Do you think time exists? Do you think time began at the Big Bang? Or has time existed forever?
I am one of those growing number of people, including scientists, that believe that time doesn’t exist. Time is only an illusion.
We today, in our society, cannot live without our clocks. We live and breathe by clocks. Everything is centered around time. When to go to work, when to play, when to eat, when to sleep, when to wake up. Time rules our lives. But, it’s not time that rules us – it’s clocks!
Time doesn’t make clocks turn. Clocks have inner workings that move the hands around in a systematic way, and measures events or motion in increments, which we can understand as “time” flowing by. And a day on Jupiter is not equivalent to a day on Earth.
But time itself is only a perception made up by man. We have no memory usually until we turn 2 years old. We don’t remember our births, or our first birthday, or what happened before we were born. So we have no concept of time until the age of 2, when memory kicks in. When we have memory, we start to predict future events and can remember events that have happened in the past. We believe that we will wake up in the morning, that the sun will rise, and the Universe will still be here. We weren’t present during the Big Bang, but we assume that the event happened in the past, even though we have no memory of it.
But can the Universe exist without time? Yes!
Have you ever wanted to stop time? I know I have. And we can, given the needed resources. Pick a room, close it off, and then freeze every particle in the room. Now you have just stopped time! That would be cool huh? Anybody got a particle freezing ray gun?
Time is a measurement of motion or interaction between particles. Without interaction between the particles, there is no time. Time is only our perception of what we see as particles interact. So you need motion to have something to measure. Even if you did freeze all the particles, the particles still exist, they are just not in motion. Time goes away because there is no interaction to measure or perceive.
Einstein said that time is a part of the fabric of space, which he called space-time. And that time is actually entangled within space. And since gravity warps space, gravity also has to be warping time as well. So that means that space is dependent on time and time is dependent on space. Really? Space cannot exist without time? I just proved it above, with the freezing. The particles still exist, but time doesn’t. So the Universe can exist without time! Do you see that? That makes sense, right?
Time measures motion and interaction between particles. The Big Bang was the first motion to occur, so we say that time began at the Big Bang. And everything that has happened (motion and interaction of particles) can be measured up to the present. And we label this measurement TIME.
Days, hours, minutes, years, millennium, past, present, and so on, are just LABELS we use for how we measure the interaction of particles or motion events. And we only perceive these motion events. We measure the flow or change of these motion events. We think one occurs before the other event. So the second event occurred because of the first event. That is a measurement of change.
So does time actually pass by? Time doesn’t have a substance to it. You can’t put your hands on it and touch it. But what about aging? Isn’t that proof of time? NO! Aging is just biochemical processes of the body that begin to break down. It doesn’t prove that time itself exists. Aging is another measurement of change.
Time seems to be an artifact of our mind – psychological. In order to even realize that the flow of time has even occurred, you must be aware or have consciousness, you must have motion (change), and you must have realized that motion has taken place and be aware of that change. Without these three things, time has no meaning.
Simply put, a rock is not aware that time is passing by. But humans are aware that change takes place. Animals have consciousness and are aware, and even see that change has taken place. But they aren’t aware that time is passing by with the changes. We have all heard the statement that dogs have no concept of time, right? Well, neither do cats. I can attest to that.
Man devised a system to measure this change and we call it time. Would change occur even if man never evolved? Sure it would. It happened for billions of years in the Universe and here on Earth long before man came along. Change happens all the time, with or without the definition of time. But did time exist before man? Is time real?
More and more physics is proving that time may not be real after all. Now, we will always have time or clocks in our lives, but time itself isn’t a part of space.
The time dilation experiments to prove Einstein’s theory of relativity, have only measured what we perceive as time differences. Was there really a time difference between the two atomic clocks? The inter working of the clocks and the motion of the earth weren’t taken into consideration when the experiments were conducted. And neither were other forces like earthquakes, wind resistance, consistent speed, warping of space, and so forth. So I have huge doubts about the outcome of this experiment. And, yes I know that GPS systems have to be synchronized for time differences due to gravity. But that is our measurement of time, all Earth time measurements. Satellites in orbit around Earth are not on Earth time, so they have to be adjusted to Earth time. The Universe doesn’t run on Earth time!
