Do you believe life is linear existance? One of the most significant measures of linear is time (eg. clocks). Time is not something that we experience, it is however something that is ever present. Do you believe that the only existance we have, is the everchanging one we happen to be in right now, like there is no actual future, only what is changing right now.

Or..

Do you believe there is no such thing as time, there is no straight line in which we follow, that both the past and the future are represents of us now? If you believe this, do you believe that our existance is ever living in the afterthought of what just happened?


There are many theories out there, what do you believe?

Do you believe life is linear existance? One of the most significant measures of linear is time (eg. clocks). Time is not something that we experience, it is however something that is ever present. Do you believe that the only existance we have, is the everchanging one we happen to be in right now, like there is no actual future, only what is changing right now.

Or..

Do you believe there is no such thing as time, there is no straight line in which we follow, that both the past and the future are represents of us now? If you believe this, do you believe that our existance is ever living in the afterthought of what just happened?


There are many theories out there, what do you believe?

Personally, I don't believe in time ( as in clocks). Why? Because time and clocks were created by men. Why? Men like to make things overly complicated without a need to by themselves. Yes, I realize we as human beings need some sort of structure or laws to abide by, but laws are made and therefore time in a way seems futile. What it seems you are hinting at is fate. Do I believe that there is someone bigger than me who has decided my fate and thus I am helpless and cannot control my fate? No, because I like to believe I am the one who has at least some sort of control over my life. My decisions are determined by my character, not by someone up in the clouds.

Do I believe we age? Well of course, each day we grow older, and our bodies that take toll, as we develop from children, to adolescents, adulthood, etc.

Do I believe people put far too much stress on the past and on the future and linear existence? Yes. Otherwise we wouldn't plan so fucking much for the future.

"Oh if you don't get a good education from day one and become a genius, you're going to die a poor loser who is homeless and has no life and will be addicted to drugs forever without any escape because that's what other people decided for us from the dawn of time and you suck and have no control, but we do because we have power."

Yet it has been proven time and time again that just because you get the best education man kind has designed, it does not guarantee success, whether we like to admit it or not ( usually those who dislike admitting it are those which control you, because although they do seem to be interested iin your well being, their usually interested in controlling you first so you will be thanking them and they can emotionally blackmail you, but I'd be a biased bitch if I didn't admit that there are various exceptions)

I like to believe we live in now. Why? Because as far as I am concerned, no one knows their future, and people HATE to admit that. They try to build this illusion that "Oh if I do this now, then this will affect my future" And I call bullshit on that. Why? Because you never know if one day you decide to step out on the street at the wrong time after getting some successful little crap and life decides to be a bitch at that moment and something bad happens to you.

You never know what will happen to you. You never know what will happen to you in the next five minutes. You only have a notion of it due to linear existance. What does linear existance guarantee? If you did things good for the moment, it MAY help your future just a tiny incy whincy tiny little wee bit.

The only thing that is known well about the future is that whether we like to acknowledge it or not, we are going to die. And that is the only thing that will never change. And not even linear existance can control that. Why? It already has been, since the day you were born. So here in short, is what I believe:

Linear existence is bullshit.

Shit happens, thus you never know the future no matter how much you plan for it.

I believe in now, and that now is what I am living for because I don't know what will happen tomorrow.

And last but not least, I like to think to some extent I control my life even just a little. And most of the time, I try not to abide by the clock.

And that's my rant.

What it seems you are hinting at is fate. Do I believe that there is someone bigger than me who has decided my fate and thus I am helpless and cannot control my fate? No, because I like to believe I am the one who has at least some sort of control over my life. My decisions are determined by my character, not by someone up in the clouds.

I wasn't hinting at that, as that would make this thread easily turn into a debate on god, and whether he controls our actions. ;)

Do I believe people put far too much stress on the past and on the future and linear existence? Yes. Otherwise we wouldn't plan so fucking much for the future.

I personally believe, that the future is just an extension of what we make it, right now. I mean, every change that occurs is still in the now, is it not? So what really constitutes as the future then? Are we living our future right now? or... now? I believe our future is just as much our present, whatever you choose to do now, reflects the next change in your life.

