The Reality Of Time And Space

Harwood emphasises the inevitability of time’s continuity, “the think I could not grasp or name”, through

time,” is a statement which this book The Daughter of Time demonstrated very well. It showed how

Have you ever felt like time was running past you? That the world kept spinning while you just stood still? Time is a central theme in many of Kenneth Slessor’s poems, however it is primarily explored through ‘Out of time’ and ‘Five Bells’. Slessor has made it obvious that he is aware that time continues whether we want it to or not and this is what allows us to put into perspective the notion of humanity’s dominance.

Time and the Conways (1937) and A Dream Play (1901) play with the idea of time as nonlinear. Influenced by John William Dunne, Priestley begins to investigate his own conception of time as the past, present, and future all happening at once. Strindberg, although he wrote A Dream Play ahead of Dunne and Priestley, also expounds on similar ideas linking time and dreams. Dreams can free us from viewing time’s structure as fixed and linear. Therefore, both playwrights begin to make theatre audiences aware of new ideas about how to perceive time and the use of dreams/precognitive states. Utilizing Dunne’s basic theory of non-linear time, I will talk about how we can apply this to readings of Time and the Conways and A Dream Play to explore themes of dreams and perception of time.

Discovery as a dynamic and transformative process has the power to transcend time shaping both past and present. Discoveries may also be generated through deliberate planning. This is reflected in Robert Grays poems ‘Flames and Dangling Wire’ and ‘Diptych’. Flames and Dangling Wire displays the beauty of nature and art suggesting the possibility of escape from the transformative destruction in our new world. ‘Diptych’ metaphorically highlights happiness in adversity presented through the mother’s immense care an idea represented in cyclical imagery of the tide and evolutionary imagery of progress. Comparatively in Liam Connors short film ‘Time’ portrays a boy who discovers the possibility of time travel, by a stone from his future self and

J.M.E McTaggart’s ‘The Unreality of Time’ is respected today as his foremost and best known work within Academia. It is appropriate that this work shares the title of one of his most enduring Philosophical projects, establishing that Time is unreal or does not exist. In regards to the question ‘Did He Succeed?’ while being a perfectly typical critical Philosophical essay topic, it would be beyond the scope of this essay to definitively say Yes or No. The standards of Western Philosophy just seem to be that for any of those enduring questions that have been the topic of study for in some cases nearly three thousand years in the discipline to be said to be definitively answered, the standard and breadth of evidence would be so great that no one would be asking if a Philosopher really did succeed in his project nearly a century after his death. So in this essay I will discuss how McTaggart attempted to establish the unreality of time, but in the context of not trying to argue he actually established it beyond doubt. McTaggart sought to establish the unreality of time by means of demonstrating how flawed conventional conceptions within Philosophy of Time were. So I will also seek to demonstrate he did at least establish that current conceptions of time were flawed and throw serious doubt upon then.

This linguistic debate brings into question the notions of time and space. It is assumed by some philosophers such as Immanuel Kant to be a necessary facet for human understanding. However, the Pirahã have no need for it, and they are not unique. The same hypothesis has been proposed for other tribes such as the Mura and the Amondawa. There has even been controversy over time in the Hopi language. What this all suggests is that time and space as well as cause and effect might not be innate knowledge or exist in the human mind a priori. They might be developed through observation and experience and therefore be empirical customs as David Hume suggests. What is clear is that they are not necessary for tribes like the Pirahã who have survived for thousands of years. The significance of these tribes is monumental when it comes to the debate about empiricism versus

General Relativity is a two part theory created by the German physicist, Albert Einstein. The two sections of relativity is special relativity and general relativity. Special relativity focuses more on lines, constant-velocity motion on the mass of objects, the passage throughout time, and that passing the speed of light is impossible. General relativity deals with accelerated motion, gravitational fields on mass, size, and time. General relativity also states that matter and space effect each other and that the universe ends and there may be more universes out there. Relativity also includes space-time. Many people think that space and time are completely different variables, but physicists often combine them into “space-time”. Space-time is a four-dimensional coordinate system used in relativity and other areas of physics. The dimensions are, length, width, height, and the 4th is the time dimension.

In Back to the Future and Back to the Future Part II Robert Zemeckis uses the second theory of the relativity of time. Marty travels back in time in the first movie and back to the present time, and then in the second he goes into the future, then the present, then the past. Marty travels through all of these different time periods which become altered every time Marty and Doc travel in time. As they go between different time periods, Marty and Doc encounter different alternate universes that are coexisting. Every time they go into a different year they have to be extremely careful as if they disturb anything they will alter the future course of history. This exemplifies the idea of the second theory of the relativity of time as if many

In this paper I will be discussing the concept of the paradox, examples from Zeno and McTaggart, and how modern science has potential solved the paradox put forth by McTaggart. Both of these paradoxes have a enormous repercussion on how objective fact about the world can be understood. I claim that McTaggart’s theory of time can be solved by modern physics as Einstein’s theory of relativity makes time a relative factor in how time is understood.

The notion of time is used as the basis for the argument in 'To his

He explains that in the A-series all events are, or have the property of, past, present, and

The Scottish philosopher J.E. McTaggart published his work “The Unreality of Time” that presented a now famous argument in the world of philosophy. McTaggart concluded that time doesn’t exist and that nothing worth calling time exists. He came to this conclusion by uncovering two theories of time, which are referred to as the “a-series” and the “b-series.” The a-series is the “series of positions running from the far past through the near past to the present, and then from the present to the near future and the far future.” The b-series is the “series of positions which runs from earlier to later.” To break this down further, the a-series is a time series in which every moment is either past, present or future, while the b-series is each moment is either before or after a different moment. McTaggart recognizes that we use both series, but questions the validity, importance and effect they have on each other.

The passage of time is intrinsically connected to every aspect of life, as it is the construct through which we understand human experiences and the framework through which we comprehend our existence. The essence and effects of temporality reverberate through narratives; acting as a catalyst for action, or becoming an impediment to the future. Through the response that characters in The Wanderer and The Tempest have towards the transience of time, it becomes clear how these effects echo throughout the narrative, prompting these events into movement, and how they seep throughout every aspect of these texts.

We were cut off from the comprehension of our surroundings; we glided past like phantoms, wondering and secretly appalled, as sane men would be before an enthusiastic outbreak in a madhouse. We could not understand because we were too far and could not remember, because we were travelling in the night of first ages, of these ages that are gone, leaving hardly a sign – and no memories.