Isn't time a measurement of motion?

[Justatruthseeker]

Isn't entropy the evidence of the passage of time?

What is entropy but the decrease in the movement of all things....... atoms loose energy and the movement of the electron slows..... hence the "time" slows..... which is nothing more than the distance between crests of electromagnetic waves.....

It isnt that time or the speed of light are constant.... it is a misconception that Einstein said light was constant. he actually said it's speed was constant regardless of the velocity of the observer, not that light itself was a constant speed.... a vast distinction between the two.....

If clocks are slowing because of entropy, then light is also slowing since the same measurement is always obtained... I.e. the two are proportional.....

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

What is entropy but the decrease in the movement of all things...

Nope, that's not entropy. Entropy is a measure of the number of possible system microstates that are consistent with a system macrostate; or, roughly, an inverse measure of the availability of energy in a system - with low entropy, energy is 'clumped', i.e. there are energy gradients; with high entropy, energy is spread evenly, i.e. at equilibrium. Alternatively, you can consider it (very crudely) as a measure of disorder in a system.

If you start with an invalid premise or assumption, your inference(s) will be false.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Nope, that's not entropy. Entropy is a measure of the number of possible system microstates that are consistent with a system macrostate; or, roughly, an inverse measure of the availability of energy in a system - with low entropy, energy is 'clumped', i.e. there are energy gradients; with high entropy, energy is spread evenly, i.e. at equilibrium. Alternatively, you can consider it (very crudely) as a measure of disorder in a system.

If you start with an invalid premise or assumption, your inference(s) will be false.

Statistically, infinitely more chances that disorder will occur rather than order. The increase in disorder is statistical evidence of sequence of events, what we call time.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Statistically, infinitely more chances that disorder will occur rather than order. The increase in disorder is statistical evidence of sequence of events, what we call time.

Yes; there are many more microstates of a system that look similar when it's disordered than there are when it is ordered, so changes in an ordered system will tend to disorder it.

Increasing entropy drives the arrow of time, although, as I understand it, at the fundamental level of the individual events that make up that statistical behaviour, time has no arrow - the interactions are time-reversible, so the arrow of time is statistically emergent.

 

[TimMcCollum]

If time is nothing but a distance measurement, then there is no such thing as "spacetime" only distance.....

No 4th dimension of a thing called time, merely a distance within the three.....

Motion would be the 4th dimension. The changing of positions

 

[loveofourlord]

If time simply measures motion, like Earth's orbit and rotation, then wouldn't that make time a concept of imagination. By this I mean, wouldn't time be a human concept? It wouldn't exist at all!

What do you think of this?

Thats what I believe, time doesn't exist, and is just a human made concept, we only feel the passage of time due to the way we acumulate how matter and energy used to look in previous states.

 

[loveofourlord]

I dont understand.

What do you mean time measures motion? Measuring is an investigatory activity.

well for me think of a clock, it's not measuring time, it's measuring the motion of the matter in the clock at set intervals that we call time, it's the acumilation of these motions that equal seconds, minutes, hours, and depending on the type of clock days and such. Same with days and years being the planets, it's just matter and energy changing positions and our acumlitive memories that create the illusion of time.

 

[loveofourlord]

When I break this down, it essentially says: time is a measurement of time.

I look at it more as time is something we made up due to us being able to remember how previous states are, we have the illusion that there is some past still out there and a future that is coming, rather then a ever changing single state. That time isn't flowing, but matter and ergnry move around, there is no place where trump wasn't president, and no place he isn't again, just that eventually the matter and energy of the universe will move to a state where he won't be. if I throw a ball to you, the ball isn't in my hand in the past, the matter and energy of the ball moved from me to you.

 

[loveofourlord]

I could say that you can measure time ... via regularly occurring events, like sunrises, and phases of the moon, but I understand what you're saying.

You could say that time is the forward procession of existence.

I used to think very similarly to you.

What has made a bit of a difference for me is Einstein's notion of a space-time continuum (or context), which proposes that time can be manipulated with the right combinations of extreme mass or velocity. I don't really have a sense of how that is, but it is interesting to contemplate.

I've wondered if time in those instances is just a effect of space being distorted by things like speed and gravity.

Something like if there was a objective 1 meter ruler that was the same size no matter where it was and uneffected by gravity that 1 meter in empty space would be 1 meter, but near the planet or star it would be 5 meters of a ruler effected by gravity so from the perspective of a objective ruler, your moving 5 times slower to cross the same distance.

 

[durangodawood]

well for me think of a clock, it's not measuring time, it's measuring the motion of the matter in the clock at set intervals that we call time, it's the acumilation of these motions that equal seconds, minutes, hours, and depending on the type of clock days and such. Same with days and years being the planets, it's just matter and energy changing positions and our acumlitive memories that create the illusion of time.

By the same token we could say:

well for me think of a ruler, it's not measuring distance, it's measuring the motion of the matter along the ruler at set intervals that we call distance, it's the accumulation of these motions that equal mm, cm, meters, and depending on the type of ruler km and such......

