If time does not exist then why does a clock give accurate measurements? And what does it measure? Its delusional to think that time does not exist. What is the persistence of your existence? Do you believe distance exists (like a physical distance, ie. miles)? What does a clock measure but the length of existence. You don’t think length applies to existence, as in the concept of time? If there was no time then how do you exist from one moment to the next? Don’t you perceive any passage of time within your mind? Don’t you know you’ve been alive for more than a second (a length of time that measures existence)?
S.H.,
Believe me when I say that I understand your objections. That is because I share them. Perhaps some background would help. In this I shall assume that you’ve not studied physics, and will present my thoughts in that context.
I do accept the existence of space, and of objects which we perceive to exist in space. I also make the common observation that the relative position between objects can change.
The act of such commonly observed change is called motion, and is treated by the human eye and mind as a continuous phenomenon.
When the behavior of particles is observed at the atomic level, the evidence that motion is continuous simply disappears. (Wikipedia must have a piece about “quantum tunneling.”)
Were you to study QM (quantum mechanics) more deeply, and take a university level course in it, as I did long ago, you would find that the conventional interpretation of motion with respect to time and space does not correlate with reality. In reality, there are discontinuities.
QM currently operates under a set of paradigms, such as the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, with which I strongly disagree (on religious principles, of all things!) There were and are real physicists who share my disagreement, for a variety of reasons, Einstein and Max Planck (the founder of QM) included.
Despite its success, QM remains a questionable theory. It conflicts with General Relativity, with treats time as a continuum, which also works. Somewhere between them there is a problem.
IMO either space or time are quantized. If time is the quantized culprit, then the notion of time as we perceive it must be modified. BTW there is an interesting non-mathematical book on the subject which would advance your understanding of the issues:
The Twin Dimensions — Inventing Time & Space, by Geza Szamosi. It is well written and readable.
I can answer a few of your questions w/o too much fuss.
- Clocks do not give accurate measurements. All that a given clock knows or measures is a sequence of internal actions which we recognize as a “tick.” Were you compare the ticks of a Timex or Cuckoo clock against those of a cesium atom (the current physics “standard,”) you would find variations. If you used the standard to measure the earth’s 24 hour day, the original timekeeping standard, you would find the actual length of the day changing, daily.
Moreover, if you take a precise clock mounted at sea level and move it to a hillside, you will find that it ticks away at a different rate.
A clock measures a sequence of actions between its own natural ticks. That’s all. We interpret these ticks as a measurement of continuous objective time.
But ask yourself this: If time is continuous, why can we only measure it in quantized units— the “ticks?”
All clocks are digital devices. If time is continuous, why is it impossible to construct an analog clock?
- I cannot make sense of your question, “What is the persistence of your existence?”
- I think that spatial distance applies to existence. But distance is both mathematically and physically different from time. Time is not even included in some of the core equations of physics, such as the Laws of Thermodynamics.
- From the perspective of the normal human mind, time is entirely subjective. Conventionally clocked time does not exist for me when I sleep or am under anesthesia (or for you). Nor does it exist for someone in a hypnotic trance. Relative time has been shown to be a function of age, in that subjectively we measure each day as a percentage of previous days alive. (You’ll experience this as you age, and can observe it in children. This is why young children do not want to sleep— each hour lost to unconsciousness, for them, represents a far greater percentage of their lifetime than yours.)
Most people find that spent in a checkout line or L.A. traffic jam, or an unimaginative Sunday sermon, proceeds more slowly than time spent lovemaking, or the tail end of a down-to-the-wire football game.
Athletes who compete in fast-moving sports commonly report that with experience, the game slows down for them.
Then, consider your own mind. You have had new ideas— meaning, concepts which you did not previously know. Or you have had sudden understandings of a problem on which you’ve worked. Notice that what is common to these moments of insight is that your understanding appears
instantly, fully formed and without words. (To retain the concept in your time-dependent brain you must wrap words around it, but that is done later.)
What we “know” is that when examining the objective cosmos, a sequence of events occurs. “Time” is an entirely artificial method of assigning a systematic way of measuring them.
Please read this a few times so as to understand it fully before replying. Do some of the invited research, using Wikipedia or library sources. In other words, think about these concepts before replying from your current subjective understandings of them. Thank you.
Thermodynamical ‘Arrow of time’ says otherwise!