Likewise, we do not experience duration — Metaphysician Undercover

So to avoid longer and longer posts, I'm going to focus on this particular statement because I think it is the focal point of the discussion.

For me, as I sit and meditate on the actual sense of being/existence, I only sense duration as a product of evolving memory. That is it in total. So for me, I experience the feeling of duration as an evolution of memory. It is right there and is complete. I can't find anything more.

Since my ontology is entirely based upon direct observation of experience, this is how I perceive the essence of my existence. This along with the creative force that presses into future possibilities that it identifies possible choices of action.

The problem is that SR is only applicable to inertial frames which doesn't exist (except as an approximation), so SR had no relevance to any discussion about light or scientific time (my distinction,). Only GR is relevant. Under GR, scientific time becomes relative. — Rich

What counts as scientific time?

And would you agree that if I take a man and fly him close to the speed of light he will age slower than one that remains on Earth? And if so, then some of the effects of GR/SR are ontological no? They're not just measurement effects. I mean we can't presume both start as babies, and one reaches old age, while the other is still in his teens and then claim that it's just a measurement effect and not ontological right?

These time dilation effects have been experienced with muons and with atomic clocks already.

What counts as scientific time? — Agustino

Scientific time is measurement of simultaneous events. It is not the duration of experience which is heterogeneous and continuous. It is there essence of Zeno's paradoxes. Duration is indivisible.

The only way to observe the duration of life is by closing one's eyes and directly experience it. One can also mediate, practice Tai Chi or yoga to get an even deeper understanding.

Scientific time is measurement of simultaneous events. — Rich

I know you're anti-science, but what does that statement even mean???

Agustino, I would have said that scientific time is the time in scientific equations, like velocity * time = distance. Such time is frame dependent since none of the terms above (velocity, time, or distance) is meaningful without a frame.
This is opposed to proper time which is a frame independent duration on a world-line between two events on that world-line. Experienced-time is proper time of the experiencer, or his real age.

And would you agree that if I take a man and fly him close to the speed of light he will age slower than one that remains on Earth? — Agustino

In scientific time, each man ages faster than his counterpart since for each man, it is the other that has all the velocity. Sans acceleration, they cannot ever meet but once and have a meaningful comparison of age.
In proper time, they age at the same pace, but their world lines are different lengths so if they meet, they are not the same age.

I know you're anti-science, but what does that statement even mean??? — noAxioms

It is the what the relativity equations are all about, keeping in mind only General Relativity. Special has c no application since inertial frames don't exist anywhere.

Scientific time is measurement of simultaneous events. It is not the duration of experience which is heterogeneous and continuous. It is there essence of Zeno's paradoxes. Duration is indivisible.

The only way to observe the duration of life is by closing one's eyes and directly experience it. One can also mediate, practice Tai Chi or yoga to get an even deeper understanding. — Rich

Okay, I'm not going to dispute that, at least not now, but I've asked you something different apart from that.

And would you agree that if I take a man and fly him close to the speed of light he will age slower than one that remains on Earth? And if so, then some of the effects of GR/SR are ontological no? They're not just measurement effects. I mean we can't presume both start as babies, and one reaches old age, while the other is still in his teens and then claim that it's just a measurement effect and not ontological right? — Agustino

And would you agree that if I take a man and fly him close to the speed of light he will age slower than one that remains on Earth? — Agustino

There should be no difference since each can be considered accelerating relative to reach other as GR is considered. However, as we all know, acceleration can be felt, and therefore may be biological effects as a result of the actual real duration of acceleration. In other words, there may be real effects but independent of Relativity which assumes no privileged frame of reference.

No one should she differently each can be considered accelerating relative to reach other. However, there may be biological effects as a result of the actual real duration of acceleration. In other words, there may be real effects but independent of Relativity which assumes no privileged frame of reference. — Rich

Will the one who travels close to the speed of light be younger than the other one upon his return? I don't care what theory you consider when answering this question, but please answer with yes or no.

Relativity which assumes no privileged frame of reference. — Rich

An accelerating frame of reference is privileged. Only inertial frames of reference aren't.

ill the one who travels close to the speed of light be younger than the other one upon his return? I don't care what theory you consider when answering this question, but please answer with yes or no. — Agustino

Who knows? As I said, as far as GR is concerned each can be considered accelerating relative to each other. The equations should be reciprocal. I don't know how you pick which one is accelerating. But I've called say that one feels like they are accelerating, which is an altogether different animal not taken into account by any scientific equation.

