McTaggart’s article is long enough that I haven’t tried to squeeze it into a single day’s class. The most natural break comes on p. 104; but, since we are likely to spend some time Thursday still discussing Newton and Leibniz, I won’t plan to discuss more than pp. 94-98 (through the short paragraph beginning “The B series, however, …”) in the first class.

In the first part of the article, roughly pp. 94-101, McTaggart is mainly concerned to introduce his ideas of three temporal series that he labels “A,” “B,” and “C.” The features of and relations between these series form the basis for his claim that there can be no time without distinctions of past, present, and future (which he thinks he has established by p. 111). The heart of his argument for this claim appears in his discussion of the A and B series on pp. 94-98; but it is bolstered by his discussion of the C series (pp. 98-101) and his responses to two objections (on pp. 102 and 103).

In the remainder of the article (i.e., pp. 104-111), McTaggart argues against the reality of the distinctions that he thinks he has shown to be required for time. This argument can be divided roughly into two parts (pp. 104-108 and 108-110), with the last page of the article devoted to the status of the C series.

Few philosophers seem to accept McTaggart’s conclusion, so much of the discussion of the article has been devoted to showing where he goes wrong. We will go on to look at one example of this, but you should begin to develop your own views of the matter, asking whether you think McTaggart is right and, if you think he isn’t, the way or ways in which you think he is wrong.