(1) The universe before ten billion years ago, (2) the earth before ten
thousand years ago, (3) human history before one hundred years ago, (4) one's
experiences before ten minutes ago, (5) other people, (6) the physical world
beyond one's consciousness, (7) the future.
Is it the A-theorists that don't believe the future exists? I am a
B-theorist and believe that it exists in roughly the same sense that the past
exists, but that our concept of both is theoretical and not direct. Of course
the theory is not the same as the reality, but neither is our knowledge the
same as the reality. I would say that my knowledge of conditions on earth
tomorrow is less than my knowledge of conditions on earth yesterday, but more
than my knowledge of conditions on earth Nov. 12, 1897, which is more than my
knowledge of conditions Nov. 12, 8004 B.C., which is more than my knowledge of
the detailed conditions ten billion years ago, but that there are some things
about all those times that I would regard as knowing with high confidence. One
could always arbitrarily define some of these theoretical entities to exist and
others not to exist (e.g., the past before ten thousand years ago for YEC's, or
the future for A-theorists), but it seems a bit ad hoc to me to make such a
distinction between things that we have high confidence in.
Don Page