Time

[DBT]

Our subjective experience of the rate of time is probably related to awareness and memory. Being absorbed in an activity, sport, a movie or book we are less aware of the passage of time. As our memories are far from complete, we forget most of the things we have done, consequently the past feels compressed into highlights that are remembered...and the feeling of how quickly the years have passed.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Change of position. Even at a subatomic level, things move... this movement (the vibration of a particle at the coldest of temperatures)... is what we consider the shortest length of time... or, the most minimal, or foundational, representation of time.

That assumes that time is a function of movement. I disagree with that notion.

OK... How do you determine the length of a second? A second is a measure of time. Describing how you determine that value describes what time is, right? At least, partially, no?

It seems to me that time is proxy for 'quantity of events' (or occurrences of events). I don't see that anyone could prove that time exists beyond our own subjective sense of time and our concept of objective time.

We measure time by counting how many of a standard species of events, say, clock ticks, grains of sand falling through a hole, burning candles etc. and then we measure events in the world by counting how much clock ticks, or grains of sand, or candles burnt they take to unfold, events such as human running one hundred metres, worker working, food cooking etc. So, in effect, we measure the quantity of various kinds of events against the quantity of yet another kind of events used as a standard. Time here just doesn't feature except as a fictional intermediary.

What remains, though, is our own subjective sense of time. It's easy to guess that our brain somehow maintains a kind of clock, a standard mechanism involving the occurrence of specific events, which provides a standard quantity of events that the brain can use to compare it to the quantity of various events occurring in the outside world. That's probably all there is to time, objective or subjective. It's a trick our brains play on us.

We effectively never have time for anything.
EB

 

[Malintent]

That assumes that time is a function of movement. I disagree with that notion.

OK... How do you determine the length of a second? A second is a measure of time. Describing how you determine that value describes what time is, right? At least, partially, no?

We use movement to measure time. Take away movement, we lose the ability to measure. Time marches on.

yes, exactly. That is why I say time is a measure of a change of position... unless "movement" means something else here....

 

[Malintent]

That assumes that time is a function of movement. I disagree with that notion.

OK... How do you determine the length of a second? A second is a measure of time. Describing how you determine that value describes what time is, right? At least, partially, no?

It seems to me that time is proxy for 'quantity of events' (or occurrences of events). I don't see that anyone could prove that time exists beyond our own subjective sense of time and our concept of objective time.

We measure time by counting how many of a standard species of events, say, clock ticks, grains of sand falling through a hole, burning candles etc. and then we measure events in the world by counting how much clock ticks, or grains of sand, or candles burnt they take to unfold, events such as human running one hundred metres, worker working, food cooking etc. So, in effect, we measure the quantity of various kinds of events against the quantity of yet another kind of events used as a standard. Time here just doesn't feature except as a fictional intermediary.

What remains, though, is our own subjective sense of time. It's easy to guess that our brain somehow maintains a kind of clock, a standard mechanism involving the occurrence of specific events, which provides a standard quantity of events that the brain can use to compare it to the quantity of various events occurring in the outside world. That's probably all there is to time, objective or subjective. It's a trick our brains play on us.

We effectively never have time for anything.
EB

You gave several examples of ways to measure time... all of the examples you provided involve movement (sand moving through a vessel, flame moving through wax... )
an "event" is indistinguishable from a "non-event" without change. If we can detect an event, then we are detecting some kind of change... time is the measure of change.

 

[PyramidHead]

I used tense for a reason. I was describing our subjective experience of time. Are you going to say that your experience of time is that the past is still there? That the future is already here? No. I don't think you would. Our subjective experience of time is that the past doesn't exist and that the future doesn't exist. So, now, how does Relativity explain that?

