Text and context
In Confessions XI.20, Augustine describes present memory of the past, present awareness and present expectation. Later in the book he uses recitation to examine how an anticipated whole passes through attention into memory. The source is the J. G. Pilkington translation reproduced by New Advent.
The present can contain different kinds of information
A memory of an event, an observation of an event and a prediction of an event can all be available now while referring to different parts of a history. Treating them as identical would erase the very distinction that makes temporal reasoning possible. Their reliability also depends on different things: retention, observation and inference.
A physical record model can investigate some of these distinctions without claiming to explain consciousness. It specifies how information survives an update and what a later observer can retrieve. In SMM/DTT this clarifies why a completed configuration is not the same thing as the whole experienced flow of time. A theory of subjective duration would require additional operational and conceptual work beyond a record-order construction.
Questions for further reading
- What is currently available, and what time does that information concern?
- How is retention distinguished from prediction?
- Which claims concern conscious experience and which concern a physical record?
Interpretive scope
Historical and philosophical reflection. The SMM/DTT connections are contemporary interpretations and research questions; they are not claims that the cited text proves a modern physical theory.
Sources and attribution
- Augustine, Confessions XI, chapters 20 and 28 — J. G. Pilkington translation; the reflection uses a paraphrase.