Is time an illusion?

[367kGNh0]

Is time an illusion? I can't tell if people say so to sound enigmatic or be witty. So what do you think? Is time an illusion? Why?

What triggered me to say this was after hearing in a production:

http://www.infinitelooper.com/?v=GTFVsOeH5QM&p=n#/109;117

[helios]

It depends on how much you're willing to distrust your senses and cognition.

Maybe you trust them both, so you trust that reality is more or less the way you perceive and remember it to be.

Maybe you trust your perception but not your cognition, so at any given instant you trust what your eyes are seeing, but you don't assume that reality and your own mental processes haven't come into being at that exact moment in their current state (i.e. ultimate last Thursdayism). In fact, since the future doesn't exist in any measurable way, you can't prove that your consciousness (and time itself, as far as you can perceive it) doesn't span a single instant of zero length.

You might also trust your cognition but not your senses, so you might distrust anything your eyes see, but since you do trust your thoughts and memories you do trust that time is real, even if you can't correlate any thought you had to any trustably real event.

Finally, at maximum uncertainty, the only thing you trust is that you currently exist. You can't say what reality might be even at a rough approximation, let alone what it ultimately is. As far as you can tell, the universe is you, this very moment, thinking "the universe is me, this very moment", and hallucinating or misremembering all the rest.

Try not to consider this while you believe that you're operating heavy machinery.

[367kGNh0]

Try not to consider this while you believe that you're operating heavy machinery.

I think we call it heavy machinery in comparison to our own strength. Like most over adjectives, relative to humans

[helios]

I feel like you chose to respond to the most irrelevant part of my post.

[367kGNh0]

I feel like you chose to respond to the most irrelevant part of my post.

I read the rest, agreed, had nothing to dispute on and therefore had nothing else necessary to say about it. I despise the non-beneficial use of time. As well as of money

[Satan]

Rascake wrote:

I despise the non-beneficial use of time. As well as of money

What does that have to do with anything?

[367kGNh0]

What does that have to do with anything?

Explaining why I didn't reply to a more sophistocated extract

[zapshe]

Time is certainly NOT an illusion. How we choose to measure time is a man-made concept, but time itself is real and exists within space.

The only illusion is how our brains perceive time. I can't agree with what he said in that video, at least not if he was talking about reality. If he was speaking more psychologically, then time is an illusion since we don't have a sense to measure time as we do for sound or light. We have to measure and keep track of time, and then people grow up and say, "When did all these years pass?" Our brains can't comprehend time as it is. But still, time is very real.

I remember talking with a friend who said, "I don't believe in time because it's a man-made concept." I just wanted to smack him in that moment, it was middle school.

[367kGNh0]

The only illusion is how our brains perceive time. I can't agree with what he said in that video, at least not if he was talking about reality. If he was speaking more psychologically, then time is an illusion since we don't have a sense to measure time as we do for sound or light. We have to measure and keep track of time, and then people grow up and say, "When did all these years pass?" Our brains can't comprehend time as it is. But still, time is very real.

would you say the theory of space time defends your point?

[helios]

time itself is real and exists within space

Time and space are orthogonal.

time is an illusion since we don't have a sense to measure time as we do for sound or light

If anything, I'd say the opposite is true. Estimating lengths of time (while in a lucid state of mind) objectively can be more accurate than for sound or light intensity. The perceived brightness or loudness of a stimulus depends on its surroundings; the exact same sound can be perceived to be differently loud depending on what other sounds are being heard at the same time.

I remember talking with a friend who said, "I don't believe in time because it's a man-made concept."

Although there's certainly a confusion of terms, this does bring up an interesting point, which is that a lot of people think of time (the physical dimension) and the bureaucracy of time (clocks, schedules, records, etc.) as being one and the same.

then people grow up and say, "When did all these years pass?"

This is such a silly statement. When people say this they're not saying they're honestly confused about the passage of time. They're saying that in their memory those years appear shorter than they actually were. This is because memory doesn't behave like a time-fair record of events. You don't remember with the same amount of detail yesterday's lunch and the time you went to pick up your first pet at the shelter, even though they might have taken roughly the same amount of time.
And the sad truth is, most of our lives are spent doing minutiae we will eventually forget about.

