Does time exist?

[Apotropaic]

My first thread, yey!
Please forgive me if I've got a wrong view on this, but here it goes:

I've read and heard certain people claim that time does not truly exist. They see time as a shred of reality, a human representation created merely to use as measurement for the 'how longs'. Cos really, when you think about it, what would change if the human mind never thought of the concept of time?

Well, that's their view. As for me, I think time does exist. I'll expound further, but someone react first. I want to know what you people think.

[Satirical]

I would think that if it is a construct of the mind, then it presupposes its existence a priori. If anything, I wouldn't call it a human conception, but a human perception.

[Apotropaic]

So is time existent? Or just a perception, as you say?
By the way, I don't know what the heck that first sentence meant. Im only 14 :p

[byquist]

You bring up a major issue that has intrigued folks since day one, whenever that was (there's a time-loaded statement). However, there is the word "eternity" and "timelessness" in the dictionary, also untimely, so there is a potential reality as to time's opposite.

Then there is Harvey, in his own play "Harvey." Elwood P. Dowd says something like, "Einstein has overcome both time and space. Harvey has not only overcome both time and space, but any objection." That idea is worth spending some time, or non-timeliness, on.

[IrishCanadian]

Saint Augustine adresses this issue in his confessions. Book 11 I think. He says that time exists, but only the present time. Heres why:
The past has ceased to exist because it is passed. And the futer has ot happened yet. This is true even for the tiniest fragment of time. The only time that we can "percieve" is the present time, which is ongoing. He says the present moment is eternal and the rest no longer exists and the rest has yet to be.

[Satirical]

St. Augustine raises a good point, and the only problem that I can find with this is that although time does pass and future has not come yet, it is more than perception that allows us to notice. It is our bodies, as they age they die. History is a bad word, but the past is obvious. The future on the other hand, exists as a will of thought. It is not yet, but it can still be percieved in the minds eye. We may just be using different defintions of the word perception, though lol.

[Apotropaic]

Saint Augustine adresses this issue in his confessions. Book 11 I think. He says that time exists, but only the present time.


St. Augustine raises a good point, and the only problem that I can find with this is that although time does pass and future has not come yet, it is more than perception that allows us to notice. It is our bodies, as they age they die.
The thing is, time may have nothing to do with the aging process of matter. It is chemicals, cells wearing out, or running out of nutrition. It is the bones repeatedly being exposed to work. It is the skin suffering constant bacteria, and its moisture depleting. So again, what is time?

Picture a world without gravity, things would not stay down. Picture a world without inertia, things would move continuously. Picture a world without the three dimensions...OK, too complicated. But picture a world without the fourth dimension, time. Would things freeze? Why? Cos time stopped? There's no time remember? One would imagine things would be exactly the same. Perhaps we'd need a new system of measure for 'how longs', but otherwise, things will remain the same.

I spent days thinking about this. It's a mind-boggler :confused:

[starrwriter]

I gave this question a lot of thought after I read several books on quantum physics and relativity. Einstein proved mathematically that time is relative to motion and simultaneity doesn't exist for people moving at different speeds. One quantum physicist argued that two kinds of time exist -- ordinary human time and time at the quantum level, which can flow backwards under the right conditions.

The 19th century German philosopher Nietzsche had a curious idea called eternal recurrence. It means that everything that can possibly happen has already happened an infinite number of times and will continue to repeat forever.

But for me the question of time comes back to lifespan. Every living thing has a lifespan that more or less defines time for it. Even inorganic things like rocks have a sort of "lifespan": they break down over time and become dust. Stars definitely have a lifespan. After they burn up their nuclear fuel, they collapse into black holes or super-dense neutron stars.

I know I will die some day in the foreseeable future and that makes time very real to me. Maybe time doesn't exist in the minds of animals who don't know they will eventually die. They might think in terms of an eternal now if they think at all.

One thing I have noticed: the older I get, the faster time seems to go. When I was a young kid, an afternoon could seem like a week if I was doing something that fascinated me (or waiting for something bad to happen.) Now it seems like only a day or two has passed between my readings of the Sunday newspaper.

[MrBojangles]

I always assumed it was the opposite, then again i'm only 15.

[B-Mental]

I think time does exist, at least on the biological level. Surely many rules of physics are bound by time. What is time on the astronomical level though. Do stars have a life? My answer would be yes. Even the universe has a proposed start. The fact that we as humans have measured it some would say makes it an invention of ours, but don't all things have a beginning and an end?


One thing I have noticed: the older I get, the faster time seems to go. When I was a young kid, an afternoon could seem like a week if I was doing something that fascinated me (or waiting for something bad to happen.) Now it seems like only a day or two has passed between my readings of the Sunday newspaper. Sounds like time is relative.

[confused1]

Time. A question I have thought of continuously. But can it truly exist if man created it? Man creats flaws....!!!!
When you look back you can only speculate and "fill in the gaps" of what has passed. Is time future and past but not present? Can it be that the clock time doesn't truly exist because each person goes by a "biological clock" from within. And can it be that the calculations and revolutions around the sun are not accurate? Are we not living by God's time? Time can just be a corralator between realities of what we know of ourselves to be true (intuition) and of what we think we know.
This then poses more questions of truely existing....we can only SEE LIGHT!!!!!

*if eternity means "NO TIME". can it be that we ARE living in Eternity........*

[B-Mental]

How did man create time? Put it in a cooker and wait? Man created a method of defining time. The time itself had to be there in order for us to measure, and I am lost after line one of your post. Consider me confused2

note to confused1:
Can I get a couple of bags of what your smoking?

[confused1]

has anyone ever seen "Waking Life" ???

time reminds me of alice and wonderland...it's ALL in YOUR head...!!!

[NewWorldOrder]

My first thread, yey!
Please forgive me if I've got a wrong view on this, but here it goes:

I've read and heard certain people claim that time does not truly exist.

They see time as a shred of reality, a human representation created merely to use as measurement for the 'how longs'. Cos really, when you think about it, what would change if the human mind never thought of the concept of time?

Well, that's their view. As for me, I think time does exist. I'll expound further, but someone react first. I want to know what you people think.
Time is tightly linked to the concept of Entropy in Science. Entropy is an Energy measure of the disorder of a system. The law of Entropy is that without forces that counter it, Nature will tend from Order to Disorder: and it is this CHANGE IN ENTROPY that "causes" TIME TO EXIST. So time exists in that sense.

Now what scientists thought before Einstein is that time was Universal that is to say a human on Earth and an Extraterrestrial somewhere else would read the same hour on their clock. This is not the case because it will depend on their speed relative to each other. Time is no more absolute but relative. I think that because of relativity people would talk about non existence of time I think the colloquial english term of existence may be misleading.

An other question about time is: can we reverse the clock ? Until recently the Entropy of the Universe was supposed to be growing eternally (because Order as by law is not natural and since Universe is the ultimate system one could not act upon it by some forces) so that time couldn't go backward but new scientific theories may discover something else. For example the speed of light may be not as constant as one could think (whereas it was an essential postulate of Einstein's Relativity).

[Bmblbee]

Parmenides had it right!

[Loki]

Can't all time exist at once?

We all know that time, physically, is the 4th dimension of space. Time is elastic, and can be warped by gravity. That sort of time (probably) exists. But we human beings are very deluded about time - we think of time as going from past to the future. This is the common sense view. But, as I'm sure somebody has already said, there is no such thing as "universal" time - time is different for everybody. Time is slower for people moving than for those at rest.

Just a few incoherent thoughts.

[starrwriter]

Can't all time exist at once?
Joke: God invented time so everything doesn't happen all at once.


...time is different for everybody.
Until you die. Then it's the same for everyone -- the end. (Unless you believe Krishna's claim in the Bhagavad-Gita that nothing ever really dies, it's just converted to a different form.)

[Countess]

Time and space make up a ball - the space/time continuum.

God is everything within and outside this ball, which is why He experiences it all at once.

We humans live life chronologically, however. Our little brains couldn't handle much else.

Countess

[Koa]

Well this might be silly but one thing I've always noticed and contested is when people say "the hour by my watch is right." How can hours be right? They ARE a convention...

