“I propose that time and its passage are fundamental
and real and the hopes and beliefs about timeless truths and timeless realms
are mythology.”
In “Time Reborn - From the Crisis in Physics to the Future of the Universe”
by Lee Smolin
Impermanence,
Buddhist style?
Buddhism seems
to acknowledge the play of opposites I've referred to elsewhere.
Recognising the
yin-yang nature of the universe, in order to claim there is constant 'flux'
(fluidity, rather than change; a subtle difference) - or for argument's sake,
change - Buddhists balance that by asserting a 'greater' reality - the one,
eternal, stable, whole (a supposed 'deeper' reality).
Contradiction
and paradox is near the heart of evidenced, reasoned contemplation?
As for
Aristotle:
time is a
measurement of change is a measurement of time.
Change makes
time possible, and vice-versa.
In principle, it
seems that time persists, even in conditions of perfect stillness.
Yet any attempt
to conceive a temporal progression, absent all change, seems to lead us into
perplexing self-contradictions: any attempt to imagine how such unchanging
time-flow could be measured, requires changing. It seems that time must be more
than change; yet remove change, and time vanishes! But if time is just a means to measure change,
then in principle, it should permit the possibility of a world where change is
cyclical. Yet our understanding seems to limit time to a linear, one way
progression.
Or does it?
Would a world
where each day began the same as the previous one be conceivable? A world
where, during 24 hours, everything that ever happens and could happen takes
place? Alternatively, could a world be conceived of, in which everything
changes every moment? Where NOTHING is the same from one moment to the next? How
could time possibly apply to a world where there was nothing stable to measure
change by?
Smolin talks of
life lived in the moment: of time being a succession of moments.
But who,
seriously, experiences life like that? To me, here, typing away, the present
seems to persist. There's a smoothness, a constancy, and an openness about it. Smolin
also claims that we must reconcile relativity theory and quantum mechanics -
the micro and the macro - into one unifying theory. But, when asked why - perhaps we must live
with fact that they are, and always will be, irreconcilable? - he flounders. It
seems this is simply a matter of faith for him! Yet, he also claims that the
world physics says is 'real', is merely a mathematically modelled one. And that
these models, rather than existing in some sense 'outside' our spatiotemporal
world of experience actually emerges from it; We should realise that,
attempting to apply (as, he claims, physicists do) abstract mathematical models
- designed to describe local, experimentally conditioned phenomena - to reality
as a whole, is erroneous. Cosmology needs different concepts than quantum
physics uses on the micro, mathematically modelled scale.
Everywhere and
anywhere, our existence always pre-supposes our existence.
To assert it in
the sense you do is, as I've said elsewhere, an obvious (sic) truism.
When lots of
things are happening, and we are fully engaged, time may seem to 'fly by'.
When bugger all
things are happening, and we are disengaged, time may seem to drag.
When young and
active, time seems to pass so slowly.
When old and
inactive, time seems to pass so quickly
As Einstein
showed, time is relative - to an observer; to speed; to distance. The effects
of change may seem temporal, insofar as we see them in a linear sense, from our
past to our future.
Yet, what is the
present?
On reflection,
it seems that there's only the past - which, as past, no longer exists; and the
future, which is yet to exist.
The present,
where things supposedly 'exist', are 'real', right now.
Is illusion.
If time must
exist, then how can there ever be a present?
And, if there's
no present, how can anything, let alone time, exist?
In
spatiotemporal terms, if Smolin's take on the 'metaphysics' or 'cosmology' of
current physics is reasonably accurate, it's more like a link - or a line -
between (point) A and (point) B. (Insofar as we
conceive it as a 'journey', that's down to our woefully limited intellectual/instinctive/sensible
abilities: we are stuck as things within space-time, rather than observers
outside it, able to see the greater reality: what's real (sic). What you
imagine to be the signs of a journey through time, taking its toll (e.g.
ageing) are 'really' more like signposts on a route. Or the sights along the
way, when you go from Cornwall to London, say.
To us spacetime
trapped beings, it’s a one-way journey. But from 'outside' spacetime, that
temporal transformation is neither back or forward. It just IS. Fully formed.
Mapped out. 'Change' is a concept arising out of our limited conceptual
capacity to comprehend the 'big picture'. We put our faith in seemingly
obvious, common sense views; yet so often, over time, science has exposed their
erroneousness (It seemed so obvious that a smaller, lighter object would fall slower
than a big heavy one; yet science proved this wrong).
Kant realised
time was imposed on experience by minds; physics has seemingly 'proven' this
(Einstein onward) through evidenced reasoning. (Though, of course, a
comparatively few theoretical physicists - like Smolin - resist this
'consensus'). Of course, what you think physicists mean when they deny time,
and what they really (sic) mean, may well differ.
It may be useful
to substitute (best) "explain" for "exist".
Assuming 'time'
fails to explain what common-sense assumes it does about reality, as far as
physics is concerned. So, physics, post-Einstein, replaced it with 'space-time'.
Time, like length, width and depth, is an idealised, mathematical dimension;
something we conceptually construct to measure stuff. Of course, I'm
playing devil’s advocate above; assuming for sake of argument that Smolin is
correct, and that most theoretical physicists have rejected time's 'existence'.