I don't see the problem. Nothing you said is inconsistent with relativity. Relativity does not predict that we should have access to points on the timeline other than the one we are currently experiencing. Our subjective experience of space is that there is only one 'here'. Behind me is not here, and in front of me is not here. If I were in either of those places, it would become 'here' for me. I do not experience being anywhere other than here, but I do not doubt that other places exist. Do you also say that general relativity cannot explain our perception of space?

Whoa! I'm truly impressed here. First, you miserably fail to understand my point about our subjective experience of time and then you proceed to explain the same thing in your own terms. Maybe my English is not good enough for you? Well, me, I understood what you said. Try it, it works.

Anyway, the positive side of it is you concur that there's no explanation to our subjective experience of time. Good.

So, anyone has any idea?

First of all... please. It's an online discussion about abstract ideas and you're acting like an ass. Stop.

I agree that there is no explanation for our subjective experience of time, but I disagree that general relativity should be given any particular relevance for not providing one. The equation that force equals mass times acceleration also fails to explain our subjective experience of time, but that isn't noteworthy because it has nothing to say about it. My disagreement with what you are saying is that general relativity is at least consistent with our experience of time, even if it isn't immediately intuitive.

 

[fast]

OK... How do you determine the length of a second? A second is a measure of time. Describing how you determine that value describes what time is, right? At least, partially, no?

We use movement to measure time. Take away movement, we lose the ability to measure. Time marches on.

yes, exactly. That is why I say time is a measure of a change of position... unless "movement" means something else here....

But that's the "is" of predication, not the "is" of identity. We can explain time in terms of measuring movement, but time at its core is something else.

 

[Malintent]

We use movement to measure time. Take away movement, we lose the ability to measure. Time marches on.

yes, exactly. That is why I say time is a measure of a change of position... unless "movement" means something else here....

But that's the "is" of predication, not the "is" of identity. We can explain time in terms of measuring movement, but time at its core is something else.

Perhaps, perhaps not.. That is part of this discussion. Is Distance "something else at its core", other than a comparison of two positions? Is Velocity "something else at its core", other than rate of change of position? Why is time "something more"?

 

[Speakpigeon]

You gave several examples of ways to measure time... all of the examples you provided involve movement (sand moving through a vessel, flame moving through wax... )
an "event" is indistinguishable from a "non-event" without change. If we can detect an event, then we are detecting some kind of change... time is the measure of change.

Well, yes, but my point went somewhat beyond that. My point was that objective time very plausibly doesn't even exist. We're fooled by our sense of time, which is subjective, to believe in the existence of objective time. Our own brain probably includes a species of clock that allows us to assess the relative rate of change in the outside world. Our own inner clock provides us with a reference to assess the rate of change in burning candles, falling sand in the hourglass, the ticking of the clock, and even the march of seasons and so we can see these things as good marker of what we believe to be objective time, when all we have to go for it is our subjective sense of time.

Yet, I don't think we could pursue this much further because even as I say this I accept that I can't even think timeless reality in a way which would be consistent with our subjective sense of time.
EB

 

[fast]

yes, exactly. That is why I say time is a measure of a change of position... unless "movement" means something else here....

But that's the "is" of predication, not the "is" of identity. We can explain time in terms of measuring movement, but time at its core is something else.

Perhaps, perhaps not.. That is part of this discussion. Is Distance "something else at its core", other than a comparison of two positions? Is Velocity "something else at its core", other than rate of change of position? Why is time "something more"?

Damn good question. Will respond later

 

[Speakpigeon]

I used tense for a reason. I was describing our subjective experience of time. Are you going to say that your experience of time is that the past is still there? That the future is already here? No. I don't think you would. Our subjective experience of time is that the past doesn't exist and that the future doesn't exist. So, now, how does Relativity explain that?

I don't see the problem. Nothing you said is inconsistent with relativity. <snip-snip> I agree that there is no explanation for our subjective experience of time, but I disagree that general relativity should be given any particular relevance for not providing one. <snip-snip> My disagreement with what you are saying is that general relativity is at least consistent with our experience of time, even if it isn't immediately intuitive.

