A critical discussion of Shoemaker's argument for the possibility of time without change, intended as an argument against relationist conceptions of time. A relational view of time is proposed based on the primitive identity of events (or whatever entities are the basic subjects of change and lack thereof).

The three theories considered here, real continuous time, real serial time, and unreal time, are each in some sense a reaction to Hume’s theory of serial or “spatialized” time. Hence, Hume’s theory is elaborated on as a foundation for the discussion and comparison of the subsequent three. This brief excursion into the nature of time may help to illuminate the differences among these three and to suggest some of their possible implications, particularly with regard to the existential difference between intuited (...) or transcendent time and experienced or immanent time and the qualitative or ontological difference between the eternal and the temporal. (shrink)

Philosophical development of Leibniz's view that time is merely earlier–later order is necessary because neither Leibniz nor modern followers sufficiently answered the Newtonian charge that order does not give quantity. Logically, order is transitive, quantity, as in distance, is not. Quantity, as well as order, is naturally assumed in Newton's absolute time, so that to declare the mere relative order sufficient is to have to show how quantity can arise for it. The modern theory of the continuum, perfectly applicable to (...) Newton's absolute, does not show this but assumes quantity. The development given here shows how interval, instant and simultaneity can be logically developed from Leibniz's insight. (shrink)

To prove the equivalence one must start with one side, and the earlier-later side seems, for starting with, logically the clearer. The equivalence is provable on reasonable definitions of ‘past’, ‘present’ and ‘future’ in terms of the earlier-later structure of time. McTaggart's attempted distinction between the past-present-future A series and the earlier-later B series, as though they were rivals for the structure of time, is based on an unexamined, and false, assumption. The equivalence shows they are not rivals; they are (...) quite consistent with each other. A very serious consequence is that all subsequent argument, from the A side or the B, however sophisticated, is flawed to the extent that it accepts McTaggart's false distinction. (shrink)