Another interesting argument is, can you measure time outside of earth? The answer is yes, I'm sure. But what if you were not in a space shuttle, on a planet? In the dead of the universe, how would you define it? If you can't define it, what makes it so important here?

If you are living in a present time, at which point do we reflect on what is going on, and comprehend events from fiction? Like me right now, I don't know what I may say in 5 minutes, but I am pretty sure I know what I said 5 minutes prior. Does that make it an subjective truth, or just would it be contradicting your own interpretation?

Do I make any sense at all?

I wasn't hinting at that, as that would make this thread easily turn into a debate on god, and whether he controls our actions. ;)



I personally believe, that the future is just an extension of what we make it, right now. I mean, every change that occurs is still in the now, is it not? So what really constitutes as the future then? Are we living our future right now? or... now? I believe our future is just as much our present, whatever you choose to do now, reflects the next change in your life.

Another interesting argument is, can you measure time outside of earth? The answer is yes, I'm sure. But what if you were not in a space shuttle, on a planet? In the dead of the universe, how would you define it? If you can't define it, what makes it so important here?

If you are living in a present time, at which point do we reflect on what is going on, and comprehend events from fiction? Like me right now, I don't know what I may say in 5 minutes, but I am pretty sure I know what I said 5 minutes prior. Does that make it an subjective truth, or just would it be contradicting your own interpretation?

Do I make any sense at all?

I know what you were hinting at young lady. You want me in bed, don't you. *gasp* :eek:

And it does make sense darling. I mean seriously, there are many times when I seriously do question " What if this isn't real and I am dreaming?" and such.

And what makes it so important is, the fact that us human beings tend to be somewhat arrogant and like to think we have much more control than we really do. We actually only control one thing, and we ATTEMPT to do it. And that is try to control ourselves and others. That is just about all we have control over. Thus we place such importance in it, we want to feel omnipotent.

I believe time is change in the order it happens and passes through our minds. :p

Do you believe life is linear existance? One of the most significant measures of linear is time (eg. clocks). Time is not something that we experience, it is however something that is ever present. Do you believe that the only existance we have, is the everchanging one we happen to be in right now, like there is no actual future, only what is changing right now.

Or..

Do you believe there is no such thing as time, there is no straight line in which we follow, that both the past and the future are represents of us now? If you believe this, do you believe that our existance is ever living in the afterthought of what just happened?


There are many theories out there, what do you believe?


I'm having a time thinking about this...

Clocks / calendars measure time. they're the best common measurement we have so far. Organisms have a life span (born, mature, age, die). They have a set length of time they are alive. Once they are dead, their time is over (unless they become ghosts).

If we had a spaceship that could travel faster than the speed of light, would we be able to go "back in time" to find the radiowaves for certain earth events (like 9/11, WW2, assassinations of heads of state) and relive those transmissions? Yes.

We're alive for just the smallest fraction of a second in "universal time" (the age of the galaxy / universe), as protists and bacteria have a very short life span compared to us.

It's a difficult concept to grasp.

Simply put we do perceive time--it exists as the interval between events. We exist as beings "unfocused" in time (to use Terry Pratchett's concept)--dwelling on the past and worrying about the future. The ability to completely focus oneself into the immediate present for any real length of time is inherently impressive.

The future is not now, nor now. It starts at now + h as h gets infinitely close to 0. It doesn't exist--yet--except as the vague notions and conceptions of groups of individuals. Their fears, desires, and intentions. These become more concrete the closer we come to them in our band of perception of the reality we exist in, but do not solidify into the present until we move into that immediate frame.

This can be modeled with "probability fields" with certain outcomes being more or less likely than others, with nothing being certain until it happens (future probabilities very rarely reach 100% until we get very close to the present).



Another interesting argument is, can you measure time outside of earth? The answer is yes, I'm sure. But what if you were not in a space shuttle, on a planet? In the dead of the universe, how would you define it? If you can't define it, what makes it so important here?


The critical question is "how do you mean measure."