An accelerating frame of reference is privileged. Only inertial frames of reference aren't. — Agustino

The equations do not identify which twin is to be considered accelerating. Either one can be chosen since from either twin's frame of reference, it can be accelerating from the other. I looked at the equations, and it doesn't state a preference.

Who knows? As I said, as far as GR is concerned each can be considered accelerating relative to each other. — Rich

That's false. According to GR, the accelerating reference frame is privileged. In an accelerating reference frame it can be distinguished who is at rest and who is accelerating. In an inertial reference frame it cannot be distinguished who is at rest or who is moving.

The equations should be reciprocal. — Rich

As I said, that's not true. Remember what the first assumption of SR is - laws of physics are the same for all observers in inertial reference frames. Accelerating reference frames are NOT inertial.

Who knows? — Rich

Well, I think this is by this point beyond doubt. We've seen atomic clocks slow down, that's more than enough evidence that the predictions of SR/GR with regards to time dilation hold true.

The equations do not identify which twin is to be considered accelerating. — Rich

No, you cannot use the equations in a way which disagrees with the assumptions from which the equations are derived in the first place. One assumption of GR, which is used to derive the equations is that accelerating reference frames can be distinguished from those that are at rest.

That's false. According to GR, the accelerating reference frame is privileged. In an accelerating reference frame it can be distinguished who is at rest and who is accelerating. In an inertial reference frame it cannot be distinguished who is at rest or who is moving. — Agustino

What is at rest?

Anyway:

https://phys.org/news/2009-06-twin-paradox-older.html

It is possible that the actual force of acceleration is affecting the bodies but this is not taken into account by the equations. The equations include some really strange definition of time that had nothing to do with clock time as we know it. It's called curved space-time and shouldn't be confused with clock time. It's its own beast.

What is at rest? — Rich

Not in an accelerated frame of reference.

The equations include some really strange definition of time that had nothing to do with clock time as we know it. It's called curved space-time and shouldn't be confused with clock time. It's its own beast. — Rich

Yes, spacetime does have to do with clock time. It explains that clocks move slower in certain regions of space and even allows us to calculate how much slower.

For example, atomic clocks are shown to slow down when flown around the Earth compared to those that remain on Earth. And the accuracy is amazing - it's something like one-billionth of a second.

For example, atomic clocks are shown to slow down when flown around the Earth — Agustino

That physical things are affected by acceleration (applied force) and gravitation is observable and can felt. But this is a far cry from giving equations ontological status as an explanation for lived time. As I peruse the different literature on Relativity, which each person giving their own take, quite often contradicting each other and very rarely agreeing on what anything actually means in GR, I just perceive a mess. I don't even know why SR is even taught?

There is some strange variables in the equation which are suppose to be some kind of warped time, but whatever it is, it is not comprehensible as clock time and certainly not duration as we experience it.

So whatever measurement problems science is attempting to iron out as far as the limits of observation (light) and how light is affected by gravity, it doesn't affect the duration that we feel as an evolving creative force. To philosophers who is interested in penetrating the nature of life, it is this duration that they should be focusing on. Observe the creative energy as it presses forward and all that it is capable of doing.

An interesting paper in the subject:

Yet another time about time …
Part I: An Essay on the Phenomenology of Physical Time
Plamen L. Simeonov

Quite a complicated an interesting read from which I extract:

"In his book “Time Reborn” Smolin argues that physicists have inappropriately banned the
reality of time because they confuse their timeless mathematical models with reality,
(Smolin, 2013). His claim was that time is both real (which means external to him) and
fundamental, hypothesizing that the very laws of physics are not fixed, but evolve over time46.
This stance is not really a new one (cf. Wheeler, 1983; Page & Wootters, 1983). "

The equations do not identify which twin is to be considered accelerating. Either one can be chosen since from either twin's frame of reference, it can be accelerating from the other. — Rich

The equations should be reciprocal. I don't know how you pick which one is accelerating. — Rich

All this is utterly wrong. The stay-home person is not accelerating in the frame of the rocket twin. It takes force to accelerate, and no force is being applied.
Velocity is not a frame independent property of an object, but acceleration very much is.

