Talk:Time/Archive 4

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

Archive 7

New Page

Mostly new. I've kept the recent debate of the lede and its images below, as it is ongoing.

The debate on the E+ pages is in Archive 3, and imho should best be considered CLOSED MERGE INTO "TIME" and "SECOND" REJECTED by the community of editors on this page. If you want to keep debating it, there are all those E pages to discuss it on. :) -- Yamara 21:56, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I got lost trying to follow the archived debate. Was the conclusion to do nothing? Ie. do not merge anything into Time and do not merge anything into Second? If so can I remove the first two merge tags from Orders of magnitude (time)? -Wikianon (talk) 20:41, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Images

The connection of the statues with time is not at all obvious - Is one "Father" Time? and the other? They look a bit too ugly to me - there must be a story that goes with them, but it is too vague for a TOP image The long-case clock has NEVER shown up on this page for me - it does on other pages. Does anyone see it? I think a more appropriate TOP image would be an "hourglass" - it is ancient not overly modern, represents past present & future, & is iconic

Some of the recent changes to the text have been quite good. I do not recall reading anything about the problem of simultaneity yet though. And it appears there's great agreement on merging the E-## articles - only question being whether to have 1 or 2 articles. Can I suggest we try ONE & divide if there is a reason to do so - so we can move on & move the templates off the page. --JimWae (talk) 19:54, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I would not object to a more distinct Father Time image or other symbol, but we could be more profound in our choices than just another clock. There are already plenty over at the Clock article. The top image should be an expression of Time that is not only about measurement. The reason is simply that the introduction is clear that measurement is only one way to understand Time. The article's detail sections leads logically with measurement, but there are too many other facets to Time, one of the major aspects of life. A more eternal image works better with the text-- a watch is very workday related, but the overview of Time in the opening text is contemplative. Which I believe is perfect for explaining one of the great ideas of mankind.

(As for the statue, the winged old man with a beard is Father Time, but I made sure to include the statue's title, "Time", in case that wasn't clear. Time liberates Man with one hand, and blocks him with the other, though I don't have a cite for that.)

(Also, I don't think van der Stappen's work often gets the critique that it's "too ugly"... The image might look clearer if it were larger, but that's not a good solution for the page.)

(And the pocketwatch that it replaces was the same image as the one someone chose for the Time Portal -- which is now minimally useful, btw -- and looked blatantly redundant on the top.)

All that aside, I was searching more a more iconic picture of Time, preferably not another clock.

The longcase clock image-- I can see it using Firefox 2 on Windows XP. I can also see it on my friend's Blackberry. ...Testing it on IE, you're right, it vanishes. Any solutions? That big space to the right of the TOC is not pretty.

Ah, Simultaneity! Something to add to a Time Topics Template!

And please someone make the argument over the merging of the Es come to a conclusion. Maybe it's just time to "be bold" and remove them. -- Yamara 23:09, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Okay, just did some tests on the longcase clock. First, the wiki syntax was not understood by IE until I placed it in the right order. I also imitated the placement of the image next to the TOC in the Clock article. But the longcase only shows up on IE when at 250 px, which means it's too long to be seen in its entirety on the screen, and tends to cover the TOC when the window is reduced.

This is strange and frustrating. Someone summon a geek. -- Yamara 00:24, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

My last guess is it's a png vs. IE problem. So, I've switched the longcase png with an hourglass jpeg. It's visible in IE. -- Yamara 00:35, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I've moved the statues down. The background & lack of detail because of size, make it unclear whether the "guy in the back" has horns. Image is just too obscure - relevance of top image should be obvious, not obscure. I took out the image sizes -- thumb lets user preferences decide. Yes, I have IE7 & the longcase clock shows up in its article, but not here. We need a pendulum image too --JimWae (talk) 04:33, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Correction - longcase clock image does NOT show up in its article either - only when I click on the blank image there & go to the image page --JimWae (talk) 04:37, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

By ugly I meant the fact that the statues are deeply discolored & the apparent horn on the unnamed "guy in the back" - at normal resolution, I cannot tell that he is assisting - only blocking came across --JimWae (talk) 04:41, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I think an hourglass qualifies as being "not only about measurement". It concretely displays past, present, & future - and the QUANTITY of elapsed time it "measures" depends on the amount of sand (and other things). Especially in the contemplative sense, time is still about sequencing events - and an "hour"glass iconically & concretely represents that. I agree that a clock or watch is too "dated" - but I think we can expect hourglasses to be around a few more centuries without changing in appearance very much - whereas clocks & watches often easily show their date of manufacture --JimWae (talk) 04:52, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I added a timeless image, an absolutely universal icon - a flower opening up over a couple hours. Potatoswatter (talk) 09:00, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

While a time-lapse of a flower opening is catchy (and also distracting), it does not demonstrate or illustrate much at all (if anything) about time. What it does demonstrates is that motion can be conveyed by images with time-intervals. ALL moving images do that. The best claim this time-lapse has over an image of a man running is that the interval of time is more apparent. An hourglass signifies elements of past, present, future AND measurement - and is traditionally and clearly associated with time. Perhaps a time-lapse of an hourglass would satisfy everyone (however, showing top & bottom quantities changing [not really necessary] would require a flip too). --JimWae (talk) 09:11, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, all moving images illustrate time. So the moving flower is superior to the static hourglass, which requires an extra dimension from the viewer's imagination. Furthermore flowers are much prettier than hourglasses, and the hourglass image is very drably generic, not to mention so tall as to disturb the page layout. And what does the hourglass signify about the past or future? I think the flower does more to unify the scientific and philosophical aspects. Maybe a nicer natural image could replace both the separate father time and scientific measurement images. Father time is an abstract personification of already abstract philosophy inspired by flowers blooming. Potatoswatter (talk) 09:21, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I cannot find any section of the article that the flowers relate to. The hourglass relates to many sections --JimWae (talk) 09:40, 9 January 2008 (UTC) --- Run it backwards & it will relate to one section anyway :) --JimWae (talk) 09:55, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I'll see Potato's flower and raise him the Sun.

Putting a moving image at the top was the right direction for this article, and kudos to Potatoswatter for that; I only wish a better sunrise were available. But the statement "This event is timeless, as it could occur on any date" was simply untrue, since it could not have happened during a harsh winter, let alone during the Precambrian. The Sun, on the other hand, is the defining object of time, even after we were able to discover things like cesium. It may not be eternal, but it will outlast a flower, this planet, and quite possibly our species.

I was growing fond of the hourglass, and especially liked the caption, so it's back. The bronze I've moved way to the bottom as a kind of visual coda, at least for now.

I've also cleaned up and revised much of the opening language. Cites should come for much of that from me sometime this week... -- Yamara 18:16, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Another idea about images of time -- time has universal relevance to human beings because we have our own internal clocks. These clocks help keep us awake in the daylight hours, prepare us for sleep as night approaches, wake us up before the alarm clock rings in the morning, etc. They give us the sense of passage of time, of having been waiting too long for something, of some other animal coming upon us too fast, etc. We know now that these biological clocks are either chemical or neurological circular chains. The first link in the chain activates and send an impulse to the second link, the second link fires off a signal to the third, etc. It takes a fairly constant length of time (as measured by things like the atomic clock that are even more regular) to go once around the circle, and at that point a signal is sent off somewhere else. (The heart has its own clock for obvious reasons.) An image of the chemical kinds of clocks (formation of one compound instigates the formation of another compound, etc.) would be too abstract, but there may be images of circular configurations of neurons. Probably such an image could be turned into a GIF sequence to put some action into the picture. P0M (talk) 06:55, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Changes to lead & other text

Time is NOT easily defined and the lede needs to deal with the issues of definition. Saying "Time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe" has at least 2 problems. First it is not a definition, 2nd it takes a POV in the debate on what time is, 3rd it is vague - and really says very little (except that the other main view can be ignored). Much of the rest of the recently composed lede is also vague and many sentences are repetitious or if they were eliminated, no meaning would be lost. Most of the recent changes to the text are NOT improvements to text that has been stable for about 3 years now. Agreement from others should be sought before such widespread changes in the text are adopted --JimWae (talk) 19:13, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Strongly agree about the first sentence, and much of the rest. The lede as it was a few days ago needed more simplicity, but not the brevity and inaccuracy of the current post.

I think it would be helpful to match the lede of Time with the lede for Space, though I'm not saying Space has a perfect lede yet either.

In a related matter, I had a problem with "Newtonian time" being leaned on in the previous lede, as that article, as it stands (and seemingly has always stood) does not address the classical physics of time, but instead the Austrian School of economics' view that time is irrelevant. Very unhelpful, though not the fault the contributors to the Time article itself.

Would not oppose restoring the previous lede and going slow with hashing it out here on the Talk page. -- Yamara 22:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

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For the sake of discussion, here is my reduced lead ("lede"? where do you get that?) paragraph:

Time is a dimension of our universe. Objects and events may be identified with positions in time, like space, relative to an observer's frame of reference. Unlike space, movement through time cannot be controlled. The fundamental importance of time results in great philosophical and spiritual significance. From the dawn of history to the present, questions of mortality, life cycles, and the permanence of the universe have been inextricably linked to the science of chronology. To accomplish absolutely anything requires some measurable time, and even the human sense of time varies with time.

The function of the lead is to introduce the topic at hand, briefly enough to give the reader an overview of the article before they are confronted with the table of contents. The "stable" alternative rambles for confusing paragraphs without even mentioning issues of technology or standardization, which in fact make the bulk of the article. So some kind of WP:BOLD change is certainly needed... please try to defend this reversion beyond the argument of "stability."

Also, you clearly misquoted my first sentence. Apparently you are looking at a revision before I wrote any new text. I reorganized with copy & paste before deciding to contribute original words - originally the beginning read (sans paragaph breaks):

There are two distinct views on the meaning of the word time.

One view is that time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe, a dimension in which events occur in sequence, and time itself is something that can be measured. This is the realist's view, to which Sir Isaac Newton subscribed, and hence is sometimes referred to as Newtonian time.

An opposing view is that time is part of the fundamental intellectual structure (together with space and number) within which humans sequence events, quantify the duration of events and the intervals between them, and compare the motions of objects.

The first and fundamental assertion is that there are two incompatible definitions of time. This statement is completely unreferenced, and to me is blatantly false. Everyone can agree that time is a single dimension, in which the universe moves from the past through the present to the future. Spiritual and scientific thought naturally consider different aspects of time, as my intro mentions. But to invent incompatible warring schools makes it sound like you're muddling the situation for the sake of some faux philosophical depth. Our object is not to confuse anyone.

Honestly, can you find a single scientist who would claim that time is not a fundamental intellectual structure, a property of visceral metaphysical being? And can you find even a crackpot philosopher who would deny that time is a dimension of the universe? Simultaneously accepting the notions of a soul and a universe, which every infant does right off the bat, requires some tacit innate understanding of both "disctinct" views you present.

Considering the physical definition is absolutely incontrovertible and unambiguous (though not well stated in the original text), my first edit was simply to erase the first sentence and present the two "definitions" as complementary rather than conflicting. Which both clarified and shortened the text.

So please reference your confusion, or let someone clean it up. Potatoswatter (talk) 12:33, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

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I do not have much time to respond today. There is a much difference of opinion over whether or not time is part of the structure of the universe or a kind of "imposition" made by our intellect. I have produced several sources & quotes to demonstrate the disagreement. You seem to take the realist position a la Newton - one that few scientists would accept post-Einstein. Time cannot be easily defined & that needs to be dealt with in the lede. I do NOT see ANY sources for what you wrote. Nevertheless, I have reworked the lede, putting the operational definition first because it is more easily understood. I have also made other changes which I think you might find more palatable. More later --JimWae (talk) 02:48, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

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The above statement: Everyone can agree that time is a single dimension, in which the universe moves from the past through the present to the future: is blatantly false. Pragmatically TIME is the MEASURE of change which uses stable, repeating, countable events as a guage for changes which are not. The only REAL time we know about is this time, which is obviously part of our intellectual stucture and is no dimension through which anything flows. The idea that time is a thing in its own right and that stuff moves through it is hard to shake considering that our mind seems to portray things this way... we have memories of objects in the past and projections of them into the future while seeing them in the "present" and get a feelling that in some way we are referring to three distinct objects even though we understand that they are connected to the single set of stuff making them... yet a bit of thought will reveal that we understand that the one set of stuff does not leave copies of itself in the past, only in our memory...that the past stuff has changed relationships with other stuff and is still with us, though in a new configuration. TIME as a dimension has never been demonstrated to be anything more than a sci-fi device for story telling. While some may claim that time travel is possible, no one has presented any evidence. Those who hold to the time as dimension belief seems to be mistaking a chart for reality. While Einsteinian spacetime seems to require it, that is not the case at all and other ways of seeing his results are possible. Past is memory, future is anticipation, now alone is real. It is always NOW, but the contents of NOW are always in motion and changing relationships...that is hard to grasp. Jiohdi (talk) 17:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

See the definition of dimension. The fact that you can quantitatively measure time, and there is no mathematical relation between position in time and position in space, make it a dimension. Whether or not the future and past "exist" despite our inability to perceive them is irrelevant. Just because some things are too far away to see doesn't make distance "not a dimension." Potatoswatter (talk) 11:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Jiohdi, that is Pee oh vee. 1Z (talk) 13:05, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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I think there is still a problem with first sentence of the current lead: "Time is a basic component of our measuring system...". Who is the "our" referring to? All of humanity? Western scientific measuring systems? Amazonian indigenous communities? Since time is understood differently by different cultures, this statement is problematic (and violates NPOV). Also, do "we" have a single measuring system? If this is actually referring to standardized scientific measuring systems (which I think it is), then we should be clear, i.e. "Time is a basic component of scientific systems of measurement..." (although I actually think it would be wrong to privilege scientific perspectives of time from the very first sentence).
I also think we need an attempt at an actual definition or series of alternative definitions as well, since this is an encyclopaedia. The current lead, although well and carefully written, doesn't give a hint of what time is, just says that it's a basic component of the way we measure things, while the second paragraph just says that it's a "fundamental quantity". The third paragraph says that it's either a fundamental structure of the universe or a fundamental intellectual structure. Still no attempt to explain either what it is or how it is generally experienced, or of the concepts of past, present and future. --GKantaris (talk) 10:34, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

This sounds like an anthropocentric sidestepping of the statement "time is a dimension of our universe". Any useful "component of a measuring system" is a dimension. By leaving out who is measuring what, the author seems to be trying to imply that the universe is being measured. I would say "our" universe is measured to cover the possibility of other universes (whatever that means). Potatoswatter (talk) 11:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Since we shouldn't only criticize but also suggest alternatives, how about something like this for the first paragraph: "Time is the presumed passage of a given system from its present state into one of its potential future states. The perception of the passage of time gives rise to the concepts of past, present and future. As a result, time is sometimes considered to be a dimension analagous to the three dimensions of space, although this is the subject of much controversy. It is a basic component of most human measuring systems and has long been a major subject of art, philosophy, and science."

That is a circular definition because "present", "future", and "state" are defined only in terms of a sense of time. If time weren't a dimension, physics would not be a mathematical science. Time appears alongside distance in the wave functions that give rise to the consistent description of reality that mainstream scientists call "physics". And no we don't need to bring Einstein into this.

Physics is a more encyclopedic topic than philosophy. This article will be better if we progress from one straightforward definition to the next rather than try to sidestep defining anything (which seems to be the essence of academic "philosophy" anyway). Potatoswatter (talk) 11:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The following (existing) paragraphs would then follow on well from this.--GKantaris (talk) 10:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

how about:

Time is the measure of changes in relationship between and among objects using stable, repeating, countable events as a gauge. The past is the remembered relational state[s] of objects that have become the currently perceived state of those same objects. The future is the likely state[s] those objects will rearrange themselves into following their current trajectories.Jiohdi (talk) 00:31, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

You're again going out of your way to replicate the definition of a dimension. Distance is also a measure of the relationship between two objects using stable, repeating, countable markers (as on a ruler) as a gauge. Furthermore there's no need to invoke the concept of memory just to define time. The propagation of information (light or other) through empty space creates a natural delay, so everything actually observed is already in the past. The past "contains" everything that has verifiably happened. Most everything that has happened is not remembered (if a tree falls in the woods, does it make a sound?) and it is easy for a person or scientific instrument to accidentally remember something not in the past. Furthermore contents of the future has nothing to do with "likelihood," which you should define, it is up to our imaginations.

The notion of a timeline may be derived from the physically observable growth of successive light cones from the world line of a frame of reference. These cones bound the size of causal relationships from the originating point. Tying that to human perception would be a good, fun project. But what the "philosophers" here seem to be clinging to, that time is a figment or at best a convenient approximation, is dead wrong and ignoring some pretty obvious physical reality.

If time weren't a physical dimension, it would not be physically measurable. Time and space are physically related by the universally constant speed of light. If you can measure distance then you can measure time. Consider an experiment where one burst of photons is reflected from a series of equally spaced mirrors. Such a device translates directly between the time between pulses and the space between mirrors. End of story. Potatoswatter (talk) 04:59, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I think you miss something important in thinking of time as physical. Consider a pool table with balls in motion... the number of balls never increases nor decreases, but just change relationships with each other. now an observer can take photographs of the changing relationships and that is equivalent to our memory sampling the changes of the world around us. those photos can be arranged in order and numbered and we can see TIME as this numbering of the images. there is no physical TIME otherwise existent but only the ever changing present mapped out. WE call the most recent image the present and the prior ones the past... we can sketch an image of what we think these balls will look like or using a computer program take the data from the images and project where they will likely go next and that is the future. Also, years ago Scientific american mag. had an article showing that because our sampling rate is never infinite, there is always a data loss which exponentially increases making accurate predictions of the future impossible after just a few moments.Jiohdi (talk) 23:45, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

You say I'm missing something important. What am I missing? You are speaking of direct human perception being very limited. I agree but being a believer in science I think that instruments capable of repeatable, quantitative measurement are superior to our unaided ears and eyes. If you look at a videotape of a pool table, you can conclude either that the familiar laws of physics are being obeyed as usual, or that some conspiracy rearranged the frames to make it look as if there's such a thing as scientific physics. You could fully expect the balls to do something different the second time you push "play," due to forgetfulness or another conspiracy theory. Or could accept that the video represents something called the "past" but it's actually just a miracle that God lets us repeat experiments as a grand joke. In any case, you are the one "missing out" on something, if you are truly denying that data can be recorded over time. That Scientific American article was about perception, not reality.

