“We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.” ― John Archibald Wheeler
I love the way this guy talks. You can see in his eyes that he's not really convinced that what he's saying is in fact the absolute truth, but he's trying to be as honest as he can be given his position of trying to satisfy the interviewers quest for an answer
0:09 What is Time? “A succession of pictures” continuously changing one into the other We need a concept of change to hold a concept of time 0:59 Newton’s flow of time is wrong according to Barbour 2:00 You need change. Without it, you can’t say time has past. 2:58 Watches march in step not with Time, but with each other 3:36 Time, for practical purposes, is about keeping people synchronized, in about the same, common time 4:41 Refinements. Einstein showed the idea of absolute simultaneity is difficult at high speeds 5:24 Simultaneity at separate points. 6:07 We’ve reached a pleatu until Quantam Mechanics. Atoms 6:49 Atomic Clocks, cesium atom. 7:35 Greater Accuracy requires Greater Care, Taking more variables in account
Photo frame of everything is changing within a fraction of a second and going into the past, next frame is still awaited and all pass in a blink of an eye
All I can say is that this man's concept of time is exactly my concept of time and I'm just a guy who's been interested in the time and timekeeping for most of my life and while I do hold an advanced degree, none of my degrees have to do with physics. I came to my view of time by reading and studying on my own. And what is more impressive about Julian Barbour is that he makes his case in plain english.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Wrong . You can experience time simply looking at the sky changing, trees changing, yourself changing and so on.. without any social interaction. Time is not a concept but physical reality. What nonsense and stupidity in this video !
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL you are right, time does not really exist, only physic matters motion is getting affected by gravity and/or speed and this is finally having an influence on the result of that "time conception"
This is a most interesting, thoughtful exposition of "time" as a human construct with innumerable uses in our everyday world. It does not say much about time as the quintessentially mysterious foundation of theoretical physics.
I was watching a physics video in which it was explained there is no need for time in physics, that everything little t does in calculations can be done another way without it. My take on time is summarized... Time is a concept only. The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of things moving relative to each other. I wouldn't be surprised to discover that the boundary between physics and philosophy is really very fuzzy.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Hey - I so agree with you - time is just a concept invented by man and initially prompted by living inside a big clock. It's so not 'mysterious'!
@@chickenduckquack I am glad that you and I and Carlo Rovelli are all in fundamental agreement. But I wouldn't say "just a concept". I would say, "a most extraordinary, fabulous, astounding, useful and convenient concept". lol
I'm a bit surprised with JBs comments about the deep rooted psychological experience of time moving forward and how he experiences it too. I thought with his viewpoint and all the research he's done on the subject that his perceptions would be free of that naivety.
Even in an unchanging environment or when staring at a picture you have thoughts passing in your mind. As long as you have consciousness You couldn't possibly be unaware of the passing of time. Time is conscious awareness.
This logic is flawed though. You say "even in an unchanging environment you have thoughts passing in your mind". Therefore the environment is not unchanging. Unless you stray from the physical view of the universe (I won't say reductionist), it is obvious that time only exists as the perception of change. If your consciousness was frozen, all the electrons stopped and the neurones stopped firing, then you wouldn't perceive time. If the environment is TRULY unchanging, then you aren't aware of time passing because you too are frozen.
They say time is going from order to disorder but isn't it more accurate to say that time is the measurement of motion or in the case already mentioned, the measure of going from order to disorder, the measurement of change?
I agree with Julian Barbour's ideas about what time actually is. Time is merely movement in our physical universe. It is wild and unfounded theory which claims that time is a "dimension". I also think that all events are reversible, meaning that time has no true direction. Entropy supposedly is "time's arrow", but with energy or deliberate action (by us), we can reverse "time's arrow". Additionally, entropy must include a change in positions and movement which is the proposed definition of time.
Change α Δx/Δt were the small letter "t" is time. It's kinda' basic physics. I read his book and wasn't convinced. Without time how can you explain the transition from frame to frame? How can you even use the word 'transition' without a time reference? The best you can do is to give time another name, but hell it is still time.
Barbour is NOT saying that there is no time - he's saying it isn't fundamental - he's saying that the transition from frame to frame is creating time - whereas you are saying that time is ticking away before and after the consecutive frames - so that transition is occurring within it - it's a subtle difference - but worth trying to grasp
John Eyon How can that transition exists without time? I can easily imagine space not being fundamental, you just need a network configured in a particular way. But it seems to me that all attempts at considering time as not fundamental end up doing the trick of just hiding it inside another concept: transition, change, transformation... None of those concepts actually make sense without some idea of time as a preexisting condition.
@@marcv2648 - good point - and also science popularizers - such as the producers & interviewees of this video series - they need to know what's getting thru to the lay audience - and what isn't
Distance by time is always a constant. The maximum is C. Energy content of anything is the measure of velocity. Directions make senses as for as velocity is concerned. Variations in directions is what traps energy otherwise it is ever constant. Mostly vector equations. Time is a measure of relative velocity of matter to that of light speed.
2:20 - I think to really say "no time is passing," you have to extend the "no change" to everything - the entire universe, including yourself. Even if the whole universe outside of you froze, you still have a subjective internal experience of time passing. You've built that up over from experience. If someone locks you in a dark room for half an hour, you probably know you've been in there for more than 10 minutes and less than an hour. Different people would have more accurate internal clocks. But, if NOTHING changes, universe wide, then I absolutely believe that no time has passed. If you return the entire universe to the state it was in 200 years ago, it IS 200 years ago. Etc.
Oh. You've been watching the universe lately? ha ha only kidding you. I'm one of those type people who is able to guess the time, most of the time (pun intended) ~ almost to the minute 80% of the time, and to within about 11 minutes about 19% of the time, no matter where I am or what I am doing or who I am with or even if I've traveled or am in a dark environment or just woken up. I don't know why, but I find it interesting that it is so. As for your point about 2:20, I think that subjective experience is what he was referring to when he said, "it's deeply psychological' or something to that effect.
@@drbonesshow1 Eh? Have you watched the recent Westworld TV series in which a virtual Bernard the android spent 30,000 years or so in the Sublime tracing down all possible outcomes so he could return and nudge humanity away from self destruction?