 

[loveofourlord]

Well I'm pretty sure actually were a child, in a past that actually happened, which you now recollect.

Of course the present is all there IS. I mean thats true by the definition the present-tense word "is".

But that doesnt mean the past didnt actually happen.

the matter that was the baby grew to become the adult, the matter was in a state that was a baby, but that doesn't mean there is still a baby out there somewhere in the past we could go to somehow, the matter is no longer the baby, therefore there is no baby to go back to.

 

[durangodawood]

I look at it more as time is something we made up due to us being able to remember how previous states are, we have the illusion that there is some past still out there and a future that is coming, rather then a ever changing single state. That time isn't flowing, but matter and ergnry move around, there is no place where trump wasn't president, and no place he isn't again, just that eventually the matter and energy of the universe will move to a state where he won't be. if I throw a ball to you, the ball isn't in my hand in the past, the matter and energy of the ball moved from me to you.

You are using time concepts at every turn to dispute the reality of time.

"Previous states"
motion (change in location over time)
the ball "moved"

 

[loveofourlord]

By the same token we could say:

well for me think of a ruler, it's not measuring distance, it's measuring the motion of the matter along the ruler at set intervals that we call distance, it's the accumulation of these motions that equal mm, cm, meters, and depending on the type of ruler km and such......

distances are a human construct, there is no objective meter or inches, beyond what we set, but there is distances and things. we can test those thigns, how do we tell the difference between time existing as a actual real thing, and time just being a byproduct of our memories acumulating. You remember yourself as a child because your acumulated memories of the state of the present you mremeber previous states, and create the illusion that there is something called time.

 

[loveofourlord]

You are using time concepts at every turn to dispute the reality of time.

"Previous states"
motion (change in location over time)
the ball "moved"

show me that we can measure time, outside of motion? I can take a ruler place it down and measure a meter without motion or anything else, where is the ruler that measures time itself and not the motion of things acumulating in what we call time. Memories are just the acumulation of the memories in a sequence creating the illusion.

 

[loveofourlord]

You are using time concepts at every turn to dispute the reality of time.

"Previous states"
motion (change in location over time)
the ball "moved"

on a fun note I could be wrong, and might very well be, just something I went through my head like a decade ago while bored :> On a cosmological scale it is true, there was no time before the big bang because there was no motion, and nothing to measure, something phycasist mention. A bored mind goes weird places hehe :>

 

[Michael]

If time simply measures motion, like Earth's orbit and rotation, then wouldn't that make time a concept of imagination. By this I mean, wouldn't time be a human concept? It wouldn't exist at all!

What do you think of this?

I'm sure that other animals experience change and the passing of time just like humans. The sun rises and sets on them as well. They get hungry, thirsty, tired, etc. It's not so much a concept of imagination as a concept related to change.

 

[Michael]

Motion would be the 4th dimension. The changing of positions

Even still, why would you suggest that change is imaginary? Time isn't so much a product of *human* imagination, it's just an observation of change by conscious beings.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

well for me think of a clock, it's not measuring time, it's measuring the motion of the matter in the clock at set intervals that we call time, it's the acumilation of these motions that equal seconds, minutes, hours, and depending on the type of clock days and such. Same with days and years being the planets, it's just matter and energy changing positions and our acumlitive memories that create the illusion of time.

That seems to be a perfectly valid way of looking at it. We experience a flow of time because we accumulate memories of the past but we can only attempt to predict the future.

The difficulty in prediction reflects the increase in entropy towards the future - there are increasingly many ways the future can be different from now. If we assume low entropy in the past (the Past Hypothesis), we can explain our singular record (e.g. memories) of it. Without the Past Hypothesis, statistical mechanics (which is time-reversible) would lead us to expect entropy to increase towards the past as well as the future.

Whether that means time's an 'illusion' seems moot, even if we assume the universe is a 4D eternalist block of spacetime where past, present, and future are equally real. It's real enough from where we sit.

It may be an illusion in that we experience it from a very limited, even misleading, perspective, but that's true of almost everything else in our experience too...

 

[durangodawood]

show me that we can measure time, outside of motion? I can take a ruler place it down and measure a meter without motion or anything else, where is the ruler that measures time itself and not the motion of things acumulating in what we call time. Memories are just the acumulation of the memories in a sequence creating the illusion.

If there is no time, then how is there a sequence?

Everything would be happening "at the same time".

 

[SelfSim]

... That seems to be a perfectly valid way of looking at it. We experience a flow of time because we accumulate memories of the past but we can only attempt to predict the future.

I don't think an untested prediction is part of objective reality in science. Until its tested, its still just hypothetical.

The future only seems real to us (ie: it 'exists') because we can recall past predictions which then happen (or test out) in the present. Without the capacity of memory, we wouldn't be capable of recollecting such predictions, so predictions are a function of the past (or our memory capability).

Time is an intrinsic essential for our mind to do what it does .. ie: to make sense of what it perceives. Without it (or memory) nothing would make sense.

PS: In other words, (and in short), memory and making sense of perceptions are all of what we 'really are'!