As for time existing well... I can't say with certainty...things do decay after a ...long time, but I also liked the St. Augustin view... But again, there is all the relativity thing related to the hours issue I mentioned above...

[odysseus]

milton erickson master hypnotist utilized hypnotic phenomenon called time distortion to make time go slower to heal symptoms and "cure patients"

watch your language. The words you speak influence your thinking. The controller of word and language controls thought and though controls reality, and beware of those who say there is not enough time.

only associate with those who have infinite time to do everything right, do all necessary due diligence. if there is not enough time for something, then make time. create time. expand time. time maximization. time for love, time for money, time for love, time for fun, time for work, time for play.

who are the masters of time? Today, I think businesses are the masters.

There is a thing in philosophy called cultural relativity, cultural relativism. One of the aspects of a culture is the processing of time. I went from japan to thailand, and one of the first things i noticed was the "speed". It was very entrancing.

I don't like to feel rushed. That is the skill of lawyers and salesmen. Never rush yourself on an important business deal. Maximize time. You are right, it is all in your head. They promote the myth of scarcity, but everyone has had to fight to be free.

africans have a different sense of time than europeans. We are out of mythic time. Culture goes through cycles, divine, heroic and urban. we are in the urban epoch, alas. It is too absurd.

I am kind of crazy, but I just wish we were in the mythic, heroic stage. I am probalby going to go back to thailand, but not before mastering time, and maximizing time. At work I can't wait till my time is up. that is no way to spend a life. 1/3 of life is at work, working to make someone else money. Time is money, they say.

Time moves differently in everyone's heads. The faster you do something, go over something, the more your mind can make a pattern of it. that's called fast filia. Read "time for a change" by bandler, richard. Let things come to you. Read The Force by Wilde, Stuart. Do the exercises. Read Canstenada, Carlos.

Watch the predicates of time in your language-

quickly, slowly, on time, hurry, now, then..

you must have proper time to prepare. if you don't have time to prepare, if you don't give yourself time, you will not succeed. no hurry

[Satirical]

Too bad that you only say what everyone thinks, and not what we do not already know. A true genius makes it obvious when it is obvious after the fact.

[DaniS]

Time does exist. There is time between the sun's circlution. We age as time passes. If there were no time we wouldn't get older. Time is there. Just wish we could all apreciate it more.

[Joakim]

Time is relation between matter, matter is energy, energy is space.
If there is no matter there is no space and there would be no time.
At the begining there was not the void, there was nothing.
Nature opose nothing.
So in a frame of time nothing can not exist and you exist in a frame of time.
Holistic.
I know nothing, and can always be wrong.

[IrishCanadian]

Hypothetically speaking:
There are two rooms --nothing moves in one room; everything moves in the next. No matter how much space can be covered in the second room and no matter how still everyhting is in the first the same amount of time goes by each to each.
Most of you are treating time as a measurment unit for distance covered in empty space. This cognitive line of reasoning leads to human perception of distance covered. The truth is, for high action, time only SEEMS to go by more quickly than it does for low action. Truely there is no way of measuring time in the first room. However, the hypothetical clock in the hallway ticks on a single steady pace that dominates the concept of time in both rooms.
As I said in the first page ... St. Augustine covers this issue quite well in book 11 of his Conffessions. The "dimension" ideal of time is a result of our cognitive placement on the subject: time seems to have the (sort of) personality of a seperate dimension only because it is easiest to understand it that way. If we simply try not to understand it it will become clear that there is no moveing time. Only the things that human brains place in time move.
As the past no longer is (back to Augustine) and the future has not yet taken place, time is only a thought. A thought that exists inside our brains and no other place. It is there because it makes the world an easier place to understand.

[Weeping Willow]

In my opinion i don't think there is time.
Men invented time in order to help explain the world he lived in, in order to make order and sense in to it.
I do not who was the first who gave time it's definition as we all relate to it this days but i think that when he invented this concept alot of stuff became clear to him.
There are a lot of ways to look on the subject of time and i'm sure there will be a lot more.
Just an opinion of a pondering little Tree..

[starrwriter]

Time does exist. There is time between the sun's circlution. We age as time passes. If there were no time we wouldn't get older. Time is there.
Time is not absolute. If humans lived on another planet in a different solar system, a "year" would be different than earth (since time is a function of gravity bending space-time continuum, according to relativity theory.) In that case, the human body and aging would probably change.

Likewise, if a human lived in the zero gravity of a spaceship on a long voyage to a distant star, his lifespan might be much longer. Or shorter if his body couldn't adapt to zero gravity (which appears more likely.)

What we call time is an earth-bound concept. It doesn't apply elsewhere in the universe.

[Tis]

Expressed as a noun, time is a temporal continuum, independent of spatial considerations, and measured in terms of successively progressing events from past to present to future.

Time has existed, time does exist, time will continue to exist until it no longer has cause to exist. (And not a moment longer) ;)

Time itself, is an absolute. Distortions of time is a human concept whereby the intervals between one observable event and the next are merely effects of forces imposed on these events, not time itself. Remove the human element and events are no longer observable, and consequently, not measurable.

The space-time continuum is a system made up of four measures. Three spatial and one temporal through which any event or physical object can be located.

[IrishCanadian]

But time is not a noun.
Furthermore, stationary objects can exist perfectly well without it. Its the annimate objects that require time ... even then it is only required as a measuring device. It measures the movement of the object, not the object itself. Therefor objects are independent of the abstract concept of time.

[Virgil]

You know, this is one of those philosophic discussions that have no basis in common sense. If there is no time, then I will never die. Yeay!!!

[starrwriter]

Expressed as a noun, time is a temporal continuum, independent of spatial considerations, and measured in terms of successively progressing events from past to present to future.
That's linear time. What about circular time -- a cycle of repeating events?

And time is NOT absolute in relativity theory nor quantum mechanics, which offer the best understanding we have of how the universe works.

[Riesa]

I'm really in the mood for some Star Trek now.

[Tis]

IrishCanadian

Come on... of course time can be expressed as a noun. Time can be used as the subject of a verb (real time, recorded time, horrible time, good times) and it can be interpreted as singular or plural (“How much time do you have?” Or How many times do I...”) and it can refer to an action, a concept, an entity, a state, or quality. Time can also be expressed as a verb (to time an event or occasion) and an adjective (time deposits, time bomb).

As for the second part of your post, I would agree that objects, that is physical objects, whether animate or inanimate, whether stationary or not, need only three measures to exist. These are height, width and length. However, to locate them or to observe their existence, you must also know the time of their existence. As I said before, time is independent of the other three spatial measures... except in a space-time continuum.

Virgil

Interesting idea... unfortunately, if time did not exist, how would you know you would be at all, or that you have ever been, or that you would ever be? The absence of time would not necessarily permit an infinite existence. How could you be if you have never been? And if you never were, could you ever really be?

Curiously, In February of 1848, Edgar Allan Poe delivered a lecture entitled “The Universe” at the Society Library located at the corner of Leonard Street and Broadway in New York City. This lecture was later re-titled and printed as “Eureka – A Prose Poem” by George P. Putnam of Wiley & Putnam in New York.

It is the instinctive and intuitive expression of Poe’s thoughts dealing with the material and spiritual birth, expansion, collapse and ultimate demise of the universe. It also provides the first known recognition of and explication for darkness and has been noted as eerily close to current modern theories of the ‘Big Bang’.

Starrwriter

Respectfully, time is an absolute. It is the singular immeasurable interval between the beginning and eternity. One may call it linear, if they like, but this suggests a straight line progression. I don’t know that this is the case, but whether curved or straight, time will not be denied, changed or altered, its duration was predetermined. As an agnostic, I would not know who or what to credit for this predetermined interval.

Only the observable incremental measures between these two points, (minutes, hours, days, years, etc) are impacted by these forces. Cyclic or repeating events infers an observable precision of recurring occasions. That is to say that if this is possible in our current space-time continuum, each repetition of any observable event must occur at the same observable place at the same observable time. Consequently, the observer would likely perceive this as a singular event.