We think that just because space is warped, that time must also be warped. But space can be warped without time, right? I think so. The freezing of particles can prove that. We can warp the space that those frozen particles are in with gravity, but there is still no motion. So space is warped but not time.
And if there’s no time – then the distance between two places would take zero time, right? Wrong. Distance has nothing to do with time. Distance is the space between two objects. Our definition, as we perceive time, is the time it takes to move from one object to the other. But we are actually measuring the space between the two objects. You can say that it is 50 miles from one city to another city. No time needed. It is just a measurement of distance. To have time involved, you need to measure “how long” it takes to traverse the 50 mile distance. So you would be measuring MOTION of moving from one city to another city. Time doesn’t need to be involved, however, we use velocity as our measurement, like miles per hour, or speed. And time changes depending upon the speed you travel that distance. It could take you two hours if walking, or 30 minutes if travelling at 75 mph. So our measurement of time changes depending on speed, but that doesn’t make TIME ITSELF real. It is our concept, our idea, for use in our everyday lives. Nothing more.
And let’s look at time from the view of a person in Flatland (2 dimensional being). I am travelling at 70 mph on Earth, and a being in flatland, who has no concept of time, sees my movement going so fast they can’t even see me. But they know they saw movement. Am I still moving at the same velocity of 70mph to the flatland being? No. He has no concept of time, nor velocity. So velocity is perceived speed. A 4D being may see me moving very slowly in his point of view. I am still moving at 70mph per my view. So even though We measure my motion (speed) at 70mph, we are the only ones that perceive that velocity.
So time is just our imagination or our mind’s perception of change (motion). The 2D and 4D beings don’t even have a concept of time – but they would still perceive motion and see me move from one place to another (or whatever they see in their dimension). So time is irrelevant and not needed to see change. Hence, time doesn’t exist just because we see things change, like aging.
According to physics, time always points forward. Why? And this is a major problem with physics. And what is forward? What direction is forward? Let’s define forward. If the Universe is a sphere, like most think, then time would also be spherical, if it existed. So time would be a loop. Forward would be around this loop. That loop would intersect all other points in time (past, present, future), so it couldn’t be just going forward. And if time can supposedly be bent by gravity, then time would crisscross all over this loop around the sphere. It wouldn’t just flow forward. And they say that time flows backward inside a black hole. So time doesn’t always flow forward after all. Which is it guys?
So our physics has to be wrong to have time always flowing forward. Time is not linear, as this concept of linear time has pretty much been abandoned.
And since time breaks down in the Quantum world, then why must we believe that time exists in the macro world we live in?
Getting rid of time in the macro world – will put us closer to tying the quantum world and the macro world together in the elusive one unified theory. We can’t get rid of time in our daily lives, as I stated, we live and breathe with our clocks.
Einstein himself contradicted his own theory. The speed of light cannot be broken. Yet he also stated that the Universe is moving away from each other (redshifted) and the outer edge of the Universe is moving away faster than the speed of light. So which is it? Get it together physicists. It can’t be both ways!
The Wheeler-Dewitt equation is consistent with my point of view. It gets rid of the “fictitious variable” –time. Is time a fundamental property of reality or just an appearance of things?
Here’s a great quote from Einstein in a letter he wrote after a friend had died:
Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
That quote pretty much says it all.
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{ 26 comments… read them below or add one }
Regina, I have NO study in Physics, sorry not to assist you there.. But my common sense tells me you are SPOT ON. Each one of us can devise thought experiments.. you seem to have done things I only have barely imagined.. And to me, only recently.. It seems so obvious, so clear.. Time is an illusion, an invention (very useful) of the human mind, to enable us to interpret, somehow, the complexity of change..
