What Is Time? The Greatest Unknown of Mankind
Sciences, Academias, Philosophies, and Ideologies Do Not Know What Time Is
(PD) Solar Corona (animated GIF)
Self-Observe Self-Time
Time Is Self-Learned
While listening to Constance Demby's Invocation, thoughts arose of life, and of how mankind seems to never progress. Choosing to fixate on one topic to self-pose questions, the choice was to spend a few minutes with one of the absolute most important cores of life itself, one that mankind still has no answer for: time.
Time Is Self-Learned
'Time' is a thing that ought to have been self-taught before the self-learning of 'triplicity'. 'Time' is one of the many core ingredients of life, and the whole of the universe is structured upon 'time', but yet no science, philosophy, ideology, nor academia knows what time is.
Within the common scientific and philosophical theories, time is believed to be 'metaphysics', 'illusion', 'consciousness', and a wide variety of other guesses. All of the guesses are mere imaginations of a thing that none of the imaginers have firsthand observed. Analogously, it is like a single individual alone on a planet, who remained unconscious from conception to adulthood. The individual never met the mother nor anyone else. The individual can only imagine how it was possible for him to have come into existence. Similarly, scientists, philosophers, and academicians did not self-observe their learning of 'time', and, so, now as adults, they invent irrational imaginations of what 'time' implies.
Almost all known authors throughout history have done similarly, including all ancient Chinese philosophical texts like the Dao De Jing. Alan Watts' translation and interpretation of Tao Mutually Arising: "Before and after are in mutual sequence". Watts' translation, as well as Dao De Jing, are obviously incomplete, and thus incorrect. The 清靜經 Qing Jing Jing - Quiet Calm Weave book's ideas are also based upon the nature of 'a singular adult attempting to reason a childhood they never had'.
The knowing of what time is, is extraordinarily rare.
Duration Equals Time
An interesting discovery is of Henri Bergson's book The Creative Mind (©1946) as translated by Mabelle L. Andison. The key word that catches the eye within Bergson's book is "duration". The word 'duration' is often used within this website, but never is an explanation given to the name. The purposeful exclusion of the explanation has several reasons, and the reasons themselves are also not given an explanation.
A quick glance at Bergson's book gives the reader an idea of what Bergson had in mind:
I was indeed very much struck to see how real time, which plays the leading part in any philosophy of evolution, eludes mathematical treatment. Its essence being to flow, not one of its parts is still there when another part comes along. Superposition of one part on another with measurement in view is therefore impossible, unimaginable, inconceivable. There is no doubt but that an element of convention enters into any measurement, and it is seldom that two magnitudes, considered equal, are directly superposable one upon the other. Even then, this superposition must be possible for one of their aspects or effects which preserves something of them : this effect, this aspect then, is what we measure. But in the case of time, the idea of superposition would imply absurdity, for any effect of duration which will be superposable upon itself and consequently measurable, will have as its essence non-duration. Ever since my university days I had been aware that duration is measured by the trajectory of a body in motion and that mathematical time is a line; but I had not yet observed that this operation contrasts radically with all other processes of measurement, for it is not carried out on an aspect or an effect representative of what one wishes to measure, but on something which excludes it. The line one measures is immobile, time is mobility. The line is made, it is complete; time is what is happening, and more than that, it is what causes everything to happen. The measuring of time never deals with duration as duration; what is counted is only a certain number of extremities of intervals, or moments, in short, virtual halts in time. To state that an incident will occur at the end of a certain time t, is simply to say that one will have counted, from now until then, a number t of simultaneities of a certain kind. In between these simultaneities anything you like may happen. Time could be enormously and even infinitely accelerated; nothing would be changed for the mathematician, for the physicist or for the astronomer. And yet the difference with regard to consciousness would be profound (I am speaking naturally of a consciousness which would not be integrated with intra-cerebral movement) ; the wait from one day to another, from one hour to the next would no longer cause it the same fatigue. Science cannot concern itself with this specific wait (or interval), and its exterior cause: even when it is dealing with time which is passing or which will pass, it treats it as though it had passed. This is, in fact, quite natural ; the role of science is to foresee. It extracts and retains from the material world that which can be repeated and calculated, and consequently that which is not in a state of flow. Thus it does nothing but lean in the direction of common sense, which is a beginning of science: usually when we speak of time we think of the measurement of duration, and not of duration itself. But this duration which science eliminates, and which is so difficult to conceive and express, is what one feels and lives. Suppose we try to find out what it is? — How would it appear to a consciousness which desired only to see it without measuring it, which would then grasp it without stopping it, which in short, would take itself as object, and which, spectator and actor alike, at once spontaneous and reflective, would bring ever closer together — to the point where they would coincide, — the attention which is fixed, and time which passes?