[IrishCanadian]

IrishCanadian

Come on... of course time can be expressed as a noun. Time can be used as the subject of a verb (real time, recorded time, horrible time, good times) and it can be interpreted as singular or plural (“How much time do you have?” Or How many times do I...”) and it can refer to an action, a concept, an entity, a state, or quality. Time can also be expressed as a verb (to time an event or occasion) and an adjective (time deposits, time bomb).

.
Time definitely CAN be described as a noun. But that is irrelivant to its being a noun or not. We have grown up with the idea of time being a noun our whole lives because of the sort of statments that you give us here. However, each of these is relative to a corporeal being. If you agree with my take on time's "single moment" existance, that I have mentioned a few times in this thread (St. Augustine), it would be clear that it is impossible for it to be difined my an event, action, object ... or any other terrestrial being.

If time is indeed a noun --where is it? As a noun it requiresd space ... I'm not saying that I have to see to believe, I just find the possibility of a space for time to exist in quite incredible.

If time's being (as a noun) is not terrestrial, than how would it effect us so much that we would even bother having such a fun debate about it? On the other hand, keeping in mind that it is independant of the objects that seem to be affected by it (as seen in arguments above and before), how can it be experienced here?

Cheers!

[starrwriter]

Old joke: God invented time so everything doesn't happen at once.

[Tis]

IrishCanadian

Time, my friend, is never irrelevant, especially to the intellect and the heart. It is only to the soul that time becomes unnecessary. And only then, if you count yourself among the faithful.

A noun does not demand tangibility, substance, solidity or mass. Music is a noun, it does exist. Love is a noun and while to a breaking heart, it may weigh heavily upon the one who grieves, it has no more substance than time or music.

Time is not terrestrial, it is intellectual. Remove intellect and you remove the need for time. Remove all else but intellect and time becomes everything. Remove time and all else becomes irrelevant.

You're quite right however, it does provide for good discourse. I wrote this for my daughter after a lengthy discussion of this subject... ;)

“Good day, sir, and how are you?”
“Quite well,” said I, “...and are you too?”
“Weren’t you round here yesterday?”
“Nay!” Said I “...I have never come this way,
And if I did, I cannot recall,
Ever having seen you at all.”
“Then, tell me sir, how can it be,
That I know you... and you know me?”
“Because, good sir, by Heaven’s grace,
We seem to share a common face.”
“But that’s not true, you’ve eyes of blue.”
I laughed and said, “Well, yours are too.”
“But your stature, sir, is straight and tall.”
And I pointed to him, “As are we all.”
“But your voice, good sir, its clear... profound.”
Said I, “My friend, you’ve equal sound!”
“Then...” said I, “...could it not be...
That I am you and you are me!”
“The paths we walk, they each oppose,
Yet we’re the same!, You don’t suppose!?”
In awe he wondered, “If you are me,
And I am you, how can this be?”
“Because within this place, sublime,
We’ve found a common space and time.
And I think, old friend, I see at last
That my future lies within your past.
And yours, within my past will be.
Until we reach eternity.”

[IrishCanadian]

I like the poem. Cute and profound at the same time.
Well I admit your right. As long as a noun is more than a "person, place, or thing" then your right. I guess in such fun debates like these we have to be seeing eye to eye on the rhetoric. I still think that a noun is a person, place, thing-- but I guess thats a different debate. Haha.
By the way, I do consider myself a member of the "faithful." I don't consider love or music to be nouns either. Art, thoughts, romance, Charity (in the ancient sence of the word), have absolutely profound effects on us all. I do not think that a noun (as I define "noun") is capable of being so emotionally powerful.
Sure these which we attach to nouns can be (ie. romace as an attachement to a person). But what would anyone else call them besides a noun? Why do you, Tis, see them as a noun? It makes no sence to me.
... Perhaps that question belongs in a different thread.

[harshwaves]

time is just a term used to describe space. there is no definite explanation for time. it can be used in many different contexts. there are just too many concepts of time which people have. to me, it's just a word man came up with to explain his world.

[Tis]

IrishCanadian

I am appreciative of your comments regarding the poem, however, I’m not so sure it would qualify as profound. The poem was merely intended to amuse my daughter and to challenge her capacity for reasoning. Allow me to assure you that my comments, all of them, were not intended to prove you wrong or even change your mind about anything, especially in terms of your faith. Frankly, I’m not sure you are wrong. Simply put... we, you and I, do not share the same perspectives.

As one of the faithful, you possess a perspective that would likely differ significantly from my own as an agnostic. While our views would likely diverge in most subjective discussions, I am confident that we would likely share parallel views on a broad range of subject matter. For example, while you and I may be at odds in terms of faith, my lack of faith has much less to do with refusing to acknowledge the existence of God. Rather, it does have much to do with a refusal (or at least a reluctance) to commit my destiny to the unknowable or the intangible. Yet, I would submit to you that we both share a similar, if not an almost identical, respect for morality, those fundamental principles of human behavior. That is to say, the fundamental laws of God and man. In effect, while we do not necessarily share a common perspective, we could easily share common moral values. After all... ‘An agnostic does not a heathen make.’ ;)

There is an old remark by Alexander Pope that I have always found applicable to any person I have ever met. I apply it equitably to myself as well. He said...

“Reflection and remembrance, how allied.
What thin partitions, thought from sense divide.”

What he meant by this is that what each of us think or feel is merely the product of our experiences. How we express ourselves as individuals may vary in the expression, but may share a common purpose or intent.

Neither you or I, nor the next fellow, share a common perspective. At least, a perspective with which we may find any discernable precision of commonality. However, many, or at times, all of us, depending on the prevailing issue, might easily share a common interest. How we serve that common interest may be substantially different from person to person. But it will not alter the common objective.

As I said before, from my perspective, time is simply that immeasurable portion of temporal existence between the beginning and the end or, metaphorically speaking, universal life and death. We may partition time however we choose, we may even alter these partitions, flex them, twist and turn them, but we will not alter time. As Edgar Allan Poe said in Eureka – A Prose Poem... “In the Original Unity of the First Thing lies the Secondary Cause of All Things, with the Germ of their Inevitable Annihilation.”

Best Regards,

[IrishCanadian]

[QUOTE=Tis]IrishCanadian
As one of the faithful, you possess a perspective that would likely differ significantly from my own as an agnostic. QUOTE]
Don't get me wrong. Agnosticism is only a philosophical school that teaches that as humans we are incapable of knowing everyhting. I too am agnostic. Perhaps atheist is the word you were looking for?
Anyway, I think its fare to say that the argument regaurding time is over (for me anyway).
It has been fun.

[RAS1LOVE]

you know, you bring a good topic to voice, and no time does not exhist, times only purpose is to keep us on time. and in order. and in line. i didnt read noones posts but first 2 so hear me now, you tell me how you gunna measure time? trully when you didnt make da universe? and you trully dont know all of the universe? you know them say we in the year 2005, and its like them actually just started counting one day?

[coreyg37]

I generally think of time as just another dimension of life. It was inevitable that it would be created so it is pointless to question the significance.

[Doctor Boogaloo]

Okay, let's figure this out.
Does the past exist? No, not any longer.
Does the future exist? No, not yet.
The present, it would appear, is a boundary between the past and the future.
But you cannot have a boundary between two non-existent things.
Therefore, time does not exist.

Cheers.

[IrishCanadian]

I think this particular thread is the most fun I'v had on these forums. YEEHAAW

[XXdarkclarityXX]

Okay, let's figure this out.
Does the past exist? No, not any longer.
Does the future exist? No, not yet.
The present, it would appear, is a boundary between the past and the future.
But you cannot have a boundary between two non-existent things.
Therefore, time does not exist.

Cheers.

The present doesn't exist either. By the time the present registers in your mind, it's already happened. Just figured I'd add that in.

[McLean]

It's too bad there isn't a hot shot physicist here.

If Einstein is right, (literally millions of tests on the theory of relativity have been carried out, and thousands of different kinds of tests, and so far, it's the master theory of science), then the only thing that isn't relative in this universe is the speed of light in a total vacuum. Time is relative just like everything else but the speed of light.

