretation and explanation: the earliest
trajectories do not represent motion (or a fortiori a mid-path change of
colour) subsequent ones do, and it is these which are reported.[40]

Taking a step back, the various attempts to put computational (or even
biological) flesh on the bones of Husserl's Retentional model are certainly
intriguing, and Grush makes out a plausible case for supposing that our
brains may contain internal modelling (or emulation) systems similar to
the ones he describes, at least from the perspective of the sort of
information processing they can carry out. But what conclusions should
we draw from this? It would certainly be a mistake to conclude, without
any further argument, that the existence within our brains of information
processing systems along the lines of the trajectory estimation model
entails that Husserl's theory (or some other form of Retentional model) is
true. Grush was right to criticize Varela, van Gelder and Lloyd for paying
insufficient attention to the distinction between brains and the properties
possessed by (or represented in) the experiences brains produce. From the
fact that momentary global brain states retain traces of their recent past,
we cannot conclude – without further argument – that momentary phases

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we cannot conclude – without further argument – that momentary phases

of experiences do likewise. A precisely analogous point can be made with
regard to information processing models. Suppose our brains do contain
(what are in effect) data-structures representing in quite detailed ways
their environments (external and bodily) over short intervals. Let us
further suppose that these data-structures are embodied in momentary
phases of our brains, and are updated on a moment-to-moment basis (or at
least, at time-scales shorter by far than the specious present). Should we
conclude that our the contents of momentary (or very brief) phases of our
streams of consciousness also reflect intervals of time, the same intervals
as are represented in the data-structures? Not without a good deal of
further argument. After all, the relationship between the phenomenal and
the computational levels is as unclear and disputed as the relationship
between the phenomenal and the physical (or neuronal) levels. Some
realists about the phenomenal – e.g. Searle – reject any significant link
between computation and experience; even those who think there is some
significant relationship between information processing and experience
may resist the claim that all instances of information processing are
associated with experience. It is thus an option for the Extensional
theorist to say:

Yes, our brains may well contain continually updated

representations (in informational or computational form) of our
internal and external environments; it may well be that at any one
time it is possible to find in the brain data-structures
corresponding to courses of events over brief periods of time; it
may also be the case that these data-structures impact on our
behaviour. But since we cannot conclude from this that our
experience at any one moment embodies the data found in these
structures, it may well be that our experience of change and
persistence is itself temporally extended, in the way that
Extensional models predict.

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Until the relationship between matter, information processing and

phenomenal consciousness is settled, this response cannot be dismissed.

Supplement to Temporal Consciousness

Interpreting Temporal Illusions

Our perceptual systems are efficient, but not miraculous: due to the finite
speed of signal transmission, and delays due to neural processing, changes
in our immediate environments do not register in our experience
instantaneously. This well-established fact gives rise to a puzzle: how are
we able to deal with a fast-changing world as well as we do if we are
unable to perceive things in real-time? Part of the answer could be that
the perceptual experiences our brains supply us with are based on
anticipations of the likely course of events, rather than signals deriving
from the events themselves. This is one interpretation of the flash-lag
illusion, a version of which is depicted in Figure 25. Subjects are shown a
moving figure – in this case a rotating circle – and at some
(unpredictable) point during its trajectory a brief flash is shown. In actual
fact the flash occurs right next to the arrow – as shown in the figure on
the left – and if perceptual experience faithfully mirrored stimuli patterns,
this is where it would be seen. But subjects actually see the flash lagging
a discernible distance behind the arrow, as shown on the right.

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Figure 25. The Flash-Lag Illusion.

Nihjawan (1994: 257) suggests that in such cases the rotating disk has
been visible long enough for the brain to be able to extrapolate its likely
future positions, and that it uses this information to deliver a perceptual
experience which lags less far behind the actual course of events than
would otherwise be the case. Since the occurrence of the flash is
unpredictable, its location cannot be extrapolated in this manner, and so it
seems to lag behind the arrow.

