THE TIME-FLOW FALLACY

[argo]

THE TIME-FLOW FALLACY

Time is described in physics as “what clocks read”; if you asked a scientist to describe what water is in physics and the answer was “what boats float in” you would think s/he was joking, asking the reader to distinguish what a clock reads is actually appealing to his/her everyday use of the word and puts it in that context when as a description in physics it should unmistakably be in a physical or mechanical context. It is this play on words that creates the bias that time flows in the mind of the reader but in doing so makes each reader responsible for the assumption instead of the definition which is a pretty good trick; at first you may think this is all just coincidental and if it was an isolated incident then I may be inclined to agree, but if it is not isolated and an intent becomes clear you have to ask what are the motivations here?

Time across all definitions has many vague and misleading meanings, like how a purely mathematical meaning of the word is quietly supplemented as a meaning in the real world to exactly how time is supposedly overlaying the other three spatial dimensions if at all. The contradictory nature of the definition of time in the real world always leads to circular arguments which are vaguely acknowledged but then deceptively downplayed and finally ignored; the aim of this post is to expose these shortcomings, examine the motivations and discuss a more suitable definition for time.

 

Quote

Time

From Wikipedia

Time in physics is unambiguously operationally defined as "what a clock reads".

 

The operational definition leaves aside the question whether there is something called time, apart from the counting activity, (such as the passage of a free-swinging pendulum) , that flows and that can be measured.

 

Time in physics is a mathematical construct, it is a certain amount of agreed upon movement of some man-made devise described by a made up term called time, the idea that time flows was invented along with the clock that reads it. Time in physics is nothing more than movement, but instead of making this point absolutely clear this definition disingenuously states that it leaves aside the question of whether there is something called time altogether. It shamelessly ignores its responsibility to close the question of whether it describes a mathematically constructed thing or a real thing intentionally blurring the line between what’s real and imaginary. Just by stating this is a physics description instead of a mathematical description it deviously implies “what a clock reads” is a real world physical description.

Time in physics is unambiguously operationally defined as "what a clock reads". What a clock reads is totally ambiguous; it can mean time itself is flowing or the movements of the parts of the clock are flowing or even the mathematically constructed activity of counting these movements is flowing. The fact is a description in physics is purely a physical one, in physics clocks read the mechanical movement of springs and cogs; the physical movement of the sun across a sundial or the swinging movement of a pendulum (which was disingenuously used in the definition); this definition is just a clever play on words trying to disguise time-flow as an actual physical occurrence. Time in physics has an intended role; this role is to break movement up into known segments so they can be counted for mathematical purposes, it was never intended to be superimposed over the definition for time in the real world but this appears to be the prime motivation behind this definition. 

Calling this an operational definition means it will define the nature of how time actually works but first the definition wrongly refers to the counting activity of a free swinging pendulum as time when counting movement is obviously only ever a mathematically constructed thing, this added statement is not only incorrect it is completely redundant serving only to confuse and break up the sentence which would reads like this without it.

 

Quote

Time in physics is unambiguously operationally defined as "what a clock reads"

The operational definition leaves aside the question whether there is something called time that flows and that can be measured.

 

This doesn’t leave the question of time-flow being real or constructed aside at all; first it unambiguously defines a debatable question about what a clock reads which is completely ambiguous and then it describes, “time that flows and that can be measured” while claiming to leave the operational question of time-flow aside, what a completely delusional set of statements this is to make and shockingly it passes for the current scientific view of time in physics. Take away the nonsense and redundant statements and what you have left is a definition in physics advertising time-flow which is its only intent.

I devoted some time to sorting out the deceptions being used to describe time in physics to show just how fraudulently the time-flow opinion is being incorporated here and just how little substance there is to it.

I would like you to compare this to the definition for time in the real world.

 

Quote

Time

From Wikipedia

Time is the indefinite continued progress of existence and events that occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future. 

.  

