The Temporal Challenge of Hope

Abstract

Hope informs and inspires our actions. We look to succeed at achieving what we hope for, and this orients our hope towards the future in which time is conceived linearly. The connection between hope as success and linear time creates several difficulties when we seek to defend our hope. This is especially the case regarding past hopes and the dead, who can no longer hope for themselves. J. T. Fraser’s hierarchical theory of time’s conflicts is a complex theory of time that makes possible thinking through hope more critically.