I define Time as “change in now”. — guptanishank
The questions of "what is time?" now become what is this force; what causes the future to become the past; how does now transform the future to the past; and what does this transformation consist of. — Metaphysician Undercover
The question is about time and as it is a dimension time can exist without any forces but not the other way around. — TimeLine
If now is considered as a division between the future and the past, then you'd have to define the "future", and the "past". — guptanishank
You can only experience "now". So if "now" did not change, there would be no past or present. — guptanishank
What is time?
What is “now”?
I define Time as “change in now”. Now is the moment we are experiencing constantly. — guptanishank
When you sit with a nice girl for two hours you think it’s only a minute, but when you sit on a hot stove for a minute you think it’s two hours. That’s relativity. — not sure, really
I generally agree with your (paradoxical) formulation of time as the 'change in now,' — 0rff
But let's say that we can make this idea clear. Then a new problem arises. There is no time for change in an instant. Let f(t) be the state of object. If we understand change as the non-equality of f(x) and f(y) at two times x and y, then clearly we can't put x and y in the same instant unless x = y. But then f(x) = f(y) and we don't have change. — 0rff
We notice change. We seek change. We await change. The invention of abstract, scientific time comes fairly late in the game. We had to institute this time. — 0rff
So there must be a minimum time taken for us to realize that now has changed, or the instant has changed. — guptanishank
Mathematics fails to capture the full essence of some phenomenon, especially if the phenomenon is qualitative. — guptanishank
I apologize if the reply seemed meagre. It was all I could think of at the time. — guptanishank
The now simply changes and we notice it. At all times. — guptanishank
The other moments are lost in the past. — guptanishank
Regarding your earlier reply, where you point out that now could be a real number.
I think your approach is correct, but we are looking for continuity there. What way is there to know if indeed time is continuous, at all points, if all we can do is observe the now, and some data from the past? — guptanishank
This is just a way of looking at things that I find fascinating. This more or less a paraphrase of my interpretation of Heidegger (a difficult but extremely fascinating philosopher.) If any of this sounds good, I recommend his 80 page book The Concept of Time. — 0rff
No we experience now.
The experience is definitely of the past, but there would be no way to recognize the past from the future or anything else if now stopped. — guptanishank
You are still defining the past and future on "now". You'd have to define them on time, to define now, otherwise the definition is circular, if you are trying to define now on time. — guptanishank
Look what you are doing. You say that experience is of the past, and you could not differentiate between past and future if there was no now. So your conclusion of "now" is a logical conclusion derived from these premises. I experience past. There is future. Past and future are not the same. Your conclusion of "now" is not based in experience it is derived from deduction. What if there is no difference between past and future? Then your argument is not sound, and you cannot claim a "now". — Metaphysician Undercover
The task is to define both now and time.No, past and future are not defined by now, you have this backward. "Now" is deduced from the assumed difference between past and future. If there is a substantial difference between past and future, then there must be a division between them. That division is called "now". — Metaphsician Undercover
already occurred indirectly refers to now. The complete sentence being already occurred compared from "now".Correct, the past refers to things which have already occurred, The future refers to things which have not yet occurred. — Metaphysician Undercover
already occurred indirectly refers to now. The complete sentence being already occurred compared from "now".
same with your definition of future. — guptanishank
So overall your definition is circular, because now depends on past and future, and past and future depend on now as well.
Circular definitions as you know are absurd. — guptanishank
No, there is no reference to now in "already occurred". As I said, you are deucing now from "already occurred", by saying that "already occurred" must be relative. It is not spoken as relative, it is spoken as absolute. So it is only with the addition of the premise that "already occurred" must be relative, that you produce the deductive conclusion that "all ready occurred" refers (indirectly) to "now". That is why you even admit that the reference to now is indirect. — Metaphysician Undercover
This is where you are making a mistake. The past you define as events which have already occurred.
Already occurred from where? From now. — guptanishank
A "dimension" is a conceptual construct, as is "force". I do not think that the concept of "force" relies on the concept of "dimension", because human beings had an understanding of force before they created dimensions. Also, I would say without hesitation, that human beings had an understanding of force before they had an understanding of time.
But if you want to talk about some natural, real thing which these concepts refer to, we need some definitions, because I think that the consensus in physics is that "time" doesn't refer to any real thing, just like "dimension" doesn't refer to any real thing. — Metaphysician Undercover
In the spacetime model, the temporal dimension is distance just like the other three. There is physical distance between any two events, and that distance is temporal only if the two events are inside their mutual light cones. It is spatial only if the two events are outside those cones.Plus distance is only applied for space. How are you defining distance for time. — guptanishank
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