And now I wan to ask: if you could, would you shrink your life down to only the "meaningful" moments (those that would have stayed the longest and clearest in your memory), knowing that you'd probably be dead in a week, two if you're lucky?

[367kGNh0]

Although there's certainly a confusion of terms, this does bring up an interesting point, which is that a lot of people think of time (the physical dimension) and the bureaucracy of time (clocks, schedules, records, etc.) as being one and the same.

So time can be an illusion, depending on what we perceived it as.

And now I wan to ask: if you could, would you shrink your life down to only the "meaningful" moments (those that would have stayed the longest and clearest in your memory), knowing that you'd probably be dead in a week, two if you're lucky?

Sadly, some people would take their put a square of chocolate in their mouth and die if this happened.

[zapshe]

Time and space are orthogonal.

Not true. Time exists within space and the universe. I believe Einstein's theory of special relativity makes this known.

Estimating lengths of time (while in a lucid state of mind) objectively can be more accurate than for sound or light intensity

I suppose, but that wasn't the point. Imagine if you couldn't hear sound and it was being described to you. You could understand it and know how it works physically, but you still have no idea what things "sound" like, that's an experience you'll never have. Same with time, we can't feel time and that takes away a certain aspect about it.

When people say this they're not saying they're honestly confused about the passage of time. They're saying that in their memory those years appear shorter than they actually were.

Yes, that was my point, though I guess I was pretty vague. Since we don't have a sense for time, we can only know how much time has passed by looking at numbers. Our brains don't understand time outside of our memories and the present. So when years pass by and our brains eventually fade out the memories, it feels like years have passed by quickly. Again, we don't have a sense for time, so we rely on our memories and the present time in order to get a feel for it, hence all of this.

And now I wan to ask: if you could, would you shrink your life down to only the "meaningful" moments (those that would have stayed the longest and clearest in your memory), knowing that you'd probably be dead in a week, two if you're lucky?

If anyone did that, those moments would become the norm. "Special" moments are only special because they don't happen all the time and change what use to be the norm. If my life was shrunk to only those moments, I conclude that my life would feel pretty normal, maybe even mundane since there would be nothing "better" to expect, by the time I die.

would you say the theory of space time defends your point?

I suppose so. The point is that we KNOW it takes time for things to happen. Chemical reactions don't happen instantly, a signal passing through a wire doesn't pass through instantly, my muscle contractions don't happen instantly. They all take time. Time is similar to language. It exists and we need it for a fundamental purpose. However, they are both expressed in a man-made way.

Moreover, if you were to travel the speed of light, time for you would be different than time for someone standing still. You would literally experience no time traveling from 1 point to another (assuming you have practically no mass like a photon). However, to an observer watching you, it may have taken you thousands of years to reach your destination! The fact that time not only exists as a concept but can also be understood and experimented with shows that it exists in the physical world.

[helios]

Time exists within space and the universe. I believe Einstein's theory of special relativity makes this known.

That's like saying magnetism is within electricity, because of the electromagnetic theory.
Both time and space are part of spacetime, but neither is part of the other. They're related, but independent.

Imagine if you couldn't hear sound and it was being described to you. You could understand it and know how it works physically, but you still have no idea what things "sound" like, that's an experience you'll never have.

That's the Mary's Room argument for qualia. It's an argument that falls on its face because it argues that qualia exist by presupposing that qualia exist.

If it was possible to explain to someone all the physical characteristics of sound and all the neurological details of hearing, how could we know whether the deaf person understands sound to the same degree as a non-deaf person or not? How could they? Both us and them are trapped inside our own brains, unable to look into each other's brains.

Same with time, we can't feel time and that takes away a certain aspect about it.

I don't understand what you mean by "we can't feel time". If you do something and, without looking at a clock, say "wow, that took longer than I expected!" what's that if not feeling time?

Again, we don't have a sense for time, so we rely on our memories

Again, I'm puzzled by this. Things that have varying shape across space are called "objects", while things that have varying shape across time are called "processes". If you just look at the present state of some thing, without querying some memory device (a brain, a computer, a fossil record), you could never tell whether its an object or a process. What, in your mind, would constitute perceiving the passage of time that would not involve looking at our memories of the past?
Like, could I ever write code like this?

