Original scientific paper

A Unified Tenseless Theory of Time

Cheng-chih Tsai ; Center for General Education, Mackay Medical College, Taiwan

Abstract

Concerning the versions of the Tenseless Theory of Time, the Old Btheory has two: the Date-analysis version and the Token-reflexive version, while the New B-theory has three: the Date-analysis, the Token-reflexive and the Sentence-type versions. Each of these five versions of the B-theory has received serious attacks from the A-theorists, some of whom even claim that the tenseless theory “though still widely held, is a theory in retreat” (Craig 1996), and that “if Quentin Smith (1993) delivered the mortal blow to the New B-Theory of Language then Laurie Paul (1997) has written its obituary” (Craig 1999). In this paper, by making more precise some key notions involved in the formulation of a tenseless theory – in particular, two notions of truth conditions, two notions of meaning and two notions of translation are distinguished – I have come up with a single B-thesis for the B-theory. When charitably interpreted, the two versions of the old theory and the three versions of the new theory can all be regarded as special ways of presenting the same B-thesis, and the various A-attacks raised against these versions can then be resolved in a systematic way.

Keywords

B-theory of time; ch-meaning; cn-meaning; pt-truth-condition; pwtruth- Condition; tk-translation; tp-translation

Hrčak ID:

68306

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/68306

Publication date:

30.5.2011.

Article data in other languages: croatian

Visits: 2.910 *