The Time in Question

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It is not because the states of energies and matter all manifest, birth and death, that the nature (the essence, the source) of the durations (of time), had a beginning and that it will have an end. 

Although it is measurable and can be represented by symbols, time has no physical reality; thinkers all admit this.
Nevertheless, time can be associated with physical references (the hands of a watch, for example), or with chronologies through mathematical equations.
However, this fact masks a very old and disastrous confusion of the natures (essences, orders) of time and space inherent to the fact that the space between temporal landmarks can be quantified by numbers, a confusion, alas, now confirmed by the notion of space-time imagined by Hermann Minkowski (1864 - 1909) and adopted by A. Einstein.

A quantity, in fact, although quantified by numbers, is also, by the meaning it expresses, an abstract entity, that is to say, an entity of transcendental order; let us specify that by transcendental nature we mean a primordial nature different from the physical one, recognized to the sensible real, that is to say to what is objectified, "materialized".
Moreover, in its nature, this association is similar to the union of the mind (of the I, me, ego, subject) and the body; it is a relationship of involvement through a transcendental and therefore universal domain, ignored by scientists and philosophers, even theologians, of which the domain of abstraction is a singular facet.

But then why does the dynamics of the universe reveal the existence of a privileged meaning for the variable time and the persistence of physical units in time, i.e. the permanent taking into account of time in the universe?
This is the problem that has not yet received a credible answer,
This is an essential problem because, for example, depending on one's understanding of time, the universe can be recognized either as having had a beginning or as pre-existing from all eternity.
Let's argue.

Certainly the understanding of the times is largely consensual; however, we are no longer in the times when it was believed, with the greatest assurance, that ideas which have always been recognised by all as true can only be true. (quod ab omnibus, quod ubique, quod semper). 

Recall the understandings of the time on the part of the :
- Plato (-427, -348) who could not dissociate time from the Cosmos,
- Aristotle (-384, -322) who imagined movement as the substratum of time,
- St. Augustine (354, 430) who saw in time a distension of the soul apprehended by the Spirit, which helps to measure the past by remembrance, and the future by expectation,
- Newton (1642, 1727), having postulated it to "flow" uniformly, saw in it the order of succession and in space the order of the situation,
- Leibniz (1646, 1716) who sensed time and space as dependent on the events they contain, space giving the possibility of simultaneous "existences" and time the order of successive "existences",
- Kant (1724, 1804), who recognized time and space as pure intuitions of sensibility beyond any empirical data,
would hardly strengthen our case.

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The same applies to certain current scientific discourse, particularly when discussing the chronologies specific to universal laws, the chronologies and heterochronies that condition the development of beings and species, the greater or lesser spontaneity of reactions to stimuli, ..., the neutralization of certain time lapses that make it possible to punctuate the reactivity of cerebral mechanisms (observations by Benjamin Libet, 1916 – 2007).
Nevertheless, two facts are undeniable,
- first of all, all the evolutionary paths of inert and living matter attest to the respect of rigorous chronologies, which presupposes the permanent consideration and respect of durations, those mysterious intervals that are not space,
- secondly, quantum dynamics (at the quantum level) bear witness to instantaneity, and therefore to timelessness.
How can that be?

Scientists do not seem to be very sensitive to this question; moreover, as you have read many times, they do not hesitate to postulate the existence of specific "powers", according to the phenomena being analysed, under cover, for example,
- of "geometric operators",
- or biological entities such as the brain, the organs of the body (heart, liver, ...), the cells releasing messengers that act, the ribosomes that translate into protein sequences, ..., the homeotic genes that code for proteins whose role is to control other genes ...
However, there cannot be multiple operators in the universe, particularly within a being, who recognize, judge by taking into account value reference points, particularly temporal ones, ..., who decide and act, and it is not laws that have this power.

It is true that this lack of conceptual and semantic rigour is very old; let us recall in particular the unfortunate ambiguity concerning the notion of thought, even that of consciousness:
" ... we must avoid the equivocation of the word thought, which we can take for the thing that thinks, and also for the action of that thing. "(cf. Descartes - Metaphysical Meditations, Letter to M. Clerselier).
Thought and conscience are not operators!
Through the brain and by means of abstract activities of a transcendental order, we generate thoughts,
and endowed with a state of self-awareness, we can recognize ourselves and hear the world by transcending it.