Time is relative only to physical movement. If you believe that what separates future from past is an immeasurably brief moment, then you are seldom present.
This is it. Time is just the comparison of events with an agreed upon metric (usually a stable oscillator - a pendulum, the vibration of a cesium atom, etc).
I already agree with that idea but my question is how can explain speed of action s ? If time is an elusion for explain a currency difference between speed of action s how can be explain?
Agree at 1:00 ... because Newton's claim that if nothing happens time still goes on doesn't seem to hold basic water as 'time occurring' would be something. There's no such thing as nothing because it would take something to identify it. So time would then seem to not be a measure OF events but THE EVENT ... events do not 'flow with time' time is, are events ... of if you like, time are the events between events.
our ability to experience time is the coolest part about being alive. we are all time seers here at our core. it is our greatest super power. too bad we all get so stressed about not having enough time when it's all we'll ever know. and it's sad that we cant all get along here in time, even though we are all literally on the same time ship traveling together! now, the reason we experience time is obv so that we have time to make love. no cap. that part should be very obvious. we are the time creators at the end of the day. .. my hypothesis on time in physics is that it functions in a wavelength and we are only designed to see a portion of the wave called the past.
My idea is Time exists when there's movement in the universe/dimension/reality/existence, call it whatever. If everything stops completely, nothing exists. The light that travels to our eyes to process and "see" things would stop also. How can we measure when all process of perception have completely stopped. How would you explain time to a person that cannot see, hear, or touch anything.
Good response. Made me think a bit. For anything to exist there must be "time" in a "space" for it to be in. Kind of like a pet fish would require a tank and water in it. Fish requires both not one or the other. Water to swim in and a tank to hold the water. Movement with distance is existence.
@@josuecaldero5955 Alternatively... Time is a concept only. The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of things moving relative to each other.
this is a miopic presumption from Barbour; he needs to see something changing? what about seeing a stationary object with a fixed light source? One would automatically presume that time is suspended or non-existant because one can't see a change? What about the fact that protons and electrons though not readily visible are perpetually moving/changing? Maybe I'm off here, I dunno -
you are off but it's partly due to Barbour's explanation - Barbour doesn't mean that we only use sight to experience change and thereby sensing or experiencing time - it's just an example - the important concept for him is that time is experienced when things change - changes either outside ourselves or inside (bodily sensations) try this thought experiment - if the entire universe froze - would time still be ticking away in - say - another dimension - isn't that like believing in god - without proof of time as a fundamental dimension - then the likely explanation is that time emerges from the tempestuous changes going on in space - something changes in some way - time is experienced
I think time passes no matter what, you just need a frame of reference to prove it, just like you need a frame of reference for motion. The earth moves, but not from our frame of reference. Just an opinion, and probably an incomplete one.
i'm usually frustrated by videos about time. i think it is a huge mistake to dismiss the most important variable in physics as imaginary :) but this video did not upset me that much :)
I told my physics teacher that time did not exist, that we only experience it because something changes, if nothing changed, we would not perceive it. He send me to the psychologist and I got kicked out of school and they out me on pills. So those pills made me very sad and I never went back to school so I have a very low paying job and I never could get a girlfriend.
EElectric_M what an incredibly stupid teacher... and anecdote. I was bad at physics because I used to be bad at math, I should have been a c student in physics, but instead got Bs specifically because I talked about things inquisitively and asked weird questions. I don't know one teacher who wouldn't accept, at least conversationally, what you said.
Time is our awareness of and sensitivity to the constant and steady flow of energy resulting in the movement of material objects, be they astral bodies, water flowing or clouds blowing. Everything moves. It is the very nature of reality.
Yes but I put it this way... Time is a concept only. The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of things moving relative to each other.
It's interesting we're all on time here, just time stamps are different. According to statistical probability, some commentators might pass away since video has appeared. It's like time doesn't pass when nothing is changing on the picture, but inner time order of events that made this section possible is constantly braking down. Picture might appear timeless, but on a cost of it's inner substance also called entropy. This is important because things are in a constant free fall towards center of gravity curvature.
Time is simply the measurement of change, nothing else! No change, no time...I am a prresentist, the past does not exist as well as the future, only the changes in the present.
Why TIME fascinates people is the fact WE ALL grow older to the point we DIE as opposed to growing younger towards our mother's womb! We can only experience time going backwards is through photographs or instant replay and rewind on movie cameras.
He is all over the place. Time is simply a measurement at a factor of the speed of light. It is a way to measure the distance between occurrences. Simple
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL You are incorrect. We all use time everyday to measure events. You have to be to work at a certain time. You leave work after being there a certain amount of time. If I ask you when did you graduate from high school, you will use time to measure how long ago the event happened. Your time is a concept talk is a bunch of air for airheads. My watch is not a concept air Jordan
@@goldstream5147 There's no denying that time is a very useful concept. It is entirely understandable that after a lifetime of believing time to be a 'something' in the universe, one would find it challenging to realize its conceptual nature. I certainly did. I'm sure that if you watch Carlo Rovelli's RUclips lecture's on time you will change your mind. He explains it far better than I can. (Actually I'm not sure but I believe there is a good chance).
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Time has shown that ignorance is bliss, which is an important point, what you believe time to be is not what we know time to be. For you it can remain a concept. For you, your kind evolved from monkeys. For us, time is not defined as a concept and we come from the earth, not the monkeys like your kind believes. Embarrassingly, 100 years ago your kind couldn’t even tell that Africans were human, let alone what time is. Also, Einstein and others have also confirmed that time is a part of space - space time.
I'm having real trouble understanding what time is. To me it just doesn't make sense, isnt time just a creation of human species to help us go about our life and understand our surroundings better. People say time is traveling slower on other planets but aren't they just slower than the idea of time we created for our planets circulation of the sun? Time is measured by minutes, days and years but years are based around our full rotation of the sun and we just calculate other matters of the galaxy on this idea. So is there actually evidence on time on say a vibrational level or is it just about perception. Because time just seems unreal, is it faster than light? Or does it change and form on its own? I dont understamd how stars can die galaxies away but we see the light after there already dead? How does this work? Time and light would have to be traveling at different times. I have no idea, please any answers would be great!
he says time hasn't passed because he doesn't see any motion. i think time is moment that passes, even if a glass of water drops and reverses back to how it was, a moment has passed. history has occurred. time travel is impossible but repeat of events is.