Is it philosophically invalid to argue that nothing really exists at all, that the Big Bang was fifteen seconds ago and the edge of the universe is ten inches from your face? And illusions to the contrary are just miracles? Should WP tiptoe around every philosophical "possibility" and "uncertainty" or just go with scientific consensus? Potatoswatter (talk) 10:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

what you are missing is that it is not about perceptions of the eyes and ears, but about what is going on and what is being measured and how it is being measured. you seem to think that something called TIME exists independantly of the pool table and balls in motion while I am trying to show that time is not a thing of itself but a measure of things in motion using other things in motion such as a camera or video taper as the scale of measure. that time has no independant existance. there is no such thing as THE PAST other than recordings of prior states, you cannot travel to THE PAST as if it were a location in reality. space can be travelled right to left and back, but time being a measure of changes cannot be travelled. there place is here, the time is now, all stuff only exists as one set of things existing and there are no copies of it in the past nor in the future. if you were to go to the location the stuff was in in "the past" it would no longer be there because it has moved to where it is in "the present". the only way you could travel backwards in time would be to rewind the entirety of the universe.Jiohdi (talk) 16:30, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I find myself in agreement with Jiohdi. Take a look at this week's New Scientist, the article "Is Time an Illusion?". Reserchers have managed to come up with descriptions of quantum interactions that do not rely on an external temporal frame of reference. They do this precisely by including the measuring device within the framework of quantum uncertainty. I'm not qualified to summarize this, and don't have the article in front of me right now -- it suggests that time is little more than a statistical artefact of averaging various interactions in the same way that temperature is (the averaging of the individual movement of many molecules in a system). In any case, whether time is real or whether "The greatest trick the universe ever pulled was convincing us that time exists" as the article suggests, is kind of irrelevant for an encyclopaedia. I don't think it is possible to come up with a non-circular definition of time that doesn't reference notions of past, present and future states, which is why in my definition above I wrote "the presumed passage of a given system from its present state into one of its future states". That is how we experience the passage of the present into what we guess will be the next thing to happen (our brains seem hard-wired to make these guesses all the time, although we often get it wrong). The illusion is that if we could know the totality of a given system, we could predict the next state it must be in, or that the next state is a pre-determined outcome, but quantum mechanics long ago blew away that God-like fantasy (while relativity doesn't need a concept of "flow" and doesn't even give time an arrow). At the beginning of the lead we need some basic reference to what human beings in everyday life presume time to be. It can be hedged with scare quotes or whatever, but we need something succinct and comprehensible that doesn't privilege any ONE intellectual system's way of understanding time (scientific, philosophical, quantum, relativistic, literary...). I like the first sentence of Jiohdi's above, although I wonder if it is necessary to collapse time into measurement quite so quickly (by the fourth word). The definitions of past and future that follow are perhaps just a little too technical to place at this point in the article, although they could certainly be put in later. How about the following, which combines some of the above but tries to make it more accessible for laypeople (which I firmly believe is needed at the beginning of an encyclopaedia article):

"Time is the perceived change in relationship between and among objects in a given system. It is measured using stable, repeating, countable events as a gauge, such as the ticking of a clock or the rate of decay of a radioactive element. The perception of change gives rise to the concepts of past (the remembered state of objects), present (the current perceived state) and future (a potential state that could arise from the current one). As a result, time is often presumed to have a "flow" and considered to be a dimension analagous to the three dimensions of space, although this is the subject of much controversy. It is a basic component of most human measuring systems and has long been a major subject of art, philosophy, and science."

Please, any improvements on the above without making it too technical at this stage of the article.--GKantaris (talk) 10:44, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Because time is a dimension and not a "thing," physics still works if you ignore it. That is the same as saying that the laws of physics hold at any instant of time.

Things interact with each other by wave propagation. Waves propagate over time from an initial point in space. The further in time, the farther the wavefront. If you're genuinely confused about the basic nature of time, or the very validity of the concept, perhaps you shouldn't hold yourself responsible for this article? Potatoswatter (talk) 05:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, I would be worried by any argument claiming certainty in defining what time is, given the huge mass of scientific, philosophical, mythical and literary speculation about it over the centuries, which has come to no clear consensus. Your definition, based on the notion of wave propagation, comes from one of those specialized branches of human knowledge, and should be expounded in sections of this article, but a more general definition is required in the lead. I would say the same for definitions of time (or its arrow) based on the second law of thermodynamics. Or for objections to the concept of temporal flow based on the relativity of simultaneity. I was merely pointing out that today's scientists are still debating whether time is an illusion, or a fundamental property of the universe, or a "dimension", etc.. Given that, it would be misleading to state with certainty at the beginning of an encyclopaedic entry, that time is a dimension (a concept derived from the Block Theory of the Universe and popularized by H.G. Wells). I am not "holding myself responsible": I came across this article while researching other things and strongly felt that the lead was missing an operational definition of time, which makes it read very oddly. If there is absolutely no consensus on an operational definition, then the article needs to start (like the article on Space) by stating the difficulty of definition and listing some competing ones.--GKantaris (talk) 10:16, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

All branches of scientific knowledge are equally true for everyone, universally.

Doh? I know no serious scientist who would hold that view. The natural sciences are approximate analytical systems which, based on empirical observation, produce testable predictions about the world. They constantly revise themselves, which is their strength compared to religion (the only branch of human knowledge which lays any claim to truth). But this is by-the-by: the point is that "Time" is a concept which spans many branches of human knowledge and it should not be defined at the beginning of an encyclopaedia article only through a very narrow interpretation of its role in physics.

Devices can measure and record the passage of time, therefore it is certainly a dimension. It is totally untrue that there is "no consensus." If scientists were still debating whether time were a dimension, there would be no such thing as the second.

Devices do not directly measure "the passage of time". All they measure is some uniformly repeating event, which is always an analogue approximation for time and ultimately based on the movement of particles in space, whether its an egg-timer or a caesium clock.

I have not been proposing "definitions" in these arguments on this page.

Which is the problem. If you'd try constructively to propose some which are general enough to cover various knowledge systems, we might advance the article.

I'm trying to point out the most obvious evidence that time is a measurable dimension and the past is unequivocally distinct from the future. The best operational definition of time is that used to standardize the second, and it's missing from the lead because it's unwieldy.

You need to understand the fundamentals at dimension, causality, and operational definition before you start going on tangents like the second law of thermodynamics or H.G. Wells. I can assure you that time goes the same rate no matter how fast entropy changes and there were units of time pre-1870.

How do you know what "today's scientists" are debating, and what does the existence of scientific debate indicate to you as a non-scientist? Do you believe that renewed debate casts doubt on established consensus? It doesn't. Observations contradicting accepted theory can unseat consensus. But anyone can propose a new theory and doing so means little.

Please try to stick to a few clear arguments and avoid saying things like "the relativity of simultaneity."

Thanks for the lessons. You in turn could do with understanding the fundamentals at Special_relativity, Relativity_of_simultaneity and Arrow_of_time if you are having trouble with concepts I refer to shorthand by way of illustration only. Try not to put down your interlocutors by disqualifying them. What does it mean to you as a non-philsopher that there exists a major academic discipline called "philosophy of science"? Or many other branches of human knowledge which use and define the concept of time in radically different ways to the narrow measurement systems by which you understand the concept? If you want to broaden your outlook, read Jorge Luis Borges' brilliant "New Refutation of Time" (the paradox of the title is intentional).

Potatoswatter (talk) 12:17, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Unless you wish to disregard nearly a hundred years of testing you are completely mistaken about time going the same rate no matter how fast entropy changes. Time rate or the rate of changes in a system is governed, per the einsteinian relativity theories, by speed and accelerations so that one system's clock is not identicle to anothers as in classical physics. Rate of change is variable and that is what time is a measurement of. now you can use your personal clock to gauge all other systems and for you time remains a fixed interval but that is not identicle to what you imply.Jiohdi (talk) 14:42, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

how about this for the lead-- or a suggestion for it:

Time is an essential basic measurement (usually denoted as 'T') which uses a semi-independant stable, cycling, and countable system as the means for the creation of a fourth space-like dimension which, along with the other three spacial co-ordinates, is required to define the dynamic relation and location changes of any group of elements. Unlike classical physics which held that all stable systems were merely tracking some universal called "Time" and thus would always give the same readings, Relativity theory holds that time is not a universal but the actual effects of objects changing relationships and postulates a four-dimensional spacetime gridwork to chart their movements. Thus different frames of reference will have differences in their chartable spacetime grids because even the nearly identicle cycling systems can vary for each frame of reference due to velocity and accelerations experienced from one relating to another. These differences can be co-ordinated using a mathematical formula known as the Lorentz transformation. Jiohdi (talk) 15:41, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. I think it is a little technical for the very beginning of the article (why introduce symbols such as T?) and too narrowly focused on physics. We need to think general layperson looking to get a sense of the range of ways in which time has been understood within social, cultural, prilosophical, religious and scientific discourses.--GKantaris (talk) 19:47, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Time measures the interval between cause and effect. What more is there to say? ;) -- JocK (talk) 20:27, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

While all definitions are circular to some degree, defining a term by means of itself is generally considered bad form. Jiohdi (talk) 02:57, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, so we should not use words like 'stable' and 'cycling' when defining 'time'. Much better to relate time to a causal structure and define time as the path-dependent separation between cause and effect. In fact, any attempt to define time without relating it to causality is meaningless. Time is a by-product of causality. Whilst causality is fundamental and absolute, time is not. Time is relative. Your 'now' is not my 'now'. Yet we agree on what is cause and what is effect. Hmmm... something tells me this discussion will not lead us anywhere. lol. -- JocK (talk) 06:33, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

actually, even cause and effect is not sacred. One view of quantum physics holds that everything is made of random elements which only give the appearance of cause and effect in large numbers the way temperature is really just a statistical average of large numbers of molecules in motion. Like my idea below on the arrow of time, the perception of cause and effect only follows from the way we compare what we are currently witnessing to what we have already witnessed and our minds color this as cause and effect. The current state of the universe was not CAUSED by the prior state, but is just a event that on the atomic scale is simply one of many probable states that does not necessarily follow from any prior state, but since we can only seem to perceive trillions of these events at a glance as single objects with a significantly delay of about 300 milliseconds for brain quantum computing, the overall probabilities seem to work out to an approximation of cause and effect. Odd events that defy cause and effect are explained away or ignored.Jiohdi (talk) 15:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Between a second and a millisecond?

I see that a millisecond is considered 0.0001, if second is 1, what is in between them? walkingonthesun Say something to me 06:22, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

see: SI prefix for those uncommon units. Btw, the prefixes are not just for seconds. Btw2, a millisecond is 0.001 s NOT 0.0001 s --JimWae (talk) 07:45, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I would like to submit for the PHILOSOPHY section an article that examines the philosophical and pragmatic meanings of time. Here's the lnik: http://www.artsandopinion.com/2006_v5_n1/lewis-20.htm Thanking you for the consideration, Artsandopinion (talk) 17:57, 14 January 2008 (UTC)Robert Lewis

between second and milliseconds

pico Prefix meaning one-millionth of one-millionth (10^ -12 ).

nano Prefix meaning one billionth or (10^ -9) .

micro prefix meaning (10^ -6)

Jiohdi (talk) 22:24, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

milli = thousandth nano = billionth and pico = trillionth Potatoswatter (talk) 13:27, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

the arrow of time

A thought occurred to me whilst pondering time-- why does time seem to move only forwards. Seeing this from a quantum probability point of view rather than the standard way of thinking a new thought emerged: the current state of the universe resembles no other prior since all others prior were within a smaller universe as the universe appears to be expanding. in other words the arrow of time is due to novelty. this current perception of the pattern of all things is unique and unlike any prior. by comparison to memories and records we can establish this as verifiable in every moment. We have no evidence what so ever that any state has repeated a prior, even though this is entirely possible in a quantum system, here too, the likelihood that any current state resembles any immediate earlier state drops to zero until such time as the universe begins to contract, should it ever do so. Even if the universe does start to contract, the likelihood that it will do so exactly as it expanded seems to drop to zero as well and so all sentient entities with memories will still perceive time moving forwards as the universe shrinks. only at point omega when the universe resembles point alpha can we say that the universe has made an exact repetition and we cannot even say that as no one will be around to notice but perhaps the alpha and omega itself Jiohdi (talk) 04:03, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Wow, you're a genius. That's a nice piece of evidence that instants in time cannot be placed in arbitrary order. Convenient that you'd start a new topic rather than put it above where it's relevant. Unlikely however it's why time "seems" to move forwards as most folks don't personally notice intergalactic distances. Time seems to move only forwards because you can't remember the future. Potatoswatter (talk) 05:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

you cannot remember the future because it has not happened yet or is that too hard for you to grasp? You can remember the "past" because your brain has the ability to sample events and record them and compare them to current states of the elements that were part of that former event. You again miss the basic point that it is novelty that gives the arrow of time even if you cannot know the universal scale.Jiohdi (talk) 14:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

That is gibberish to me. Absolute measurement is possible (by the brain or some other device) without comparing successive "states." A photograph shows one "state" but is still meaningful. You use the word "state" an awful lot, what do you mean by it?

I believe the future "exists" just as much as the past. The only difference between the future and the past is that the past can be observed, given a method of observation. How else do you propose to express the meaning of "happened yet", Mr. I'll Write The Article Myself? Potatoswatter (talk) 15:39, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

state means a specific arrangement of objects, elements, or things. as for the future existing, you are in the vast majority who seem to just assume that this is so, but I find there is no basis for this belief. 1. for the future to exist means that the universe we know should in principle be viewable by some hyper-dimensional being as a solid 4-d object. if this were so then this being would have no reason to see any particular point in that object as the present, nor would that being see anything resembling movement. the question would then become how can we see movement if there actually is none? do you propose that we exist hyperdimensionally and are just viewing reality as a film? that we are the light passing through the frames? I find that scientifically dis-satisfying. I believe we are part of reality as it is happening and as such need to find an explanation that keeps us within the system, not external to it.

If the future exists, what connects it to the present? Who built the future? How did it get there? Do you disregard cause and effect, evolution or any other sort of apparent change as mere illusion?

Jiohdi (talk) 16:50, 24 January 2008 (UTC) ___

Another way to see the arrow -- all elements exist now and now alone. they are always in motion relative to each other. the illusion of an arrow of time is accomplished by the awareness of unique or novel patterns rather than repeating ones. We compare what we witness to memories and find novelty even if small portions seem to be retracing steps, the overall context is still unique. we run a film backwards, but the rest of the world around us is still changing and so is recorded by our minds as forwards in total. time is neither moving forwards nor backwards only our mental charting of events is causing us to feel like time is thing in motion. what is actually moving is just the elements of our perceptions. This is some what analogous to power in an electronic circuit which is the measure of heat loss, which is always a one way event.Jiohdi (talk) 16:20, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Moderate modification of lead/lede - Jan 28

I moved some stuff around & re-added a comment about the difficulty of definition

Time is a basic component of the measuring system used by humanity to sequence events, to quantify the durations of (and intervals between) events, and to compare the motions of objects. Long a major subject of mythology, philosophy, and science, defining time in a non-controversial way applicable to all fields of study has eluded the greatest scholars. While this article does not attempt to devise any such definition, it will discuss some of the main topics regarding time.

We cannot agree on a definition, yet there seems above to be an expectation that we *might* eventually find one. Wikipedia is not a dictionary - it cannot cite 6 or 7 competing definitions, and then drop the matter. Look at the articles on number, space, truth - they too do not give a definition of their topic. If scholars cannot agree on a definition, we certainly cannot pretend to have one here. BUT, whatever we say by introduction, it is important to make it clear that such is NOT a definition.

We can say that time is used for sequencing events, comparing the duration of events, comparing the intervals between events. We can even add (quite redundantly) that it is used to compare the motions of objects (which are also events). We can say this either in the 1st paragraph or a bit later. Not even in science is time restricted to motion.

I'd like to say that time is used by ALL human cultures, but too many Whorfians would likely object. Even though his contention has been discredited, I am content to omit both "all humanity" and "all cultures". I suspect dogs have a "notion" of time too, but that is too speculative as of yet.

We could omit the motions of objects from the first paragraph, but I suspect the physical science people might feel overlooked. We could try other ways to deal with the parenthetical in the 1st paragraph - but the order there serves to highlight the growing complexity of the concept - from sequencing (before & after), to comparing "lengths" of time (quicker & slower), to numerical quantification of physics (which involve not just TIME, but also SPACE) --JimWae (talk) 04:38, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

---

We can even add (quite redundantly) that it is used to compare the motions of objects (which are also events). That's not very accurate. In physics velocity, momentum,e tc are used to deal with motion.1Z (talk) 11:33, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Lede - 2008 Jan 30

A reminder that Time is both a Vital and a Core article, and if we want Wikipedia to be the best encyclopedia this is one of the primary places to make that happen.

With that in mind, the lede must be of FA quality, and thereafter not encouraging endless tinkering or elaboration.

So let's see how that other encyclopedia leads off on Time...

1911 Britannica (11th Ed.):
TIME, the general term for the experience of duration or succession, either in whole or in part.

