AgnosticWeb.com - The Illusion of Time https://agnosticweb.com/ An Agnostic's Brief Guide to the Universe en The Illusion of Time (reply) BALANCE_MAINTAINED: In real world terms, Time is the imaginary construct we have designed to link one instant and the next. It is not part of reality (i.e. it is not a real thing) but it is useful as an imaginary tool that helps us measure events.-This is very much in line with Matt's thinking, and I don't want to repeat the arguments I've put forward in my response to him (15 September at 14.01). However, when you say "it's not part of reality (i.e. it is not a real thing)", you raise all kinds of questions. Do you mean that only tangible objects are real things? Is love not a real thing? Friendship, joy, sadness, consciousness, imagination, hope, grief, faith? You won't find a solid block labelled love out there in the universe, but it's probably more real to you than a red giant or a white dwarf. (I hope it is!) There are vast areas of existence that we don't understand, but we give names to them because they have a reality for us as humans. You may perhaps argue that human reality is not objective reality***, but in your admirable post under "Science Trips Over Its Own Feet" (16 September at 13.13) ... which strikes many answering chords in me ... you emphasize that materialism and spiritualism are "two sides of the same coin, life". (I take it that by spiritualism you mean matters of the spirit, not Madame Arcati summoning the dead!) I would put time almost in the same category, except that it goes one step beyond these individual spiritual realities, because we can actually see its effects in the material world around us. Nothing stays the same. Science can observe the changes, and can even predict them. You say "the rate of change is an illusion". The rate, yes, but as you say yourself, not the change. You're treating time solely as a measuring instrument, which of course is one way of defining it. And as a measuring instrument, it's certainly a useful if imaginary construct. But if you define it as a movement, the statement that it has no reality flies in the face of all experience. -***In Matt's post today under "Chapter 2 of Does it Matter" he quite rightly, in my view, attacks Graham Dunston Martin's contention that "without consciousness nothing can exist", arguing that "the universe, without man, would still exist." I would say that without man the process of change would continue in Nature (I know you agree), thereby proving that there is a continuous onward movement which we call time. The present will always become the past, whether we are here or not.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4396 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4396 Fri, 17 Sep 2010 09:53:21 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'dhw The Illusion of Time (reply) Balance_Maintained
> > They are a million instances strung together by the editor and director, and our brains interpret them as a continuous stream. 
> > 
> I found your answer to this last question interesting. Will think on it some more before replying to it.
> -I eagerly await a response: Plenty of interesting scientific and metaphysical questions can be asked here...-> 
> If each persons perspective of time is relative to them, are all perspectives real? The answer of course no, because time is only a measurement tool, not a real physical property.-Unreal in the abstract sense that each person only captured "a reflection" or unreal in the literal sense? I'm an amateur fighter, and I'm pretty sure that when I hit a guy, we all see me hitting a guy although for me its in slow motion while for everyone else its very quick. THIS is the relativity I'm used to seeing with time; it doesn't mean that the hit never happened, but it does mean that my perception of the hit, my opponent's perception of the hit, and the crowd's perception of the hit are all drastically different? Are we on the same page here?

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4377 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4377 Thu, 16 Sep 2010 00:55:07 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) In my analogy, time would be the little bits of black cellophane that tie each frame together. When you play the film, you can't see them because they are not part of the reality of the movie. Intellectually, you know that each frame is tied together and progress from one instant to the next in a linear pattern too fast for your eye to detect, but it is not part of the reality that is the film.-In real world terms, Time is the imaginary construct we have designed to link one instant and the next. It is not part of reality(i.e. it is not a real thing) but it is useful as an imaginary tool that helps us measure events. Changes between one state and another are real, changes between one position and another are real, but the rate of change is an illusion. By the way, you out to check out the new experiments on Quantum Teleportation (or instant transmission).

