Ronald Frederick
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Ronald Frederick (M, 51)
Amsterdam, NL
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    TEDx Amsterdam 2009 Wubbo Ockels
    Wubbo Ockels' speech about time and gravity

    TEDxAmsterdam: Wubbo Ockels from TEDxAmsterdam on Vimeo.


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    nagash     Wed, Dec 2, 2009  Permanent link
    gravity just pulled my chin to the ground...
    Olena     Wed, Dec 2, 2009  Permanent link
    I came here to say: HOLY SHIT.
    But I think nagash said it better :D

    Do you think that if this is true... it is part of the paradigm shift?

    Also, important question: does anyone remember this essay that came out a year or two ago, written by (I think) a European student, who hypothesized that time isn't real because there is no way to truly quantify it? That is, there is no fundamental 'smallest piece'.

    There was some controversy over it and he kind of renounced himself saying he's just a student taking guesses, but I thought it was interesting... wish I saved it!
    HelloAlexCL     Fri, Dec 4, 2009  Permanent link
    This alternative physics (which Jung called synchronicity) is a physics of light. Light is composed of photons, which have no antiparticle. This means that there is no dualism in the world of light. The conventions of relativity say that time slows down as one approaches the speed of light, but if one tries to imagine the point of view of a thing made of light, one must realize that what is never mentioned is that if one moves at the speed of light there is no time whatsoever…So if one imagines for a moment oneself to be made of light, or in possession of a vehicle that can move at the speed of light, one can traverse from any point in the universe to any other with a subjective experience of time zero. —Terrence McKenna, Archaic Revival
    HelloAlexCL     Fri, Dec 4, 2009  Permanent link
    This is specifically about time being a construct of the mind. It's sort of redundant but the central point is important:
    Olena     Tue, Jan 19, 2010  Permanent link
    Hey guys,

    I just re-watched the Wubbo video (& going to watch the Buddhist one), but I have a question that I'm hoping someone here can answer.

    Perhaps I'm misunderstanding this new theory, but it just doesn't make sense to me because Wubbo says that "physicists still think that if we all died, time would still exist", implying it wouldn't, or really stressing his point that it's a construct of our central nervous system.

    All well and good, but if we DO die, or, before we ever lived, supposedly things still moved(/will move), planets formed, stars died, etc. Even here on our planet — it orbits the sun regardless of us, it turns regardless of us. I understand time to be the measurement of the motion of something over a distance... so it seems that the only way for that measurement to disappear is if, outside of our perception, everything is infinitely happening at the same time (the earth is always facing all directions; everything in the universe is always in every possible state it could ever be), which is just like "spooky action at a distance" and truly hard to comprehend.

    Is that what he's saying? Or am I missing something?

    *Edit:
    The video Alex posted was really helpful in further explaining the concept (thanks!). The word I forgot when writing originally was "change", and the fact that the act of observation is essentially what is being measured by time.
    But my question still remains, because things seem to change outside of / despite us, which strengthens my thought that maybe they are eternally in all states.
    HelloAlexCL     Tue, Jan 26, 2010  Permanent link
    You raise really important questions. Whether one decides that all things exist always independently of our observation or nothings exists independently of our observation is for the most part inconsequential. These are two extremes within ontology, the question of being, which is where most western philosophy begins (Derrida recognizes this as a pivotal question, and in one of the interviews with him that skyphone posted, he claims to - in his work - question that question). What is the ontological status of the mind's apperceived referent? I guess the best answer I can think of - which happens to be infuriating - would be that the referent neither exists nor doesn't exist.

    It seems that the perpetual suspension of the ontological question is essential. Many mystical languages of various traditions employ a language in which a statement continually turns back in on itself in order to retain the absence of a referent, or at least continually empties and refills the the place of referent. I've been collecting my thoughts on this kind of language and will continue to do so for a few months, but I should be able to put together a post on it shortly thereafter.
     
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