Please recommend some material to delve into this subject, so pervasive, ubiquitous, and yet so hidden to all of us.. Books or docs on the web, if possible.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
One book that I am reading now is “About Time” by Adam Frank.This book takes the reader through 2 ultimate questions, how did the universe begin and is time real. Another good book is “Parallel Worlds” by Michio Kaku. Also try “The Hidden Reality” by Brian Greene. One book that I just bought but haven’t yet read is “Hyperspace” by Michio Kaku, so can’t give you advice on this one yet. Anything about space and time is fascinating to me.
Other reads I did on the internet. I typed in “Time is an Illusion” and saw what came up in the search. I read alot of what was there. Some interesting and some not, and some over my head.
Oks, thank you so much.. found parallel worlds and the hidden reality.. at my present rate of reading I guess I’ll have my eyes full for the whole of 2013.. The usual cultural view of time is so pervasive its not easy to find material dealing with the other side of the Necker cube..
A fundamental flaw in this argument is the misunderstanding of Einstiens theory of relativity. Nothing can travel faster than light IN space, but space ITSELF is not confined to this law. Space can expand faster than the speed of light, indeed the theory of warp drive relies upon the premise that space itself moves, not the object traveling within it.
Kris, your argument doesn’t make sense. I understand what you are saying about being in space versus space itself, which I agree that space isn’t confined to that law. But everything travels in some kind of space. Nothing is outside of space. Lets say at a given time, light was traveling through space, and the space it was in was expanding, at a rate that is faster than the speed of light – Then the light traveling within it would also be traveling faster than light (which is itself), because it is IN the space. It can’t be outside of the space. Actually I think one would have to define what “IN space” means exactly. Is the space static? Is the space only what we can see or think of when we say space? And if nothing can travel faster than light IN space -does that mean only in “the space” at that given time? What about other space – like hyperspace, or subspace, or space between parallel worlds? Or space in other dimensions? I do agree that space can expand faster than the speed of light – but anything within that space that is expanding is ALSO expanding at the same rate as the space it is contained in.
But none of this really matters. Time is still just an illusion whether or not space is outside of the law of breaking lightspeed or not.
According to Quantum Physics, Time,space, and the mind must all exist at the same moment, or they cant exist at all. Neither can they exist one without the other. They are a unit. So the question must surely be asked. How could the Universe start without an observing mind, if time and space did not exist prior to it? Is time, space, and the mind infinite too? Maybe we are all figments of Gods imagination. Too, our Universe is so holographic like that maybe we are simply on Gods flat screen tv, for his entertainment.
“According to Quantum Physics, Time,space, and the mind must all exist at the same moment, or they cant exist at all.” in which quantum physics textbook did you find this Gem. sorry Dennis, but I don’t even know what you’re trying to argue here, but your arguments are a little shoddy.
I have several books on Quantum Physics. Accordingly some are saying the mind is a separate entity unto itself. We may all be bonded to a higher Universal mind set. that is why all living things view nature in the same way. Quick example is. A dog knows a tree. We know a tree. Both pee on that tree, and we use it for construction. There is a common brain identification at work here. If life is discovered elsewhere in the Universe, it too will have a connection to its environment. It will also know a tree or other things it must to survive. If aliens were to land, they would know what a tree is. We may call it a different name, but we all will identify it. We all know automatically that we must eat and drink to survive. That is a Universal thing too. Is that Universal bond tied to a God? Quantum Physics cant say YET, but there is room for such an idea.
dennis, very well put. But one day, I believe, that quantum physics will prove that God doesn’t have anything to do with it.
