I often think of things like "living in the now", but it's been bothering me for a while. What is now?

I mean, now is a local reference frame in my head, but really seems to consist of a few seconds. Certainly it has to lag the "real" now (the present of the clock) by a few milliseconds at least or whatever for my brain to process what it deems to be happening right now.

So does the now I speak of always have to be specified by the context in which I use it? Do I have to say "the now in my head" (which is more time than the "no time" of the clock (seemingly a few seconds of stimulous and thought all sliding along right behind the "no time" of the clock), or "the now of the clock"?

When then, is now? It's always right now, but right now is always changing... but now by the clock isn't enough time for anything to change. Right now by the clock isn't any time at all. So there is no "right now", even though that's all there is?

Hmmm.

Yes, your Now will always lag a few milliseconds from the moment you began to think about Now to the moment that you became aware of it, but why is this important?

Living in the now is a more general thing, like living in the moment, seizing the opportunity as soon as you see it, experiencing each day for what it is and being aware that each day is full of moments that you probably miss, but c'est la vie, the brain refreshes itself the same way we blink, so there are many moments that we must simply miss, even if they are just nano seconds of time, the point is to experience those moments that you do notice. But don't worry about the milliseconds... what are you, a bean counter? :D

i think it is more THINKING bout 'now' is te lagging behind. for if you say 'it is now' ten by the time you have closured the sentence 'now' ha moved on/
so the 'problem' is thought as in language and thought, where its syntax uses a noun to desscribe a verb.....only withthought/thinking is tere a 'now'....an abstracted 'moment' from dynamic process

LOL. Sort of I guess. The deal being that it's easy to mix up the two when speaking of "now". Which exists?

The future and past are both abstracts, but in the sense of "the now" as in "the present of the clock", we live in the past (at least a smidge). Thus that now is ALSO an abstract, and the "now" in which we live isn't really "now" by the clock but a "relative now" that is completely dependent upon the speed at which your brain processes stuff. Abstractions lag "the real present" and thus can only really be spoken of as things past? Goddamn beans.

i think it is more THINKING bout 'now' is te lagging behind. for if you say 'it is now' ten by the time you have closured the sentence 'now' ha moved on/
so the 'problem' is thought as in language and thought, where its syntax uses a noun to desscribe a verb.....only withthought/thinking is tere a 'now'....an abstracted 'moment' from dynamic process

perhaps, but it also takes time for the signal to get from your retinal never or whatever into the visual cortex, and then processed into something informative to you about the state of your environment.

perhaps, but it also takes time for the signal to get from your retinal never or whatever into the visual cortex, and then processed into something informative to you about the state of your environment.
at note forum sometime back.......a rational-mystic science character was going on about te slight lag between thinking to do someting and then the action.....which what you said reminds me of........somewhere i found a challenge to tis idea and made noes, but cant remember. so i will have to improvize

as i am seeing it, we are just 'conscious'...ie, askin questions like ths etc, doing what we do consciously. we also have an 'unconscious'...in this meanin meaning that we are subliminally aware which our conscious mind may not seem aware of.....if thismakes sense.....so what i am suggesting is the unconscious mind is far quicker than te conscious mind seems to be. tis would explain tat when the 'conscioous' mind is........expanded eithe psychedelically or natrual exceptional exprinces or holiday, and having sex, fun, then time is much more differnt......so whatever 'time' is or the 'now' is it is extraordinarily flexible, and is synchronized with consciousness--ie., consciousnes which includes 'conscious' and 'the unconscious'

at note forum sometime back.......a rational-mystic science character was going on about te slight lag between thinking to do someting and then the action.....which what you said reminds me of........somewhere i found a challenge to tis idea and made noes, but cant remember. so i will have to improvize

as i am seeing it, we are just 'conscious'...ie, askin questions like ths etc, doing what we do consciously. we also have an 'unconscious'...in this meanin meaning that we are subliminally aware which our conscious mind may not seem aware of.....if thismakes sense.....so what i am suggesting is the unconscious mind is far quicker than te conscious mind seems to be. tis would explain tat when the 'conscioous' mind is........expanded eithe psychedelically or natrual exceptional exprinces or holiday, and having sex, fun, then time is much more differnt......so whatever 'time' is or the 'now' is it is extraordinarily flexible, and is synchronized with consciousness--ie., consciousnes which includes 'conscious' and 'the unconscious'
the unconscious mind is quicker than the conscious mind, but thats only because the conscious mind relies on the unconscious mind to exist. when you react to something without thinking, that is your unconscious mind acting. your conscious mind just tries to justify and explain what your unconscious mind does. both are lagged by the speed at which signals move through the body.

The "now" is really the infinitely small (in a very litteral sense) time period.

I've wondered about the same sort of thing :D

http://sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=36399

The "now" is really the infinitely small (in a very litteral sense) time period.

Yep... something like a trillionth of a trillionth of a second (enough time for quantum gravity to settle into a single state from a jumble or proabilities... theoretically of course :))

Now is forever.

The question you pose cannot be answered here. I believe that the issue of time, and what is "now", and what is past-present-future, may be the most difficult concept there is. The best we can do is talk around it.

