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.
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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.
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.
I think this particular thread is the most fun I'v had on these forums. YEEHAAW
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by Doctor Boogaloo
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.
What time? :DQuote:
Originally Posted by XXdarkclarityXX
Replace "By the time" with "When"....figure of speech, my friend.
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?
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.
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.
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?
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by meddle_some
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.
I'm not sure at all. But time could be seen as an idea, therefore a noun...which exists.
There must be time, because what else does it take to get up after we fall? And fall so frequently.
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.
There's no need to be so rude.
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?
Time exists, but only in our realm. Outside of our realm is also outside the stream of time and time does not exist there.
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. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by kilted exile
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.
Read The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. Very interesting. Its physics, but it gives you a whole new outlook on time.
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by Geoffrey
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!!!!Quote:
Originally Posted by hastalavictoria
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.
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by Geoffrey
...unless it stops! Sorry. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Stanislaw
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe
Sometimes I wish that stopping a watch would halt the perception of time though. :D
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.Quote:
Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe
:D
But wouldn't we all be late for work the next day? Sounds risky to me! :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Stanislaw
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. :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe
I think we are all already ignoring the time when we hang out on the Forum for hours! :D
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
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:Quote:
Originally Posted by Stanislaw
well thats why I replaced my pocket watch with a compass! (also it died, and I could still percieve time, :D )Quote:
Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe
So you decided to perceive 'place' instead of 'time'?Quote:
Originally Posted by Stanislaw
:D