Bergson's statement of "see it without measuring it, which would then grasp it without stopping it" is the one and only known sensible statement ever made by a sciencian/philosopher/academician speaking of 'time'. For those who know what 'time' is, Bergson's statement is a thrill to see, and to curiously wonder if perhaps he might have actually landed upon a sensible answer to his own question.
I very quickly spotted the inadequacy of the associationist conception of the mind; this conception, then common to most psychologists and philosophers, was the result of an artificial re-grouping of conscious life. What would direct vision give, — immediate vision, with no interposed prejudices? A long series of reflections and analyses made me brush aside one prejudice after another, and abandon many ideas I had accepted without question; finally, I believed I had found pure, unadulterated inner continuity (duration), continuity which was neither unity nor multiplicity, and which did not fit into any of our categories of thought (cadres). That positive science had not been concerned with this duration was, I thought, quite natural: its function after all is to compose a world for us in which we can, for the convenience of action, ignore the effects of time. But how had Spencer’s philosophy, a doctrine of evolution constructed to follow reality in its mobility, its prepress, its inner maturing, been able to close its eyes to what is change itself?
Bergson's statements continue to tease the reader into desiring to learn what Bergson's final conclusions may have been. Nevertheless, since the book is about 93,600 words long, and since Bergson's statements were being voiced from the 'solitude adult on a planet' perspective, then an accurate answer is surely not arriving, nor is the effort of reading the entirety of the book expected to answer the immediate questions.
Jumping over to Bergson's "Time and Free Will - An Essay on the Immediate Data of Consciousness" (1913, translated by F. L. Pogson), we find more of Bergson's thoughts on time. Pogson begins the Preface with the quote of:
"The idea of a homogeneous and measurable time is shown to be an artificial concept, formed by the intrusion of the idea of space into the realm of pure duration. Indeed, the whole of Professor Bergson's philosophy centres round his conception of real concrete duration and the specific feeling of duration which our consciousness has when it does away with convention and habit and gets back to its natural attitude. At the root of most errors in philosophy he finds a confusion between this concrete duration and the abstract time which mathematics, physics, and even language and common sense, substitute for it. Applying these results to the problem of free will, he shows that the difficulties arise from taking up one's stand after the act has been performed, and applying the conceptual method to it. From the point of view of the living, developing self these difficulties are shown to be illusory, and freedom, though not definable in abstract or conceptual terms, is declared to be one of the clearest facts established by observation.
It is no doubt misleading to attempt to sum up a system of philosophy in a sentence, but perhaps some part of the spirit of Professor Bergson's philosophy may be gathered from the motto which, with his permission, I have prefixed to this translation:—"If a man were to inquire of Nature the reason of her creative activity, and if she were willing to give ear and answer, she would say—'Ask me not, but understand in silence, even as I am silent and am not wont to speak.'"
Again interest is piqued: might Bergson have at least recognized that 'time' is a mental invention, and if so, then might Bergson have also recognized how 'mental time' is processed? As any observer looking in from the outside, never will the observer be able to observe what is on the inside looking out, and, thus, if Bergson himself did not previously know from firsthand experience what 'time' is, then his adult reasoning might hold a lot of weight, but still it can never observe the how and why 'time' originally nascented. Without the firsthand knowing, and without the firsthand experiencing of the how and why, no quantity of imaginations can ever explain what is unknown.
But if time, as immediate consciousness perceives it, were, like space, a homogeneous medium, science would be able to deal with it, as it can with space. Now we have tried to prove that duration, as duration, and motion, as motion, elude the grasp of mathematics: of time everything slips through its fingers but simultaneity, and of movement everything but immobility. This is what the Kantians and even their opponents do not seem to have perceived: in this so-called phenomenal world, which, we are told, is a world cut out for scientific knowledge, all the relations which cannot be translated into simultaneity, i.e. into space, are scientifically unknowable.
Excellent! : "...elude the grasp of mathematics". Yes, man's mathematics is flat, two-dimensional, surface-only, and does not relate to Nature, nor to the laws of Nature, and especially does not relate to 'time'.
"In the second place, in a duration assumed to be homogeneous, the same states could occur over again, causality would imply necessary determination, and all freedom would become incomprehensible. Such, indeed, is the result to which the Critique of Pure Reason leads. But instead of concluding from this that real duration is heterogeneous, which, by clearing up the second difficulty, would have called his attention to the first, Kant preferred to put freedom outside time and to raise an impassable barrier between the world of phenomena, which he hands over root and branch to our understanding, and the world of things in themselves, which he forbids us to enter."
Heterogeneous yes. All things everywhere in the universe are composed of ingredients, and more-so are all organic beings composed of varying ingredients. Any ideology, whether it be science or philosophy, that believes in sameness of origins, is very ignorant of the utmost basic nature of Nature.
