ABSTRACT
McTaggart's attack on time has two steps. The first is to show that tensed, or what he calls 'A-series' time, which involves the idea that events begin in the future, become present and end up in the past, is unreal because contradictory. The second step is to demonstrate that the apparent reality of tenseless or 'B-series' time depends on tensed time. Time itself is therefore unreal. If we believe in the reality of tensed or A-series time, McTaggart argues, we must hold that events that are future are also present and past. But being future and present and past are incompatible states, the same thing cannot be 'not-yet' 'now' and 'no-longer'. The obvious response is that this would be a problem only if the event were past, present and future at the same time. Tensed time can be protected against McTaggart's accusation that it is paradoxical if we realize that we cannot call any event future until it is past.