1929 Britannica (14th Ed. - under copyright):
TIME, the general term for the experience of duration.

Note that both the 11th and the 14th editions have separate articles on the measurement of time. The main article grew more brief, and the Time Measurement article grew longer, until they simply merged them:

britannica.com:

Measured or measurable period.

More broadly, it is a continuum that lacks spatial dimensions.

The 1911 and current online Britannicas expand from there, but the 14th edition only goes on to mention psychological time in passing (as "See Space-Time" ( ! ) ), and spends its only other paragraph on describing keeping time in music. The bulk of the discussion goes under Time Measurement. Britannica.com's concise article is as equivocal about a definition of time as ours is, so far.

First paragraph
Time is a basic component of the measuring system used by humanity to sequence events, to quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to compare the motions of objects.
The measuring system is used by humanity, but time has effect on other forms of life, and inanimate objects. Also, emphasizing a "system used by humanity" would not be met seriously under review, as I discovered when I tried recently to emphasize the human origin of the Pioneer plaque displayed on the Human article-- even though that was Carl Sagan's point-- because it's too seemingly redundant, and I was slapped down by scientist contributors.

The older Britannica phrase TIME, the general term for the experience of duration still elegantly describes how average people feel and live through time. This is important, as readers want to confirm as well as discover information about Time. Potatoswatter should not be rewarded for his 'tude, which has no place here, but it is indicative of the common feeling that Time is "obvious" to "most folks".

Also, if velocity and momentum are used to measure motion (as per 1Z), Time is at one remove from the quantity used to define that.

Time has long been a major subject of mythology, philosophy, and science, but defining time in a non-controversial manner applicable to all fields of study has eluded the greatest scholars.
"Time has long been" is very circular and unhelpful, and would qualify as weasel words in other contexts.
Religion should be listed instead of mythology. Not interested in debating their similarities and differences; suffice to say considerations over time in religion has had historic real-world ramifications, mythology less so.

While this article does not attempt to devise any such definition, it will discuss some of the main topics regarding time.
Redundant, even if we were the "greatest scholars" themselves. We're arguing it out on the talk page, this shouldn't be on the article page.

Second paragraph
In physics and other sciences, time is considered a fundamental quantity, i.e. one that cannot be defined in terms of other quantities because those other quantities – such as velocity, force, energy – are already defined in terms of that fundamental quantity (in these cases, both time and another fundamental quantity, space).
This could be phrased more simply. The focus should remain on Time as a fundamental quantity, and what that means in defining Time. There are too many qualifiers and parentheticals.

Within science, the only definition needed or possible is an operational one, in which time is defined by the process of measurement and by the units chosen.
This seems clear, but needs a steadier lead-in sentence preceding it.

My recommended change to the first two graphs:
(Relevant links not shown - and we will need some serious & sober inline citations):

Time is a common term for the experience of duration, and a basic component of current measuring systems. Time is an intrinsic subject of religion, philosophy, and science, but defining time in a non-controversial manner applicable to all fields of study has always eluded the greatest scholars.

In physics and other sciences, time is considered one of the few fundamental quantities: Other physical quantities (i.e. velocity and force) can be generated from time, but no other quantity defines time. Thus within science, the only definition needed or possible is an operational one, in which time is defined by the process of measurement and by the units chosen. In this capacity time is measured to sequence events, and to quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them.

The rest of the opening
I blanche at the thought of asking JimWae to make the intro synopsis on philosophy more concise, as I wouldn't know if it's possible. In any case, he has citations, so that's farther along of the rest of opening, anyway.

The last paragraph before the TOC seems like it should lead out from the second paragraph, since it's about measurement, but then ends with some references to other fields interested in Time. This should probably be retooled as well.

Looking forward to people's thoughts. I may be away for a few days, and responses may not be immediate. Cheers. -- Yamara 00:56, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

First off-- Time is a common term for the experience of duration --Time is another way of saying the experience of duration, perhaps? because what is the experience of duration other than time? time is time? really not saying anything at all other than saying another way of saying it.

secondly= I do have a problem with insisting that time cannot be defined in terms of anything else, as this was the notion under classical physics which has been disproven over a hundred years ago by Einsteinian physics... in relativity physics time is part of a co-ordinate system which is always defined in relation to another co-ordinate system with the speed of light as the only constant. Basically light is measured by a comparison of an arbitrarily chosen distance measure such as miles or kilometers compared to a standardized count of some countable cycling event such as a fraction of the rotation of the earth or a second. The idea in physics is that no matter which co-ordinate system you find yoruself within, the same measure and same rotational fraction will yeild the same speed of light, no matter how much this violates common sense when two or more systems are involved and classical physics says the result should not work out that way... like when you and I are passing each other at close to light speed, our measurements relative to each other should not result in the same speed of light, yet they still do. What this means is that for relativity to work, time is no longer a fixed quanity, but is variable due to the combined differences between your and my coordinate systems. even though we use identicle time pieces such as watches, the duration being measured is varied because light is the same for both of us and we must use the Lorentz transformation to adjust for each others time factor to get the correct readings.

Jiohdi (talk) 17:35, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Time is a common term for the experience of duration

This is based on older Britannicas, true. And it is neither a comprehensive view taken by philosophers, nor the detailed understanding required by physicists and other chronometricians and chronologists.

But it is how time is commonly used and understood in the English-speaking world. People-- the common readership-- think in terms of being late for work, or knowing when the sun will set For instance, I right now have to run to post office, and I only have so much time' to write this before it closes. Time is commonly considered a known quantity--even if it literally is nothing of kind, its nature still being reconsidered by our best minds.

The readership does not live by Planck units, and only some are maintaining an awareness of Kant or Julian Barbour as they consult this article. This should be acknowledged first, as it is the assumption the readership will generally bring. The article has plenty of space to disabuse and inform the reader, but time is indeed a "common term for the experience of duration". It is the most widely understood use of the word, even if the definition has far more surprises and detail in store.

Excuse me for now, I'm running out of time. :) -- Yamara 22:26, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

(Back. --Yamara 23:37, 31 January 2008 (UTC))

Time difference instead of a top mass quark

Sorry for the strange bold topic, I dont want to introduce a new theory (or upset you physicans). I just wonder where we are in modern physics these days.

As it's a known fact; Time goes slower here down on earth (close to earth's mass). Compared to far away in space satelite / astronauts. The mass of earth is quite big but as a general effect in the universe it should aply to all kind of masses. Altough a widely known fact, i'm missing any reference of this in particle physics/quantum mechanics.

I'm wondering asking here for any theories, is mass just slowed down time?. Where gravity (or bended space) is just like (ahum sorry) a waterfall of space-time* between different spaces. I'm not a physican but it's the level at wich i understood some of einsteins concepts.

Einstein talked a lot about spacetime, but somehow it seams the concept of the 'empty spacetime is not much used in particle phyiscis. Altough it's a great concept Einstein tought of; he for saw gravitational lensing - einstein rings - blackholes etc..

So i just wonder is there a modern theory of space time for the small scale atomic world?

Where mass of a particle is taken into acount with time delays in the particle, where 'particles/>>spaces' bend space surounding them. And where it might be that mass is explained by the time difference of that area. It might be a theory of a universe based on a pure: space & time only concept. (particles and gravity and all other forces as side effect)

I'm curious, is there such a theory, these days (be it proven or not quit yet ?) I'll be happy to read it.. --82.217.143.153 (talk) 22:26, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Have a look at Quantum gravity... -- JocK (talk) 16:20, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Time doesn't exist?

I have been reading in the popular science books (Greene) that according the theory of relativity, the usual experiencing of time as a moving quantity is wrong and that such time doesn't exist. If I try to express that idea in my layman terms (if I remember correctly), in spacetime all the time coordinates exist all at once - just like all space coordinates exist all at once and consequently past, now, and future are just subjective sensations imposed on us. Should something like that be mentioned at the section about time in physics/relativity (and other more specialised pages)? NikNovi (talk) 23:24, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

It's covered under Time as "unreal": (Julian Barbour in his The End of Time: The Next Revolution in Our Understanding of the Universe). That leads into the physical sciences section, at least.

—Yamara ✉ 00:57, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict)

I don't remember anybody's making the claim that "time doesn't exist" can be derived from Special Relativity or General Relativity. One has a theory that relates several fundamental terms, including time, in a mathematical way. As I recall, one of the things that Greene does relate is that the "arrow of time" is not implied in theory, or at least is not always implied in theory, so it is possible to theoretically explain an event that is diagrammed vertically on the page as going from top to bottom or from bottom to top. (On a quantum scale there are "different" events that look exactly the same except for the direction in which they move according to our clock sense.)

I think this question is more like the arguments regarding the interpretation of quantum mechanics. The math is clear, but people tend to try to interpret the math and the experiments in different ways. People have the black box. They know what goes in and what comes out, and they are not satisfied with that unless they belong to the "shut up and calculate" school. They want to know, "which slit does the photon really go through in any run of the double-slit experiment." "Why does the photon show up in this interference fringe band rather than another one? There has to be a reason!"

Time does not move in time, or so logic and common language would seem to indicate to us. If time did move in time then infinite regress problems might result. If so, so be it. But let's not borrow trouble just yet.

Space can have concrete markers, at least in local experience. If we were walking around on an abandoned air field, we could pound nails in the concrete wherever we wanted, and we could use any piece of bronze, steel, or whatever as a standard of measurement. Given that we could repeat the development of our classical ideas of space assuming that we were as smart as Euclid. We get into trouble when we assume without good evidence that a triangle's three angles will always equal 180 degrees. It took Western science centuries to come to the conclusion that maybe geometry as we conceived it is not the word of God, the law of the Universe.

Time doesn't work that way. We can't make a marker in time, a second marker, and so on, and then come back to the first marker. At least not in everyday experience. (Greene also talks about ways that we might be able to return to the original "peg" by, e.g., revisiting the first sign of a nova as seen from Earth.)

The operational definitions that are gathered around our ideas of space involve driving nails or making dots on paper, making meter sticks, drawing straight lines using tools (a laser is a present-day convenient tool), laying our meter stick along the line and noting down how many times we do so before we get from one point to the other.

The operational definitiions that are gathered around our idea of time involve comparing processes. The earliest actual clock may have been a biological device for keeping biological activities synchronized with things like high and low tides. Biological clock frequently work by having a circular series of events. If you are aware of the dark of the moon, and notice that it "comes back" and "goes away," then you can also count the number of times some circular event series occurs between appearances of the dark of the moon. Heart beats are not entirely reliable because sometimes our bodies need our hearts to cycle more energetically to pump more blood. Special time circuits that are "dedicated" are not so tied to transient environmental features. So even simple organisms with dedicated clock circuits may do a good job of timing activities like ovulation (which involves some growing time) to the phases of the moon and the rising of the tides.

There is a fine book by Gottfried Martin that describes the development of our ideas about time in the context of explaining Kant's philosophy (which took a maverick view of time). The book is, if I remember correctly, called Kant's Metaphysics and Theory of Science. The general sequence of historical developments (leaving out some intermediate figures) was that St. Augustine figured that space and time were both created by God, and God was therefore outside of time and would see everything from an e-tern-al perspective. People might make their own free decisions but God would know about how everything turned out without involving the need to work through things sequentially. It would be like somebody perceiving the way out of a maze by looking at the pencil trace left by the child that worked the maze puzzle. The Medieval philosophers, Aquinas et al., worked on it some more. Leibniz decided that time was a relationship among events, and not itself a thing. Kant had his try at it, and Einstein was influenced by being in a historical position not to have to work through all of the intricacies of the problem from scratch.

Going back in time implies a sort of "river of time" to swim against. Things that are located in space can be visited by moving around in space to readjust one's individual coordinates with the coordinates of the Space Needle, or whatever it is you want to visit. Is there something called time that has its coordinates and that one can adjust one's own coordinates to? If one is in inter-Galactic space, traveling along in a space ship, what would be one's experience of going back to where one was before? I met Mary Lou in the S.S. Enterprise at x, y, z, t, and now I want to see her again. Does it make sense to go back to x, y, z at time t'? Or have Mary Lou and her ship moved somewhere else? If Mary Lou and ship have moved somewhere else in space, does it look particularly promising to expect that they would still be stuck in the time where I met them?

In Buddhist thought, or at least in some varieties, the universe is re-created from instant to instant. What I experience as movement in space is actually the "quantum" recreation of my cat or my finger in a new place vis-a-vis my desk, the earth, etc. What I experiment as movement in time is actually the "quantum" recreation of me, of my cat, of my computer, of my wall clock, and the computer and the wall clock have been recreated showing slightly different times. So all of time exists "simultaneously" in the sense that all of the events shown in a movie exist "simultaneously" because the whole spool of film is in the can.

The Buddhist way is a little more concrete than the four-dimensional space-time view with different time-lines, etc., so let's stick with that simpler model for a while. The Buddhist idea is that one is recreated from instant to instant according to the laws of karma. Basically, intentional acts in instant x are causal factors in what occurs in instant y. It's at least conceivable that one flock of karma might cause the creation of the next instantiation of me back in days of Confucius. I think I would be severely disoriented if I retained memories of sitting typing at my computer and then tripping over the threshold of the front door of the Duke of Lu. From the standpoint of people "back in that time" a strangely dressed individual would pop out of empty air. In terms of the movie analogy it would be as though a cartoonist had drawn a sequence of pictures of me leading up to frame n and then had for some reason refrained from drawing me in the next frame and had rewound the film a mile or so and had drawn in a brief sequence in which I appeared, blundered into the ducal presence, and was killed on the assumption that I was an assassin.

From the standpoint of the cartoon characters, events occur in temporal sequence. From the standpoint of the projectionist, it's all in the can when Disney gets through with his work. What difference does it make?

One of the main things that seems to be in question is whether there is a standpoint outside of the temporal sequence where events at time a and time b could be seen in an encompassing vision. If you take the standpoint of Aquinas, then there is. God is outside of time. He is the creator of the movie. He is the projectionist of the movie and can choose to view the strip of film spread across his desk or projected frame by frame. If you take another standpoint, then protons, neutrons, electrons, etc. are not in a constant relationship with each other, but in ever-changing relationships. The proton may be everlasting, or nearly so, but it is not "frozen" and neither are the electrons that happen to fall into its sphere of attraction. If the proton moves in space it is not to be found between a bunch of marker entities we have our eyes on, and it it moves in time then it is not to be found as a copy of itself. There is only one photon, and it moves in space and in time. So if you could "go back," then what would that mean? If time is a "thing" (as some people believe that space is in some sense a "thing" with its own nature and characteristics) then would one find anything "there" if one went back in time?

If I am a thing in time because I am an evolving series of events, then for me to go back in time to my youth would involve violating the laws of entropy somehow (or using a huge amount of energy and an infallible memory of how I got to my present state) to force things step by step back through the series of changes that brought them to their present state. So at great and improbable cost I might be forced to return to a newborn child. But would doing so have returned my mother to live, and would it have reverted her to the state of her early middle age when she could provide a womb to pop the newborn baby back into? The more of the Universe that one wanted to revert to its past state, the more impossible the energy costs. Entropy involves the probabilities of things like a just-splattered egg reversing its splatter, reforming its shell, and jumping back into the egg carton. If one event has a fifty-fifty probability, and another event has the same probability, the probability of getting both at once = .5 * .5 = .25. The probability of getting Humpty-Dumpty to spontaneously reform is rather lower than .25.

To me, the real question is not whether one could find a standpoint out of time from which one could, as it were, see the movie in the can. The question is what is the nature of the connections among the frames of the movie. Frame one shows a steel bearing teetering on the edge of a table. Frame 10,000 shows the steel bearing striking a steel plate one the floor. Frame 20,00 shows the steel bearing somewhere pretty near where it started out. Is the causal relationship between the steel bearing's position in frame 10,000 and in frame 20,000 absolute?

If Laplace was right, all the causal relationships are absolute. There is no slop in the system. So whatever was going on in frame one of the movie will determine what happens in the frame at the end of the movie. There would be no need to store the entire movie in the universal hard drive. One could just store the initial conditions and the laws of the system, and anybody who wanted to view something from the middle of the movie could just have the universal computer generate the scene.

If quantum mechanics is right, or if free will is a reality, the initial conditions and the laws do not dictate the end of the movie. So the cosmic movie maker would be able to set up the beginning conditions and make many movies by running the same experiment over and over again, and filming it each time. Each film would have a different outcome. Some might become best sellers. Some might go dark after the first billion billion frames. The cosmic projectionist could see the movies "in the can," but he couldn't know what the movies show without scanning them either in panoramic vision or frame by frame or projected on a screen.

I think this stuff is too highly speculative to make a good part of the article. Perhaps an accurate summary and a citation to Greene might be made. But I'm pretty sure that he is reporting the work of other people even if he has his own thoughts on the matter, so it might be lots of work to see how this idea developed. Maybe it would turn out to be so complicated that it would have to go into a different article.P0M (talk) 01:38, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

I think OP is refering to the concept of "block universe" (see Eternalism (philosophy of time) and external references therein). -- JocK (talk) 09:11, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I see, what I was talking is eternalism (@Patrick: time as a moving quantity does not exist, not the time itself). The problem with eternalism is, that in Greene's book this is not a philosophical term, but a scientific. Greene also talks about what simultaneous events are, with regard to the speed and direction of the observer. IIRC he derives the existence of the whole spacetime as a "block universe", as you say, from this and such considerations. There is no philosophy there, just calculations using the verified equasions of relativity. NikNovi (talk) 14:52, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

It would be helpful to have the book and page citations for Greene.

Somewhere (probably in both of Greene's books on my shelves) he goes into the argument about whether space exists, i.e., whether space is "just a relationship" (as Leibniz would have it). The crux question was whether, in an otherwise empty universe, water in a rotating barrel would "crawl up the sides," or whether in the absence of any other masses in that universe rotating the barrel would not have any influence on the contents. (Or something like that. Obviously there are problems with how one would rotate a barrel and how one would know whether one was getting the job done if one tried to rotate it.) The conclusion was apparently that rotation would have results that could be noticed, and from that it was reasoned that space must not simply be an absence.