There are four independent sizes or vastness (might not be the correct word, sorry) : Length, Mass, Electrical charge and Time. We have direct observing ability only for the length. Thats why it is very difficult to understand the others. Not only the time.
Brad Younger Moments aren't measured which is my point. As such, moments can't be defined in terms of relativistic affects as, conceptually, all moments are of the same duration regardless of one's point of view. Moments are outside the realm of physics and are more concept than fact.
Moments can be measured from the perspective of the individual and matched "near-precisely" to someone else's measurements - everything is relative, as we know. Planck lengths would be the most "near-accurate" measurement of a moment. But beneath a Planck length, measurements becomes meaningless within the confines of our universe.
It could be that there is a certain amount of the future experiencing the past and a certain amount of the past experiencing the the future in order to create the instant present moment and your conscious consentration of movement and spacial dimension in the moment creates your present experience of instant as a whole to the greater human shared consciousness of universal time experience. Time could be a superposition of energy creating matter, matter creating energy in the multiverse. Thomas Mottawa Wilson.
Time not only seems to require change in things but also the activity of memory. Without memory, there is no change only disconnected states of things. Another way of looking at this is to say that memory is the glue which holds individual states in an ordered succession of "earlier" and "later". Taking this viewpoint reduces time to a structure in the phenomenal world, the world that all sentient beings experience. I think the philosopher Kant had it right when he said that we must limit our science and knowledge to the phenomenal world. We have no direct access to things as they are in themselves, completely separate from our avenues of experience. Ultimate reality is like the engineer's black box, something whose inner workings we cannot directly experience but only what its output is, given a certain input. To say we can directly experience reality in itself is to say then that reality is phenomenal, constrained and determined by the structure of experience, which includes both time, space, and causality.
The quote on Einstein not really having given "duration" much thought is a wowser in the context of the clash betw. Einstein and Henri Bergson (then-celebrated philosopher who defined "duration" as the aspect of time that can't be reduced to number), a once-famous conflict recently brought back to light by Jimena Canales' book "The Physicist and the Philosopher." Bergson rules! Einstein drools! XX
i felt frustrated when Barbour didn't go on discussing "duration" - maybe he goes into more details in the videos of his longer lectures - - Einstein's frames of reference pretty clearly treat time as constant - ie a clock in a frame scooting past you at near the speed of light seems to have slowed down - altho the passenger & clock in that frame experiences time passing the - same - as - you - do - - this could be what Barbour was referencing when he mentioned Einstein's inattention to "duration"
Time, Space, Existence, Consciousness, Matter/Energy, Deity, Number... all of these are words (with different contexts and usages) describing distinct but inextricably connected aspects of one fundamental binary: Perceived and Unperceived.
Time is a flow of events....physical or mental ..... The physical seems to offer no reverse direction but strangely, the mind seems to. The parallel universe and time travel is in the dream state .....
I like the thinking of that person, Perhaps he has no exception of new idea. I am nobody but as I know time is rule our life more than we think of. Great example is our own body and brain which can communicate more than the tick of clock, even what he thinks about how we get thoughts its about time at it own value.
Julian Barbour is a world expert on the subject of time; he also holds the minority viewpoint among physicists that time does not exist. He is a deep thinker and this video doesn't do him justice. If you really want to understand his views on time, and learn a lot about the foundations of physics, read his book The End of Time (1999).
Surely without time no two events could be separated? If time did not exist per se, everything would either remain unchanged or would instantly change to a final state. Time is the indicator of the energetics of change, since energetics is tied in with the rate at which an event can take place, with available energy. A heavy object could be thrown a great distance very quickly if there were enough energy avail, but only slowly if there was not. Time is a function of energy in some way.
Time is distance (space) divided by velocity t=s/v. . Frequency is the number of light-waves produced in 1 second of time (f=1/t). Time is therefore the frequency of a light-wave multiplied by its wavelength and it is relative to time (again t=s/v). That is why the speed-of-light (c) in a vacuum just happens to be based on the wave-length and frequency of light-waves. That is spacetime. It has absolutely nothing to do with Earth-time based on the rotation of the earth around the sun, in which time is based on astronomy and not physics.
3.24 Clocks are "marching in steps with each other." Well they are not, are they? Only if they are in the same frames of reference, that is only if they move in unity. Otherwise their steps will not be synchronized.
Time is a cross-boundary, "unification concept" of motion and he seems to bog down in the notion of time being an agreement between two watches. It's not. Those two watches have to agree with not only each other but with the number of (what we've defined as) seconds there are in a day which has to agree with the speed at which the earth is rotating which has to agree with the speed the earth circles the sun which has to agree with the velocity the sun is revolving around the center of the galaxy, etc.We unify all those different types of measurements with an almost ineffable notion we use as the "master-measurement" and call it time. It IS an "illusion" but a necessary one which is self-imposed. It is, in fact, a requirement of intelligent existence. We literally can not "not have a concept exactly the same as time".
that is what you explain the old measurement of time if you need an update we us vibrations from atomic systems. Of such these include Cesium and ammonia
If time is motion then time doesn't exist where no motion is. Motion creates heat - thus when there is no heat then there is no motion and no time. WOOT! My freezer is a time-machine! ^^
Hey look, that glowing ball pops up every day, we could use that to make appointments... But..., it's not really a stable system. Don't worry, we'll skip and add days now and then, it's fine. We'll even pull an hour from the bottom and glue it to the top so we have a longer one for a while... My favourite quote by someone in school when i was younger: "it's about time that it's time."
What really exists in this reality is "events" not "time". Events have their own pace ...slow, medium & fast .Time is only a "measure" of "pace"of these events happening. In reality, the pace of an event can be increased or decreased by means of some force.....so.... Time is only a "measure" associated with events. Got it?