"But perhaps this distinction is too sharply drawn and perhaps the barrier is easier to cross than he supposed. For if perchance the moments of real duration, perceived by an attentive consciousness, permeated one another instead of lying side by side, and if these moments formed in relation to one another a heterogeneity within which the idea of necessary determination lost every shred of meaning, then the self grasped by consciousness would be a free cause, we should have absolute knowledge of ourselves, and, on the other hand, just because this absolute constantly commingles with phenomena and, while filling itself with them, permeates them, these phenomena themselves would not be as amenable as is claimed to mathematical reasoning."
Very good! But here arises another question that cannot be answered: at which stage does a developing human attain consciousness? Most all scientists, philosophers, and academicians claim that they did not attain consciousness until about the age of eighteen months old. Some have made different claims as early as around six months old. All scientific and academic claims of consciousness invalidate all other claims made by the scientists and academicians. If an individual did not self-observe himself attaining 'time', then never will the individual be capable of comprehending even the absolute most simplest of things within Nature, nor within himself.
Sciencians and academicians admit that they do not know what consciousness is, nor what emotions, dreams, thoughts, beauty, memories, and all other things are that are related to the mind. Without first knowing what consciousness is, all scientific and academic theories are imaginary and utterly false.
"...This intuition of a homogeneous medium, an intuition peculiar to man, enables us to externalize our concepts in relation to one another, reveals to us the objectivity of things, and thus, in two ways, on the one hand by getting everything ready for language, and on the other by showing us an external world, quite distinct from ourselves, in the perception of which all minds have a common share, foreshadows and prepares the way for social life.
Observe, that though Bergson's ideas are far superior to the norm, still he missed the obviousness of the core. Bergson was a smart fellow, but still his mind could not sum a theory that was not founded upon fantasies of imagination.
"Over against this homogeneous space we have put the self as perceived by an attentive consciousness, a living self, whose states, at once undistinguished and unstable, cannot be separated without changing their nature, and cannot receive a fixed form or be expressed in words without becoming public property. How could this self, which distinguishes external objects so sharply and represents them so easily by means of symbols, withstand the temptation to introduce the same distinctions into its own life and to replace the interpenetration of its psychic states, their wholly qualitative multiplicity, by a numerical plurality of terms which are distinguished from one another, set side by side, and expressed by means of words?"
And there Bergson illustrated the chasm: expressions of words, are not the expressions of the "I-self", and if the "I-self" expressions are silent while words become the sole expressions, then the man cannot know what 'time' is, nor know his own ingredients.
"In place of a heterogeneous duration whose moments permeate one another, we thus get a homogeneous time whose moments are strung on a spatial line."
Sorry, but no. Nothing in Nature is flat, nor linear. Bergson's ideas seem to approach so closely to what is real, but then his ideas fall back to the idea of a flat mind forming flat time.
"...We should see that if these past states cannot be adequately expressed in words or artificially reconstructed by a juxtaposition of simpler states, it is because in their dynamic unity and wholly qualitative multiplicity they are phases of our real and concrete duration, a heterogeneous duration and a living one. We should see that, if our action was pronounced by us to be free, it is because the relation of this action to the state from which it issued could not be expressed by a law, this psychic state being unique of its kind and unable ever to occur again."
The ideas are good, and the ideals seem to repeatedly approach close to 'time', but, unfortunately, without the firsthand knowledge of 'time', no quantity of reasoning can imagine that which must be firsthand experienced.
"...But we should also understand the illusion which makes the one party think that they are compelled to deny freedom, and the others that they must define it.
But it is neither. One has fate, one has choice... the third, is never spoken of within man's imaginations. All things in Nature are composed of three or more ingredients... 'time' is composed of many, most of which are unknowns to science, philosophy, academia, and ideologies.
"It is because the transition is made by imperceptible steps from concrete duration, whose elements permeate one another, to symbolical duration, whose moments are set side by side, and consequently from free activity to conscious automatism."
Not imperceptible, not 'steps', and not 'set side by side'. To not know the process, nullifies all beliefs. None of man's beliefs, include a knowledge of the process.
"...It is because, finally, even in the cases where the action is freely performed, we cannot reason about it without setting out its conditions externally to one another, therefore in space and no longer in pure duration.
Incorrect. It is only the flat mind that behaves with conditions and external.
"The problem of freedom has thus sprung from a misunderstanding: it has been to the moderns what the paradoxes of the Eleatics were to the ancients, and, like these paradoxes, it has its origin in the illusion through which we confuse succession and simultaneity, duration and extensity, quality and quantity.
Agreed. It is an illusion, a self-induced hallucination to believe that 'time' and freedom of choice have substance, while also contradicting the knowledge that substance does not exist.
Sciencians loudly declare PHYSICS! PHYSICS!, and yet absolutely zero of the sciencians are mentally able to apply their own physics to their own beliefs. The worlds of science, philosophy, and academia, exist within continuous contradictions.
