Q&A with Paul Davies: What is Time?

Hi Akinbo,

You asked, "Has time flowed?"

In our conscious experiencing of duration elapsing, we assume that time is passing.

Please see my initial post, immediately above, that is dated February 25th, 2,014.

Thank you for your questions Akinbo.

1. Yes the imagined future has names. It is not a prerequisite that something actually exist for it to have a name. Unicorns are imaginary things with a name. 2. Morrow is an old English word for morning so I imagine tomorrow means the morning that we are "going to". I will see you tomorrow does not mean I will see you tomorrow but next today, morning. I actually think Nexttoday is a better name.

3.Rethinking a Key Assumption About the Nature of Time by J. C. N. Smith We can superimpose a temporal view point on to a material change. Lets say an egg has gone from raw to cooked with solid white and runny yolk.The pan of water has gone from cold to just boiling. The two material changes can be correlated. that is how I cook boiled eggs. It might also be done this way. The egg will be cooked as before but instead of comparing the state of the water I will compare the position of the hands on a clock. Now I can say the egg will be cooked when 3 minutes have elapsed on the clock. ( I think that's about right, I never use that method.) It is comparison of change that is being used in both methods not actually the flow of time though you and I could call it that and know what we mean.

If the Earth stopped spinning there wouldn't be days and nights, so if its night , to morrow or next morning would not arrive, messing up calender time but there would still be other measurable changes occurring. So change in configuration of the Object universe, "passage of time", has not stopped.

"Comes into being" is just a turn of phrase. I mean when the configuration of nexttoday exists it isn't tomorrow it is today. It doesn't exist as tomorrow except in our minds.

All of these different words about time seem to be saying pretty much the same thing. The Smith essay argues that time flows since the universe evolves and that is somehow a different explanation from a time that is what clocks measure or a blocktime.

It always seems to me that defining a moment of time, i.e., what now means, is very important. You must avoid the knife edge of an infinitely divisible moment resulting in an infinity of moments. As soon as you have a finite moment, it doesn't matter what word you use for it.

An operational definition of time is what clocks measure, just as in Smith's essay, but the complete definition of time is embedded in the fossil record of each and every object of the universe. Time is not only the evolution of the universe, a flow, but time is in the evolution of each object as the flow of time moments.

Thus, although time is continuous, matter is not. Matter objects are discrete lumps of matter and the size of those lumps defines a moment of matter and a moment of time. What we call clocks are objects with very regular matter moments that accumulate into an object like a second. A second only has meaning as an amount of matter and each object in the universe is made up of the same concept of time.

Georgina, I actually gave your response further thought and I kind of agree about, "configuration or arrangement of the Object universe has changed". Perhaps, if we know why or what causes configuration or arrangement to change we can apprehend time wherever it may be hiding. That is if it exists.

Akinbo

Time is duration of motion in timeless space.

Dear Akinbo, (Steve, Georgina, Jim, Amrit, et al Hi :)

I don't always join discussions like this but yours seem to be sensible and open minded. I came across your discussion because I have entered 3 videos in the FQXI "Show Me the Physics" on this site, and they are all about "time", or more accurately "the possibility that we may be completely wrong to assume something like "time" exists in anyway at all".

(e.g. "Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past". "

On that matter, Akinbo, you suggest a dialectic ("discussing all the possibilities and reductio ad absurdum type arguments."), and I think you are very much on the right track, and have written the book 'A Brief History of Timelessness', in that format - i.e. a (imo) very thorough investigation of the truth of opinions re the theory that a thing called time may exist.

However, (with respect), to varying degrees you each may have 'automatically' incorporated a critical error in to the discussion, from the very outset, making it (imo) impossible to resolve unless the (possible) error is seen, and very carefully considered.

Fundamentally, the error may be that you are sure you are discussing to some degree at least, "a thing called time", and, trying to work out what "it" is...

The problem being, if "it", is absolutely nothing, (other than a useful idea), then even where the conversation gets close to seeing how the theory of "time" may be completely unfounded, people try to explain and describe this... in terms of a thing called "time". (i.e. there seems to be an ingrained assumption, which just won't quit).

