[time-nuts] Beginner's time reference

[gandalfg8 at aol.com]

In a message dated 13/12/2009 05:04:53 GMT Standard Time,  
charles_steinmetz at lavabit.com writes:

I think  we all agree that intervals are what we measure.  The 
question is  whether this has any bearing on whether "time is an 
absolute quantity,"  and if so, whether time being or not being an 
"absolute quantity" is  philosophically interesting.  A number of us 
have been trying,  without success, to get you to be more precise 
about what you mean by time  "being [or not being] an absolute 
quantity," and how that might be  important.  As it stands, you have 
not done so, so we are left to  guess what meaning and import this 
phrase has in your view.

The two  possibilities I see are that you mean (i) time has no 
ontological status  -- that is, that it doesn't "really" exist, but is 
merely an imaginary  construct that we impose on the universe; or (ii) 
even if time does have  ontological status, it is not philosophically 
interesting unless it is  "absolute" (whatever that means).

What a number of us have been saying  is that the way we measure time 
is purely conventional (and therefore, I  suppose, "imaginary"), but 
that accepting this says nothing about either  of these two issues -- 
i.e., whether time really exists or whether it is  philosophically 
interesting.

I take no position on the ontological  status of time, but not because 
we measure it "only" in intervals or  because it is not "absolute" 
(whatever that means).  Rather, for me,  it is an issue whether time 
-- as one dimension of spacetime -- can be a  separate ontological 
entity.  In my view, when Einstein, Dirac, Bohr,  Lorentz, 
Schroedinger, and other "founding fathers" of modern physics  spoke or 
wrote regarding the "existence" of time, this is the issue they  were 
addressing.  However, if we accept that spacetime exists,  nothing is 
really riding on whether time is a separate ontological entity  -- it 
has ontological status as a constituent of spacetime.

So, the  remaining question is whether the claim that time is not 
"absolute"  (whatever that means) -- if true -- somehow renders the 
issue of time a  merely semantic matter, or otherwise philosophically 
uninteresting.   I don't see how this could be, but then I cannot 
imagine what you mean by  time not being absolute, other than it can 
"only" be measured by  intervals, and you have not explained what you 
mean in any but the most  vague and circular terms.

If you are able to articulate what it would  be for time to be an 
absolute quantity, and how this would make a  difference with respect 
to its ontological status or philosophical  interest, I'll be happy to 
listen -- but I won't hold my  breath.