Time Travel Paradox
Paper Prompts: Write on ONE of the following topics:
(1) Explain McTaggart’s distinction between an A-series and a B-series of time. Is McTaggart right in claiming that it is not merely a terminological distinction? Explain McTaggart’s thesis that the A-series involves a contradiction. What, if anything, is problematic about McTaggart’s argument to the effect that the A-series involves a contradiction?
(2) What is time travel? Explain the grandfather paradox. Explain David Lewis’s solution to the grandfather paradox. Do you find Lewis’s solution convincing and why?
(3) Explain the distinction between fatalism and causal determinism. Explain the argument for fatalism from foreknowledge. Suppose you were Osmo and you found the book describing your past and future life in a local library. Would it be rational for you adopt a fatalistic attitude and why? How, if at all, do you think that your situation differs from Osmo’s? Are those differences relevant to the question of whether you have free will?