A photon's clock runs really really slow seeing as it's moving at the speed of light. Time stops at the event horizon of a black hole. Science doesn't seem to be easy for you...
Time is the effect of existence of mass which occupies space. Mass is the effect of existence of consciousness awareness. Together mass, space and time are the effects (illusion) of the same awareness consciousness.
Raydensheraj......Haven't read his books, I'm sure they're a wonderful read, but I just get the impression from his narrative here that he's not exactly sure that what he's saying is totally true. No problem tho, because sometimes we have to say things we don't particularly believe to get to where we wanna go. If that makes any sense
Might the "now" moment be how decoherence is expressed in the time dimension of space-time? So, in space we experience solid matter (as opposed to the wave it emerged from) and in time we experience the "now". The implication would be that time is emergent from mass, not fundamental. Also, the arrow of time would therefore be the result of our continuously expanding universe, which in turn "stretches" all matter, which in turn generates a continuous flow of new "now" moments. Another implication of this way of thinking is that entropy is the result of our expanding universe.
I believe 'time IS emergent from' matter and I put it this way... Time is a concept only. The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of things moving relative to each other.
Superb video, thank you. Time for me is an emergent aspect of Entropy. Without Entropy there would be no way of noticing the passage of Time, and entropy is one directional. Hence, Time is too. Thinking about what i just wrote, i think its not entirely a cogent explanation, since by expending energy, one can undo a high entropy state into a lower one. 😅😅
The professor in the video (Julian Barbour) recently released a book that talks about this idea of time's relation to entropy in much more detail, you might find it interesting. It's called 'The Janus Point - A New Theory of Time'
On the other hand you may find this more compelling... Time is a concept only. The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of things moving relative to each other.
His concept is absolutely correct and the reason why time has never been settled on what it actually is, or if it even exists. The issue is just as big taking time out of the equation as having it in the equation. I don't think Einstein agreed with what time was, he just needed to have it added in to complete his theories. The issue is that these theories, which have been shown to be true, over and over again show that time as Einstein thought of it, was indeed real. The worst part which Julian touches on briefly is that Einstein didn't even like time, it was more that he could not exclude it to complete his theories. If you can't exclude time from a working theory then it must be real. The issue with time is that it forces you to comply, it's like a jail you can't break out of. As much as you don't want to include it in your theories, you have to. Even worse is that time makes you comply in theories the same way each time. It's one of the biggest reasons why no traction has been made since Einstein on this subject. The biggest annoyance ever.
Time isn't real. It was invented by man. As a side effect of having a regular set of 'snapshots' of some motion and using 'distance' we can get both velocity and acceleration. Clocks are used as a guide to take those snapshots. But the kicker here is that ONLY man is interested in velocity or acceleration. We use those concepts to study our world. No Animal or rock formation gives two hoots about the 'time'. Think about it, only man wants to meet next wednesday at 2:45 and only man wants to study the motion of a ball bouncing down the stairs!
“We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.” ― John Archibald Wheeler
Like fractals!
@@youretheai7586 You're the fractal.
What he says at 3:09 is truly the key.
No physicist in the world today know for sure what "Time" is. However, some youtubers seems to have it all figured out.
*know's
knows*
Nose.........nos...........
youtubers can have hypotheses - it's a law of nature
Einstein was a patent clerk. Just sayin.
I love the way this guy talks. You can see in his eyes that he's not really convinced that what he's saying is in fact the absolute
truth, but he's trying to be as honest as he can be given his position of trying to satisfy the interviewers quest for an answer
So his books are just mumbo jumbo hmmm....ohhhkayyy
0:09 What is Time?
“A succession of pictures” continuously changing one into the other
We need a concept of change to hold a concept of time
0:59 Newton’s flow of time is wrong according to Barbour
2:00 You need change. Without it, you can’t say time has past.
2:58 Watches march in step not with Time, but with each other
3:36 Time, for practical purposes, is about keeping people synchronized, in about the same, common time
4:41 Refinements. Einstein showed the idea of absolute simultaneity is difficult at high speeds
5:24 Simultaneity at separate points.
6:07 We’ve reached a pleatu until Quantam Mechanics.
Atoms
6:49 Atomic Clocks, cesium atom.
7:35 Greater Accuracy requires Greater Care, Taking more variables in account
Photo frame of everything is changing within a fraction of a second and going into the past, next frame is still awaited and all pass in a blink of an eye
@@kalapitrivedi6966 i don't think it's like a photo
All I can say is that this man's concept of time is exactly my concept of time and I'm just a guy who's been interested in the time and timekeeping for most of my life and while I do hold an advanced degree, none of my degrees have to do with physics. I came to my view of time by reading and studying on my own. And what is more impressive about Julian Barbour is that he makes his case in plain english.
Consider...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Wrong . You can experience time simply looking at the sky changing, trees changing, yourself changing and so on.. without any social interaction. Time is not a concept but physical reality. What nonsense and stupidity in this video !
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL you are right, time does not really exist, only physic matters motion is getting affected by gravity and/or speed and this is finally having an influence on the result of that "time conception"
Time is a measuring tool on how we perceive an always changing universe
This is a most interesting, thoughtful exposition of "time" as a human construct with innumerable uses in our everyday world. It does not say much about time as the quintessentially mysterious foundation of theoretical physics.
Do you get paid by the syllable or something?
@@scottk1525 I can see why you asked. I was sure polysyllabic in that comment.
I was watching a physics video in which it was explained
there is no need for time in physics,
that everything little t does in calculations can be done another way without it.
My take on time is summarized...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
I wouldn't be surprised to discover that
the boundary between physics and philosophy
is really very fuzzy.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Hey - I so agree with you - time is just a concept invented by man and initially prompted by living inside a big clock. It's so not 'mysterious'!
@@chickenduckquack I am glad that you and I and Carlo Rovelli are all in fundamental agreement.
But I wouldn't say "just a concept".
I would say,
"a most extraordinary, fabulous, astounding, useful and convenient concept".
lol
Can't we define time as change in the arrangement of atom ?
we see time in just such a way that it aallows water and/or beautiful hair to shimmer and allure us. a key to our survival
I'm a bit surprised with JBs comments about the deep rooted psychological experience of time moving forward and how he experiences it too. I thought with his viewpoint and all the research he's done on the subject that his perceptions would be free of that naivety.