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4368 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4368 Wed, 15 Sep 2010 15:00:46 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'Balance_Maintained The Illusion of Time (reply) MATT: You seem to be reasoning, "If time doesn't exist, then nothing that happened in the past happened."-I wrote that "our memories ... even though they can't capture the reality of what was once fleetingly real ... nevertheless relate to something that WAS real." -MATT: I read your issue here as that the absence of time negates cause and effect? You seem to be reasoning, "If time doesn't exist, then nothing that happened in the past happened."-In both cases you have inverted my argument. I am saying that past realities, and cause and effect, provide the evidence that time exists, i.e. that since we have cause and effect, there has to be an onward movement, and that is what we call time. The fact that time is relative, and that we have created our own system of measurements is not the issue, nor is the fact that present perceptions of reality immediately turn into memories of perceptions of reality. -You write: "What creates time? For you to state that there is an actual flow, you have to be able to tell me what it is. I say that time is the difference between what I measured [at the present moment] yesterday, and [at the present moment] today. There is no "flow". There just is."-I can't answer the first question, any more than I can answer what creates life, but that doesn't mean life/time don't exist. However, your definition does, I think, almost settle the dispute, because we are clearly talking about different concepts of time. Yours is one of measurement, mine is one of movement. I think this is best illustrated by a metaphor offered to us by someone whose opinions we both greatly respect:-"Teachings such as the Prajna paramita Sutra (diamond sutra) focus the concept that existence is a raging river, upon which man attempts to stake his claim. The past: doesn't exist. The future? Doesn't exist. Only NOW exists." (xeno6696, 15 June at 03.59)-In this image I would equate "time" with "existence". Time is not the past, present or future, but the river. You can try to grasp it, but the moment you do, it's gone. Interestingly this is the combination of nouns used in the Collins definition of time: "the continuous passage of existence in which events pass from a state of potentiality in the future, through the present, to a state of finality in the past." The only problem I see here is that you say time is separate from events. As I've said at the start of this post, my argument is that just as the blown-down tree is proof that the invisible wind exists, events (cause and effect, if you like) are proof that time exists.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4363 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4363 Wed, 15 Sep 2010 13:01:42 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'dhw The Illusion of Time (reply) Balance_Maintained asks me to imagine a movie shot from a million different camera angles, and to ask some questions:-Are all of these movies real? Do the events exist anymore? [...] Do each of the camera angles reflect reality? How can each of the different perspectives be real if they are all different?-I've pinpointed these questions, because in all of them you're emphasizing "reality", but reality is not the point in dispute. A film of an event is not the event itself (see Magritte's painting of a pipe, entitled Ceci n'est pas une pipe), and although you can have as many different perspectives as you like of an object, they will all be perceptions of the object and not the object itself, the one neither more nor less real than the other. But I don't see what connection this has with your subsequent comment:-"I am not implying that one 'now' to the next is not strung together, simply that I do not think that the framework for this mechanism is human's conception of 'Time'."-The million perspectives and the no-longer-existing events have nothing to do with my concept of 'time'. It is the "stringing together" in which the "now" becomes the "then". But as usual there is a danger that I've misunderstood you completely, and so to make matters clear, perhaps you would explain exactly what you think IS humans' conception of time.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4362 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4362 Wed, 15 Sep 2010 12:30:37 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'dhw The Illusion of Time (reply) Xeno, 
You and I are arguing for the same side of the coin ;) And, by answering the questions, you illustrated my point beautifully.->I don't see how the question of "framework" plays in. We are humans. We only >have a "human" conception of time. We have no knowledge of any other; and >moreso, our conception of time is false.-Framework plays in as a relation to another discussion thread on here, consciousness. Framework, conception, perspective are only available to a conscious entity. More importantly, only a consciousness aware of both self and other. Animals controlled by instinct, adaptation, or behavior learned by repetition show no discernible acknowledgment of the concept of time.-> 
> > [*]Are all of these movies real?
> Yes. 
> > [*]Do the events in them exist anymore?
> No. 
> > [*]Are the films one continues stream, or a million instances strung together by the something we can not see within the framework of the movie?
> 
> They are a million instances strung together by the editor and director, and our brains interpret them as a continuous stream. 
> 
I found your answer to this last question interesting. Will think on it some more before replying to it.-> > [*]Do each of the different camera angles reflect reality?
> They are a recording of different angles of the same reality. 
> > [*]How can each of the different perspectives be real if they are all different?
> I don't see why this question is here; each camera captured a different angle of the same events.-This question is here because of a few reasons. One, time is relative to the viewer. To a person viewing the scene from an emotionally detached and uninterested viewpoint might time may seem to drag on interminably, while to a viewer with a vested interest or intense curiosity time may 'fly' by. To a person involved in the chase scene(using the analogy of a film), senses heightened from the adrenaline rush may seem to make time slow down, where a few seconds seem like minutes or hours. -If each persons perspective of time is relative to them, are all perspectives real? The answer of course no, because time is only a measurement tool, not a real physical property.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4361 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4361 Wed, 15 Sep 2010 12:09:06 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'Balance_Maintained The Illusion of Time (reply)

