BBC Focus Magazine

[mr.duck]

Watched a program called 'into the wormhole' narrated by Morgan Freeman the other day and it got me thinking about time and I'll try to explain my thoughts as best as possible (just to warn you I don't study science so this will not be scientifically sound. this is more of a philosophical approach)...

OK so I was thinking how quickly time goes but also (because I finish my exams in 6 weeks) I was thinking how slowly time can pass (as I can't wait till this 6 weeks is up).

So then I started to think about how quick life is, then I started to think about it in percentage terms in comparison to the rest of time. i.e. 20% of 100 years, 10% of 200, and so on and so on. Until you come to the realisation that if time is infinite then the time you're on this planet = 0.00000000*.

If you apply this thinking to anything then everything = 0.0000000* (because time is infinite) i.e. therefore it takes '0 time to do anything'. If time is 0 then everything takes the same 'time' i.e. 6 weeks is the same as 1 day. I was thinking the reason we perceive 1 day as shorter than 6 weeks is because we are 'closer to time', i.e. the closer we are to time the quicker it goes.

We tend to think of time in days, weeks, months etc but this is only because we are taught to think like this. Instead think of a bed sheet pulled tight at the four corners, now place a ball in the middle of that sheet (that ball will be us) the ball thus makes a dip in the middle, this dip is the warping of time.

In this logic it turns out we are time (we are the ball). This is why we can't go back in forth in time because our minds are the 'creators of time'.

Returning to the thought of '1 day' and '6 weeks' to my exams, these are in fact exactly the same 'time' i.e. 1 day, 1 second, 6 weeks, 10 years, 1000 years all = 0, they are exactly all the same but its just the fact that my mind is warping time (like the ball on the bed sheet) that time closer to me becomes 'compressed' so that it appears to move faster. and time further away is 'stretched' so it appears to be much larger.

This is probably doesn't make any sense and is probably complete rubbish rambling but wondered if anyone else has tried to think 'out the box' on time? and would be great to hear your ideas on it?

[mr.duck]

Sorry just realised I've posted in the wrong subject area... can an admin move my topic to appropriate forum please?

[Shadowwolf]

Hello there Mr. Duck and welcome along.

You're right in that we invented the labels of 'day', 'week' etc., however, whilst we did invent them we did apply them to measurable periods such as the period between one sunrise and the next. However, the passage of time exists independent of our perception or presence to observe it, the verse plodded along just fine for most of the thirteen billion years or so prior to our arrival. Even if our time as individuals is incredibly small in comparison to an infinite verse, it is not zero, may seem like it is in certain math that involves infinity as a variable but it's clearly not zero. Apply infinity to any measurement and they will all look like zero just like the further away you get the lower the resolution until whatever it is disappears, still there though.

The reason time flies or drags is purely a function of our imperfect and subjective mechanisms of observing the world, a properly calibrated instrument will find no difference between your dragging six weeks and someone else's six week world holiday that just flew by.

Of course that's not the whole story, your bed sheet is also known as a rubber sheet and is a visual demonstration of the warping of space-time by gravity, the stronger the gravitational field - heavier item - the greater the warping. Time is relative to the observer, faster you go the slower time passes for you as viewed by an external observer; time passes at the same rate from your personal perspective mind. Why going FTL results in much more time having passed on Terra by the time you return. Gravity also effects time which is why it gets quite weird at and beyond the event horizon of a black hole. However, as far as we are concerned here on Terra, we're all pretty much in the same frame of reference and even though flying at altitude will affect the passage of time these are negligible and beyond our ability to notice. So if you are in the same frame of reference events will progress at the same rate for everyone and are not zero, Terra will still have to get through 42 revolutions.

[M Paul Lloyd]

Hello and welcome Mr. Duck.

I don't think I can add much to the above other than to emphasise how our personal perception of time is very flexible, so that when you are young it just seems to drag by and six weeks seems an eternity but when you get old it flies along and you wonder where it went to.

Personally I think it's down to how our brains process information and so when we are bored or waiting for something importanat our brains are inactive and yet focussed on that one thing allowing each second to be analysed and catalogued as it passes and so it seems to move more slowly but when we are busy and our brains are busy and less able to analyse it all it seems to move much more quickly. Possibly?