Be here now.


Buddhism developed a whole philosophy about this. It would take a lot (a lot) to explain.

But you can meditate on "be here now", pure presence. This means not depending on the past or future, so that you would have a sense of being.
As soon as you ask "Why? How?", you're not (in the) present anymore, but are dealing with assumptions and preconceptions that you have gathered in your life.

the unconscious mind is quicker than the conscious mind,

me:agreed

but thats only because the conscious mind relies on the unconscious mind to exist.

me:but that way of putting it kinda divides up 'consciousness' which is INCLUDING consciousness and the unconscious. get me?

when you react to something without thinking, that is your unconscious mind acting. your conscious mind just tries to justify and explain what your unconscious mind does. both are lagged by the speed at which signals move through the body.
i am not sure i agree that both are lagged behind. not sure what you mean. i am more seeing itas a sychronicity between 'outer reality' and the unconscious.........spontaneity. evn now consciously thinking. every thought is happening now isn't it?

i think this only really became a problem when clocks were introduced. Our sense of time has become externalized (i.e. we see it as a steady force ticking away inexorably no matter what we do or think). But older cultures measured time by events (the "time of the great flood", the "reign of Tiberius", some older folk still refer to "the time of the great depression", etc.).

The alternative is to think of "now" is your sitz im leben (place in life), to use a term of historicists. One way of finding this "now" is to think of yourself as an octopus (bear with me), and slowly retract all your "tentacles" (wherever they might be) one by one, until you are adrift in clock-time, sitting on the second-indicator of the clock so to speak. Instead of time being your master, you are now the master of your time.

Then again, one might say that the idea of knowledge and truth in and of themselves are practical, but quite flawed. For instance, the now is all there is, yet in the now, knowledge and truth are not as one might generally think them. There is no impression of the now in the now because it doesn't fit. If there is no time in for which you to have knowledge, how can you? How can there be truth when the truth is unknowable with no time for it to be known in? The moment is fleeting... an infinitessimal slice of time between the past and present. What exactly exists in that lil slice? What can be known in it? What can be truth in it?

Wesmorris:

This is invalidated by the fact that people do speak of "living in the now", such as Deeprak Chopra, and find it very rearding. Krishnamurti spoke about something like that, too.

Is that an appeal to authority? Why is it invalidated because they talk about it? Perhaps they are not thinking of it the way I am? I think I'm trying to figure out what the "now" really is, where it exists... which aspect of it we're speaking of when we say that's where we live.

Moreover, in what way does the "now" invalidate time?

I was thinking of it in terms of "what do I know right now"? Well, I can't know anything right now because there isn't enough now to know it in. By the time I verbalize what I think I know it isn't now anymore, for instance - at least it's not the now that it was when I "knew" it. What about the time it takes to think it? Do you know what you knew at the beginning of your thought as compared to end?

Is "knowledge" the slope of a "line" tangent (in or just behind "the real present") to the collision of short and long term memory? Sort of a collision between present and past experience? Meh. I dunno. I'm just freewheeling.

And how is truth "unknowable"? Why can not knowledge be comprehended in an indefinite amount of infinitely small moments?

I'm thinking about definitive knowledge I guess. I dunno I'm just wading through this kind of aimlessly today. I'm distracted by life stuff and haven't figured out if I have a point in here or not. There's something in here, but it might just be philosophical funk.

If it exists in the mind, is not it, by definition, known?

There are plenty of things in my mind I don't "KNOW".

Logic.

What about it?

when you think isn't it happening now? the actual thinking, not you trying to quickly find the 'now' thought......so isthinking time? is thinking time? and is the cessation of the thinker separated frm thought the 'end of time'?......when you daydream, are you aware of 'now'....wheres it gone then?

I often think of things like "living in the now", but it's been bothering me for a while. What is now?

I mean, now is a local reference frame in my head, but really seems to consist of a few seconds. Certainly it has to lag the "real" now (the present of the clock) by a few milliseconds at least or whatever for my brain to process what it deems to be happening right now.

So does the now I speak of always have to be specified by the context in which I use it? Do I have to say "the now in my head" (which is more time than the "no time" of the clock (seemingly a few seconds of stimulous and thought all sliding along right behind the "no time" of the clock), or "the now of the clock"?

When then, is now? It's always right now, but right now is always changing... but now by the clock isn't enough time for anything to change. Right now by the clock isn't any time at all. So there is no "right now", even though that's all there is?

Hmmm.For whom is "now" more important? For you or the clock?

Really everything exists now, but time is changing.

I think you could say that you exist in your whole life. Doesn't that equal you and your life? So "now" you could change your life.

Life for me is change in the whole, your whole life is changing. It's a mystery.

