Jim Westergren
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"If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas A. Edison

What is time?

What is time?

Often the immediate concept that comes to mind is a clock, watch or a calendar, but what really is time?

This is perhaps a very confused subject and you often hear: “I have no time.”, “Time is money.”, “I need to be on time” and so on.

And for example the Einstein theory of relativity makes the subject for ordinary people just even more confused.

Let us assume time would stop, what would happen?

I tell you what would happen. Nothing would move. As “The illusion called time is composed of altering of the particles position in space” and “Alteration is the basic manifestation of time”. (L. Ron Hubbard, 1951)

Everything moves, all the time. Time is measered from instruments which from beginning comes from natural movements such as the sun and the planet as well as the moon.

Let us assume that suddenly something happens and the planet would circulate slower around its own axel. Let us say it would take 30 hours instead of 24.

Now to the key question, would you have more time?

Perhaps in the beginning that is what would be experienced. But I am pretty sure that after a month or two people still claim to not have enough time.

Imagine when you where a child and there was a lot of commotion and a lot of action. Life was fun and time appeared to be over before you even noticed it – mother coming and telling it was over. And it was always as it was most fun. This even though the child was gone for the whole afternoon.

Then imagine when you another day had to go and visit the old grandmother. It was boring and the time went very slow, very very slow.

Once when I was a kid and I had to tell my little brother – who had no concept of words such as hours, minutes and so on – that mam comes back in one hour. I told him: “Mother comes back after one ‘Donald Duck’” as Donald Duck cartoon last for one hour and he saw this each week, thus I assumed he would understand. But now to my point, the next hour of waiting for mam was probably experienced 10 times longer then the hour of cartoon. Does time then not have something to do with the person?

I know a person saying that she has no time to write a letter to me during the last months and I know a person (myself) who is working 80 hours a week but still makes it to write a novel.

What is the difference?

You create time by being effective. When you see something to be done, do it immedietly and work fast. Only then can you really say that you have more time. A person saying “I don’t have time to do X” is just saying the X is not considered a priority for this particular person – otherwise the person would organize himself in a way to get X done. My father told me a good counter-statement to somebody stating that they don’t have time: “Do you watch TV?” if the question is “yes”, then ok the person has time to do even more things.

Let us speculate as to what time really is.

Could you have time without a viewpoint? Certainly not. It has to be “viewed” and then an idea about it’s passing has to be created or “considered”.

Thus the viewpoint is the key ingradient and not so much “it” itself.

So we found the answer easy; time is what you consider it to be. “A consideration” as Mr. Hubbard writes, and that is all.

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About the Author Jim Westergren Jim Westergren is a company owner from Sweden who lives together with his wife and son. Some of his interests are SEO, web development, writing and taking photos. Read his full about page or contact him. Follow Jim on Twitter or subscribe to this blog.
In Swedish: presentation, blog.
32 responses »Leave a comment
  1. Pretty Myspace Layouts
    said on April 19, 2006 at 8:13 pm

    I think time simply don’t exist, it is only a human based theory to explain something it doesn’t understand. Just like theologies.

  2. DANIEL
    said on July 27, 2006 at 12:24 am

    TIME?? THIS IS VERY INTERESTING. “THE” REAL FINAL FRONTIER.

  3. Ken
    said on October 9, 2006 at 4:45 am

    Some say that if/when time stops, then all motion stops too. There have been some fun stories and movies created by the concept of “what if time stopped for everybody but me”. And wormholes are big now on the SciFi channel. Stargate, Dr. Who, etc. I’ve always agreed with Pretty Myspace Layouts’ opinion that time is just something that humans made up to explain — well — time. But now I’m thinking it’s more than that. I don’t yet know what it is. Perhaps I never will. But it bothers me. And that’s probably good.

  4. peter
    said on February 25, 2007 at 6:17 pm

    time is a measurement. simple as that.
    people are all scietists nowadays and therefore have to measure everything.

    the centimetre is a measurement too. not sure who invented that.

    today can not be identified simply dy the date someone made up.
    according to christians, the date is different to the chinese and so on.

    my question is, what year is it really?

    please reply

  5. NorberHawk
    said on July 24, 2007 at 6:59 pm

    Is possible stop the things? yes., but not the time.