[Gabriel]

Uf¡ Very deep, fellows I`m not quite sure if brains processes information (oh, let me say that this month magazine`s theme is the construction of a brain by the way, let`s be alert¡) or if time exist as an independent reality of us as observers. This topics refer us to the problem of reality. I always thought that science and epistemology are an inseparable unity, but if we start to talk about this things I guess we have to use another category (if already doesn`t exist).
Maturana (2010) talks about time as an explicative intent of man to explain his present following the structural coherences. This means that neither past nor future exist, they are just human`s creations, because we human beings exist in a continuous changing present (Maturana, 2011).
Literature Cited
Maturana,H.(2010) Speech in: http://matriztica.cl/2010/11/09/humbert ... de-malaga/, recovered on July 1st, 2012.
Maturana,H.(2011) Responsabilidad en la localidad del vivir. In: http://matriztica.cl/2011/05/16/respons ... del-vivir/, recovered on July 1st, 2012.

[Shadowwolf]

What we call time does exist independent of our observation, verse existed and progressed for 13.7 billion years without needing our presence to observe and thus allow it to or make it unfold. The labels and divisions are our invention but the progression - whatever it is - we apply them to is independent of us.

This means that neither past nor future exist, they are just human`s creations...

Yes and no, they don't exist now but the past has existed, it was a state that had to be passed through to get to the present and is not a human creation, these past events did happen and thus did exist. If you go from your home to the store and stand there looking for whatever brought you there, the journey, all those slices of time no longer exist but they did exist at some point otherwise you would not be in the store.

The future does not exist either but there is a potential and as time neither stops nor reverses there is at least always a future space to move into or towards, some configuration will be arrived at to be called the present. It will always be out of reach like tomorrow always becomes today, tis more like an acknowledgment that even if it's never attainable the potential is still there.

So whilst we humans and the other creatures on Terra can only be active agents in the present, the rest are rather more than mere invention

[Gabriel]

I don't know anything about physics, but when you say that time existed for 13.7 billion years, it reminds me the "History of time" of Stephen Hawkins jeje. But if we talks about time for a living being, we have to refer to living beings. That's why I said we would have an epistemological discussion. I agree with you when you say that neither past nor future exist NOW. But if time exist independent for us (living beings) maybe belongs to the niche as a fourth dimension perhaps (I insist that I don't know anything about physics). How do we create an idea of time? Perhaps using our memory, remebering our experiences of world's regularities, we create the ideas and labels, as you said (and I agree with that). Because we exist in a continous changing present (Maturana, 2011) past and future doesn't exist in present. The questions are: does exist and have existed time for a long while (13.7 billion years) and will exist as an independent reality for us? And can we have access to this objective reality independent for us using our senses as passive entities? Forunately there are a lot of answers. This is the problem of reality, and as I said, maybe we need a different category. I leave the open questions. And how interesting it would be if you lend me a hand with theory of relativity and time and so on
Literature cited
Maturana,H.(2011) Responsabilidad en la localidad del vivir. In: http://matriztica.cl/2011/05/16/respons ... del-vivir/, recovered on July 3rd, 2012.

[Shadowwolf]

Sorry, can you restate those questions? I'm fairly sure I know what you're getting at but I'd rather be certain.

[Gabriel]

In the core of the matter, I really share your opinion that we exist only in present, not in past or future, just in present (Maturana, 2011). Also agree with you when neither past nor future exist in present too. But how can we talk about past and future if we just exist in present? We humans, are the only one who can say something about past and future because we are observers and have that ability. Think this: if you never had existed in this world (which is the only that I know, by the way), does this slippery thing that we call time and we can't see, would existed without you in our world? That's the question if time exist in our world with independence from us, as observers. First of all you said yes. I'm not so sure, I have my doubts (every good scientist is always an skeptic (Maturana & Varela, 1990)(Villee, 1996)). Nevertheless if answer is yes or no, how is constitued our world and how we can know our world? Answers, there's a lot. We live in an objective world with independence of us and we can know this world through our senses and nervous sistem (representationism) or we can't know our world with our senses and is relative and just our experience, nothing else (solipsism), for example (Maturana & Varela, 1990). But time is a very fun topic.
Literature cited
Maturana,H.(2011) Responsabilidad en la localidad del vivir. In: http://matriztica.cl/2011/05/16/respons ... del-vivir/, recovered on July 3rd, 2012.
Maturana,H.,Varela,F.(1990) El arbol del conocimiento. Bases biológicas del entendimiento humano, 2nd Ed.: Universitaria.
Villee,C.(1996) Biologia (R. Espinoza, Trad.), 8th Ed.: McGraw-Hill.

