Temporary Discussion

Now look, it says very clearly on the list of forums that this is the Temporary Discussion Area, but there are NO discussions about the nature of time. So i'm making one.

Time confuses me for several reasons
1. you can't poke it with a stick.
2. we all seem to be moving along it at the same speed but...
3. when i try to think about how 'fast' we are moving in time, without reference to time to determine speed, my brain stops working and starts thinking about iced buns instead.
4. did i say several reasons? um...
5. how small does time go till you get to an indivisible elementary particle of time, eh? eh?
6. if the answer to the last one is 'infinitely small' then what sense does 'now' make, eh? eh?
7. is the future already there, or does it get made as it happens?

um yeah.

So anyone want to give me some of their time?
(go on Dom, i've forgotten how your theory that time doesn't exist actually went )

and finally, to fit in with the rest of this Forum, i'd like to blame the USA for its abuse of time and general temporal irresponsibility

I want to give you some of my time.

here:

*hands simian some time in a glass vial*

now dont drop it.

wow, gloopy...

thats nearly as good as when you gave me 'the funk' after you'd been listening to DJ Hype lots.

which reminds me...

i have a cd to write for you...


erm..

*scurries round room*

erm,...cant seem to find it at the moment....if i do...you will have a copy tonight.

it might have gaps in it unfotunatly...cos i dont know how to not do that.

what do we discuss here?

We discuss time.

Like this:
ooh, isn't there a lot of it!
i wonder what it's for.

Stuff like that.

ok then.

where is it?

Well its not a thing, its a direction.

Its like asking where left is.

Although left changes depending on where your facing, but i don't think you can rotate relative to time. That'd need another axis.

ok...lets create a new axis.

not of evil (bah...Iraq)

it now runs from my top right nearside, to the bottom left farside.

make sense?

I'd like to object to the time-distortion achieved during spinning or spinning practise

If it's fire... one minute takes inbetween two minutes and five to pass as you're left thinking "sod it, it'll go out soon, maybe if i just weave quickly for a bit... no... sod it..."

If it's practise... one hour takes between one and ten minuites to pass rapidly leaving you at bedtime with no idea what you were trying to learn when you started, interesting new bruises and a new move taht you didn't intend on finding out about now

And if it's the working day... nuff said.

i span solidly for three hours once...went like 10 minutes.

then again i was stoned.

time is an ilousion as is david copperfield

[ 27. August 2003, 03:48: Message edited by: The United Chains of Fire (Jon) ]

Time is a confusing.

When waiting for something good it drags, when waiting for something bad it whizzes by.
When waiting for my bus it goes really really slowly - wait actually thats my bus just being late all the time

Sorry yall but I am stayin out of this one, atleast untill I get some sleep. Yall went way over my head hahaha I have no clue where yall came up with this post

Ok...as no-one else has actually tried to help you...here are some answers

1. you can't poke it with a stick.

No, but did you know if it wasn't for time you couldn't poke anything at all? The stick would have to exist in the retracted and extended states simlultaneously...

2. we all seem to be moving along it at the same speed but...

We aren't...it is just that you, as the observer, are observing things within your own personal timescale, so something that has a much slower timescale appears to be "moving fast". you then equate this rapid movement to speed and strength rather than a different perception and actualisation of time. Pretty simple really.

3. when i try to think about how 'fast' we are moving in time, without reference to time to determine speed, my brain stops working and starts thinking about iced buns instead.

Try throwing an iced bun, and then see how fast it is moving relative to a bun you have rolled along the ground. You can use drag factors instead of time factors to determine speed, especially as the icing is likely to come off the rolled one and can be scraped up and measured via weight as 'lost potential'.

4. did i say several reasons? um...

Yes

5. how small does time go till you get to an indivisible elementary particle of time, eh? eh?

Time can continue to be divisible until the system being used to meaure it cannot distinguish between smaller units. Time is a theorectical theory and a human concept, therefore, if we cannot make smaller measurements, there are no smaller units. time doesn't exist of itself, it only exists because we 'perceive it'.

6. if the answer to the last one is 'infinitely small' then what sense does 'now' make, eh? eh?

Infinitely small is a nonsensical phrase. Infinity, in it's very nature, can be measured in time, so the arguement above still relates to your use of infinitley small.

Sorry if I haven't answered the direct question here, but the one above also answers it too so I thought i could be allowed to digress.

7. is the future already there, or does it get made as it happens?

