What is time..

[JohnT]

OK, so you need to have a couple of glasses in you before reading further.. I'll wait......
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OK, so now that you are softened a little, here is my question... Is time real?

This is a rather involved question and there are two theories on this topic. One theory is that time is a real physical entity and part of the fabric of our universe.

Another theory is that time is something that our brains invent to help put our reality into perspective. In this theory, our brains percieve time as our existance passes through frame after frame of reality.


Any thoughts folks?

 

[jamesngalveston]

who cares, when it is time to eat i eat
time to sleep i eat
time to drink i drink....
the rest does not matter.

 

[Arne]

Forgot one James, time to make wine so you can drink. Arne.

 

[Gwand]

John T, Deja Vu is a reminder that time is an illusion and that we "were", "are" and "will be" exist simultaneously. A little wine and majic mushrooms proves my point.

 

[corinth]

What is time

first of all,

JamesGalveston: spoken like a true Zen Buddhist!

When I eat I eat and when I sleep I sleep!

What is time?

This can get very complicated but there are some known facts.

When an object( gross example) travels at the speed of light , 186 thousand miles per second, we KNOW times slows down. There have been several tests by astronuats to prove this.

I would have to look this up but the bottom line here is that if you were to travel faster than the speed of light, time would slow down. What this means is that if there were two of you, one on earth and the other traveling at the speed of light over a few years. When the other you which was traveling at the speed of light came back on earth, you would be younger!

This is just a beginning. My brain is not moving too fast this morning! I am sure others will add to this as I will give me a little time!

PS: scientist knew the above theoretically during the time that cowboys were roaming the southwest

 

[sour_grapes]

Call me a simple direct realist, but I'll take the former position.

 

[sour_grapes]

When an object( gross example) travels at the speed of light , 186 thousand miles per second, we KNOW times slows down. There have been several tests by astronuats to prove this.

I would have to look this up but the bottom line here is that if you were to travel faster than the speed of light, time would slow down. What this means is that if there were two of you, one on earth and the other traveling at the speed of light over a few years. When the other you which was traveling at the speed of light came back on earth, you would be younger!

Corinth is referring to the Twin Paradox (which is not really a paradox).

What Corinth is saying is basically, true, except that no object that has mass can travel at or above the speed of light. But that is not needed for his example. It is true that one clock traveling with respect to a second clock will tick more slowly (as observed by someone holding the second clock). It is true that this has been demonstrated by atomic clocks on airplanes. And it is true that if one of two twins rockets off at high speed, turns around, and comes back to Earth, he or she will be younger than the twin who stayed at home.

 

[wineforfun]

Another theory is that time is something that our brains invent to help put our reality into perspective. In this theory, our brains percieve time as our existance passes through frame after frame of reality.

I fully believe in this. ^^^^^

Without getting into a religious tangent, our minds or way of life here is only using time or recognizing time as we know it or are taught it.
God created "xyz" on Day 1. Now our "earthly" minds tell us he did that in 24hrs when in fact it could have been 2400 years. No one knows that for sure.

 

[corinth]

Sour_grapes: nice! Michio Kaku, the famous theoretical physicist would be proud!

Wineforfun: I can easily accept and respect your views as I am one who believes quite strongly.

 

[Bartman]

But if it weren't for time acting as a 'fourth dimension', physical objects would theoretically occupy the same space/location simultaneously. So long as you accept that matter is a physical constant at any given moment (of time!) and matter physical objects cannot occupy the space simultaneously, only time keeps things as discrete objects rather than merging them all into the same hunk of matter. Example: At the intersection of two streets, if it were not for the stoplight that 'controls' traffic flow, your car would collide with other cars crossing the intersection - i.e., if it weren't for time separating the coincidental location of your car and the other one, your car would be 'sharing'/coinciding in the same physical space as that other car. Hence, there would be two objects in the same place which cannot be, given the original assumption.

 

[DoctorCAD]

Ticking away the moments
That make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours
In an off-hand way

Kicking around on a piece of ground
In your home town
Waiting for someone or something
To show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine
Staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long
And there is time to kill today

And then the one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun

(Solo)

And you run and you run
To catch up with the sun
But it's sinking

Racing around
To come up behind you again

The sun is the same
In a relative way
But you're older

Shorter of breath
And one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter
Never seem to find the time

Plans that either come to naught
Or half a page of scribbled lines

Hanging on in quiet desperation
Is the English way

The time is gone
The song is over
Thought I'd something more to say

Home
Home again
I like to be here
When I can

When I come home
Cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones
Beside the fire

Far away
Across the field
Tolling on the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spell...