The equivalent question would be whether time has any such "existence" apart from the relationships among clockish things.

Since there is already an article, it looks like the best course would be to summarize the article here and link to it. P0M (talk) 18:38, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

I am reading the articles that JocK recommended (external links on the Eternalism page). Paul Davies's article That Mysterious Flow would probably be a good starting point. Now I am reading Petkov's article Is There an Alternative to the Block Universe View? About Greene: I don't have a copy at hand right now. I think the topic is covered somewhere after those early philosophers you mention (Leibnitz, Newton, Mach) and their speculations, and of course after he introduces relativity. You will see the diagrams of the "block universe" there, represented as bread loaves, where space part of the spacetime is 2D, and the third dimension represents time part of the spacetime. But don't know which chapter would that be... And of course there are no calculations in Greene as it is a general-public book, if those would be included some more technical source should be found. NikNovi (talk) 20:48, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Time Cube

The current article states "Among philosophers, there are two distinct viewpoints on time" when there is a third, legitimate viewpoint on time held by philosophers, namely Time cube. This merits a mention. I agree that it should not take up a lot of the article, but it should be mentioned as a viewpoint on time. Time keeps on slippin (talk) 22:57, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Time Cube is a highly individualized opinion, with no serious acceptance in the wider philosophic community. The article Time is both a Vital and a Core article according to the Wikipeida 1.0 Editorial Team, and there will be no room in it for such an extreme minority opinion. —Yamara ✉ 02:06, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

For all people talk about how "out there" Time Cube is, I have not heard anyone able to disprove it. Typically, people resort to ad hominen attachs and call Dr. Ray a crank. He has even offered a cash prize for anyone who can disprove it and has spoken at respected educational institutions. Copernicus, Brahe, Gallileo were all considered cranks in their time and their ideas were dismissed. Denial of time cube appears to be primarily based on the idea that -1 x -1 = 1, WHICH IS STUPID! Time keeps on slippin (talk) 02:23, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Extreme claims such as Time Cube require extreme evidence. Since the majority of the time cube "work" is either indecipherable or a very clear misunderstanding of what mathematics is (a great example of this is your statement "Denial of time cube appears to be primarily based on the idea that -1 x -1 = 1, WHICH IS STUPID!") there is no need for explicit rebuttal for editors to decide that there is no place for the Time Cube theory in this article. It is so inept as to require no further consideration. There are places where the Time Cube work can be mentioned: Uncyclopedia and "Dr." Ray's websites are examples. Wikipedia in general (with the exception of the Time Cube article) and this article in particular are not places where this material can appear. If you could provide multiple independent, reliable, published sources that describe Time Cube as a mainstream theory of time, we can include it. Otherwise definitely not. Continued addition of this material without such sources is a clear violation of our policy on maintaining a neutral point of view. Thanks, Gwernol 02:40, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree. P0M (talk) 07:52, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Those interested in Time Cube vandalry can check out this 92k archive of an assault on the Greenwich Mean Time article.

I am also taking this as a cue to start a fresh talk page... —Yamara ✉ 08:57, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

Archive 7

Discussion

New page, previous talk moved using TW. —Yamara ✉ 09:01, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

user Neverquick deleted my changing, he does not believe our in time machine, but the science is not a religion, so please do not delete if You are not agree, it' s not a reason to delete it a reason to reasearch and try to understand.Ryururu (talk) 06:42, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

If there is research needed such as you indicate, the reports cannot be cited as reporting matters of fact regarding time.

Wikipedia has an explicit policy against publishing original research. It also has high standards regarding the factual content of articles. Statements need to be supported by reputable sources. In the sciences, this typically means that at minimum a statement has been made in a peer-reviewed journal and credible dissenting views are also reported. P0M (talk) 07:00, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok A Brief History of Time is not about time. It's about physics. Not a related book.

Wiki IP policy acknowledged, encyclopedic boundaries vague. Recommend study of time variants applied to physiology of the heart. The heart is governed by two very exact influences known as systole and diastole. These influences are understood as [phases] of cardiac performance.--Lbeben (talk) 04:47, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Dogmatic assertion

Within science, the only definition needed or possible is an operational one, in which a procedure is given for defining the base unit of time (the second).

The above statement is dogmatic. It is also indefensible and unscientific. Even the presumed "fact" that only an operational definition (or, actually, operational definitions) are currently acceptable among scientists is stated dogmatically. Anytime one makes a statement using the word "only" as it is used above, an incredible burden of proof is loaded onto the writer. And, besides, the statement is contradicted by what is well attested in other, competent, writing within Wikipedia (not to mention standard physics books).

An operational definition of time says, basically, "Time" is what we call the measurement or quantity we get when we compare the beginning and end of one operation (or some number of cycles of some regular operation like the swinging of a pendulum under standardized conditions) with the beginning and end of some other operation. But the number associated with "t" in such a case does not even have a direction. Working with devices like clocks, which incorporate an operational definition of time, researchers are puzzled by the direction of time. (I can establish a line from New York to D.C., start laying my meter stick along the line at a point in NYC and stop counting when I get to a point in D.C. Or, I can start in D.C. and end up in NYC. So why can't I start laying out cycles of my stop watch with the birth of a hamster in my lab and stop the clock when the hamster dies of old age, but also start the stopwatch when the hamster dies and lay out cycles of its operation back to the moment of its birth?) Then, around the beginning of the 20th century, people begin to realize that identical clocks do not measure identical numbers of cycles if one of them takes a fast trip to Pluto and back. The measurement of time becomes inextricably implicated in the measure of space and movement in space. Then the question arises, "Why?" There is no answer for that in the operations used. To the contrary, the measurements and the operational definitions of "space" and "time" suggest that something is going on to link the two, and from that point some researchers have asked whether there is some realm of experience (perhaps at quantum measurement range) in which space and time "collapse" into something more basic.

"Space-time" turns out to have more explanatory value than just "space" and just "time." The operational definitions for the measurement of time are profitably brought into cojunction with the operational definitions for the measurement of space, for motion in space, etc. It is not clear whether space is nothing but the relationships among things, or whether space has characteristics of its own. Similarly, it is not clear yet whether considerations of entropy and use of the operational definition of time will be sufficient to exhaustively delineate the nature of time.

If science can discover something about time that is not a function of the operations by which we make what are called "time measurements," then on what grounds can the writer preemptively exclude that knowledge from the definition or the understanding of time in the sciences?

The "Within science" part is clearly argumentative. Why start the article by taking a dogmatic and argumentative stance? P0M (talk) 04:56, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I've had my qualms about the sweeping scope of the phrase "within science": ie geology and palaeontology use relative dating, so a precise chronometric unit may be of less importance than a sequential placement of events. The adjective "only" and the verb "needed" are problematic and presumptive. But I don't find the sentence forwarding an "argument" so much as a rough attempt at categorizing the many perspectives on time in the opening of the article. The opener demands a conciseness and clarity that is also useful to the reader. And it has to be accurate, of course. Can the sentence be replaced with a more perfect description in thirty words or less? Don't forget to preserve a mention of the SI second. —Yamara ✉ 07:11, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it needs anything more than tweaking. I've started to take a look at the whole article, so I may wait until I've gotten a better grasp of the whole and then tweak the top. No use in making a change topside that will mess us something later down. P0M (talk) 04:55, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Hourglass analogy

Trying to take a wikibreak, but we know how that is; as soon as you announce it something you've been wanting to address moves to the fore.

The caption under the hourglass pic describes the analogy—("The flow of sand in an hourglass can be used to keep track of elapsed time. It also concretely represents the present as being between the past and the future.")—and I believe it was placed there by JimWae on January 9.

It's a truly brilliant analogy, and one that ought to have been seen before. I'd been working on Hourglass before my break, but never got to ask—where did JimWae get that phraseology? It would very sad if it were OR, since "concretely represents the present as being between the past and the future" is very insightful and helpful to readers (IMO).

BTW - It's a philosophical analogy, but is describing the hourglass appropriate for the religion & mythology section? I haven't found references yet suggesting the hourglass is older than the 11th century AD, and would be unknown to the early Greek philosophers. —Yamara ✉ 20:44, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

I took out the part in the text about the famous third century hour glass analogy. I thought it would be easy to find by Googling it, if it were indeed a famous analogy. Unfortunately most of what I found were in clones of Wikipedia, and no indication of a real locus classicus.

The hourglass is a very good way of talking about time "flow" or "the arrow of time" as something closely related to entropy and/or probability. First, for the hourglass to work we have to supply energy by lifting the sand above the level of the tiny gap in the middle. Second, when a grain of sand falls it can hit just about anywhere below, and then it will probably bounce a couple of times. So that is at least two or three low probability events and their joint probability is X x Y x Z, i.e., extremely low. The probability that some blow coming from beneath the same grain of sand would launch it in the correct trajectory to drive it back up way it came is almost infinitestimal. Getting a string of luck that would drive all of the grains of sand up the way they came down (and against gravity) is not an event that one should bet the family farm against.

So getting "time" requires an energy source to drive things along, and a universe that has probabilities. Getting a universe that would permit the reverse "flow" of time would demand our getting into a very different kind of universe (or maybe restricting ourselves to considering only individual quantum events in this universe). The next question is whether one could imagine a sequence of events in which the outflow of the hourglass would go through some kind of warp and become the inflow at the top of the hourglass. That's only a rough analogy, but it suggests one idea of time travel (or at least communication backwards in time) in which a signal is sent from one intertial frame to another, and eventually gets bounced back to the first inertial frame before it was sent out. But, if I recall correctly, that scenario would only work if signals could have a velocity greater than c.

But regarding a grain of sand in the hourglass, all one really can say is that its passage from wherever it starts in the upper chamber to where it ends up is a process that occurs in time. "The present" is not at the neck of the hourglass. The nearest we could get to that is to look at the path of the grain of sand in a movie and stop the projector on the frame where the grain of sand is in the neck. The movie film that has already passed through the projector would record the "past" from the point of view of the frame that is currently being paused in the gate of the projector, and the movie film yet to be shown would represent its "future" from that arbitrary definition of what the present is.

In a sense, the person standing outside the "universe" of the hourglass can see the past and future of a grain of sand, at least in general terms. If the grain of sand is near the neck, the observer can be pretty sure that it was originally higher up, and the observer can predict that it will end up somewhere in the bottom chamber. But then the real master experimenter beams the hourglass into outer space, gravity ceases to pull sand from one chamber to the other, and its future is suddenly to stay just where it is. P0M (talk) 02:51, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

By the way, if anybody can supply the warp then we have an inexhaustible energy supply. We just put a little paddle wheel in the outflow and connect it to a generator. P0M (talk) 03:02, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Semi-protection

I think it is about time for this page to be Semi-protected as it is constantly being vandalized by IP's. N.B. This is the first time I am in need of Admin. with the exception of Speedy deletes. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 23:19, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

When do we start measuring time?

An open question,"When do we start measuring time?" Some scientists agree that we start measuring time after the "Big Bang". I disagree. Time begins at the point of observation. Everything else is computer model of what our modern concept of time could have been millions of years ago. What do you think?

Who is the "we" of whom you speak? Who was around to measure the time at which life on Earth began?

Without getting into the argument of that time is (relationship or something real in itself), measuring time implies that there are processes of sufficient regularity to make counting their cycles useful to some lifeform, and that there is a lifeform around to do the measurement. Of course that doesn't mean that the moon wasn't circling earth before the first oyster started timing its ovulation to the times and the tides.

We can measure things like how long it takes to lay down an inch of sediment in a lake and then work backwards to date things not according to current observations of clock cycles but according to inches of sediment (and what was caught in it) in existing lake beds. When we go back to the earliest times in the Universe we have the advantage of the natural "time machine" presented to us because it because things that we see that are the farthest away in space are also the farthest away in time. So by panning from near to far we can pan from nearby times to far back times, and we can measure the progress of events that happened long ago. P0M (talk) 14:47, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

"Is time worth measuring if there is no organic life?"

TIME. An Open Question for Discussion. "Is time worth measuring if there is no organic life?" After all it is organic life which came up with the concept of time and how it relates to the beginning, size and evolution of what we call, "The Universe". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.231.14.90 (talk) 23:47, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Does time exist if nobody is there to experience it? Does a tree that falls generate noise if no-one listens? Does a comment exist if no-one reacts? Can anyone tell me why the heck I rendered above comment existent..? ;) JocK (talk) 07:53, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Firstly, the universe in its common definition is not capitalised or in quotation marks. It is possible that non-organic life-forms could, at some point, measure time and record its passage but the question you asked was "is time worth measuring". If the non-organic life-forms have sentience then it becomes of equal value for them to measure time as for us or any other intelligent organic life-form. --F Notebook (talk) 05:00, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

'Time as a measure of resistance'

One thing I wonder is if it possible to think of time in terms of resistance to force. That if A has no resistance in reaching state, or location, B then the dimension of time is not present, yet there is still space dimensional change. Also, what would that type of a change be defined as? I know this is a metaphysics question, just curious as to what people think. It would be a singularity would it not? --99.225.10.18 (talk) 09:39, 11 March 2008 (UTC) Now that I think about it, I doubt there could be space without time. XD --99.225.10.18 (talk) 11:23, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

There is a long history of working out such logical connections, etc. Is space a thing (does it exist?), or is it only something that appears within a context of the relations that exist among things? Is Euclid's geometry the only geometry?

Suppose that all actions occurred instantaneously, or that light traveled instantaneously. If things traveled instantaneously they would be everywhere at once -- whatever that means. If light traveled instantaneously that would mean that inter-atomic events would occur in a radically different way. (Just look at how many fundamental formulas contain a c or a c squared factor.) (fixed omission P0M (talk) 10:42, 15 March 2008 (UTC))

If you want to start on the ground floor, look for a library that has a copy of Gottfried Martin's Kant's Metaphysics and Theory of Science. It's a very useful book because, while it centers on Kant, it covers the history of the concepts of space and time from the early Greeks, through Leibniz, into Kant, and beyond to Einstein. P0M (talk) 15:23, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

That sounds like something I'd enjoy reading. Thanks for suggesting it. I'll look for it this weekend. --99.225.10.18 (talk) 07:39, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Time as an observable set of wave-function collapses.

It seems to me that the fact that we humans can only observe one history of the universe needs some mention. Theories of the history of the universe that do not necessarily agree with that we can observe and/or experience abound. That we cannot observe those histories is a point that seems to be omitted when those theories are discussed. This is an important omission. I could repeat similar criticisms about many physics-related topics. A stress toward exactness seems to be overwhelming encyclopedic-style writing.Wildspell (talk) 08:14, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean. First, you imply that there is some "history of the universe" that we cannot observe. How can we do other than imagine or speculate about something that nobody can observe? Second, you imply that there is one account of the "history of the universe" when in fact one of the problems is that accounts of what are going on can so easily differ if stringent controls are not maintained and differences in perspective, e.g., people in different inertial frames, are not taken into account.

Different models to account for the development of the universe exist. One of the frontiers of our knowledge is the very earliest time after the big bang. As scientists recover evidence of earlier and earlier periods by detecting radiation from farther and farther away, the models we have that will fit with the evidence will change.

The difference between what we can observe and what we theorize is always in play. We take whatever we do see and whatever remains in the natural black box is something that we have to make up our own models to explain. Then maybe we make one more observation and see something that strongly suggests that our model is the wrong one. Two things tend to happen at these points: (1) We have trouble giving up on something that has been enormously helpful, e.g., Newtonian mechanics. So the first thing that people are likely to do is to explain away the difficulty, or, if that doesn't work we can just paper over the defect and continue to use the model -- just keeping away from the places that it doesn't work. Sometimes we have discovered that a theory such as classical physics is a special case of a more general theory, and that if we apply the more general theory we get the same answers except in special ranges of experience (speeds that are substantial fractions of the speed of light, for instance). At other times people may be forced to admit that the old model just was not right, and they have to be abandoned.

Are you possibly referring to subjects like the search for previously undocumented animals, or subjects like ball lighting that seem hard to make jibe with physics?

What does your topic have to do with what your wrote below? One group of people who theorize in the area of quantum physics speak in terms of the collapse of wave functions, but nobody actually observes the phenomenon. What we observe is the appearance of a photon or other particle at some specific time and place. Or, to avoid circularity, we might say that we observe events that some postulate are due to the collapse of wave functions, and we are somehow convinced that they are serially related and that the series is not reversible.

One of the problems with that kind of account would be that in quantum entanglement versions of double-slit experiments, a photon that is detected at t=3 can determine how a photon is detected at t=2, so the idea of sequence mentioned above no longer holds. P0M (talk) 19:27, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure that there is only one history that we can observe. I have had many instances where I remember specific events that those who were involved will later tell me happened in a completely different way. I would chalk this up to faulty memory except that a rare few remember things the same way I do which indicates that some of us are changing parallel universes where the flow of history is not as it seems to those around us who did not come from our universe (^_^)Jiohdi (talk) 19:16, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

One of the consequences of Special Relativity is that events that observers in one inertial frame identify as simultaneous will be observed to occur at different times by observers in another inertial frame. So even if one uses the most complete recording devices, there are problems with the "one history" idea.

Then there is the problem that may occur if two or more observers have very complete recordings. If it really happened that my neighbor and I recorded a view of the street from our security cameras and when we compared tapes one showed that there had been a mugging and the other showed there was not even a single person on the street at the same time, then maybe the multiple universe idea would have merit. But we'd also have to ask why somebody with no history of interest in burrs and stick-tight out of nowhere invented Velcro. I.e., there are generally antecedents to discoveries like that which make sense, so if there were many cases of such "spontaneous attacks of genius" we'd probably have noticed by now.