Well, then you need to read again what I said until you get it.

Our subjective experience of time is that the past and the future don't exist. Relativity sees time as just a species of space, to produce this concept of "block time". According to this, the past and the future exist just as much as the present time and just as much as the three-dimensional space around us. How are these two ways of seeing time not incompatible? Please explain.
EB

 

[Malintent]

You gave several examples of ways to measure time... all of the examples you provided involve movement (sand moving through a vessel, flame moving through wax... )
an "event" is indistinguishable from a "non-event" without change. If we can detect an event, then we are detecting some kind of change... time is the measure of change.

Well, yes, but my point went somewhat beyond that. My point was that objective time very plausibly doesn't even exist. We're fooled by our sense of time, which is subjective, to believe in the existence of objective time. Our own brain probably includes a species of clock that allows us to assess the relative rate of change in the outside world. Our own inner clock provides us with a reference to assess the rate of change in burning candles, falling sand in the hourglass, the ticking of the clock, and even the march of seasons and so we can see these things as good marker of what we believe to be objective time, when all we have to go for it is our subjective sense of time.

Yet, I don't think we could pursue this much further because even as I say this I accept that I can't even think timeless reality in a way which would be consistent with our subjective sense of time.
EB

I agree that "objective time" does not exist anymore than "objective distance" or "objective speed" exist as some kind of force or entity.

Distances and speeds are also subjectively experienced, exactly the same way as time. The reason for this is simple (to me)... V = D/T... each is defined as a function of the other... the trinity of experience, one could say.

 

[Speakpigeon]

speeds are also subjectively experienced

Still, I did get a ticket for over-speeding with my great Porsche on the Champs-Elysées...
EB

 

[PyramidHead]

I used tense for a reason. I was describing our subjective experience of time. Are you going to say that your experience of time is that the past is still there? That the future is already here? No. I don't think you would. Our subjective experience of time is that the past doesn't exist and that the future doesn't exist. So, now, how does Relativity explain that?

I don't see the problem. Nothing you said is inconsistent with relativity. <snip-snip> I agree that there is no explanation for our subjective experience of time, but I disagree that general relativity should be given any particular relevance for not providing one. <snip-snip> My disagreement with what you are saying is that general relativity is at least consistent with our experience of time, even if it isn't immediately intuitive.

Well, then you need to read again what I said until you get it.

Our subjective experience of time is that the past and the future don't exist.

That needs more qualification. We experience that they don't exist right now, which is exactly what we should expect, given that 'now' excludes the past and the present. That's why I used the spatial analogy of 'here', which works the same way. We are unable to confirm that any place other than 'here' exists, because as soon as we move there to investigate it, it becomes 'here'. Similarly, our minds interpret time in such a manner that we only experience 'now'. But just as our spatial 'hereness' does not cause us to doubt the existence of places other than where we are standing, the 'nowness' of our experience should not make us doubt the existence of other times.

 

[lpetrich]

Some years ago here, I'd posted on Theories of Time. I will list them, along with way they say about the reality of past, present, and future (_ or X).

• _ _ _ Unreality
• _ _ X
• _ X _ Presentism, JME McTaggart's A theory
• _ X X
• X _ _
• X _ X
• X X _ Growing Block Universe
• X X X Eternalism, Block Universe, JME McTaggart's B theory

Let's see what we get as we add the reality of the present, the past, and the future.

(None). Time is not real, or at least not at the highest level of reality. This was JME McTaggart's belief. He tried to show that time is not real by showing that it has properties of both the A theory and the B theory, and that those sets of properties contradict each other. Various other philosophers have argued that time is unreal, and some mystics have claimed that their experiences give direct evidence of that.

Present. Presentism seems like common sense, since our conscious experience is always at some specific time, and not multiple times. However, that time is a continually changing one, and it has a resolution of about 1/20 - 1/10 second.