We can't confirm the existence of Alpha centauri, our closest star, simply because we can't bounce a signal off of it to confirm its distance. We can determine quite a bit about it and other celestial objects with a good degree of accuracy though.

I would pose, as a thought, that we can measure time off the planet in the frame of reference of our planet for (as a trivial example) measure the distance between the pulses of a pulsar.

Well, time is a function of speed ie the faster you go the slower time moves around you. But to look at someone going very near the speed of light it would seem like they are living forever. But to the person going very fast it would seem like they are living their normal 80ish years, while everyone else is living but for a moment. The two people both seem very different to each other, one living thousands, even millions of years to the other person, the other but a fraction of a second to the other. I know i kind of ramble on, my point is that we exist as we are but we are slaves to the perception of ourselves. At the speed of light all time breaks down and everything that ever was and ever will be apppears before us. Its all a matter of perception.

hope this makes sense :confused:

Now THIS is a conversation I can get with!

First of all, the concept that you're talking about, so far as we only exsist in this moment, is called Solipsism. It's actually a mental disorder that every human goes through to one degree or another. The idea behind it is amazing...in it's extreme, the person suffering from it believes that his conscience is the ONLY thing that exsists and every single other thing that he perceives is created solely by his unconscious mind. Any argument brought up is just something else created by his unconscious mind and the best part of it is... THERE'S NO WAY TO DISPROVE IT! like I said, any proof provided is created by his unconscious mind. Now in it's basic form, it's a matter of "did I just imagine that or did it really happen?" and that happens to everyone at sometime or another.

As for time being linear, what we call "Time" is simply the measuring of the rate of decay. All things (at the molecular level) decay and we know that some things decay at a measurable and very stable rate. So, we're sitting here watching this group of molecules decay and since we've seen it 20 times or so, we know that between the moment that this one has finished decaying and the moment this one is finished, we have time to go say, get a pop-tart.

YaNeS, you mentioned this: "Personally, I don't believe in time ( as in clocks). Why? Because time and clocks were created by men."

What else would you have it created by? Let's say for instance that there is no measurement of time. None at ALL. Just for the sake of argument, we'll also say that you're the only person around. You notice the days get bright and dark but don't know how long is in between. It doesn't really matter that you don't know though, you just know that at a couple of points during the bright bit, your tummy growls at ya so, you go find something to eat. Your body is going to get on (gasp) a schedule. It's going to want to eat at roughly the same time every day. There's your first clock. Now let's say that everytime you go to get something to eat, you notice that the food is all gone. THERE MUST BE SOMEONE ELSE HERE! Ok, so now you go hungry. Then it happens again cause evidently, this other person's body clock tells him he's hungry a little before yours. If this goes on long enough, you're going to have to either pair up with this person or live the short period of time you'll have left dealing with the growing pains in your tummy. Since you don't have any concept of time, you can't go "earlier" to get there before they do. So it basically comes down to our bodies created this "time" thing and we either die off or find a way to measure it so you can survive.

"I like to believe we live in now. Why? Because as far as I am concerned, no one knows their future, and people HATE to admit that."
That's right but we DO have a small bit of control over what we hope to happen. For instance, if you wear glasses, you can be fairly sure that if you put them on a nightstand when you go to bed, they'll be there when you wake up. Things happen so let's say that your kitten knocks them off the stand while you're sleeping every night for a week. Kittens are nice to sleep with so instead of keeping it out of the bedroom, you put your glasses somewhere you can be relatively sure they're going to be when you wake up...planning.

"Another interesting argument is, can you measure time outside of earth? The answer is yes, I'm sure. But what if you were not in a space shuttle, on a planet? In the dead of the universe, how would you define it? If you can't define it, what makes it so important here?"

Sure you can measure it in a void if you have the tools. For instance, Uranium molecules decay, again, at a very stable rate. If you can measure that rate of decay, you have a clock. What makes it so important here is survival.