One of the things that psychologists have determined about witness reports in crime cases is that people's memories are very selective and not very reliable. One of the most glaring problems with memory is that if someone is led somehow to visualize an event as if s/he had perceived it in person and in fact, then it becomes a memory that "replays" in no way distinguishable from the "replay" of an event the person really saw. A similar thing can happen when someone reviews an old memory over and over again. There may well be an active component, a sort of mental editing, involved, and each time the memory is reviewed it gets changed a little more.

I'll let you know if the wife I never had meets me at the doorway of my spick-and-span cottage. It will be too bad for the me in whatever universe she comes from. But, wait... How will I recognize her? And then there is the loutish teenager who demands to know where his heavy metal posters, etc., have gone to. But I'll be sure to let you know... P0M (talk) 20:51, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Time as a World Standard

Since time is essential to history and chronology, a short section might address when the present seconds, minutes, and hours became universal. Perhaps it's unknowable but I suspect that most of Asia and Africa must have adopted the Western standard c. the 18th century.

B Tillman 15 April 2008 (Tax Time!)

Good question. There were interactions between Egypt and the Middle East (particularly Judea) very early on. Their ideas on time have determined many of our ideas on time, particularly the division of the day into 24 periods, the idea that each of the planet-gods had charge for a time period in regular rotation, and the resulting way that the days of the week got their names.

At least the major outlines of these ideas were known in China around 50 a.d. The Chinese divided the day into twelve watches, i.e., into two-hour periods. I suspect that as a practical matter the division of the day into hours must have coincided with mechanical clocks, and they may have been imported by Catholic missionaries around the time of Leibniz.

When the further division of the hour into 60 minutes came about must be recorded somewhere. There is apparently a practical connection between the number of days in a year and the division of the circle into a rounded version of that number, 360 degrees. All over the world at the dawn of civilization people were aware of the five planets. (Astrologers are still fascinated with some of the ideas that drove lots of early interest in the planets, so it's an enduring idea.) There are 12 months, which is an idea we get from lunar cycles, 12 * 5 = 60, human heart rates average out to something close to 60/minute (particularly for shepherds and other people in good physical condition), and 60 * 60 gives the number of seconds in an hour and the 360 degrees in the circle and approximates to the 365.25 days/year. So all of these numbers hang together. Also, we see traces of numeration base 12 in things like our idea of the dozen (12) and the gross (12*12).

So my guess is that time to the base 12 must have been a common idea throughout Eurasia very early on. I have no idea about pre-Muslim Africa or the pre-Columbian Americas.

Probably the best one could do would be to find the earliest mentions of "24 hours in the day," "60 minutes in the hour," and "60 seconds in the minute." Linguistic traces suggest to me that the Chinese, before missionary-led calendar studies, divided the hour into quarters. Books on technology might tell us when the first mechanical clock was made. It's pretty hard to imagine dividing the hour into standard units with tools like the water clock or the hour glass. On the other hand, a big enough sun dial would have probably encouraged people to divided the dial into degrees, so maybe that could have led to the definition of a minute.

Joseph Needham's Science and Civilization in China might have the information somewhere in one of its many volumes. If you are around a library that has the whole set you might give that source a try. There are also encyclopedias of technology. P0M (talk) 01:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Archaic systems of time measurement

This article is lacking discussion of systems of time measurement other than the current international one, for units smaller than a day. There are many different units listed in the particular articles linked from Systems of measurement, such as Chinese units of measurement. History of measurement could potentially be expanded to provide an overview of this topic, with a very short summary in this article. -- Beland (talk) 17:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Ideally, archaic systems of time measurement would be collected in an article demonstrating their creation, period of use, and obsolescence. A chronology of chronometry, as it were. History of calendars and History of timekeeping devices both have useful information, but how the clock and the calendar interact across history is little explored.

That being said, the main Time article needs to remain a broad and relevant overview, and has little room for more than a summary of any approach to understanding Time; indeed, I think it would be useful to have most of the detailed information on the history of clocks moved off to be handled by History of timekeeping devices. The timekeeping methods (and reasons) of other major cultures should certainly be mentioned in the main Time article, but even notable details belong in other articles. The subject is simply too vast, and finding the balance between the extremes of too much detail and being a glorified List page is where the article will achieve its goal of being informative. --Yamara ✉ 20:42, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

As I've indicated above, the subject is universal (as far as I know) in the ancient past (days, moons, years being obvious, but dividing the day into shorter periods -- except the variable units day and night -- has no natural unit. Providentially (or maybe due to cultural transmissions) the two ends of Eurasia settled on 12 watches and 24 hours. Anybody know what the Muslim world worked on? India? But as soon as mechanical clocks came into existence they had a pervasive influence. Technology drove language, for instance. The Chinese "hour" is "little time unit" (xiao shi) because it is half a "normal" time unit. Nobody figures time in the old 12 unit system anymore. As far as I know, there are no base-16 time systems, base-10 time systems... Maybe the Mayans had a different system. Those brief determinations ought to do it for this article. P0M (talk) 21:07, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I did a preliminary survey of Mayan time ideas. They divide the day into four periods, according to some sources. But then if you look farther you will find indications that they divided the daytime hours into four periods, and the nighttime is not divided. Anyway, they do not seem to have ever divided the day into small units. The Muslim societies were quite well aware of Greek philosophy during the dark ages when that stuff had been forgotten in Europe. So they probably took over the 24 hour day from them if not more directly back to Middle Eastern sources. P0M (talk) 23:22, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Boldness strikes: Shake up in religion & mythology

I've removed the following from the "Time in religion and mythology" section, following a sentence about Greek philosophers:

One analogy compared the time of life to the passing of sand through an hourglass (a common measuring device for time in the past). The sand at the top is associated with the future, and, one tiny grain at a time, the future flows through the present into the past (associated with the sandpile at the bottom of hourglass). The past: ever expanding, the future: ever decreasing, but the future grains become amassed into the past through the present.

My work on Hourglass suggests ancient Greeks didn't have hourglasses. Also, looking in the history, this statement was tagged "citation needed" in February 2007, but never got one. I've said before that I like the image, a lot, but there's simply no cite for it.

Finally, I've moved the opening of this section down to "Time in philosophy", since it's, well, philosophers talking philosophy. There are plenty of gods one might mention under the "religion & mythology" header, but these ain't it. --Yamara ✉ 22:25, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

New image

Would you please comment on the new "light cone" image we have prepared. The intention was to imply the correct scale of space-time relative to the observer. Interstellar light-years vs years scales seemed appropriate. Thoughts? Dhatfield (talk) 11:55, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

The function of an illustration is to communicate meaningful information to the intended audience of an article. The image looks fine, technically, but the reader has to reason backwards from the word "cone" in the caption to understand the part about what the straight lines represent. What the dots represent is not indicated at all. Are they stars? Are they events? It's up to the reader to guess. And what is the snake that has consumed stars or events and keeps slitering forever toward the bottom of the screen? I think I know enough about the subject, and have seen similar diagrams in enough books on the subject, that I might guess correctly. But if I relabeled the drawing then whoever put it up might revert me on the grounds that I had gotten it totally wrong. P0M (talk) 16:23, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not into reverting - we're not a very militant lot at the Graphics Lab :) Can you please post specific comments / suggestions for improvement at Wikipedia:Graphic_Lab/Images_to_improve#Light Cone. I'm not sure wht you mean about the "snake". We are working specifically on the "World cone" image. Dhatfield (talk) 11:33, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

The graphic is probably o.k. It is the caption that is inadequate because it does not say what the undulating line represents. The diagonal lines could be labeled, at least with letters, so that the caption could say something like, "Line AB represents..." The lines that I am guessing represents the world-line of some observer would be hard to label on the diagram itself because the only place where it doesn't move from side to side is at the center.P0M (talk) 15:17, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we are talking about different images. I assume you are talking about the animation. We have not done any work on the animation. If it needs improvement, please place a request at Wikipedia:Graphic_Lab/Images_to_improve. Dhatfield (talk) 22:01, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

time does not exist

time in itself does not exist . it is merely an instrument for measuring change.if there is no change then time does not exist..for example before god made his first creation , and god was the only thing in existence there was no change ...which is why it can be said that god has always existed...time as a unit of measure however gives order to everything . simply stated in cause and effect...an effect cannot precede the cause..but the cause has an effect which is in itself a unit of measure.....thereby giving a very subjective viewpoint of the passing of time as to the individual that is observing the change.....it is therefore impossible to see the present or the future as anything that is seen has already happened and therefore is actually the past....for example lets say light takes 8 minutes to travel from sun to earth..then it takes time to reflect to the observers eye and be proccessed by the brain...after all that has happened it is the past , and cannot be changed . Timedoesnotexist (talk) 06:00, 21 July 2008 (UTC)timedoesnotexist

Philosophers have been arguing about what time is for a very long time. So an opinion on the subject is not going to help us directly.

When you say, "[time] is an instrument," you confuse something that is purportedly measured with something that measures, and (at least in a figurative way) something that measures something. We have difficulty in determining the ontological status of both space and time. Augustine taught that God created space and time. Mach questioned whether space was purely relational and physicists are still trying to work out what space is and what its characteristics are. Einstein fused space and time together in his account, so it may be that the ontological status of time cannot be disentangled from the ontological status of time.

One way to put one's toe into the freezing water of the time discussion is to state an operational definition. We have to ask, "When we say that two events are separated in time by x amount of time, what does that statement imply that we have done?" In a typical situation, we are timing a horse race. The bell rings, the gates fly open, the horses run to a line a mile away, a photoelectric device is tripped, and one or more horses are declared the winner. At the time a switch is thrown to ring the bell and open the gates a third signal is sent to an electric stopwatch that is set in motion and continues in motion until a signal from the finish line turns it off. An accurate clock operates by counting pulses from a vibrating crystal. Older, less accurate, clocks may count cycles of a moving pendulum. The principle is the same.

So what do we have here? We have an observer who notices changes. So the observer has the capability to observe external states, record them in some sense, and stack the records in sequence. Each mental photograph goes "on top of" the pile of photographs that have already been taken. Now we have events being mirrored by events, sequences being mapped onto other sequences. And in the interests of greater accuracy and reliability (in doing things like time-and-temperature calculations in baking bread) we like to have a clock that is more reliable than our internal clocks and a single clock that can be observed by multiple witnesses.

A change in space is not necessary for there to be a perceived change in time. We may be watching a blinking light that does not change position. Experience has taught humans that there are causes for changes, so even in that case we would look for movements if only at the atomic level to explain the blinking light. The most radical case I can think of would be a single atom of a radioactive substance. Radioactive decay is a matter of quantum probability, so it would be impossible to determine any mechanisms involved in the decay. It either occurs, or it doesn't.

So we are left with "looking for a change" and "counting a regular cyclical event."

"if there is no change then time does not exist" This statement is dogmatic, and possibly involves solipsism. If the universe were to cool to absolute zero, maximum entropy, then possibly there would be no motion. How does one know that the universe has reached this state? Only by moving around to inspect all parts of it.

Suppose that God created two universes. Each is created with a Big Bang event. Each has its own time and space, and time begins with each of them at the instant of creation. Time in one universe exists regardless of what becomes of time in the other universe.

What are the implications for changelessness in the case of a single entity? A proton is believed to be changeless for billions of years. Its halflife is extremely long. But we do not say for that reason that change disappears from the rest of the universe. How about Han Solo in stasis? If his body temperature is reduced to absolute zero, then nothing changes. Even at somewhat higher temperatures nothing significant would happen to him. When he is returned to normal life after a thousand minutes or a thousand years it would, for him, be as though no time had passed. His biological clock has been stopped. He has not aged. He has not experienced everything. But the world around him will have changed greatly.

"god has always existed." As somebody pointed out a long time ago, God does not exist in the sense that humans or electrons exist. We say that Mr. X exists if we can go to x, y, z, t and observe Mr. X sitting at his office desk. God is not to be found in space or time. He is eternal. So all that we can legitimately say is that in all of the time of this universe we could find to time at which God could not be contacted by whatever means one has.

"time as a unit of measure however gives order to everything." No. Humans or other functioning parts of the universe record orders of events. Clocks or other recording devices (slowly settling grains of sand that embed grains of charcoal, arrowheads, etc. of the same times in the same layers)leave something in relatively permanent form that is a mapping of more fleeting events. And the fleeting events, above the quantum scale at least, do not undo themselves for reasons of probability. (Humpty Dumpty does not self-assemble from his scattered parts.)

"anything that is seen has already happened and therefore is actually the past." That statement is true, at least in regard to events that pass through space by mediation of processes that occur at or below the speed of light. However, in physics there is the anomaly that Einstein thought would kill quantum mechanics, entanglement, and it not only gives the surprising result that events can be link instantaneously even over great distances, and, in experiments that have already been performed, the surprising and counterintuitive experiments that indicate that events that occur later in time have determined events that occur earlier in time. Not only that, but from the standpoint of theological explanations that began with the Medieval scholastics, things or events can be linked by transcendental relationships, i.e. "causal" events that occur because of the action of God. For instance, presumably if someone prayed for an intercession in the year 2009, God could change something that had "already" (to the human observer, anyway) occurred in 2000. (The philosophy of Leibniz held that all relationships, causal relationships included, were in fact transcendental relationships, not real relationships.)

Space can be changed by great masses, and so can time. The rate of flow of time, the cycle rate of atomic clocks for instance, changes in proximity to massive objects like stars. Can something that does not exist be changed? P0M (talk) 22:45, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be better stated that time would be an intangible vehicle for multiple systems of measurement , events can be measured in seconds , minutes , years , ticks of a clock , how many times the sun rises and sets , the speed of light , half the speed of light or double or triple the speed of light . The system of measurement used does not matter it is still just a measurement . Timedoesnotexist (talk) 05:54, 26 August 2008 (UTC)timedoesnotexist Timedoesnotexist (talk) 05:54, 26 August 2008 (UTC)august 26 , 2008

Things that have standards of measurement can be measured. Time can be measured. Things that can be measured exist. Hence time exists, like the spaces before your commas. (Did someone tell you to hit space twice for each period?) Potatoswatter (talk) 22:22, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[edit] Editing comments

[edit] Others' comments It is not necessary to bring talk pages to publishing standards, so there is no need to correct typing errors, grammar, etc. It tends to irritate the users whose comments you are correcting. Do not strike out the comments of other editors without their permission.

Never edit someone's words to change their meaning, even on your own talk page. Editing others' comments is sometimes allowed, but you should exercise caution in doing so. Some examples of appropriately editing others' comments:

If you have their permission Removing prohibited material such as libel and personal details Deleting material not relevant to improving the article (per the above subsection #How to use article talk pages). Removing personal attacks and incivility. This is controversial, and many editors do not feel it is acceptable; please read WP:ATTACK#Removal of text and WP:CIVIL#Removal of uncivil comments before removing anything. Timedoesnotexist (talk) 04:09, 29 August 2008 (UTC)timedoesnotexist august 28,08

What time really is

Time is the maintenance of an identity - what something is - across a change. For example, the inhabitants of an island have different words for different stages of the development of certain yams. Each word conveys no relation between the different stages. It is as if the identities of these stages are separate. The result is the inhabitants do not perceive time with respect to the growth of the yams. Only when identity is maintained across a change is there time. No change, no time; No identity, no time. Reference: Psychology of Time Perception, Edmund Bergler, M.D. and Géza Róheim, Ph.D. http://www.pep-web.org/document.php?id=PAQ.015.0190A

What allows a clock to tell time is that it remains a clock while having undergone a change - in this case, the position of its hands. The subjective experience of time for a human is like that. A human maintains his or her identity - who he or she is - while undergoing physiological changes (metabolism). When people lose their identities, they lose the subjective experience of time altogether. 74.195.25.78 (talk) 23:30, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Salaam,

I think you're on to something if you have came up with this all yourself. I figured it out as well--- :-). I got a lot of hep from reading the Maya and Inca references to time, though. I never laid my hands on an Einstein book yet I figured out some of his theories. Anyway, I haven't read the essay but I'm sure your enthusiasm would be good for this article. Cheers. InternetHero (talk) 19:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

“Time is like the charge on a battery. The battery that time charges is consciousness and everyone is a time machine. During the day while you’re awake you spent time to make reality and at the end of the day when you become depleted of time you get tired. Sleep is how you recharge your consciousness with time.”

Taken from the book “If we free the slaves who will pick the cotton” Tomas Real (talk) 16:41, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

"Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once"

"Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once". This quote, attributed variously to Einstein, John Archibald Wheeler, and Woody Allen [...]

