Does "time" really exist?

I read this interesting article on "time" and it has stuck with me for long time. Time is a really strange idea. It's not like you can hold time in your hand and experience it like the way we all experience holding an apple. Nobody denies the existence of apples. Most people do not deny the existence of time. However, if you really look hard enough, or listen hard enough, does time really exist? It seems to me what we call time is just the difference between two arbitrary physical measurements. Time seems to be purely a human construct and does not really exist in reality. It seems time only exists in our words and language. The existence of time is only present in mind-space and not in real-space.

Nature may behave in repeating patterns that can be modeled in mathematics. And you could say the patterns themselves are evidence for the existence of time. But the patterns themselves are defined by time so there's a little bit of strange semantic loop in that way of thinking. Time by itself without a pattern to rest on is a bit of mystery.

Here's a quote from the article and link to the article:

"Julian Barbour's solution to the problem of time in physics and cosmology is as simply stated as it is radical: there is no such thing as time.
"If you try to get your hands on time, it's always slipping through your fingers," says Barbour. "People are sure time is there, but they can't get hold of it. My feeling is that they can't get hold of it because it isn't there at all." Barbour speaks with a disarming English charm that belies an iron resolve and confidence in his science. His extreme perspective comes from years of looking into the heart of both classical and quantum physics. Isaac Newton thought of time as a river flowing at the same rate everywhere. Einstein changed this picture by unifying space and time into a single 4-D entity. But even Einstein failed to challenge the concept of time as a measure of change. In Barbour's view, the question must be turned on its head. It is change that provides the illusion of time."

www.popsci.com...

I need some time to think about this

Time doesn't exist, as we are all living and experiencing everything at the same time.

Our conciseness has evolved so much that humans have literally slowed down the progressive evolution that we forced it to slow down and materialize so we can enjoy it as matter and different experiences.

I believe time is purely a human construct. There's only now, and it stretches forward and backward. The concept of time is just a way to help humans make better sense of the world they live in. Outside of our experience, I don't believe it exists.

Well, even if it doesn't really exist, it IS a convenient way to separate events so they don't happen at once, even if they do, really, if you catch my drift. And even if you don't believe it, be sure to set your clocks back an hour next Sunday.

a reply to: dfnj2015

Before the winter came, the fall made its apperance. The winter killed of everything that was sick and weak, and in the spring nature feed of the very essence winter gave. When the summer days appeared all life seemed to be as one, and then fall came again and took it all away..

I don't mean to take away from the value of this topic, but I thought it was generally accepted that time doesn't actually exist as a physical thing?

Time is an illusion, created by things moving. If everything in the universe was at a stand still, there would be no need for time, because you would know where everything is always.

This is why our universe is considered to be 4th dimensional. Because you need time as a fourth dimension in order to accurately navigate it as all things are moving, and would be in a different spot in the universe if you did not account for time.

You cannot have time, without movement.

Carlin is over-quoted and excessively invoked, but sometimes no one says it better:

a reply to: dfnj2015
For processes that happen in order, one after another, there is time. Yet, What are we left with when our time is up? Time could be the only real thing, and space and matter could be an illusion.

The past could be the only thing, with the present as an illusion. After all, at the time we have a thought it happened in the past and is now complete. Or the present could be a mere bridge to a final static state in the future, making the past and present but a mere shadow of the future reality that has yet to exist.

There is a physics theory out there that the universe has only one electron. Thats right, the whole universe has one electron... a theory of a very bright person. Its one electron that goes around in order in simulation of each apparent electron. It was a surprisingly realistic theory and I'm not sure what ever came of it... maybe it became a type of string theory because when drawing the path of that electron it travels in a long "string". I don't know.

Atoms are more than 99% empty space, so it could be said that atoms are less than 1% real, and so more illusion than reality.

What is real? What isn't real? These are questions of the first philosophers and these questions only seem to increase in popularity as time goes on.

a reply to: dfnj2015

I suspect that time exists. I consider it something along the lines of If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it.... Does it make a sound?

I think that us mere mortals view time in two ways that muddy the water.

1) For understandable reasons we quantify it with clocks and calendars.

2) We consider it an exclusively one-way street. That is not to say that I believe human time travel is possible but simply that our understanding of time as a dimension is likely EXTREMELY limited.

originally posted by: eluryh22
a reply to: dfnj2015

I suspect that time exists. I consider it something along the lines of If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it.... Does it make a sound?

I think that us mere mortals view time in two ways that muddy the water.

1) For understandable reasons we quantify it with clocks and calendars.

2) We consider it an exclusively one-way street. That is not to say that I believe human time travel is possible but simply that our understanding of time as a dimension is likely EXTREMELY limited.

I'm curious, your explanation is a little vague.

How is time like a falling tree, with no one around to hear the sound?

That's kinda like asking "If a bug moves and no one is around to see it, does it actually move?" or "If I cat dies in a room of poisons gas, but no one checks on it, is it actually dead?"

It exist. Very punishing for some people like Darius Rucker.

a reply to: DeadCat

Sorry for the vagueness. I was (sort of) responding to some assertions that time is exclusively a human construct. The (maybe poor) comparison I was making is that, in my opinion, the sounds made by a falling tree happen whether or not we are around to hear it. Time would be a "thing" whether or not people ever existed.

Time is simply the measurement of perpetuation.

a reply to: dfnj2015

Good topic.

Time does not exist literally as it is an arbitrary form of measurement.
In fact, I'd even say length width and height do not exist either.

Do meters exist?
Do liters exist?
Do grams exist?

No, they are abstract conceptualizations that we devised in order to quantify things.
It is a system we created.

Time is exactly like this. Arbitrary and abstract - though it can be applied with specificity and to be exact.
Can something be subjective and objective at the same time?

originally posted by: eluryh22
a reply to: DeadCat

Sorry for the vagueness. I was (sort of) responding to some assertions that time is exclusively a human construct. The (maybe poor) comparison I was making is that, in my opinion, the sounds made by a falling tree happen whether or not we are around to hear it. Time would be a "thing" whether or not people ever existed.

If you think about it, time is not purely a human creation by any means.

Technically, the perception of time is crucial to the life of any conscious entity in this universe.

If it does not perceive time, it does not perceive any type of unfolding reality.

Perception of time definitely plays a huge role in the development of consciousnesses.

You're moving. So therefore time exists.

a reply to: dfnj2015

Does "time" really exist?

Ask the guys in prison.

originally posted by: Deaf Alien
You're moving. So therefore time exists.

It's probably best expressed as a paradox.
It does and doesn't exist both simultaneously.

So although I'm partially contradicting my earlier statement, I am also not contradicting it.