Then again, we only have focus in 2% of the vision, the rest is a blurr. But we see it as if it wasn't, cause it isn't so important than what we focus on.

i am not sure i agree that both are lagged behind. not sure what you mean. i am more seeing itas a sychronicity between 'outer reality' and the unconscious.........spontaneity. evn now consciously thinking. every thought is happening now isn't it?
the signals that travel through neurons have a limited speed. it is pretty fast, but its still limited. so your mind, subconscious and conscious, are not actually recieving information at the exact same time it is happening. you are not actually thinking in the 'now' but rather a little bit behind the 'now'.

i think this only really became a problem when clocks were introduced. Our sense of time has become externalized (i.e. we see it as a steady force ticking away inexorably no matter what we do or think). But older cultures measured time by events (the "time of the great flood", the "reign of Tiberius", some older folk still refer to "the time of the great depression", etc.).
people have used the sun as an external measurement of time for thousands of years. i don't see how its really that different than a clock.

Crunchy Cat:

Yep... something like a trillionth of a trillionth of a second (enough time for quantum gravity to settle into a single state from a jumble or proabilities... theoretically of course )

Not infinitely small. If you measure it, it is, by definition, not infinite.

Wesmorris:

Is that an appeal to authority? Why is it invalidated because they talk about it? Perhaps they are not thinking of it the way I am? I think I'm trying to figure out what the "now" really is, where it exists... which aspect of it we're speaking of when we say that's where we live.

No. This was not an argument from authority, but simply pointing out that if someone can live "in the now" - as they claim to be able to do - then part of your argument, at the very least, is invalidated.

And I can't believe I made the typo of "rearding" instead of "rewarding". But anyway...back to the reply.

Since the rest of my post - which you responded to and I am about to respond to your replies - deals with the rest of this reply, we'll deal with it.

I was thinking of it in terms of "what do I know right now"? Well, I can't know anything right now because there isn't enough now to know it in. By the time I verbalize what I think I know it isn't now anymore, for instance - at least it's not the now that it was when I "knew" it. What about the time it takes to think it? Do you know what you knew at the beginning of your thought as compared to end?

This is true. The "now", being so fleeting, cannot contain a whole thought within it. A thought, like all other things, must occupy a massive amount of these "infinitely small nows", in order to conceive of a thought. But certainly one does not know what one knew at the beginning of the thought as compared to the end, as the end of the thought is when the knowledge-process has been completed. It is akin to when one has finished an equation.

Is "knowledge" the slope of a "line" tangent (in or just behind "the real present") to the collision of short and long term memory? Sort of a collision between present and past experience? Meh. I dunno. I'm just freewheeling.

Well, for all intents and purposes, the true classification of the now - as an infinitely small duration of time - is not really useful. The "now" on a far more relative level, would refer to the instant - really about 10 milleseconds or so - that something is perceived. But really, most knowledge is not simply contained in one thought, but the connection of many thoughts, that come to to a single realization, so ti includes the past to even a greater extent.

I'm thinking about definitive knowledge I guess. I dunno I'm just wading through this kind of aimlessly today. I'm distracted by life stuff and haven't figured out if I have a point in here or not. There's something in here, but it might just be philosophical funk.

Well, let me ask you this: It takes more than one second to learn a language, yes? Does not one still know the language even if it can take years to learn it?

There are plenty of things in my mind I don't "KNOW".

In what sense?

“ Logic. ”

What about it?

Logic allows us to grasp, definitively, truth.

And tell me this: Is my reply post popping up for you? Because I am looking through this archive, and can't find mine anymore. I think the website burped again, what about you?

And tell me this: Is my reply post popping up for you? Because I am looking through this archive, and can't find mine anymore. I think the website burped again, what about you?

Actually James, I cross posted this because it seemed relevant in both threads. Actually it seems more relevant here than in onefinity's thread. I was in that thread thinking it was this conversation and responded as such. Kind of dumb of me. *shrug* It happens. I'll reply more later regarding the meat of the bizness above.

Crunchy Cat:
Not infinitely small. If you measure it, it is, by definition, not infinite.


I agree.

I was talking with some sixth graders about this two days ago. I said, "you cannot prove that the future exists, or the past." They of course argued with this.

One student said, "Now. Now. Now...See, I am showing the future as it arrives." I replied that he was only stating the now, not showing that the future exists.

One student said that we can prove that "past" exists by videotaping something and watching it later. I replied that this only shows that we are looking at something encoded on tape (or disk, as the case may be). It does not in and of itself show that there is a thing called "the past."

Of course, it could also be said that the present cannot be shown, either, since uttering "now" immediately goes away except for an echo in our mind of the idea/sound "now," which itself pretty immediately goes away.

I think that a viable hypothesis is that the only present is change. After all, the root of the word "moment" is "movement." It ties into the notion that I've stated elsewhere, that we are an eternal pattern that yearns to connect, in the course of which it creates form. Forms, in the case of notions of time, are "past" (events, dates, etc.), "present" - the immediate frame of experiences that we act upon, like, I just got home and I'm getting ready for bed, and that being within a reasonable range of experience, I arbitrarily call "now." (Of course, "now" can be stretched out to a billion years, or compressed to an attosecond). Future is also forms, i.e., objects. Objects of imagination, vision, anticipation, prediction, planning.