I saw than sentence within a quotation from Le possible et le reél by Henri Bergson. Can anybody who has read that book confirm that? --A r m y 1 9 8 7 ! !  16:12, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Without time everything would not happen at once. Without time nothing would happen at all. Its space not time that keeps everything from happening at once. Space is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once. Time is nature's way that anything can happen at all. Tomas Real Tomas Real (talk) 23:40, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

In fact, there was a humorist who said "time exists so that everything doesn't happen at once; space exists so that everything doesn't happen to me" --130.225.247.116 (talk) 14:44, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Time exists because some systems of differential equations can't be de-parameterized; can't have the "t" (or "dt") removed -- and furthermore, are chaotic or even stochastic. Kevin Baas^talk 15:03, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

On a deeper metaphysical level, every observable system is observable because both it and the observor act upon and can be acted upon. Take this away and you have essentially nothing. Once you introduce this, however, you have dynamics, and thus time. Time and affect are inextricable, and without affect there is nothing. Kevin Baas^talk 15:15, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Beginning of Time

Just what it means to suggest Time "began" with the Big Bang needs elucidation. "Time began with the Big Bang" is a position often repeated and correctly sourced to Hawking. Personality issues about Adler & Hawking are not relevant & can be found elsewhere. I propose the following replacement - which is not a revert. --JimWae (talk) 03:12, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Stephen Hawking in particular has addressed a connection between time and the Big Bang. In A Brief History of Time and elsewhere, Hawking says that even if time did not begin with the Big Bang and there were another time frame before the Big Bang, no information from events then would be accessible to us, and nothing that happened then would have any effect upon the present time-frame. Upon occasion, Hawking has stated that time actually began with the Big Bang, and that questions about what happened before the Big Bang are meaningless. This less-nuanced, but commonly repeated formulation has received criticisms from philosophers such as Aristotelian philosopher Mortimer J. Adler,

• Hawking never said time began with the big bang. In trying to make complex issues easily understood by people other than physicists, he has unintentionally muddled his own point. Adler was an idiot, had a degree in psychology, taught philosophy even though he knew nothing about it, and is being used to discredit the world's foremost authority on physics and mathematics. This is precisely why nobody takes Wikipedia seriously. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.107.60.166 (talk) 04:10, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

It is still relevant to discuss common misunderstandings about what it means to say "time began with the big bang" - which Hawking HAS said upon occasion, and has been oft-repeated because of him. If H muddled it, it is important that we do not. Adler became a professor of philosophy - his credentials are well established. And yes, Adler did attack Hawking's weaker position rather than his stronger one - but my proposed wording does not get into discredting anyone - and anyone, even Hawking, can make a mistaken statement. In this case, looking at the misstatement makes the correct formulation clearer --JimWae (talk) 04:30, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

• Hawking never said that. Hawking stated very clearly that whether or not time existed before the big bang is irrelevant to physicists because there is no way to observe anything outside our universe. I know that's easy to misunderstand, but a Ph.D. in psychology trying to make a name for himself by intentionally misquoting scientists is not useful to anyone. Adler's credentials were doubted by his own peers. His credentials as an asshat are well established. If he gets a voice here, we better put in something about the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

He HAS said that ("one may as well cut them out of the theory, and say that time began at the Big Bang") and also that "questions about what happenede before the big bang are MEANINGLESS". THe refs are already in the article. Adler is used here only because opposition to the oft-repeated version of "time began with the big bang" needs a source. Find another one, then --JimWae (talk) 04:52, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

• You language comprehension is questionable. One "may as well cut" what out of the theory? "Questions about what happened before the big bang" is what he's cutting out, because they ARE meaningless. What am I wearing on my feet right now? It doesn't matter and there is no way for you to find out. I guess you better put in something about the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Nobody worth citing believes that Hawking ever said time actually began with the big bang--he said it was a meaningless question. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.107.60.166 (talk) 05:02, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Here are 2 quotes already referenced

1. "Since events before the Big Bang have no observational consequences, one may as well cut them out of the theory, and say that time began at the Big Bang. Events before the Big Bang, are simply not defined, because there's no way one could measure what happened at them. This kind of beginning to the universe, and of time itself, is very different to the beginnings that had been considered earlier."
2. from "The Beginning of Time": "The conclusion of this lecture is that the universe has not existed forever. Rather, the universe, and time itself, had a beginning in the Big Bang, about 15 billion years ago."

You yourself have said he muddled his explanation. Clarifying that oft-repeated mud is part of the job of the article. Irrelevant & not measurable are not the same as meaningless & undefined -- and that is Adler's point --JimWae (talk) 09:10, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

• Space and time are the same thing. If the Big Bang was the beginning of our universe, it was necessarily also the beginning of time in our universe. If you can't measure outside of our universe, speculation about what does or does not, did or did not go on outside our universe and our time frame is irrelevant, not measurable, meaningless and undefined. Until we have a unified theory of quantum gravity, the question is philosophical and has nothing whatsoever to do with the big bang or any other physical theory. Knit a new sweater and then ask, "What was this sweater doing before I knitted it?" Hawking has never stated that the big bang theory denies the possibility of space-time outside our own universe, and his own quotes clarify his position as well or better than Adler ever could. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.107.60.166 (talk) 18:22, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

This section is about "time" - the biographies of H & Adler are not relevant. You yourself have admitted that H has been a bit overly hyperbolic/simplistic in his explanation. Whom you or I think is correct in this is not a matter for the encyclopedia to present. H has stated that "before the big bang" is meaningless. If it were truly "meaningless" it would convey no meaning at all, would be nonsense (such as what color is a square?). H does not get to determine what "meaningless" means. He has been challenged on this - and the reader is better informed if the article covers the fact that the oversimplified position has been challenged in academia & that there is still something worthwhile in H's position if the over-simplification is removed. Just because Adler is a theist does not mean that he cannot made a valid point. Even IF H had never said the oversimplified position, that position is commonly repeated & attributed to H. The reader is better informed if he is warned away from the hyperbole. --JimWae (talk) 03:57, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

This article is not about the big bang theory, but about time. It would be speculation to make any statements about what happened before the big bang, but it is not speculation to raise the question of whether time really began with the big bang, and whether anything at all could have happened before it. Indeed, H appears to have backed off somewhat on his position, himself. Futhermore, this article deals with whether or not it is even proper to say that time "exists" or EVER "started" at all. The article also can deal with whether time should be counted as an entity, substance, particle, property, or none of the above. Saying that time "began" at all is a position that needs to be balanced --JimWae (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• Well I guess I can be glad that physics classes aren't taught by anyone that has an internet browser. You have no understanding of the subject at hand and it is clear. Asking what happened before the big bang IS THE SAME AS ASKING ABOUT THE COLOR OF A SQUARE. Many people have tried to get this erroneous section dealt with, but it appears that the masses cannot understand plain English. Good luck convincing anyone to take wikipedia seriously while this sort of editing is allowed. I hope editing an online "encyclopedia" makes you feel smart. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.107.60.166 (talk) 13:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The idea of time starting at a certain point is utterly insane. But hey, more than half of us believe it all goes back to some omnipotent being, so I guess it's not all too surprising that masses of people believe such crazy things. In any case, our task is not to critique these beliefs, but to document all POVs, however absurd some may be. Kevin Baas^talk 15:23, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

It's just one thing after another

Really. Lycurgus (talk) 18:32, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Picture at top right is distracting

Anyone else find the picture of the "Sunrise shown in time lapse" distracting? It's hard for me, at least, to concentrate on the article when there is a large shaky image next to the words. Perhaps someone can edit it so that it is smoother (and thus not so distracting) or replace/remove it completely? 209.173.109.104 (talk) 22:08, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Distracting, annoying, naive, and poorly crafted: classic example of over/under-lighting. As far as I am concerned, get rid of it without giving it a second thought. DVdm (talk) 23:43, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

If you're using Firefox on a PC, just hit the Escape key. That, at least, stops the animation. I can't speak for other software/hardware combinations. Stormerne (talk) 14:42, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• As the sun rises, it gets darker - And it also prevents screen-savers & other power-saving functions from starting --JimWae (talk) 02:39, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Nobody opposed against removing, so I went ahead. DVdm (talk) 11:00, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but you removed it incorrectly, leaving the text underneath the image at the top of the article. I've had to undo the edit. You should also decide what to do with the (interesting) text about the sun and moon before you simply chop. GKantaris (talk) 16:00, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, I missed that. I have removed the text as well. I think the idea of the text is sufficiently covered a bit below in the sentence "Examples include the apparent motion of the sun across the sky, the phases of the moon, the swing of a pendulum, and the beat of a heart". Cheers, DVdm (talk) 16:34, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Where's the Philosophy?

I was suprised to find that, except for the brief section on Unreal Time, philosophical theories are completely neglected in this discussion. It is certainly not the case that Physics has a stranglehold on what time really is. Some traditional philosophical discussions involve static (nonmoving) time, and ideas about events and objects flowing through time. Of particular interest to me, and of, I think, general utility, is the Kantian concept of time, which receives a short discussion in the Transcendental Idealism article. Basically, it views time, and space, not as physical realities, but as mind dependant concepts. Under this view, our conception of time is a fundamental cognitive process in that it serves to structure all of our other experiences. This is a fundamentally different from the theories of Physics in that Time is not seen as an actual thing existing out in the Universe. This idea ties into the discussion on this pagrle titled, "What Time Really Is." Our basic measurement for time is the rotation (change) of the sun, and on smaller scale, the clock. As discussed in the article, sometimes time seems to "drag" or "fly", and this may be viewed as the difference between the Mind's perception of the change of the event that it is concentrated on, and the objective measurment of time on the clock. See, most importantly, Critique of Pure Reason, I. Kant —Preceding unsigned comment added by 32.152.145.0 (talk) 09:18, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

I totally agree -- so add some discussion of philosophical theories of time! I'd suggest including Jorge Luis Borges' magnificent _A New Refutation of Time_ (paradox of the title is intended). GKantaris (talk) 12:05, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

I totally disagree. Time is what we read on our clocks. Philosophers can whine as much and has hard as they want, they will never have anything interesting to say - let alone contribute - about it. They can only produce more babble and nonsense. And after having produced more babble and nonsense, they can only produce even more babble and nonsense. DVdm (talk) 15:23, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Unable to remove "THIS WHOLE THING IS WRONG!!!!!!!!!"

Under the section physical definition (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time#Physical_definition) just above the heading "Classical mechanics", there is a line that does not belong: "THIS WHOLE THING IS WRONG!!!!!!!!!"

I was unable to edit it as it does not show in the edit section for "Physical definition".

The offending line also does not appear in the any of the versions in the article's history.

What could be the reason for the above, and how does one correct it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.178.171.206 (talk) 08:56, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Template vandalism, solved here. --Van helsing (talk) 10:02, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Leap second

Someone has inserted material about GMT being wrong even before GMT is discussed, and used an argument that the rotational period of the Earth is constant. I have reverted. Please note the following from leap second --JimWae (talk) 20:05, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

The leap second adjustment (which is approximately 0.6 seconds per year) is necessary because of the difference between the length of the SI day (based on the mean solar day between 1750 and 1892) and the length of the current mean solar day (which is about 0.002 seconds longer). The difference between these two will increase with time, but only by 0.0017 seconds per century. In other words, the adjustment is required because we have decoupled the definition of the second from the current rotational period of the Earth. The actual rotational period varies due to unpredictable factors such as the motion of mass within Earth, and has to be observed rather than computed.

dmoz link

wp:el is quite broad. be specific why dmoz link is not appropriate? 212.200.243.13 (talk) 22:21, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:EL#Links_normally_to_be_avoided pt. 13

"Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject: the link should be directly related to the subject of the article. A general site that has information about a variety of subjects should usually not be linked to from an article on a more specific subject."

But perhaps I interpreted this the wrong way: The site is indeed only indirectly related, whereas the link is directly related. So, I won't make a fuss if you restore it :-)

Cheers, DVdm (talk) 14:50, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

"Time is that which differentiates moments"

I think that this serves as an aggreable and safe general opening. It speaks of a broad and important effect that is more then a just a component of a system. It may be simplistic but we've gotta start somewhere.Gnostril (talk) 05:35, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

"...has consistently eluded the greatest scholars." (Gnostril takes an optimistic and naive bow)Gnostril (talk) 05:47, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

• A contextual definition (one that talks of what the concept of time is used for) with a history in the literature serves better than what amounts to a circular definition that is original research and favors a particular view of time as a collection of moments (the meaning of which "moments" is often taken differently by different people). Your suggested def makes no connection to literature on the subject, & saying time is "what differentiates moments" is no help in telling us HOW "moments" are differentiated. Your "def" also does not apply to uses of time that measure different durations for events. Your def "Time is that which differentiates moments" also talks of time as if it were an entity in itself - even one that might be seen as an agent that itself DOES the differentiating --JimWae (talk) 08:02, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughtful comments. You gave several reasons for dismissal. I would like to address them.

Circular definition:All definitions form circles as the entire matrix of meanings rests on nothing but it's self. (I know this is a week point but sometimes small circles are unavoidable. See Mass and Gravitation)

On Original Research. There are some truths that we can hold to be self evident. With this complaint you could similarly dismiss the definitions of Fear, Distance, and many other features of our primary experience.

I am not favoring a view that time is a collection of moments. Moments are. And Time is something else; the quality that makes them different. Just as distance(as a spatial dimension) makes one place different from the next. We wouldn't say that distance is a collection of places.

It is true that this definition does not tell us HOW moments are differentiated. Depending on the question, I would either say that moments are differentiated by our measuring systems, or point out that after all this time, The HOW of gravity is still up in the air, yet that doesn't weaken the theory.

When measuring different durations of events. The moment at the end of event A is x points different (plus or minus) than the moment at the beginning of it. And the moment at the end of event B is y points different(plus or minus) from the moment at the beginning of event B.

I don't see what the problem is with time being an entity. If spacetime is curved by matter, then matter might be seen as an agent that its self DOES the curving. I imagine almost any thing could be seen this way.

Thanks again. I'm diggin this discussion. Gnostril (talk) 21:14, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

the clock itself

changes rhythm during time Prisms and rain (talk) 07:11, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Page Structure

The page structure seems wrong, it seems as though it is only concerned with the religious and philosophical aspects of time as well as time being just a measuring device with the physics of time being a side note. It should begin with and be mainly concerned with the physics behind time as a dimension as well as the representation of time in physics as this is the most generally accepted theory, as religions choose to disagree and atheists would say otherwise and philosophy isn't as well accepted. Then include side details related to religion and philosophy. Also time, as well as positions in space(the 3 spatial dimensions), existed long before humans were here to measure and quantify it, therefore I'm removing the first sentence about time being a measuring device as it is inaccurate, it also completely contradicted the second sentence about time being hard to define. Thanks for the consideration —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.111.198.213 (talk) 10:24, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Imaginary time

I have moved this section to the Imaginary time article discussion. Softvision (talk) 23:15, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

{{editsemiprotected}}

Hi. I think it's a good idea to add the following links (under the ISST -International Society for the Study of Time- link):

• Institute for Time Nature Explorations : http://www.chronos.msu.ru/eindex.html
• CEITT - Time and Temporality Research Center : http://ceitt.com/index-en.html

My first reaction was to say no, because the external links section is a real mess; however, I agree that those two specific sites appear to be genuinely revelent, and also in the interests of avoiding bias, I've added them. Cheers!

 Done  Chzz  ►  10:20, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I've removed them. Those particular pages do not even discuss the topic - but only announce upcoming events &/or ask for feedback. Other pages at sites deal with topic of time - but are only in the form of speculative, introductory questions about time --JimWae (talk) 18:49, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Automate archiving?

Does anyone object to me setting up automatic archiving for this page using MiszaBot? Unless otherwise agreed, I would set it to archive threads that have been inactive for 30 days and keep the last ten threads.--Oneiros (talk) 21:45, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

 Done--Oneiros (talk) 20:06, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Time is not a unit

The second paragraph states that "... time is considered one of the few fundamental units." It even cites a source that is supposed to back this up. But it isn't correct. Time is not a unit; a second is a unit, and it is a unit of time. The cited source includes a quotation that talks about units of time or units of length, not the concepts of time or length being units in themselves. In general, a unit is an agreed-upon quantity of measure, not the abstraction being measured. I want to either fix this sentence or remove it. I think the intent was to indicate how important the concept of time is in physics; it is perhaps better to say that time is one of the fundamental quantities that can be measured in the International System of Units: length, mass, time, electric current, thermodynamic temperature, luminous intensity (which is actually a human perceptual unit, not a physical unit), and "amount of substance" (actually just an atom- or molecule-count). If nobody objects, I will change this in the next day or two. CosineKitty (talk) 14:19, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it surely souds odd. Perhaps writing it as fundamental quantities helps. DVdm (talk) 14:34, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Or, "a fundamental physical quantity", since there is an article for that? CosineKitty (talk) 14:57, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and then we might even drop the reference altogether. No problem with me. DVdm (talk) 16:18, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I changed it. CosineKitty (talk) 17:05, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Direct quote from commencement of second paragraph as of today 2010 February 06: Time is one of the seven fundamental physical quantities ...

Time a Quantity? We have concepts for time but that is all, surely? There can be an infinity (almost) of metaphysical approaches to defining time but all definitions are prone to fail: "Time is the vessel of deeds — no deed done, no time consumed — philosopher’s conundrum." And so on ...

For practical purposes we have working systems for time measurement, for example "mean solar time", "sidereal time" and so on. Fundamentally time is a unique abstraction in that its invariance is beyond challenge. I am open to challenge myself on this one! Wilberfalse (talk) 18:47, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

The current opening sentence needs to be replaced. Time is not primarily "part of the measuring system used to sequence events ...". Like distance or mass it can be measured but that does not make anz of them primarily part of a measuring system. Something like, "Time flows, separating and sequencing the past from the present and the present from the future." A far more general 1st statement. Also Time is not a quantity. It can be divided up and numbered or counted. But that does not make Time a quantity. A count of time gives a quantity. Not Time itself. Just like Mass is not a quantity. It can be counted but again its the count that is the quantity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.154.42.131 (talk) 12:37, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Saying what "time is", is probably the most impossible thing humankind has invented.

I think we only find solid agreement over the (operational) definition of time among physicists, engineers and John Doe: "Time is what we read on clocks" (see also http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/second.html). For philosophers o.t.o.h. the opening sentence will never be acceptable. I think that's just one of those facts of life :-) - DVdm (talk) 12:52, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

St. Augustine Part

"In Book 11 of St. Augustine's Confessions, he ruminates on the nature of time, asking, "What then is time? If no one asks me, I know: if I wish to explain it to one that asketh, I know not." He settles on time being defined more by what it is not than what it is,[23] an approach similar to that taken in other negative definitions."

If you are going to keep that quote from Augustine's Confessions we need to elaborate on the relevance of it to the article and how it relates to Augustine's inquiry on the subject. The setence that follows the quote is also pointless and sounds like their knowledge of Augustine's position on the issue is limited to that quote. In my opinion the quote does not adequately represent his analysis of time and some of the acute inferences he makes. I suggest someone with adequate knowledge of Augustine try and fix this becuause his contributions to the subject matter are notable and have had a wide spread influence toward the western conception of time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.150.49.50 (talk) 20:54, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once.

