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Elaborate and complex theories of Time have been propounded in science and philosophies through the ages to this day. But it appears possible to formulate a precise,
rational concept of Time, at once simpler, more fundamental and more significantly revealing than concepts offered so far. And this can be derived entirely from an analysis of the totality of human experience.
The formulation can be expressed as:
Conscious awareness of change is time.
The validity of this definition is proved when we probe the three distinct states of human experience-waking, dream and dreamless sleep common to all.
When you wake up at night suddenly in the dark, you cannot gauge the hour, unless you look the relative position of the moving hands of the watch, or
at the changed positions of the heavenly bodies in the night sky. During the hours of the day, in the absence of a watch, you can only approximate the time - and you are continually reminded of time - by the
changing position of the sun, or by the length and direction of the sun's shadows of the objects around. Among the three states of diurnal experience, it will be recalled, during the spell of dreamless sleep, time
consciousness is altogether absent. In this span, with the mind in suspended animation, there is no consciousness of any change whatsoever, and therefore, no knowledge of time either. It may here be queried: During
deep sleep, then, is there no time at all? Yes, certainly: For the sleeper, no Time at all.
Time, it follows, is but a creature of the individual's mind. No perceiving, appraising mind, no time.
Change and conscious awareness of change, therefore, are the two necessary and sufficient conditions for comprehension and evaluation of Time. The
truth of this fact comes home when we take notice of the lack, among non-human creatures, of the faculty of conscious awareness of time, and of gauging it. While animals have a mind, and do sense changes in their
environment, and react to them, too, they do not-unlike the observing, comparing, inferring homo sapiens- consciously perceive change.
Consequently non-humans do not cognise Time, the fourth dimension, the way man cognises time. That is why, and how, they fail to react to time, in
contrast to man's conscious and deliberate response to change in the space around.
Many of the routine activities of animals, which seem to have a timed regularity, result from unconscious, built-in, biological instincts, or from
acquired conditioned Pavlov reflexes (which apply equally to much of the physiological, involuntary functioning in man no less) but not from their conscious awareness of the flow of time.
Experience of abstract time obviously involves space and matter (as objects). And therefore, the definition of Time, enunciated at the start, is a
total concept, unlike the presently held concepts of Time.
The total concept is further augmented by probing the nature of the other two associated components. Space is a multidimensional infinity. And Matter
is the end-product of concretisation of primal energy in space. Thus all the three, seemingly separate elements, are indeed the inextricably integrated stuff of human experience. And that is congruent-identical-with
the ultrasensuous, ceaseless, pristine, non-differentiate (as subject vs object) SELF-experience in the dreamless, deep sleep state of all creatures, pointed to in philosophy. In other words, it is the experience of
Totality (the Absolute) of all perceivable and imaginable, but unworkable, existence as ONE and the SOLE SELF.*
(* Beyond Thought, Brahmavadin, Vol. 14, 1979, p. 3, Madras.)
In the total concept, science, philosophy and all objective knowledge converge and reach their common destination of ultimate, singular truth -
reality, ubiquitous, timeless.
Why the prevailing concepts of time fail to arrive at the Truth.
Theories of Time have been formulated unquestioningly hitherto on the tacit assumption that only the experience of waking consciousness is valid, and
that, that is all which is necessary to define and comprehend Time. Logically speaking, however, it cannot be denied that the diurnal cycle of experience encompasses two other distinctive categories of experience,
each, while it lasts, is no less valid (felt 'real' and actual) as the other two. But current concepts of time, it should be noted, dismiss, and take no account of two-thirds of the totality of experience in their
calculations and attempt to comprehend the truth behind the phenomenal world.
Theories relying on truncated data, it has to be admitted, can only be partly true. And a truth incomplete can hardly be the Truth. Conversely, only a
Concept which comprehends and is true in each and every state of experience can be accepted as valid. The Total concept outlined above fulfills this essential criterion. (See table on next page)
The formulation of the Total Concept of Time and Space and Matter, it will be seen, also enables total comprehension of the space-time-matter
continuum, which is the phenomenal world. The true origin, sustenance and dissolution of the cognisable world stand unravelled as the sole, inviolable cause behind all existence.
Taking into account all the segments, varieties, levels and strata of experience, therefore, the above deductions appear to be as inevitable as they
are irrefutable.
If corroboration of derivations and generalisations arrived at from facts gathered by the senses (summed up as experience) is the final arbiter of
Science, then the Total concept should supersede the partially understood concepts, presently held, of the fundamental elements of the elements of the universe.
When the veracity of the Total Concept is realised, Science and philosophy will have together achieved their goal.
Major Implications of the Total Concept of Time, Space and Matter in Comparison with the old concepts
Common Concept
- Definition - None.
- Confined only to a part (the waking part) of human experience.
- Absolute and unchanging for all practical pur poses.
- Unidirectional.
- Time is never zero as per current concepts.
- Velocity of Time - constant normally; slows down at the speed of light.
- Indissolubly linked with 3-dimensional space.
- As per present conception, is an objective, independent entity.
- Present concept of Time is erroneous, drawn as it is from waking experience only. It
blocks the development of a comprehensive concept, uniformly valid for the entire gamut of human experience-including dream and dreamless states of oblivion.
- Space-time continuum is envisaged.
- Experience of Time, Space and Matter of only the waking state is deemed by current
concepts as the "Total Reality" and is being considered for arriving at the Truth.
- Truncated, limited concepts.
Total Concept
- Definition - conscious awareness of change.
- Comprehends the entire range of human experience - without exception.
- Variable from state to state and type of experience.
- a. Unidirectional in normal waking state,
b. Multidirectional in imagination, in fantasy, etc., in the waking state.
c. Chaotic in dream state.
- Time is zero (non-existent) during dreamless sleep, as recognised by the New Concept.
- Constancy of velocity, and Einstein's relativity are true in waking state only.
- This is true during waking and dream state only - but not during deep sleep, wherein mind (consciousness) is in abeyance.
- Time is revealed in the Total Concept to be subjective.
- The Total Concept enables comprehensive understanding of the true nature of Time
and of Space and of Matter, and of all conceivable contents of objective knowledge.
- Since change is a spatial property, the Total Concept embodies Space-Time Continuum also.
- The new Total Concept recognises that time, space and Matter of the waking hours
are, like those of the dream, but a projection of the individual mind. And the mind in its turn is revealed to be a creature of the ABSOLUTE (the indescribable experience of dreamless sleep.)
- Total, comprehensive concept.
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