IntegralScience.org
Title
Center for Integral Science
Description
Why Time?
This paper is an invitation to explore the nature and meaning of time, drawing from the Western philosophical and scientific traditions, as well as from Buddhist traditions. After examining some of the common-sense notions of time that we typically take for granted, we will look into the deeper mysteries of time. My intention is to understand these deeper aspects of time, and appreciate their intimate and meaningful connection with life—and death. We will approach time, therefore, as something that has immediate personal importance, for we come face-to-face with the meaning of life through the inevitability of death brought by time.
In addition to having profound significance for our personal lives, time is also fundamental to the nature of all existence. Thus, a substantial part of our inquiry will also deal with what are often called impersonal or metaphysical aspects of time. By the end of the paper, it will become clear, I hope, that the personal and impersonal aspects of time both open up into the same mystery.
What Time is it?
When we normally talk about time, we can mean different things. There is, of course, the conventional time measured by physical clocks. When we ask someone “what time is it?” it is this physical time we typically mean. But there is also a more psychological kind of time, as when we say “time flew by” or “that seemed like forever”. Such expressions show us that the subjective passage of time is sometimes faster or slower than the objective passage of time that clocks measure. It seems, then, that these two types of time are distinct, at least as far as the rate of passage of time is concerned. Our inquiry into time does not presuppose that objective time is more real than subjective time, or vice versa. Rather, our approach is to acknowledge both these aspects of time, and then to see what inquiry reveals about them.
Contact
- The Center for Integral Science
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- Eugene Oregon
- United States 97405-8200
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- +1.5415544985
