Time has no independent existence apart from the order of events by which we measure it. — Albert Einstein
Currently with the new book written by Lee Smolin about Time, to me, it is a fundamental question about what arises, and, on how we use time to measure. Also for me, to ask what relevance time means, as an emergent product for any beginning.
LEE SMOLIN- Physicist, Perimeter Institute; Author, The Trouble With PhysicsA "scientific concept" may come from philosophy, logic, economics, jurisprudence, or other analytic enterprises, as long as it is a rigorous conceptual tool that may be summed up succinctly (or "in a phrase") but has broad application to understanding the world.
Thinking In Time Versus Thinking Outside Of Time
One very old and pervasive habit of thought is to imagine that the true answer to whatever question we are wondering about lies out there in some eternal domain of "timeless truths." The aim of re-search is then to "discover" the answer or solution in that already existing timeless domain. For example, physicists often speak as if the final theory of everything already exists in a vast timeless Platonic space of mathematical objects. This is thinking outside of time. See: WHAT SCIENTIFIC CONCEPT WOULD IMPROVE EVERYBODY'S COGNITIVE TOOLKIT?
What ignited this question for me goes to a comment I wrote as to what I saw as a precursor to this question for Lee Smolin and others. Further to this, the lessons and explanation Sean Carroll gave toward how we look at time.
Darwinian evolutionary biology is the prototype for thinking in time because at its heart is the realization that natural processes developing in time can lead to the creation of genuinely novel structures. Even novel laws can emerge when the structures to which they apply come to exist. Evolutionary dynamics has no need of abstract and vast spaces like all the possible viable animals, DNA sequences, sets of proteins, or biological laws. Exaptations are too unpredictable and too dependent on the whole suite of living creatures to be analyzed and coded into properties of DNA sequences. Better, as Stuart Kauffman proposes, to think of evolutionary dynamics as the exploration, in time, by the biosphere, of the adjacent possible. See: Thinking In Time Versus Thinking Outside Of TimeWhile we then become cognoscente of the rules around which parameters have meaning in relation to Time, it was also important to understand that the idea of cross pollination of the sciences recognizes what is brought to the table.
"It is very good that Stu Kauffman and Lee are making this serious attempt to save a notion of time, since I think the issue of timelessness is central to the unification of general relativity with quantum mechanics. The notion of time capsules is still certainly only a conjecture. However, as Lee admits, it has proven very hard to show that the idea is definitely wrong. Moreover, the history of physics has shown that it is often worth taking disconcerting ideas seriously, and I think timelessness is such a one. At the moment, I do not find Lee and Stu's arguments for time threaten my position too strongly."- Julian Barbour
In regard to The Adjacent Possible I was well aware of the implication and parameters around such thinking to realize that even while applying the trade, Stuart, was traveling new ground. His thinking is encouraging the flexibility that I am talking about with regard the restrictions one places on them self. I encourage this kind of thinking so as to bolster the lull in scientific advancement to stimulate and foster the idealization of creativity that I think has become stagnate while moving from one point in the measure to the next. Why Murray Gell-Mann's move and his expertise is understood in context of new approaches. Simplicity and complexity.
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| Setting Time Aright |
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