Well, time is a function of speed ie the faster you go the slower time moves around you. But to look at someone going very near the speed of light it would seem like they are living forever. But to the person going very fast it would seem like they are living their normal 80ish years, while everyone else is living but for a moment. The two people both seem very different to each other, one living thousands, even millions of years to the other person, the other but a fraction of a second to the other. I know i kind of ramble on, my point is that we exist as we are but we are slaves to the perception of ourselves. At the speed of light all time breaks down and everything that ever was and ever will be apppears before us. Its all a matter of perception.

hope this makes sense :confused:


I'm assuming that's what you believe? I mean no one can move at the speed of light, and even if they could there is no proof that time would speed up or slow down. Time is something man invented to help organize the world around him, but what you are saying is that time was around before man and it is directly related to how fast one is moving?


Does time slow down when you are moving a mach 3? I think not.

I'm assuming that's what you believe? I mean no one can move at the speed of light, and even if they could there is no proof that time would speed up or slow down. Time is something man invented to help organize the world around him, but what you are saying is that time was around before man and it is directly related to how fast one is moving?


Does time slow down when you are moving a mach 3? I think not.
There is experimental evidence of time dilation matching the predicted values.

...and yes, time slows when you are moving at mach 3, just not by much.

I'm assuming that's what you believe? I mean no one can move at the speed of light, and even if they could there is no proof that time would speed up or slow down. Time is something man invented to help organize the world around him, but what you are saying is that time was around before man and it is directly related to how fast one is moving?


Does time slow down when you are moving a mach 3? I think not.


Actually it does slow down, just not enough to count for anything. Samples were sent into space and, knowing the amount of decay or rate of change, it was found that, due to the speed they were traveling to get to orbit and coming back, the rate of change was behind where it should've been.

The rate of change (time) WAS around before man but, obviously, there wasn't anyone around to measure it.

http://www.phys.virginia.edu/classes/252/srelwhat.html

If high speed equals slower decay, is there any proof that it would conflict with aging? Or is this all still in theory ;-) I can’t believe that just because a substance showed slowing down on some level, that the same could be said for humans. At least not at this point in time, I have not really seen any solid evidence that can prove this would happen to anything organic... I don't even think it's possible to move anything organic at such speeds and keep them alive long enough for them to defy aging.

Just what I think :-/ On the other hand I am pretty shocked I never heard anything on the whole speed / decay issue. I guess I opened my mouth a bit too soon on that one.


I still don’t know if you could use decay as a measurement of time because not all substances decay in the same way. However you should be able to determine the relative age of any part of the universe through decay? Being that some parts of the universe are thought to be older / younger than others?


Someone please explain because you are losing me.

If high speed equals slower decay, is there any proof that it would conflict with aging? Or is this all still in theory ;-) I can’t believe that just because a substance showed slowing down on some level, that the same could be said for humans. At least not at this point in time, I have not really seen any solid evidence that can prove this would happen to anything organic... I don't even think it's possible to move anything organic at such speeds and keep them alive long enough for them to defy aging.

I still don’t know if you could use decay as a measurement of time because not all substances decay in the same way. However you should be able to determine the relative age of any part of the universe through decay? Being that some parts of the universe are thought to be older / younger than others?


Someone please explain because you are losing me.

That's a good question. It's very possible that a human's rate of molecular decay varies so much by different outside influences that it'd be impossible to measure it. It'd change even depending on what you ate the day before.

If high speed equals slower decay, is there any proof that it would conflict with aging? Or is this all still in theory ;-) I can’t believe that just because a substance showed slowing down on some level, that the same could be said for humans. At least not at this point in time, I have not really seen any solid evidence that can prove this would happen to anything organic... I don't even think it's possible to move anything organic at such speeds and keep them alive long enough for them to defy aging.


Experiments with everything from atomic clocks to computer chips have shown the effect in the predicted amounts. This would indicate that time actually moves differently based on velocity, which would in turn, indicate that we would age differently if we moved much faster.

Organic isn't all that different from inorganic in this respect, but can you propose a falsifiable experiment that can be reasonably done that would demonstrate that it does not work (by exception) on organics when it works with inorganics?



I still don’t know if you could use decay as a measurement of time because not all substances decay in the same way.


No, but many substances (radioactive cesium) decay in predictable ways that can be measured.

