Q about the preception of time

[jschaef5]

I am just going to throw this out there. Its sort of a thought that just came to my head so I thought maybe some of you could give some input or shoot it down. Here we go:<br /><br />We sense the three spatial dimensions using our senses as a human that we have been given. Like we see and can feel around and the tubes in our ear give us an orientation in the 3 dimensions. Now for time the only reason we sense it is because we have memory which is a product of the brain. So what I was thinking is if we had no brain than we would sense no time and thus we wouldn't exist in the 4D world but a 3D world. But then I was thinking what about plants. They have no brains so it has to be something in the DNA. But the plant can't think so it doesn't even precieve the 4D it only knows the 3D because it grows around. So now I am thinking maybe there is a middle ground. Some bugs only live for a few days or even hours. Maybe their minds precieve time at a faster pace so even though they are living what seems like hours to us it may actually seem like years to them. So then I was thinking maybe it has something to do with how fast our brain makes connections and such but I really am not sure. Do we all precieve time at a different speed but we just grow up knowing an hour is an hour so no one notices that we are all running at different speeds but then wouldn't brain scans show slower activity possibly but even that doesn't really mean that our memory is precieving time at a certain pace. Well anyways enough babbling. Maybe someone will comment and tell me I am sgoing insane or something. Its just a thought that came to me. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[soft_rain]

by Jschaef5: Some bugs only live for a few days or even hours. Maybe their minds precieve time at a faster pace so even though they are living what seems like hours to us it may actually seem like years to them.<br /><br />-------I've never thought of that before. I really like that idea if it is true. It very well may work that way. My cat is in her senior years (16 human years) and I'd like to think she's had a good long life.

 

[qso1]

There is no scientific evidence I'm aware of backing up what I'm about to say. Its more a mental exercize.<br /><br />My sense of what your saying is that indeed insects may live on a faster timescale. I'm not so sure they give it much thought but they might. If you look at structures in time...galaxies are not entirely unlike hurricanes. But they rotate very slowly in part because they are so large.<br /><br />There has been the idea put forth in the past that if we could shrink someone small enough to penetrate atoms, they might find Universes within the atoms. They might also find they are living on an extremely accellerated time scale. An atom sized human living for mere nano seconds but in his/her frame of reference, the same amount of percieved time as he/she would be at full size. Meanwhile, if they were in a position to observe a full sized human, they would see a massive object that they actually could not see whole unless the massive human were some distance away (10 feet would suffice) for at least a partial enough view of the full sized human to recognize them as such. But this human would remain motionless for the entire lifetime of the nano-human. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[spaceinvador_old]

qso1, <br /><br />You explain things with such simple logic it makes you look smart. *smiles* You make complete sense... Say, you have a 747 jet and a 1/4 scale. Wouldn't the smaller jet run out of fuel faster, and also travel less distance "in comparison" to the larger scale model? <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

 

[qso1]

Thanks for the compliment:<br /><br />On the jets...if you have a 1/4 scale 747, it would travel 1/4th the distance on 1/4th the fuel. But the fuel capacity is the same in terms of how much fuel is carried in proportion to the jet. I often think of Matchbox cars but I forgot how small they are compared to real cars. I'll say 1/144th scale. If you can make one go the equivalent of 60 miles an hour at that scale, and have it run into another, the accident scenario would be the same as full size except for one major difference. The material density and vehicular rebound response. Matchbox car crashes are bouncy, real ones crumply. A Matchbox car can survive even a scale equivalent of a 120 mph head on crash with another Matchbox car virtually unscathed, a paint nick maybe. Whereas real cars, well...you know what happens to them. And of course, real cars cannot be built with Matchbox durability because no known combustion engine technology is economical enough to move all that material weight.<br /><br />The 747 jet at 1/4th scale if fueled with normal scale fuel...may perform a bit differently than it would normal scale because the molecular structure of the full scale fuel is unchanged. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[SpeedFreek]

I have heard this before - that insects experience time speeded up compared to humans. It is sometimes used to explain why it is so difficult to catch/swat a fly. Supposedly the fly sees us lumbering towards it in slow motion, and can easily fly away before we can squash it. <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <br /><br />Also, as humans get older, we seem to perceive time quicker. Remember how long a year was when you were a kid? It went on for ages! Now I'm nearly 40, the years seem to fly by. Some have suggested that the "speed" that you perceive time is relative to the percentage of your lifetime, i.e. to a 10 year old, 1 year is 10% of their life, whereas to a 50 year old, 1 year is only 2% of their life. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#ff0000">_______________________________________________<br /></font><font size="2"><em>SpeedFreek</em></font> </p> </div>