It should be noted, however, that Eagleman and Sejnowski (2000) have

offer a different diagnosis of this effect. They conducted a series of
experiments in which the direction of rotation of the disk prior to the
occurrence of the flash is always the same, but where it is altered, in
random fashion, just after the flash occurs. With this protocol it turned
out that – contrary to the prediction of the extrapolation model – the
perceived location of the flash relative to the ring is independent of the
initial (pre-flash) trajectory. They conclude from this that visual
awareness is not predictive, but rather is postdictive: the experience the
brain ends up associating with the time at which the flash occurs depends
on events which occur approximately 80 msec after the flash itself. As
they put it: ‘these experiments indicate that the visual system consults the

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they put it: ‘these experiments indicate that the visual system consults the
ongoing input of information from the near future of an event before
committing to a percept’. (2000: 38). As for how we manage to catch a
moving ball, they suggest perceptual extrapolation is not needed, that
processing delays can be compensated by appropriate training of our
motor systems. [41]

This ‘delayed response’ model of the perceptual process is relevant to a

criticism that Grush lays at the door of Extensional approaches (2007:
§5). As we have seen, there are a number of cases in which what is
perceived at a given time t can (seemingly) effect what is experienced
prior to t. By way of an example, take the phi phenomenon. We see a
spot on a screen moving smoothly from one location (A) to another
location (B); in actual fact, all that appears on the screen are two
motionless flashes of light. Why should this be a problem for Extensional
theorists? Grush reasons as follows. When the A-flash occurs we have not
yet seen the B-flash, and so we perceive a motionless spot of light; after
the B-flash occurs, we experience a spot of light moving between A and
B. When queried subjects report that they saw the moving spot, but not
the stationary spot. Why? Retentionalists can make sense of this sequence
of events as follows. The perception of the immobile A-flash occurs in
one specious present, the perception of the moving spot occurs in an
entirely distinct specious present a short while later; since only the second
experience is remembered, when queried subjects report say they only
saw a moving light. According to the Extensional theorist, however, there
is just one token experience corresponding to the A-flash. Hence the
problem: since the A-flash is seen as both immobile and as in motion, this
one token experience must possesses an impossibly inconsistent content.
Since there cannot be such contents, we have little option but to accept
the Retentionalist's interpretation of events.

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Figure 26.

Extensional theorists would certainly be unwise to defend inconsistent

contents of this sort, but there is another option. Why assume that the
initial (stationary) flash is ever experienced as such at all? Recalling
Eagleman and Sejnowski's diagnosis of the flash-lag effect, might it not
be that our visual systems take some time (perhaps 80–100 msec) before
producing experience in response to a given stimulus? And might they not
use this time to work out a single coherent version of events before
committing it to experience? Applying this to the case of the phi
phenomenon – see Figure 26 – although the initial stationary flash is
registered at a pre-conscious level, it never actually reaches
consciousness: as soon as the second flash registers, our visual systems
reach the conclusion that the likely source is a moving light, and this is
what we experience. It is thus only to be expected that subjects deliver the
reports they do. Until this construal of events can be ruled out, the
Extensionalist has little to fear from this sort of case. [42]

Notes to Temporal Consciousness

1. Though for an alternative reading see Scharp (2008).

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2. See Rosenberg (2005: ch.5), Blattner 1999: 190–210) for more on this.

3. So far as E.R. Clay is concerned, Andersen and Grush (2009, §7)

rightly observe that commentators invariably recycle the quote from
Clay's The Alternative supplied by James (as, indeed, has just been done
here). They have performed the valuable service of tracking down both
Clay and The Alternative. It turns out that ‘E.R. Clay’ is a pseudonym of
Robert Kelly, an Irish immigrant to the U.S. who built up a successful
cigar company, and took up an interest in philosophy after taking an early
retirement. In the same article Andersen and Grush provide a very useful
survey of other (non-Germanic) influences on James, e.g., Reid, Dugald
Steward, Thomas Brown, William Hamilton and Shadworth Hodgson.

4. Gallagher (1998: 205) relates that in his well-annotated copy of James'

Principles Husserl jotted down a German translation of the term, but his
handwriting is indecipherable at this point.