It's another dimension, like length.

However, I am aware that with the addition of quantum mechanics, (but I have only two quarters of calculus so I can't follow it very far mathematically), the very existance of time has come under question. I think we have so spend of this doubtful stuff called time and wait for a better answer.

Rats.

[beer good]

The present doesn't exist either. By the time the present registers in your mind, it's already happened. Just figured I'd add that in.
What time? :D

[XXdarkclarityXX]

Replace "By the time" with "When"....figure of speech, my friend.

[beer good]

But how do you measure the length of that "when" if time doesn't exist? What do you call that which has passed between the present and the point where it registers in your mind?

[XXdarkclarityXX]

Ahhh we have ourselves persistence of the utmost fortitude! How unrelenting are you, beer good! Venture not into what is not discussed and let us delve into the topic at hand! That which inhabits the realm bordered by the present and the mind's recognition can be named the true time of occurrence. The future is hope of occurence, the past is memory of occurence, and what is known as the present is fleeting, yet incomplete occurence for it cannot be recognized by the human mind. However, the present is an entity of constant degredation. The minute it exists is the very minute of its death.

[meddle_some]

Time obviously does not have an objective body but the existence of a thing is not dependent upon it's physical nature. Take beauty for example, this is not an objective thing that exists, but an abstract idea. Though the blue-eyed girl is beautiful, it is her objective form that beauty describes. So although what exists is her physical form, beauty is used in a manner that gives it substance and existence. So yes, time exists in the eye of the beholder.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Of course time exists. If it didn't my watch would stop. But then, if I don't listen to my watch, does it tick?

[IrishCanadian]

Time obviously does not have an objective body but the existence of a thing is not dependent upon it's physical nature. Take beauty for example, this is not an objective thing that exists, but an abstract idea. Though the blue-eyed girl is beautiful, it is her objective form that beauty describes. So although what exists is her physical form, beauty is used in a manner that gives it substance and existence. So yes, time exists in the eye of the beholder.
Thats what i was trying to get to earlier in this thread ... thanks for the laymans terms. I cannot percieve time as a noun! It doesn't make logical sence to me. Alas.

[Stanislaw]

time can not exist, it is a secondary quality, and aside from that: is comprised of now, the past and the future, since the past, and the future can not physically exist for us now, our sense of time is based on an immediate static unchanging point, so in a sense time is non existance, movement is non existance, these are sensations merely generated by our mind, but are not existant in reality.

[RemiAnn]

I'm not sure at all. But time could be seen as an idea, therefore a noun...which exists.

[simon]

There must be time, because what else does it take to get up after we fall? And fall so frequently.

[pan_is_dead]

You wot?

Does time exist? Well, what kind of bloody stupid question is that? Obviously time exists, because you have way too much of it on your hands.

[sallyrose]

There's no need to be so rude.

[bhekti]

Does time exist?

What do you mean by "exist"?
and, what do you mean by "time"?
How should I understand those words?
How can I make you believe my answers?
How do you know that I won't lie to you?

Distressing...

What's the use?

[tfwelch]

Time exists, but only in our realm. Outside of our realm is also outside the stream of time and time does not exist there.

[kilted exile]

For anyone interested, there is a wonderful special edition of Scientific American which came out fairly recently devoted entirely to the subject of time. It truly is a fascinating read.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

For anyone interested, there is a wonderful special edition of Scientific American which came out fairly recently devoted entirely to the subject of time. It truly is a fascinating read.

Yes, I heard of that, there was a review of it in next week's paper. ;)

[just popping in]

First off, nouns are not limited to physical objects. Never have been. The old "person, place, or thing" is merely a way to explain a noun to first graders. A noun, says Merriam-Webster, is "any member of a class of words that typically can be combined with determiners to serve as the subject of a verb, can be interpreted as singular or plural, can be replaced with a pronoun, and refer to an entity, quality, state, action, or concept."
Thus, time, being a concept, is a noun. Some would accept that as existance, others might not. However, if we challenge the existance of time we must also challenge other concept nouns: anger, love, passion, sadness, and any other emotion. Anyone who has experienced emotion has a hard time challenging its existance.
However, that is a proof by collaboration, and is not exactly definate.
It seems clear to me that time must exist. I'm wasting time by posting this comment. Just because the past does not exist physically does not mean that it does not exist. In Orwell's 1984, he says the past exists "in records and in memories." Also, if I exist only in the present, then how do things I made in the past still exist now? Thus the past, at least, exists. The future, also, has to exist. Otherwise we could not be constantly moving into it.
Again, just because something is not physically existing, with mass and filled with atoms, does not mean that it does not exist.
Indeed, one would even say that time is intimately linked to the existance of everything. If there was no time, than how could anything exist? What would existance mean if it did not have a past or a future? Existance, to answer the question of rhetorc for this debate, could be said to be anything that can be expressed in knowledge, and expression and knowledge both require time. Imagine that there is no time. I would have no past or future. Then I would not exist. There is no third dimension if it can not exist in a fourth.
Finally, I would like to add something to console the skeptics. Time does exist, however, the measurement of time, a human creation, is not pure or absolute. However you define time, everything passes though it. While time exists, "hours" are merely a human measurement of it, a measurement that is flawed and could be said to exist only in human perception.


Outside of the debate, I must point out that the old joke "Time is something created by God so everything doesn't happen at once" is getting old on this forum. I swear, it's been posted at least once a page. Give it a rest.

[BassoonPatch]

Read The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. Very interesting. Its physics, but it gives you a whole new outlook on time.

[Geoffrey]

time is a device, its how we reffer to yesterday and tomorrow. even the immediate. So yes- augustine was very accurate.

Than, time is alot like the bible - its just something that we invented because we believed it should exist, and be understood as reality. but time is not as arbitary as the bible, in that its nessisary to function in our societies. time just reminds me of an alright religion.

[Stanislaw]

time is a device, its how we reffer to yesterday and tomorrow. even the immediate. So yes- augustine was very accurate.

Than, time is alot like the bible - its just something that we invented because we believed it should exist, and be understood as reality. but time is not as arbitary as the bible, in that its nessisary to function in our societies. time just reminds me of an alright religion.

time is arbitrary even more so than the bible. at this exact moment, there is no time but an illusion of passage that our imperfect minds percieve, time is non existant and can only be percieved when one is not enlightened. Our existance is more like a movie, uncountable amounts of freeze frames run together, with each previouse frame affecting the next, time is only the percieved sense of these frames running together. Once enlightenment is reached time is irelevant since one will percieve its non existance.

[hastalavictoria]

Time is a way of humans explaining existence, death, and so on.
what does and doesn't exist depends on our understanding, our ability to comprehend things.
I do not think that it is unlikely that time exists, but I also do not think that I am one to say what does and does not exist, seeing as how I really understand nothing.
as humans we think we can explain and prove a lot of things. but the reality is that we cannot explain anything. nothing can be proven.
all I know is that i know nothing at all.

[Stanislaw]

Time is a way of humans explaining existence, death, and so on.
what does and doesn't exist depends on our understanding, our ability to comprehend things.
I do not think that it is unlikely that time exists, but I also do not think that I am one to say what does and does not exist, seeing as how I really understand nothing.
as humans we think we can explain and prove a lot of things. but the reality is that we cannot explain anything. nothing can be proven.
all I know is that i know nothing at all.

I think... therefore I know nothink...nothink!!!!

I am not sure that I agree with you, I understand the idea that we know very little in the great scheme of the universe, but I wouldn't say we know nothing...we know quite alot actually, it just doesn't seem like much, since our knowledge generates new questions.

[Geoffrey]

Actual time is only in the present. Before you blink that moment in time is gone and the next has come and gone. The past exists through artifacts - books - relics - what have you, but it still is existing in our time. The future can be predicted too, but only today - not tomorrow or yesterday.

I am a big fan of godfather clocks and pocketwatches though. I'd hate it if they lost there function.

[Stanislaw]

Actual time is only in the present. Before you blink that moment in time is gone and the next has come and gone. The past exists through artifacts - books - relics - what have you, but it still is existing in our time. The future can be predicted too, but only today - not tomorrow or yesterday.

