Understanding the Direction of Time: A Philosophical and Scientific Exploration

[moving finger]

It combines CHDO and rationality. Look at the definition of FW at the beginning.

Your definition is :

Free Will : "the power or ability to rationally choose and consciously perform actions, at least some of which are not brought about necessarily and inevitably by external circumstances"

At least two things here :

1) Indeterminism clearly allows your model to dissociate itself from external circumstances, but in what sense does your model "choose" to perform one action rather than another?

2) You don’t believe that free will entails ultimate responsibility?

For a detailed examination of the problems inherent in any naturalistic model of free will based on a combination of determinism & indeterminism, see :

http://www.geocities.com/alex_b_christie/Swamp.pdf

Best Regards

 

[Mickey]

Did you know that the instance of suicide has fallen in recent years? Since the introduction of Prozac, in fact.

For whom? I'm quite sure that the instance of suicide has risen for those in the 15-24 age group.

According the NMHA, the http://www.nmha.org/suicide/youngPeople.cfm since 1960.

 

[Fittler]

Time is a creation of man.

 

[moving finger]

Time is a creation of man.

wish I could create time. first thing I'd do is to pack 2 seconds into every 1.

Best Regards

 

[ValenceE]

Dear Madness,

It seems that your first question refers to the present moment; in the now.

As for your question about a scientific way of determining if times flows or not, well, what I can say is that, in many equations where time is used as a parameter, it serves the purpose of making both sides of the = sign work together, validating those same equations.

One of those states that; Speed = Distance / Time

This equation simply defines movement as opposed to rest.

What is particularly interesting about this equation is that, for it to take form, Time cannot be static (cannot equal zero) because both speed and distance just don’t exist on their own, they are constructions of each other through time. Hence, time, as showed in this simple equation, not only can be assigned any arbitrary value, but this value must be endowed with flow for movement to occur.




For your question in 2), I would respond by putting myself in the following context ;

… sitting on a rock by a brook on a sunny autumn day, looking at a leaf that had just fallen in the water, upstream, coming towards me, as I wonder if time flows, just like the water carrying the leaf does… the entirety of the universal laws are contained in that single experience, including the arrow of time and my perception of it.

In my mind, there is just absolutely no way that this experience could go backwards or sideways or any other way that is has… because it HAS happened the way it has. Past and future just don’t exist as separate entities they are all intertwined in the experience of the now. I can, in the now, remember seeing the leaf fall in the brook, as I can in the now, looking at it, envision it being carried further downstream.



VE

 

[jhe1984]

Didn't read all the posts, but if no one else has, I thought I'd add a passage from Nietzsche's Twilight of the Idols, in which he discusses our perception of events and subsequent, almost simultaneous, reordering of these events to match what we understand as likely to have occurred in the objective, physical world,

"The cannon shot appears in a causal mode, in an apparent reversal of time. What is really later (the causal interpretation) is experienced first — often with a hundred details that pass like lightning before the shot is heard. What has happened? The representations which were produced in reaction to certain stimulus have been misinterpreted as its causes."


In the example, Nietzsche describes hearing the boom of the cannon first (or perhaps the cannon ball wizzing over head, depending on distance I guess?) and from that event, immediately working backward to reconsruct a series of events leading up to the cannon shot: loading the cannon, aiming the cannon, being told to fire, igniting the cannon, etc. All of these reconstructed events lead up to the one experienced even that we hear as the cannon ball overhead (or the boom). But once we process these events, they all become real and the order of the sequence puts our actual experience somewhere towards the end, as opposed to the first.

The excerpt is by no means a final answer to this question which won't be solved here, but I thought it might add another voice to the discussion. [If in fact, no one's included it yet, lol.]

 

[myoho.renge.kyo]

This is a topic relating to physics but philosophical in nature. Physicists are talking about explaing why the "arrow of time" flows forward the way it does, instead of flowing in any other direction. My questions are these:
1) How do we know that time flows at all? is it not possible that we simply experience time to be flowing as a feature of our consciousness and that all moments in time simply exist with no flow from one to the next. Is there any scientific way to distinguish between time flowing or not?
2) Does it make any sense at all to ask why time flows in the direction it does? surely the direction of time being labelled as "forwards" is arbitrary. What would be strange is if time suddenly changed direction. But even then, would we even notice? If time were to change direction, we would have no idea as we ourselved would be going back in time, retracing our steps.
Basically, i have no idea what physicists mean when they ask why time has an arrow

i am going to try to answer the questions as when i was a kid.