However, as we all know, acceleration can be felt, and therefore may be biological effects as a result of the actual real duration of acceleration. In other words, there may be real effects but independent of Relativity which assumes no privileged frame of reference. — Rich

One twin getting older than the other is not a function of acceleration. Suppose both get on a rocket, and one accelerates at so many G straight out and back, and the other furriously orbits with similar acceleration. They both experience the same acceleration but the orbiting one is much older (more proper time in his worldline) when they meet. So it is not biological effects of being under acceleration. It's not the velocity since in the frame of each, it is the other one that has all the velocity.
But one has a greater moment of acceleration, and that is the difference.

An accelerating frame of reference is privileged. Only inertial frames of reference aren't. — Agustino

Privileged means it is the one correct frame. There is no correct accelerated or inertial frame, so none is privileged. Or are you just yanking Rich's chain?

All this is utterly wrong. The stay-home person is not accelerating in the frame of the rocket twin. It takes force to accelerate, and no force is being applied. — noAxioms

I don't see how either twin knows this or how the clocks know this. Do they feel it? To the twin on Earth, it appears that he is accelerating away from the rocket. Where in the the equations does it identify which twin to choose? It seems rather arbitrary unless one of the twins knows our feels something, but there measurements should be neutral. Just measurements. They are looking at the same thing. But it is possible that the additional forces that are being applied and felt are having some biological effect.

It is very speculative to begin making all kinds of ontological speculations about the nature of biological and conscious evolution based upon some equations that were designed to address some measurement issues. My guess is that the physical body will actually perish under such prolonged pressure. Who knows what happens to consciousness.

From an interview of Smolin:

"Feynman once told me, "Whatever you do—you're going to have to do crazy things to think about quantum gravity—but whatever you do, think about nature."

One really needs to keep focused on the problem and not get carried away with equations, substituting symbols for conscious experience. I share this point of view.

In speaking of time, Smolin, describes a situation that echos my sentiments about immutable Laws of Nature:

"Let's consider a system that's been studied many times. We have measured before the statistical distribution of outcomes through some collection of past instances where we've measured the system before. And if we do it now and measure the system again we're going to get one of those past outcomes that we saw before. If we do it many times now we're going to get a statistical distribution, which is going to be the same distribution that we saw before. We're confident if we do it next year or in a million years or in a billion years we're going to get the same distribution as we got before. Why are we confident of that? We're confident of that because we have a kind of metaphysical belief that there are laws of nature that are outside time and those laws of nature are causing the outcome of the experiment to be what it is. And laws of nature don't change in time. They're outside of time. They act on the system now, they acted on the system in the same way in the past, they will act the same way in a year or a million or a billion years, and so they'll give the same outcome. So nature will repeat itself and experiments will be repeatable because there are timeless laws of nature.

But that's a really weird idea if you think about it because it involves the kind of mystical and metaphysical notion of something that is not physical, something that is not part of the state of the world, something that is not changeable, acting from outside the system to cause things to happen. And, when I think about it, that is kind of a remnant of religion. It is a remnant of the idea that God is outside the system acting on it."

Now he goes in the describe an alternate hypothesis about the nature of time:

"So let's try a different kind of hypothesis. What if, when you prepare the system, you transform it, and then you measure it-nature has a way of looking back and asking the question: have similar things been done in the past? And if they have, let's take one of those instances randomly and just repeat it. That is, nature forms habits. Nature looks to see is there a similar thing that happened in the past. And if there was, what if it takes that? If there are many, it picks randomly among them and presents you with that outcome.

Okay, well that will give the same statistical distribution as you saw in the past, by definition, because you're sampling from the past. So there doesn't have to be a law outside of time. The only law needs to be what I call the principle of precedence—that when you do an experiment, nature looks back and gives you what it did before."

In these two paragraphs if one substitutes mind for nature, Smolin described Bergson's mind, though he probably doesn't realize it. This process is Bergson's duration.