[Shadowwolf]

That's the question if time exist in our world with independence from us, as observers. First of all you said yes. I'm not so sure, I have my doubts (every good scientist is always an skeptic [...])

This is true, every scientist should be a skeptic and this technically extends to even that which is considered, for all intents and purposes, scientific fact. However, in many cases this skeptical position is rather notional, sure it's there but it goes unmentioned and is not a salient point of the conversation. Take evolution, yes there is always the chance that it could be overturned in light of new evidence but as far as we are concerned it's as close to scientific fact as we tend to get and thus it is treated as such, the skeptical caveat left out.

I think that the question of time being independent of our perception is similar. That we can with a solid degree of certainty be assured that the passage of time carries on regardless of any intelligence or life being around to observe that there is a progression of events. We have evidence all about the world in geology of features that took incredible spans of time to form and did so without our gaze to note them. We have event after event occurring in the cosmos whose light only now reaches us, stars that blew up long before we knew anything of it. Therefore whilst the skeptical caveat may technically remain, we've no reason to assume that time only exists because we are there to make it exist. I suppose that it is entirely possible that we all live in a Matrix style simulation that just started and all our memory and evidence of a long aged universe is but a coded illusion, but until I've any evidence to suggest such a scenario I'll take the simpler explanation and assume we are not in the Matrix.

That's at least my opinion as to why I think that we can be more certain and need not signal any skepticism, but you're right it is a fun topic regardless

[Gabriel]

You really spread me your passion for science, I needed to say it . Indeed, if doubt wouldn't be a constant practice, Copernicus probably had believed in Ptolemy's universe; or if Darwin hadn't doubt of fixism, he wouldn't have formulated evolution theory maybe. And I used to believe time doesn't exist with independence from us, and now I have some serious doubts jeje Thanks.

[Shadowwolf]

Indeed, if doubt wouldn't be a constant practice, Copernicus probably had believed in Ptolemy's universe; or if Darwin hadn't doubt of fixism, he wouldn't have formulated evolution theory maybe.

Perhaps, however, they had more than just doubt spurring them they had a reason they could not reconcile with the prevailing outlook that led to a reasonable doubt towards that outlook. From there they then amassed evidence to further their new interpretation and ever since that has been built upon.

So whilst there may always be the technical caveat of doubt it should probably not be an articulated property without sufficient good cause when we are dealing with the likes of well founded knowledge such as the theory of evolution.

And I used to believe time doesn't exist with independence from us, and now I have some serious doubts jeje

I think it must be an independent property, the labels and the divisions are our invention but the progression, the flow of change is there regardless. If time did not exist independent from us neither could the universe exist independent of us, it would all require a human observer to instigate the entirety of reality which would be impossible for there is nowhere for that human observer to come from in the first place.

[Lateralman]

As we all know, some creatures have food larders to help them cope with adverse weather etc. That indicates an awareness of seasons, preparation for the future and therefore time? When they have to remember where they hid this food in order to retrieve it. That indicates an awareness of the past.

They may only live for the ‘NOW’ but they have to be aware of past and future events in order to exist.

Therefore, humans may have the label on time but in order to survive, all life around us has to be aware of it.

Looking at life from their perspective and varied life spans I think that they do not perceive life as being quick at all, for life to them would only be ‘quick’ (as it is for us,) if it had the label of time.

I guess for them it is more like, I am here, I am fast, I am slow, I am gone. Without time as a label, they all live longer, if you catch my drift.

[Shadowwolf]

They have a rudimentary conception of the passage of time and that's about it, they don't perceive it as quick as they don't really perceive it at all on an order that would allow them to appreciate their place and make those judgments. But how animals view time is somewhat beside the point of time being a property of the verse whether any living thing is around or not.