I am a big fan of godfather clocks and pocketwatches though. I'd hate it if they lost there function.

A watch is the perfect existance of time, the past is not atainable, nor is the future, just the point that the hand stops on, for that instance that is a freeze, a stop, and then the next instant, the hand is at once at another location, and not at the previouse location in the same context.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

A watch is the perfect existance of time, the past is not atainable, nor is the future, just the point that the hand stops on, for that instance that is a freeze, a stop, and then the next instant, the hand is at once at another location, and not at the previouse location in the same context.

...unless it stops! Sorry. ;)

[Stanislaw]

...unless it stops! Sorry. ;)

well if it is allowed to act in its natural fashion...asuuming it is wound...and no one is playing with the arms or the like.

Sometimes I wish that stopping a watch would halt the perception of time though. :D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Maybe if everyone in the world all stopped their watches and clocks at the same time ...

Nah! :lol:

[Stanislaw]

Maybe if everyone in the world all stopped their watches and clocks at the same time ...

Nah! :lol:
well...theoretically if everyone ignored time at the same time, it is reasonable to assume that people may no longer see the need to percieve it.
:D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

well...theoretically if everyone ignored time at the same time, it is reasonable to assume that people may no longer see the need to percieve it.
:D

But wouldn't we all be late for work the next day? Sounds risky to me! :D

[Stanislaw]

But wouldn't we all be late for work the next day? Sounds risky to me! :D

well, if everyone ignored time...work would be irelevant, wed be a bunch of sitting-ignoring-meat-popsicles doing absolutly nothing...actually that would be pretty funny. :D

[Scheherazade]

I think we are all already ignoring the time when we hang out on the Forum for hours! :D

[Stanislaw]

I think we are all already ignoring the time when we hang out on the Forum for hours! :D


SEE, SEE, its working!! :D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

SEE, SEE, its working!! :D

It is too. It's just a shame that my watch has moved on so far when I stop! :lol:

[Stanislaw]

It is too. It's just a shame that my watch has moved on so far when I stop! :lol:

well thats why I replaced my pocket watch with a compass! (also it died, and I could still percieve time, :D )

[Scheherazade]

well thats why I replaced my pocket watch with a compass! (also it died, and I could still percieve time, :D )So you decided to perceive 'place' instead of 'time'?

:D

[Stanislaw]

So you decided to perceive 'place' instead of 'time'?

:D

indeed place is much more tangible :lol: , besides, the compass looks pretty cool. :D

[Scheherazade]

indeed place is much more tangible :lol: , besides, the compass looks pretty cool. :DOh I know! How cool it would be when you took out your compass and say 'Oh, look at that! It is already past North!'

:D

[Stanislaw]

Oh I know! How cool it would be when you took out your compass and say 'Oh, look at that! It is already past North!'

:D

...half-past north. :D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

...half-past north. :D

Is that the place? I'd better get to bed soon - I've got to be at work at WSW tomorrow! :eek2:

[Stanislaw]

Is that the place? I'd better get to bed soon - I've got to be at work at WSW tomorrow! :eek2:

no kiddin? where does the latitude go? :D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

no kiddin? where does the latitude go? :D

Tell me about it - I've got to make up for a couple of hectares I missed a few miles ago.

[Stanislaw]

Tell me about it - I've got to make up for a couple of hectares I missed a few miles ago.

oh, man thats pretty harsh. I hate the winter season it seems that it gets darker further south than it does in summer, I think I should jump a plain travel a couple hundred minutes to where the the latitude doesn't fluctuate with the seasons. :D

[Xamonas Chegwe]

I know what you mean, I used to live three hours ago. It got so far away, every minute felt like a yesterday. Somewheres I'd think that a mile down the road would never come at all.

But if I had my place again, I'd never go then.

[Stanislaw]

I used to live several minutes outside of a big city, the daily commute would take miles, so eventually I just moved into the city so I don't live that many minutes away from my work, and school any more!

[IrishCanadian]

WOW ... i knew this thread would never die! It has gone on wasting miles and miles and miles (oh yeah). I missed you guys, especially when I was only moments away from my computer. Weeeee.

[byquist]

Interesting start for you. This query is big -- Einstein-level and all.

My opinion: if we think or use the word "time" it has a meaning or a type of definition for us. And most folks, indeed, use the word "time" such as, "I had a good time spending time at your party."

On the other hand, there is the word "timeless" and "timelessness." Such as, "Your party had a timeless impact on my life. I got in a fight and just got 10 stitches."

Also, there's words like immortality, immutability, eternity, eternality that might qualify as liquidating the consciousness or impact of time. As, "this relationship is so much fun that I'd like it to be eternal."

Plus, don't forget that in the "Superman" movie he flew the world backwards and saved Louis Lane. He defied time; reversed it.

I also like Tennessee William's witty take in "The Night of the Iguana" when Hanna Jelkes calls her grandfather, "Ninety years young." If you, therefore, want to be an iconoclast and a rebel, you might want to agressively position youself as categorically opposed to time; not relent to it, rebel against it. Distance racers are constantly working at opposing time ("fighting the clock"), and occasionally master it to some degree.

[Stanislaw]

Time is irelevant...distance is irelevant...good spelling is irelevant...resistance is futile... *man, my spelling sucks*

anyways...I was thinking, what is so bad about living life as a borg, I mean you have no knowledge of what life was like before, so what is so bad about borg existance?

[Xamonas Chegwe]

so what is so bad about borg existance?


The dress sense! :D

[Stanislaw]

The dress sense! :D
oh common...black matches everything! :D

[jackyyyy]

I reckon if you're porting a cellphone, ipod and 2 or 3 megs of music, you've already been assimilated. I saw a city dude the other day, dressed to the gigabyte.

[Stanislaw]

I reckon if you're porting a cellphone, ipod and 2 or 3 megs of music, you've already been assimilated. I saw a city dude the other day, dressed to the gigabyte.

Heh, Stanislaw of Borg...3rd of five...resistance is futile.

Me: 1 cell phone, 1 512 Mb MP3 Player (small by todays standards I know...I'm an older model Borg), 2 laptop computers, 3 desktop computers, 1 gameboy, 60 gigs of media on my portable external 160 GB hard drive, and 1 fm trnasmitter for said MP3 player.

Welcome to the 21st centuary Mr. Anderson...we are the future. :D

[jackyyyy]

Heh, Stanislaw of Borg...3rd of five...resistance is futile.

Me: 1 cell phone, 1 512 Mb MP3 Player (small by todays standards I know...I'm an older model Borg), 2 laptop computers, 3 desktop computers, 1 gameboy, 60 gigs of media on my portable external 160 GB hard drive, and 1 fm trnasmitter for said MP3 player.

Welcome to the 21st centuary Mr. Anderson...we are the future. :DWhen you are touting that much hardware... alas... assistance is futile. We may be able to pry it off with static or some rap music.. whatdyathink?

[Apotropaic]

What the hell man? What's a borg?



you know, you bring a good topic to voice, and no time does not exhist, times only purpose is to keep us on time. and in order. and in line. i didnt read noones posts but first 2 so hear me now, you tell me how you gunna measure time? trully when you didnt make da universe? and you trully dont know all of the universe? you know them say we in the year 2005, and its like them actually just started counting one day?
It's not really a matter of measuring time accurately, it's if it exists at all. It's like mis-measuring weight. No matter wrong you may, the fact is, you still weigh something.


Time obviously does not have an objective body but the existence of a thing is not dependent upon it's physical nature. Take beauty for example, this is not an objective thing that exists, but an abstract idea. Though the blue-eyed girl is beautiful, it is her objective form that beauty describes. So although what exists is her physical form, beauty is used in a manner that gives it substance and existence. So yes, time exists in the eye of the beholder.
Yeah, I like this one best. It's all subjective in the end, isn't it?

Thanks for all the posts. They've been helpful (except for the exchange between Xamonas Chegwe and Stanislaw about compasses :confused: ).

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Thanks for all the posts. They've been helpful (except for the exchange between Xamonas Chegwe and Stanislaw about compasses :confused: ).