 

[jschaef5]

is there really no way to experiment with this? Like wouldn't we see differences in the speed of brain transmissions and such? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[pyoko]

If you find that there is nothing to refer to, please read the Persinger research antitled "Subjective time estimation by humans is increased by counterclockwise but not clockwise circumcerebral rotations of phase-shifting magnetic pulses in the horizontal plane."<br /><br />link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10400078&dopt=Abstract<br /><br />I am doubtful there is any 'straight answer' for you, but I hope it will be at the least informative. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p> </p><p><span style="color:#ff9900" class="Apple-style-span">-pyoko</span> <span style="color:#333333" class="Apple-style-span">the</span> <span style="color:#339966" class="Apple-style-span">duck </span></p><p><span style="color:#339966" class="Apple-style-span"><span style="color:#808080;font-style:italic" class="Apple-style-span">It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.</span></span></p> </div>

 

[alokmohan]

Insects might know theory of relativity.Who knows?

 

[qso1]

speedfreek:<br />I have heard this before - that insects experience time speeded up compared to humans.<br /><br />Me:<br />I sometimes think that insects live on accellerated time scales. As for us folks over 40, it does seem time moves faster but I'm more inclined to think thats just our perception. When we were kids, time didn't matter as much until we had to go to bed or school LOL. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[qso1]

jschaef5:<br />is there really no way to experiment with this?<br /><br />Me:<br />Can't say I really know the answer to that from an expert viewpoint. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[search]

Interesting question:<br /><br />Spatial dimensions can be sensed by our senses in conjunction with our brain so is time. Jetlag or disruption of circadian rhythems is one example and its not an exclusive attribute of humans:<br />http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/317/7174/1704<br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm<br />http://healthlink.mcw.edu/article/922567322.html<br /><br />Time is not product of memory. "Perception of time" can influenced by memory.<br />http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/time-experience/<br /><br />No you are not going insane but if you keep posing this kind of questions I will...hihi

 

[harmonicaman]

Our perceptions of the flow of time come from a rather interesting perspective. <br /><br />The matter we are made out of cannot exist in time. In fact, if you get enough matter together in one place, time must infinitely curve around it. Matter does not perceive the passage of time because time and matter cannot co-exist in the same space -- they just don't mix! Matter sees itself as infinitely static and unchanging. <br /><br />Time, on the other hand, perceives itself as instantaneous. The infinitely static and unchanging matter cannot perceive time instantaneously passing it by. <br /><br />The realm of our existence is the conflicted space between bits of static matter and flowing time; this provides us with a unique perspective of the universe. <br /><br />We perceive time passing relatively slower than instantaneously; and from our viewpoint, the static matter in the universe behaves rather energetically -- our existence is stuck between these two disparate entities... <br /><br />(This thought experiment is "Under Construction".) <br /><br />

 

[search]

But humans perceive both matter and time so they can coexiste in our mind<br />

 

[jschaef5]

Thanks for the info and input everyone. Everyday I seem to have more and more questions about this universe. It seems like we have no idea at all what space and time are and how they are related, well i guess we have some theories but they contradict eachother. I'm currently reading the Elegant Universe and it's definitely some interesting stuff. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[oscar1]

I think the reason that we feel that time goes faster as we get older, is to be found in that our brains throw out insignificant happenings, and with it the time that was required for these happenings to transpire. If I travel to and from work each day, my brain will only have stored the fact that I did do my work, not the trips to and fro (I will merely decide later that I must have made them to have been able to do my work), unless something odd happened during one of those trips. For a young person a lot of things are relatively new and new experiences, so he remembers more of the happenings, and thus also the time they took to take place. If you are an older person living a consistent life, and you, at some point, decide to start learning Chinese on the side, you will suddenly percieve time to go slower.

 

[alokmohan]

Unless we from perspective of space time all these dicussions may not help.Space and time are not two different things.They are one .

 

[oscar1]

Although I do find a straight four dimensional state interesting to toy with, I can get by comfortably with my life, including thoughts, dreams and beliefs, within three dimensions plus one, specifically when I can find satisfying answers to questions within the latter [trusted] sphere.