Time

[steve_bank]

Round and round we go...

More like a dog chasing its tail. Beats watching reruns on TV.

 

[steve_bank]

Time is still something of a mystery, I think. And, obviously, I'm not the only one in this category.

Reading an article about Roger Penrose discussing the few issues still pending about time, got me thinking. One point is that there's an explanatory gap left by general relativity and it's objective vision of a space-time block, whereby time is just one dimension of space-time. Clearly, that's not how we experience time subjectively.

Instead, our subjective experience of time discriminates, even segregates, the present moment from the rest of time. Our experience is that only the present moment exists. The past no longer exists and the future does not yet exist. So, it's a radical distinction, and one which is not explained by general relativity, or any science for that matter, or at least not explicitly. According to our subjective view of time, the universe only exists in the present. Only the universe as it is now exists. The universe as it was only yesterday, only a second ago, no longer exists, i.e. does not exist at all.

Yet, maybe it's possible to explain our subjective experience of time in a way that would be fully compatible with what science says. I expected Penrose to articulate such an explanation but apparently no. He seems to think in terms of a different scientific theory of time altogether. Me, I'm thinking in terms of the existing science and what it suggests about time.

Obviously, I'm not suggesting current science could explain subjectivity, clearly it can't, certainly not yet, and perhaps it would be irrelevant. But, it could perhaps explain our radical distinction between the present moment and the rest of time. We can ignore for now the issue of our evanescent subjectivity, and think of our perception of time in physical terms. Wouldn't that be enough?

What do you think?
EB

Why are you hung up about subjective experience?

I have been in rehab for over two years first for heart failure then for an infection on my spine that affected my mobility.

When I was learning to walk again a flight of stairs looked like a mountain. It is not just time that has a subjective experience. A small hill felt like an expedition. Some days birds chirping can sound like a symphony.

What are you really trying to get at.

 

[fast]

Time is not the measure of change. If there was no change, there would be no time. But there is time! You can't go, "but there is change!" My point is there is time even when there is no change, so although we measure time by measuring change, we have to be astute enough to recognize that time continues to endure even when change does not.

It's imperative to distinguish the measuring tool from that which is measured. That which is measured does not follow suit and vanish merely because our measuring tool does. Time continues to tickity-tick along, even at universal zero kelvin.

 

[Speakpigeon]

<snip>
Obviously, I'm not suggesting current science could explain subjectivity, clearly it can't, certainly not yet, and perhaps it would be irrelevant. But, it could perhaps explain our radical distinction between the present moment and the rest of time. We can ignore for now the issue of our evanescent subjectivity, and think of our perception of time in physical terms. Wouldn't that be enough?

What do you think?
EB

Why are you hung up about subjective experience?

Sorry, but you wouldn't be able to show I'm at all 'hung up' on subjective experience.

Clearly, it's a very interesting question since no one so far has been able to explain it in materialistic terms but I 'm far from being exclusively, let alone obsessively, interested in this particular question.

Rather, it may well be that it is you who are overmuch sensitive and perhaps somewhat annoyed when you have to read particular words or expressions like 'subjective experience'.

Your problem, Sir, obviously.

I have been in rehab for over two years first for heart failure then for an infection on my spine that affected my mobility.

When I was learning to walk again a flight of stairs looked like a mountain. It is not just time that has a subjective experience. A small hill felt like an expedition. Some days birds chirping can sound like a symphony.

Exactly. I would even say that I don't know anything, and I don't know of anything, that's not exclusively part of my subjective experience. And if there's something like a window through which I can now see buildings, it seems to me that I don't actually know that and that all I can do in this case is just to believe there's something like a window through which I can now see buildings.

What are you really trying to get at.

I probably wouldn't know myself.

But beware that it's not all in the eyes of you the beholder.
EB

 

[Kharakov]

Yet, maybe it's possible to explain our subjective experience of time in a way that would be fully compatible with what science says.

Sure. We can explain time and our experience of it like we can explain our experience of size and distance.

I'm curious about what Penrose thing you spoke of?

 

[Malintent]

Time is more like the passage of seconds. A perfect clock will tell us that a second has passed when and only when a second has passed. An imperfect clock will inaccurately state when exactly a second has passed.