This is the current scientific view for time in the real world now; the definition clearly describes time-flow with statements like progress of existence and succession from the past through the present to the future but it gives no indication of where this idea came from nor does it explain the mechanics for how this would work in the real world; this is why a mathematical description disguised as a physics definition is put there to guide us. The everyday idea of time in the physics definition is now being superimposed over the idea of time in reality, there is no evidence anywhere in science that can show time flowing because the whole idea comes from an opinion installed in a physics definition; it is completely made up and this fact is not only ignored there is a substantial effort being made to cover it up!

The extraordinary thing here is that at one point the circularity of the time-flow argument is openly acknowledged albeit in the vaguest way possible.

 

Quote

Time

From Wikipedia

Time is used to define other quantities – such as velocity – so defining time in terms of such quantities would result in circularity of definition.

 

 

What other quantities is this vague and confusing statement referring to and why would it not explain the show stopping circularity it just pointed out? The original quantity it talks about is “what clocks read” which must mean linear motion because the other quantity –velocity- is a rate of change of its position which is non-linear motion. In linear motion, the directions of all the vectors describing the system are equal and constant which means the objects move along the same axis at a constant rate and do not change direction just like the imaginary motion of time in a clock.

According to the idea of time-flow, time must facilitate all movement, what a clock reads is only linear motion, it does not read velocity or non-linear motion, this is a contradiction and leads to circular arguments. This is still a little vague even when clarified and doesn’t quite explain just how imaginary time-flow actually is so let me explain it a little further.

According to the idea of time-flow, time must facilitate all movement, because all things in the real world can move at different rates then so must time facilitate movement at these different rates - but time must move at one rate in the real world if everything is to continue to exist at the same time. Time-flow is not a real world definition; it must imagine everything moves at one rate of time which contradicts the real world evidence that everything can move at different rates.

This dubious definition uses confusion and vagueness to cover up the contradiction that makes time-flow a completely useless idea in the real world and without a single word to clarify the circularity it just pointed out it tries to shift the blame in yet another attempt at misdirection, why else include:

 

Quote

Time

From Wikipedia

Time has long been an important subject of study in religion, philosophy, and science, but defining it in a manner applicable to all fields without circularity has consistently eluded scholars.

 

Since time-flows circularity must be very loosely acknowledged to give this fake news definition of time any credibility at all, the contradiction is quickly diluted by lumping it together with philosophy and religion; this is a veiled attempt to repackage it while blaming the circularity no less on it not being applicable across these other fields. What has religion and philosophy got to do with the contradiction between linear and non-linear motion, which seems to have been easily forgotten seeing how it was never clarified anyway. To some this will all just be a series of misunderstandings and happy coincidences while the complete lack of evidence for time-flow is casually overlooked, but to others I can only imagine it has exposed these definitions as the carefully contrived attempts to mislead us all that they are.

*

THOUGHT EXPERIMENT

The photo in the frame is a thought experiment that’s goes some way to proving time-flow is impossible by showing the mechanics involved. Assuming the whole universe was a photograph and time is an overlaying frame then there are only two options for making the pixels in the photo move.

The first option is the contemporary view that time is a fourth dimension overlaying the three spatial dimensions all at once, if the original photo was to move to the next frame all the pixels would still be in the same place i.e. there would be no movement at all so this is not an option at all. A completely new photo must therefore be taken with the pixels in their new positions each and every time, this all apparently happens as time flows from frame to frame in some inexplicable way. This is the current scientific view of how time works as described by the progress of existence, all individual parts/pixels throughout the universe/photo exist at one time and are moving to the next time together. Both linear and non-linear motions are accounted for only because there is a completely new and different universe being created to accommodate this movement. Perhaps this works just fine for some of you but in reality the mechanics would involve the entire past universe being discarded and an entirely new future universe being created every moment which cannot be a real world option.

The second option is that time is a fourth dimension that overlays the three spatial dimensions but does so individually with a different frame for every part, every part/pixel in the universe/photo now has its own unique tiny time frame around it and is free to move independently meaning both linear and non-linear motions are accounted for. The mechanics involved are each new time surrounds a quantity of space, making particles of space and time, movement is just movement of these particles nothing more and time is defined as the when and where something exists nothing more, especially not the facilitator of movement in the universe.