5. Heidegger took these ingredients from Husserl's approach and

fashioned something quite different from them. The Heideggerian
conception of ‘originary time’ is intriguing, but also difficult; here is one
attempt to summarize it: ‘Originary temporality is a manifold of
nonsuccessive phenomena that explain ordinary time. The elements of the
manifold go by the names “future” (Zukunft), “beenness” (Gewsenheit),
and “Present” (Gegenwart). They are non-successive in the precise sense
that the future does not follow, succeed, or come after beenness.’
(Blattner 1999: 26–7). Also see Barrett (1968) and Guignon (1983).

6. See Strawson (2009: 5.6) for a more detailed exposition of his views on
continuity; for critical discussion of Strawson's position see Natsoulas
(2006), Dainton (2000/2006: §5.2).

7. Bergson's complained that conceiving of the continuity of experience in

mathematical terms reduces experience to a ‘dust of instants’(‘poussière
des instants’). Poincaré is in sympathy with this, and points out that the

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des instants’). Poincaré is in sympathy with this, and points out that the
orthodox mathematical continuum ‘is only a collection of individuals
ranged in a certain order, infinite in number, true, but exterior to one
another. This is not the ordinary conception, wherein is supposed between
the elements of the continuum a sort of intimate bond which makes of
them a whole where the point does not exist before the line, but the line
before the point. Of the celebrated formula, ‘the continuum is unity in
multiplicity’, only the multiplicity remains, the unity has disappeared.’
(1952: 42). For more on this theme see Capek (1971), Part II.

8. Here are online interactive illustrations of the effect, at The Motion

After-Effect; Motion Aftereffect (Waterfall Illusion).

9. There is evidence of motion aftereffects occurring in the tactile (see

Hayashi et al, 2006) and auditory domains (see Dong, C-J. et al, 2000),
but it is not clear that analogues of the paradoxical features of the visual
case are present in these cases.

10. ‘If we have a single experience of two items as being present, then,
surely, we experience them as simultaneous. Suppose we are aware of A
as preceding B, and of B as present. Can we be aware of A as anything
other than past? Of course we can have successive experience of items,
each of which in turn we see as present. But no single experience presents
all these items as present.’ (2007: 87) ; also see (2004: 111).

11. Can we pick out a briefer span – or even an instant – within the
duration of the specious present as the present? There is nothing to
prevent our doing so, but given its the brief span, dividing the specious
present in this way would serve little practical purpose. Clay seemingly
took the leading edge to be present in the strict sense; James was
evidently situating his vantage point in the middle region when he
referred to ‘backward’ and ‘forward looking parts.

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12. There are further options: see Tye (2003: chapter 4) for an attempt to
combine something akin to an Extensional view with ‘representationalist’
account of perceptual experience; note, however, that Tye's account of the
specious present is in some respects idiosyncratic.

13. Sprigge (1983: ch.1) defends a view along these lines; Whitehead
believed that reality was composed of ‘drops of experience’ (1929: 25);
see Sprigge (1993: 276ff) for an introduction to Bradley's ‘finite centres
of experience’ – which Bradley himself regarded as inherently
problematic.

14. For further discussion of these see Mabbot (1951, 1955), Mundle
(1954), Foster (1979) and Dainton (2000: §6.2).

15. Tye argues that there is no problem here, on the grounds that it is a
mistake to conclude that a sound is heard as occurring several times
simply because there are several times at which it is heard (2003: 93–94).
But while it is logically possible for there be experiences which go
unnoticed by their subject, it remains the case that Broad's theory is
profligate to an extraordinary degree, requiring as it does a vast
censorship mechanism to conceal the innumerable surplus-to-
requirements experiences it generates. And as Phillips (2010: §4.1) notes,
Tye's proposal is incompatible with plausible doctrines concerning the
sort of epistemic access we have to our own experience.

16. ‘If A, B, and C succeed each other rapidly, A and B may be parts of
one sensation, and likewise B and C, while A and C are not parts of one
sensation, but A is remembered when C is present in sensation. In such a
case, A and B belong to the same present, and likewise B and C, but not A
and C; thus the relation “belong to the same present” is not transitive …
two presents may overlap without coinciding.’ (1913: 77–78)

17. It is possible (in principle) for specious presents to be separated by

very little indeed: ‘it may be that the whole series of experiences is

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very little indeed: ‘it may be that the whole series of experiences is
literally continuous (or at least dense)’, or so Foster suggests (1991: 248).