The 'Enlightened' Were Not Enlightened
And here we look back at the countless books that speak of enlightenment, none of which described their 'enlightenment' within a manner that suggested an awareness of the "I", nor of 'time', nor of duration, nor of the natural flow of Nature.
Books like Dao De Jing and Qing Jing Jing speak of attaining centeredness, claiming 'The Great Dao', but the books' descriptions are of self-hypnosis, and do not so much as hint of self-awareness. Nature's Way is the only Great Dao... there can be none other, and, Nature's Way, created 'time'.
Some religions speak of their 'masters' having been conscious at conception, but, if it were true, then the 'masters' would have been able to describe conception. None ever did. None ever described 'time', nor so much as hinted of the nature of 'time'. None of the masters ever spoke of their 'conscious incarnation' from a firsthand point of view; the descriptions are all from third-person points of view, of which, obviously, illustrate that the 'masters'' claims were invented imaginations. None of the 'masters' could count to 'triplicity', which also permanently invalidates the 'masters'' claims.
Again, Alan Watts' translation and interpretation of 'Tao Mutually Arising': "Before and after are in mutual sequence". There is no 'before', nor is there an 'after'; all is 'now'. The 'before and after' are mental constructs (imaginary inventions), and are not real relative to Nature. The 'now' that exists, exists within the perpetual flow of waves, cycles, and harmonics that occur 'now'. The invention of 'before and after' is self-created. Ideologies like Buddhism speak of their masters 'being in the now', but, if the claims were true, then the masters could describe what time and duration are. It has never been done. The claims are false.
Sciencians, philosophians, academicians, ideologians, all of them, none excluded, all of their words permanently prove that the individuals know nothing of the very topics that they claim to be masters of.
Beliefs of Time Illustrate Intelligence
By how an individual approaches the topic of time, so will the method exhibit his own mind and knowledge. As Bergson so very well recorded, all philosophies and all sciences are populated by individuals who do not know what 'time' is, of which, within the unknowing, permanently proves that all of the individuals' other beliefs are similarly imaginary and false.
Like the solitude adult on a planet, of whom can never reason his origins, so is an individual who did not self-observe and self-learn 'time' as a fetus; the individual can never observe nor learn as an adult.
William James Sidis and Albert Einstein are mythically believed to have been the smartest men on earth, and yet neither men knew what time is; not forward time nor reverse time. Bergson was far smarter than Sidis and Einstein.
If biologists knew what 'time' is, or could even correlate what their own 'physics' claims, then there would not exist the gross stupidities of 'chance mutation', 'survival of the fittest', nor any form of Darwinian evolution. The existence of Darwinian evolution within science and academia, proves that all of the believers have very, very low intelligence.
Sum
Without the ability to accurately and intricately describe what 'time' is, all scientific theories are false, all philosophies are false, everything taught in academia is false, over 99% of biology is false, all mysticism is false, all ideologies are false, and all other organized systems of belief are false.
The cycles of light and dark, warmth and coolness, repeat... the infant self-learns of days. The cycles of distinct sounds every seven days, repeat... the infant self-learns of weeks. The cycles of weeks, of distinct aromas, repeat... the infant self-learns of months. The cycles of hot, cooler air upon hot soil, cold air upon cool soil, warmer air upon cold soil, hot air upon warm soil, repeat... the infant self-learns of seasons. The cycles of hot, cool, cold, warm, hot, repeat... the infant self-learns of years. The cycles always repeat... the infant self-learns that Creation exists within cycles. Upon birth, the newborn infant sees the flow of flux within walls... feels the flow of flux within adults... smells the flow of flux... hears the flow of flux... tastes the flow of flux... the infant self-learns that Creation is wave-based, and not a solid substance. Walking around the block of houses, the toddler perceives that space and forms do not remain stable relative to speeds and durations... the toddler self-learns what adults name 'space-time dilation'. But one of the very first things self-observed and self-learned prior to birth, was duration... Creation exists within durations... the infant self-learns that cycles exist within durations... the infant self-learns that self-duration, does not exist outside of one's self... the infant self-learns that the "I" is motionless, the "I" is always 'now', and that Creation is always 'now', but it is the mind that creates the analyses that enable reasoned sequences of events. The infant, at two months old, knows more of Nature than all of man's sciences and philosophies combined.
When grown, without the aid of a clock, the child is able to wake at the chosen precise minute, able to know the time of day to within one to two minutes, and able to accurately estimate time requirements to accomplish a task. 'Time' is one's own.
'Time' is a core ingredient of life itself, but before 'time' existed, the "I" existed... without the "I", there is no sense of 'time'... without a sense of 'time', there is no "I".
Related articles are in the Intelligence section.