Can I suggest therefore that you start any dialectic with a mind free from every rumor or theory you know, and starting from the most basic observations of what you in actual fact, actually, directly observe.

I would suggest that what we seem to actually and only observe is...

1- that matter exists, and,

2- matter is able to move, interact and change.

What I would also suggest is movement, change and interactions only happen where there is energy/momentum present, and they happen in essentially simple physical ways e.g. as a bowling ball hits some pins ( as a large scale example).

But... what , in my opinion, as things are existing and moving etc, we do not observe in any way at all that there is also a thing called "time" that exists, and is needed for, or part of, motion etc.

i.e. despite hearsay and opinion, I personally do not see anything "come out of a future", or "disappear into a past", or extra to energy "need an intangible thing called 'time' to be happening".

- And therefore, if you want the conversation to be scientific, and logical, I would suggest it is invalid for anyone to "just" use terms like "time, or "the past" or "the future", without providing a clear explanation of exactly what they think they are talking about - and - detailing a scientific experiment , as per the scientific method , that they think proves the existence of the "thing" they think needs explaining or incorporating into our understanding of the world.

(this complete lack of science , by the scientific community, re the apparent subject of "time" , is what I call "the elephant in the room, wearing the emperor's new robe", - i.e. its amazing that so many experts are happy to talk about something no one can see or describe, and ignore the fact no experiments exist to prove any aspect of it : )

( this (with respect Georgina : ) may avoid confusions like

"Tomorrow doesn't move Akinbo it doesn't exist. When it comes into being it is -Now."

as - "the term Tomorrow is useful but(unless prove to exist), scientifically, completely invalid - the sun is emitting light, and the earth IS spinning, and we may be constructing thoughts about how the universe IS, and calling them thoughts about a place or thing called 'Tomorrow'.

But for the sun to shine, and the earth to spin, and for us to have any thoughts , or label them in any way (imo) proves only that matter exists and can interact.

To expect there to be a valid explanation for a term like "tomorrow", the questioner would have to define what this thing "is", and provide reasonable proof that it exists, and justifies explanation, or incorporation into any understanding of the world )

The key thing to consider here, imo, is that part of the matter that exists, moves and changes in the universe, is of course, the physical matter that make up ourselves and our minds.

If we consider very fully, and carefully how every single "memory" we have, is in fact something that just exists, and thus proves only that matter exists, and can be in stable (or unstable) formations - then we may see how - (no matter how strongly we may feel otherwise), the patterns we "call" , memories of "the past"...

1- do show that matter exists and can form stable formations in our minds...but

2- do not show in any way at all that there is a thing called "time" - OR - that there is a thing or placed called "the temporal past" - or "the temporal future".

In short (Akinbo), if you wish to have a valid dialectic, it might be worth you considering what I call (in abh Timelessness) the Key Question, specifically.

"If the universe is just filled with matter moving, changing, and interacting, including the matter in our own minds, would this be enough to mislead us into thinking 'a past', and thus 'time' exist"?

Or to put it another (falsifiable) way, "Can you produce an experiment to show that matter does NOT just exist, move and interact etc (but also needs a thing called time) ?"

All the best,

not quite sure how links work here, I`ll post some separately also to the FQXI videos, in case anyone's interested.

Matthew Marsden

(auth "A Brief History of Timelessness")

link:http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/2245]"Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past". "[/link]

(please post video comments on the FQXI site

(couldn't see where original response went, so added it to main stream, links to follow , m.m.)

Dear Akinbo, (Steve, Georgina, Jim, Amrit, et al Hi :)

I don't always join discussions like this but yours seem to be sensible and open minded. I came across your discussion because I have entered 3 videos in the FQXI "Show Me the Physics" on this site, and they are all about "time", or more accurately "the possibility that we may be completely wrong to assume something like "time" exists in anyway at all".

(e.g. "Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past". "

On that matter, Akinbo, you suggest a dialectic ("discussing all the possibilities and reductio ad absurdum type arguments."), and I think you are very much on the right track, and have written the book 'A Brief History of Timelessness', in that format - i.e. a (imo) very thorough investigation of the truth of opinions re the theory that a thing called time may exist.