OK. In this context, what does "passage" mean?

The elapsed moment between the boundaries of the second.

If the clock stops, the problem isn't with time. That would be a problem with timekeeping.

If a clock slows down, that's because of forces on the clock. If we're not careful, we'll think time has slowed down when it's not time that is the problem but the forces on the clock.

"Elapsed"? What I am getting at is these definitions contain rephrased versions of that which you are trying to define. If I asked what "distance" means, and you said "space between things", I would ask what "space" was, since it is just a replacement of the word we are trying to define.

The point being that time is just an expression of the relationship between two other things, and one cannot define it apart from it constituents.

 

[Malintent]

Round and round we go...

Like the hands on a clock, these are the circular references...

 

[Speakpigeon]

Yet, maybe it's possible to explain our subjective experience of time in a way that would be fully compatible with what science says.

Sure. We can explain time and our experience of it like we can explain our experience of size and distance.

I'm curious about what Penrose thing you spoke of?

I'd like very much to give you the details but I no longer have the article. Sorry.

Still, Here is an abstract of the article given by the journalist on their website (Google's translation from the French -- Not bad at all, I only had to correct "spilled in geometry"!).

To get more, just Google "cosmic censorship conjecture and Penrose".
EB

La Recherche
Interview by Philippe Pajot dated December 2016-January 2017
http://www.larecherche.fr/entretien-avec-roger-penrose-tout-ne-serait-quun-éternel-recommencement-»

Since Einstein's general relativity, time is irremediably linked to space. But this model does not explain why we experience the sensation that it flows. Physicists continue their efforts in search of a theory that would justify the lack of reversibility of the time variable.

A physicist and mathematician with an iconoclastic vision, Roger Penrose has been exploring the mysteries of theoretical physics for six decades. He worked on black holes with Stephen Hawking and also formulated the cosmic censorship conjecture that there is no singularity - where physical quantities become infinite - without a black hole. Spilled Adept in geometry, the physicist has proposed a theory of twists, a new way of looking at space-time, which tries to reconcile general relativity and quantum physics. He is also the author of a cosmological model in which the need for an origin of time disappears, since it is an infinite cyclic model.

 

[steve_bank]

If you want to bend time, opium has been around for centuries.

If you are always time tripping you need to work on your stability. That is what meditation and concentration techniques are for.

 

[Kharakov]

..mehh.... deleet

 

[fast]

OK. In this context, what does "passage" mean?

The elapsed moment between the boundaries of the second.

If the clock stops, the problem isn't with time. That would be a problem with timekeeping.

If a clock slows down, that's because of forces on the clock. If we're not careful, we'll think time has slowed down when it's not time that is the problem but the forces on the clock.

"Elapsed"? What I am getting at is these definitions contain rephrased versions of that which you are trying to define. If I asked what "distance" means, and you said "space between things", I would ask what "space" was, since it is just a replacement of the word we are trying to define.

The point being that time is just an expression of the relationship between two other things, and one cannot define it apart from it constituents.

Okay, but what I don't want lost in your definition is that it's an enduring dimension. I don't mind trying to capture what time is in your explanation that it's a relationship between two other things. Thing is, when confronted with no events and thus no relationship, I'm opposed to the notion time has stopped; on the contrary, time is enduring; it persists. It continues despite your explanation designed to capture time for what it is.

What fuels my persistence is the fact we can measure the duration of inaction. How long has the clock been broken? How long did the box with moving parts been without moving parts? We can step back and measure, and then we can step back again and again. At some point, should there be a universe with no motion and no ability to step back, why should we think that time has stood still, when it's just an enduring dimension of endlessness.

 

[Kharakov]

Still, Here is an abstract of the article given by the journalist on their website (Google's translation from the French -- Not bad at all, I only had to correct "spilled in geometry"!).

Skilled: adept

La Recherche
Interview by Philippe Pajot dated December 2016-January 2017
http://www.larecherche.fr/entretien-avec-roger-penrose-tout-ne-serait-quun-éternel-recommencement-»

Since Einstein's general relativity, time is irremediably linked to space. But this model does not explain why we experience the sensation that it flows. Physicists continue their efforts in search of a theory that would justify the lack of reversibility of the time variable.