I suspect that "ontologically," there is only a single moment and all is enfolded within it in the form of pattern. We, being pattern seeking pattern, cause form to manifest and we thus live in the map that requires us to lay out a "timeline," complete with memories and history (past), future (goals, visions, anticipations); those things we can SEE; the present is pattern, and thus we cannot see it, for it is us. The eye can see itself in a mirror, but it cannot see itself seeing.

On a linguistic note: As Indoeuropean, our common ancestor, first evolved, it didn't have tenses as we know them nowadays. They only distinguished between what is already finished, and what is still happening; in grammar, this is called verb mood.

English doens't have an exact equivalent of this structure anymore, but to illustrate the language phenomenon, the closest is the pair of the simple and the continuous form:

I did vs. I am doing
I wrote vs. I am writing
I ate vs. I am eating


The understanding of time used to be strongly integrated into verbs; the "now" was understood in terms of what is currently happening, as expressd by the verb.
Yet nowadays, as the language progressed, we have an understanding of time that seems to be very analytical, disattached from our activity-based experience of time.

This certainly explains why the "now" seems so abstract and elusive.

Just as a matter of interest and no doubt a target for criticism, I thought I'd post Albert Einsteins view on the Now that lead to his postulates about light [energy]and mass.
<img src=http://www.paygency.com/light%20cones.jpg>
The upper cone is indicative of the future. The lower cone is indicative of the Past. The intersection of the two cones is the present or NOW.

[ if you want to do some research Google "Light cones"]

It demonstrates that a light event always occurs at this intersection and always is zero in duration [ or infinitely small duration - depending on which definition you prefer to use]

This means that if you can see it it must be happening at this moment.
so no matter what you see and when you see it it is always now because that is when the light event occurs.
So regardless of when you look or where you look you will always see the now and nothing else. What makes this somewhat of a paradox is that what you are looking at actualy is infinitely small or zero in duration. So the now is effectively not able to be seen but is seen.

we do see the constantly changing infinitely small duration, in fact that is all we see. this also seems to suggest that the rate of change universally is occuring at the speed of light [ c ]

very interesting QQ....which means we ARE seeing hearing feeling now....!
thing is though, maybe we lag behind due to clumsy thinking which has been indoctrinated by current paradigm......for example, seeing now - usually ordinarily- and seeing now psychdelicized are two really dramtically different things.....The moment, the now, when psychdelicized seems to be organically living and not tick tock-now like many of us are led thru the nose to believe. clock times seems absurd.

Also, i heard a while back on a Nature programme about pigeons some information which really blew me away. you know when we waatch films/movies and we see constantly moving motion when really it is stills moving very swifftly?...well apparently according to this programme, pigeons see OUR movement like stills, and would see the movie in stills....!!
ifso, what would this say for the now of a pigeon in comparison with the now of a human-----a human who is seeing 'ordinarily' i mean?

The 'a-temporal Now' of the Planck 'moment' is beyond the 'temporal'. It is beyond thought, beyond experience, beyond perception, beyond space/time/matter/energy, which all are predicated within/upon temporal parameters. So..

We re-define 'now', we add just a bit of dimensionality, a 'bit' of temporality, (to that which contain neither quality) so that we may discuss this. Unfortunately, by altering 'Reality' to fit into a the tiny paradigm of our discussion, we create our own dillemnas and paradoxes within the subject. The 'paradoxes are not 'real' as we have deliberately distorted 'Reality' for reasons of thoughtful discussion. This is similar to wrapping the Invisible Man in bandages so that he may be 'seen', and then examining the bandages in order to determine the nature if the Invisible Man within. (This is an applicable hypothesis across the scientific board, by the way.)

As 'temporality' is necessary for our 'existence' here, were we truly 'In the Moment', there could be no 'time' for us to exist as individual, material entities. There could BE no discussion as there could be no 'dreaMatrix'; no us, no universe (temporally predicated again..), no-THING!

So we 'stretch' the 'a-temporal', in our conceptualizations, to provide fodder for discussion', for 'room to live'!

The 'In the Moment' that the Sages speak of is not the immediate experience of our lives sans 'thought' which 'binds' one to illusions of the 'past' and 'future', very lost in 'illusion/dreaMatrix', but points to Ultimate Reality/Truth (at least as far as they have 'found') beyond 'illusion', beyond temporality, and hence the illusions of 'life' and 'death'. To be truly in the Now would mean a complete disintegration/dissipation/absorption of the Duality of 'self' into the Timeless nonDual One Self.

So we talk about the conceptual, as opposed to the 'actual', 'now' because there can be no 'us' to talk about that 'NOW' of which temporal words and thoughts are inappropriate and inconsequential, completely nonexistent in the timeless 'Now'!

Note, please, that I did not say the 'Eternal' NOW, as we cannot conceive of an 'eternal/infinite' with a temporally limited mind/brain/thoughts. Understanding, somewhat (metaphorically, allegorically, poetically, etc...) the 'quality' of 'timelessness' would certainly be a monumental (in your 'life') 'mental/experiential' transcendental coup!

I hope that I have made some sense. It is difficult, to say the least, speaking of some'thing' which is not a 'thing' and words are inadequate tools to describe that which has no description...

Thank you for your time...

*__-

very interesting QQ....which means we ARE seeing hearing feeling now....!
thing is though, maybe we lag behind due to clumsy thinking which has been indoctrinated by current paradigm......for example, seeing now - usually ordinarily- and seeing now psychdelicized are two really dramtically different things.....The moment, the now, when psychdelicized seems to be organically living and not tick tock-now like many of us are led thru the nose to believe. clock times seems absurd.

Also, i heard a while back on a Nature programme about pigeons some information which really blew me away. you know when we waatch films/movies and we see constantly moving motion when really it is stills moving very swifftly?...well apparently according to this programme, pigeons see OUR movement like stills, and would see the movie in stills....!!
ifso, what would this say for the now of a pigeon in comparison with the now of a human-----a human who is seeing 'ordinarily' i mean?

Yes, it seems that birds see "faster" than we.
Watch pigeons when they pick crumbs on the ground. If we'd be picking up things so fast, we couldn't really tell what it is we are picking up. But birds either eat a lot of gravel, or they can see far "faster" than we.

Thank you for your time...


An odd thing to say -- as if time *belonged* to a person.

What is it that we give, when we have "spent some time" for someone or with someone?

An odd thing to say -- as if time *belonged* to a person.

What is it that we give, when we have "spent some time" for someone or with someone?
Hello Water, nice to meet you.
Perhaps you neglected to appreciate the 'meat' of my post. Had you, you would have realized that my phrase, "Thank you for your time" was completely 'tongue-in-cheek'! Not 'odd' at all.
Do you think that there is a little 't-i-c' emoticon? Would that have helped? Sorry for the confusion.

What we give, when we 'spend time' with someone, is a gift of love, potentially. We could be 'vampirizing' the other person for our own sick agenda, or some other reason, but to compassionately and lovingly (whatever that means) allow someone else to occupy the limelight of your life for a moment is the greatest gift that a person can give, in my opinion of course. We willingly 'give' a piece of our valuable lives, our oh-so-limited 'time' here, a true gift! Think so?

On second thought, 'time' could well belong to us, in a 'proprietary' way.
"My time is valuable"; "My time is short", 'your time is valuable to you', etc... Perhaps 'time' can be so subjective as to be completely personal? But, this isn't the thread for that discussion...
That is, perhaps, why a gift of YOUR time is the most valuable gift? The greatest commodity in a person's life? When it 'runs out'....

Don't forget yourself, the dream is now,
the past is just memories, data in brain,
can not return, can not turn the time.

All that can be is now, and all that can be you,
there's nothing for what to wait, there's no code to say,
no passcode to heaven, no ticket to hell,
smile!, shake off the sweat, this is a good day to die.

Amen!

wesmorris:

Actually James, I cross posted this because it seemed relevant in both threads. Actually it seems more relevant here than in onefinity's thread. I was in that thread thinking it was this conversation and responded as such. Kind of dumb of me. *shrug* It happens. I'll reply more later regarding the meat of the bizness above.

Yes, I responded somewhat backwardsly. Didn't see that the other thread was all linked with that.

Onefinity:

Whilst one may not be able to give someone the past or future, you postulate that movement is the root of all things, which itself, implies time. Movement can only exist in time.

water:

Very interesting post. Very interesting.

Quantum Quack:

This means that if you can see it it must be happening at this moment.
so no matter what you see and when you see it it is always now because that is when the light event occurs.
So regardless of when you look or where you look you will always see the now and nothing else. What makes this somewhat of a paradox is that what you are looking at actualy is infinitely small or zero in duration. So the now is effectively not able to be seen but is seen.

Doesn't, actually, Einstein's light cones refer more towards the capacity to judge how long ago a conical projection of light was first emitted at one point?

Hi Nameless.


I just wanted to ***expose*** that phrase more.
:)

Certainly your prerogative, water.
No comment on my 'musings'?
The reason for your expose' is?

Quantum Quack:


“ This means that if you can see it it must be happening at this moment.
so no matter what you see and when you see it it is always now because that is when the light event occurs.
So regardless of when you look or where you look you will always see the now and nothing else. What makes this somewhat of a paradox is that what you are looking at actualy is infinitely small or zero in duration. So the now is effectively not able to be seen but is seen. ”



Doesn't, actually, Einstein's light cones refer more towards the capacity to judge how long ago a conical projection of light was first emitted at one point?

So at what moment in time does the light event occur with in the eye?

Quote:
The Light Cone represents the idea that "the direction of the light-flash does not depend on the motion of the source---but just on the event at which the light-flash is emitted." In addition, by the Einstein Principle of Relativity, all observers, regardless of their motions, must (because of Maxwell's Laws) measure the speed of light to be the same constant, in all directions. That is to say, "all observers will universally agree on the Light Cones at each event." This means that each observer drawing a spacetime diagram in which he is at rest must have the worldlines of light-flashes at the same angle of 45 degrees from his worldline (his time axis), and 45 degrees from his plane of simultaneity (his space axes)."
C/o http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/modules/LIGHTCONE/minkowski.html


To me :
This clearly states that each light event will be agreed to by all observers to occur at the same moment.