"How do we know that time flows at all?"

if you take a piece of ice out of the freezer, it melts. water does not freeze out of the freezer. or if you put water in a freezer, it freezes, but you need a freezer to do that. that is how we know that time flows.

"Does it make any sense at all to ask why time flows in the direction it does?"

why is it that ice melts when you take it out of the freezer? why is it that water does not freeze out of the freezer? why is it the water freezes inside a freezer? `it is as good a question as any (i think).

 

[Evo]

if you take a piece of ice out of the freezer, it melts. water does not freeze out of the freezer.

It does if it's cold enough outside the freezer.

or if you put water in a freezer, it freezes, but you need a freezer to do that. that is how we know that time flows.

it would depend on the temperature in the freezer.

why is it that ice melts when you take it out of the freezer? why is it that water does not freeze out of the freezer? why is it the water freezes inside a freezer? `it is as good a question as any (i think).

What does any of this have to do with the topic?

 

[mosassam]

Is there a mathematical or scientific proof for Time? If not we must assume that Time has no objective reality until such a proof arrives.
Is Time a byproduct of change? If so 'cause-and-effect' is also a byproduct of change.
Q: What causes change?
A: Change
Q: What is the effect?
A: Change
I know this is all bar stool philosophy but I'm driving at something important. Without proof of either, two fundamental buliding blocks of physics disappear.
Time and Cause-and-Effect are so blindingly obvious that they have been assumed to have objective reality. This does not mean that the history of physics and all its myriad applications are invalid, but it does mean that physics as a desription of reality is.
PS Can I descibe something as indescribable?

 

[Time is Unreal]

Time could be holding us back in our minds. Could it not? Can something be simualtaneous, and in the past at the same time? I don't think so . Yesterday, if you like calling it that is the past. I don't think so. Ithink it is just a simualtaneous motion in or at a point of space where when at that point all things are present . When you move into the future if you like to call it that. Same thing. How can a point that is always present, just because it changes distance from one point to another be called time?
It could just be eternity we are in. Always present and constant. This is just some ideas I wonder if they could ever be proven? Maybe time does exist, but hard to imagine it for me. I believe all matter, energy and everything in the universe are constant and present always. I guess what I'm saying is just because something was present over there point (a) and now is present here point (b) dose'nt prove any time has gone by. It just explains change in corrdinates for something and it is always present, at the point it rests or moves. I will be present and constant were ever that point may be realative too anything else or even nothing. If we are let's say 4 hours apart in "time" if you want too use that, we are present were we are in space; time does not apply to our presence , or any other matter , or gravity, or energy so why do we insist on using it when it confuses us? Distance, and motion does not give any reasonable answer for" time" if you consider presence while moving, or setting still. It is still present in a form whether it be energy, matter, mass, or gravity, or light.

 

[mosassam]

It could just be eternity we are in. Always present and constant

.
My continuous experience of 'reality' is as an ever-changing present. I have memory of the past, can make predictions about the future but these are just 'tricks' of the mind. My ongoing experience is always of NOW. I can make rational arguments demonstrating the reality of Time but these are more tricks of the mind. I am coming to the conclusion that time only exists in an abstract sense. However, although NOW is constant it is ever-changing. This changing, or unfolding, does not seem to happen in a random way. It gives the impression of "movement forward", and I don't know why this should be so.
Two things bother me -
Is my NOW the same as everyone/everything else's NOW?
Is there a mathematical model of reality that doesn't have time factored into it?

 

[heman]

I think
If however the arrow of time has had the same direction since the big bang or whatever started it all, then it is a pointless theory, unless it changes direction.

Why it will be a pointless theory in that case ?

 

[abhaiitg]

is velocity of time is equal to the velocity of light?

 

[CaptainQuasar]

is velocity of time is equal to the velocity of light?

It doesn't really make sense to ask a question like that because velocity involves both a change in time and a change in distance (and direction of movement, actually). Time just involve a change in time.

But if you want to talk about the rate of change of time, it's one second per second. :tongue2:

⚛​

 

[basePARTICLE]

Relavistic time can be defined as Tr = M/E, where M is mass and E is total Energy. A zero value corresponds to annhilation whereas 1 corresponds to timelessness. Seeing total energy is always greater than mass, Tr is never greater than one.

M can be written as M1 + M2 and similarily E can be written as E1 + E2.
If M2 is sufficiently small, along with E2, we have the wave function collapsing in dTr, as M+dM/E+dE. There are no arrows of time seeing the interval Tr, in essence represents a state in the block universe. However dTr has an arrow, a very specific band through the now moment, which implies that all possible movement backwards in time will occur during the foward cycle dTr!