It doesn't matter, for example, that uranium and cesium decay differently, only that we can calculate what one of them should be (assuming the null hypothesis) versus what it is.

I'm having a time thinking about this...

Clocks / calendars measure time. they're the best common measurement we have so far. Organisms have a life span (born, mature, age, die). They have a set length of time they are alive. Once they are dead, their time is over (unless they become ghosts).

If we had a spaceship that could travel faster than the speed of light, would we be able to go "back in time" to find the radiowaves for certain earth events (like 9/11, WW2, assassinations of heads of state) and relive those transmissions? Yes.

We're alive for just the smallest fraction of a second in "universal time" (the age of the galaxy / universe), as protists and bacteria have a very short life span compared to us.

It's a difficult concept to grasp.

From the way that I see it, the life span of a human being has nothing to do with time. Time in space are ways in which we measure our existance, but it does not define us. We are not given a set of dates as to when we are born and when we die. We have no control over these things, and neither does time.

We exist as beings "unfocused" in time (to use Terry Pratchett's concept)--dwelling on the past and worrying about the future. The ability to completely focus oneself into the immediate present for any real length of time is inherently impressive.

That's interesting, so another words we can't comprehend ourselves until we are into our past? If that is true, then at what point do we become present? Maybe there is only the ineviteable future, and the non existant past?

First of all, the concept that you're talking about, so far as we only exsist in this moment, is called Solipsism. It's actually a mental disorder that every human goes through to one degree or another.

Hmm, that is if I were saying that I'm aware of my presence and only my presence, which is not entirely true. I'm more or less saying that nothing can be verified as here and now, and that all things can only exists at this time. Your past is obviously non-existant, right? Your future doesn't exist, except for your projected thought of it, which does play a role in your present, but it's still you in your present state.

What else would you have it created by? Let's say for instance that there is no measurement of time. None at ALL. Just for the sake of argument, we'll also say that you're the only person around. You notice the days get bright and dark but don't know how long is in between. It doesn't really matter that you don't know though, you just know that at a couple of points during the bright bit, your tummy growls at ya so, you go find something to eat. Your body is going to get on (gasp) a schedule. It's going to want to eat at roughly the same time every day.

Just like in the antarctic where they goes half of a year in complete darkness, they use time to help them sleep, but that does not mean they cannot go on there own. I'm sure eventually instinct will kick in, and help them with that. Instinct is not a measurement of time though, and unless these happen at specific intervals, I don't see how that relates to time. As for the stomach being hungry, that is not time that is making your stomach growl, that's a natural reaction of your stomach wall squeezing together, and there not being any food in there. This doesn't occur at certain times, and depending on what you ate last, there is really no way to determine when it could happen.

I still don’t know if you could use decay as a measurement of time because not all substances decay in the same way. However you should be able to determine the relative age of any part of the universe through decay? Being that some parts of the universe are thought to be older / younger than others?

That is exactly what I was thinking, being that decay just like all life decay at it's own rate, wouldn't that say right there, that we may not be following the rate of time for all things, which can kind of go against your theory?

Even when mentioning radioactive cesium, what you are talking about is only human conception, and does not actually exist. First off, an atomic clock doesn not use decay, rather from the oscillation frequencies within the atoms which are determined by the mass of the nucleus and the gravity and electrostatic "spring" between the positive charge on the nucleus and the electron cloud surrounding it(yes I looked that up).

The relevance to this is that both oscillation frequencies and nucleus, are measurements and don't actually exist on their own, so what says that time is any different? It's your perceived concept, but why does it have to mean that all things exist like this?

Just like in the antarctic where they goes half of a year in complete darkness, they use time to help them sleep, but that does not mean they cannot go on there own. I'm sure eventually instinct will kick in, and help them with that. Instinct is not a measurement of time though, and unless these happen at specific intervals, I don't see how that relates to time. As for the stomach being hungry, that is not time that is making your stomach growl, that's a natural reaction of your stomach wall squeezing together, and there not being any food in there. This doesn't occur at certain times, and depending on what you ate last, there is really no way to determine when it could happen.