So when a light ray enters the eye and is reflected the moment of reflection is a light event that every observer will agree occurs at the same moment.
So the Now for all observers is exactly the same NOW. Further I would contend that for Special Relativity to be valid this must be the case.

Certainly your prerogative, water.
No comment on my 'musings'?
The reason for your expose' is?

... sheerly intuitive.


All along as I have follwed this thread, this thought was with me: "Reality is what is now; now is the only reality".
That which was a second *ago*, which is *away* from me now -- that is not real anymore.

I'm not as fine with words as you are ... But I have more or less made my point in my first post in this thread, and to continue -- our assumptions and preconceptions shape our reality/now, and make it into a non-reality/non-now. The dreaMatrix as you called it.

My native language has the category of the verb mood similarly as Indoeuropean, and my thinking about time is conditioned by that; for me, the perception of time is inherently connected with activity.
So when I give someone "my time", I mean that I "give" them whatever I have been doing in that chronologically measurable unit. Now, how much has my activity been shaped by my assumptions and preconceptions -- this is the cruxy issue.


(I am someone else in English.)

I understand what you are saying. For a second language, your English is excellent! A very difficult language indeed!

Richard Feynman once said, "The laws of Nature are not rules controlling the metamorphosis of what is into what will be. They are descriptions of patterns that exist all at once, in the whole tapestry... The four dimensional space-time manifold displays all 'eternity' at once!"

"Blend the immediate past with the anticipation of the soon to be, not some infintesimal point-like instant forever fleeing out of reach, is our 'now'" -Genius; The Life and Times of Richard Feynman

(I am someone else in English.)
I cannot tell how frivolously that this was spoken, but perhaps you don't know how true that statement really is. People display their ignorance and say things like, "Oh, thats JUST semantics!", but 'language' is how we 'define' and thus 'create' our 'reality'! An 'alternative' language 'creates' an alternate 'reality'. But, thats another thread I guess..
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Quantum Quack:

So at what moment in time does the light event occur with in the eye?

[...]

To me :
This clearly states that each light event will be agreed to by all observers to occur at the same moment.

This is certainly true, due to the constant speed of C.

So when a light ray enters the eye and is reflected the moment of reflection is a light event that every observer will agree occurs at the same moment.
So the Now for all observers is exactly the same NOW. Further I would contend that for Special Relativity to be valid this must be the case.

Ah, but what about nows where no light is reflected?

Whilst one may not be able to give someone the past or future, you postulate that movement is the root of all things, which itself, implies time. Movement can only exist in time.


Time is timing. Timing means intervals. Intervals are in something. That something is movement. Humans need timing in order to know movement. Movement is not only the root of all things; it is all things. But don't dwell on this too hard. Just imagining it requires an ability to use intuition, a very deep, sensory imagination, which in you is weak compared to your logical side.

Onefinity, I find your perspective on movement quite interesting. I'd like to see a thread by regarding your "deep list" above, unless you just want to talk about it here. I'm curious at the moment as to how you relate "dimensionality" to movement, as there can be no movement without its possiblity... so perhaps you consider it integrated into the term, as with the term "movement", "the possibility of movement" is implied?

What is moving, and what is it moving in? What are the possibilities of movement?

To me, movement implies many things. I wonder if there's a level of dimensionality though at which the term would become irrelevant. I suppose not at first thought, but I'd like to hear more of your ideas in its regard and ponder it more thoroughly.

We can just talk about that in your new thread if you want, or go here, however you like.

Onefinity, I find your perspective on movement quite interesting. I'd like to see a thread by regarding your "deep list" above, unless you just want to talk about it here. I'm curious at the moment as to how you relate "dimensionality" to movement, as there can be no movement without its possiblity... so perhaps you consider it integrated into the term, as with the term "movement", "the possibility of movement" is implied?

What is moving, and what is it moving in? What are the possibilities of movement?

To me, movement implies many things. I wonder if there's a level of dimensionality though at which the term would become irrelevant. I suppose not at first thought, but I'd like to hear more of your ideas in its regard and ponder it more thoroughly.

We can just talk about that in your new thread if you want, or go here, however you like.


Sure, I can start a new thread. What would I call it? As far as "what's moving?" Only movement is moving, and thus we cannot see it. Everything else - all objects and events - are standing waves.

Metaphor: Is a river moving?

Well, I have a style of my own for thread naming. If I were doing it I'd call it something direct like "movement" or if you're going to run the list "Deep List" or something like that.

Of course a river is moving no? It's also changing. The river of now is not the same river as now except in convenience of referring to a generality. I am not the me now that I am now except in the same.

What's the different between change and movement? Please answer in your groovy new thread.

Onefinity:

Time is timing. Timing means intervals. Intervals are in something. That something is movement. Humans need timing in order to know movement. Movement is not only the root of all things; it is all things. But don't dwell on this too hard. Just imagining it requires an ability to use intuition, a very deep, sensory imagination, which in you is weak compared to your logical side.