All this is utterly wrong. The stay-home person is not accelerating in the frame of the rocket twin. It takes force to accelerate, and no force is being applied.
— noAxioms

I don't see how either twin knows this or how the clocks know this. Do the feel it? To the twin on Earth, it appears that he is accelerating away from the rocket. Where in the the equations does it identify which twin to choose? — Rich

F=MA.
No force means no acceleration. That's a Newton equation, and relativity didn't even need to modify that one.

The twin paradox can be illustrated with nothing but SR rules using a tag team and no acceleration and no significant masses screwing with gravity. I put one together that I think has no flaws. I can post it if you like. As I said, both subjects can be accelerating equally and yet one will age more than the other. Acceleration is not required.

F=MA — noAxioms

That's Newton, which at the end may be closer to nature than Relativity.

That's Newton, which at the end may be closer to nature than Relativity. — Rich

Yes, I said it was Newton. I also said that equation went unaltered by relativity. Zero force still means zero acceleration, in any frame.

"In his book “Time Reborn” Smolin argues that physicists have inappropriately banned the
reality of time because they confuse their timeless mathematical models with reality,
(Smolin, 2013). — Rich

"Time Reborn" is a good book, well worth the time to read it. Smolin explains how the applicability of the laws of physics is limited by the confines of the size of the experimenting theatre. So the laws are not applicable at the extreme micro scale, nor are they applicable at the extreme macro scale, they are applicable at the human scale, because this is the environment which they have been developed to be applicable in. He applies this principle to time, and suggests that over a very short period of time, or over a very long period of time, the laws of physics would differ, and speculates that the laws of physics should actually be represented as evolving over time.

The equations are not an ontology. If you want to use the equations as an ontology they only totally different views of time. In fact, time vanishes in GR.

I think we can stop at this point. The OP is about philosophical vs scientific time. There are thousands upon thousands of ideas about the ontological implications it lack thereof of GR (let's forget about SR) and no reason to throw yet more into this very mixed up bundle. It doesn't even jive with QM so why even consider it until it is straightened out.

To philosophers who is interested in penetrating the nature of life, it is this duration that they should be focusing on. — Rich

Why? You have not sketched out yet why this primacy of philosophical time over scientific time.

That physical things are affected by acceleration (applied force) and gravitation is observable and can felt. But this is a far cry from giving equations ontological status as an explanation for lived time. — Rich

The point is that it can't be felt. The clock as such does not feel as if it's slowing down but when compared to the other one it does. So if one person travels close to the speed of light while the other stands still, the one that travels will return younger than the one that stands still. However, the one that travels will not feel like he ages any faster. But when he returns, he will be younger than the other.

So in what sense is this not ontological time if it affects how one ages relative to others?


Regarding the paper, what Smolin is concerned about is the arrow of time, and its irreversibility. According to GR (I think), there's nothing that stops time from going backwards so to speak. It's only the second law of thermodynamics that accounts for why events are irreversible, and why we can't travel backwards in time.

His claim was that time is both real (which means external to him) and
fundamental, hypothesizing that the very laws of physics are not fixed, but evolve over time46. — Rich

What does time being external to him mean? This seems to be precisely what duration isn't, since duration is internal.

And in addition, the hypothesis that the laws of physics are not fixed but evolve with time is very interesting, I too think something like that may be the case, but so far we have no evidence at all for it. It's just a possibility.

My guess is that the physical body will actually perish under such prolonged pressure. Who knows what happens to consciousness. — Rich

This is only if the deceleration is very fast when the rocket turns around. Otherwise, there would be no issue. Furthermore, since everything slows down - including for that matter the synapses in your brain, etc. - you will not perceive that anything has slowed down. To perceive that something slows down would be to presuppose that your internal workings don't slow down while your external environment does - but this isn't what happens. Both of them slow down. Thus in your experience you would not perceive a change.

Privileged means it is the one correct frame. There is no correct accelerated or inertial frame, so none is privileged. Or are you just yanking Rich's chain? — noAxioms

Okay, I did not mean to use privileged in that sense. I meant to use privileged in the sense that the accelerating frame is distinguishable from the one that is at rest in a way that the frame moving at constant speed isn't distinguishable from the one that is at rest.

Why do you say that no one with a good understanding of physics can disagree with special relativity? According to what you've said here, all one has to disagree with to disagree with SR, is the assumption that light travels at the same speed everywhere. Unless the speed of light has been measured in every possible type of circumstance, then there really is no reason to believe in SR. We can easily fail in our inductive generalizations when we conclude that X is the case in all types of situations, without testing X in all different types of situations. — Metaphysician Undercover

There's no reason to disagree with special relativity for the simple reason that we have never observed light traveling at a different speed anywhere in all our observations so far. It could be possible, but we've just never seen it happen. So there is no reason to doubt SR. A rational person just cannot doubt it.

What you're writing isn't the scientific view of the time. In scientific stance, we use some event, the rate of which doesn't change, to measure time, but not to define it. Scientists still use their subjective experience of time to confirm that the time doesn't change.

Aaand I just noticed theee has been three pages of discussion in three days so this has probably been said by now. Eh.

Time as we experience only exists as an experience of the past moving into the present, continuously. No one experiences the future. — Rich

How can you be sure of this? Not as in what if someone else can experience future, but what if you don't experience single moments but a nanosecond of both past and future at any given moment? Given the reaction times of human beings and how (in)accurately we experience our perceptions, I don't think one could notice knowing something a fraction of a second before that event happens.

Before the creation of the Universe there was no time for the physicist/materialist because there were no phenomena that could be used to measure time. — Agustino

You seem to be mistaken about the physicist's stance on time. They also use matter to measure distances, but no physicist would claim that the distance between two objects divided by void have no distance between them. Similarly void is a possible concept in time.

Time did not exist before the universe, and neither did matter, but the correlation doesn't imply causality.

Why? You have not sketched out yet why this primacy of philosophical time over scientific time. — Agustino

If one is interested in understanding measurements, then scientific time is primary. Einstein was interested in the issue of simultaneity. If one is interested in exploring the nature of life (ontology) then time as experienced becomes primary.

As for GR, as a matter of measuring, both twins can view themselves as accelerating away from the other as they take measurements. The twin on Earth can view himself as accelerating away from the rocket.

Here is an interview with Lee Smolin. In it, he discusses the many problems of time when approaching it from QM and GR. He then goes on to suggest that possibly science had it all wrong and time had primacy over matter (time in this case can be viewed as Bergsin's duration) and the implications on all of science in this were so, e.g. that laws evolve over time. I can't sort out the scientific mess. I can only proceed with direct observation of life and develop a metaphysical ontology based upon these observations.

https://www.edge.org/conversation/lee_smolin-think-about-nature

If one is interested in exploring the nature of life (ontology) then time as experienced becomes primary. — Rich

Again, why? It could be that time as experienced is illusory, Einstein certainly thought so for example. This requires some argument.

As for GR, as a matter of measuring, both twins can view themselves as accelerating away from the other as they take measurements. — Rich

Wouldn't this imply that an accelerating frame of reference is indistinguishable from one that is at rest? This is precisely what GR denies though - the claim is that they are distinguishable. Meaning each observer can determine who is really accelerating.

Here is an interview with Lee Smolin. In it, he discusses the many problems of time when approaching it from QM and GR. He then goes on to suggest that possibly science had it all wrong and time had primacy over matter (time in this case can be viewed as Bergsin's duration) and the implications on all of science in this were so, e.g. that laws evolve over time. I can't sort out the scientific mess. I can only proceed with direct observation of life and develop a metaphysical ontology based upon these observations. — Rich

Okay thanks for that. Will be watching it.

In the meantime, why do you think the direct observation of life yields knowledge of ontology? What if the direct observation of life is illusory, and hence yields knowledge of an illusion, not really of the way things are?

It could be that time as experienced is illusory, Einstein certainly thought so for example. — Agustino

This is why ignore GR and Einstein. Ontology becomes deeply derailed into an experienced of illusion. From this point, everything, including this thread becomes totally pointless. Anything and everything becomes an illusion.

In the meantime, why do you think the direct observation of life yields knowledge of ontology? What if the direct observation of life is illusory, and hence yields knowledge of an illusion, not really of the way things are? — Agustino

I take this approach for the same reason the Daoist did, it yields concrete, practical results that I can truly understand and believe in, because I actually experience it. I understand the healing intelligence of the mind/body because I experience it. I am a very practical person who is experimenting and exploring in every day life and gaining knowledge of life in the process.