This quote is a witticism, said as a kind of semi-joke - and it is only part of the quote. It is something interesting, but I do not see any reason to take it so seriously as to assign it as a principle of science. It does not say anything specifically about cause and effect, though causal events are, of course, included among the events it can refer to. If only causal events were intended, then everything else MIGHT happen and the same time.

Some events DO happen at the same time in the same reference frame. Some effects can occur at the same time as the cause - it all depends on how the event is defined and WHERE it is located. Though the sunshine is about 8 minutes old, the change from day to night has a cause in the simultaneous rotation of the Earth. Lightning is caused by a static discharge - but in a sense IS just a manifestation of a static discharge - the only time delay is the result of needing to be far enough away to see it and survive. The requirement is not that the cause precede the effect, but that the effect cannot precede the cause.

If every event happened at once, there would be only one event. --JimWae (talk) 07:43, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Jim, concerning the bottom-change of this, cause and event are always separated by time - by definition. Two events can happen at the same place and time, so not all events are separated by time.

Now just compare:

• Google search the original cause and effect version: 5760 hits
• Google search your events version: 1 hit

I know it's a semi-joke and I know google search is not authoritative, and we are not dealing with academic sources, but your change is just WP:SYNTH. Time is not what separates events. It is what separates cause and effect, semi-joking or not. Therefore I have changed it back to the original version, with the google search added as a reference, but while retaining your top-change (with which I fully agree). If we find a more authoritative source for this, we can always add it. DVdm (talk) 08:53, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

• I cannot believe you think such a search would settle this. Did you not notice how most of the links were to articles with paragraphs identical to the wp article? They are wp mirror sites - and there were only 73 of them (and only 20 not counting duplicates). I am deleting the quote to avoid wasting any more time on this. Read Causality - there is no requirement that the cause be before the effect. The static discharge, the lightning, and the thunder are not 3 separate events - there is one event and the manifestations of the static discharge take time to propagate over distances. --JimWae (talk) 19:05, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, of course I noticed how most of the links were to articles with paragraphs identical to the wp article. Anyway, I have added the somewhat famous sentence with two sources to the end of the lead. It was indeed not sitting at its proper place in the time dilation section. I have also left out the speculations about causality. Let's indeed stop wasting time on this. Cheers - DVdm (talk) 20:03, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

The quotation is not partial, but it is misattributed and slightly corrupt. The correct quotation is:

“Time is that great gift of nature which keeps everything from happening at once.” —C. J. Overbeck

Biographical Encyclopedia of Scientists wrongly cites a 1978 American Journal of Physics issue attributing the quotation to John Archibald Wheeler. The quotation does appear in issue 46(4) at page 323, but unattributed. Look instead at “What does a man possess?”, a 1973 article by physicist C. J. Overbeck which appears in the August issue of The Rotarian at page 47. The quotation is from paragraph 3, the first column. Verify this online at <http://books.google.com/books?id=vjUEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PA47#v=onepage&q&f=false>. I am sorry I am unfamiliar with the CITE tag and the citation markup in general and have not corrected the article myself, but I hope I have sufficiently informed someone with the necessary know-how. Cheers, MetaEd (talk) 20:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

Interesting. Thanks for having dug this up. I have changed the article. Feel free to hone. DVdm (talk) 20:57, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

JimWae, even more thanks to you for having found and inserted the Cummings quote. In answer to your recurring edit summary question ("WHY do we keep it?"), I'd say, well... let's keep it because (1) it is catchy, funny and to the point, (2) it is all over the place and everyone seems to have said it, (3) it is bound to reappear in this article anyway, and (4) our Wikipedia article might be (or become) the only place that's got it right. Good job :-) - DVdm (talk) 08:43, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

---

Now we've got Bergson saying it in French

• Le temps est ce qui empêche que tout soit donné tout d'un coup. [Time keeps everything from happening all at once.] -- Henri Bergson
• http://ca.search.yahoo.com/search?fr=mcafee&p=bergson+%22time+keeps+everything%22
• http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=time+%22keeps+everything+from+happening%22+bergson&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=
• http://books.google.com/books?lr=&cd=12&as_brr=0&q=%22Le+temps+est+ce+qui+emp%C3%AAche+que%22&btnG=Search+Books
• http://books.google.com/books?id=qprjifRX9WsC&pg=PA74&dq=%22Le+temps+est+ce+qui+emp%C3%AAche+que+tout+soit+donn%C3%A9+tout+d%27un+coup%22&lr=&as_drrb_is=q&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=&as_brr=0&cd=12#v=onepage&q=%22Le%20temps%20est%20ce%20qui%20emp%C3%AAche%20que%20tout%20soit%20donn%C3%A9%20tout%20d%27un%20coup%22&f=false

I do not read French, but apparently the last one gives a date of 1930--JimWae (talk) 09:05, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

---

Bergson wrote "Duration and Simultaneity" in 1921, but this does not show the quote & here's his bibliography--JimWae (talk) 09:38, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Current Time

It may be just me, but it seems that a page on time should have a current time. I don't know how to put such a thing on there (html?), but I think something at the top that said The current time is: XX:XX:XX (UTC) would be really nice.--E♴ (talk) 01:03, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

EDIT: found T:Time Cell which I think could be modified for this... looks like this:

The time is now:

16:35

Friday

1

November 2024

--E♴ (talk) 01:09, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

EDIT2: how about this? User:E2eamon/sandbox I am going to add it per WP:BOLD If anyone wants to revert, go ahead and post a comment here. --E♴ (talk) 01:34, 10 June 2010 (UTC) EDIT3: I moved the template to the template namespace at Template:current time box--E♴ (talk) 01:59, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

• I removed it. I doubt anybody is going to come to this article to find out what the time is - not even people in the UTC timezone. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia - not a newspaper, and not an applet--JimWae (talk) 05:17, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

• That's true...I just did a google search for time, and this article is #7. Anyone who wanted to know the current time would have gone to an earlier result. I guess it's just people like me who start by searching wikipedia, instead of google...--E♴ (talk) 13:38, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Time is an intersection between 3 dimensional space and the 5th dimensional information field

What is this supposed to mean? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.237.126.183 (talk) 03:37, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Nonce introduction

JimWae reverted my changes to the lede (diff), commenting "this IS an operational def. other appears to be a string of words with little sense that makes time an agent." JimWae has for a while now defended NONCE at this article, meaning a lede paragraph without a definition, or else one that prefaces the topic with a kind of disclaimer saying "there is no one agreed upon definition," rather than finding language that people can agree on. The current version reads:

Time is an essential part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects.

This entire first part of the sentence is problematic, and, combined with the next sentence add up to NONCE. In my comment I wrote: "opening sentence - pls avoid WP:NONCE - time is not "the essential part" of "a measuring system." On the positive side, I can say that the lede overall covers a lot of ground and thus isn't so bad. So while I appreciate the good hard work that JimWae and others have put into it, I must point out that time is not "an essential part" of "the measuring system" that's "used for sequencing events." Time is time —not that. My edit added an actual lede sentence that said something like:

"Time is the transformation or change that acts upon all of reality, in accord with constraints that connect states in the present to events in the past and to a projection of the future. It is described variously in philosophical and physical contexts as measuring system or dimension used to sequence events..." (diff)

-Stevertigo (w | t | e) 15:11, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

• Regarding the existing 1st paragraph: 1) there is nothing at all in that first sentence that mentions any problem in defintion, 2) you have not touched anywhere on any reasons to support your claim that the first sentence is problematic 3) It would be uninformative to not mention in the lede that defining time has challenged the greatest scholars. But this does not begin the article -- it is at the end of the first paragraph. 4) A defintion in terms that do not already involve temporal concepts is impossible, so a certain amount of circularity is unavoidable (see Definition#Limitations_of_definition) 5) the def that has been accepted on this page for years now, presents the range of concepts that function to make up our notion of time. It gives a conceptual definition for time, expressing the contexts in which the base notion of time would apply. An operational definition of the units in which time is "measured" is then possible.
• Regarding your proposal: 1) you have not mentioned any reasons supporting any way in which it would be an improvement 2) It personifies (or, at least, reifies) time, making it an agent of change 3)it refers to some constraints, but nowhere does the article cover that 4) it externalizes the connection between events in the past & the future - making time the origin of the connection (taking the POV that it is time that connects events rather than something else such as energy or causality) 5>the existing lede does not say time is a measuring system, but that it is an essential component of a measuring system. Other components (especially regarding the quantification of motion) would be space & number 6) What does "Time is the transformation or change that acts upon all of reality" tell the reader? Besides personifying time as an agent, what more is it than a string of words that says nothing specifically at all about time? 7) Other than that the terms past, present, & future are temporal words, what does "in accord with constraints that connect states in the present to events in the past and to a projection of the future" tell the reader about time?
• Regarding sources: I can find reliable sources that support every part of the existing lede sentence. I did not see in my search any such complete support for your proposed sentence. The closest I found to anything that supports any part of your wording was that the *concept* of time is a way we have of speaking that links the past, present, and future, as in: "the *system* of those *sequential* relations that any *event* has to any other, as past, present, or future; indefinite and continuous *duration* regarded as that in which events succeed one another". They mostly supported use of "continuum" as a concept -- and not as any objective external reality. There were a very few that spoke of time as an objective substratum (aether) that is part of the underlying structure of the universe - but to have wikipedia state that as the definition would be to take sides on an issue about which a profound disagreement is covered in the article, and thus would violate NPOV. I think NPOV is an additional problem for your proposal.
• More later JimWae (talk) 21:52, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

• The NONCE template & the WP:NONCE article have been created & worked on only by yourself, and are in no way any wp guideline. Nevertheless, I submit that WP:NONCE does not apply to this article. It is not the case that this article "only reveals and discusses a concept's ambiguities or peculiarities". It begins with about as good a definition as possible for such a term. Furthermore, to not mention in the lede that definition has been difficult would be uninformative. Additionally, your proposal, since it "begins with non-definitive or otherwise vague language", is far more an example of your version of NONCE than the lede that has begun this article for nearly 2 1/2 years now.--JimWae (talk) 22:26, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate your points - the fact that the current "working definition" represents a compromise for what was previously a rather contentious philosophical article, and that this version has sufficed for quite a while now. Full disclosure, I agreed at the time that the current version was adequate to our needs, and stepped back with an understanding that it would work for a while. It has, and I think the rest of the article has developed quite well because of it. Nevertheless, I have returned for a reason, because the language "an essential part" is not what time is. It would be better to state that time is a dimension or even a force that acts upon particles, than it would to keep the current version. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 23:22, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

• I see you have repeated your assertion that "time is not an essential part of a measuring system" - but I see no argument for your position. Do you disagree that "a measuring system [is] used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects"? Do you disagree that time is an "essential component" of that measuring system? Perhaps you disagree that these activities capture the primary usages we have for the word time? Surely you must have some familiarity with Definition#Limitations of definition. Some circularity is inevitable with basic concepts. Sometimes, as here, there is no other definition possible than a conceptual one. The "working" conceptual definition leaves aside the question whether there is some entity called time, apart from the activities we carry out to which we attach the term. Do the activities include too much? Are there other activities that have been left out? If we cover all the main activities "time" applies to, haven't we given a comprehensive context for the usage of the term?
• Do you have some other NPOV definition in mind besides the idiosyncratic & unsourced ones that "Time is a force" OR that "Time is the transformation or change that acts upon all of reality, in accord with constraints that connect events in the past to the state of the present and the projected future (which 2nd also has all the problems mentioned above)?
• Would it make a difference if the lede began:

Time is a dimension of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects.

• Sure, the word "dimension" is a more familiar term to apply to time, and it would not be absolutely terrible if that is what was there. However, because "dimension" is so familiar, it would just hide the emptiness of applying it to the only dimension used for all the activities except the last. Furthermore, a focus on dimension would overemphasize the other associated dimensions (of space) and screen over the other essential component of the measuring system, ie: number.

• You have not made your case for tagging the article with the template that only you have ever worked on and that is neither a wiki policy nor guideline. You disagree with the lede - but have not proposed any alternative that you can show has any support. Disagreeing with a lede does not justify tagging it with your own personal template without making the a case for what your template says it means. Offer a better lede if you can. If you cannot, isn't it appropriate to remove your template? JimWae (talk) 06:41, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

"Time is an essential part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects."

Can I add my own objections to the first sentence. Time is something that can be measured, and so is not just part of a measuring system (as "second" or "inch" could be said to be). Secondly, time measurements do not quantify motions, measurments like velocity do. 1Z (talk) 15:07, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

OPh, and I don't like this either

"Time is the transformation or change that acts upon all of reality, in accord with constraints that connect events in the past to the state of the present and the projected 'future. "

Time is not change. Changes occur accross time; time is what change occurs accross. 1Z (talk) 15:18, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Peter. Jim, the issue that I raise and which Peter adds to is simply that time is not "a measuring system" nor is it "part of" such. Time is time, and it exists independently of human measurement or for that matter, observation. Granted, philosophers into subjectivist worldviews can experience a warm and fuzzy feeling if they wade deep into the idea that everything disappears when they close their eyes, but that's not how the real world is understood, and that's not the way encyclopedia articles approach a topic. We defer to objective viewpoints.

Jim, you asked: "Do you disagree that time is an "essential component" of that measuring system?" - In a certain context, that is what time is, but in objective contexts time is quite not that at all. You could for example look at physical descriptions of time - all the way up to computational/holographic conceptualizations - and you might consider these a better generalization of what time actually is. Jim you wrote: "Perhaps you disagree that these activities capture the primary usages we have for the word time?" - Your language does indeed get to a serious idea about how we conceptualize time and how we contain it (the concept), but it does not rise to the level of a general definition that says what it (the concept) actually is. Granted, its not easy, and I appreciate your take on it enough to consider as a secondary statement in the lede. Regarding my wording:

"Time is the transformation or change that acts upon all of reality, in accord with constraints that connect events in the past to the state of the present and the projected 'future. "

Peter wrote: "Time is not change. Changes occur accross time; time is what change occurs accross." - Understood, though from a certain perspective, time and its effects can be thought of as inextricable. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 20:16, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Time as configuration

I believe a good way to think about time is to think of a "moment in time" as a certain configuration of the universe. This configuration would include things like the locations of the universe's objects and also things like the momentums of the objects and in which direction the objects are "currently" moving. In my view, time is a much more encompassing dimension (piece of information) than width, length and height. If you know what time it is, you'll know the current configuration of the universe and therefore, the width, length and height of all the objects.

If a moment in time is a configuration of the universe, then time travel is possible. Clearly, the configuration of the universe is always changing. Going "back" to a certain moment in time, according to my definition of time, would mean changing the configuration of the universe to it's configuration in the given moment in time. Of couse, it will be quite difficult to travel "back" in time if the configuration of the universe you wish to achieve is quite different from the current one, as almost any two universe configurations are likely to be.

But, if you're content with changing your "local time" - the configuration of the universe in a local area - well, at least getting it to match to a high enough degree, then it appears that you can travel to (change to) a time (configuration) that is sufficient for your purposes. For example, if you wanted to bring someone back to life, you'd have to reconstruct their body with their DNA sequences, etc... okay, it can be difficult! But, you can construct a clock that at least appears to cycle through the same local times. Using System Restore on a Windows machine is another example - the settings get changed back. It appears that you've gone back in time.

Do these definitions of time and time travel make sense enough to include a new section on them in the article? What do you think? Synesthetic (talk) 06:43, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Off topic and OR. The idea of time as a configuration has some insight in it, meaning that's generally how time is handled locally (as a state), but that's not what time actually is. You seem to be shaping your conjectures to match your original premise about time travel, which, as with most T-symmetry transforms, is not actually possible due to entropy. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 19:09, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Synesthetic:Off topic and OR. The idea of time as configuration has been fully developed into an eliminative theory Julian Barbour's End of Time, which you might care to look at.

Steve: There is no straightforward fact to the effect that entropy defeats time symmetery. See Huw Price's Time's Arrow. -1Z (talk) 19:22, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

?!? -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 17:41, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Lede

" Time is the concept of the underlying physical mechanisms that macroscopically transform reality —according to dimensional constraints and orthographies at the smallest scales —such that the state of the present is realized directly from past states, and the future can be pictured by projection."

Given that Jim and other mainstay custodians of this article have not vocalized any issue with the criticisms listed (in above sections), I have gone forth and added a new lede sentence (above) expanded from my earlier edits and with consideration of the criticisms given to it by thoughtful co-editors. For future reference, I encourage everyone to consider WP:CONCEDE and what its essential idea, if implemented, can do for any article discussion. Regards, -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 02:24, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

I have already expressed numerous problems with the reification of time, and/or making it into a force, as well as the lack of meaning in the wording that you have proposed. It is not until the 32nd word that you touch on anything clearly identifiable with time. You repeatedly say "that is not what time is" as if you have found a better def, when you have neither sourced nor found anything approaching a def, and what you present does not even clearly distinguish time from things such as motion or causality. --JimWae (talk) 04:51, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate the comment that time does not depend on us, but that does not make time an entity. We are simply unable to conceptualize the universe, even a universe without humans, without temporal concepts - but that does not demonstrate that time IS a force of the universe or something that objectively "exists".

If we cannot resolve this without reifying time in the lede, then perhaps we will need to return to a lede that says there are two views on what time is JimWae (talk) 05:09, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

We also cannot conceptualize a universe without number, but that does not make "a force that separates things" a definition of number. Some scholars claim that the best def of time is "what a clock says", and that the question of what time "really is" is unanswerable. Not all concepts are as amenable to definition in simpler terms the way rectangle is -- and if you look at the rectangle article, you will see that even defining rectangle has some complications. Some concepts just cannot be defined in terms of simpler concepts (there have to be some simplest terms). When this happens, the best we can do is delimit the contexts in which we use the term that signifies the concept. That is what the lede has done for 2 1/2 years, and adding your jargony tag neither improves the article nor helps the reader understand why it is there. (One of the examples of the limitation of definition used by Wittgenstein turns out to be number, and he spoke of family resemblance as the way out of the limitation.) Look at the distance article and the number article - the same limitations of definition apply. JimWae (talk) 06:49, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

I do have another sentence I am working on:

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to compare and quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to compare and measure the motions of objects.