*

The second option is an uncomplicated idea with an explicit description that does not contradict itself and resembles the free-moving individuality of the reality we live in; it is also prudent to realize that if the idea of time-flow is not an option then this is the only other option available. Why? It is a simple choice of one frame around everything or individual frames around everything, these are the only alternatives here which should be the focal point of any genuine argument because this explains the operational nature of time being a particle.

Still something didn’t look right but this was because in the beginning I had been following the tradition of time overlaying space which is the current scientific view, but this contemporary view is the wrong way around, the universe does not have timeframes overlaying space; it has spaceframes overlaying time. In retrospect I reasoned that time is the one thing that always exists and is the only thing with an ability to recreate itself again and again with each new moment, the enduring moment time leaves behind is a time particle, space is just the emptiness around each time point separating what are effectively individual things. Time is not the fourth dimension it is the first and only real dimension, without time space is nothing, but with time nothing becomes a measurable quantity of space.

A very easy guide to gauge the probability of both these ideas is to consider the resource and energy requirements of an ever expanding universe where space must be created piece by piece over and over again as it is in the real world. Either an enduring point in time is being recreated and moves to the next time accounting for expansion OR the whole universe is being recreated and moves to the next time without accounting for expansion. If the issues of fake definitions, the circular nature of the time-flow argument, the focus of the thought experiment or the expansion and energy requirements of the universe are not going to be observed, then nothing else I say is ever going to convince you otherwise. I don’t really see how the tricksters profit from deceiving us into believing time flows but I would like to make it perfectly clear my prime motivation here is to not end up being forced into an evolutionary dead end along with everyone else.

Just for my own piece of mind I would like to say time is not god; it is a naturally occurring phenomenon, it is an answer that puts an end to the religious question, “what created the universe in the first place”, the natural or the supernatural? I did wonder, with religions greatest magic trick at risk of being exposed is it behind the motivation for time-flow but I doubt the business that is religion ever thinks very deeply about anything but itself. Strong scientific opinions are usually driven by men of science who need this or that fact to be true to support their own ego driven ideas elsewhere, often as evidenced by any fraudulent means necessary but that’s just my opinion.

I may be wrong and it is quite easy to prove, just provide any hard evidence you have for time-flow, even a believable story or some other alternative would be preferable to the same old lies and deceptions being restated, redesigned and rehashed.

To evolve or not to evolve, that is the question.

ARGO

R.A. Russell

[Mordred]

Time is simply a measure of rate of change of events or duration it isn't a substance or material that flows. Quick simple and easy... Under relativity how one measures the rate of change will depend on the observer measuring the event. All too often people like to think of time as more than a property of a system or state. It is simply a measure of rate or duration. The Universe itself doesn't care how we measure or describe it. Time will continue without our measurements, as change will always occur. How we describe rate of change is irrelevant to the process undergoing change.

Edited January 30, 2019 by Mordred

[swansont]

If you really think this is unique to time, how about defining length, without any circular references. Perhaps it’s what a ruler measures?

And if your concern is about physics having a mathematical construct that doesn’t physically exist, I fear you haven’t been exposed to much physics.

[studiot]

36 minutes ago, argo said:

 THE TIME-FLOW FALLACY

Time is described in physics as “what clocks read”;

 

Could you please give a two line summary of what we are supposed to be discussing?

 

I would agree that clocks do not measure time (directly).

They measure seconds (or whatever) and seconds are a unit of several different quantities, just as other quantities such as inches or volts are units of more than one quantity.

You can for instance measure height or height difference or total length or extension in inches.

Or you can measure voltage drop in an electric circuit or electromotive force in volts.

 

Similarly with time you can measure time difference or elapsed time or lifetime in seconds, but never time itself.

 

For some reason we (well some of us) bother to make the distinction, but not for time.

Perhaps this is a source of much confusion.

 

I would have thought that at least some Physicists would define time as the reciprocal of frequency, as this is connected to the use in clocks.

Edited January 30, 2019 by studiot

[Mordred]

10 minutes ago, studiot said:

 

Similarly with time you can measure time difference or elapsed time orlifetime in seconds, but never time itself.

