Presences of the Future. The Experience of the “Block Universe” at the Time of the Pandemic

Abstract

Structural semiotics traditionally offers a time analysis inspired by Indo-European linguistic, and generally based on a conception of time separated from space. About ten years ago, a complementary theoretical proposal emerged: that of “temporal regimes”, configurations which support the structuring of forms of living, and which associate temporal, spatial, axiological and passionate and properties. The philosophy of science deals with time and space together, and today debates on the modes of existence (from an objectal point of view) and the modes of presence (from a subjectal point of view) of the different parts of space-time. The concept of "universe-block" makes it possible to think about the coexistence of the present, the past, the future, the here and the elsewhere, as well as the strong solidarities, at a distance in time and space, between quantum entities. The experience of the pandemic and of containment prompts us to take up the concept of "temporal regimes", to deepen it, or even radicalize it, and to face the difficulties of an indissoluble "space-time" coupling. We have recently experienced a soft and viscous temporal regime, a present that spreads out without flowing away, absorbing a substantial part of the future. This contribution focuses more precisely on the future, on the presence modes of future, on the narrative and ethical interweaving between presence and future of presence.