Well, for some people, the body gets conditioned to do certain things at certain times. If you eat at the same time every day, your body will want to continue doing that and make you hungry at that time. The same goes for sleep. Because of my work hours, I can't go to sleep whenever I want. My body doesn't get tired untill around 5 in the morning so I simply can't go to sleep at 8 pm. If I never had access to a clock, I'd still know it was around 5 am, give or take a few hours. When you're talking about time alone and with no scheduled requiremens to interfere a few hours won't matter.



That is exactly what I was thinking, being that decay just like all life decay at it's own rate, wouldn't that say right there, that we may not be following the rate of time for all things, which can kind of go against your theory?

Not neccessarily. Everything has a molecular decay and it, of course varies from one molecule to the next. We simply found something that has a stable decay time so we can measure it.

Even when mentioning radioactive cesium, what you are talking about is only human conception, and does not actually exist. First off, an atomic clock doesn not use decay, rather from the oscillation frequencies within the atoms which are determined by the mass of the nucleus and the gravity and electrostatic "spring" between the positive charge on the nucleus and the electron cloud surrounding it(yes I looked that up).

The relevance to this is that both oscillation frequencies and nucleus, are measurements and don't actually exist on their own, so what says that time is any different? It's your perceived concept, but why does it have to mean that all things exist like this?


Well, the measurement of it is a human concept but the action is still there. The word time and it's measurement are human ideas but the action/decay is still occuring. We're just using it's stability for our own convenience.

Not neccessarily. Everything has a molecular decay and it, of course varies from one molecule to the next. We simply found something that has a stable decay time so we can measure it.

An atomic clock does not go by decay though. And whether all things decay or not, we are still left with us, at our present state. Yes my body is decaying right now, so are other things I'm sure, but can this form of measurment and life itself not be independent? Why do you feel the need to connect the two? Like entropy, is it not possible that we are all just leading to destruction (or perhaps order) on the same cycle that the universe exist, and with no actual time?

Well, the measurement of it is a human concept but the action is still there. The word time and it's measurement are human ideas but the action/decay is still occuring. We're just using it's stability for our own convenience.

You're right, they are there. We use them as tools to help us organize our life, which could otherwise be chaos. That still doesn't prove that time exists to us though, other then a nifty little tool science picked up. ;)

No, but many substances (radioactive cesium) decay in predictable ways that can be measured.

It doesn't matter, for example, that uranium and cesium decay differently, only that we can calculate what one of them should be (assuming the null hypothesis) versus what it is.


Hmm, so you would be able to find the individual age of object alone, but not of space itself? Being that some objects might have been formed later on, while some where formed at earlier times?

http://img6.photobucket.com/albums/v19/DhammaSeeker1975/Dilbert_Time.jpg

You can verify futur thing with 100% of exactitude.You know you're going to die one day.
Your futur life modifies your present life. That's why you make choice.
Your past life modifies your present and futur life. You won't do the same error twice.

But, could we live without time?
Yes, assuredly. Animals live without it and Homo sapiens did it too.
But does it mean that time is just a human perception?
The word itself, yes, the consequences no.

About the cesium thing. You say it's only a human conception and does not actually exist...
I think it exists.
Can you read? Yes. Your brain reads thanks to your eyes and everything behind. If you can read it means your brain exists.
Measurement of time by Radioactive cesium does exist because it was scientifically proved. Such as it was proved than your brain "read" letters and make them sentences.

Now, sure is that, all depends if you believe in science or not.

:D


btw, my apologies if that^^ has been said previously....

It's a good one, this. :)

Let's talk about the existence of time, on one hand as a mere measure and on the other as an entity... because it's been mentioned as both so far.

So, matter decays... that's a given. By way of an illustration, let's say that the human heart will give out after 1,000,000 heartbeats (in all cases). If you say that each heartbeat is a unit of what we've decided to call Time™, then you could say that a human lives for 1,000,000 beats. Or seconds, or whatever name you choose to give it. It's your system, after all.