That's really the kicker we can only measure the rate of change and compare different rates of change. One can literally throw away the word time which is just a convenient label and simply describe the rate of change in any process. Another common misconception is thinking time controls rate of change. Time isn't a force or substance that can directly influence anything. 

Edited January 30, 2019 by Mordred

[studiot]

4 minutes ago, Mordred said:

That's really the kicker we can only measure the rate of change. One can literally throw away the word time which is just a convenient label and simply describe the rate of change in any process.

 

Then surely time fits the description of a dimension, since it then a label for a coordinate axis.

Edited January 30, 2019 by studiot

[Mordred]

Just now, studiot said:

 

Then surely time fits the description a dimension, since it then a label for a coordinate axis.

correct an under mathematics a dimension is any independent variable. All coordinate axis are independent in that you can change any coordinate value without affecting other coordinate values.

[beecee]

Time exists, It is the fourth dimension along with space and its three dimensions. Time imho is not movement as  such, but more correctly, movement occurs in time and enables us to measure via clocks, the duration between specific events. If all atomic movement ceased, if the universe stopped expanding, time would continue to pass/flow in a forward direction. If the universe started contracting, time flow would not reverse, but continue on in that direction which the late Stephen Hawking called the cosmological arrow of time. 

[studiot]

Interestingly the first measuring devices for time were (not very) linear devices, not cyclic devices as modern clocks are.

But the first devices for measuring distance were not linear devices like rulers or tapes, they were cyclic devices - measuring wheels.

 

[beecee]

10 minutes ago, Mordred said:

 Another common misconception is thinking time controls rate of change. Time isn't a force or substance that can directly influence anything. 

I like that. 

[michel123456]

100 years ago somebody made the claim that Time & Space are intertwined. Spacetime is the thing to figure out what it is.

Time by itself provokes a circular definition. Space by itself provokes also a circular definition.

One can describe distance in terms of time: the distance one walks in one hour (the parasang).

I am quite sure that one can also describe a duration in terms of distance*.

Also, thanks to this "someone", one should focus over a quantity that mix Time & Space, called velocity.

Because "someone" has made the remark that some elementary particle (the photon) not only has a constant velocity, but cannot even exist if it has not this velocity. Which is totally mind-blowing.

* the Light-Year.

As to the Time Flow, my idea is that it does not work that way.

The objects "flow" in Time (& in Space). When you sit on your chair doing nothing, you still get older. In my view, it means that some kind of "motion" is taking place without you being able to see it. No external "time" is "flowing" over you.

Edited January 31, 2019 by michel123456

[dimreepr]

14 hours ago, swansont said:

If you really think this is unique to time, how about defining length, without ?ny circular references. Perhaps it’s what a ruler measures?

And if your concern is about physics having a mathematical construct that doesn’t physically exist, I fear you haven’t been exposed to much physics.

5

so time is a measure of geometry?

[michel123456]

no comment

 

Edited January 31, 2019 by michel123456

[Raider5678]

14 hours ago, argo said:

Time is described in physics as “what clocks read”; if you asked a scientist to describe what water is in physics and the answer was “what boats float in” you would think s/he was joking, asking the reader to distinguish what a clock reads is actually appealing to his/her everyday use of the word and puts it in that context when as a description in physics it should unmistakably be in a physical or mechanical context.

Water is a physical object that can be touched, manipulated, created, destroyed, etc.

 

Time, is an abstract concept of measurement. We cannot create it, touch it, manipulate it, create it, or destroy it. It's something we perceive, not something that exists.

Take an inch for example. It's definition is "a unit of linear measure equal to one twelfth of a foot."

And a foot is "a unit of linear measure equal to 12 inches."

 

Both of them define each other. They're not in a physical or mechanical context. Yet we know what they are. It's the same thing. 

An inch can be measured by the amount of time it takes a laser to reflect off of a mirror and return to the emitter. An inch will be measured because we know the speed of light, and we know how long it should take for the laser to travel that far and come back. So, once the laser returns in that amount of time, you know you have an inch. A foot can be measured by 12 times that long. I'm assuming you'd agree that this is an "unmistakable" definition in a "physical or mechanical context."