Even in an unchanging environment or when staring at a picture you have thoughts passing in your mind. As long as you have consciousness You couldn't possibly be unaware of the passing of time. Time is conscious awareness.
Then unless you are truly paying attention to your consciousness, there is no feeling of time existing.
This logic is flawed though. You say "even in an unchanging environment you have thoughts passing in your mind". Therefore the environment is not unchanging. Unless you stray from the physical view of the universe (I won't say reductionist), it is obvious that time only exists as the perception of change. If your consciousness was frozen, all the electrons stopped and the neurones stopped firing, then you wouldn't perceive time. If the environment is TRULY unchanging, then you aren't aware of time passing because you too are frozen.
Well, he did say "if you have a record" of a picture and it doesn't change....I've never ever seen a picture on a record...there is that.
They say time is going from order to disorder but isn't it more accurate to say that time is the measurement of motion or in the case already mentioned, the measure of going from order to disorder, the measurement of change?
I thought this was going to be the metaphysical interpretation of time, but it's time used as a practical measuring tool type of video.
I agree with Julian Barbour's ideas about what time actually is. Time is merely movement in our physical universe. It is wild and unfounded theory which claims that time is a "dimension". I also think that all events are reversible, meaning that time has no true direction. Entropy supposedly is "time's arrow", but with energy or deliberate action (by us), we can reverse "time's arrow". Additionally, entropy must include a change in positions and movement which is the proposed definition of time.
where is that library it's awesome
Time is my mom yelling at me for hours
Change α Δx/Δt were the small letter "t" is time. It's kinda' basic physics.
I read his book and wasn't convinced. Without time how can you explain the transition from frame to frame? How can you even use the word 'transition' without a time reference? The best you can do is to give time another name, but hell it is still time.
Completely Agree
Barbour is NOT saying that there is no time - he's saying it isn't fundamental - he's saying that the transition from frame to frame is creating time - whereas you are saying that time is ticking away before and after the consecutive frames - so that transition is occurring within it - it's a subtle difference - but worth trying to grasp
Barbour's definition makes no sense, but Newton's does.
John Eyon How can that transition exists without time? I can easily imagine space not being fundamental, you just need a network configured in a particular way. But it seems to me that all attempts at considering time as not fundamental end up doing the trick of just hiding it inside another concept: transition, change, transformation... None of those concepts actually make sense without some idea of time as a preexisting condition.
@@SidneyBloom EXACTLY.
Amazing! With this one video, millions of physicists were created in the comments section
To be taught and get convinced means some changed opinion, pple have retained theirs except for a fool like you who cant have such own opinion!!
Well, 703 anyway.
The guys who get a paycheck doing theoretical physics all have different conceptions and pet theories of time, so it's fair game.
@@marcv2648 - good point - and also science popularizers - such as the producers & interviewees of this video series - they need to know what's getting thru to the lay audience - and what isn't
What might a time separate from causation look like?
Distance by time is always a constant. The maximum is C. Energy content of anything is the measure of velocity. Directions make senses as for as velocity is concerned. Variations in directions is what traps energy otherwise it is ever constant. Mostly vector equations. Time is a measure of relative velocity of matter to that of light speed.
Velocity does not exist for a single body in empty space . Velocity is measured relative to something.
We don’t know the real speed of time
Did he actually answer the question at all? Because maybe I missed it but it seemed like he was re-describing what perception of time is
He has no idea what he's talking about
2:20 - I think to really say "no time is passing," you have to extend the "no change" to everything - the entire universe, including yourself. Even if the whole universe outside of you froze, you still have a subjective internal experience of time passing. You've built that up over from experience. If someone locks you in a dark room for half an hour, you probably know you've been in there for more than 10 minutes and less than an hour. Different people would have more accurate internal clocks. But, if NOTHING changes, universe wide, then I absolutely believe that no time has passed. If you return the entire universe to the state it was in 200 years ago, it IS 200 years ago. Etc.
Oh. You've been watching the universe lately? ha ha only kidding you. I'm one of those type people who is able to guess the time, most of the time (pun intended) ~ almost to the minute 80% of the time, and to within about 11 minutes about 19% of the time, no matter where I am or what I am doing or who I am with or even if I've traveled or am in a dark environment or just woken up. I don't know why, but I find it interesting that it is so. As for your point about 2:20, I think that subjective experience is what he was referring to when he said, "it's deeply psychological' or something to that effect.
time is change or is time expressed as change or both?
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL i remember time is a construct and is a parameter if an object is moving in our lives
Would you take air in and out of lugs while looking in to unmovable picture?
As a physics professor, the only thing that I truly understand about time is that there is too little of it for me.
You may have mine. Want to buy it from me?
If you could think and move a million times faster than you do
you would have a million times more time in which to think.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL The answer to that is sadly no. Sorry to burn your pumpernickel.
@@drbonesshow1 Eh?
Have you watched the recent Westworld TV series in which a virtual Bernard the android spent 30,000 years or so in the Sublime tracing down all possible outcomes so he could return and nudge humanity away from self destruction?
p.s. 'time' in the Sublime has a ratio of a thousand to one in relation to 'real' time (because the computer can think so much faster).
as for time, how to define space?
Time is relative only to physical movement. If you believe that what separates future from past is an immeasurably brief moment, then you are seldom present.
This is it. Time is just the comparison of events with an agreed upon metric (usually a stable oscillator - a pendulum, the vibration of a cesium atom, etc).
I already agree with that idea but my question is how can explain speed of action s ? If time is an elusion for explain a currency difference between speed of action s how can be explain?
Why are atomic clocks so regular in quantum field?
It is in their nature.
Do clocks and objects in motion count time, as if time were numbers?
No. They simply exist and move relative to other objects.
(Which may not be as simple as it looks).
Agree at 1:00 ... because Newton's claim that if nothing happens time still goes on doesn't seem to hold basic water as 'time occurring' would be something. There's no such thing as nothing because it would take something to identify it.
