|
After thinking yet
some more about "time", I am inclined to think that the situation we are in with
regard to time is somewhat akin to the limitation in physics we know as "the
measurement problem" in quantum mechanics.
Rosen describes
the key aspect of the measurement problem as follows:
"The problem here is that the very acquisition of data, the
very cognition of phenomena (phenotype) in a material system, requires one to
consider a larger system ("system + observer") and not to consider
smaller ones, as reductionism (or context-independence, or objectivity)
requires. This in turn creates a chicken-egg situation, an
impredicativity; specifically, one must know the larger system to
characterize the smaller, but one cannot know the larger until the smaller
is characterized." [EL 106]
With time, I feel
we are in a similar situation. In this case the "smaller system" is some system
which exhibits the apparent quality of "time" we want
to describe using terms like
dynamism/change/process/action/etc. But, we cannot know this quality of
this smaller system except by considering a larger system, consisting
of the ("system + observer + clock-reference-system"). Here the
clock-reference-system is some system which acts to generate the time
labels or references. This can be an actual clock, or the sun moving across
the sky, or even our internal awareness of our changing thoughts (as Mach
noted). Without some such reference system we cannot even have a
sense of the "passage of time".
If this is so,
then it seems to me that the scientific investigation of time will be
circumscribed by this impredicativity in the same way that scientific
investigations of quantum systems are circumscribed by the impredicative nature
of the measurement problem. As a result, it seems to me that the dynamical
qualities of systems can only be studied with
reference to some clock system. This
impredicativity also thereby sets limits on the sensibility of questions
about time that are outside of that circumscribed
realm.
Note that the
clock system need not always be separate from the system itself. In the
discussion of "Time and Age" [AS 4.8], Rosen demonstrates that "age" is perhaps
most accurately portrayed not by reference to some external common clock
time, but by a dimensionless quantity in which the changes in state of
the system are themselves the basis for the "units of time" used to detemine the
system's "age". With his example of a system having radioactive
decay, he notes "If we measure time in units proportional to the rate of decay
(e.g., in half-lives), then all systems obeying [an equation of
radioactive decay] decay at the same rate." [AS 273]
However,
this kind of measure is often unsatisfying for most of our investigations
of dynamical qualities: we generally want to contrast their dynamical qualities
with those of their environment and/or other particular systems (e.g.,
ourselves!), and thus we generally invoke some system external to the one
under study to act as the clock reference system.
Regards,
Tim
[Judith's
remarks in bold]
In a living system, it's not really a case of
"changes" (which implies moving from state to state) as a constant dynamical
process.
To me,
"changes" implies moving from state to state only if the "changes" are
considered as discrete unique events to which state information can be
attached. That would be the case where discretely measured changes are used as
the basis for labels for "time", but in general changes need not be considered
discrete.
My intuition about
time is based on the idea of a dynamic system never being in any single
"state". The quality "Life" (in an organism) is a fluid, dynamical
quality or " process" rather than a state.
Doesn't
the phrase "dynamic" or "dynamical quality" here simply refer
to "a system's changes over time"? And "process" similarly mean "a series
of actions or changes over time"? My point being that it seems you are
essentially invoking the notion of "changes" or "changes over time" as a way
to characterize "time", albeit through different terminology.
I wonder if what is fundamental to
material reality is not 'time' & 'space', but rather 'change' or
'action'. In that case, time & space are merely conceptual tools for
aiding our comprehension of change/action.
Regards,
Tim
In a living system, it's not really a case of
"changes" (which implies moving from state to state) as a constant dynamical
process. There is no "state" in a living system, only a dead one. This was
the source of so much of the trouble in trying to use contemporary physics
or quantum physics to try and answer biological questions, which was what
led my father to look at the questions differently. He started also
examining the roots of what is accepted as the "laws" of physics and found
that various assumptions that became part of the basis for those laws were
incorrect assumptions. When he applied that same examination to most
seemingly carved-in-stone laws in current scientific approaches, he found
many similar cases of early mistakes leading to conclusions that are
misleading.
My intuition about time is based on the idea of a
dynamic system never being in any single "state". The quality "Life" (in an
organism) is a fluid, dynamical quality or " process" rather than
a state. It's something that cannot be tampered with beyond a small group of
exceptions and still remain life. It also cannot go backwards (as in
reversing aging, or undoing embryonic development) and yet there are
different time scales involved in the behavior of living organisms (which
was how my father developed the idea of Anticipatory Systems). There are so
many aspects to the essence or quality of life that intrigue me personally
in regards to how time is involved at the organizational level-- the level
of Rosennean complexity. That quite naturally leads me to ask what is time?
And to want to apply my father's approach to it, ignoring the seeming "laws"
that have simply been accepted heretofor, and ask "Why time?" Why is it what
it is, how does it work, what aspect of material reality is this shaping? It
simply fascinates me personally, which is why I keep pushing smart people
like my Dad to take a serious look at it and see what they can come up
with!
Judith
Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2003
11:01 PM
Subject: Re: [ROSEN] Time and
context
Hi
Judith,
I don't know
if I could see time as being an actual quality. But, to be
honest, what keeps bothering me about my definition is that it
involves the use of the term "changes", and I am concerned that this may
involve circularity in the definition. Can one speak of "change"
without some (hidden) reference to time or temporality?
I suppose we
can use the language of FM and AS, and speak of "change" as simply being
the case where there are at least two measurements and whose
respective values are in different equivalence classes.
But
we actually mean by "two measurements" to really be "two
temporally sequential measurements". -sigh-
Is this
unavoidably a circularity? Perhaps not. Or perhaps it
may be that such circularity is unavoidable. I have not yet thought
it through satisfactorily.
Regards,
Tim
Tim et al,
Right, that's what I thought, Tim. But whereas
you see time as an "observer-imposed relation", I see it as an actual
quality or force that is one of the ingredients of all matter. I think
time has an essence that can be figured out and understood by science,
in the same way that life can. I think time behaves differently in
relationships with different systems, such that complexity intensifies
the effects. The more complex a system is, the more it's relationship
with time is intensified. I wonder whether perhaps one of the reasons
living systems have behaviors so different from non-living ones is
partly due to this intensification. Just one more thing I'd love to
discuss with my father, you know?
Judith
Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2003
3:58 PM
Subject: Re: [ROSEN] Time and
context
Hi
Judith,
I think
we are indeed each looking of time in somewhat different ways. As
do you, I do not think time is "merely a figment of collective human
imagination". Not entirely, anyway. To me, time is the
observer-imposed relation of changes in some
physical clock system as a reference system to changes in
some physical system under study.
|