Tell you what, I can do one better. I can give you a practical example of how we are each correct. Study the way an old movie film works. Then, imagine having the same movie(i.e. locations, actors,scenes,etc) recorded from a million different camera angles, maybe even a few cameras that are recording something completely unrelated. Then ask yourself a couple of questions.
> 
>

  • Are all of these movies real?
>
  • Do the events in them exist anymore?
>
  • Are the films one continues stream, or a million instances strung together by the something we can not see within the framework of the movie?
>
  • Do each of the different camera angles reflect reality?
>
  • How can each of the different perspectives be real if they are all different?
>
  • etc etc etc
>


> 
> I am not implying that one 'now' to the next is not strung together, simply that I do not think that the framework for this mechanism is human's conception of 'Time'.-I don't see how the question of "framework" plays in. We are humans. We only have a "human" conception of time. We have no knowledge of any other; and moreso, our conception of time is false. Remember the last great experience you had? Maybe it was a roller coaster, or the thrill of a kiss. But that event is only in your mind, and as much as you will it to be, that moment cannot be revisted in actuality; the past is the past, and is gone. The future is forever uncertain; but at all times, we have "now." I will repeat and answer your questions here:-> [*]Are all of these movies real?
Yes. 
> [*]Do the events in them exist anymore?
No. 
> [*]Are the films one continues stream, or a million instances strung together by the something we can not see within the framework of the movie?-They are a million instances strung together by the editor and director, and our brains interpret them as a continuous stream. -> [*]Do each of the different camera angles reflect reality?
They are a recording of different angles of the same reality. 
> [*]How can each of the different perspectives be real if they are all different?
I don't see why this question is here; each camera captured a different angle of the same events.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4344 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4344 Tue, 14 Sep 2010 23:26:33 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) dhw&#13;&#10;> MATT: Our language helps preserve &quot;now&quot; in our memories, but they are only memories. [..] The present moment that was recorded in your memory cannot be reclaimed. [...] Time is nothing more than a ruler we use to mark events.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> I have no problem at all with this, but I&apos;m stubbornly reluctant to allow philosophy to take over from pragmatism, so I will argue my case so that you can both enlighten me with yours. What you have shown is that the past has no reality, and in a flash the present also loses its reality. The future has no reality anyway. But although they have no reality, we all assume (and why should we not?) that our memories ... even though they can&apos;t capture the reality of what was once fleetingly real ... nevertheless relate to something that WAS real. <<-I did try to deal with this; I&apos;ll try again. I do not say that &quot;things in the past never happened.&quot; I do not say that &quot;there is no events that did not occur prior to the present moment.&quot; -What I say is that time is separate from events. This shouldn&apos;t be too shocking anyway; Einstein already proved that time is relative in the first place. -First I need to try and restate myself: The absence of time does not negate cause and effect. I read your issue here as that the absence of time negates cause and effect? To me you seem to be reasoning, &quot;If time doesn&apos;t exist, then nothing that happened in the past happened.