∆-3 Assumptions 'seem' to be confirmed.

'No matter how beautiful your theory, no matter how clever you are or what your name is,

if it disagrees with experiment, it's wrong.'

Richard Feynman

( related article > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias )

One of the biggest traps in trying to understand whether Time exists is very subtle and hides in the following observation...

'If when looking at the evidence you assume that Time exists, then the evidence "may seem to confirm" this.

Excuse the extra emphasis here, but they highlight 2 important distinctions.

'Assuming' something is not the same as something being a fact, and,

'Seeming to confirm something' is not the same as 'a direct first proof'.

And no matter how many apparent confirmations you have of something you assume, unless you have a first proof then you may just be dealing with a confusing mass of (apparently) self supporting rumours.

As Mr Feynman says above, if your belief disagrees with experiment then you are wrong. But what is worse is if you don't even have an experiment... Can you think of any experiment that proves that time exists ?

Surely for such a popular, and scientifically believed in 'thing' we should all be able to name the classic experiment that proves there is more than just a sea of matter swirling 'now' in the universe. An experiment that shows how the contents of your mind also prove that an invisible fourth dimensional record of 'the past' also exists.

As I say, I think there are a lot of 'apparent confirmations' that time exists, but I see no core proof, this is summed up here.... (see The House of Cards. )

If you are wondering what experiments can be run to prove 'Timelessness', the answer is, any and all experiments - I.e anything you deliberately do or that you just happen to observe, should prove that matter just exists, and moves and interacts 'now'. Where energy is free to flow, in orderly or chaotic ways. If 'Timelessness' is the correct view then likewise you should never find any proof that time exists. In particular, we should not find proof that 'the past' or 'the future' really exist, other than just as ideas that we have.

How to test assumptions...

As you read this book you will find that there are a lot of observations and situations that seem to prove or confirm the existence of time, and which by ‘default’ we are happy to accept in a very hasty and biased way, as being actual or scientific proof that time exists. The very subtle problem with these observations is that...

• If you look at some situations, with the assumption that ‘Time definitely exists’, then those situations will seem to confirm ‘that time exists’. But if you look without the assumption that time exists - you will just see matter and motion ‘now’.

The meaning and significance of this will hopefully become more apparent as we progress, particularly if at any point of doubt you first recall that our own internal memories only really prove that matter can exist and move ‘now’, though we may think they prove the past exists. And then ask yourself the key question which is...

• Would the situation I am considering still work and make sense if time did not exist, and things ‘just’ moved and changed’ - or does this situation actually prove the existence of the fourth dimension... ‘Time’?

We tend to assume that the existence of time is either obvious, or has already been proven by some experiment, or that virtually any matter seeming to involve time also works as a proof of time, but this is precisely what this book is actually checking, and confirming or denying – because no other work seems to have rigorously carried out this most basic step. This may seem unnecessary, and if it is then this should become apparent very quickly, but in my experience this doesn’t seem to be the case.

If you check to see if any particular situation ‘actually proves’ the existence of time, rather than just assuming that it does, or assuming that time is proven elsewhere, you may unexpectedly find that every example that seems to prove the existence of time, and its apparent flow from the future through the present and into the past, only actually supports the idea of time if it has been proven elsewhere, and otherwise only proves - that things exist, and move and change ‘now’.

Instead of time flowing from the future to the past, we can see that trapped energy - say in a coiled spring, suspended weight, chemical compound, or electrical cell, can flow from there, out, through a mechanism to the surroundings.

This happens for example with the energy stored in a spring driving a clock, fuel in a car tank escaping as motion and heat through an engine, the calorific fuel in food escaping as motion and heat through your body, electrical energy flowing out through a torch bulb - and so on.

While these things may seem to suggest or show that 'time' also flows from one invisible place, 'the future' through the present to the 'past' - unless this extra flow of something from A to B can be proven, the mere flow of energy from one tangible place to another does not prove the 'intangible' flow of time.

>> ∆-4 The onus of proof.

M.Marsden.