Better with something a bit more leafy than wine, but wine will do.

 

[BernardSmith]

Nothing with mass can travel faster than light, OK. but aren't physicists now able to show that certain quantum particles can affect the motion of another quantum particle across space quite literally, instantaneously? so "something" is "traveling" between the two particles faster than light. And.. If Einstein's understanding of the universe is correct (and so there are no Archimedean fixed points in our universe and everything is simply in motion relative to everything else - (The paradox of the twins is an example))then how can time be thought of as a vector (having both length and direction) independent of everything else?

 

[sour_grapes]

Nothing with mass can travel faster than light, OK. but aren't physicists now able to show that certain quantum particles can affect the motion of another quantum particle across space quite literally, instantaneously? so "something" is "traveling" between the two particles faster than light.

Ah yes, the EPR Paradox and quantum entanglement. The upshot is that you can have two particles that are created together, but are now separated by a great distance. If you make a quantum measurement on one, it instantaneously affects the probability of the outcome of a measurement on the other one.

Yes, ladies and gents, it turns out that the universe we live in is demonstrably non-local. That is, a measurement at point A instantaneously influences the outcome of a measurement at distant point B.

However, this measurement is not causal. It cannot be used to, say, transmit information from point A to point B faster than the speed of light. Nothing is traveling from A to B. Only by later comparing the outcomes of the measurements do the people at A or B know that their measurements were linked.

This is not easy to get your mind around, I readily grant you, but it has been definitively shown to be true since the '80s.

 

[RegionRat]

Ticking away the moments
That make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours
In an off-hand way

Kicking around on a piece of ground
In your home town
Waiting for someone or something
To show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine
Staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long
And there is time to kill today

And then the one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun

(Solo)

And you run and you run
To catch up with the sun
But it's sinking

Racing around
To come up behind you again

The sun is the same
In a relative way
But you're older

Shorter of breath
And one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter
Never seem to find the time

Plans that either come to naught
Or half a page of scribbled lines

Hanging on in quiet desperation
Is the English way

The time is gone
The song is over
Thought I'd something more to say

Home
Home again
I like to be here
When I can

When I come home
Cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones
Beside the fire

Far away
Across the field
Tolling on the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spell...

Better with something a bit more leafy than wine, but wine will do.

Makes me wanna smoke a fattie (Havent smoked weed in YEARS) and watch this


[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gXvVUg-VAE"]The Dark Side Of The Rainbow[/ame]

 

[pjd]

wow you guys make my head hurt! Region Rat, i'm with you on that!

 

[jamesngalveston]

holy chit, what you guys do for a living...i am a lowly un educated seafood salesman/carpenter you guys are way over my head..
im going to bed now....when i dream, there is no time....think on that.

 

[corinth]

One or more of you mention the physics.
One of you mentions a spiritual or religious view
One of view quotes a wonderful poem
One adds a visual clip from a movie
One of you adds humor
one of you talks about times gone past
and many people view what has been written and further thought is produced!
It all helps everyone to understand and see how all is infinitely intertwined!

 

[corinth]

what is time

Ah c'mon Jamesgalveston!

Don't sell (no pun intended since you are a salesperson) short here!

You mean to tell me that you have never heard about how dreams can transcend reality?

We need some music from the "twilight zone" just about now!

PS: "Holy Chit" also sounds good to me!

 

[RegionRat]

One of view quotes a wonderful poem
One adds a visual clip from a movie

see how all is infinitely intertwined!

RR

 

[Runningwolf]

float in time with open mind...
A quest, a chance of riddled thought:
Infinity squared; then seek to find
An answer; pained and overwrought,
I dodder with an addled head -
Befuddled, merging with a haze of
Mysticism -
Then to tread a metaphoric swamp -
A maze of existentialism…

But now for time to tick in rhyme
With ‘tock' - a clock to tell thro' chime
Precisely on the knell
That as I dared to understand,
I must be deep in Hell…