&quot; -Earlier this morning I had eaten bad fish. Now I have stomach cramps. -There is a cause and effect here; I ate bad fish, and now I have food poisoning because of it. How does time even affect this? -It doesn&apos;t. Bacteria began to grow in the morning--multiplying, but always in the &quot;present moment,&quot; until it got to the point where my body detected there was something wrong and started to fight the infection. When the doctor asks me, &quot;How long ago did you eat the fish?&quot; He is doing so because different species of bacteria grow at different speeds. Time here again, is only a measurement, one of many that the doctor uses to assess the type of infection. -Lets try another event: Some kids in a physics class are lined up, spaced every meter apart from each other. A bowling ball is rolled down their length, and as the ball passes them, each child clicks a stopwatch. -How does time affect this? -Again, it doesn&apos;t. In this instance, time is an explicit measurement in relation to the bowling ball. -Even our clocks are just a measurement of the position of our sun around the earth. -Time is practical because we need a way to reason about events yesterday to today. But it doesn&apos;t make it real. Time is a tool that lets us quantify and reason about the past.--&#13;&#10;>>I don&apos;t want to get sidetracked into issues of subjective interpretation here, so let&apos;s take a solid, material example. You and I are looking at a building. What we see will be our personal perception of it, but we do not doubt its reality, and if there were a million people standing there with us, they too would testify to the reality of the building. Through the mere fact that it is standing there in our present, we would all agree that it must have been built in the past. Each such perception of the present (immediately turning into memory) ... whether linked to material things or experiences or history or evolution ... testifies to the once-reality of the past. In other words, there has been an onward movement in which present has become past. We don&apos;t understand it, and as you say, it&apos;s a ruler we use to mark events, but &quot;nothing more than a ruler&quot; seems to me to miss out on the fact that the onward flow continues, and the records of the no-longer-real ... abstract as well as material ... are evidence of the reality of the movement. I would argue, then, that time is not the present, past and future, but the flow that links them. And so if you claim that time does not exist, you will have to convince me that there is no onward flow.-[EDIT]-You are presenting a false dilemma. My examples above deal with this. But I&apos;ll play. First let me explain more explicitly why I think it&apos;s a false dilemma: What creates time? For you to state that there is an actual flow, you have to be able to tell me what it is. I say that time is the difference between what I measured [at the present moment] yesterday, and [at the present moment] today. There is no &quot;flow.&quot; There just &quot;is.&quot; -In regards to the building, this is information that requires us to know how long it takes to build the building, and this knowledge tells us that the building has a minimum &quot;age&quot; (another two measurements of past vs. present).-[EDIT2]&#13;&#10;I&apos;m milking my brain for any other way to dispel the idea of a &quot;flow.&quot; I look into the past, I see what I would describe above as measurements. If a ball hit yesterday hits me in the head today, there&apos;s still a path of cause and effect. What convinces you that there is a &quot;flow?&quot; I think our differences here is one of perspective... you already accept that the future doesn&apos;t contain reality. -[EDITED]