That was helpful too - just not helpful to you. :lol:

[Stanislaw]

When you are touting that much hardware... alas... assistance is futile. We may be able to pry it off with static or some rap music.. whatdyathink?

Rap music eh...I am sure that would work!...but I think ye forgot the c... :D


What the hell man? What's a borg?

this is a borg: Borgs on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borg)


Thanks for all the posts. They've been helpful (except for the exchange between Xamonas Chegwe and Stanislaw about compasses ).

heh, well it was a humerous demonstration of the arbitrary non-existance of time and distance. Life exists as a string of stops...much like that of a movie, each is affected by the previouse, and in so affect the future, however time is only a perception of these single frames changing, where as in fact life is a series of stills. One cannot reclaim stills that have occured, or ones that have not occured, so time, like distance, is a human invention.

[jackyyyy]

Time is regressive, taking back what it gave.

So, as the clock hand is moving clockwise, its actually counting down. Scary thought, eh. (I just dream't that up to see yas reaction, and sorry it has nothing to do with borgs) :lol:

[Stanislaw]

Time is regressive, taking back what it gave.

So, as the clock hand is moving clockwise, its actually counting down. Scary thought, eh. (I just dream't that up to see yas reaction, and sorry it has nothing to do with borgs) :lol:

Do not try and understand time, thats impossible, instead just realize the truth. What truth. That there is no time, once you realize that, you realize it is you who counts. :D

[Apotropaic]

I think memory gives us time. The abilty to percieve what happens before and what is happening now proves that time does exist. There is, or was, a before, and all the befores we have are manufactured by time, that's what's important :nod:

[Stanislaw]

I will respectfully disagree with you on matters of time, I do believe the ideal of budhists, time is a perception. :)

[Xamonas Chegwe]

All I know is: 8 hours sleep tonight and someone cuts me up on the way to work - I shake my head and tut; 6 hours sleep tonight and someone cuts me up on the way to work - I call him / her a **** and blast my horn!

Time is a bloody annoying, persistent and effective perception! :nod:

[Chinaski]

..................................................

[Soma]

Here is a question to think about. If time is money, what would happen to money if time did not exist? Would it become nonexistant or would it still be an exponential source of use within the worldly structure?

[Stanislaw]

All I know is: 8 hours sleep tonight and someone cuts me up on the way to work - I shake my head and tut; 6 hours sleep tonight and someone cuts me up on the way to work - I call him / her a **** and blast my horn!

Time is a bloody annoying, persistent and effective perception! :nod:

oh yeah its a *****...I didn't say it was persistant! ;)

[Stanislaw]

Here is a question to think about. If time is money, what would happen to money if time did not exist? Would it become nonexistant or would it still be an exponential source of use within the worldly structure?

money is truly and utterely irrelevant, it is a blite that we have a cure to but it is one we cling to like our precious time!

[Chinaski]

existant, persistant - what is with this vowel swapping craze! e, e!

'Exponential source of use within our wordly structure' - Pseuds corner beckons! And does that actually make sense? No offense - perhaps I just don't understand! Unlikely - but possible!

[Stanislaw]

existant, persistant - what is with this vowel swapping craze! e, e!

'Exponential source of use within our wordly structure' - Pseuds corner beckons! And does that actually make sense? No offense - perhaps I just don't understand! Unlikely - but possible!

er, it makes sense to me.

an update on the borg:

scientest were able to succesfully ping a computer chip using a rat nerve cell/chip interface...This is very cool, a possibility of organic/inorganic interaction at the microscopic order...perfect integration. I'll post the link up later, but you should be able to find it on the makezine blog (makezine.com/blog) or directly on the discovery website (thats where I read it)

[jackyyyy]

er, it makes sense to me.

an update on the borg:

scientest were able to succesfully ping a computer chip using a rat nerve cell/chip interface...This is very cool, a possibility of organic/inorganic interaction at the microscopic order...perfect integration. I'll post the link up later, but you should be able to find it on the makezine blog (makezine.com/blog) or directly on the discovery website (thats where I read it)Thanks, Stan. That last borg link really helped me out, looking forward to your next borg link. You know, after reading what you wrote about 'whats wrong with being a borg', I woke up to its really a form of modern socialism, except there's cheap spare parts instead of expensive health care, and no money, no time, is a good thing too. I downloaded some mp3 stuff, along with 10,000,000 other borgs today, thanks to the collective! :nod: :nod: :nod:

[Soma]

What I mean by exponential source of use within our worldly structure is that by having it still with us, would it rule the world as it does today? I mean think about it, in every dealing you do in this day it revolves aroound the use of money. So back to the question at hand, if we did not have time would we go out and make the effort to get money or as we would not have time, would we just not take "time" to earn it, fabricate it, etc...? That is the question that I pose here.

[ElizabethSewall]

I'd say that time is more or less a conception. Indeed children do not share the same vision of it than adults do. Time is endless and flexilble for a child whereas an adult's vision is somehow corrupted by the notion of death and the loss of innocence. This idea is extremely present in Romantic writings (We Are Seven by W.Wordsworth and even modern poem Fern Hill by D.Thomas).

[jackyyyy]

I'd say that time is more or less a conception. Indeed children do not share the same vision of it than adults do. Time is endless and flexilble for a child whereas an adult's vision is somehow corrupted by the notion of death and the loss of innocence. This idea is extremely present in Romantic writings (We Are Seven by W.Wordsworth and even modern poem Fern Hill by D.Thomas).You're absolutely right, Elizabeth, and I love that piece by WW too!

[Stanislaw]

Indeed, I think you are right! Why do we need to live as "grown ups" why the lack of creativity? why the lack of empathy?

[superunknown]

I don't believe that time exists. It is a concept created by humans. Things change over time, but time itself does not exist. Think about the following: tell yourself "I am already 50 years old." Sound absurd? Let's put it at a smaller scale. Go and touch the doorknob of the room you're currently in, but before you go, tell yourself, "I have already touched the doorknob," and "I am already back at my desk after touching the doorknob." And the fact is that you are already back at your desk, and you are as much in the present now as you were before you got up. You have already finished reading this post. You are already on your deathbed. You are already dead at this very moment, because there is no such thing as time. Depressing, isn't it?

Perhaps Joseph Heller can explain this better than I:

"Do you know how long a year takes when it's going away?" Dunbar repeated to Clevinger. "This long." He snapped his fingers. "A second ago you were stepping into college with your lungs full of fresh air. Today you're an old man."

"Old?" asked Clevinger with surprise. "What are you talking about?"

"Old."

"I'm not old."

"You're inches away from death every time you go on a mission. How much older can you be at your age? A half minute before that you were stepping into high school, and an unhooked brassiere was as close as you ever hoped to get to Paradise. Only a fifth of a second before that you were a small kid with a ten-week summer vacation that lasted a hundred thousand years and still ended too soon. Zip! They go rocketing by so fast. How the hell else are you ever going to slow down?" Dunbar was almost angry when he finished.

"Well, maybe it is true," Clevinger conceded unwillingly in a subdued tone. "Maybe a long life does have to be filled with many unpleasant conditions if it's to seem long. But in that event, who wants one?"

"I do," Dunbar told him.

"Why?" Clevinger asked.

"What else is there?"

[wingedspiral]

I agree with starwritter, it seems that time is real in a sense to where we think it drags on as children then seems to speed up when we're older. I dunno that's just my opion at the moment, I will come back after I read up on the topic and formulate a point.

[kjt1981]

i find if i think too much about time i get depressed about getting older and all that "what am i doing with my life" stuff. I try as best i can not to think about it too much. I just trry to get there when everyone else does, go home when everyone else does and make use of my private time as best as a i possibly can (read, play the guitar, drink, drug and f*ck :lol: ). I eat when im hungry and sleep when im tired.

Time only really comes in useful when im thinking about football... "what times kick off?", "how long left?" etc, other than that ive no real use for it.

