BBC Focus Magazine

[Lateralman]

If you have no awareness of how long your life expectations are and have never looked in a mirror. Then by not knowing your age, must play a psychological role in extending your life.

The thing is organic robots or not even without the ‘intellectual hardware’, many of these creatures were here before us.

Observing the habits of wild animals may give us clues of how time affects us.

Anyhow, I think that I have aged ten years just by trying to get my head around this.

Any advice on how to get out of a deep hole?

[Shadowwolf]

Then by not knowing your age, must play a psychological role in extending your life.

No I cannot see any reason why, saying it 'must' does not make it so.

...many of these creatures were here before us.

Your point is?

Observing the habits of wild animals may give us clues of how time affects us.

I think we already know, you're born, you live and die in one direction just as they do. Animals are just as ignorant of time as they are of what makes the ground shake or what lightning is, nothing else and nothing to their advantage.

Any advice on how to get out of a deep hole?

Climb?

[Lateralman]

“Animals are ignorant of time!” I will be back as soon as I have a word with Dr Do-little.

[Lateralman]

How can we be sure that many of them have not risen in the past beyond what we now see? Perhaps they were once very clever and an event wiped them all out so now the survivors are just playing it safe by keeping a low profile and acting stupid. For they know what is coming next.

Time is running out and that is why they are in a big hurry to spread their progeny to all parts of the planet. It is an inbuilt survival mechanism. From past extinction events, that they have survived and we are yet to live through.

Their awareness of any up and coming disasters is far superior to ours. They are more in tune with the vagaries of the planet. They know when to run, fly, swim or hide. Without saying a word, our fellow creatures tell us to think as one and start preparing...for the future.

Book me a ticket on the space ark.

[Shadowwolf]

Ahh I see we've now ran to total fiction territory, well paragraph one lacks any evidence to even suggest anything of the sort so we can dismiss that as nonsense. Paragraph two and three are no better and also fail to account for the fact that most species that lived on this planet have gone extinct and continue to do so, so that's more nonsense.

You're not just anthropomorphising every other living thing you're making them even smarter because of, well nothing at all and I'm not interested in further empty insistences that every other living thing is a super advanced species and the only one that demonstrates sentience is dumb as a bag of rocks. If you've nothing else to add but make believe about animals please check it at the door.

[Lateralman]

Sorry, Mr Wolf, that was my fault. I wandered off topic.

[M Paul Lloyd]

Sorry, Mr Wolf, that was my fault. I wandered off topic.

Really? Right.... thanks for pointing that out... I did wonder.

[Gabriel]

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.

I agree entirely, mr Shadowwolf, anything said is said by an observer, and the observation may be spoken to other observer who could be another observer or himself (Maturana, 1970). And according to

I think it must be an independent property, the labels and the divisions are our invention, the flow of change is there regardless

I think you're right, we have experiences of the flowing of the continuous changing present in the realization of our living, as observers (Maturana, 2011), and if you mean independent properties of the observer's explanation, I agree. I think the explanation doesn't replace the observer's experience, because they pertain to different non-intersecting operational or phenomenal domains (Maturana & Mpodozis, 2000), but if you mean independent properties of the observer's observation, I think we can't do this because, as stated above, anything said is said by an observer (Maturana, 1970). That's how I understood the meaning, if I don't understand well (because we understand what we understand (Maturana & Porksen, 2005)), maybe you can specify what you mean with "independent properties" to us. Thank you.
Literature cited
Maturana,H. (1970) Biology of Cognition. BCL Report 9.0.Biological Computer Laboratory. Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Illinois.
Maturana,H. & Mpodozis,J. (2000) The origin of species by means of natural drift. Rev.Chil.Hist.Nat., 73: 261-310.
Maturana,H. & Porksen,B. (2005) Del ser al hacer, los orígenes de la biologia del conocer. (2nd ed.) Santiago, Chile: J.C.Saez.
Maturana,H. (2011) Responsabilidad en la localidad del vivir. In http://matriztica.cl/2011/05/16/respons ... del-vivir/ recovered July 14th, 2012.

[Lateralman]

Every one appears to observing the obvious.

[Shadowwolf]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you mean by, "anything said is said by an observer, and the observation may be spoken to other observer who could be another observer or himself," we'll see.

...but if you mean independent properties of the observer's observation, I think we can't do this because, as stated above, anything said is said by an observer (Maturana, 1970). That's how I understood the meaning, if I don't understand well (because we understand what we understand (Maturana & Porksen, 2005)), maybe you can specify what you mean with "independent properties" to us.

By 'independent property' I mean time is something that exists whether there is any intelligent life / observers or not to notice it, much like there is gravity in the verse whether or not there is any intelligence to notice. All that an intelligent observer brings is the capacity to notice the one-way procession of events that are present regardless, create a system of measurement with specific labels assigned to divisions, to chart this progression and make use of it where relevant. However, whilst the capacity to notice this, voice it and derive meaning from it is something unique to an intelligent observer, what is being observed was there before, independent of any observer and does not require an observer to manifest the phenomenon, only to articulate the concept of the phenomenon to themselves or other intelligent observers. It's like the distance between two rocks, an intelligent observer can see they are not in the same place, they can create a system of measurement and create names for the divisions they invent and apply this system elsewhere. But even if these rocks are on a barren world where no intelligent observers exist, there is still a span between the rocks, the distance doesn't need an observer to make it real, just to note there is one. From what I know so far time is the same, it's there, may not mean much to the lifeless bulk of the verse but it is nonetheless present. All of which you may actually agree with, just the inclusion of, "but if you mean independent properties of the observer's observation, I think we can't do this because," lead me to think otherwise.

Every one appears to observing the obvious.

Are you perhaps being facetious again

[M Paul Lloyd]

As I see it, we might be able to draw a simplistic parallel between how we observe time and how stars appear in the sky?

To the casual observer the stars can (and indeed did for many years) appear as if they existed on the same plane and at the same fixed distance as part of some great celestial sphere.

Of course now we know that this is not so and indeed some of the very brightest stars, such as Sirius, which might be taken as being closer to us than dimmer objects is in fact a very distant but very bright source of light.

Likewise time may, to the casual observer, appear to be running at the same rate in all instances but in reality it is much more complicated than that?

[Lateralman]

Facetious naa, the obvious is only obvious when someone points the obvious out.

It is the reason why children have the ability to arrive at conclusions, which elude the greatest minds.

[M Paul Lloyd]

Ah the old 'out of the mouths of babe's' quotation.... but consider, the babe's in question have ears and do eavesdrop and repeat verbatim what they hear and indeed if something has already been though of then its subsequent re-occurrence is hardly a cause for remark or mention beyond a knowing nod and smile.

Besides, it's one thing to make a clever sounding statement and quite another to turn it into something useful.