Hence,
everything is true and false; real and unreal.
Which lead me to
a choice: if everything is isn't; and vice versa.
Then attempting
to think anything is impossible; as one must always be looking to negate
anything Smolin asserted.
And, if you
manage to do that, then you have then to try to re-assert it.
Anyway, I saw
relativity (or relativeness) as a possible way out of this.
'Everything that
is true is false' smacks of absolutism.
But if all is
true and all is false, perhaps that can be seen as:
Everything is
partially true and partially false; to varying, and probably changing, degrees.
What we are
doing, for the most part, may be distinguishing what seems (relatively) more
true from what seems (relatively) more false.
IE: what we say
is true, is really more true than false.
Relatively speaking.
(Absolutely speaking, it's still as false as it is true).
But, 'cos I'm
still a sucker for this philosophy shit, I thought it might be interesting to
try to see everything in positive terms.
After all, when
we deny something, we say sod-all about what is.
'He's not
guilty. your honour."
"So who is?
Somebody did it!"
If 'time' is not
'real'; what is it? What does it refer to?
As long as any
word has any meaning; as long as it's utterance makes some sense to someone, then
it exists as something more than merely an empty word.
I'd like
answers.
But I've been
compelled to ask questions from an early age.
"That kid
won't let up. He's always asking why!"
Somewhere along
the line, that seemed to change from "why" to "what".
What is?
Sod all, really.
But, 'unreally',
everything imaginable, and more.
Seeing the world
as made up by minds; as the work of imaginations; It sure helps trying to
understand how so many people seem to believe such silly stuff.
From astrology,
thru theologies, UFOs, conspiracy theories, ad
infinitum.
Everything is
made up; but some of it makes more (evidenced reasoned) sense than others.
What alternative
to science does Smolin offer?
None!
Merely an
alternative scientism.
Theoretical
physicists, in the absence of experimental support for their theories, have
understandably come to increasingly rely on mathematical models, on which to
base their speculation on the possible nature of the universe. Smolin's
response is an appeal to 'everyday intuition'; but that 'intuition', in his
hands, maybe more akin to an earlier, pre-post (or even simply) modern,
metaphysical ideology. He says he seeks to re-align physics with making
falsifiable hypotheses; yet how is what he seems to offer any more open to such
testability?
"Is time
emergent or fundamental?"
That's more akin
to "the disagreement" that "could hardly be more
fundamental".
And what about
space?
Smolin seems to
accept that space is "unreal" (is emergent).
If given a
choice between space or time, people would be more likely to 'intuitively'
assume space existed, than time.
Smolin, in the
simplified, distorted sense in which his speculation about a fundamental
conception of time is presented here, would be proposing a pretty bog-standard
and old-hat metaphysical realism (the universal 'time' has objective/absolute
'existence').
Dressing this up
as "everyday intuition' hardly does him any favours; it's more-like a kiss
of death. (Science typically progresses by defying intuition).
Check yourself
before you wet yourself!
If it's
'outside' time (actually, that's 'outside' spacetime), it can hardly precede or
succeed), can it?!
Such a theory,
should it ever emerge, would unite quantum field theory with general
relativity. Insofar as 'time' is 'unreal', how could it concern itself with a
'history', when history presupposes time?
Smoliin claims
to have captured something of the essence of physics; minus the maths. If this
is any indication, then it's also minus any sense, common or otherwise. If Smolin is right - if he's being read right
- then physics' study of the natural (material) world has lead it to largely
posit ideal objects - mathematical models and speculative concepts derived from
them - as if they are the constituents at that make up the material world's
essence? Black holes, dark matter, electromagnetic fields, etc. are theoretical
constructs - ideas - that are inferred and imagined, based on understandings of
observed 'material' phenomena.
How is it
inconsistently to be skeptical of something unless and until there is some
necessary data? Necessary and sufficient would be nice but I'm enough of a
realist and a seasoned experimentalist to know that is asking a lot. Just some
at least indicative data. All I've had thrown at me is 'Theory' meaning
hypotheses. A theory without data is just waffle. Darwin knew that, which is
why “On The Origin of Species” is packed with data. He also spent years doing
scientific grunt work to establish himself. His systematics of the barnacles is
still the seminal work on the subject. Added to, amended by genetics but still
sound, referred to science. He was the first to demonstrate what good worms did
to soil. Some people think all he did was think up a nice theory then sit back.
Darwin was a data man. Evolution came upon him in contact with the data just as
it did with Wallace in the Indies. The Wallace line denoting the divide between
Asian animals and plants and Australian animals and plants still exists, still
carries his name.
AS HEINLEIN WOULD SAY. AGAIN, SHOW ME
THE DATA!
Bottom-Line: Sadly, drink is consuming me - even now, I'm pissing blood, I should be drinking water, and here I am with a glass of booze. Like the smoker, putting a cig into a hole in his throat, as he approaches lung-cancer death? Nietzsche helped me 'realise' that everything true is false; Derrida, that everything false is (therefore) true.