I like articles like this, anything that questions reality in ways that most people don’t think of. I see what you’re saying about freezing every particle in a room, the only trouble is that such things are purely theoretical and have no real use. the fact is, time does exist even if it is only the measure change and interaction of objects, in fact that IS what time is, it is a measure of change and interaction, and we’ve standardized that, it’s a very useful tool that we use every day. on another note I’m not sure why someone in a 2 dimensional world would have no concept of time, I could still measure distance in a 2d world, and the speed an object has moving between 2 points and therefore measure time it takes to travel. I don’t know really what you mean by 4d either, in a way we live in a 4d world if you measure time as a dimension, which many people do. anyway, cool article, I love discussing stuff like this.
Benoit, thanks for your comment. Actually, being able to freeze every particle might be only theoretical now because we don’t have the technology to actually do it – but it would give us a great amount of information that would be very useful if we could. Time is a measurement of change. And nothing else. I think you missed the point. Time doesn’t exist as a part of the fabric of space, giving us a 4 dimensional world. Time as we know and use it, is only a measurement for our convenience.
Those who believe that space and time is one fabric – believe that we live in a universe that has 4 dimensions (4D) – because time is a part of our universe. Those that believe that time isn’t a part of the fabric of the universe – believe that we live in only 3 dimensions (3D) and time is separate, which is in my opinion the correct theory.
I am fairley new to the subject even though i have been subject to time. I spent 5 years in a cage. Anyway, is time quantized? If it cant be quantized then it has no beginning and end that we are able to see. For example, light is composed of packets of waves called photons no? And matter breaks down into smaller ever smaller components like a russian doll. These things can be measured and are evenly partitioned particles with identical particles to compare to. But can time be broken down? Hours seconds nanoseconds, picoseconds and so forth into infinitely smaller moments or intervals of time. So what is a moment? Does It exists simultaneously with the next one since it cannot be distinguished from the next by the passage of “time”. “Changes and events and motion are indicators of time” but WHEN(what time) does the event actually begin or end? If I were to place myself in a sensory depravaion chamber I believe that I could still estimate the passage of relatively small amounts of time because the flow of thoughts also take time. You can think about a pink elephant in a second but you need more time, about 15 minutes in my case, to imagine making love. I have been reading much and am studying electromagnetics and light. Its the only class I like but no one else in class wants to talk about it so Im gratefull blogs like this.
I loved the article, it is a subject that I have been actively discussing, debating, arguing, about pretty often over the last couple of years, I like the ideas, where the thought inevitably takes me. Thanks, I believe there was some redundancy to this piece but it still stands on the subject matter very well.
I have a number of observations on your article, I hope you won’t take it personally, but your argumentation is less than scientifically rigorous and leaves far too many loopholes. Oh and before you get offended, you may well be right that our perception of time is false, but not for the reasons you give!:
1) “And a day on Jupiter is not equivalent to a day on Earth”. That does not relate to “time” but to the speed of rotation of the planet.
2) “But time itself is only a perception made up by man.” We haven’t met any other species we can communicate with yet, so this is an assumption.
3) “Pick a room, close it off, and then freeze every particle in the room. Now you have just stopped time!”. Yes, but all you are saying is “stop time, then you have stopped time” – This is only a thought experiment, you can’t do it so what does this prove?
4) “Space cannot exist without time? I just proved it above, with the freezing.” See 3 above. No, a thought experiment does not prove anything unless it has unassailable logic, your’s doens’t.
5) “You can’t put your hands on it and touch it.” Since when has this been evidence of anything?
6) “More and more physics is proving that time may not be real after all”? Really? Proving? Where are you citations? How do you “prove” that something “may” not be real?
7) “Animals have consciousness and are aware, and even see that change has taken place. But they aren’t aware that time is passing by with the changes. We have all heard the statement that dogs have no concept of time, right? Well, neither do cats. I can attest to that” How can you possible make a statement like that? Research into animal senses, indicates that large numbers of species have a very well developed sense of time, just Google it.
8)”Time doesn’t need to be involved, however, we use velocity as our measurement, like miles per hour” What? miles per…?