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4343 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4343 Tue, 14 Sep 2010 22:52:54 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) Tell you what, I can do one better. I can give you a practical example of how we are each correct. Study the way an old movie film works. Then, imagine having the same movie(i.e. locations, actors,scenes,etc) recorded from a million different camera angles, maybe even a few cameras that are recording something completely unrelated. Then ask yourself a couple of questions.-

  • Are all of these movies real?&#13;&#10;
  • Do the events in them exist anymore?&#13;&#10;
  • Are the films one continues stream, or a million instances strung together by the something we can not see within the framework of the movie?&#13;&#10;
  • Do each of the different camera angles reflect reality?&#13;&#10;
  • How can each of the different perspectives be real if they are all different?&#13;&#10;
  • etc etc etc&#13;&#10;

-I am not implying that one &apos;now&apos; to the next is not strung together, simply that I do not think that the framework for this mechanism is human&apos;s conception of &apos;Time&apos;.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4334 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4334 Tue, 14 Sep 2010 08:59:05 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'Balance_Maintained The Illusion of Time (reply) BALANCE_MAINTAINED: I have said that Time is a linguistic construct that humans need to express an idea that we do not yet fully understand. I am not claiming to fully understand it myself, and by default I am left having to use the same literary constructs as everyone else. That does not mean it exists, it just means that our way of thinking and language are closely interwoven with that concept.-We have linguistic constructs for all the things we do not yet fully understand: consciousness, life, love, beauty, dark energy, imagination, will....That may not mean they exist, but it certainly doesn&apos;t mean they don&apos;t exist. You and Matt have explained the non-existence theory very clearly, and I&apos;ll switch to Matt&apos;s post on the subject, so that I can combine the two. But first, please don&apos;t apologize, Matt, for intervening! These discussions are open, and I find it immensely helpful to get these multiple viewpoints. -MATT: Our language helps preserve &quot;now&quot; in our memories, but they are only memories. [..] The present moment that was recorded in your memory cannot be reclaimed. [...] Time is nothing more than a ruler we use to mark events.-I have no problem at all with this, but I&apos;m stubbornly reluctant to allow philosophy to take over from pragmatism, so I will argue my case so that you can both enlighten me with yours. What you have shown is that the past has no reality, and in a flash the present also loses its reality. The future has no reality anyway. But although they have no reality, we all assume (and why should we not?) that our memories ... even though they can&apos;t capture the reality of what was once fleetingly real ... nevertheless relate to something that WAS real. I don&apos;t want to get sidetracked into issues of subjective interpretation here, so let&apos;s take a solid, material example. You and I are looking at a building. What we see will be our personal perception of it, but we do not doubt its reality, and if there were a million people standing there with us, they too would testify to the reality of the building. Through the mere fact that it is standing there in our present, we would all agree that it must have been built in the past. Each such perception of the present (immediately turning into memory) ... whether linked to material things or experiences or history or evolution ... testifies to the once-reality of the past. In other words, there has been an onward movement in which present has become past. We don&apos;t understand it, and as you say, it&apos;s a ruler we use to mark events, but &quot;nothing more than a ruler&quot; seems to me to miss out on the fact that the onward flow continues, and the records of the no-longer-real ... abstract as well as material ... are evidence of the reality of the movement. I would argue, then, that time is not the present, past and future, but the flow that links them. And so if you claim that time does not exist, you will have to convince me that there is no onward flow.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4333 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4333 Tue, 14 Sep 2010 07:10:56 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'dhw The Illusion of Time (reply)

You have actually just hit the proverbial nail on the head. Even though we are able to intellectually understand, to a certain extent, that time may not exist, we are limited in discussing it because of the limitations of our language and of our own understanding.-Maybe it&apos;s just me--but I don&apos;t have this problem. It is likely due to my time in Buddhism, but time is a concept I am willing to let go; many religions speak of acting in the present moment... the reason is that when the urge to do good comes your way, most people decide to shelve it for later, for when they don&apos;t have time... Sufi writers especially discuss this tragedy. -A timeless universe is easy for me to comprehend. It actually simplifies a great many things.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4304 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4304 Mon, 13 Sep 2010 01:35:42 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) dhw,&#13;&#10;I&apos;m interjecting again, sorry!->... But what I do not understand is how it is possible for our present to turn into our past, for memory to exist without a past, and for prediction to take place without a future, if there is not an onward flow from one to the other. Balance_Maintained began this discussion with the claim that &quot;we are rediscovering that time may not exist&quot;. If it does not exist, what name would you give to that onward flow?-Think of it this way: Our brains record like tape-recorders; the moment of &quot;now,&quot; the only moment that truly exists is here and gone just as fast as when you listen to your favorite song; our language helps preserve &quot;now&quot; in our memories, but they are only memories. We all know we can&apos;t undo the past, correct? My view tells us why. Because the present moment that was recorded in your memory cannot be reclaimed. -Our belief in time as an actual object comes from our ability to organize and plan--you can&apos;t organize and plan if all you have is &quot;here and now.&quot; You need to be able to look at past recordings to discern patterns, and then plan for the future. -But time is nothing more than a ruler we use to mark events.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4303 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4303 Mon, 13 Sep 2010 01:32:25 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) You have actually just hit the proverbial nail on the head. Even though we are able to intellectually understand, to a certain extent, that time may not exist, we are limited in discussing it because of the limitations of our language and of our own understanding.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4291 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4291 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 14:16:35 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'Balance_Maintained The Illusion of Time (reply)