Past, Present. The growing block Universe we infer from our memories of past experiences. We extrapolate from there to the time behavior of entities outside of our consciousnesses. Like object persistence, how clocks work, the travel time of light and sound, and so forth. While we get a lot of detail about the past, we don't get a lot of detail about the future. So the past seems well-defined, but the future does not.

Past, Present, Future. Eternalism or the block Universe may seem odd, but it is a consequence of the more fundamental theories that we have developed, starting with Newtonian mechanics. Past and future can be interchanged in the equations of motion without changing them. Though Newtonian mechanics has a universal time that is consistent with the other theories, special relativity and its successors do not. Time is relative to position and motion, though in a way that is very hard to observe under ordinary circumstances. But it is observable, and it is well-established. Individual objects have their own proper times, but relating those proper times depends on how one slices space-time to define overall time values.

An attempt to rescure non-eternalist theories is the "Lorentz aether theory", after that physicist's reconciliation of Maxwell's equations with Newtonian mechanics. It features a slicing of space-time that serves as a universal time. However, there is no physical support for any such cosmically preferred time.

 

[fast]

yes, exactly. That is why I say time is a measure of a change of position... unless "movement" means something else here....

But that's the "is" of predication, not the "is" of identity. We can explain time in terms of measuring movement, but time at its core is something else.

Perhaps, perhaps not.. That is part of this discussion. Is Distance "something else at its core", other than a comparison of two positions? Is Velocity "something else at its core", other than rate of change of position? Why is time "something more"?

There is a calculable distance between two positions. I know this. You know this. Whether there is such a thing as distance is not up for debate. If I take away your ability to calculate distance, the next step isn't to question whether there is distance. How much distance, maybe, but not whether there is such a thing as distance.

If you cut on the faucet in the sink and water pours out, you can measure the water with the only available means to you, the measuring cup, but if I take that measuring cup from you, the wrong question is, "but how do I know there is water." You may ask the question, how much water is flowing but not whether water is flowing.

Time is something we can measure, so you should have little doubt as to the existence of time, but such doubt shouldn't manifest with a thought experiment with the absence of our ability to measure it. Doubt how much time has passed, sure, but not whether there is time at all.

Time is not a concrete object, so it makes sense we speak of it in terms that we can understand, but we have to be careful not to deny the existence of something when we take away the means that help us make sense of it. If each tick of time is equivalent to a constant second that cannot waver in duration, then popping everything out of existence whereso no movement that allows for the measurement of time may lead us to experience time as it has stood still, but the duration is still a function of the elapsed ticks from when moving objects are popped back in again.

So yes, time is something we measure, but where there can be no measurement does not imply no existence of time.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Our subjective experience of time is that the past and the future don't exist.

That needs more qualification. We experience that they don't exist right now, which is exactly what we should expect, given that 'now' excludes the past and the present. That's why I used the spatial analogy of 'here', which works the same way. We are unable to confirm that any place other than 'here' exists, because as soon as we move there to investigate it, it becomes 'here'. Similarly, our minds interpret time in such a manner that we only experience 'now'. But just as our spatial 'hereness' does not cause us to doubt the existence of places other than where we are standing, the 'nowness' of our experience should not make us doubt the existence of other times.

You're trying hard but it doesn't work.

The default way we think of space is distinct from the default way we think of time. The concept of 'block universe' is precisely the extension of our default view of space to time itself. It makes time something like space. We think of other places (there) as existing in the same way as we think of the place we're at (here). We don't think of past and future times as existing in the same way as the present moment. That's a difference. And we think we can move from one place to another every way we fancy but we couldn't move from now to yesterday or from now to two centuries from now, certainly not as we please.