And thats my two pennorth'

[Gawaine]

I don't believe that time exists. It is a concept created by humans. Things change over time, but time itself does not exist. Think about the following: tell yourself "I am already 50 years old." Sound absurd? Let's put it at a smaller scale. Go and touch the doorknob of the room you're currently in, but before you go, tell yourself, "I have already touched the doorknob," and "I am already back at my desk after touching the doorknob." And the fact is that you are already back at your desk, and you are as much in the present now as you were before you got up. You have already finished reading this post. You are already on your deathbed. You are already dead at this very moment, because there is no such thing as time. Depressing, isn't it?

Perhaps Joseph Heller can explain this better than I:

"Do you know how long a year takes when it's going away?" Dunbar repeated to Clevinger. "This long." He snapped his fingers. "A second ago you were stepping into college with your lungs full of fresh air. Today you're an old man."

"Old?" asked Clevinger with surprise. "What are you talking about?"

"Old."

"I'm not old."

"You're inches away from death every time you go on a mission. How much older can you be at your age? A half minute before that you were stepping into high school, and an unhooked brassiere was as close as you ever hoped to get to Paradise. Only a fifth of a second before that you were a small kid with a ten-week summer vacation that lasted a hundred thousand years and still ended too soon. Zip! They go rocketing by so fast. How the hell else are you ever going to slow down?" Dunbar was almost angry when he finished.

"Well, maybe it is true," Clevinger conceded unwillingly in a subdued tone. "Maybe a long life does have to be filled with many unpleasant conditions if it's to seem long. But in that event, who wants one?"

"I do," Dunbar told him.

"Why?" Clevinger asked.

"What else is there?"

He said it much better than I did. ;)

Regarding time, reading Thomas Mann this morning, I ran upon a very interesting paragraph wherin Hans Castorp argues with Joachim Zeismann rather disinterestingly listens along. Hans Castorp (damn you, Mann, why must you always use both names?) ponders an interesting philosophical problem - that being best known as the 'Tree falling in the woods' sensory question. He mentions how some moments seem longer than others, whether you like them or not it seems, may in fact simply be longer. That time only exists because we sense it (because we must!), thus these moments are longer if they seem longer, and those moments are shorter than seem shorter.

To take it one step further myself: We measure time with a clock or calender, which measures the future, present, and past just as we use a microscope to measure molecules of the very tiny variety we cannot sense without such an instrument.

I'm certain others here can go even further with this thought.

[NikolaiI]

Alan Watts has a wonderful video on Youtube titled Time. He says that time doesn't exist as we know it. We look at things going from the past to the future, with now as the present. However, you can't pinpoint beginnings or ends. We look at things in terms of events, however, you can't pinpoint the beginning or end of events either. What happens today is the result of what happened yesterday and time before, and the repercussions go on beyond today and tomorrow, so the real beginning of today was a long time ago, even until the beginning of time, and likewise for the end of today. Watts also talks about the Big Bang, and how time continued from there - something about how it strethches out from that one moment, I forget exactly - but it's well worth looking up, it's one of my favourites.

[weepingforloman]

Time is illusory. We are physical creatures, so we cannot experience eternity at once. But eternity is already defined. What is now, and what will be, are the same, separated only by the physical actions that make them up. But God sees all, because He is outside of time, without a physical body.

[Mr. Dr. Ralph]

David Hume wrote well on this subject in An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding. He claims that there is no logical ground to claim whether one thing must have caused another thing to happen, and doing so is not only common but post hoc. For example, we see one object collide with another, the other moves, so we say that the first object moved the second. Hume writes that we do not have enough license to say what the cause of something is because all we notice is a change in cases, or in the example, that the first object was moving and now the second one is. There is no logically sound reason why the first must have moved the second.

We as humans notice changes in what we perceive, and we rhetorically refer to this change as occurring over a time interval. However, the only basis that time can have is a change in cases. That is, we say the preceding case as happening farther in the past than the present one. Therefore, to claim that time exists is foolish because it is fundamentally a change in circumstance.

A good way to decide whether something is legitimate or not is to try to picture it in your head. If it isn't derived from experience or cannot be logically demonstrated then there's no reason to believe it is true.

[Midas]

Time is the means by which we determine, and are able to express the spatial element between one thought, and the next and is therefore subjective and related wholly to mind.

However, today, in order to more easily communicate our thoughts we adopt the measure provided by a universal instrument designed, and accepted by society that gives 'time' a common relationship which in English we call a clock.

In the same way we accept a universal measurement of distance - in Roman times it was 'paces', and then there was 'feet'; with the height of horses it is 'hands'. We have also inches, and centimetres.

The importance lies in using the one understood by those with whom we are trying to communicate.

Time to my young daughter was expressed in terms with which her mind could relate. For instance if I said we will go somewhere tomorrow, she would know in her mind that it would mean something which would happen after she had been to bed. If I said in three days, she would say ' You mean when I go to bed and get up again, then go to bed and get up again, and then go.......

You get the idea.

Before 'time pieces' , as you will remember from those Westerns, they used 'Sunrise' and 'Sundown', and the Indians would say - 'many moons'.

From this we see that time is brought about by the needs of communication to others, or in 'spacing events' in our own mind.

Time, or anything for that matter, only 'exists' if we want it to exist. We are mind with a body, not a body with a mind. Nothing exists to us which our mind does not see and accept.

Our minds can be tricked, or programmed, into seeing things differently from what they are to others - and that includes time. Therefore, time is subjective to the individual, and can be different to that which is accepted
by consensus as in that determined by the majority.

Some will say that 'time' existed before we were born. It did not exist for us.

It was only meaningful to the living - those who had a thought process.

The past, or 'time past' only has meaning to us when we need to relate that which 'is' to that which now 'isn't' ( has changed, because life is a process of constant change.)

We can relate more to the past, than the future, because there is usually evidence. When there is no evidence then we have conjecture (imagination).

Any thoughts relating to future has to be conjecture.

To summarise in as few words as possible - time is subjective and is something the mind devises, or accepts, in order to make sense and provide order to its thought processes.

I put these thoughts forward to stimulate the mind in seeking answers, not to particularly pass it off as a definitive explanation.

[Mr. Dr. Ralph]

Time is the means by which we determine, and are able to express the spatial element between one thought, and the next and is therefore subjective and related wholly to mind.

Please explain how thoughts have a spacial element. Granted, noticeable succession is necessary for the perception of time but I wouldn't say that time is a means of determining rather than a term we use to describe an interval of successive physical cases.


Time, or anything for that matter, only 'exists' if we want it to exist. We are mind with a body, not a body with a mind. Nothing exists to us which our mind does not see and accept.

I also wouldn't say that time exists because we want it to, it is a necessary product of the perception of change. Seconds do not elapse because I want them to, but rather because there is a relatively consistent and unquestionably measurable interval between one state and a noticeable separate one.

[Midas]

You ask me to explain how, to me, thoughts have a spatial element.

It is said that we cannot entertain two 'conscious' thoughts at the same time (or superimposed if we negate the word 'time'.) I have found this personally to be true. Others may believe differently. However, the subconscious 'thought' never sleeps. It continues to instruct our heart to beat - even when asleep.

There is a process between one thought and the next - no blank spaces if we are conscious. While we are conscious, as in awake, our mind is continuously thinking - mostly, in the common man, 'Like a drunken monkey' as someone once described.

It is the ability to focus thought for a specific purpose that produces the outstanding men and women of history, and contemporary - for good, or for bad. Time is the name we give to what measures the space between one thought and the next. As thought is continuous it can be both conscious, and subconscious.

Time, as with anything, only exists, to us, because we want it to.

Here 'want' has a more liberal meaning and relates to 'need' . Our minds, in order to maintain balance, or sanity' requires (needs, wants, demands) order. To establish and maintain order or division of thought we coin the word 'time' (it is only our English word) The word 'time' has no meaning in Chinese, or any other language with which I am familiar. They have their own word.

There are very serious people who claim they can see ghosts. Most of us who cannot see such things do not believe, or don't believe but maintain an open mind. We are judged by what is accepted as normal by the majority - in other words, we are judged by what they think. If you built a community of people who all believed they could see ghosts, and you entered that community, you would be considered abnormal.

We are more comfortable when we are in a society that accepts our standards. EVERYTHING relates to mind. We are what we think, not what we eat.