//auto t0 = clock(); Not needed, duh! This is for feeble minds that need memory to measure time!
some_lengthy_operation();
//auto t1 = clock();
auto time_span = /*???*/;
std::cout << "It took " << time_span;

The point is that we KNOW it takes time for things to happen.

You don't know that, though. All you can observe is the present moment. As you said, you're not perceiving time, you're using your memories to create the illusion of perception. Yes, just now you measured the ping signal arrive 100 ms after you sent it, but are you sure you actually sent it? Yes, you remember sending it less than a second ago, but how reliable are your memories? Before you answer consider that you would need to remember instances of your memory being accurate, which would have to be stored in your memory.

Are you capable of constructing an experiment that can prove or disprove time exists without using your memories or any other record of the past?

If anyone did that, those moments would become the norm.

You're altering the premise. The moments being meaningful to you personally is a supposition of the question.

I conclude that my life would feel pretty normal, maybe even mundane since there would be nothing "better"

First of all, I didn't say "happy" moments, I said "meaningful".
Second, you can't know that ahead of time. Yeah, maybe today you got your Ph.D., and that's pretty great, but maybe tomorrow your son's getting his and that feels even better, or maybe you have to make the decision to shut off his life support.
It's your life condensed into a few days, with you experiencing the most important moments as if you had experienced them normally.

[zapshe]

That's like saying magnetism is within electricity, because of the electromagnetic theory.

From reading a bit, Newton's theories always have time and space as independent. However, Einstein came along with different ideas. The point is that time is affected by speed and gravity. If time was truly independent of space, then it wouldn't be affected by the physics going on in space. This is where Einsteins space-time theory tries to explain aspects about the world we see. Off of wiki on spacetime "In the context of special relativity, time cannot be separated from the three dimensions of space."

In the end this might clear up the point. If time stopped, space will continue to exist. If space disappeared, time would not exist (at least not as we know it).

That's the Mary's Room argument for qualia. It's an argument that falls on its face because it argues that qualia exist by presupposing that qualia exist.

Whether there would actually be a sensation for time or not isn't the point. The point is that we don't feel it, whether or not it's possible to begin with. And language is limited, you can't describe a color to a blind person in a way that would make color "appear" in their minds.

I don't understand what you mean by "we can't feel time". If you do something and, without looking at a clock, say "wow, that took longer than I expected!" what's that if not feeling time?

This would likely be because of context clues, like the sun going down, and plain old experience from constantly keeping track of time will help you get some skills in estimating how much time has passed. And again, memory is also going to be important. If you can't remember more than 10 seconds at a time, how would you know that it took a long time? Ever get so wrapped up in something that a lot of time has passed before you knew it? Our brains are simply wired to feel bored when uninterested, making one feel like things are taking a while. However, spending time with something you love doing could make time suddenly disappear on you. You could probably look back and think, "Yea, I can see why that took a long time." But you had to look back to your memory. Unlike being bored, which can make even a short while seem like forever. How we experience time and how time actually moves is different - which is what I mean by we can't feel time. Not that we can't, but that we don't feel it as it actually is.

You don't know that, though. All you can observe is the present moment. As you said, you're not perceiving time, you're using your memories to create the illusion of perception. Yes, just now you measured the ping signal arrive 100 ms after you sent it, but are you sure you actually sent it? Yes, you remember sending it less than a second ago, but how reliable are your memories?

So now I'm right about how we can't actually perceive time xD!? Also, you're using an argument that can be used for literally anything. I can't prove to you that time exists outside of our minds or anything else for that matter. Can you prove that anything exists outside of your mind? When you pick something up, did you really? Does that object actually exist? Can you prove it exists outside of your brain? You can't. However, without taking it that far, we can compare how long things take relative to another thing. For example, two people can race, one walking the other running. Unless your memory is VERY bad, you should be able to clearly identify that one made it through much faster than the other, without any exact measurements of time.

EDIT: Also, if you argue that our memory is not to be trusted at all, understand that to survive our brains and senses have to be reflective of the real world. If our memory lies to us, we would likely to have survived this long. Assuming of course we live in a world outside of our minds where we have to survive at all!

The moments being meaningful to you personally is a supposition of the question.