The future doesn't exist, and therefore, cannot be "made as it happens" as that is then the present. Even if the future is set and nothing can change what is going to happen, this does not mean that the future is "already there". It will not happen until it become the present.

Simple...

:whooooosssshhhhhhh:
don't you just love the sound of conversations going straight over your head...
so here goes...
can't remember where I read this, but someone famous said it(aint I soundin bright today!):

Life is a waste of time
and time is a waste of life,
so stay wasted all the time...
and have the time of your life!
hey!
(actually, I added the "hey" part, but I thought it added a certain je ne sais quoi!)

Ben

and why does time seem to move faster as you get older?

and why is time circular, and not linear in it's construction?

*mental image of sprinting backwards through a minefield*

that's certainly true of History - as that's written down people's perceptions of their present time

but the past? is that absolute or does that change? i'd say absolute

Frostypaw...distance as a measurable quantity is NOT a pure theory put forward by humans such as the whole past-present-future thingee. (In my opinion)

We have a theory of how we measure it, and apply our own numerical systems and so forth to it, but it does have a quantifiable figure on it's own.

You can take an object a nanometre wide and halve it's span to half a nanometre, then halve it again, and again, so on approaching an infinite number of halvings. That next step will always exist, as distance when applied to an object's width, exists in the world, and can be halved, you don't even need a numbering system for this, simply find the midpoint, then the midpoint between one side and the midpoint youn just found and so on...

Time, on the other hand, only really exists in the NOW. Minutes and hours etc don't exist int he same way that the width of a particle exists.

The only thing to do with time that really does exist, is the PRESENT. And you can't halve the PRESENT , for it doesn't have a length or point of existence in the same way as a measurement of a quality (eg width) can have.

It is simply a theorectical point on a theoretical graph of time involving the theoretical PAST and FUTURE, which do not exist.

Sure you can find the halfway point on the object as discussed above, but can you measure the width of that midpoint? The point itself? No, it exists due to it's place in the universe, not because of any other properties it posesses. Because it doesn't possess any other properties...

The 'timeline' that people keep talking about is not and does not and can not exist. We have distancmorphosised our concept of time, with this 'timeline theory', that fools people into thinking that time is something that can be measured the same way by other people.

The problem with time is that you can never get more of it, even skipping ahead in time zones doesnt grant you much more time, it always seem to catch up and then pass you. Kinda sucks really.

I thought that was the number 42...

jet-lag sucks!

Raph

Well, that depends on whether you are overtaking the dateline or crossing over it the other way.

if you are crossing over it, jet lag blows!!!



And geez guys, I was hoping for a bit more analytical thought into this than the current responses...Simian would you mind if I moved this into Technical?

Travelling west seems ok, but going east just kills me!

Raph

And congeniality?


Where are all the badgers?

That's more like it! Ha haaa!

Bender and Frosty...

BENDER FIRST...Congenialty is the DNA state of a person in jail...Badgers are where they always are, in the badge factory making badges...sheesh!

FROSTY...

quote:

---

i can say this object will take 10 seconds to fall to the earth,and i can divide that time into 10ths

---

You can, Frosty, but you are using our concept of distance to do the dividing.

That ten second fall is a progressive realisation of the potential of the object. The fact that, to you, as an observer, it took ten seconds to fall to the earth is completely subjective.

The time (10 seconds) is being treated exactly as the distance that was covered, in being a set figure or amount.

What occurred during those '10 seconds' was not a fall recorded along a time line, but an object passing through various states before it comes to rest on earth.

Those states do not have a mid-phase. It is simply your distancmorphosised concept of the fall that makes you feel there is a timeline involved.

Although you do seem to be starting to grasp it, shown by

quote:

---

i just can't go backwards into it - have to go forwards and grasp the moment as it passes

---

This getting closer. You do not go backwards or forwards in time, you simply change states.

Thinking that "forward" is progressing along a timeline is ultimately flawed, as there is no direction as such.

"forward" assumes there are other choices and directions to go in, or that you can choose to stop and not progress any further.

The so-called 'present' does not give us any other these options, therefore forward is an innappropriate word.

In fact, due our distancmorphosised culture, there is no word I know of to describe what we mistakenly see as a window of opportunity (the present).

We can no more choose not be in this state than we can choose to unmake history.


Oh, and this has now been copied into Social... Here

[ 03. September 2003, 14:32: Message edited by: Charles ]

you guys are making me insane aaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!