I didn&apos;t say they would hide it, just that they wouldn&apos;t be fast to release it. I think they would try everything in their power to get back to falsify it.-Our experience with climategate certainly supports your contention. Peer review and the plethora of government grants has politicized science to a point where your mistrust of science seems very valid.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4289 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4289 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 13:53:32 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'David Turell The Illusion of Time (reply) Last night I drafted a reply to Balance_Maintained&apos;s post of 11 September at 11.52. This morning I woke to find that in the (non-existent) time in between, there had been twenty more posts! I wonder if/when ... in the course of this (non-existent) time ... you guys sleep. But of course US (non-existent) time is different from UK (non-existent) time, and in any case you guys may be an illusion. -That time is &quot;our construct&quot; (David) is clear, but so is language, and some of our language is used to denote things that we believe really exist (e.g. me). Romansh points out that &quot;we only have the &quot;now&quot;, whatever that is, and our perception of that is likely illusory.&quot; Balance-Maintained says that &quot;past, present and future can only exist now, in the form of memory, prediction, and current state,&quot; and &quot;much of reality is limited to what your senses can detect.&quot; Put all this together, and you have the argument that reality (whatever that is) exists only as we perceive it. In the context of this discussion, our present perceptions of &quot;reality&quot; immediately become our memories of our perceptions of reality. All this is clear, although I would strongly advise Balance_Maintained that when Romansh&apos;s intelligent brick comes flying towards his head, he should duck rather than tell himself it&apos;s an illusory perception. But what I do not understand is how it is possible for our present to turn into our past, for memory to exist without a past, and for prediction to take place without a future, if there is not an onward flow from one to the other. Balance_Maintained began this discussion with the claim that &quot;we are rediscovering that time may not exist&quot;. If it does not exist, what name would you give to that onward flow?

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4287 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4287 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 13:42:08 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'dhw The Illusion of Time (reply) I didn&apos;t say they would hide it, just that they wouldn&apos;t be fast to release it. I think they would try everything in their power to get back to falsify it.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4283 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4283 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 11:01:51 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'Balance_Maintained The Illusion of Time (reply)

&#13;&#10;> We only know it because it is what we are taught; My experience with African culture (so far) has shown me that they simply don&apos;t have the same concept of time as I have here in America; Time is relative. If time is relative; is it real?-&#13;&#10;We measure the passage of events. The universe evolves and we refer to the universe as containing space-time; really space evolution. Time is our measurement, on a clock, based on the sun and earth rotation. Light-years are a distance mechanism we invent. As noted in the physics of the universe time can run in either direction, but doesn&apos;t appear to. We are built to remember the past and recognize the present instant, and the arrow points to the future in our minds and consciousness. Time is as real as we make it, but it is our construct.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4280 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4280 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 05:19:08 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'David Turell The Illusion of Time (reply)

The latest I have read on it suggest that it is still under investigation, and somehow I doubt any controversial findings will be released in a hurry even if they are found.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> http://www.opfocus.org/index.php?topic=story&v=8&s=4-The website shows lots of speculation, even a hope that the speed of light will be shown to be slowing. I&apos;ll take proof over speculation. I don&apos;t think science will hide the discovery of a change in speed, if proven.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4277 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4277 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 05:02:24 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'David Turell The Illusion of Time (reply)