  6. everymansmedium
    said on August 27, 2007 at 1:03 pm

    Time is the point of Creation. The future does not exist. Now is an imaginary point where the future can be changed by your free will. When you decide on what the future will be, you act. Once you act, the time has past, creation has happened, it is now real never to be changed. The past is post creation.

    (time=being=creation)1 …………………….. This is us: …creation=being
    (space=matter=energy)3 …….e=mc2……. same relation ship..the body.
    (time=being=creation)3 ……… This is God: … creation=being x C2
    (space=matter=energy)1 …….. universal divine memory…e=m..

    http://unit-unity-community.com/cdstuf/what-is-time.htm
    You may ignor this if you wish.
    It will however outlive us all.
    See you around.
    John

  7. GodsBestFriend
    said on September 15, 2007 at 9:34 pm

    Time = change; if there is no change then there is not time. It may be that time might elapse even if there is no change BUT there is absolutely no way to prove it because any evidence of time elapsing requires change. Also, time isn’t something we travel through; you don’t travel through change. Consequently, you cannot go back in time because you can have more change or less change or no change but you cannot have negative change. Besides, backwards time travel violates causality.

  8. everymansmedium
    said on October 15, 2007 at 7:18 am

    The Primary force is bipolar. In the one hand is gravity this is the hand that gives us space. A place for matter to be. With the other hand it gives us Continue this is the force/constant that is at the core of all that lives. It gives time. Time is what makes space volatile. Space without time is an unmoving solid.
    Time is a place for a being to be.
    The thought for the force gravity is “Bring all things together unto thyself.” This is the divine in space. Here there is only room for the one God.

    The thought for the force continue is “Continue and let others continue as you must.” This is the thought to be home for a being.

    When a being becomes so attached to the material world, They begin to respond to the thought for the material world “To bring all things together unto thyself.” When this happens to a being, that being will be forever attracted to the place that all material things must go. “The black hole” However when you arrive you will find that there is only room for the one God and you will be discarded as nothing of value. For all that is of value to the one God is responding to that word that is for all beings to continue.
    There is a word for the thought of the material world when it is hosted by a being, it is “GREED”.

    John.

  9. M Khan
    said on October 22, 2007 at 12:17 am

    Time is the presence of motion and forces. Time is due to expansion of space. Time is slow where expansion of space is slow like around large masses. As total motion and forces within a mass is a constant therefore when linear motion is increased then internal motion as well forces within that object slow which is then percieved as slowing of time.

    Check this out: http://www.timephysics.com

    Thanks
    Mkhan

  10. Thomas
    said on November 1, 2007 at 4:38 am

    I profess a simple six words that explains time:

    “Time is the Measurment of Motion.”

    Respectfully,

    Tom

  11. Zack Rozelle
    said on November 9, 2007 at 5:51 pm

    i think that time is an illusion to which the human responce to life itself, needing structure and invalid of movement.

  12. John Richardson
    said on January 1, 2008 at 1:25 am

    Of the comments to this point, Thomas said it best. It goes even beyond the measurement of motion. It is a made up concept. Time is something that people have invented for the purpose of simplistic organizational requirements. Science has to this point used time without really acknowledging what it really is. There is no time, there is only motion. Until this becomes acknowledged we will remain in a state of scientific infancy. No scientific measurement requires the usage of the concept of time. Everyone I tell that to tends to disagree with me, but it is simply because they don’t understand what time really is. Further explanation, worded more eloquently than I ever could have, can be found here:
    http://rilo.org/TimeWillTell.html

  13. mewe
    said on January 3, 2008 at 6:28 pm

    There is no time, its purely a mental construct, its a movement of mind/thought there is only ever the present moment in which ideas of time arise, however there is change but all change happens in this very same moment ie this moment is always this moment ( this is not about being in the “Now” ,there only ever is , ever has been and ever will this moment).

  14. Jamie
    said on January 31, 2008 at 7:29 pm

    “time is a straight plantation”- Jim Morrison

  15. Fatm
    said on February 24, 2008 at 10:35 pm

    Hi
    No one can feel time before minutes of his born,we feel it when we
    see light and recognize mottion.So time is some thing relative to
    observer.After die it will be constant and equal zero.

