Re: Time/Life/Science

["Judith Rosen" <***>]

Hi Tim,

I see what you are saying. But I'm looking at this from a different
direction: The truth is that anything that comes out of human consciousness
is going to be a limited and inadequate description of material reality.
That's the given that gets forgotten in a lot of "hard science". My father's
all-time best remark on that subject: "There is nothing more abstract than a
measurement." We've already talked about the limitations of language (which
are also an expression of human consciousness) to convey information from
one mind to another. But since we can't be other than what we are, namely
flawed and limited material systems, if we're going to discuss a concept
like TIME, we have to do it within this admittedly inadequate set of
parameters.

That being so, what I wonder is how would you describe the phenomenon that I
call TIME. You seem to know what I mean when I refer to it, and you've
pointed out several areas where human perceptions of it may be inadequate,
but now that you've said what it isn't, I'm curious to know what you think
"it" is.What is space/time/other; what is this aspect to the universe and
all the things in it-- that we are seeing the influence of in dynamical
systems and even more so in living systems?

Thanks,
Jude

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tim Gwinn" <***>
To: <***>
Sent: Sunday, October 05, 2003 7:40 PM
Subject: Re: [ROSEN] Time/Life/Science

> As I see it, "dynamical" is a term which is based in the language of a
> 3-dimensional space + 1-dimension of time conceptual framework. So, from
> within this conceptual framework, "dynamical" is indeed about changes
along
> both dimensions of space and time.

> My feeling is that this conceptual framework is inadequate in a way akin
to
> which the Newtonian framework for physics is inadequate for representation
> of complex systems. My thought is that any 3+1 conceptual framework -
> including Einsteinian - will be inadequate as a conceptual modeling
> framework for what we call "dynamical" processes in the material world.

> From this view, "dynamical" is a limited concept. It is limited by the
> notion of state. This notion of state in turn rests on conceptually
dividing
> the world into "space"+"time". I suggest that this concept, although as
> commonsensical as Newtonian physics, is not thereby a true and complete
> representation of the material world. I believe it is incomplete, and
cannot
> be made complete by any amount of enhancements or modifications.

> I think that this kind of thinking is mistaking the formal concept for the
> reality. We model the world in 3+1 spacetime frameworks, and we then begin
> to think that the material world _actually_is_ this 3+1 framework, and so
> "time" is also a real thing.
>