Justification for lack of reversibility of time variable: more than one actor. Mystery solved.

So what?

 

[Speakpigeon]

Skilled: adept

Ya, that was my initial reaction.

But no, it was just a coincidence. Google really mistook one 'versé' meaning experienced with another 'versé' which means spilled.

La Recherche
Interview by Philippe Pajot dated December 2016-January 2017
http://www.larecherche.fr/entretien-avec-roger-penrose-tout-ne-serait-quun-éternel-recommencement-»

Since Einstein's general relativity, time is irremediably linked to space. But this model does not explain why we experience the sensation that it flows. Physicists continue their efforts in search of a theory that would justify the lack of reversibility of the time variable.

Justification for lack of reversibility of time variable: more than one actor. Mystery solved.

So what?

Could you please explain what's an 'actor' in Relativity?
EB

 

[Malintent]

The elapsed moment between the boundaries of the second.

If the clock stops, the problem isn't with time. That would be a problem with timekeeping.

If a clock slows down, that's because of forces on the clock. If we're not careful, we'll think time has slowed down when it's not time that is the problem but the forces on the clock.

"Elapsed"? What I am getting at is these definitions contain rephrased versions of that which you are trying to define. If I asked what "distance" means, and you said "space between things", I would ask what "space" was, since it is just a replacement of the word we are trying to define.

The point being that time is just an expression of the relationship between two other things, and one cannot define it apart from it constituents.

Okay, but what I don't want lost in your definition is that it's an enduring dimension. I don't mind trying to capture what time is in your explanation that it's a relationship between two other things. Thing is, when confronted with no events and thus no relationship, I'm opposed to the notion time has stopped; on the contrary, time is enduring; it persists. It continues despite your explanation designed to capture time for what it is.

What fuels my persistence is the fact we can measure the duration of inaction. How long has the clock been broken? How long did the box with moving parts been without moving parts? We can step back and measure, and then we can step back again and again. At some point, should there be a universe with no motion and no ability to step back, why should we think that time has stood still, when it's just an enduring dimension of endlessness.

I am of the opinion that in the absence of any event, we have an absence of "time".
Another poster referred to the "direction" of time as the vector of change in entropy. I found that elegant. It also falls in line with what I am saying... time is change (in entropy, at the lowest possible degree of change). So, if you can stop entropy, you will have stopped time.

Your clock may be broken, but all the parts of that broken clock are abuzz with molecular and atomic change. At Time's most fundamental level we have noted the smallest degree of change possible, and therefore the smallest amount of time that makes sense to reference... the plank second... the time it takes the fastest thing (light) to move the shortest distance (the radius of an electron?).

 

[Treedbear]

Maybe time is what results from the quantum nature of reality. That is, because reality operates non-deterministically at the quantum level there is a wide range of adjacent possibilities into which the future can progress. Perhaps infinite ways. While there is only one course of events that will retrace the past. Although the physical laws are supposed to operate just as well in either direction it becomes essentially impossible for this to happen due to the improbability. Any particular path into the future is just as improbable. The illusion is that it's as inevitable or as set in stone as the past has become. If it wasn't for the indeterminism of quantum dynamics the past and future would be equally probable. Which might be equivalent to non-existence or just chaos. So time isn't what keeps everything from happening at once. It's what allows anything to happen at all.

 

[fast]

"Elapsed"? What I am getting at is these definitions contain rephrased versions of that which you are trying to define. If I asked what "distance" means, and you said "space between things", I would ask what "space" was, since it is just a replacement of the word we are trying to define.

The point being that time is just an expression of the relationship between two other things, and one cannot define it apart from it constituents.

Okay, but what I don't want lost in your definition is that it's an enduring dimension. I don't mind trying to capture what time is in your explanation that it's a relationship between two other things. Thing is, when confronted with no events and thus no relationship, I'm opposed to the notion time has stopped; on the contrary, time is enduring; it persists. It continues despite your explanation designed to capture time for what it is.

What fuels my persistence is the fact we can measure the duration of inaction. How long has the clock been broken? How long did the box with moving parts been without moving parts? We can step back and measure, and then we can step back again and again. At some point, should there be a universe with no motion and no ability to step back, why should we think that time has stood still, when it's just an enduring dimension of endlessness.