  16. eslampanah
    said on March 16, 2008 at 4:24 pm

    Time is an energy that transmit between two events in universe.

  17. eslampanah
    said on March 16, 2008 at 10:07 pm

    Time is a dimension that we travel in it with constant speed.

  18. Fatm
    said on March 28, 2008 at 5:35 pm

    Hi
    The most important thing that we should recognize is our ability to feel and measure time.This ability will be end at the moment of man death.
    Although all atoms have there own movements which go continously
    our own structures (man,plants,….) have the codes to analyze the time
    depending of atoms time cycles.
    We can see this clearly in plants life cycles.
    In physics i think time is liquid accompanier to place and can only be detected by moving (absolute)

  19. luis
    said on April 3, 2008 at 5:21 am

    To all the people who are using Aristotle’s definition that time is a measurement of motion that cant be a working definition because its circular. All motion is a change of position with respect to time, so your really just using time to define time, which doesnt really work. and while yes it can be subjective does that mean it does not exist?

  20. philosophyJake
    said on April 10, 2008 at 7:45 am

    Time is the presence of motion and forces. Time is due to expansion of space. Time is slow where expansion of space is slow like around large masses. As total motion and forces within a mass is a constant therefore when linear motion is increased then internal motion as well forces within that object slow which is then percieved as slowing of time.

    This is a circular argument. You can not define Time in terms of motion as motion is defined with time. According to the laws of physics motion is a displacement in space over time. so what you would be saying is that Time is a displacement is space over time. Time may be viewed as change. Or Perhaps there is no such thing as time, or atleast a time universal. Perhaps time only exists in the subconsiousness of life in order to explain decay and change. It could be that to the Universe (or God for those who are religious) the time it takes to get from point A to point B is trivial. If a mass moves from point A to point B in a day, it would hold the same change value as if it had taken a week. It would still have covered the same distance. And to a universe, or a God, to whom are not a slave to time, the duration or length of “time” the mass took to move would not be an issue. It is however an issue to us. We are not immortal. We have a concept of time becuase we are not eternal. We try to fit as much as possible into our lives. And with the greed and expectancies of life we are confined to measure our non-eternalness. We can thus see time pass but are incapable of explaining it. Touching on an old but favorable paradox: If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, did the tree ever really fall. Well according to physics the answer is indubitably yes, but existentially if went by unappreciated then what does it matter. If you were wipe all things that are slaved to time, such as all life, time would exist unappreciated and therefore it wouldnt really exist.

  21. Nasser Gheta
    said on April 12, 2008 at 4:59 am

    I’m with John Richarson and Tom on this for sure.
    I have come to this conclusion that time is not a discovery but an invention by us humans for the purpose of measuring motion of things in space. The concept of time has become such an inseparable part of human psyche, human consciousness and so entrenched in our subconscious that has become impossible for us to deal with it as what it really is, a mere illusion. Time was invented to regulate and manage our daily activities just the way religion was invented to explain “supernatural” and unexplainable events that our ancestors witnessed. Time represents the ongoing and continuous change and reconfiguration of atoms in space. Any given configuration of atoms for, let’s say, an object in a given “time” is unique and cannot be repeated.

  22. OWUSU JAMES
    said on April 16, 2008 at 7:27 am

    Time is a very big determinant factor in every activity that a person will perform. Therefore, your ability or inability to manage your time in life is a key factor in determining how successful and flourishing you may be. Time is how you live and perform your activities. People who manage their time never lack because they know what to do at any periodic interval.

  23. Shuvai Ranganai
    said on April 16, 2008 at 11:45 am

    a good examination on time.I believe that time is just a resource that people need to use in day to day living.

  24. Javier H
    said on June 19, 2008 at 5:55 pm

    wel this was enteresting , me and my best friends always talk about this , and I learned something new today , but I believe the bible has al the answer to this great question ….