So time would then seem to not be a measure OF events but THE EVENT ... events do not 'flow with time' time is, are events ... of if you like, time are the events between events.
our ability to experience time is the coolest part about being alive. we are all time seers here at our core. it is our greatest super power. too bad we all get so stressed about not having enough time when it's all we'll ever know. and it's sad that we cant all get along here in time, even though we are all literally on the same time ship traveling together! now, the reason we experience time is obv so that we have time to make love. no cap. that part should be very obvious. we are the time creators at the end of the day. .. my hypothesis on time in physics is that it functions in a wavelength and we are only designed to see a portion of the wave called the past.
Is there feeling of time accumulating like counting seconds, even when there are no changes happening?
There are never no changes happening.
My idea is Time exists when there's movement in the universe/dimension/reality/existence, call it whatever. If everything stops completely, nothing exists. The light that travels to our eyes to process and "see" things would stop also. How can we measure when all process of perception have completely stopped. How would you explain time to a person that cannot see, hear, or touch anything.
>>If everything stops completely, nothing exists
Good response. Made me think a bit. For anything to exist there must be "time" in a "space" for it to be in. Kind of like a pet fish would require a tank and water in it. Fish requires both not one or the other. Water to swim in and a tank to hold the water. Movement with distance is existence.
@@josuecaldero5955 Alternatively...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
this is a miopic presumption from Barbour; he needs to see something changing? what about seeing a stationary object with a fixed light source? One would automatically presume that time is suspended or non-existant because one can't see a change? What about the fact that protons and electrons though not readily visible are perpetually moving/changing? Maybe I'm off here, I dunno -
you are off but it's partly due to Barbour's explanation - Barbour doesn't mean that we only use sight to experience change and thereby sensing or experiencing time - it's just an example - the important concept for him is that time is experienced when things change - changes either outside ourselves or inside (bodily sensations)
try this thought experiment - if the entire universe froze - would time still be ticking away in - say - another dimension - isn't that like believing in god - without proof of time as a fundamental dimension - then the likely explanation is that time emerges from the tempestuous changes going on in space - something changes in some way - time is experienced
I think time passes no matter what, you just need a frame of reference to prove it, just like you need a frame of reference for motion. The earth moves, but not from our frame of reference. Just an opinion, and probably an incomplete one.
If time is just the measure of change..why does a clock going fast through space click more slowly then a clock at rest?
I'm addicted to this channel
i'm usually frustrated by videos about time. i think it is a huge mistake to dismiss the most important variable in physics as imaginary :) but this video did not upset me that much :)
I told my physics teacher that time did not exist, that we only experience it because something changes, if nothing changed, we would not perceive it. He send me to the psychologist and I got kicked out of school and they out me on pills. So those pills made me very sad and I never went back to school so I have a very low paying job and I never could get a girlfriend.
EElectric_M what an incredibly stupid teacher... and anecdote. I was bad at physics because I used to be bad at math, I should have been a c student in physics, but instead got Bs specifically because I talked about things inquisitively and asked weird questions.
I don't know one teacher who wouldn't accept, at least conversationally, what you said.
well thats just depressing
Good.
Just wait a bit, to find a good woman, well, it takes some time. 😁
Time is our awareness of and sensitivity to the constant and steady flow of energy resulting in the movement of material objects, be they astral bodies, water flowing or clouds blowing. Everything moves. It is the very nature of reality.
Yes but I put it this way...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
It's interesting we're all on time here, just time stamps are different. According to statistical probability, some commentators might pass away since video has appeared. It's like time doesn't pass when nothing is changing on the picture, but inner time order of events that made this section possible is constantly braking down. Picture might appear timeless, but on a cost of it's inner substance also called entropy. This is important because things are in a constant free fall towards center of gravity curvature.
Time is when you are fed up of waiting for the bus to come on time
How could you define time in a better way?
Time is a measurement.
No, we measure time. But time itself is not a measurement.
@@paroblynn That statement makes very little sense. It's a measurement that is measured but it's not a measurement?
@@jlg4398 time keeping is measuring time. Time in and of itself isn’t the measurement.
Sense of time moving forward into future from entropy due to change being irreversible?
Time is simply the measurement of change, nothing else! No change, no time...I am a prresentist, the past does not exist as well as the future, only the changes in the present.
Why TIME fascinates people is the fact WE ALL grow older to the point we DIE as opposed to growing younger towards our mother's womb! We can only experience time going backwards is through photographs or instant replay and rewind on movie cameras.
Does space keep a record of time moving into the past?
He is all over the place. Time is simply a measurement at a factor of the speed of light. It is a way to measure the distance between occurrences. Simple
Not a measurement.
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL You are incorrect. We all use time everyday to measure events. You have to be to work at a certain time. You leave work after being there a certain amount of time. If I ask you when did you graduate from high school, you will use time to measure how long ago the event happened. Your time is a concept talk is a bunch of air for airheads. My watch is not a concept air Jordan
@@goldstream5147 There's no denying that
time is a very useful concept.
It is entirely understandable that
after a lifetime of believing time to be a 'something' in the universe,
one would find it challenging to realize its conceptual nature.
I certainly did.
I'm sure that if you watch Carlo Rovelli's RUclips lecture's on time you will change your mind.
He explains it far better than I can.
(Actually I'm not sure but I believe there is a good chance).
@@REDPUMPERNICKEL Time has shown that ignorance is bliss, which is an important point, what you believe time to be is not what we know time to be. For you it can remain a concept. For you, your kind evolved from monkeys. For us, time is not defined as a concept and we come from the earth, not the monkeys like your kind believes. Embarrassingly, 100 years ago your kind couldn’t even tell that Africans were human, let alone what time is. Also, Einstein and others have also confirmed that time is a part of space - space time.