I am of the opinion that in the absence of any event, we have an absence of "time".
Another poster referred to the "direction" of time as the vector of change in entropy. I found that elegant. It also falls in line with what I am saying... time is change (in entropy, at the lowest possible degree of change). So, if you can stop entropy, you will have stopped time.

Your clock may be broken, but all the parts of that broken clock are abuzz with molecular and atomic change. At Time's most fundamental level we have noted the smallest degree of change possible, and therefore the smallest amount of time that makes sense to reference... the plank second... the time it takes the fastest thing (light) to move the shortest distance (the radius of an electron?).

Your view accords with the general theory of relativity. You're in good company--at least it's in today's mainstream as the most accepted view regarding the nature of time.

 

[steve_bank]

It is not just clocks in relativity. The presumption is all processes vary with time dilation, including biology and life.

No matter what you use to measure time and distance, time and space are linked.

Newtonian relative motion only requires xyz coordinates between frames. Like planetary motions.

At high relative velocities between frames dilation needs to be accounted for, Newtonian time fails.Hence space mapped from an inertial frame requires 4 space, (x,y,z,t) in rectangular cooedinates.

 

[Kharakov]

Ya, that was my initial reaction.

But no, it was just a coincidence. Google really mistook one 'versé' meaning experienced with another 'versé' which means spilled.

Hmm. Google translate literally translates versé as versed (practiced), which makes more sense to me. Anyway... Context detection?

La Recherche
Interview by Philippe Pajot dated December 2016-January 2017
http://www.larecherche.fr/entretien-avec-roger-penrose-tout-ne-serait-quun-éternel-recommencement-»

Since Einstein's general relativity, time is irremediably linked to space. But this model does not explain why we experience the sensation that it flows. Physicists continue their efforts in search of a theory that would justify the lack of reversibility of the time variable.

Justification for lack of reversibility of time variable: more than one actor. Mystery solved.

So what?

Could you please explain what's an 'actor' in Relativity?
EB

A simple example of an actor would be an object with inertia in some direction (non relativistic is fine). If you have just one object, you still need another source of energy to reverse that object's direction of movement. So for it to go back to a previous point, it needs some force to change it's direction. Not only that, it needs a force to change the direction of every particle within it as well....

Going back in time requires every particle in the universe to abruptly reverse inertia (direction of inertia). A funny consequence would be that a human mind would not be able to tell whether it was in a universe that was going forwards or backwards in time, because every state (assuming we leave out QM bullshit about non-determinism for now) would be exactly the same going forwards or backwards (assuming conscious observers aren't parity violators or something).


Or you can just check out entropy. The complexity of reversing entropy (or time) is that you have to do it at every scale, everywhere, at once.

That one protein fold that you forgot about, or that one particle in the fold? Well, that could have large effects over time (reversed or otherwise).

 

[Speakpigeon]

Maybe time is what results from the quantum nature of reality. That is, because reality operates non-deterministically at the quantum level there is a wide range of adjacent possibilities into which the future can progress. Perhaps infinite ways. While there is only one course of events that will retrace the past. Although the physical laws are supposed to operate just as well in either direction it becomes essentially impossible for this to happen due to the improbability. Any particular path into the future is just as improbable. The illusion is that it's as inevitable or as set in stone as the past has become. If it wasn't for the indeterminism of quantum dynamics the past and future would be equally probable. Which might be equivalent to non-existence or just chaos. So time isn't what keeps everything from happening at once. It's what allows anything to happen at all.

I would assume there are as many possibilities where entropy would go down as there are where entropy would go up. So, I don't see why one direction of evolution of entropy should be privileged by quantum physics. There is only one possibility to retrace the past exactly but there are any number of possibilities for an alternative past. The past and future are equally probable.

So the question is, why do we never go there?
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

I am of the opinion that in the absence of any event, we have an absence of "time".

That's also my view but without time we need something else to explain the facts, I think. So, how do you explain that the same species of atoms located billions of light-years appart should nonetheless be seen as emitting exactly the same light? How it is possible for this absolutely huge universe to vibrate at exactly the same rate everywhere without a master clock?
EB