  25. Gordon Tatro
    said on June 22, 2008 at 5:25 am

    I’m not too sure that time is a thing as is a ‘car’ or a ‘hangnail’. Rather time is a sense as in love or integrity as time relates to what is done in the physical world. In other words if it were not for time then we would not be able to appreciate or even relate or react in the world we know as is: length., width, depth or as is time space matter energy and intelligence.

    It also seems clear that time is not definable unless space is included: the universe is a fabric sort of definable as a rubber sheet whereby our mass (material) in life deforms the fabric (be that mass us or the Earth or an infinite mass…a black hole).

    But allow me to go in another direction!

    In that we are complainers of time for a reason: We complain that time is too long when we are young and too short when we are old. We try to save time, borrow time, kill time, make time, cut time and etc ad nausium. We also wear time (wristwatch), make a history (whereby we want to learn from past mistakes but regret that we all too often do not succeed), and plan a calendar (filling it up but often in vain).

    We complain about time because we are foreign to this physical world: whereas an astronaut gets inside his space suit to experience an EVA mission, we are spirits put inside an earthsuit (body) to experience the physical world and to accomplish a mission here in recognizing the design and specialality that is this planet, universe, and life.

    Now is this going to jump into Bible verses and God and Christianity? Well, it could…because there are verses in the Bible that smack enough to where science and philosophy are pointing…and if that bothers you then good and if it does not bother you then…get bothered!

    Why is it that no matter what we do or get or desire it is never enough and we always want more? I assure you…that, that which makes you, you and not me is not going to be able to take it all with you when you leave your earthsuit (body). What if, when we step through deaths door there is just existence without the need of an earthsuit (body) because we will then not longer be in dimension to experience only the four dimensions but be beyond them?

    Scientists state via the WMAP satellite that the Big-Bang is basically fact—there was a beginning to time-space, matter, and energy. And, let me so bold as to add in ‘Intelligence’ (yes that is with a capital “I”). What if we are more than just Darwnian ‘meat’ robots but that we are timeless spirits on a mission of exploration (aren’t we all insatiably curious?) to explore and to then relate to this intelligence?

    Time certainly is weird and it has been related to entropy (the decay of energy potential into an even quantity…a heat death). Without that second law of thermodynamics we would last forever here (well, until the planet failed to support us) and frankly, we would not be happy about that either. Life is work! Life is interesting!! Life is Pain!!! Life is Love. We are complicated creatures to the point to which we should look like creatures from a far off distant galaxy from the ‘eyes’ of every other creature here on this planet. Frankly, we do not fit here! When animals sleep they just replenish their biological strength but when we sleep we do that plus we understand (know) that we are disconnected from the experience of reality around us…we are out of time…we are in a dreamlike state…we are totally defenseless/vulnerable. We should not like that if Darwinianism is all we have to fall back on for our ‘existence’!?

    I could go on… gordonta@comcast.net

  26. Pradeep
    said on June 26, 2008 at 1:25 pm

    Time is motion(group of movement)

  27. NIkhil Arora
    said on November 5, 2008 at 4:34 pm

    Time doesn.t exists.It is only a human based theory

  28. Al Ien
    said on May 18, 2009 at 4:58 pm

    Time is a concept of relationships between different states of space configurations.

  29. Jelly
    said on September 15, 2009 at 11:11 pm

    I am convinced that darkness rules the Universe. Simply because black holes are the most powerful forces in the Universe, sucking in light. So not even light can overcome a blackhole making darkness the ruler over everything.

  30. Sergius
    said on September 28, 2009 at 6:11 pm

    Definition of time will perhaps become easier as soon as we answer the question: Who is the definer?

  31. jared
    said on December 26, 2009 at 7:20 am

    my question is if their is no time in space how is it still motion out there? I think that if all time stopped anyone would have unlimted time to do anything ,but if time start again where it stopped at ,all what you did between where it stopped and started it never happened.

  32. Sergey Malovatov
    said on December 26, 2009 at 12:17 pm

    Perpetual states are beyond space-time. Happenings take place within space and time. Perpetual, eternal states find their expression in happenings. Between the realm of “no space-time” and the realm of “space-time” there is the transitional zone of various states of consciousness. What happened depends on the state of your consciousness which is aware of everything in terms of various space configurations and their relationships.

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