 

A second can be measured by 9,192,631,770 oscillations of the radiation corresponding to the transition between two levels of the caesium atom. As a result, we have a physical definition of a second.

It's a measurement.

 

[dimreepr]

25 minutes ago, Raider5678 said:

Time, is an abstract concept of measurement. We cannot create it, touch it, manipulate it, create it, or destroy it. It's something we perceive, not something that exists.

of course, it exists (is real).

Edited January 31, 2019 by dimreepr

[swansont]

1 hour ago, dimreepr said:

so time is a measure of geometry?

Not sure how that comes out of what I said.

1 hour ago, Raider5678 said:

Water is a physical object that can be touched, manipulated, created, destroyed, etc.

 

Time, is an abstract concept of measurement. We cannot create it, touch it, manipulate it, create it, or destroy it. It's something we perceive, not something that exists.

 

‘Not something that physically exists. It exists, as you have mentioned, as an abstraction. One must make such distinctions when discussing what exists, and/or what is real. There are two ways for that to happen.

[Raider5678]

17 minutes ago, swansont said:

‘Not something that physically exists. It exists, as you have mentioned, as an abstraction. One must make such distinctions when discussing what exists, and/or what is real. There are two ways for that to happen.

My bad, it was a mistake. I understand that it exists, but I meant in a physical context, as you mentioned.

[argo]

If the issues of fake definitions, the circular nature of the time-flow argument, the focus of the thought experiment or the expansion and energy requirements of the universe are not going to be observed, then nothing else I say is ever going to convince you otherwise.

[Mordred]

Well its clear nothing in the OP has been overly convincing...so I guess that's that with the last response.

Cheers 

Edited February 1, 2019 by Mordred

[argo]

i think the trick being played now is to not recognize the current scientific definition is false, to debate what this vague and confusing means just ads still more confusion when the truth is any other time the operational definition that describes "time that flows and can be measured" is quietly accepted.

Quote

I may be wrong and it is quite easy to prove, just provide any hard evidence you have for time-flow, even a believable story or some other alternative would be preferable to the same old lies and deceptions being restated, redesigned and rehashed.

 

[Mordred]

I'm positive many of the pop media convenient descriptive's  commonly used are often misleading. The descriptive time flows being one of them admittedly as it tends to lead people to place some substance or force like property to time instead of a term to represent rate of change. Other examples being the descriptive spacetime fabric. Time reversibility being another, the problem is that people do not wish to know this descriptive is a mathematical vector under a geometry basis. If they simply state the formulas who would pay attention that doesn't like the mathematics lol.

The time reversibility is a symmetry descriptive to verbally describe vector direction under a change in sign + or minus. where time is treated as a geometric dimension. This also entails time can flow under math treatments. However once again its a descriptive...

 

 

Edited February 1, 2019 by Mordred

[argo]

Trick, imply pop media has something to do with this published scientific definition. Misdirection, you are not responding to the issues. This is exhausting.

[Mordred]

24 minutes ago, argo said:

i think the trick being played now is to not recognize the current scientific definition is false, to debate what this vague and confusing means just ads still more confusion when the truth is any other time the operational definition that describes "time that flows and can be measured" is quietly accepted.

 

Time flowing is a descriptive it is not part of the definition of time. Though there are numerous different definitions some arguably more accurate than others. Wik's isn't bad

Time is the indefinite continued progress of existence and events that occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future.[1][2][3] Time is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to compare the duration of events or the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change of quantities in material reality or in the conscious experience.[4][5][6][7] Time is often referred to as a fourth dimension, along with three spatial dimensions.[8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time

Try not to confuse descriptives with definitions

4 minutes ago, argo said:

Trick, imply pop media has something to do with this published scientific definition. Misdirection, you are not responding to the issues. This is exhausting.

cross posted, your looking at a descriptive not a definition of time. In simple terms the statement time flows is a descriptive of behavior. A descriptive of behavior of time does not define time.

Edited February 1, 2019 by Mordred

[argo]

Still nothing to do with the issues at hand, bored now.

[Mordred]

So am I perhaps a better argument than last post with a more precise direction ? After all well thought out debates can be enjoyable...

Edited February 1, 2019 by Mordred