Complex Numbers

Time to Get Real

https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/09/19/a-new-refutation-of-time-borges/

A New Refutation of Time: Borges on the Most Paradoxical Dimension of Existence

"Most paradoxical dimension of existence," my ass. I mean, yeah, it's different from the spatial dimensions, but the only "paradox" is that we can't move freely in both directions of time. And, maybe, that it's not discontinuous; there's no "wall" or barrier to time. That's not really a paradox; that's what time is, and how it's distinguished from the other aspects of spacetime.

Sometimes, philosophy and science collide. This is one of those times.

Time, in other words — particularly our experience of it as a continuity of successive moments — is a cognitive illusion rather than an inherent feature of the universe, a construction of human consciousness and perhaps the very hallmark of human consciousness.

Steaming pile of bovine excrement.

Time proceeded to do time stuff before we evolved, and will continue to do so until the heat death of the universe (because, literally, time stops when entropy stops).

Borges begins by noting the deliberate paradox of his title, a contrast to his central thesis that the continuity of time is an illusion, that time exists without succession and each moment contains all eternity, which negates the very notion of “new.”

Yeah... no. I'm not going to get into light cones and other features of relativity, but, with due respect to the philosopher, this "each moment contains all eternity" crap is crap.

Time, Borges notes, is the foundation of our experience of personal identity...

It is the case that personal identity depends on time. That is, we remember the past but not the future; time is asymmetrical. This, again, is a feature of time. But that's what makes it real, not illusory.

Look, I'm not saying the essay excerpted in the article isn't worth reading. It's always good to gain new perspectives (I've heard that weed assists with this effort). But... I know I've said this before, but if time is an illusion, then space, too, is an illusion, along with everything in it. And if everything is an illusion, while the only things that are "real" are constructs of the mind such as "eternity" or "love" or "the present moment," then this switches the definitions of "real" and "illusion."

Deny the existence of objective reality all you want, but you don't get to make up stuff and then call it real; that's the worst kind of hubris. Sure, there's a lot we don't understand, but any philosophical examination of the universe has to start with something like "the chair I'm sitting in is real," or the entire edifice is built on - quite literally - an illusory foundation.