What Is Time? | Answers With Joe

Time is something we experience every day, and it seems like something we'd be familiar with. But when you dig into it, it gets weird. So what exactly is it? And how does it work?

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Saint Augustine, the Christian monk was once asked what is time, and his answer was, “If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know."

The ancient Egyptians measured time with obelisks that served as sundials, water clocks that flowed at a steady rate, and of course hourglasses.

It was the Babylonians that first divided the day into hours made up of 60 minutes each with 60 seconds per minute, this was all the way back in 1800 BCE.

It was the great Dutch astronomer and physicist Christiaan Huygens who invented the first pendulum clock in 1656, which used a weight that swung at specific intervals to keep time. This would be the most precise way to keep time for nearly 300 years.

1927 saw the invention of the quartz crystal clock, which uses the piezoelectric properties of quartz which vibrates at a rate of 32,768 Hz, giving it an accuracy of 6 parts per million.

But the most accurate measure of time we’ve been able to conceive so far is the atomic clock, which uses the natural resonance of a cesium atom.

Ss the scientific revolution began to take hold, the main argument around time was had by the Absolutists and Relationalists.

Absolutists believed in absolute time. The idea that time was an independent, absolute constant of the universe, that it wasn’t affected by our perception of it or by the interaction of matter.

Sir Isaac Newton was one of these Absolutists.

The Relationalists saw time as a measure of change. Basically arguing that the only reason time exists is because of the changing state of matter.

Newton’s second law of thermodynamics states that in a closed system, entropy will always increase over time. Entropy being a movement toward a state of equilibrium.

By the way, another really interesting way to look at entropy is through a statistical mechanics model, which was championed by Ludwig Boltzmann.

There’s a more philosophical debate on the nature of time that has to do with how it actually progresses, between what they call tensed and tenseless theories of time.

The tensed theory of time states that the future doesn’t exist yet, that it’s a tree with branches that spread as the now passes through the tree.

The tenseless theory of time suggest that the past, present, and future are all equally real and what we experience as time is just the now passing down the timeline.

Einstein stated in his 1905 paper on special relativity that the laws of physics and the speed of light must be the same for all uniformly moving observers. And for this to be true, space and time can no longer be independent. This was the only way for the speed of light to be constant for all observers.

But it was Minkowski three years later who came up with the idea that space and time could be seen as a single four-dimensional spacetime fabric. He closed out his paper on the subject by saying, "Henceforth space by itself, and time by itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality".

[amkurian]

Video Joe Scott made in 2019 after watching Tenet in 2020

[gingerninjafpv]

"Depression comes from living in the past, anxiety comes from living in the future and happiness comes from living right now" Joe, you blow my mind!

[hdufort]

In high school (I was 14 years old), I actually wrote a short story about a guy trying a time machine he built. He programs a date just a few minutes in the future, and dies embedded in a mountain. My teacher didn't fully understand the reasons why this happened, so he found my story only mildly interesting and I got a good, but not excellent, grade. :(

[BenSullinsOfficial]

What do we want? TIME TRAVEL!
When do we want it? IT'S IRRELEVANT!

[trongborg]

This video came out just in time!
I'll show myself out thank you...

[rivule]

Joe's Main Cam: 'Yeah he has his life together. All organized.'

Tangent Cam: 'lol you thought'

[one-of-us]

Unless someone can prove me wrong:

Time was invented by people who charge interest.

[heisag]

I suppose i kinda belong in the tenseless theory group, that time sorta don't exist. However, since

i am paid by the hour, i usually keep quiet about it.

[Blalack]

"If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I try to explain it to he who asks, I don't know"... I feel like that about a lot of things.

[Witnessdomaining]

You ate a banana, then an ananab ate you.

[thapeloafrika]

Thank god there's a logical explanation for the random banana eating, for a second there I thought you were gonna move right along LOL

[Highlander]

Seems very much like what they showed in "Tenet".
Your ahead of your time Joe!

[mrman]

i saw this video pop up, and thought to myself "it's about time!"

[napadave]

"Daddy ... Where do bananas come from?”
‘Er ... Joe Scott’s mouth.'

[jonigomez]

My mind easily wanders around and I struggle with anxiety... You help me to stay in the present. You do this by always giving me something interesting to think about right this second and it's more helpful than you can imagine and because you are interesting in the way that you are, you manage to keep my attention throughout the video, I don't even mind when you plug your t-shirts. Just I guess, thank you, all around for all the great information and for being something that can keep me from going crazy!

[realitycheck]

"Time is what keeps everything from happening at once.'" - Ray Cummings 1922

[adilator]

What is Time?
Baby don't hurt me...
Don't hurt me...
No more.

[Hyraethian]

9:20
just remember that your standing, on a planet that's evolving, and revolving at 900 miles an hour. Its orbiting its reckoned 90 miles every second, the sun that is the source of all our power; And the sun, and you, and me, and all the stars that we can see, are moving at a million miiiiles a daaaay, in an outer spiral arm, at 40 thousand miles an hour, of the galaxy we call the milky way!

[fernandocabette]

You can time travel to the future by moving slowly too. The less i do each day, the more days blur together and woosh, a week went by and i did nothing useful...again...

[davidbjacobs]

"Ironically by the time you've even processed that very moment, it's already in the past."
Joke's on you - I paused the video!!