Reply to Le Poidevin and Mellor

Abstract

Throughout their discussion of my critique of McTaggart, Le Poidevin and Mellor represent me as claiming that there are 'tensed facts' and as attempting to defend this claim against a threat of contradiction posed by McTaggart. But in fact (!) I make no appeal at all in my paper to the notion of a 'fact', whether 'tensed' or 'tenseless', and, indeed, can find little use for this notion. Certainly, I do not find it at all illuminating to be told by Le Poidevin and Mellor that they 'take facts to be whatever make truth conditions obtain', because this strikes me just as so much empty jargon. Since the bulk of Le Poidevin and Mellor's critique is couched in these terms, however, it is rather difficult for me to extract from it an argument with which I can engage. None the less, I shall try. The strategy which Le Poidevin and Mellor adopt is to attempt to convert an argument of McTaggart's which I reject into an analogous argument against me. McTaggart's argument uses the following premisses (I retain Le Poidevin and Mellor's numbering):