Subjective Time

Something that might mess with your head...

You are a certain age. Let's say 50.

One year is 1/50 of your life. It seems much shorter than a year did when you were 20, when it was 1/20 of your life.

When you're a baby a year is a long time - your whole lifetime if you're one year old!

This pattern suggests that the first subjective moment of life is infinitely long subjectively. Right?

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A year was still a year before you were born. It will be a year after you die. What does it matter how long you've been alive?

I think "half a lifetime ago" gets longer as you get older, but a year is a year is a year.

Originally posted by forkedknight
A year was still a year before you were born. It will be a year after you die. What does it matter how long you've been alive?

I think "half a lifetime ago" gets longer as you get older, but a year is a year is a year.

A year on a lifetime is nothing.

When a baby, a year is a huge amount of time. With a year you double your age when you're 1.

Originally posted by forkedknight
A year was still a year before you were born. It will be a year after you die. What does it matter how long you've been alive?

I think "half a lifetime ago" gets longer as you get older, but a year is a year is a year.

Haven't you noticed that an hour seems a lot shorter than it did when you were ten?

The speed of time depends of which side of a bathroom door you are currently waiting.

Ask your teenage daughter in your bathroom how much time a "just a minute" is.

I would say time seems to take the longest when you are bored, you are experiencing and learning little and you have a slow heart rate. Conversely all these things are the opposite when you are younger. That would suggest to me that years packed with experience etc would subjectively feel shorter.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
Something that might mess with your head...

You are a certain age. Let's say 50.

One year is 1/50 of your life. It seems much shorter than a year did when you were 20, when it was 1/20 of your life.

When you're a baby a year is a long time - your whole lifetime if you're one year old!

This pattern suggests that the first subjective moment of life is infinitely long subjectively. Right?

Not necessarily. This can be solved by assuming that your time line starts at conception, but sentience only after a couple of months. Or that sentience only arises in parts, with the part that perceives relative length of moments coming into existence after the part that perceives the passing of time per se.

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
Not necessarily. This can be solved by assuming that your time line starts at conception, but sentience only after a couple of months. Or that sentience only arises in parts, with the part that perceives relative length of moments coming into existence after the part that perceives the passing of time per se.

Richard

lets go back before you were born. How much subjective time do you experience in the first 9 months in utero?

Originally posted by sonhouse
lets go back before you were born. How much subjective time do you experience in the first 9 months in utero?

It probably starts whenever the central nervous system and brain begin to form.

Originally posted by sonhouse
lets go back before you were born. How much subjective time do you experience in the first 9 months in utero?

Well, that's my point... I suspect you only experience the passing of time, that is, experience what could be called the subjective length of time, after you've been experiencing time per se for some, ahem, time.
IOW, I suspect that you are aware of there being one "now" after another some time (and I couldn't even guess how long) before you are sufficiently grown to be aware of one "now" being longer or shorter than another.
But I can't prove any of that, of course. It's just that length of time seems a more advanced notion, to me, than a moment of time itself.

Richard

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
Well, that's my point... I suspect you only experience the passing of time, that is, experience what could be called the subjective length of time, after you've been experiencing time per se for some, ahem, time.
IOW, I suspect that you are aware of there being one "now" after another some time (and I couldn't even guess how long) before ...[text shortened]... h of time seems a more advanced notion, to me, than a moment of time itself.

Richard

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