However, (with respect), to varying degrees you each may have 'automatically' incorporated a critical error in to the discussion, from the very outset, making it (imo) impossible to resolve unless the (possible) error is seen, and very carefully considered.

Fundamentally, the error may be that you are sure you are discussing to some degree at least, "a thing called time", and, trying to work out what "it" is...

The problem being, if "it", is absolutely nothing, (other than a useful idea), then even where the conversation gets close to seeing how the theory of "time" may be completely unfounded, people try to explain and describe this... in terms of a thing called "time". (i.e. there seems to be an ingrained assumption, which just won't quit).

Can I suggest therefore that you start any dialectic with a mind free from every rumor or theory you know, and starting from the most basic observations of what you in actual fact, actually, directly observe.

I would suggest that what we seem to actually and only observe is...

1- that matter exists, and,

2- matter is able to move, interact and change.

What I would also suggest is movement, change and interactions only happen where there is energy/momentum present, and they happen in essentially simple physical ways e.g. as a bowling ball hits some pins ( as a large scale example).

But... what , in my opinion, as things are existing and moving etc, we do not observe in any way at all that there is also a thing called "time" that exists, and is needed for, or part of, motion etc.

i.e. despite hearsay and opinion, I personally do not see anything "come out of a future", or "disappear into a past", or extra to energy "need an intangible thing called 'time' to be happening".

- And therefore, if you want the conversation to be scientific, and logical, I would suggest it is invalid for anyone to "just" use terms like "time, or "the past" or "the future", without providing a clear explanation of exactly what they think they are talking about - and - detailing a scientific experiment , as per the scientific method , that they think proves the existence of the "thing" they think needs explaining or incorporating into our understanding of the world.

(this complete lack of science , by the scientific community, re the apparent subject of "time" , is what I call "the elephant in the room, wearing the emperor's new robe", - i.e. its amazing that so many experts are happy to talk about something no one can see or describe, and ignore the fact no experiments exist to prove any aspect of it : )

( this (with respect Georgina : ) may avoid confusions like

"Tomorrow doesn't move Akinbo it doesn't exist. When it comes into being it is -Now."

as - "the term Tomorrow is useful but(unless prove to exist), scientifically, completely invalid - the sun is emitting light, and the earth IS spinning, and we may be constructing thoughts about how the universe IS, and calling them thoughts about a place or thing called 'Tomorrow'.

But for the sun to shine, and the earth to spin, and for us to have any thoughts , or label them in any way (imo) proves only that matter exists and can interact.

To expect there to be a valid explanation for a term like "tomorrow", the questioner would have to define what this thing "is", and provide reasonable proof that it exists, and justifies explanation, or incorporation into any understanding of the world )

The key thing to consider here, imo, is that part of the matter that exists, moves and changes in the universe, is of course, the physical matter that make up ourselves and our minds.

If we consider very fully, and carefully how every single "memory" we have, is in fact something that just exists, and thus proves only that matter exists, and can be in stable (or unstable) formations - then we may see how - (no matter how strongly we may feel otherwise), the patterns we "call" , memories of "the past"...

1- do show that matter exists and can form stable formations in our minds...but

2- do not show in any way at all that there is a thing called "time" - OR - that there is a thing or placed called "the temporal past" - or "the temporal future".

In short (Akinbo), if you wish to have a valid dialectic, it might be worth you considering what I call (in abh Timelessness) the Key Question, specifically.

"If the universe is just filled with matter moving, changing, and interacting, including the matter in our own minds, would this be enough to mislead us into thinking 'a past', and thus 'time' exist"?

Or to put it another (falsifiable) way, "Can you produce an experiment to show that matter does NOT just exist, move and interact etc (but also needs a thing called time) ?"

All the best,

not quite sure how links work here, I`ll post some separately also to the FQXI videos, in case anyone's interested.

Matthew Marsden

(auth "A Brief History of Timelessness")

link:http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/2245]"Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past". "[/link]

(please post video comments on the FQXI site

Dear Akinbo, Steve, Georgina, Jim, Amrit, et al

The FQXI link system here seems rather odd - you can link to the discussion on a video, but it doesn't show the video at the top of the page !

You can see all the videos in the FQXi FORUM: FQXi Video Contest

here.

(mine, relating to my work on the possibility of timelessness as per the discussion, are...

Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past".

Time Travel,Timeless Answers to Prof Brian Cox's Science of Dr WHO

Time travel, Worm hole, billiard ball' paradox, Timelessly. (re Paul Davies- New scientist article)

Note: FQXI requests of course that any comments are made on the FQXI pages relating to the videos).

M.Marsden

Don't know why those links don't work, last try,

FQXi FORUM: FQXi Video Contest

relating to my work on the possibility of timelessness

Does Time exist? How 'Time travel Paradoxes' can't happen without "the past".

Time Travel,Timeless Answers to Prof Brian Cox's Science of Dr WHO

Time travel, Worm hole, billiard ball' paradox, Timelessly. (re Paul Davies- New scientist article)

Note: FQXI requests of course that any comments are made on the FQXI pages relating to the videos).

M.Marsden

(I followed the instructions, but no joy, anyone interested please look under contests, or cut paste http://fqxi.org/community/forum/category/31423)

mm

FQXi web site

Hi Peter,

Very nice to hear from you, i hope you can check out each of the videos re scoring ( they work as a set ), I`ll have a look at your essay, seems interesting,

My first thoughts are that whether Nature is Continuous or Discrete shouldn't conflict with what i am suggesting.

it seems to me we have a tremendous amount of confirmation bias instilled in the area of science that assumes a thing called time must exist, i.e. many people may jump to the conclusion that pretty much everything confirms their conjecture ans assumption that an invisible intangible thing called time must exist.

(this is why I see the theory of time as analogous to "the emperors new robe".

Re your paper, (imo) nature may be Continuous or Discrete, but this may not prove there is a past, a future and a thing called time that may 'flow' in a Continuous or Discrete way.

my first thought on your text is re,

"A glass box with mirror floor and ceiling is in uniformmotion with respect to an external observer O. A light pulse reflects, vertically with respect to the box,which represents an inertial frame. But as it moves, O must observe the pulse at more than c on a diagonaltrack, so time must dilate to slow the pulse down,"

re "time must dilate"

i would say only that "the oscillator oscillates in a dilated way, or more 'slowly' than expected".

this is extremely different to suggesting there is a thing called time, which is dilated in its passage from a past to a future,

re this i think it is extremely important to consider how Einstein only seems to assume time exists in "on the electrodynamics of moving bodies" - and in no way proves this in relativity - but - many many people assume time is proven in relativity.

you can find more inf on this at my www.timelessness.co.uk site ( cant get links to work here :(

Specifically

https://sites.google.com/site/abriefhistoryoftimelessness/special-relativity

and

https://sites.google.com/site/abriefhistoryoftimelessness/comments-on-time-books/-einstein-s-relativity

yours

Matthew Marsden

(auth: a brief history of timelessness)

Matt,

The comment; "so time must dilate" was Einstein's view (along with the box "contracting" not the coherent solution which followed.

It appears you didn't understand or rationalise the solution. No length contraction or dilation of 'time' is needed. The 'signals' emitted by n mechanisms we call 'clocks' can indeed be Doppler shifted (but only 'on arrival'), so giving the same results.

It seems I forgot to add the attachment. I've stuck it below here. Let me know if you understand it. It's all abut Raman scattering (1930 Nobel), which is absorption by electrons and re-emission each time at the new c using the electron 'centre-of-mass' rest frame as the datum. Far too simple to be understood it seems!

It seems community members can only score as 'public'! bit I'll try to find some time to look through the other video's and score them. The trouble is I don't appear to have any. Any ideas where I can find some?

Best wishes

PeterAttachment #1: Light_Box2.jpg

Science needs relevant and feasible clarifications rather airy-fairy opinions:

Is time an objective and ubiquitous measure? Obviously yes, if we ignore SR:

Correction for delay and Doppler shift provided, the time seen by A equals to the time seen by B and vice versa. This corresponds to the assumed equality of A and B as well as to any experience so far.