A method of calculating this concept, time, has been accepted by the majority. Before Greenwich Mean Time, in England the clocks would give different times of the day in different parts of Britain.

It was the advent of the railways that brought the need for time tables that would be meaningful (the same) for all parts of the country. The acceptance of 'time' brings order.

As life throughout the world became more sophisticated due to the Industrial revolution, it became necessary to have a more precise, and accepted, universal measure of the period between cause and effect, or one thought and the next.

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, while time existed, because thought existed, there was no need for it to be so precise. Hence people used usually the positions of the sun, or moon - or even light and dark, day and night. You got up at daylight, worked the land, and slept at night. Meal breaks were fixed at the appropriate periods (intervals). To differentiate between each they were given names. The needs of the body would tell the people when it was 'time' and eventually this would be programmed into a bodily habit that became common to all.

In remote societies today they will still have their measure of one period of change and another (change is constant) but it will be different to ours.

Even if you were out with some friends in the country and none of you had a watch, or means of 'telling the time' by the accepted measure, after some time, if each of you were asked what time you thought it was - you would find quite a difference in answers, and probably none spot on correct.

Now all would know that you were nearer to night time than when you all got up in the morning, and if the sun was visible and some understood navigation they could probably make a closer guess than those who were not, they would still not guess the precise time, unless they were lucky.

The point I am getting at is that it is all subjective. The minds wants (as in needs) a measure to have balance, and order, but it does not always need to be precise as that generally accepted, and required, by modern society.

[NikolaiI]

Sometimes I think this life is like a movie we are watching and we are being pulled along by time.

[AuntShecky]

Time exists only when we are aware of it. For instance,
while waiting in line at the Motor Vehicle.

[Ludmila607]

Methaphysical object...we cant see it or touch it or taste it.But we meassure it, we count it, we calculate it and we move inside it.
Well, Philosophy and Physichs use time to explain the duration and the phenomenical sucession, and it is always related to space.
Some think that time is absolute and all things are determined by Time_Space as they were conditions to reallity dinamism.Other philosophers and scientist thinks that Time and Space are relative and a determined by reallity.
All these is to old Metahphisical discussion and it goes through Physichs and many sceintist try to explain it.If time always existed, before the universe begun ...if it is caused by the movement if it is only a concept on your mind.
We can call it time or Tick Tack but it is always moving forward.Because all things appear, grow, decay and die.
That for us and the rest of what exist.For me time, is the name we give to our finitude.
regards....

[Ludmila607]

Please explain how thoughts have a spacial element. Granted, noticeable succession is necessary for the perception of time but I wouldn't say that time is a means of determining rather than a term we use to describe an interval of successive physical cases.



I also wouldn't say that time exists because we want it to, it is a necessary product of the perception of change. Seconds do not elapse because I want them to, but rather because there is a relatively consistent and unquestionably measurable interval between one state and a noticeable separate one.

This sounds quite Kieergard to me.

[Bakiryu]

Time is created by the creatures who live it. Usually a concept to measure the moment. To perceive change movement history we need time. Time is also a confirmation of a being's existence. We would be lost without it even as it does not truly exist.

[Demian]

I discussed Phillip K. Dick's first theory on time in Anastasija's thread 'Have you ever met a dream character'. If you check it out you can see PKD's first theory among many. He later came to believe that not only were alternate pasts and futures possible, but also alternate present time scenarios. He even gave a speech to the effect that he had full knowledge of the experiences of another Phillip K. Dick that was living in a slightly altered version of the USA--one in which Richard Nixon had not resigned office but had actually been assassinated. He wrote all of this down in Radio Free Albemuth primarily, as well as a few other novels. As absurd as it sounds, for those who follow quantam physics, this notion of multiple versions of the same person living at the same time on slightly different versions of the earth have been seriously entertained. There have even been some early data backing up their suspicions, such as the peculiar ability of a single electron to appear in two different places at the same time. Anyway, PKD tried to explain time as being circular but linear at the same time. Like when you examine a record and follow one of the grooves from beginning to end. For him, this idea could also explain the curious propensity that space-time has for churning out a plethora of possibilities at once. His ultimate view was that this was how God managed the messy business of history. The best possible outcome would be selected, (or win out) leaving the other threads of history to wither away and eventually ending up in an eschatological victory over history and the end of time itself.

[Ludmila607]

I discussed Phillip K. Dick's first theory on time in Anastasija's thread 'Have you ever met a dream character'. If you check it out you can see PKD's first theory among many. He later came to believe that not only were alternate pasts and futures possible, but also alternate present time scenarios. He even gave a speech to the effect that he had full knowledge of the experiences of another Phillip K. Dick that was living in a slightly altered version of the USA--one in which Richard Nixon had not resigned office but had actually been assassinated. He wrote all of this down in Radio Free Albemuth primarily, as well as a few other novels. As absurd as it sounds, for those who follow quantam physics, this notion of multiple versions of the same person living at the same time on slightly different versions of the earth have been seriously entertained. There have even been some early data backing up their suspicions, such as the peculiar ability of a single electron to appear in two different places at the same time. Anyway, PKD tried to explain time as being circular but linear at the same time. Like when you examine a record and follow one of the grooves from beginning to end. For him, this idea could also explain the curious propensity that space-time has for churning out a plethora of possibilities at once. His ultimate view was that this was how God managed the messy business of history. The best possible outcome would be selected, (or win out) leaving the other threads of history to wither away and eventually ending up in an eschatological victory over history and the end of time itself.

Interisting submission.
The same Leibniz talked about multitemporal reallity,being a newtonian and before Eisntein was born and brings relativity and plurydimensionality to the Time and Space theories.tHE POST EUCLIDEAN GEOMETRIES AND THE CURVATURE lighted up this idea of a not continuous space and time but flowing and not uniform...
The speculation about time since Aristotle until Eistein take us to the most deep scientific and methaphysical questions.But time "is not a thing" Leibniz sayd, not abn object...not material but a concept and the only way to order the not simultaniety.
How I love Galileo, Newton, Leibniz and Einstein.They are as Mathematic as Philosophers.

[Ludmila607]

Yes but Leibniz proclaim the two principles :The Enough and Neccessary reason and the principle of identity and then he says that we need to order those things that appear to our senses as real. , the material things, objects, the co existences and we NEED time to order the phenomenichal sucession because we dont experience things all simultaniously but in a flown so we need time.Our reason and understanding need and have the concept of time almost innate because we are temporal beings and need to situate ourselves inside of it.
I wonder if Hume had a clock on his empiric desk!

[mmaria]

Of course it exists - time is money.

[latimeri]

i cannot say anthing but there are waise talks all in all.

[Billbo]

Yes. Next question... How old would you be if you didn't know how old you were?

[blazeofglory]

There are different ideas with respect to time. The question that time can not be reversed is flawed. Time has no motion, no movement. It is an idea, a conception and there is no such thing as time.

We say past with respect to physical movements. Some events happened and we relate it to time, but there is no time at all.

The reversal of time is a misconception and we choose to imagine whether histories or events repeat? This is gibberish.

Time and space are named entities, not entities.

[Babyguile]

Time is just a means of organisation. The human world today would not be run sustainably (not environmentaly speaking) without time. Time is a man-made (China?) concept and it has proven vital.

I think the whole 'does time exist' question is nothing more than a silly question. Like so much of philosophy is.

[blazeofglory]

Time and space do not exist at all. Time is understood in terms of its flows, forwards and backwards. And in point of fact we understand it in terns of yesterdays, tomorrows, days, nights, weeks, moths, years, decades, centuries, millenniums and the like.

So many generations come and so many go, and there is a constant flow of time. But in point of fact there are no yesterdays, no tomorrows. We understnad time by some measurements. We measure it by yesterdays, tomorrows. But there are no yesterdays and tomorrows. It is the same. It seems to be flowing but it is not flowing nor is frozen.

We take measures of time as time, and this dimension or measure is an illusion.

This thing is hard to comprehend. And yet the truth is there is anything as time. If you meditate over this for a while your capacity for understanding it will deepen and you will understnad the intricacy of it.