First of all, I didn't say "happy" moments, I said "meaningful".
Second, you can't know that ahead of time. Yeah, maybe today you got your Ph.D., and that's pretty great, but maybe tomorrow your son's getting his and that feels even better, or maybe you have to make the decision to shut off his life support.
It's your life condensed into a few days, with you experiencing the most important moments as if you had experienced them normally.

No, I wouldn't do that to begin with. If somehow the context of those "meaningful" events weren't lost on me since I just hopscotched through my life, it would still mean that I live a short life. Of course, one could argue this already happens since we forget most things that we ever do. So by the time most people die, their memories consist of mostly the meaningful events. However, living through life, even if you forget most of it, still gives you things. I don't remember everyday I spent trying to learn C++, but that doesn't mean I don't remember how to code. Your brain may forget the process you went through, but experience builds up.

[helios]

The point is that time is affected by speed and gravity. If time was truly independent of space, then it wouldn't be affected by the physics going on in space.

Motion and gravity are phenomena in spacetime, not just space. A gravitational well exists in a finite region of both space and time (the gravity well doesn't exist before the matter coalesced, and its gravity doesn't propagate out faster than c).

If time stopped, space will continue to exist.

Do you realize what you're saying? If time has a final point then there's no time beyond that point for space to continue to exist.
The universe is a canvas, and we're lines on that paper. If the canvas has edges then it exists only within those edges. If past a certain point the continues canvas continues then that wasn't the edge of the canvas. Now, you can pinch the canvas (gravity), and that will bend the canvas in both dimensions, but that doesn't change the fact that the dimensions are orthogonal.

And language is limited, you can't describe a color to a blind person in a way that would make color "appear" in their minds.

This is not as obvious as you think it is. Whether it's possible for there to be real things that cannot be (not are are not) named is a debate in semiotics.
But, let's suppose this situation: you tell to someone who was born blind "imagine the color red", and they say "okay, I'm doing it". Are they lying, mistaken, or telling the truth? Can either of you tell the difference between these three cases?

So now I'm right about how we can't actually perceive time xD!?

I agree with you that we can't feel our consciousness move along the fourth dimension. We use clock-like mental processes to keep track of time and create time perception, however you for some reason don't agree in calling this cognitive process "time perception", even though in our universe there's no other way to perceive time, because of relativity.

Also, you're using an argument that can be used for literally anything.

Yup. But hey, you're the one who said we KNOW time exists. If we want to answer the question of whether time is an illusion, we need to be prepared to ask the question of how we test if time is an illusion. If we can't design a test that will do this, the intelectually honest answer to the question "is time real?" is not "YES!", it's "we don't and we can't know".

Also, if you argue that our memory is not to be trusted at all, understand that to survive our brains and senses have to be reflective of the real world. If our memory lies to us, we would likely to have survived this long. Assuming of course we live in a world outside of our minds where we have to survive at all!

If we're no longer assuming that time is real, and are accepting the possibility that the universe is a single instant of space, like a three-dimensional cosmic painting, then it makes no sense to talk about the evolution of the brain. None of our ancestors ever existed at all. Their remains exist in the fossil record, but their lives never happened.

No, I wouldn't do that to begin with. If somehow the context of those "meaningful" events weren't lost on me since I just hopscotched through my life, it would still mean that I live a short life. Of course, one could argue this already happens since we forget most things that we ever do. So by the time most people die, their memories consist of mostly the meaningful events. However, living through life, even if you forget most of it, still gives you things. I don't remember everyday I spent trying to learn C++, but that doesn't mean I don't remember how to code. Your brain may forget the process you went through, but experience builds up.

I think you're treating the question less poetically than I intended. I ask whether you'd prefer to live a really short and really intense life assuming the universe somehow worked like that, and you ask whether you'd know how to program in C++ even though you never learnt it. I bet if I had asked if you'd prefer to be happier you'd ask about how it would affect your taxes or something.

[deleted account xyzzy]

Nah, time is saved in a bottle.

[367kGNh0]

Nah, time is saved in a bottle.

I suppose the great sophistication and formality of this topic could not last eternally.

[deleted account xyzzy]

I suppose the great sophistication and formality of this topic could not last eternally.

The notion the topic was one of great sophistication and formality was an illusion from the start.

[zapshe]

Sorry to reply late.

Motion and gravity are phenomena in spacetime, not just space.

