CONTENTS OF THIS ISSUE
Winter 2017 Issue |
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In the News
Time as Perceived by the Human Being
By O. Norman Evans, MD
TIME as represented by clocks, calendars and similar ordinary measuring devices is an invention of the human brain, based on the Earth’s rotation on its axis (day and night-circadian rhythm), phases of the moon (months) and the Earth’s orbit around the Sun (seasons and years) – all requiring periodic mathematical adjustments to maintain accuracy. This serves the practical everyday needs of most human activity on planet Earth with GPS accuracy with one exception. Time, as part of the Space/Time dimension as explained by Einstein’s Relativity Theories involving velocity and gravity strains the visualization and comprehension of most human brains: e.g. space time tells mass how to move and mass tells space time how to curve. Physicists tell us there is no Universal Time and what happens WHEN is RELATIVE to the momentum of the observers and that time (clocks) goes more slowly with increasing momentum and stronger gravity (very thought provoking but with the usual speeds of humans on Planet Earth, of very little consequence for our daily lives except to adjust our GPS accuracy and maybe for NASA scientists to worry about).
The human brain’s awareness of time is always the PRESENT moment which is constantly moving toward the FUTURE as the PAST recedes into memory. Each moment, as the present moment is perceived, can be thought of as being newly created with the continuous space/time expansion of the Universe.
The PAST for the human brain is just a fading and incomplete memory which is recreated in the ever moving now moment. How accurately it is re-created each time it is considered is the question.
The FUTURE exists only in the imagination of the present moment based on past memories and expectations. The Future never arrives; it is always the present moment when perceived. We can imagine the future is coming while in the present moment but it always is the present moment when perceived. All of our conscious awareness occurs in the NOW moment.
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