Now, you stick two people in some sorts of vehicles that allow them to travel at ridiculous speeds. One travels at 100 miles per hour and the other travels at 180,000 miles per second (tipping the wink there to the accepted thinking that nothing can travel at faster than the speed of light - we've stopped just short ;) ) If the claim is that travelling that quickly slows down time, then what will the effect be? Will the human travelling fast get more than his allotted 1,000,000 heartbeats? Or will each one simply seem longer to him? If it's the former, then I'd suggest that the increased lifespan is not a function of time, but of moving quickly... and that's another discussion.

If it's the latter, then what has actually changed? Because by the time he gets back to the same place as his slow-moving friend, he'll have slowed down himself and his time perceptions will have sped up. their remaining number of heartbeats will be the same - in effect, no change.

Do you see what I'm getting at?

When they did those experiments which accelerated Atomic Clocks at different rates and they came back showing different times, that might only have been a result of moving quickly (possibly microscopic compression of the atoms of the clock having an effect on it's function - I dunno. Book-Laarnin' is Lly's thing :p ). What would have been interesting would to have done a before-and-after carbon dating of the material of the clocks to see if one had decayed any faster than the other.

I just find it hard to believe that a system of recording events can have any effect on causality... but then you're gonna get all Quantum and "Schroedinger's Cat" on me, aren't you?

I'm making no sense now. I'll shut up.

:D

Organic isn't all that different from inorganic in this respect, but can you propose a falsifiable experiment that can be reasonably done that would demonstrate that it does not work (by exception) on organics when it works with inorganics?


I think Organic is very different from inorganic, and by that I am just talking about solid blocks of whatever (carbon, iron, blah blah)

Is it known that all object will slow down at the same rate if moving at a set velocity? Humans are not just one solid block of a certain element. We are many different elements. However if all elements do not slow down at the same rate... who is to say that every part of your body would age at the same rate. But this I do not know so there is not much that can be said on it on my part.

I can't believe that post where it was stated that if you moved at the speed of light time would change for you, and you would age differently because there is NO proof that this is true.

We don't know how this would affect life itself. We don't even know what life really is (that I know of). To say that it would cause you to age differently is pure theory and nothing else. I would need some kind of proof that it would actually change how a living creature would age. Unfortunately I can't think of any way to perform an experiment that would do this so I'm stuck as a non believer.


This is unless it is known that all objects do in fact slow down at the same rate when moving at a set velocity. If that is the case every aspect of a human body should slow down at a set rate. Still, there is nothing that can be said about life itself, and how our genes and brain keep track of time. That in itself might play the biggest factor on how a living being ages.

Humans are not just one solid block of a cretin element.

That is the BEST. TYPO. EVAR.

:D :D :D :D

An atomic clock does not go by decay though. And whether all things decay or not, we are still left with us, at our present state. Yes my body is decaying right now, so are other things I'm sure, but can this form of measurment and life itself not be independent? Why do you feel the need to connect the two? Like entropy, is it not possible that we are all just leading to destruction (or perhaps order) on the same cycle that the universe exist, and with no actual time?



You're right, they are there. We use them as tools to help us organize our life, which could otherwise be chaos. That still doesn't prove that time exists to us though, other then a nifty little tool science picked up. ;)


I get what you're saying now... a perfect and eternal NOW that's only changing because we're experiencing it. The past can't exsist because there'd be more than one NOW and the future is a form of Schrodinger's Cat where the observation of NOW changes the possible outcome of the future.

You've made a convert of me...hehe I love changing side inthe middle of a debate.

I do have questions.

I get what you're saying now... a perfect and eternal NOW that's only changing because we're experiencing it. This makes sense... I think.

The past can't exsist because there'd be more than one NOW
When viewing movies / news footage, or listening to music, the past becomes present again, Right? Or does this make the past catch up with the present again, making the past parallel with the present (NOW)?

and the future is a form of Schrodinger's Cat where the observation of NOW changes the possible outcome of the future.

Ok... I decide that I'm going to go rob a bank & I know that I am going to have that money, afterwards. Yet, I didn't expect to get caught and thrown in jail / shot by a cop along the way. Did my now affect the future in a way I didn't know?