I am sorry I haven’t time to raise every point here, but please, learn some physic (evening school, or read some serious books), this just doesn’t hang together.
Mark,
I undestand that you may have questions. The debate over time is a long one and may go on forever. And from your comment – I guess you have won the Nobel Prize in physics and have it all figured out – right? Wrong!
You are so wrong. And I have read plenty of physics books, articles, and journals on the subject. I am not an expert and don’t claim to be one. But there are physicists out there that think the same way I do and I am just agreeing with them. Do some research and you’ll find that out. As far as your rebuttal to my arguments:
1) A day on Jupiter doesn’t equal a day on Earth. And yes this has to do with time! We control our lies based upon doing things today, tomorrow, or next week – which is nothing but a rotation, 2 rotations, or 10 rotations from now based upon our usage of time.
2) Show me another animal or species on this planet (or any other planet) that is making watches, clcosk, and GPS systems to track time! This is not an assumption. Man is only tracking movement – not time itself!
3) Yes, if you freeze everything to which nothing – not any particle- nothing is moving, then time as we think of it has stopped. No motion = no time. It may not prove anything – but man’s concept of time is due to motion. So if there is no motion- is there still time? No! Time couldn’t “fly by” if nothing is moving. If we are moving “through” timne and we stop moving – then we wouldn’t be passing time.
4) If spacetime, as Einstien concluded and everyone else theorizes, is one in the same – both time and space spliced together into a fabric – then one cannot exist without the other! Duh!
5) Lots of things in our world can’t be “touched” but we know they are real. Like air, gravity, love, etc.. We see their effects and know that they exist or at least we perceive they are real. But time, if its a part of the fabric of space – we should be able to reach out and touch it (sort of). We now know that space isn’t empty – its full of particles all the time. So where is the particle for time? If we can see all the other particles in the fabric of space- we should be able to also see time.
6) Uh, I’m not the only one that believes that time is just an illusion. Or that time is a concept and we are only perceiving time from our brains. We could all be just holograms for all we know. Lots of articles, books, science journals talk about what we are finding out about how our brains work and how we actually perceive our world around us. Just Google it.
7) I’m not saying that animals aren’t aware of time. They are. But animals don’t know when 2:00 in the afternnon is or 10:30 at night is. They know seasons, and patterns, and see changes and have biological clocks that tell them “when its time”. Not the same as how we use time. So I can say that stement along with eveyone else.
8) Time doesn’t need to be involved! Get over this. We can contiue to rotate around the sun without having time. It would all still be the same. Galazxys would rotate, stars would be born, and black holes would die. Time isn’t needed for all the Universe to function. And again – our concept of time is a “MEASUREMENT” of motion and moving things. So we base our measurements (like velocity) with these same measurements as we perceive them. MPH on Earth isn’t the same speed as MPH on Mars. Same measurement – just not the same rotation. All of this still doesn’t require time. TIME IS A MEASUREMENT as we perceive the world moving around us. Take time out of the universe but leave all motion as is. It will still be the same. Time doesn’t STOP motion. The Earth will still rotate whether we have time or not. All we need is motion. And motion isn’t the same as time. We perceive time and motion as the same thing – but it is not the same thing. If we could ever break the two apart and remember that one is a measurement of motion and the other is time – then we may have a breakthrough.
Interesting, but it doesn’t fly. So many things are just a matter of perception, just like the half empty half full saying. You’re trying to “prove” that time is an illusion cannot work here with the arguments made or proof offered. Love is more made up than time. Time is exactly what you said it is. An invention based on light (the sun basically) to track everything. On Earth, a day is a cycle and it’s simply broken down into increments, right? Of course. If you see the magician reach into his sleeve to pull out the card in a card trick, there would be no illusion at all based on your perception. Time may be an “illusion” in the grand scheme of things, but here on Earth, this one very tiny dot in the universe it’s our invention, our measurement. And as much as I hate being ruled by time, and YES…clocks, it has a great many uses.
