A Ponder of Time.....

"There are three times; a present time about things past, a present time

about things present, a present time about things future.  The future

exists only as expectations, the past exists only as memory, but

expectation and memory exist in the present." -St. Augustine

Time can be such an anomaly sometimes.

There are moments in our day, week, or year that seem to take forever. 

Then there can be times when this illusion of time seems to fly by. We can be strolling down the beach having a daring conversation with a loved one and next thing you know we've lost three hours.

But how can this be we ask, how can time seem to stand still while simultaneously, for another, leaping forward. 

Is perception the only thing that defines the ticking of moments. Or could there be more to it than that.

What is intriguing and somewhat hard to wrap the brain around is that time does tick differently on some occasions. Take speed for instance, something in motion can slow down time. A jet plane zooming around the earth will move slower in time than anything not in motion sitting on the ground of earth. 

Or gravity is also a factor in the manipulation of time. As gravity increases time will slow down. If we were to watch a person fall into a black hole. While there getting closer and closer to the center of this immense gravitational force we would see them moving slower and slower. Even talking and moving in what we would perceive as slow motion but to them would contain a relative normal speed of time. 

But the real question is, 'what even is time?'. Besides just the numerals we use to define these moments that pass us by. Could our perception be substantiated on falsehood and misleading information. 

Some scientists speculate that time is just an illusion and all moments exist at once. Could this be. I mean how do we even define time. It just seems to be a series of moments that exist in the now, which can't even be measured because as soon as you are in the present another present moment will take is place, now and now and now and now. 

So, how do we make sense of it all. How do we determine what moments don't exist and what do. 

While doing some experiments on the brain they determined that people could have vivid memories of past moments. When stimulated by electric waves, patients would have clear experiences of times prior. They could smell and feel the room, they could feel the chair they were sitting on, the clarity of their grandpa's voice telling a wild and crazy story from his past. 

They would say it was so clear that they didn't just remember it. But in a way completely relived the entire event. Again, like it was happening in the here and now.

Does that make it a past event when they can actually touch, smell, hear, and see the sensations of that existing frame of time. That existing frame of reality. 

I would have to speculate not.

So are we actually traveling through some amount of speculated time, if it can be so easily manipulated. Just by moving quickly or increasing and decreasing the amount of gravity surrounding us.

Or are there really even past and future moments occurring in a string of time. Would that mean the past existed and doesn't presently, or does it mean that future events are going to occur. I would assume that past moments are not gone if they can be felt and seen by people. And I would rather assume that the future doesn't exist either other than our perception of how things might go. 

Otherwise, the future would already be conscious in a sense. Having is own due time in process, and wouldn't be something we could manipulate or change by our actions. 

With all these questions and speculations out there. I would have to assume that time is a string of experiences to become the people we intended ourselves to be. 

There are not merely moments that existed at one time or another through the presence of an observer. But our perspectives from a certain point of view, in it containing the information that each one might need to become more of who they truly are. 

A sort of string of events and information contained in a span of space time dimension that we took from our angle of view and determined how to tally it up in our lives.

So, what do we do with all these questions. How do we formulate a consensus on all of this? 

I would have to say we still have some science to ponder and a continued pursuit of what is the reality of our space and time, and how they interrelate. 

But I digress. And admit that I ponder the length we have on this earth sometimes, when compared to the immensity of the length of the universe. By those standards we are just the mere blink of an eye.

I ask then, Does time change in the moments of bliss? A moment with friends and family, filled with laughter and ecstasy. And if that is true, does time change when we need a release from the constraints we're in? The moments of failure and mistakes, that seem to stretch to a lengthy desolation.

-RA BAR