Given this, it seems very clear to me that it's to do with the way we are conscious of the world, including our own body. I even expect that there is a perfectly good scientific explanation for this fact but it's also clear to me that this explanation should explain why our impression of time and space is fundamentally wrong. I'm not asking that Relativity provide this explanation. I'm pointing to the fact that there's a contradiction between the block universe concept in Relativity and our subjective experience of time and that there's a need for a specific explanation. All you've done so far is to say 'it's to be expected'. Right, but not good enough.
EB

 

[PyramidHead]

Our subjective experience of time is that the past and the future don't exist.

That needs more qualification. We experience that they don't exist right now, which is exactly what we should expect, given that 'now' excludes the past and the present. That's why I used the spatial analogy of 'here', which works the same way. We are unable to confirm that any place other than 'here' exists, because as soon as we move there to investigate it, it becomes 'here'. Similarly, our minds interpret time in such a manner that we only experience 'now'. But just as our spatial 'hereness' does not cause us to doubt the existence of places other than where we are standing, the 'nowness' of our experience should not make us doubt the existence of other times.

You're trying hard but it doesn't work.

The default way we think of space is distinct from the default way we think of time. The concept of 'block universe' is precisely the extension of our default view of space to time itself. It makes time something like space. We think of other places (there) as existing in the same way as we think of the place we're at (here). We don't think of past and future times as existing in the same way as the present moment.

Some people do. I do. At the very least, I don't see why I shouldn't.

And we think we can move from one place to another every way we fancy but we couldn't move from now to yesterday or from now to two centuries from now, certainly not as we please.

This is the real difference. But the situation is strangely symmetrical between time and space:

In order to change our position in any of the first three dimensions, we must also change our position in the fourth. To counterbalance this restriction, we can travel in the first three dimensions at varying rates and directions.

We do not have to change our position in any of the first three dimensions in order to change our position in the fourth. To counterbalance this lack of restriction, we can only travel in the fourth dimension at a constant rate and direction.

Why dimensions 1-3 and 4 are juxtaposed in such a particular way is unknown. The equations of relativity don't require this juxtaposition. If this is all that you mean when you say "there's a contradiction between the block universe concept in Relativity and our subjective experience of time", then we agree.

 

[Treedbear]

... We don't think of past and future times as existing in the same way as the present moment. ...

Just a thought, but if the present exists in time it's an infinitely small amount of time. If something is infinitely small can we claim that it actually exists? Whereas if the past and/or future exists in time they are extremely large if not infinite. That is much easier to establish. The present only exists conceptually (as it seems so many things we tend to argue about do).

 

[PyramidHead]

On top of which it has been abundantly demonstrated that there is no singular "present" that is absolute for every observer in every frame of reference.

 

[Speakpigeon]

... We don't think of past and future times as existing in the same way as the present moment. ...

Just a thought, but if the present exists in time it's an infinitely small amount of time.

Or not. Maybe time, if it does exist as such, is quantified. Why not?

Our sense of time doesn't help here but the present does not seem infinitely small to me, although I guess it wouldn't appear so even if it was in reality.

If something is infinitely small can we claim that it actually exists?

That I think is a good example of the profound divide between reality as we perceive it and the kind of mathematical models we use to represent it formally. The infinitely small we accept for models just don't seem physically plausible to us--think also of UM's denial that there could be an infinite time.

I think it wouldn't be possible for any cognitive system to process all the information relative to even its immediate environment if it had to treat every moment in the succession of infinitely small present moments for any finite period of time. The system would inevitably suffer overload. Our brain perform well by ignoring a tremendous amount of information.

It's likely the reason for our failure to imagine the infinitely small beyond our concept of it.

Whereas if the past and/or future exists in time they are extremely large if not infinite. That is much easier to establish.

But they're so far removed from us.

The present only exists conceptually (as it seems so many things we tend to argue about do).

We don't know that but it is at least clear that the present is a metaphysical notion. All we have is our sense of time and that's probably not enough to judge whether there's any actual time, let alone an actual present. All we can do is believe and you can believe what you like without fear of being proved wrong.
EB