[Lateralman]

How can it be beside the point, if we as a genus created time in order to fit in with our perception of the universe? I would argue that we should take our cue from our fellow species.

For example, if I was not aware that the average life span for a human was seventy I would never think about it. If I never thought about it, I would not be aware of my time ever ending. If I were never aware of my time ever ending, I would never think about it and live until the end of time.

My time.

The knowledge of our allotted life 'time' span that we place on ourselves puts limitations on how we live our lives.

In fact, I would say that the label of time makes our lives ‘quick’ by forcing us to slow down.

As a species, time is a rod for our own backs. Our lives ruled by something that does not exist, that some ancient mathematical wit made up as a joke, which we never got.

If the earth span twice as fast, would I live twice as long?

When I was a child, a day lasted forever and then someone taught me how to tell the time.

[Shadowwolf]

How can it be beside the point,

Pondering what animals rudimentary understanding of time is, is beside the point as it's a not particularly relevant tangent to the OP or current thrust of the discussion. I don't see any use in taking cues from creatures whose mental capacities are simply incapable of appreciating higher concepts like time and their place within the verse.

For example, if I was not aware that the average life span for a human was seventy [...] I would never think about it and live until the end of time.

Even assuming there were no division of time into the labels we all know, you would not live as you imagine you do above. For unlike the lower orders you are inescapably aware of the passage of events, light to dark, moon to new moon, times of cold and waste to times of heat and plenty, that people change and die and that most of this death happens to folks in a similar state. You would know of death, when it is closer and you would think about it because you don't need the labels to see the obvious.

The knowledge of our allotted life 'time' span that we place on ourselves puts limitations on how we live our lives.

Yes because it is fairly apparent that we don't have eternity, it's how it is, not an assumed burden or one inflicted on humanity by a few careless people. Count yourself lucky that you have the self awareness to appreciate that fact and live your life accordingly rather than losing that brief span of existence to nothing. Animals live and die oblivious of anything beyond existing under the whims of a harsh world. They're unaware so have nothing to lose but they also don't achieve anything, they merely exist until they cease.

As a species, time is a rod for our own backs. Our lives ruled by something that does not exist, that some ancient mathematical wit made up as a joke, which we never got.

The fun thing about reality is that it cares not about what you might wish it was, whether it's gravity or time it acts upon us whether we believe it or not. Time does not rule our lives so much as our understanding of it allows us to appreciate the brief time we have and not squander it. Where would you be if you spent eighty years in a stone cell on a wind blasted rock surviving on meager fare on hermit sabbatical from time before joining the world? Precious few years left and so much no longer available before your inevitable and imminent end because time's not just an arbitrary invention. Something we have long understood, our forbears started to divide the clearly regular periods like day and night as best as their technology allowed because it improved their lives to have a better handle on when one season ended and another began. It was far from some obscure joke.

If the earth span twice as fast, would I live twice as long?

No, the numerals may double but you'd still last as long as if Terra revolved half as fast as it does. It's like having a different currency worth a lot less than the pound, you might be a millionaire in that denomination but you did not suddenly become fabulously wealthy.

When I was a child, a day lasted forever and then someone taught me how to tell the time.

Oh now that's just mawkish piffle Lateral, day lasted twenty-four hours that may have seemed longer to a child because they have no responsibilities or are so young they don't even have a concept of it; was still twenty-four hours mind. Eternity didn't suddenly change because some mean person educated you.

[Lateralman]

Mr Wolf, thank you, - interesting response. Actually, I think there is no such thing as a lower order. We do not know enough about the many other life forms we share this planet with or what they may or may not understand, as we cannot ask them. Given that the common ant is smart enough to have been around for millions of years and will probably still be here when we are long gone.

If we are not aware of when our end of days will arrive, I think that time slows down, is all I am saying. It is the worker bee living a lifetime in one summer thought. I do not understand why time seems to be slow when we are young and speed up, as we grow older. I presume it is because a steady awareness of time begins to dominate our repetitive routines.

Aging bodies, yes. Night and day, yes. Temperature, yes. All of these things would make other creatures aware. However, they are only reactions to their changing environment and not reactions to the restrictions that a constant awareness of the limitations of their natural lifespan that time places upon them, so therefore has no effect on their overall long-term well-being.