Do you believe life is linear existance? One of the most significant measures of linear is time (eg. clocks). Time is not something that we experience, it is however something that is ever present. Do you believe that the only existance we have, is the everchanging one we happen to be in right now, like there is no actual future, only what is changing right now.

Or..

Do you believe there is no such thing as time, there is no straight line in which we follow, that both the past and the future are represents of us now? If you believe this, do you believe that our existance is ever living in the afterthought of what just happened?


There are many theories out there, what do you believe?

The nature of time interests me. Western civilization generally has been regarding time as having a beginning, and either continuing infinitely or ending at some point. Some philosophers and cultures notice the cyclical nature of time more (like seasons) and so view the ultimate nature of time as cyclical rather than linear.

Then came the Big Bang Theory, for which the red light shift and cosmic background radiation provided evidence. That theory seemed to verify the Western "beginning". However, if the universe expands, will it expand forever? Depending on the total amount of mass of the universe, it will either expand indefinitely (open universe) or reverse its expansion leading to a "Big Crunch" (closed universe). The Big Crunch theory led to the oscillating universe theory of a universe that expands and contracts indefinitely. Does the cycle repeat the same universe forever (with time possibly running backward during the contraction phase), or do they differ each cycle? Do parallel universes lie outside our own? Does our universe represent a part of a larger "multiverse"? The ultimate nature of time remains a mystery.

I want to point out that in this case, I'm taking the possibilities to their extreme hypothetical side so with that in mind...


I do have questions.

When viewing movies / news footage, or listening to music, the past becomes present again, Right? Or does this make the past catch up with the present again, making the past parallel with the present (NOW)?


on thinking about it, it's possible that if you're watching something like a news reel from the past, say WW II, you're actually creating it in the past. That's probably bunk though hehe. You can view/hear the past through recordings of it but you can't re-experience it.


Ok... I decide that I'm going to go rob a bank & I know that I am going to have that money, afterwards. Yet, I didn't expect to get caught and thrown in jail / shot by a cop along the way. Did my now affect the future in a way I didn't know?

Well, anything's possible...It's possible that the planet earth will turn into a mouse in the next 5 minutes. Highly unlikely but still possible.

Sure, you can rob a bank and expect to have the money. You can also expect to not get shot or caught. Because our actions in the Now can have infinite outcomes you can also expect to have aliens drop Elvis off where he steals it from you and gives it to the sasquatch. All we have to say what might happen is probability and even that's relative. The probability (chances) of the aliens/elvis/sasquatch outcome are enormously better than the probability of the earth turning into a mouse.

That is the BEST. TYPO. EVAR.

:D :D :D :D

har har har har har :p

On a side note rickcarlson, quantum theroey says that anything can spontaniously appear out of the vacuum (simple things like electrons do it alot) there is a probability that a million dollars in gold will spontaniously appear on my desk, as long as its antimatter oppisite is also created. So the earth doesnt have much of a chance of turning into a mouse. But i have the oppurtunity to be a millionare for .00000005 seconds.

On a side note rickcarlson, quantum theroey says that anything can spontaniously appear out of the vacuum (simple things like electrons do it alot) there is a probability that a million dollars in gold will spontaniously appear on my desk, as long as its antimatter oppisite is also created. So the earth doesnt have much of a chance of turning into a mouse. But i have the oppurtunity to be a millionare for .00000005 seconds.



hehe, enjoy it while ya can!

Slightly off topic... There's this newbie around (Sarah)... http://www.killtimeproductions.com/

Interesting. Kill time.

I'm think my brain's gonna burst from reading this thread :o

get a mop :rolleyes:

okay, how bout a little joke

A pair of twins, both ten years old, is seperated. One is placed in a spaceship and sent around the galaxy for ten years at very close the speed of light. So, when the twin on the spaceship comes back, he is 20, but finds his twin is eighty due to time dialation! The old twin gets a twinkle in his eye, then starts crying. The young twin rushes up and asks if he is that happy to see hime. "No" says the other twin "remeber that $10 i loaned you when we were nine? you owe me $200000 in intrest" :rolleyes: