• Benj96
    2.2k
    1). In order to be aware of the passage of time one requires stability of/access to past events in the form of a record/memory. If we had no memory of the previous moments how would we ever know there was a "then" to this "now", a "cause" to this "effect".

    2). The universe shows lack of simultaneity. Due to gravity all parts of the universe experience the passage of time differently therefore how is there a unanimous "now". Even a hiker at the base of a mountain experiences slower time passage than one at the top even if infitisimally small. Your now is different to mine. When I react instantly to something you see it occur slightly afterward at a different point in "time" due to the fact we occupy different space.

    3). We all live in the present. The past has never been reached nor has the future. You are always living now. You were born now and you are reading this now and you will die now. The only dividing factor is the sequence of change that is continuously occuring now. Where is time if it's always this case?

    4). When does an event end? Units of time are arbitrary. The second, hour month etc are manmade repeatable units based off natural ones from astronomy and ecological cycles. It seems the only way to measure time is to particularise it as a frequency of a defined length. Otherwise it simply flows with events just blending into one another. One seamless transitional state of change.

    5). Reversability. Almost all mechanism of physics are reversible and work equally well backwards as forwards. They are directionless and do not require an arrow of time. Entropy increases the disorder of energy giving us a seemingly obvious direction to time. However the dury is out on whether entropy has an opposite. Life is technically a decrease in entropy as it is the organisation of a system so perhaps consciousness plays a role in countering entropy? Gravity orders millions of chaotic mass particles into a singular one and then perhaps a black hole which further gathers energy in its light form too decreasing entropy.

    6). Energy and time really describe two facets of the same thing. Energy is the ability to cause change/work and time the measure of change but they are linked inseparably to eachother. We really only require energy to cause motion in the universe as time cannot occur without energy to bring about events. You could argue it in reverse that energy is impossible without time to allow events to happen. But if you think of it as a spectrum with one end being all energy and no time and the other all time and no energy it makes more sense as differing "rates" of the same phenomenon. In the middle is the only place where you can speak of energy and time as separate entities because theres a ratio of the two. Relativity.

    7). At the speed of light (speed of change/energy)... nothing changes. Time doesnt occur for pure light energy. Energy travels in an instant from the sun to earth due to time dilation and space contraction but because we exist as mass at a lower rate of change it appears to take 8 minutes. The difference in rate and quality of energy is manifested as time and space. Therefore doesnt time really only play a role when energy is mass? (not travelling at the speed of light with relativity to its surroundings - space.) and can actually interact and be set in motion by itself - "faster" "less solid" raw energy.

    I'm skeptical to believe time actually exists in the universe. I believe it is a necessary concept to explain all phenomenon relative to one another across a medium which is objective and constant (both in the sense of physics but also conscious experience of the past present and future) but its convenience/utility doesnt mean it actually physical exists.

    Thoughts? Happy to be corrected on some or all of my points if you can defend a contrary argument.
  • tim wood
    8.7k
    Both, it seems to me. Agreed, much about time is arbitrary, made up by us for us. But there seems an intrinsic beforeness and afterness that is something more than merely subjective. The cat that was a kitten, but that never will be a kitten.
  • jgill
    3.5k
    Nice presentation. I hadn't thought about your #6 ( the second one) :cool:
  • InPitzotl
    880
    Which one? (ETA: answered in edit) Quick request... fix the numbering (you have two 6's)... good for reference (like jgill's)
  • prothero
    429
    1). In order to be aware of the passage of time one requires stability of/access to past events in the form of a record/memory. If we had no memory of the previous moments how would we ever know there was a "then" to this "now", a "cause" to this "effect".Benj96
    Elements of the past are incorporated into the present. There are no permanent enduring “objects” there are only repetitive patterns of events “processes”. A primitive form of memory is thus built into the “universe”. “The past is never dead, in fact it is not even the past”-William Faulkner

    2). The universe shows lack of simultaneity. Due to gravity all parts of the universe experience the passage of time differently therefore how is there a unanimous "now". Even a hiker at the base of a mountain experiences slower time passage than one at the top even if infinitesimally small. Your now is different to mine. When I react instantly to something you see it occur slightly afterward at a different point in "time" due to the fact we occupy different space.Benj96
    Two different issues really. One relates to the influence of gravity or acceleration on the rate of a process (cesium emission for an atomic clock, crystal oscillation, etc.). The rate of all physical, chemical and biologic processes are influenced by gravity and acceleration and since this is what we use to measure “time” the rate time passes changes under these conditions. (time dilatation).

    It is true there is no “universal now” available to any observer since there is no privileged point of view in the universe. One can arbitrarily “adopt a reference point of view” and sequences of events as the light from them arrives there can be ordered and causality will not be violated.

    3). We all live in the present. The past has never been reached nor has the future. You are always living now. You were born now and you are reading this now and you will die now. The only dividing factor is the sequence of change that is continuously occurring now. Where is time if it's always this case?Benj96
    I too am a”presentist”, believing only the present to “truly exist” but you may get a lot of responses from people with a different view of past, present and future. I am also a “process philosophy” person as a basic ontology (metaphysics). The world is constantly becoming (creative advance) and so sequential events necessitating “memory” of the past and “anticipation” of future possibilities requires “change, becoming” but not time as some separate metaphysical entity.

    4). When does an event end? Units of time are arbitrary. The second, hour month etc are man made repeatable units based off natural ones from astronomy and ecological cycles. It seems the only way to measure time is to particularize it as a frequency of a defined length. Otherwise it simply flows with events just blending into one another. One seamless transitional state of change.Benj96
    Since there is no absolute “time” as you say its measurement is arbitrary. Different events have different durations. Change is what we perceive not “time”.

    5). Reversibility. Almost all mechanism of physics are reversible and work equally well backwards as forwards. They are directionless and do not require an arrow of time. Entropy increases the disorder of energy giving us a seemingly obvious direction to time. However the jury is out on whether entropy has an opposite. Life is technically a decrease in entropy as it is the organization of a system so perhaps consciousness plays a role in countering entropy? Gravity orders millions of chaotic mass particles into a singular one and then perhaps a black hole which further gathers energy in its light form too decreasing entropy.Benj96
    Entropy “the arrow of time”. Cats do not become kittens. Time in our experience is not “reversible”. Cosmology indicates a direction to the universe (the big bang, formation of stars, planets, increasing complexity, life, etc.). I don’t think our consciousness creates these changes in the universe. Nature is full of self-organizing, self-sustaining systems of which we are one. There is creative advance at least in some small corners of the universe and I think explaining that is worth exploring (could even inspire some religious inclinations).


    I'm skeptical to believe time actually exists in the universe. I believe it is a necessary concept to explain all phenomenon relative to one another across a medium which is objective and constant (both in the sense of physics but also conscious experience of the past present and future) but its convenience/utility doesn't mean it actually physical exists.Benj96
    Time is I would say an abstraction from change. Something we use to record sequences of events. Time itself does not exist. Change (becoming) is the fundamental nature of reality. There is no fixed absolute independent separate entity “time”.
  • Luke
    2.6k
    Aging is real => Time is real
  • javra
    2.4k
    Nice OP.

    If we had no memory of the previous moments how would we ever know there was a "then" to this "now", a "cause" to this "effect".Benj96

    In such a hypothetical, wouldn't inference be sufficient? Here thinking of people with certain forms of amnesia, but taken to an extreme. As I was recently expressing in a different thread, the experienced present, or now, can not so be experienced if devoid of duration. So, when I hear a hammer hitting a nail, there will be a beginning to this sound that occurs before this sound ends, even though this sound will as experience occur within the timespan of the present moment I experience, from its beginning to its end. Normally, this then gets changed into memory of what once was the present but no longer is. But sans any such memory, some befores and afters would yet be experienced to occur within the duration of the experienced present moment. From this, I'm thinking that one could then infer that what occurs in the present had a "before the present moment" to it - even if one could not remember such past moments.

    Even a hiker at the base of a mountain experiences slower time passage than one at the top even if infitisimally small. Your now is different to mine. When I react instantly to something you see it occur slightly afterward at a different point in "time" due to the fact we occupy different space.Benj96

    Yet, experientially speaking - here momentarily placing aside the mathematical models of time of which we know - when we causally interact, will we not at such juncture share a commonly experienced reality of what temporally occurs during the present between us - this in contrast to what has already occurred between us? In other words, when we causally interact with each other don't we then share a commonly experienced now - a commonly shared present moment that isn't duration-devoid - wherein we act and react to each other?

    You were born now and you are reading this now and you will die now.Benj96

    Even when presuming a presentist position, the now I currently find myself is neither my birth as an infant nor my death as (hopefully) and oldtimer. Even if the present is all that materially exists, the present is ever changing, such that what is memory and forethought - though only knowable in the present - reflects either former present moments that no longer materially are or, otherwise, future present moments that have yet to materially be. Not just for one or two, but for every living entity, arguably including bodily cells and neurons. For the record, I subscribe to this form of presentism.

    Ah, saw that @prothero already gave a lengthy reply. I'll stop short. Save to comment on this:

    I'm skeptical to believe time actually exists in the universe.Benj96

    What then is you're take on the proposition that conscious beings exist in the universe? If we exist in the universe and our so being requires that we are aware of time, then wouldn't time necessarily also exist in the universe?

    I don't personally favor Cartesian dualism, so I'm inclined to believe the contrary of what this last quote affirms. I'd say that mathematical models don't require time to exist in the universe, but these are models of what is experientially evidenced: they are a mapping of the road, but not the road itself.
  • Benj96
    2.2k
    What then is you're take on the proposition that conscious beings exist in the universe? If we exist in the universe and our so being requires that we are aware of time, then wouldn't time necessarily also exist in the universe?javra

    Sorry I should have clarified I dont believe time exists in the universe independently of the function of consciousness to be aware/living things to survive effectively. I think it is an intrinsic quality of mind that develops with the continuing improvement of cognition and memory and serves as a metaphysical platform by which we can categorise events in order of linear immediacy and potential/possibility.
  • Benj96
    2.2k
    Very nice points.

    Cats do not become kittens.prothero

    Of course in the typical sense of a cat there is no reversability of its existence, it cannot age backwards into a kitten. However it may be interesting to note that its existence genetically speaking is theoretically reversibly. The Gene's necessary to make the cat are concentrating by factors of 2 with each approaching generation of ancestors until the individual cat is born where it equals one whole, and then dilutes by factors of 2 with each generation of offspring thereafter. In this way we see the cat manifests at a rate equal to that with which it is disappears back into the gene pool but only "lives" when it is at 1.

    When the cats grandparents are alive it is portions of quarters and then it parents - as halves and then when it is born the Gene's that make it up sum to 1 and then dilute in reverse fashion through its offspring; 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 and so on. Cats may not become kittens but the instructions for the Cat come into form and out of form at an equal rate and the direction has no particular bearing as far as genetics go.

    Time directionality is not necessary for genes to make a cat. Just probability of all being lumped together as one particular individual.
  • jgill
    3.5k
    5). Reversability. Almost all mechanism of physics are reversible and work equally well backwards as forwards.Benj96

    The formulae that involve a time variable seem to have this property. But keep in mind they merely describe phenomena and are not themselves phenomena. The reversibility might just be a quirk of the mathematics. A real physicist should comment. :chin:
  • Possibility
    2.8k
    Time directionality is not necessary for genes to make a cat. Just probability of all being lumped together as one particular individual.Benj96

    Not to make a potential cat, no. But time directionality is required for genes to make an actual cat. Language and probability make no distinction between potentiality and actuality. Reality does.
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