I'm having real trouble understanding what time is. To me it just doesn't make sense, isnt time just a creation of human species to help us go about our life and understand our surroundings better. People say time is traveling slower on other planets but aren't they just slower than the idea of time we created for our planets circulation of the sun? Time is measured by minutes, days and years but years are based around our full rotation of the sun and we just calculate other matters of the galaxy on this idea. So is there actually evidence on time on say a vibrational level or is it just about perception. Because time just seems unreal, is it faster than light? Or does it change and form on its own? I dont understamd how stars can die galaxies away but we see the light after there already dead? How does this work? Time and light would have to be traveling at different times. I have no idea, please any answers would be great!
he says time hasn't passed because he doesn't see any motion. i think time is moment that passes, even if a glass of water drops and reverses back to how it was, a moment has passed. history has occurred. time travel is impossible but repeat of events is.
Everyone on the comments had the insight that humanity is trying to understand since always. Amazing how many genius there are on the internet!!
opinions need to be cancelled 😝
Animals do not have a wrist watch but a cow will come to be milked at the same time every day so animals can measure time without a clock explain that
There are four independent sizes or vastness (might not be the correct word, sorry) : Length, Mass, Electrical charge and Time.
We have direct observing ability only for the length. Thats why it is very difficult to understand the others. Not only the time.
This moment, right now, exists, has exited, will exist. In this sense, perhaps, we never truly die.
We don't, you got it :), we are infinite in the reality of the now.
+DataSlam The problem with using a "moment" as a measure stick is that you can't measure its size. For instance, how long is a moment?
Brad Younger Moments aren't measured which is my point. As such, moments can't be defined in terms of relativistic affects as, conceptually, all moments are of the same duration regardless of one's point of view. Moments are outside the realm of physics and are more concept than fact.
Moments can be measured from the perspective of the individual and matched "near-precisely" to someone else's measurements - everything is relative, as we know. Planck lengths would be the most "near-accurate" measurement of a moment. But beneath a Planck length, measurements becomes meaningless within the confines of our universe.
Its idea existed, and now its memory in that sense will remain too.
T=d/s, so to cover distance with a speed means your moving.
Could time be movement.
Thomas Mottawa Wilson.
It could be that there is a certain amount of the future experiencing the past and a certain amount of the past experiencing the the future in order to create the instant present moment and your conscious consentration of movement and spacial dimension in the moment creates your present experience of instant as a whole to the greater human shared consciousness of universal time experience.
Time could be a superposition of energy creating matter, matter creating energy in the multiverse.
Thomas Mottawa Wilson.
Time not only seems to require change in things but also the activity of memory. Without memory, there is no change only disconnected states of things. Another way of looking at this is to say that memory is the glue which holds individual states in an ordered succession of "earlier" and "later". Taking this viewpoint reduces time to a structure in the phenomenal world, the world that all sentient beings experience. I think the philosopher Kant had it right when he said that we must limit our science and knowledge to the phenomenal world. We have no direct access to things as they are in themselves, completely separate from our avenues of experience. Ultimate reality is like the engineer's black box, something whose inner workings we cannot directly experience but only what its output is, given a certain input. To say we can directly experience reality in itself is to say then that reality is phenomenal, constrained and determined by the structure of experience, which includes both time, space, and causality.
The quote on Einstein not really having given "duration" much thought is a wowser in the context of the clash betw. Einstein and Henri Bergson (then-celebrated philosopher who defined "duration" as the aspect of time that can't be reduced to number), a once-famous conflict recently brought back to light by Jimena Canales' book "The Physicist and the Philosopher." Bergson rules! Einstein drools! XX
Could time be contracting as space is expanding? Does space + time = constant?
i felt frustrated when Barbour didn't go on discussing "duration" - maybe he goes into more details in the videos of his longer lectures - - Einstein's frames of reference pretty clearly treat time as constant - ie a clock in a frame scooting past you at near the speed of light seems to have slowed down - altho the passenger & clock in that frame experiences time passing the - same - as - you - do - - this could be what Barbour was referencing when he mentioned Einstein's inattention to "duration"
Where does time come from? What happens to time if you go through a black hole?
JUST LIKE HE SAID NOTHING WOULD CHANGE IF TIME NEVER CHANGED.
This week seems like a great use of my time right now.
Time, Space, Existence, Consciousness, Matter/Energy, Deity, Number... all of these are words (with different contexts and usages) describing distinct but inextricably connected aspects of one fundamental binary: Perceived and Unperceived.
it takes time to connect space and thus space IS time
Came here after Top5s video to hear about this very interesting !
Time is a flow of events....physical or mental ..... The physical seems to offer no reverse direction but strangely, the mind seems to. The parallel universe and time travel is in the dream state .....
I found the comments section far more interesting than the video which was lacking in meaningful information.
deckard6_6 "meaningful information"; that's putting it...nicely!
I like the thinking of that person, Perhaps he has no exception of new idea. I am nobody but as I know time is rule our life more than we think of. Great example is our own body
and brain which can communicate more than the tick of clock, even what he thinks about how we get thoughts its about time at it own value.
For Mr Barbour the question should not have been " What is time" but " What time is it"?
thank you Julian .
There is the past, present and future. We call it time. How it relates to the speed of light is quite a jump. The photo ages so it does change.
Julian Barbour is a world expert on the subject of time; he also holds the minority viewpoint among physicists that time does not exist. He is a deep thinker and this video doesn't do him justice. If you really want to understand his views on time, and learn a lot about the foundations of physics, read his book The End of Time (1999).
Surely without time no two events could be separated? If time did not exist per se, everything would either remain unchanged or would instantly change to a final state. Time is the indicator of the energetics of change, since energetics is tied in with the rate at which an event can take place, with available energy. A heavy object could be thrown a great distance very quickly if there were enough energy avail, but only slowly if there was not. Time is a function of energy in some way.
First part of your claim is exactly right. The second part, no. The 'energetics of change' is the proxy we use to try to measure Time.
Cant see the wind but it's there professor!
He's using "see" as the verb to express "experience". Is that all you get from this, an activation of your own pedantry???
Time is distance (space) divided by velocity t=s/v. . Frequency is the number of light-waves produced in 1 second of time (f=1/t). Time is therefore the frequency of a light-wave multiplied by its wavelength and it is relative to time (again t=s/v). That is why the speed-of-light (c) in a vacuum just happens to be based on the wave-length and frequency of light-waves. That is spacetime. It has absolutely nothing to do with Earth-time based on the rotation of the earth around the sun, in which time is based on astronomy and not physics.
