There is an apparent tension in Shepherd’s accounts of space and time. Firstly, Shepherd explicitly claims that we know that the space and time of the unperceived world exist because they cause our phenomenal experience of them. Secondly, Shepherd emphasizes that empty space and time do not have the power to effect any change in the world. My proposal is that for Shepherd time has exactly one causal power: to provide for the continued existence of self-same or changing objects. Because Shepherd takes causation to be a relation whereby two objects combine to form a third, their effect, whenever we perceive a continually existing object, since time is a proper part of such objects, our perception of time is caused by time itself. Likewise, space’s causal power is to provide for the possibility of the motion or rest of objects, and so when we perceive objects with space as a proper part, we come into causal contact with space.

中文翻译：

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牧羊人对空间和时间的描述


谢泼德对空间和时间的描述中存在着明显的张力。首先，谢泼德明确声称，我们知道未被感知的世界的空间和时间存在，因为它们导致了我们对它们的现象体验。其次，谢泼德强调，真空的空间和时间没有能力改变世界。我的建议是，对于牧羊人来说，时间恰好具有一种因果力量：提供相同或变化的物体的持续存在。因为谢泼德认为因果关系是两个物体结合形成第三个物体的关系，即它们的效果，每当我们感知到一个持续存在的物体时，由于时间是这些物体的固有部分，所以我们对时间的感知是由时间本身引起的。同样，空间的因果力是为物体的运动或静止提供了可能性，因此当我们将空间作为物体的固有部分时，我们就与空间产生了因果联系。