PHILOCHRONY: FORMAL SCIENCE

The formal sciences are those that use forms or mental structures to explain reality. These forms can be: numbers, symbols and letters. Philochrony can not be an empirical science because time is imperceptible or not observable directly. We know time by the sequential changes that things experience.

Philochrony helps to study time of:

1- Definitions (real time and sensory time),
2- The measurement of time (clocks, periodic intervals),
3- The past (memory) and the future (imagination). The past and the future are mental structures that help us explain time.
4- The sequential activity occurred or SAO, which is established by the experience of the subject. For example, in one hour there is a known SAO and we can differentiate it from the SAO of two hours.

Other formal sciences are: Mathematics and Logic.

--------- ccp ---------->
  past            future
ccp = changeable continuous present (real time)

Elvis Sibilia

TIME: CHANGEABLE CONTINUOUS PRESENT

Humanity has been divided in opinion about the existence of time. Is there or is not time? For some, time does not exist because the past and the future do not exist. For others, time exists based on the measurement of time. However both groups have half truth.

Philochrony leave from the definition of real time: it is the duration of things, between a start and an end, in a particular physical state or situation.

   duration
s -----------> e

1) Clocks measure time, the continuity of things in the present.

2) Time does not need the past nor the future to exist.

3) We use the ideas of the past and the future to organize our lives.

In conclusion, time exists in a changeable continuous present.

Elvis Sibilia

THE TIME-LIGHT ANALOGY

In the time-light analogy:
- The real time is similar to light (objective).
- The sensory time is similar to color (subjective).

The real time is the duration or permanence of things in a certain state or situation. The sensory time is the continuous succession of irreversible moments that goes from the past to the future. Moment is a mathematical concept, the time point. In the real time things happen sequentially. The real time flows in things (objects and phenomena). The real time flows in clocks, in the movements of planets and stars, in the life of a person (age), in an airplane in flight, in a song, etc. The clocks time is uniform and periodic.

The real time is universal and the sensory time is particular (of subject).
The cosmic time starts with the big bang and continues with the expansion of the universe.

Elvis Sibilia

THE REALITY OF TIME

We perceive time as the continuous succession of irreversible moments that goes from the past to the future. Moment is a mathematical concept, the time point. Actually time is the duration or permanence of things in a certain state or position. The states can be: in motion, at rest, alive, waiting, in existence, etc.

The time interval consists of a beginning and an end, a before and after. The time states are: past, present and future. We have an assistant to verify  time: the chromnesia.

In Philochrony there are a perceptual concept and a real concept of time. As time is magnitive (objective, measurable and imperceptible) and C2 (double continuity) people form their own idea of time.

Elvis Sibilia

THE DOUBLE CONTINUITY (C2) OF TIME

The types of variables are: qualitative and quantitative. The qualitative ones can be: nominal and ordinal. The quantitative ones can be: discrete and continuous. The discrete variables take a finite number of values. The continuous variables take an infinite number of values. Examples of discrete variables are: the number of siblings of a person, the number of chairs in a room, the number of planets in the solar system, etc. The continuous variables are those that can be measured. For example: length (3.5 m), mass (9.2 kg), temperature (27.6 'C) and time (31.3 s). But time is not only continuous by taking infinite values, but by increasing in value continually. That is why this characteristic of time is represented by C2 (C is continuity, 2 is double).

A time interval (duration) can be 15.6 minutes, but time never stops. C2 is the proof that time passes or flows.

Elvis Sibilia

REASONING THAT PROVES THE EXISTENCE OF TIME

- Physics is the science of measures that use a number and a unit.

- Time can be measured by clocks.

- Therefore, time is a physical entity.

To think that time does not exist or is an illusion, is an absurd and illogical idea.

Time is an exhaustible and non-renewable resource.

Elvis Sibilia

THE TIME ARROW

1- Moments are irreversible.

2- Some irreversible changes are: the age of a person, a tree or a star.

3- In Quantum Mechanics we can find reversible changes.

We must differentiate between moments (irreversible) and changes (reversible or irreversible). The time arrow refers to moments, not changes. Therefore, time (natural) is the continuous succession of irreversible moments that goes from the past to the future. Time marks the rhythm of changes or movements.

a) pt < pm < ft (time increases continuously). True.

b) pt > pm > ft (time decreases). False.

pt is past time
pm is present moment
ft is future time

Elvis Sibilia