18. Strawson has recently elaborated a Retentional model which eschews

strictly momentary episodes of experiencing: ‘What is the duration of the
living moment of experience? I take it to be very short indeed. … One
thing I take for granted is that experience takes time: it can't exist or
occur at an instant, where an instant is defined as something with no
temporal duration at all. So I take ‘moment’ as it features in the
expression ‘living moment of experience’ to refer essentially to a
temporal interval, however short.’ (Strawson 2009: 256).

19. This diagram resembles the one provided by Broad himself (1938:
285), but he adopted a different (and perhaps less perspicuous) convention
for representing specious presents. Broad chooses to represent individual
specious by triangles, such as A-D-A***. He took the height of the
vertical lines to represent degrees of presentedness, so C has
presentedness C-A** in the specious present A-D-A***, and
presentedness C-B* in the specious present B-E-B** – the higher the
vertical, the greater the presentedness.

20. See Dodd (2005) for more on Husserl's various ‘diagrams of time’.

21. Section 36 of the 1905 Lectures is headed The Time-Constituting Flow

as Absolute Subjectivity and concludes thus: ‘This flow is something we
can speak of in conformity with what is constituted, but it is not
“something in objective time”. It is absolute subjectivity and has the
absolute properties of something to be designated metaphorically as
“flow”; of something that originates in a point of actuality, in a primal
source-point, “the now”, and so on. In the actuality-experience we have
the primal source-point and a continuity of moments of reverberation. For
all this we lack names.’ (1991: 79)

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22. Tye's definition of phenomenal unity as ‘a relation that connects

qualities instantiated in adjacent specious presents’ (2003: 101) is
puzzling, since it seems to leave the qualities within specious presents in
the awkward position of not being directly phenomenally unified, even
though the specious present is where we experience succession and
persistence, as Tye himself seems to accept (2003: 86–7). See Bayne
(2005) and Kobes (2005) for further discussion of Tye's position.

23. See Roache (1999) for an argument to the effect that the apparently
very different standpoints of Dennett and Mellor are in fact reconcilable.

24. Prominent defenders of this conception are not hard to find, e.g.
Minkowski (1908), Williams (1951), Smart (1980), Mellor (1981, 1998)

25. Broad introduced the ‘spotlight’ metaphor (1923: 59), though at the
time he subscribed to the Growing Block view; the Moving Spotlight
conception is perhaps best known for being the primary target of
McTaggart's assault on the reality of time. For a more recent defence of
the Growing Block see Tooley (1997); for a defence of Presentism see
Bourne (2006).

26. The issue is not quite so straightforward. McKinnon (2003) argues

that Presentism poses problems for Retentionalists too, on the grounds
that there is good reason to believe the neural correlates of consciousness
are extended over time, and that attempts by Presentists to accommodate
this fact (e.g., by appealing to tensed properties possessed by momentary
brain-phases) are unsatisfactory.

27. Peter Forrest advocates a form of the Growing Block model in which
consciousness only exists in the present; consciousness, he believes, is a
by-product of the ‘frisson’ generated at the interface between being and
non-being. (Braddon-Mitchell 2002; Forrest 2004, 2006). Since it is not
clear whether on this model consciousness is momentary or not, it is
difficult to know what its implications for the current issue are. It is also

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difficult to know what its implications for the current issue are. It is also
worth adding that this model is rather speculative.

28. For further discussion of Dennett see the commentaries in Brain and
Behavioural Sciences following Dennett and Kinsbourne (1992); the
special issue of Inquiry (March 1993, 36(1–2), with essays by Clark,
Fellows & O'Hear, Foster, Lockwood, Seager, Siewert, Sprigge);
Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 1993, 53(4), with essays by
Tye, Shoemaker, Jackson; also Phillips (2009: chapter 5).

