Does proof of time not exist in science?

[vorlon13]

Going even further, time is intuitively obvious, do we need to over think it ?

[MindForgedManacle]

"No scientific experiment has ever been done (or could be done) to prove that time exists"

This is a straight, unaltered, in full context quote from the 2012 QI Book of facts.

QI are usually pretty keen to get their facts straight, but I'm having trouble corroborating this on the web. It seems a really interesting subject and I wondered if anyone could help with any pointers.

Fanx

You might be better off reading stuff on the philosophy of time here. The topic is a little too complex to resort to pointing at particular facts, as it largely has to do with our concepts and interpretations of facts.

I'm not sure we even need a scientific proof of time. Since everything clearly doesn't happen at once, time exists. QED.

Boru

But you're appealing to a notion of time ("everything doesn't happen at once") to prove time exists. McTaggert's Paradox bro.

More seriously, even your statement doesn't make clear what time is. Does only the present moment exist along a progressing continuum (presentism and A-theories of time) or do all moments of time co-exist in a 4D block universe (eternalism and B-theories of time)?

Going even further, time is intuitively obvious, do we need to over think it ?

See my above response to Brian. Just saying time is "intuitively obvious" is just not true. I may think that the concept of knowledge is intuitively obvious, but that doesn't itself tell me what knowledge is. It wouldn't be overthinking it to actual unpack our conceptions of time. And seeing as that's what the philosophy of time does, it's clear that our intuitions regarding time are far from infallible.

[Cinjin]

Cool article Darth. I had forgotten about this Einstein quote.

Einstein, for one, found solace in his revolutionary sense of time. In March 1955, when his lifelong friend Michele Besso died, he wrote a letter consoling Besso’s family: “Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”

I've always felt that science could one day explain the reality of existence beyond death. Perhaps this is just a step towards that end. Like I've said many times, one does not have to believe in god to allow for the possibility of an afterlife.


Meanwhile, this absence of time may help to explain the Big Bang but my ever-aging knees just aren't buying it.

[Losty]

So, according to that article, the chief reason no such experiment could be devised is that time (along with space) may not be anything in itself. Both may have more to do with our own wiring and our 'size' than they do with the inherent nature of reality. Oh well I tend to accept reality in the way that is necessary for me to successfully negotiate my way around it. But it is always fun to try to peer behind the curtain.

[MindForgedManacle]

Cool article Darth. I had forgotten about this Einstein quote.

Einstein, for one, found solace in his revolutionary sense of time. In March 1955, when his lifelong friend Michele Besso died, he wrote a letter consoling Besso’s family: “Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”

I've always felt that science could one day explain the reality of existence beyond death. Perhaps this is just a step towards that end. Like I've said many times, one does not have to believe in god to allow for the possibility of an afterlife.


Meanwhile, this absence of time may help to explain the Big Bang but my ever-aging knees just aren't buying it.

I think you're misunderstanding what's being said there. Einstein was talking about what I earlier mentioned: eternalism and the B-theory of time. Physics support these positions, and they basically mean that all points in time are real, i.e the past, present and future all exist, as Einstein's says in your quote. It's not about an afterlife, but about the fact that since all points in time exist, we're never truly gone from the world: move further to the past and there you are, a moment in which you exist which never stops existing.

[Mudhammam]

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=I5rExaKLEoU

[vodkafan]

Time might just be in our own heads. The human brain is made to count intervals of time. It might not exist. It's more of a sort of working hypothesis -a way for our brains to organise the world around us in a linear manner so it makes sense.
In physics there are only discrete events. We don't even know if one thing really causes another . It's really fascinating stuff.

[The Grand Nudger]

I was under the impression that when we pitiful monkeys talk about time we're simply referring to entropy.......

[Jackalope]

Time is an illusion lunchtime doubly so-Ford Prefect

I prefer this one from The Doctor...

[Wyrd of Gawd]

Time= distance/speed, right? Distance and speed both exist...

Since Einstein, no, well, depending on your relative position. I travel to the nearest star at (or close to) the speed of light. For you, the observer here on earth the round trip took 11 years or thereabouts (allowing for acceleration and deceleration) . For me, however, a few weeks have passed.

You had better take more than a few weeks worth of food.