3.24 Clocks are "marching in steps with each other." Well they are not, are they? Only if they are in the same frames of reference, that is only if they move in unity. Otherwise their steps will not be synchronized.
BREAKING NEWS: Time is this thing, which can be measured by clocks, so that we can keep appointments. What a literal waste of time...
Time is a cross-boundary, "unification concept" of motion and he seems to bog down in the notion of time being an agreement between two watches. It's not. Those two watches have to agree with not only each other but with the number of (what we've defined as) seconds there are in a day which has to agree with the speed at which the earth is rotating which has to agree with the speed the earth circles the sun which has to agree with the velocity the sun is revolving around the center of the galaxy, etc.We unify all those different types of measurements with an almost ineffable notion we use as the "master-measurement" and call it time. It IS an "illusion" but a necessary one which is self-imposed. It is, in fact, a requirement of intelligent existence. We literally can not "not have a concept exactly the same as time".
that is what you explain the old measurement of time if you need an update we us vibrations from atomic systems. Of such these include Cesium and ammonia
Time has to be defined at a more fundamental level than what is discussed here.
Attempts to MEASURE time implies the properties present - why?
If time is motion then time doesn't exist where no motion is. Motion creates heat - thus when there is no heat then there is no motion and no time. WOOT! My freezer is a time-machine! ^^
Oners82 It is possible to reach absolute zero - at least temporary.
Oners82 It is possible now.
No atoms = no temperature.
Hey look, that glowing ball pops up every day, we could use that to make appointments... But..., it's not really a stable system. Don't worry, we'll skip and add days now and then, it's fine. We'll even pull an hour from the bottom and glue it to the top so we have a longer one for a while... My favourite quote by someone in school when i was younger: "it's about time that it's time."
What really exists in this reality is "events" not "time". Events have their own pace ...slow, medium & fast .Time is only a "measure" of "pace"of these events happening. In reality, the pace of an event can be increased or decreased by means of some force.....so.... Time is only a "measure" associated with events. Got it?
but time moves at the same pace forever and always and with that how do you explain spacetime
A photon's clock runs really really slow seeing as it's moving at the speed of light.
Time stops at the event horizon of a black hole.
Science doesn't seem to be easy for you...
If time didn't exist independently of events, you couldn't tell if events happened slowly or quickly, LOL.
What time is it?
1 year later
Time is the effect of existence of mass which occupies space.
Mass is the effect of existence of consciousness awareness.
Together mass, space and time are the effects (illusion) of the same awareness consciousness.
it's 6:55pm in San Diego
and yet it feels like 10 o'clock
Raydensheraj......Haven't read his books, I'm sure they're a wonderful read, but I just get the impression from his narrative here that he's not
exactly sure that what he's saying is totally true. No problem tho, because sometimes we have to say things we don't particularly believe to
get to where we wanna go. If that makes any sense
Time is a measure of progress. Time has wave properties. Progress through time is directly affected by temperature.
Might the "now" moment be how decoherence is expressed in the time dimension of space-time? So, in space we experience solid matter (as opposed to the wave it emerged from) and in time we experience the "now". The implication would be that time is emergent from mass, not fundamental. Also, the arrow of time would therefore be the result of our continuously expanding universe, which in turn "stretches" all matter, which in turn generates a continuous flow of new "now" moments. Another implication of this way of thinking is that entropy is the result of our expanding universe.
Damn that's a really interesting idea, thanks for sharing!
so instead of expanding entropy - you say it's expanding space - that produces the arrow of time
I believe 'time IS emergent from' matter and I put it this way...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
Time does not exist. Therefore it cannot begin and it cannot end. What we perceive as time is simply changes that take place in our existence.
You perceive change only because of the existence of Time.
Superb video, thank you. Time for me is an emergent aspect of Entropy. Without Entropy there would be no way of noticing the passage of Time, and entropy is one directional. Hence, Time is too. Thinking about what i just wrote, i think its not entirely a cogent explanation, since by expending energy, one can undo a high entropy state into a lower one. 😅😅
The professor in the video (Julian Barbour) recently released a book that talks about this idea of time's relation to entropy in much more detail, you might find it interesting.
It's called 'The Janus Point - A New Theory of Time'
On the other hand you may find this more compelling...
Time is a concept only.
The concept developed out of our thoughts about our observations of
things moving relative to each other.
Time was invented by man - it is a concept. It has no direction. We only live in the now and as such 'time passing' has no meaning.
Multitasking....on dunny learning about our concept of time.
His concept is absolutely correct and the reason why time has never been settled on what it actually is, or if it even exists. The issue is just as big taking time out of the equation as having it in the equation. I don't think Einstein agreed with what time was, he just needed to have it added in to complete his theories. The issue is that these theories, which have been shown to be true, over and over again show that time as Einstein thought of it, was indeed real. The worst part which Julian touches on briefly is that Einstein didn't even like time, it was more that he could not exclude it to complete his theories. If you can't exclude time from a working theory then it must be real. The issue with time is that it forces you to comply, it's like a jail you can't break out of. As much as you don't want to include it in your theories, you have to. Even worse is that time makes you comply in theories the same way each time. It's one of the biggest reasons why no traction has been made since Einstein on this subject. The biggest annoyance ever.
Time isn't real. It was invented by man. As a side effect of having a regular set of 'snapshots' of some motion and using 'distance' we can get both velocity and acceleration. Clocks are used as a guide to take those snapshots. But the kicker here is that ONLY man is interested in velocity or acceleration. We use those concepts to study our world. No Animal or rock formation gives two hoots about the 'time'. Think about it, only man wants to meet next wednesday at 2:45 and only man wants to study the motion of a ball bouncing down the stairs!
6:50 isn't a quartz clock "quantum mechanic"?
You tickle it with electricity to make a very precise frequency, quantum mechanics are both timeless and timefundamental, yet to be solved :)
While there is a general sense of time in quantum field, something does have to happen in space for time to pass in the past, present and future.
Without time, would there be change?
There is no time. There are only things moving.
duration, in order to exist, needs a measurement. if there is no measurement from the side of the observer, there is no duration.