While there is no known natural point of reference in space, and any (usual) event-related time scale does also need an arbitrarily chosen point zero, current elapsed time and time to come have a natural zero, the point now. See my last but one essay

While future durations cannot be actually measured in advance, not just any clock is designed to measure duration of something that happened in the past.

Time is a measure that permanently grows and doesn't loop.

Even if there was a Big Bang, further speculations are unfounded and useless.

Objections? Additions?

Eckard

I forgot mentioning that Heaviside managed to seemingly provide future data by analytic continuation in order to use complex Fourier transformation with nonsensical integration from minus to plus infinity.

Use of real-valued Cosine transformation is sufficient if one prefers to analyze only the already available past data.

This avoids redundancy and imperfections in signal processing, in particular of the spectrogram, and it has been successfully used in coding, e.g. MPEG.

Eckard

Matt,

you wrote quoting me"( this (with respect Georgina : ) may avoid confusions like

"Tomorrow doesn't move Akinbo it doesn't exist. When it comes into being it is -Now." That is not at all a confusion but a response to Akinbo's particular question worded in a particular way which you have read and taken out of contexrt. I replied further to Akinbo, "Comes into being" is just a turn of phrase. I mean when the configuration of nexttoday exists it isn't tomorrow it is today. It doesn't exist as tomorrow except in our minds. It is it because it refers to the material configuration of the Object universe, material patterns and relationships not disembodied time.

Maybe, quantum physical tenets are effected? Let me first explain something correct but not very obvious: Redundancy in the sense of too much of data, does not contradict to incompleteness, i.e. not enough data.

I criticize that the use of time as a line that is infinitely extended to both sides instead of the two half-lines (rays) of past time and time to come implies using a (redundant) complex-valued rather than real-valued description.

That's why I early suspected that Schroedinger's heuristic trick (cf. his 4th communication in Ann Phys. 1924?) might be to blame for being a redundant i.e. incomplete description. Meanwhile, I got aware that Einstein correctly asked what does determine the lifetime of an atom if its description is complete, and he had the idea of a guiding (Fuehrungs-) wave even before de Broglie. Einstein's rejection of any spooky action at distance is certainly also correct, even if I question his SR.

Pleas check these arguments carefully. They may have unwelcome to many consequences.

Eckard

Matt,

My argument against time is that as individual beings, we experience change as a sequence of events and so think of it as this point of the present moving from past events to future ones. Physics then further reduces this impression to measures from one event to another, as compared to the progression of other, seemingly more stable units of duration, but there doesn't seem to be an actual, universal measure and all specific measures seem to vary according to physical circumstance.

Yet since it is this dynamic of change, these events are being formed and dissolved, so that it is the events which are actually going from future to past. To wit, the earth does not travel some dimension from yesterday to tomorrow, rather tomorrow becomes yesterday because the earth turns.

The obvious problem is that since the linear, rational component of our brains evolved as a navigation tool from this sense of linear sequence, this observation doesn't compute for very many people. (Plants don't have that linear rational thought process, but are largely thermodynamic.)

Now what this means is that time is an effect of motion, similar to temperature. In fact, time is to temperature, what frequency is to amplitude. It's just that we experience time as an individual sequence, while we experience temperature as a cumulative effect, but this goes back the realization that there is no universal measure of time, but only the cumulative effect of lots of different rates of change. A faster clock rate doesn't move into the future more rapidly, but ages/burns quicker and so fades into the past faster.

Also the non-linear, emotional side of the brain is effectively a thermostat and so functions as a scalar, as in pressure and temperature, hot cold, stress, etc. Effects like intuition come from the wave effect of these actions creating connections, interactions, etc that don't have an obvious linear sequence.

This linearity is why we associate time with motion and thus space.

Regards,

John M

PS, Sorry I haven't seen the videos. I live out in the country and have a lousy satellite connection and slightly out of date computer, so video is more trouble than its worth, even when it does program.

I enjoyed Al Schneider's video "Is the Big Bang a Hoax" because of the possibility to easily understand the argumentation even without sound. I would appreciate the possibility to discuss with him anything of relevance concerning time.

Eckard