Ever hear of Zeno's second paradox? Remove time from an arrow, and what you get is a static object, which shows no signs at all of movement. Would not this indicate more than just a human incapacity to view movement outside of time?

Also, might you be able to elaborate a wee bit on this notion of intuition as "very deep, sensory imagination"? Perhaps describe what you mean more completely and why you think I am weak in such?


Ah, I suppose I'll just post in the movement thread now.

wesmorris,

I often think of things like "living in the now", but it's been bothering me for a while. What is now?

Nice thread wes.
*my opinion*
Ultimately, NOW, is the reality.
All our experiences happen now.
When we recall past events, we can only recall them NOW, for NOW
When we consider the future, we do so NOW.
Now aways exists, the past is a collection of NOWS.
The past and the future do not exist in reality.

When then, is now? It's always right now, but right now is always changing... but now by the clock isn't enough time for anything to change. Right now by the clock isn't any time at all. So there is no "right now", even though that's all there is?

This about matter and spirit. Matter always changing, spirit stays constant. This is a great topic to dicuss and understand God to.

Jan Ardena.

Perhaps there is no now, for as you rightly put it Wes, 'now' could consist of milliseconds, or seconds. Maybe there is only the past, which has already happened, and the future, which is yet to happen.

To me, mind is begat by a bubble in time. Perhaps you could see it as a pancake squished onto a plane perpendicular to the instantaneous moment. I dunno. Awareness itself cannot be if there isn't more time in it than just an infinetissimal: dt. Awareness requires by its nature a connection to past and future.

To me, mind is begat by a bubble in time. Perhaps you could see it as a pancake squished onto a plane perpendicular to the instantaneous moment. I dunno. Awareness itself cannot be if there isn't more time in it than just an infinetissimal: dt. Awareness requires by its nature a connection to past and future.Does awareness really require a connection to past and future? I don't think so, remembering being aware is one thing, but awareness itself doesn't have to require a connection to past and future. Only awareness of the now would be the same as total freedom, but also probably total randomness...though if you knew what to do constantly then it would be equal to total obediance...

The awareness we have now is probably a balance between total randomness and total obediance, in which we can use the randomness in a meaningful way.

Who knows?

Does awareness really require a connection to past and future?

Just a lil bit, yeah. At least a smidge - straight up. Why? Because if neither exist (abstractly, I don't think they do exist physically), there is nothing to be aware of. If there is no sense of "what's coming" or "what just happened", what's left? More technically, the "bubble" in time is more than just the time. While you may focus on "the now", you are more than it, or you wouldn't be because there isn't enough now for you to be in. Infinitessimal is too small for anything to exist within. In order for "awareness" to exist, it must account for "time" in some capacity. As such, there is a connection to "the past" and "the future", or whatever you want to call them. No?

I don't think so, remembering being aware is one thing, but awareness itself doesn't have to require a connection to past and future.

I disagree per the above.

Only awareness of the now would be the same as total freedom, but also probably total randomness...though if you knew what to do constantly then it would be equal to total obediance...

But there isn't enough "now" for you to exist in if you look at the clock and talk about it as in "where is the now". Now? Is it now? Well, it's alway right now but in terms of linear, measurable time, now is infinitessimal. I draw the conclusion that we exist within at least the illusion of more time than just the time of the now. As such, past and future blah blah like I said above.

The awareness we have now is probably a balance between total randomness and total obediance, in which we can use the randomness in a meaningful way.

For some reason, obediance is a dirty word to me. I find it repulsive... pardon the tangent.

Who knows?

I have tentative knowledge of, pending someone's ability to show me the flaw in my thinking, or rather my ability to garner a response I can use to break out of my current mental paradigm.

"Now" is simply a boundary between "past" and "future". It has no duration, and it's not even worth discussing. Talking about the arrow that travels half the remaining distance to its target (thus never getting there) is more fun.

Hi Marv, actually, the arrow cannot move at all, as to move, first the arrow must move half the distance to the first nanometer of it's flight, but before must move half that distance, etc...
So, mathematically, motion is impossible.
Either math/logic is horrendously flawed to produce such an obviously false conclusion, or the evidence of our senses as received and manipulated by our minds is horribly inaccurate and cannot be trusted as an indicator of 'Reality'.
Or neither...
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Yep... something like a trillionth of a trillionth of a second (enough time for quantum gravity to settle into a single state from a jumble or proabilities... theoretically of course :))

CC,

You might as well have said a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth.... well you get my point. Now is merely the demarcation between the past and the future...

CC,

You might as well have said a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth.... well you get my point. Now is merely the demarcation between the past and the future...

Is it?

I can buy that to some extent, but from my perspective right now, it's always now and there is no future and no past except as abstracts I can reference as I please. The past and future are merely demarcations of the transitioning now, no?

there is no past or future, there is only "now", time dosent exist, there are only currently ongoing events, the past is just a memory of something that previously happened before the chain of events that lead up to the event that your living now,




there is no time, there is only action and reaction, cause and effect,


peace

Hey, Empty, your knowledge is out of date.
There is no action/reaction, no cause/effect.
They are considered 'different aspects of the same event'.
Linear time is a fantasy, as is motion. For motion to 'exist', time must 'exist' as a context for that motion. Mathematics and logic tell us that motion cannot 'be' and is a 'fiction'.

