ABSTRACT

Sydney Shoemaker is a leading American metaphysician and philosopher of mind. He taught for many years at Cornell University, where he received his PhD. Many philosophers have thought that time implies change. That is, if time passes, then somewhere in the universe some amount of change, however small, must occur. An A-theorist may regard it as obvious that time implies change, since the movement of the now constitutes change. In a world where there is time without change, time passes while no events occur. But the only sense that a B-theorist can make of time passing is one event following another in the B-series. For many, time travel is the most exciting topic in the philosophy of time. Many science-fiction television shows, movies and stories depict an individual travelling in time. What distinguishes a time traveller from an ordinary person is that the personal time of a time traveller differs from external time.