Presentism and the Non-Present

objects. But if she does say that there are abstract past and future times, these times will have a different status than does the present time. Present, past, and future times all would exist on this view, yet only the present time would be exemplified or instantiated. Second, she can in some sense accept that there are past or future entities in that there now are individuals who did or will exist. What she cannot accept is that these entities have any reality beyond the reality they have now. There appears to be a prima facie problem with presentism. If only the present is real, how can present entities stand in relations to past and future things which don't exist? It certainly seems to be the case that present objects do stand in relations to past and future things. Suppose that I'm a Democrat. I stand in the being of the same political party relation to FDR. The event consisting of my drinking coffee 20 minutes ago stands in a causal relation with my currently being alert. Suppose I have a crystal ball and I am able to view the life of an individual who is alive 100 years in the future. He and I might stand in the being taller than relation, or we might stand in the being of the same ethnic background relation. But how can any of this be if at least one relatum of the relation in question doesn't exist? One consequence of these relations not holding is that sentences that appear to be true would seem to come out false. Consider "I am of the same political party as FDR." It appears to have roughly the logical form aRb, and its truth conditions appear to be that it is true iff a stands in R to b; that is, if I stand in the being of the same political party 2