Spacetime because they wouldn't happen without time. But space because that's where it takes place. Where it actually happens is space, and it affects time.

Do you realize what you're saying? If time has a final point then there's no time beyond that point for space to continue to exist.

Not true, space would exist in that moment where it stopped. I'm not saying time has disappeared, I'm saying time has stopped progressing. The moment would be captured perfectly, an unchanging image of the universe. Argument still stands. Time can stop and space will continue to be there, but without space - time would have no place to exist.

This is not as obvious as you think it is. Whether it's possible for there to be real things that cannot be (not are are not) named is a debate in semiotics.

The issue is that it IS obvious. Very obvious, but it can't be proven without a doubt. The point is that any logical thought would lead to this conclusion and what evidence there is would also point to it. However, there's always the chance that it's wrong, and that's what you're arguing even though there's no reason to. The whole world could simply be a projection of our minds and not actually existent, but it's healthier to think the world is actually real - and a lot more probable.

however you for some reason don't agree in calling this cognitive process "time perception", even though in our universe there's no other way to perceive time, because of relativity.

I agree that there seems to be no viable method for time perception because of relativity. I also didn't say that it wasn't time perception, I said it's not time perception in the way of being accurate or relating to the ACTUAL passage of time. We perceive time in our own way, which is fine for our use case. However, you obviously wouldn't use your memory for anything where time was an important factor because our brains can't calculate time in this fashion.

Yup. But hey, you're the one who said we KNOW time exists. If we want to answer the question of whether time is an illusion, we need to be prepared to ask the question of how we test if time is an illusion. If we can't design a test that will do this, the intellectually honest answer to the question "is time real?" is not "YES!", it's "we don't and we can't know".

Am I mentally retarded? "We don't and we can't know." Did NASA fake the moon landing? "We don't and we can't know." Was Trump elected? "We don't and we can't know." -- By using the argument that we can't possibly know anything, suddenly you have answers to nothing. Nothing is absolute, there's always a small percentage that something that was proven extensively might be wrong. But we all logically know that the likelihood of that being the case is small. Same with time being an illusion. We KNOW that time is real. We've measured time, we've seen the effects of time, even seen the effects of altered time. For example, muons should decay before coming to Earth's surface. However, traveling at light speed they have physics running at a slower clock, making the distance they travel shorter to them than to us, hence why we find more of them on the Earth's surface than originally predicted (Vsauce, "Is the Earth Actually Flat?") EDIT: If you don't watch the video then don't worry, it's not advocating Flat Earth. If we IGNORE all this to simply say "we don't and we can't know," simply because we can't prove it beyond impossible to disprove doubt, then I don't know what to say. Certainly, any scientist will conduct experiments assuming time exists in the way we already know.

If we're no longer assuming that time is real, and are accepting the possibility that the universe is a single instant of space, like a three-dimensional cosmic painting, then it makes no sense to talk about the evolution of the brain. None of our ancestors ever existed at all. Their remains exist in the fossil record, but their lives never happened.

Which is why I added that last sentence in. However, I don't see why we have to refer to an argument like that. It's much like "last thursdayism." Sure, we can't disprove it, but things like ockham's razor and such serve to disprove these undisprovable/unprovable theories.

I think you're treating the question less poetically than I intended. I ask whether you'd prefer to live a really short and really intense life assuming the universe somehow worked like that, and you ask whether you'd know how to program in C++ even though you never learnt it. I bet if I had asked if you'd prefer to be happier you'd ask about how it would affect your taxes or something.

I was talking it pretty philosophically. I meant that even if I could have a short but "intense" life, I'd rather live long and go through day to day. To me, the buildup is important. Experience, our little forgettable daily thoughts, etc., are all just as much part of life.

And if you asked me if I'd prefer to be happy, I'd say that without sadness you can't appreciate the happiness. As Lelouch said, "Life without change cannot be called life." And in the anime Ergo Proxy, there was a place where everyone was constantly made to enjoy their lives. However, when an outsider came in they were far happier than the one's who'd been living there already. It was new happiness after the issues they had faced. It was more appreciated.

That's my way of thought, maybe I'm simply not as much of a romantic as you. I feel like you hate me a bit more with each reply!

[deleted account xyzzy]

https://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2019/04/Screen-Shot-2019-04-16-at-2.50.20-PM.png