29. Drawing these distinctions gives rise to a range of underexplored and

difficult to answer, questions. For example, can the apparent variations in
the ‘speed’ of the objective world be explained in variations in the extent
of the specious present? Noting the work of Saillant and Simons (1998)
which suggests bats possess the ability to alter the temporal span of their
echolocation systems' ‘sensory window’, Lockwood has proposed that the
apparent slowing of the surrounding world (in times of emergency or
absorption) is due to a ‘diminution in the temporal span of the specious
present’ (2005: 373); this shrinkage results in our apprehending a smaller
than usual number of changes within a typical specious present; since we
are not directly aware of latter's change in size, we attribute the alteration
to a slow-down in our surroundings. Implicit in the story Lockwood tells
is the assumption that the phenomenal duration of the specious present
remains constant – and Strawson (2009: 253) agrees: ‘One may expressly
intellectually register the fact that one is experiencing a great deal in a
short time (a short time that feels for all that particularly calm and
leisurely), in moments of great crisis, but this does not mean that the
basic, subjective experienced temporal extent or “roominess” of the lived
present experience is not the same as it is in ordinary life’. These are
intriguing proposals, but are they correct?

30. For a survey of relevant work on the neural bases of temporal

processing, see Mauk & Buonomano (2004). Kelly argues that the vast

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processing, see Mauk & Buonomano (2004). Kelly argues that the vast
bulk of empirical work is focused on just two questions: How do we
come to represent events as occurring at a particular time? Which events
to we experience as simultaneous? He draws this conclusion: ‘The puzzle
of temporal experience will not be resolved by empirical research of the
type now being done … [the relevant neuroscientific accounts] do not
have any bearing at all, in other words, on the question of how we are to
conceptualize perceptual experience from the point of view of the subject
so as to allow for the possibility of experiences as of continuous,
dynamic, temporally structured, unified events.’ (2005b, §7–7.1) Kelly
also believes that an alternative to the standard Retentional and
Extensional approaches will be needed.

31. Benussi preferred the term ‘psychic present’, construing the latter as
the ‘time required to apprehend the maximum number of elements of a
change in one single perceptual act’ Albertazzi (1994: 161); see also
Albertazzi (1996).

32. As Debru (2001: 478) notes, it may be that James' figure of 12

seconds was also influenced by Helmholtz's discovery that after-images
typically have a maximal duration of 12 seconds or so.

33. And when describing Wundt's attempt to measure the interval which
is remembered most accurately: ‘[this interval] of about three-fourths of a
second, which is estimated with the minimum of error, points to a
connection between the time-feeling and the succession of distinctly
apperceived objects before the mind. The association time is also equal to
about three-fourths of a second. This association time he regards as a sort
of internal standard of duration to which we involuntarily assimilate all
intervals which we try to reproduce, bringing shorter ones up to it and
longer ones down.’ (1890: 596–7)

34. Reprinted in many collections, including McDermott (1967: 194ff; the

extracts quoted are from 195–8).

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extracts quoted are from 195–8).

35. Myers (1971: 355) notes that Boring claimed James' commitment to
this approach stemmed from a general doctrine concerning the temporal
character of introspection: ‘introspection was not believed to be a process
that takes time … But how then can a duration that takes time be
immediately known, since the duration, not being instantaneous, is itself
not all immediate?’ (1942: 576). Myers has his doubts: ‘I cannot connect
Boring's remarks with what James wrote in “The Perception of Time” in
The Principles of Psychology, because he never said that introspection is
instantaneous or that the duration of the specious present is specious’
(ibid.). Mabbot (1951: 165) usefully summarizes Boring's changes of
view on these matters.

36. If he were committed to full-blooded duration-blocks and the

Retentional approach, the upshot is the Non-Modal form of
Retentionalism, which as we have seen, arguably generates too much
experience. See Sprigge (1993: 198–225) for an interesting discussion of
how James' views on time, experience and continuity evolved through his
career.

37. There is another strand to Varela's argument: he suggests that neural

cell assemblies will flip between their favoured states given the slightest
of pushes, and that this ‘self-powered’ behaviour may be the physical
correlate of experienced alterations in phenomenal contents, e.g., the
perceived changes in aspect of a Necker cube. However, the idea that
experience is naturally packaged into discrete chunks is not in the least
Husserlian, and so this proposal is peripheral to our current concerns.