BALANCE_MAINTAINED: Humans have a nasty tendency towards arrogance, and we arrogantly assume that the ancient civilizations were ignorant and barbaric compared to us.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> First of all, welcome to the forum, and thank you for reopening this thread with such an interesting post. The comment above strikes a chord of recognition, as it seems to me that regardless of whether God exists or not, our own civilization has lost touch with many of the ideas that our ancestors took for granted ... a healthy respect for Nature perhaps being at the forefront. &#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> However, as I read what you wrote about timelessness, the thought occurred to me that without time existence would be both inconceivable and unbearable. I don&apos;t mean relative time, as in your quote from 2 Peter 3, but the total absence. Without time there could be no before and after, and therefore no change. We ourselves may moan about the effects of age, and the passing of our moments of happiness, but imagine being stuck at the same point in your life for ever. If there is a God, the same would surely apply, and I can only suppose that he would be bored out of his mind. Creating life would at least be a distraction from the endless sameness of his existence. There is a similar problem with the concept of an afterlife: what are we supposed to do throughout eternity or in a timeless void? It&apos;s only the onward movement that allows life to take on its variety. Without such movement ... which is totally dependent on the flow of time ... we, the rest of existence, and God himself might as well be dead.&#13;&#10;> -The Buddhist in me stirs...-No; your concept of how timelessness works here isn&apos;t quite right: you are following the fallacy I warned about in the original post. -Buddhist timelessness doesn&apos;t make any claims at all that we won&apos;t age or that things don&apos;t change; only that our concept of time itself is a man-made illusion. It isn&apos;t a property of the universe, but a convenient signpost between two measurements. Clearly, Buddhist babies still develop into adults, and Buddhist scientists can recreate past events. So what gives? The difference is on treating time as if it is REAL. Take out a ruler. Is a centimeter real, or did we make it up? Time is no different. -&#13;&#10;> A possible rejoinder to this is that we are ignorant, and the universe (or God) holds secrets to which we finite beings have no access. No-one can argue with that (although scientists like Hawking and Mlodinow have their own quasi-religious faith that we CAN unravel the secrets) ... but it&apos;s hard to build beliefs on ignorance, and time-based existence is the only one we actually know. There may be &quot;something very intuitive about timelessness&quot;, but I think there&apos;s also something very exciting and even reassuring about time.&#13;&#10;> -We only know it because it is what we are taught; My experience with African culture (so far) has shown me that they simply don&apos;t have the same concept of time as I have here in America; Time is relative. If time is relative; is it real?-> Once again, thank you for joining us. I&apos;d be interested to know your own views on the importance of time and timelessness.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4276 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4276 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 04:50:53 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696 The Illusion of Time (reply) &quot;Balance_Maintained,&quot;-Thank you for coming to the site, I am always happy to see new faces! Now, on with the discussion...&#13;&#10;> The original post made some references to Buddhism. I am not an expert on it, and have only just begun studying it. However, I have studied several other major religions, more out of morbid curiosity than anything, but some of the things I have found are interesting in that they expose a basic understanding of things not to be discovered by science for several thousand years. &#13;&#10;> -As far as the Buddhist perspective there isn&apos;t much to say: time is man-made; it is an illusion. The only thing that exists at any point in the universe is &quot;now.&quot; We can make predictions about the future, we can analyze the past, but the only important part of existence is in &quot;here and now.&quot; This wisdom is echoed in many religions--including the Abrahamic religions.-> The issue of time is one of those things, and the Buddhist view is not the only religion by far to have a premise in its religious text. &#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> For example, for the bible 2 Peter 3, &quot;a single day is like a thousand years with the Lord and a thousand years are like a single day.&quot; It could be a reference to the perspective of an entity that has an extrodinarily long life, or could be read as, Time has no meaning, or does not exist.&#13;&#10;> -This was my argument as a christian to support evolution. Obviously, I&apos;ve since given up that ghost, but one would wish that more Christians would read their damn book...-> &quot;According to the Hindu theory of creation, time (Sanskrit &apos;kal&apos;) is a manifestation of God. Creation begins when God makes his energies active and ends when he withdraws all his energies into a state of inactivity. God is timeless, for time is relative and ceases to exist in the Absolute. The past, the present and the future coexist in him simultaneously.&quot;&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> The concept is even reflected in the Jewish Kabballa (though I don&apos;t have a copy or link to one to reference.)&#13;&#10;> -Kabbalism refers to timelessness in terms of the Godhead. There is a few suggestions of this mentioned in the Zohar; but in general it is applied to God and not to the world or the universe. -> My point is, there is something very intuitive about timelessness. The idea has been around a LONG time. Humans have a nasty tendency towards arrogance, and we arrogantly assume that the ancient civilizations were ignorant and barbaric compared to us. (A lot of horse poo in my opinion, but regardless) However, it is only now that we are rediscovering that time may not exist. Even if the religious texts are not &apos;Inspired by God&apos; they are worth digging into as a source of insight into things that we are only just now discovering.-Physics has done quite a bit to demonstrate that nature is NOT intuitive. While I don&apos;t deride ancient civilizations in terms of wisdom; I would echo dhw here in asking the question: &quot;Would you prefer to submit to medicine of 4000 years ago, or medicine in this day and age?&quot; Especially in terms of emergency care, the ancients had nothing on us. Or, what about disease being caused by demons instead of bacteria? -I bring this up only in the caution that the ancients did not have all the answers, otherwise we wouldn&apos;t be wrestling with many of the same questions.

]]> https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4273 https://agnosticweb.com/index.php?id=4273 Sun, 12 Sep 2010 04:19:20 +0000 The nature of a \'Creator\'xeno6696