Time and Linear progression

[BillClintonsCigar]

I think people view life through time, as a linear progression, yet they forget time, is a record of changes in space. One day, is the time it takes the Earth to revolve on it's own axis, so sunlight meets the same point again. One year is the time it takes the Earth to rotate around the Sun, but the Earth still rotates on its' own axis. All records of time merely record the configuration of space at that moment.
A man of fifty years of age, for example, has not lived fifty years in time, but he has been alive, while the Planet he lives on, has rotated on it's own axis 18,250 times (365 [days] x 50 [years] = 18250), and the planet itself has circled the sun, completely, fifty times! Trying to survive life, in my opinion, should not consist of us shielding ourselves, but it should consist of us looking at the Sun, with full praise and glory, and watching it, as our life progresses, and everything around us also does.

[One]

No disrespect intended, but what is your point? As far as I understand it, there is no objective way of measuring time, only subjective methods. We have to gauge time by the earths physical positioning in relation to the sun coz theres no other method!

[BillClintonsCigar]

I agree, one, but I would say that measuring one's age in years is not an appropriate method for measuring ability. That was all I meant. An organism's experience is more of a measure than anything else.

[BillClintonsCigar]

Can I just say I don't appreciate the name Dearprudence, purely because it is the title of a Paul McCartney song, and I really don't like Paul McCartney. Apart from that I accept your points, but I don't think looking at things in a different way makes it wrong, but maybe it can provide people in the future, who are looking at things from a different perspective, with some answers.

[Siddhartha]

Time is not absolute. So even if you had an objective method of measuring it, it would be different wherever you measured it.

[janeelsa]

hi! my 'search' for 'linear time' led me here. My questions is: is time linear? or does it all exist at once? Do we travel through a 'sea' of possible happenings, choosing our events, shaping our lives as we 'go through the motions'? Do we move from stepping stone to stepping stone? I do not think the future is pre-ordained, but I do think there are an infinite number of possibilities. Please, help me reason this out :)

[Siddhartha]

If you have read Immanuel Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason", he has interesting ideas on the nature of time and space, stating that time exists only in the mind, because it can have no volume, length or height, and is like a thought. Space can only exist outside the mind, because the mind can have no dimensions. Hmm, that's about the crappest summary I've ever made in my life, but you should get hold of that book.