There is no doubt, therefore, that understanding the nature of time also presupposes taking into account the phenomena and processes inherent in the field of abstraction, if only because it leads to a debate on the present moment, that time which has no, never has physical expression! 

In fact, having no duration, since as soon as we try to "surround" it, it becomes "past", the instant appears as an eternal present that paradoxically separates and unites "past time" and "future time" with the remarkable property of always being the same in its nature and meaning, even though it participates in different spatio-temporal contexts.

The present instants then make it possible to divide the actualizations (materializations) of time, but, themselves, are not divisible.
Moreover, being unaffected by the constraints of relativity, and not being able to be put together end to end to form lapses of time since they have no duration (if not in them, they would mix past and future), they are an absolute reference that accompanies us from birth to death, the only absolute reference we have!
This is one of the reasons why we transform ourselves ceaselessly, physically, during our existence, while continuing to remain identical, always oneself within an invariant ego.
and why the I (me, subject, ego, spirit), although capable of transcending the body (our physical identity), of moving in space and using time, is constantly forced to recognize, to judge, ..., to choose, in the present moment, its only absolute referential.

We could also draw a parallel with the in-betweens represented by the "blanks" (the voids, the unspoken) because they too hold the conditions of positivity and transcendence that are absolutely necessary for understanding, memorizing and transmitting "meaning"; for example, the in-betweens represented by the blanks participate in the "structuring" of languages, from the simplest to the most elaborate, and even singular ones such as those characteristic of genetic heritage and computers.

Then let us remember the Augustinian analysis: 

"I know that there would be neither, if nothing happened, past time, nor, if nothing happened, future time, nor, if nothing existed, present time, ...
As for a present, always present, which does not go away in a past, it would no longer be time, it would be eternity. "(cf. Confessions - Book XI, 14),

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Certainly the present moment is representative of eternity, and logically, since without duration, timeless and involved in every being, ipso facto in the universe, the present moment (the instant) reveals one of the facets of time never highlighted: its potential character.
Here we are far removed from the common understanding and how obsolete the Nietzschean assertion seems:
"Time in itself is an absurdity; there is only time for a sentient being"! (cf.- The Philosopher's Book, Theoretical Studies).

In a quest for the primordial causes, let us stop speculating on the flight of time, on its arrow, ..., on its beginning with the Big-bang and on its end during a Big- crunch.
There can be no credible understanding of universal dynamics without recognizing time as a potentiality, which after "actualization" (materialization), allows for the integration of evolutions in reproducible and rigorous chronologies.
Because of its transcendental nature since durations are non-spatial intervals, the source of time had no beginning and will have no end.

It is true that the world of potentialities is hardly the subject of debate, but we are convinced that the dynamics of the universe presupposes two worlds of virtualities (few researchers are):
- the world of physical virtualities such as the universal forces that ensure the coherence and dynamics of particles, atoms and molecules,
- and the world of transcendental order virtualities as the correlative psychic forces of will, intentions, desires, ...

Besides, don't be surprised by the dichotomy:
- The "updated time" that can be objectified using measuring devices or lend itself to symbolisations and equations,
- The "potential time" likely to be associated with any physical phenomenon or abstract referential such as virtual imagery, concepts, ideas that furnish the field of abstraction.
This dichotomy shows that during existence we live physically in the spatiotemporal and spiritually in the timeless, thus revealing the dual and eternal character of the universe!

Therefore, we consider the universe to have known, from all eternity, myriads of bangs, and we take a special interest in black holes, which we consider to be singular expressions of processes of demassification of cosmic matter.
Moreover, we have reexpressed Einstein's univocal formula: E = mc² by the reversible equation: E ↔ mc² to mean that universal dynamics presupposes : 
- of permanent and various massifications of Universal Energy leading to particles, atoms and molecules,
- and constant demassification of cosmic matter with a return to their primordial state of Universal Energy, the energy that some scientists talk about without ever including it in their assumptions.

And more specifically, about the dual nature of the universe, we confidently advocate, in the manner of Descartes:
Cogito ergo mundus vivit (so I think the world lives).

Of course, one question remains and will forever remain unanswered: why is there something rather than nothing? (cf. Leibniz -1646, 1716).

Paul Moyne
Theory deposited at the Académie des Sciences, in Paris, under sealed cover n°17325

llustration: Painting of Nilos /2011  

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