I'm a newbie here, but I thought I'd add my two cents. It's a way of elimating time as a dimension:

Time has two directions. The observer's arrow of time goes from past events to future events. On the other hand, these events go from being in the future to being in the past, so the arrow of time for the observed goes from the future to the past. To the hands of the clock, the face is going counterclockwise.

The three dimensional frame of reference is not moving along an additional dimension. This subjective coordinate system is interacting with other such frames.

If we were to build a clock-like device to characterize motion, it would have many hands, going in both directions and the cumulative action would cancel out in a general equilibrium. With the concept of time, most of these hands are combined into the face, with a few going in one direction as coordinates for the reference point. Time is a component of motion, not the basis for it.

The unit of time goes from beginning to end, but the process of time is going toward the beginning of the next, leaving the old. The hour on the clock starts in the future and the hand passes from its beginning to its end and then moves on to the next, leaving the previous hour in the past. Days go from dawn to dusk, as the sun moves from east to west, but the reality is that the earth is rotating west to east and the sunlight is moving on to other time zones. Our individual lives are units of time going from beginning to end, while the process of living goes on to the next generation, shedding the old like dead skin.

Compare it to a factory. The product moves from start to finish, but the production line is facing the other way, consuming raw material and expelling finished product. This relationship of the process and the unit is one of perspective. A unit at one level is a process at another and vice versa. What matters to the process isn't so much the end product, as it is the energy produced, in wages and profits, calories burned, etc, that propels the process forward, consuming more material.

Reality consists of energy recording information. As the amount of energy remains the same, old information is erased as new is recorded. Objective reality is the energy. Time is a function of the subjective information, as past and future do not physically exist because the energy to manifest them is currently tied up in the present. If another moment were to exist, it would require its own energy and so would not be on a continuum with our reality.

Time is not so much a projection out from the present event, as it is a coming together of factors to define what is present. The past being those influences which define current order and the future is determined by the energy to motivate that order. When order is an open set, it absorbs fresh energy, defining it and adapting to it, so that the future is a continuation of the past. When order is a closed set, the energy accumulates elsewhere and the future becomes a reaction to the past. Evolution and revolution. Essentially it is an version of the top down order/bottom up process relationship of Complexity Theory. Compare order, complexity and chaos, to past, present and future.

One definition of the arrow of time is that of decreasing usable energy and increasing entropy in a closed system. Keep in mind though, that a "closed system" is a unit and these processes are the aging of this unit.

This concept of time having two directions doesn't really propose anything new. It just examines what is accepted, in a little further detail. The general essence of relativity is that since there is no absolute frame of reference, all position and motion can only be measured with reference to all other bodies in motion. Say that since you are your own center of reference, do you move down the road, or is the road passing under you. Without thinking it through, this might seem silly, given the road is attached to the earth, but in a situation where the bodies approach similar size, it begins to make more sense. Now apply this to the concept of time. Since you are the center of your own reality, are you traveling through time, from past events to future ones, or is it that you, being the reference point, are still and it is these events which are passing you by, going from the future into the past? Isn't the road essentially an analogy for ones path in life?

Hi Brodix,

Let me make an observation about time, energy, and infinity.

First energy. There seems to be a theme that energy is more fundamental that anything else. As though it powers the universe and matter happens in spacetime. Something like that anyway. But energy is just the wave form of a particle form, of "mass". When the particle gets blurry we call it energy and when the energy gets distinct, we call it a particle. String theory seems to think it goes beyond this, by saying there a vibrating lines. Cheese balls, string cheese, it's all the same.

Next infinity. As I stated before, "it is that which doesn't actually happen". It doesn't contain or have, a departure or arrival point. All points in an infinite scale that has no beginning or end, are also infinite in their own right. There is no inherent possibility of dimension, direction, or charge.

And time. The arrow of time, which is widely considered to go in one direction, dragging with it what seems to become the present and past, has a very simple reason why it appears the way it does. Time as an expression of the infinite (which doesn't actually happen), puts the universe in a perpetual state of potential, of "will happen". There is nothing about the universe, that science can say "has happened" or "is happening". As I mentioned before, event horizons (actual happenings) have yet to be located.

Time is one aspect of fourth dimensional thinking. Scientists give the arrow of time the value of a constant, as well as they give the speed of light the value of a constant. But they also admit, that is not definite that either one are constant, i.e. finite, and that because of this, it can not be said that either one are one-dimensional. It's all a can or worms (ummm... worms), that lead us back to trying to understand infinity, omni-direction, and what is "finite", why and how, etc.

Eric

Hello, Philosophers, Everybody, Mind, and Spirit!

Specifically, Eric England: No apology necessary; but thanks anyway!
1) This statement reminded me of a typical Consciousness or Existence vs. Observer conundrum: In the absence of an Observer—ie, the Evolution of our human Life and Mind on Earth—does the Universe or Consciousness exist?

The scientific answer is yes; this is because the dynamic Universe did give rise to the human Life and Mind or Consciousness on Earth.

However, metaphysicians would subscribe that Consciousness is the Universe; and therefore, they would argue that Consciousness did exist in the absence of an Observer!

So, as your statement above has had implied to me: How could “absolute nothing” give rise to “nothingness” in the Universe?!

QUOTE

If absolute nothing EXISTED, there wouldn't be absolute nothing. Or in other words, if non-existence EXISTED, there wouldn't be non-existence.