OR

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to compare and measure the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to compare and measure the motions of objects. JimWae (talk) 07:47, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

OR

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to quantify and measure the motions of objects. Time is quantified in comparative terms (such as longer, shorter, faster, quicker, slower) or in numerical terms using standardized units (such as seconds, minutes, hours, days) JimWae (talk) 07:56, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Jim wrote: "I appreciate the comment that time does not depend on us, but that does not make time an entity. We are simply unable to conceptualize the universe, even a universe without humans, without temporal concepts." - Jim do you understand much about holographic theory/paradigm, QC, etc.? -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 16:05, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Physicists identify FOUR fundamental forces. They do not include time as on of those forces. In order to put your supposed text in as a defintion of time you will need to provide extensive reliable sourcing beyond speculative determinism and ideas about many-worlds being a reality. You have not replied to the several objections I have raised to your text - nor to my points about the limitations of defintion.-- JimWae (talk) 18:36, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

You are assuming that I have "identified" time as a "fundamental force." I have not. Can we please drop the rhetoric and deal with substance. You have conceded that the previous definition, which you once staunchly defended, is in fact inadequate. In other words, what you once thought was stellar writing was not, and you were not correct in defending it. So though I diregard your adversarial tactics, I greatly appreciate your progress. Now if we can now project a future course of where this discussion is going, you may find forthcoming trends to be similar. Let me start off by apologising for using similar rhetoric to yours. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 19:35, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Jim proposed

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to compare and quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to compare and measure the motions of objects.

Time is not a "one-dimensional quantity." Putting aside that time may in fact at certain very small scales be a one-dimensional operation (on one-dimensional objects), time is not a "quantity," and nor is it in larger scope "one-dimensional." In fact the idea that time is one-dimensional is itself asserting a kind of POV from the standard model that doesn't deal with time in a very rigourous way except to categorize it as functionally single-dimensional and objectively relativistic, and rejects many-worlds (the basis for quantum computing) and other insights that are massively "dimensional." -SV

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to compare and measure the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to compare and measure the motions of objects.

In addition to the criticisms above, linking "used" to quantification is an non-helpful easter-egg. The rest is material I keep in my version as a secondary explanation, and so the only issue I have with it is that it doesn't actually explain what time is (a conceptualization for change), and therefore is unsuitable as a first sentence. -SV

Time is a one-dimensional quantity used to sequence events, to quantify the durations of events and the intervals between them, and (used together with space) to quantify and measure the motions of objects. Time is quantified in comparative terms (such as longer, shorter, faster, quicker, slower) or in numerical terms using standardized units (such as seconds, minutes, hours, days)

The above criticisms still apply. Times numerical quantification is relevant, but inessential to a grand unified definition. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 19:56, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Time is not just about change - it is also about duration & sequencing. It is not just about the unspecified past - it is also about sequencing the past. Your text is vague - it does not distinguish time from causality or motion or change. With all its vague vagaries, your text does not, in the end, do what you keep asserting we must do - define what time "really is". (Here's a relevant essay that has been worked on by more than one person.) Your text does not define time at all; it is closer to a definition of change. It speaks of time vaguely and figuratively as some kind of "force". It speaks vaguely of some kind of all-encompassing deterministic causality. Along with lame links such as state, your text has several serious Easter eggs - such as projection linking to Many-worlds interpretation. We are not here to provide new "intuitive insight" or original research. We are here to summarize what the best reliable sources have to say. Perfection is a goal we can only hope to get close to. Text that substantially satisfies the desire for definition should not be substituted out just to say anything/something that pretends to be a complete definition but is jargony vagueness that pays no attention to sources. The text that has been here 2 1/2 years may be imperfect, but your text is still no improvement --JimWae (talk) 04:35, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

See when you say things like "jargony vagueness" what you are really doing is showing a total and complete lack of good faith or a willingness to find consensus. Very little of what I write can be described as such, and in reality you are just violating both CIVIL and OWN. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 00:50, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Jim wrote: "Time is not just about change - it is also about duration & sequencing. It is not just about the unspecified past - it is also about sequencing the past." - Duration and sequencing are objective concepts related to measurement (and not dimension itself) which are not fundamental to time itself (in the way dimension is). I like the formulation you wrote, but it serves best as a secondary sentence - one which opens up the door to objective concepts.

JimWae wrote: "Your text is vague - it does not distinguish time from causality or motion or change." - Causality is of course relevant, and can be added to my wording.

JimWae wrote: "With all its vague vagaries, your text does not, in the end, do what you keep asserting we must do - define what time "really is"." - Again time is not "an essential part" of "a measuring system" and it is not "a measuring system" - that is a strict utilitarian way of looking at it. Time is a fundamental physical transformation. It is the "essential part" of "reality" itself, not just "a measuring system." You defended the earlier wording and I appreciate that you have since shown some understanding that it was not sufficient.

JimWae wrote: "Here's a relevant essay that has been worked on by more than one person." - I appreciate some of the main points in that and I appreciate your mentioning it. But you seem to be under the impression that taking a strict utilitarian view is best, and more suitable for "the reader." You now agree that the previous version is inadequate, and have suggested some new alternatives - but again time is not "a one-dimensional quantity" either.

JimWae wrote: "Your text does not define time at all; it is closer to a definition of change. It speaks of time vaguely and figuratively as some kind of "force". It speaks vaguely of some kind of all-encompassing deterministic causality." - Your commentary comes not just from the point of view of an adversarial editor who has an invested OWNership of the article, but someone who thinks that they have mastered the concept and whose explanations are superior to mine and probably anyone else's. But I shown now how about five different versions you've proposed have fatal inaccuracies in them, and I think it wise that we not continue repeating this pattern.

JimWae wrote "Along with lame links such as state, your tex1t has several serious Easter eggs - such as projection linking to Many-worlds interpretation." - I noted this easter egg in the comment line and kept it contained as a separate edit. Note that your usage of "lame" here is a pejorative and adds nothing to your argument. I don't understand why you can't just correct these minor issues yourself rather than make a bigger issue out of them than they actually are and rigorously wave your hands claiming them to be fatal flaws in my version.

JimWae wrote: "We are not here to provide new "intuitive insight" or original research. We are here to summarize what the best reliable sources have to say. Perfection is a goal we can only hope to get close to." - It is not that perfection cannot be achieved, its that you don't actually understand what the concept is as well as I do, and you therefore can't actually write about it at the level I or anyone who is not a subjective utilitarian can.

JimWae wrote: "Text that substantially satisfies the desire for definition should not be substituted out just to say anything/something that pretends to be a complete definition but is jargony vagueness that pays no attention to sources." - You are citing V without yourself actually using it. You are referring to "sources" but not stating what those sources are or that the sources you cite are low level. You are easter-egging the "Sokal affair" from a pejorative and acting as if its an actual argument.

JimWae wrote: "The text that has been here 2 1/2 years may be imperfect, but your text is still no improvement." - I appreciate the concession, but how can you draw an equivalence between what you write and what I write? It is an apple and oranges comparison your are making here. There is no equivalence between my general and conceptual overview, and your version which is best usable as a secondary sentence. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 23:42, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Impossible To Verify Negative Statements

"Travelling backwards in time has never been verified, presents many theoretic problems, and may be an impossibility."

"Has never been verified" is an impossible to prove claim. How does one know, for example, that the Tibetan philosopher, Sum Sing Wing Wong, who flourished in 1850 in the Fling Flong Province did not verify traveling backwards in time? (EnochBethany (talk) 13:58, 19 July 2010 (UTC))

Omnibus first ref

The first ref tag (from Jim?) is an omnibus citation of about ten different dictionary sources. The current lede sentence comes from the fifth source down:

"The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language". 2010. "1a. A nonspatial continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future."

I used it here, and I am happy with the fact that its general and usable. But its not our own writing as it should be, and I want to change it. But I'm hesitant to change this wording given JimWae has yet to respond to the above critiques, and that it seems to be adequate. There are other definitions of "time" in the AHD version which are just as superb and have relevance for our article. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 00:52, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Lede issues (2)

Of the many definitions of time that there are, there is no indication why that particular one should be the one wikipedia uses. At present the article is self-contradictory. The lede twice takes note that there is no consensus in the literature on definition, yet picks one that is not neutral with respect to the disagreement. A more neutral one would substitute "in which events are located" instead of "in which events occur" - but there is no source for that one. We will probably have to go back to beginning with something like "There are 2 distinct views on how to define time."--JimWae (talk) 01:14, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Jim wrote: "The lede twice takes note that there is no consensus in the literature on definition, yet picks one that is not neutral with respect to the disagreement." - It is a textbook example of a WP:NONCE introduction where, because of some "neutrality" between good and mediocre sources, a "there is no consensus" version is produced. Nonce introductions are to be avoided.

In my view, there is no comparison: The AHD definition excels for each and all definitions beginning at the most general (a1) to the most mediocre (11). There is no other definition which gets to the substance of the concept at the same high-level. It also subsequently treats the dimensions of time you appear interested in, and as I said above, your writing is essential to a continuation from a general definition. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 06:20, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

WP:NPOV is policy. Your NONCE is not. The lede touches on the debate over how to define time. Wikipedia cannot take sides JimWae (talk) 06:48, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

I understand the difference between NPOV and what you state to be reality. In addition to violating OWN, stop violating CIVIL. There are no "sides" - only arguments of different conceptual depth. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 07:01, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

I think I said this before - insisting on observing the policies of WP:NPOV, WP:V, and WP:RS in the face of repeated violations exhibits neither OWN nor being uncivil.--JimWae (talk) 07:12, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

I think anyone who has dealt with you knows the difference between what you do and civility. But I appreciate you taking it down a notch to label the current lede according to certain criticisms. Now can you please explain what you mean by "vague" tag? It does not appear to be warranted in that case as "[[physics|physical]] process" seems adequate. I would not mind it linking to something more relevant and specific. What article would you suggest?

The "failed verification/not found in source" tag does not appear to be warranted either, as the lede sentence seems in large part to echo exactly the source. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 15:40, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

You have added a significant number of phrases that do not appear in the source - nor in any known source. You are reifying time & you are doing WP:OR JimWae (talk) 00:07, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

In source

• non-spatial dimension
• past
• present
• future.

NOT in source

• physical process
• in which reality
• is macroscopically transformed

Paraphrased from source but attached to unsourced phrases

• in continuity

-- JimWae (talk) 00:18, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

JimWae, thanks for responding. You list four things which are "NOT in source" and "Paraphrased from source but attached to unsourced phrases":

• physical process
• ..in which reality
• ...is macroscopically transformed
• ...in continuity

Can you explain how or why any of these basic concepts are in the least controversial or controvertible? I mean, can you explain in some general objective way what is problematic with each of them? - Stevertigo (w | t | e) 17:32, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Nobody mentioned anywhere in the article, nor in any of the refs I've checked, defines time as a process, yet you've made that the primary descriptive phrase. The closest is language like "Time heals all wounds", but that is figurative language - nobody thinks time is the main cause that results in healing. You are treating time like a force or some kind of application of energy - but time is not "measured" in Newtons nor in Joules. This is your own research, not anything you have presented a single source for. --JimWae (talk) 18:21, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Time is also not JUST about transformation, it is also about endurance and duration. We do not need "As conceptualized by human beings< !-- as opposed to what???-->" because, like it or not, unless we hear from ET, OUR conception is all we can ever talk about. The first sentence does us no good, it is original research which detracts from the value of the article. We can very easily begin with the well-sourced 2nd sentence (without the "As conceptualized by human beings")--JimWae (talk) 21:20, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

• JW wrote: "The first sentence does us no good, it is original research which detracts from the value of the article." - Can you substantiate your view with a clear, bulleted point-by-point commentary on the four listed items?
• JW wrote: "Nobody mentioned anywhere in the article, nor in any of the refs I've checked, defines time as a process," - The word "process" indicates two things: "procession" and "function." Is "procession" irrelevant to a physical paradigm which "proceeds" sequentially from past to present to future? Is "function" irrelevant to a physical paradigm which the formentioned "procession" occurs in an orderly way bound by physical laws, as described in physics in accord with mathematical "functions?"
• JW wrote: "The closest is language like "Time heals all wounds", but that is figurative language - nobody thinks time is the main cause that results in healing." - Your comparison here is insufficient.
• JW wrote: "You are treating time like a force or some kind of application of energy - but time is not "measured" in Newtons nor in Joules." - These (force and energy) are two different things. In physical terms, time has properties which resemble that of a force, and hence might use similar terminology in their description. At no time did I suggest that time be treated as some kind of "application of energy" or that it be "measured in Newtons or Joules."
• JW wrote: "Time is also not JUST about transformation, it is also about endurance and duration." - Am I to understand that you are now trying to be constructive here, by saying that 1) transformation is now somehow relevant to time, and that 2) we need to consider "endurance" (huff!) and "duration" in the first sentence? "Endurance" is clearly a typo —you must instead have meant "persistence." And you already did a stellar job of indicating "duration" in the second sentence. I could not do better than you already have at dealing with this secondary concept.
• JW wrote: "We do not need "As conceptualized by human beings" because, like it or not, unless we hear from ET, OUR conception is all we can ever talk about." [..] "We can very easily begin with the well-sourced 2nd sentence (without the "As conceptualized by human beings")" - I don't know where you are quoting this from, or why you are raising this issue. I see now what you are referring to. When going from a very general, abstract, and objective look at time as in the first sentence, some transition is required when going into how it is used in special, objectified, and subjective contexts. I agree that its not beautiful, but some transition is required, and I think its acceptable. The word "conceptualized" does confine the context how people percieve and use time - which are what your secondary treatment gets into.
• Jim could you now deal with the four issues you raised in detail (there are only four of them, and its YOUR list), and explain why they are irrelevant or else unsuitable to the lede. Regards, -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 21:46, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

It does not really matter what we agree or disagree about. You have made the very first sentence of the article one that is mostly unsourced. Without sources, this is original research. Encyclopedias are not places to introduce one's own pet ideas & definitions, and on wikipedia, the policy is to remove such material.--JimWae (talk) 00:03, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

JW wrote: "You have made the very first sentence of the article one that is mostly unsourced." - It is sourced, and my writing complies with that source. Its the best dicdef from among the dictionaries you listed. So what you now seem to be saying is that:

"it does not really matter" 'what I [you] argued before' 'that there were four specific terms which I [you] claimed were irrelevant or inappropriate for the definition

Ostensibly these "[do] not really matter" anymore because you realize (now that youve had time to think about it) that there's nothing at all wrong with these four items ( 1)...physical process.. 2) ..in which reality 3) ...is macroscopically transformed, 4) in continuity..) or my overall formulation. A formulation which, again, is fully compliant with the source. Note, we can't simply quote a dictionary - we have to rewrite things. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 01:09, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

You have not provided a single source for anything, much less one that defines time as a "process" or "transformation" -- or even speaks of it in such a way. "Reality" is also unsourced & vacuous. Sorry, Steve, it has to go --JimWae (talk) 01:56, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

"You have not provided a single source for anything" - I provided the AHD source. Next. "..much less one that defines time as a "process" or "transformation" -- or even speaks of it in such a way." - This criticism has some validity. Lets do a quick search for some sources which deal with time as a process, or use "process" analogies with reference to time:

• "Space time physics and fractality."
• Aristotle
• Itzhak Bars
• Whitehead
• stochastic processes

I suppose you will now try to suggest that all of these be cited in the passage, and that every word I write have a separate citation. Jim wrote: "Reality" is also unsourced & vacuous. Sorry, Steve, it has to go." - Im quite familiar with "reality," and though I understand some people (such as yourself) have a different sense of things, I still think "reality" is relevant to the concept (time) and I think it should stay.-Stevertigo (w | t | e) 04:36, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

You did not provide the AHD source. I provided it and you "appropriated" it. There is nothing in any source presented that supports "Time is a process that transforms reality" nor "time is a process in which reality is transformed", nor "time is a process". If you can find something in Whitehead or Bergson saying that, then provide it and that can stay in the article. For it to be acceptable as the lede sentence will require much more. An encyclopedia must rely on sourced material, not unsourced speculative metaphysics of its editors --JimWae (talk) 01:35, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Btw, removing tags and radically altering ledes of articles are NOT minor edits, as has been explained to you already. It is very inconsiderate of the collective process to continue to mark nearly every edit you do as "minor edit".--JimWae (talk) 02:00, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

JimWae claims: "You did not provide the AHD source. I provided it and you "appropriated" it." - I understand. So you "provided" the source, meaning you did the hard work of looking up the AHD and copying and pasting its content here. After which I then "appropriated" the content by 1) actually reading it, 2) deciding it was a good source with a good conceptual take on how to write a definition, and 3) moved it out separately from the 19 dic-def omnibus citation you "provided" and 4) used it to substantiate the first sentence wording I wrote. The one you dislike so much. You have yet to deal with the four basic 'problem' concepts you yourself raised:

• "physical process" - (links to physics of time - debatable, but what would you prefer? "Paradigm?"
• "..in which reality" - Do you have a problem with reality?
• "...is macroscopically transformed" - You appear to have conceded that time has something to do with transformation (JW: "time is not just about transformation..")
• ...in continuity - (linked to continuum) - You appear to have conceded that the AHD source supports this term at least "partially."

I feel as if I am sometimes repeating myself with you. -Stevertigo (w | t | e) 02:11, 1 August 2010 (UTC)