For example, I read something recently that those who work night shifts suffer poor health. This left me thinking if this new information will affect whether or not we continue to turn the clocks back.

I wonder if we had no labels if our perception of the passing of time would be fast or slow or to a certain extent none existent if its basis was not a 24-hour day.

If we didn’t use time as a measurement between two events then what would we use? Perhaps the ball idea as Mr Duck suggests. Time exists only in our limited memory. It is nothing but a contagious thought.

As for believing, you can live for eternity. If you do not know what eternity is, you can.

Anyway, if we have all the answers then what is there left to question...

[Shadowwolf]

If we had no labels for time, didn't bother recording it or paying it any heed then our perception of time would be different. Not that we'd have much time for pondering such things as the shorter lived and small human population exists in a perpetual hunter-gatherer / early farming society. But we'd still know that the days were roughly the same length and grew longer or shorter with regularity, and more importantly, a day would still be the same length of time regardless of our perception or even presence.

If we didn’t use time as a measurement between two events then what would we use? Perhaps the ball idea as Mr Duck suggests. Time exists only in our limited memory. It is nothing but a contagious thought.

If we didn't use a ruler to measure the distance between two points what would we use? Something else that curiously does the exact same thing the ruler did? Seriously, time is not human recollection of events, we have evidence all about of things that happened and happened in a pretty one way direction and all without us. An entire verse and everything in it formed without us and it took approximately 13.7 billion years as we count em to do so and we haven't even been about for .1 of that; that's not just a product of memory.

The ball on a rubber sheet is a graphic illustration of how gravity curves space-time and distorts it, it's not an alternate concept for time.

As for believing, you can live for eternity. If you do not know what eternity is, you can.

No, if you don't know what it is then you're unaware of the concept and that's it. Whilst the rest of us who do know what the word means and that everyone dies, we know that no one lives for eternity regardless of whether they're aware of the concept or not.

In respect of reasoning and self awareness animals are a lower order to varying degrees, insects lower than that and bacterium even lower. They live at the whims of their environment unaware of their place in life and unable to better their lot, don't even know they have a wellbeing to be concerned with. Animals are not equal intellects which we just fail to communicate with, they're pretty clearly not even in the same ballpark. As for ants, no not smart enough, resilient enough and only so far whilst bees don't think about their life at all, they're unaware of the very concept.

[Lateralman]

Correct without time we are still aware that we can live and die. However, the very idea of knowing when we will expire when we reach a certain age may speed up the process because you have a set number of years lodged in your mind. Other creatures do not have this problem.

I understand that time is a measurement that has allowed us to achieve many things. The thing is, has this measurement label allowed everything else we share the planet with to under achieve?

To be born, to live and reproduce is the driving force in all life. How can we be sure that there is no higher self-awareness in all living creatures for in order to eat and mate you have to be aware of something? In addition, who can say that, that ‘something’ isn't bigger than anything we can yet comprehend?

I know that is a bit basic but can you see what I am getting at. What we conceder to be lower orders, to everything else is just life, living to an unknown allotted time span.

[Shadowwolf]

However, the very idea of knowing when we will expire when we reach a certain age may speed up the process because you have a set number of years lodged in your mind.

No it won't.

Other creatures do not have this problem.

And yet they all die.

I understand that time is a measurement that has allowed us to achieve many things. The thing is, has this measurement label allowed everything else we share the planet with to under achieve?

It's the other way round, the measurement of time has allowed us to achieve many things. Nor does our capacity to be aware of ourselves and our place in the grander verse repress all others, almost everything else lacks the intellectual hardware to even comprehend what achievement is and that's why other species do not approximate human civilisation.

How can we be sure that there is no higher self-awareness in all living creatures for in order to eat and mate you have to be aware of something?

We can be reasonably certain because thus far we have no evidence of any other creatures operating beyond their base instincts whilst living at the whim of the environment. They do nothing that demonstrates any appreciation of their place or to better their lot, they lack any marker of civilisation. Basic biological and situational awareness is not intelligence, insects have these basic drives and they're little better than organic robots.

I know that is a bit basic but can you see what I am getting at.

I think I know what you're suggesting, however, misunderstanding and anthropomorphising animals results in your conclusions about what time is being wrong.