Hey, Empty, your knowledge is out of date.
There is no action/reaction, no cause/effect.
They are considered 'different aspects of the same event'.
Linear time is a fantasy, as is motion. For motion to 'exist', time must 'exist' as a context for that motion. Mathematics and logic tell us that motion cannot 'be' and is a 'fiction'.


when did i say the word motion? i said action and reaction, like if i pick a ball up and throw it, i caused the ball to move, cause and effect from the cause, time is irrelevant to the situation, it was just an event, you could time the ball but thats just a human tool/concept to measure something,


peace

when did i say the word motion?
Does not 'ongoing events' and 'chain of events that lead up to the event that your living now', mean motion?
Or are all your 'nows', your 'events', occurring simultaneously.

..if i pick a ball up and throw it, i caused the ball to move, cause and effect from the cause
You are describing motion here too.
The ball rising and flying through the air is an event. Part of that event is your hand touching the ball for a portion of that event. You are the 'cause' of the ball going through the air no more than the ball was the cause of your hand touching it, rising (more motion), and ceasing contact while it rose and flew through the air.


time is irrelevant to the situation
Your problem here is that time is not irrelevent to motion as motion MUST have the time to 'happen'. You cannot have a one sided coin.
'Time' has no more 'reality' than that which you perceive as 'motion'.
BUT, for the 'fiction of motion' to exist, time must also exist. It is 'all' fiction though, born from the perceptions of the body and mind.


just a human ...concept
Yes! motion, 'self', matter/space/gravity/time.. EVERYTHING that you can conceive, 'exists as a 'concept'. Our whole omniverse, concepts within Mind.

Does not 'ongoing events' and 'chain of events that lead up to the event that your living now', mean motion?
Or are all your 'nows', your 'events', occurring simultaneously.


You are describing motion here too.
The ball rising and flying through the air is an event. Part of that event is your hand touching the ball for a portion of that event. You are the 'cause' of the ball going through the air no more than the ball was the cause of your hand touching it, rising (more motion), and ceasing contact while it rose and flew through the air.



Your problem here is that time is not irrelevent to motion as motion MUST have the time to 'happen'. You cannot have a one sided coin.
'Time' has no more 'reality' than that which you perceive as 'motion'.
BUT, for the 'fiction of motion' to exist, time must also exist. It is 'all' fiction though, born from the perceptions of the body and mind.



Yes! motion, 'self', matter/space/gravity/time.. EVERYTHING that you can conceive, 'exists as a 'concept'. Our whole omniverse, concepts within Mind.





so your conclusion is that ongoing events dont exist, and me throwing a ball dosent exist, if this is your approach to discussion,

then everything is just a concept of our five senses, so everything is irrelevant so lets just conclude everything dosent exist and settle every debate with the "everything is a concept" method and approach.


hey and if you say a balls motion and falling dont exist then gravity dosent exist also, and wind resistance on the ball dont exist either, because there all part of cause and effect,



peace

so your conclusion is that ongoing events dont exist, and me throwing a ball dosent exist, if this is your approach to discussion, then everything is just a concept of our five senses, so everything is irrelevant so lets just conclude everything dosent exist and settle every debate with the "everything is a concept" method and approach.
I have no 'conclusions as whatever present tentative understanding is always subject to modification should new 'evidence' require.

I am here to discuss 'Reality' as I understand it, from my perspective. If I wished to discuss fantasy and delusion, I'd go to a religious site. It is 'illusion' that youir 'ball' is different from the arm throwing it is different from the person catching it is different from the Andromeda galaxy, etc... Making believe that everything has independent, seperate 'existence' is a game. Believing the same is 'delusion'.

Again, I have a very specific 'ultimate' definition of Reality/Existence as I have previously shared. It is a simple choice on my part not to accept all and every 'phenomenon' as 'Real', as per my definition. Others do not share the 'subtleties' that I employ. It is simply a matter of 'choice' and 'understanding'.

What you mention 'exists' as 'dream'. As 'hologram'. I can discuss anything you like from that perspective of understanding. When you question where everything goes under the microscope and find paradox all over the place, as I do not 'suffer' from that problem due to my 'understanding', I can offer a 'different' perspective that might resolve your paradoxes. Otherwise, I guess it really doesnt matter what you choose to 'believe' or what perspective you choose to occupy.

hey and if you say a balls motion and falling dont exist then gravity dosent exist also, and wind resistance on the ball dont exist either, because there all part of cause and effect,
They all 'exist' within the 'dream'. It is for you to decide how much 'importance' to place upon the 'stuff of your dreams'.

As I said, modern science doesn't go for the 'medieval concept' of 'cause and effect' anymore, and oddly enough, neither do I. I shall not respond to discussion of outmoded notions as if they had validity. It is not uncommon for people to come 'kicking and screaming' into a new understanding, a new and improved 'world view'. Gallileo has just recently been 're-commumicated'! The pain doesn't last long.

peace
Back atcha!
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