Regina…after reading a couple of your comments (Should have done so first) I realize, or at least believe in my mind that you are perfectly aware of “perception”. I love to entertain ideas, especially with the understanding that most of the answers we seek are mostly unknown by even some of the greatest scientific minds still. That makes it fun. So much more fun than those who use their “educated” minds to become closed off and preach what they think they know based on what they have learned. Mankind holds very few of the answers to the questions I have, that’s for sure. I do like how you think Regina.
Thanks Jay for believing in me. I too don’t like people preaching to me from their minds that they think are so grand. Please. I’m educated too. But I have a mind that can think and I hate to preach to anyone. I think everyone does in some way at times. And yes I do believe in perception. Anything about Time is a passion for me. I personally think that time isn’t real, but I haven’t been convinced one way or another yet. There is so much to think about. So many things we don’t know. So many what ifs. We are still just infants in the understanding of our world and universe. It is so much fun!
Jay, thanks for your comments. The debate on whether time is a real thing will continue. I for one think that time is an illusion. I don’t think time has any “substance” to it like Einstein believed. He thought that time and space were intertwined into one and made up the fabric of all space. I don’t buy that. We do, here on Earth, live and breath by time – we have no other way. But that doesn’t make time a real thing. It is a concept to me. We had to come up with some form of counting what is the past (things we remember) and right now (things gotta do) and future (things to do later). But all this still doesn’t prove that time is made up of any substance or is real in any way other than through our perception at that moment. Gotta ask yourself – if aliens landed on Earth – would they have the same counting or tracking mechanism as we do that we call time? Or would they think we are out of our minds? Its a debate that is fun to argue about.
very interesting,,,,But,,,,time is a reality, not an illusion, my silver streaks are proof! My growing grandchildre are proof…passage of time. Perhaps in relation to the universe, time is illusory, but in relation to human existence, this immediate existence of ours, time is no illusion.
Elisa, thanks for your comment. And I understand that most people, even the experts, have a hard time when it comes to time. Humans will always have time – it is our reality. We live and breathe by time. Time is how we measure our existence. And this will never go away.
But, just because we measure our existence with this concept we call Time, doesn’t make Time itself real. Time as we have defined it is relative. Go out in space and clocks tick at a different pace. If you are in space for 10 Earth years travelling 80% of light speed — you will actually only age 6 years, and the clocks will say 6 years as well. But on Earth the clocks say you have been gone for 10 years.
So which do you use? If you left at age 40 – are you now 46 years old upon return or 50 years old?
Time is nothing but a measurement, and measurements don’t make things real.
And if you throw in more than one dimension of time, then it gets really ugly. But you are right, time is not an illusion to the human existence. It could be that our brains have more to do with time than we think. What if our brains are making us “think” we have aged – getting gray hair, kids growing up, things sagging, and so forth. What if that is nothing but an illusion created by our minds? Just a possbility.
The universe is not a sphere. We have measured this and have known this for years. Also Einstein said nothing with mass can move at the speed of light. It gives no restrictions on the speed of the expansion of space due to dark energy. You should read up about a few things before saying “get it together physicists”
daniel, last I have heard and researched – scientists actually think the universe is either a sphere or a cube. Maybe you should cite your source. I can’t find any article that states for a fact that the universe is not a sphere. And Einstein said nothing can go faster than the speed of light, which would include the expansion of space. And dark energy isn’t even confirmed as real yet. And if there is no restriction on the speed of the expansion of space – then we are in deep shit. And what does this have to do with TIME? Stay on the subject of the article.
I think it is pretty obvious that time is a valid sentiment. There are actions and reactions, not reactions and actions. The only way to understand cause and effect is to know that one precedes the other. Tied to that is the notion of time. If time were false then every mathematical equation that used time as a variable would work without it but they don’t. Sure, time could just be a way to see actions in relativity but that doesn’t negate the validity of the concept
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