38. While Lloyd is certainly aware that further work linking the levels is
needed, and that his discoveries merely reveal suggestive analogies which
may prove useful as guides for future research, he is perhaps guilty of not
giving this point sufficient emphasis.

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39. Clark (1998) also takes dynamists such as van Gelder to task for
giving insufficient attention to the brain and its information processing
capabilities.

40. Grush notes that his interpretation of such cases is similar in some
respects to the multiple drafts model of Dennett (1991: ch. 5–6), but the
trajectory estimation model is not committed to a plurality of competing
simultaneous representations. In some respects it is also similar to the
‘fixed-lag smoother’ model that Rao, Eagleman and Sejnewski (2001)
employ to explain related temporal illusions (e.g. the flash-lag), but has
the advantage of not postulating a delay of around 100–200 msec between
sensory stimuli and their subsequent representations (Grush 2005b: 214–
216).

41. For an online variant of the flash-lag illusion see Flash-Lag Effect.
For a connection with debatable off-side decisions in football matches see
Baldo, M. Ranvaud, R. & Morya, E. (2002). For more on how successful
athletes deal with fast-moving balls, see Abernethy (1981), Bahill and
LaRitz (1984), McLeod (1987), McCrone (1993).

42. See Dainton (2009) for this interpretation; see Butterfield (1984) and
Callender (2008) for further discussion of perceptual time-lags.

43. Of the two most general visual pathways in primates ‘we find that it is
the older tectopulvinar pathway (evolutionarily speaking) that is more
involved in motion perception than the newer geniculostriate pathway.
There are some suggestions that the tectopulvinar pathway may be
entirely specialized for the perception of movement, along with the
control of responses that involve moving stimuli, such as some kinds of
eye movements’ (Coren, Ward, Enns: 360).

44. See Weichselgartner & Sperling (1985), Long & O'Saban (1989) and
Nisly-Nagele & Wasserman (2001) for further discussion and references

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Nisly-Nagele & Wasserman (2001) for further discussion and references

on visual persistence.

45. There are complications. Although 20–30 fps is sufficient to generate

smooth apparent motion, higher rates are needed to eliminate variations in
brightness (flicker); accordingly, in cinema and TV the same image is
shown two or three times in succession. Three factors are most relevant to
the quality of apparent motion: interstimulus interval (the time between
the end of one frame and the start of the next), frame duration, and the
time between the start of one frame and the start of the next – the latter is
the most important single factor. For further detail on a complex topic,
‘flicker studies’, see Anderson & Anderson (1993), Galifret (2006).

46. E.g., See Color Phi Phenomneon. For a presentation discussing two
varieties of the phenomenon, together with online examples, see Phi is
Not Beta.

47. See BioMotionLab and Introduction to Motion Perception.

48. Intriguingly, Allport also distinguishes two forms of the perceptual

moment theory: the ‘Discrete Moment Hypothesis’ and the ‘Travelling
Moment Hypothesis’. According to the former, perceptual moments are
entirely discrete, whereas according to the latter, they overlap (e.g., if one
moment takes in A-B-C-D, the next will take in B-C-D-E, etc. ). The
details are not clear, but there are certainly some similarities between
Travelling Moment Hypothesis and the overlap version of
Extensionalism. Allport illustrates the travelling model thus: ‘A simple
spatial analogy may help to make this distinction clear. To a man standing
on the platform, the occupants of a passing train are revealed
compartment by compartment as each window draws by. His glimpses of
the interior of the train are essentially discontinuous in time. To an
observer in one of the compartments, on the other hand, the field of view
is always bounded by his own carriage window. New elements of the
passing scene enter his view continuously from one side of the window,

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passing scene enter his view continuously from one side of the window,
while others drop out of it at the other. Given a temporal rather than a
spatial extension, the moving window analogy corresponds with the idea
of a continuous “travelling moment” ’(1968: 396). Efron and Lee (1973)
argue that the experimental evidence which leads Allport to prefer the
Travelling Moment Hypothesis over its Discrete counterpart can also be
explained in terms of visible persistence.

Copyright © 2010 by the author

Barry Dainton

190 Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy