TIME AND ETERNITY (THE

PHILOSOPHY OF TIME IN THE

WORK OF AURELIUS
AUGUSTINE)

Afshin Riahinia

8. Klasse
TIME AND ETERNITY (THE
PHILOSOPHY OF TIME IN THE
 WORK OF AURELIUS
AUGUSTINE) / Zeit und Ewigkeit
(Die Philosophie der Zeit bei
Aurelius Augustinus)

Vorwissenschaftliche Arbeit

Verfasser/in: Afshin Riahinia

Betreuer/in: Brigitte Pll

8. Klasse 2016/17

ORG Rudolf Steiner

Auhofstrae 78 f
1130 Wien

Abstract

Table of Contents

Introduction.........................................................................................1
1 What is time?.................................................................................2
1.1 Antiquity..........................................................................................................
1.1.1 Plato......................................................................................................3
1.1.2 Aristoteles............................................................................................4
2
 1.2 Today...............................................................................................................
1.3 Difference in the understanding of time......................................................
2 Augustine......................................................................................7
2.1 Eternity............................................................................................................
2.2 temporality......................................................................................................
2.3 Time continuity...............................................................................................
2.4 Human-experience.......................................................................................
2.5 conclusion....................................................................................................
3 Modern Physics versus Philosophy.........................................12
3.1 theories.........................................................................................................
3.1.1 Special Relativity...............................................................................12
3.1.2 General Relativity..............................................................................13
3.2 Comparison..................................................................................................
3.2.1 Similarities.........................................................................................14
3.2.2 Differences.........................................................................................15
4 Conclusions................................................................................16
4.1 Philosophy versus Physics........................................................................
4.2 Philosophy versus Experience...................................................................
Bibliograph........................................................................................18
List of Figures...................................................................................19
Betreuungsprotokoll.........................................................................20
Eigenstndigkeit Erklrung..............................................................21

3
Introduction

What exactly is time, and how can we define it?

I try to investigate properties of time on a philosophical basis, and back that
information up with some physics.
A lot of philosophers have tried to explain time, but Im going to look at Plato,
where in his dialogue, Plato unravels the mysteries of time and tries to understand
it as best as he can.
Another philosopher who also commented on time was, Aristoteles. Not only did
he write about psychology, biology and medicine, physics and much more, he also
wrote about the metaphysics, which includes time as well.
The next and last philosopher I would like to address and the one that my scientific
paper is mostly about is Augustine of hippo. A Christian Philosopher, who wrote
about several topics concerning god, one of which was time.
Aside from philosophers Im going to analyze Albert Einsteins, Theory of relativity,
which is also one of the modern ways of understanding time and much more.
The goal of my scientific paper is to examine what time actually is, what important
philosophers have said about time and how much of that holds true to our
understanding of the world explained by physics.
To do that, I read what each philosopher said about this topic, and what physicists
have found out about the nature of time. After reading and summarizing the most
important aspects of each point of view, I try to reach a conclusion on which idea
still holds true and which ideas are different from our understanding and
experience of time.
My paper is set in chronological order, I start with Plato, the oldest of the three
philosophers, then his disciple Aristoteles and last Augustine. After examining
Every philosopher, I take a look at the newest theory, published in 1905, and
examine the aspects of the theory that concern themselves with time. After
summarizing every theory, I compare the theories.
What I try to avoid in my scientific paper is, to come to my own conclusion while
writing about human experience, I try to stay with what has been said as much as
possible. I also only analyze these three Philosophers and Einsteins theory of
relativity, otherwise this topic would get very complex.
1 What is time?

Many people ordinary men as well as scientists, theologians as well as

philosophers have asked this question and struggled to find a definition to a
phenomenon that seems most natural to all of us. We all know temporal effects but
find it utterly difficult to define time in principle.
As to the Oxford Dictionary time is the indefinite continued progress of existence
and events in the past, present and future regarded as a whole. 1
One way of coping with time is by measuring it. To that end, we gave time a unit,
for example one second or one minute.
Although time is hard to define, it in reverse - essentially defines everything, at
least all living things as they are subject to transitoriness. Maybe time is best
understood by watching things grow old and wither such as the metamorphosis of
a flower.

Another way of easily understanding time is observing things pass for example
an hourglass. We see how the sand drops and say it will take ten minutes for the
all the sand to pass through the small opening. Thats another way of observing
time.
As time is so omnipresent it is also referred to as the fourth dimension, it is one of
the components building our reality. Physicists use mathematical formulas to
define aspects of time such as the time dilation. The time dilation is an aspect in

1https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/time (zugriff am 10.12.2016)

Einsteins theory of relativity which I will explain later. The formula for the time
dilation is:
t
t '=

1
v
c2

the formula states that t (the dilated time) changes with respect to the velocity
the object is moving at.
In the following chapter I am analyzing the major concepts of time.

1.1 Antiquity

Most ancient civilizations believed that time was cyclic, that it had cycles,
since everything around them in nature showed a kind of resurrection and
repeatability, like the rising and falling of the ocean tides and rivers, the
return of the seasons, and the cycles of the heavens. But the greatest
efforts to study and understand and define exactly what time is began with
the philosophers of ancient Greece. 2
I have chosen the two most famous ones, Aristotle and Plato, to depict their
theories.
1.1.1 Plato
http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/physis/plato-timaeus/default.asp
In Timaes Plato describes gods as being eternal.
The universe, he proposes, is the product of rational, purposive, and
beneficial agency. It is the handiwork of a divine Craftsman, who, imitating an
unchanging and eternal model, imposes mathematical order on a
preexistent chaos to generate the ordered universe. 3
They were created by the father creator and the creator tried to make the universe
eternal too. The only problem that the father of all beings had was the impossibility
to bestow eternity in its fullest to any creation. His solution to the problem was,
create a moving image of eternity. The heavens were eternal moving images
according to numbers.
Plato says that the past and future are wrongly associated with time. The past and
future are not time but a motion. Something that does not move will not age, it will
stay the same in years. But through motion and alteration, the object ages and one
can say in the past it looked different and it will look different in the future.

2 (www.andersoninstitute.com) (zugriff am 10.12.2016)

3 (Plato, Demiourgos, 28a6 cited in www.plato.stanford.edu)

Plato thought time and the heavens were created together in the same instant. As
a result, if one would cease to exist, the other would as well. The heavens were
created with eternity in mind, the heaven is and will be all at the same time.
God created the sun, moon and five other stars to distinguish and preserve time.
These five stars are the planets we know.
First, there was the moon in the orbit nearest the earth, and next the sun, in
the second orbit above the earth; then came the morning star and the star
sacred to Hermes, moving in orbits which have an equal swiftness with the
sun, but in an opposite direction; and this is the reason why the sun and
Hermes and Lucifer overtake and are overtaken by each other. 4
1.1.2 Aristoteles
http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/physics.6.vi.html
In Book IV of Physica, he states that time is the number of movements in respect
of the before and after.5
To Aristotle time is not made up of the past, present and future, he says that the
present is not a part of time. While the past has been and the future is about to be,
the present makes up something else. To illustrate this more clearly, he suggests
imagining two lines: The first line being the past and the second the future. Now
divide the two lines with a point. That is what the present is, the binding that binds
the past and the future together.
Aristotle also comes to the conclusion that time is a motion of some kind but finds
that time is not the same thing as motion the reason being, something can change
faster or slower but time will not be faster or slower, time is always equally
presented. Thus, he concludes that time does not exist without change or motion.
One does not know how much time has passed if nothing changes. A simple
example of this is the state of sleep, where an individual would not know how
much time has passed if the sky did not change you would not know if two hours
have passed or eight, you would only know that the sky is still dark, which would
mean that either no time at all or just a small amount of time has passed.
Aristotle has proven that time is not motion but it is not independent of motion
either. For him time is a number. Just as motion is a perpetual succession, so also

4http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/physis/plato-timaeus/default.aspTime, 37c-39e,
Page 2 (zugriff am 12.12.2016)

5 http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/physics.4.iv.html (zugriff am 13.12.2016)

is time. Consequently, time is made by the now and divided by it. Time cannot
exist without the now and vice versa.
Time can either be referred to as a length (the line just mentioned) or a number.
There is, however, a difference between the two. If we refer to time as a number
then there is no number smaller than one (for the ancient Greeks the number 1
was the smallest number, the number 0 was invented later). But a piece of rope
or silk can always be divided into smaller pieces, so it is also with time.
Time is also not fast or slow, it is either many or few and long or short. Also, seen
with number (many or few) and a line (long or short).
What does being in time mean? Aristotle contemplated two possibilities. First
possibility is to exist when time does and the second is to belong to in number.
(Aristotle referred to time as a number.)
Aristotle also examines the way we humans express time within sentences. The
word now has many meanings for us. He will come now in this sentence we use
the word now for describing something that will happen in the near future. We
describe a time in relation to the now with at some time e.g. at some time troy
was taken. For expressing an action that will happen in the future close to the
now we use words such as presently and lately for actions in the past.

1.2 Today

Today time is most accurately defined by physics. The definition of time has gotten
more and more accurate through the years.
Galileo Galilei was one of the first to try to measure time. Instead of using a clock
as we know it, he used other things such as his pulse or by using a vessel of
water. What Galileo Galilei believed, was that there was one time for all reference
frames. Sir Isaak Newton followed Aristoteles idea of linear time and formulated it
into a mathematical unit.
Newton too believed time to be a universal clock, just as Galileo Galilei his
predictor thought it was.
Albert Einsteins viewed time differently. In his theory of relativity, he challenged
the idea of an absolute time. Synchronization created an illusion of an absolute
time. Our modern concept of time is defined by this theory.
In the theory of relativity time is not universal, each reference frame has its own
time depending on its motion. The faster an object moves the slower its clock runs
relative to an object standing still. For example, if I were to fly in a spaceship
traveling at C (C being the absolute speed of light) then my clock would be slower
than someones clock who is standing on the earth.
Ill.1 This is an illustration of a light clock. a) is the person standing b) is the person who is moving at a higher
speed. The beam of lights takes longer to reach its position when the person is moving.

1.3 Difference in the understanding of time

One of the most notable differences would be the jump from the way of thinking
before Einstein and after. Before Einstein we believed time to be a universal thing.
There was always one time, and nothing we did would change this. After Einsteins
theory of Relativity, we know that time is not universal, but influenced by motion.
2 Augustine

http://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/augustine/Pusey/book11
In Book IX of Confessions Augustine analyzes the nature of time in relation to
eternity, the eternity of God. This clearly shows that he is writing upon a religious
background and intends to present a religious to some extend even dogmatic
theory.

2.1 Eternity

Saint Augustine draws a very clear line between the time as we know it and
eternity. He explains, if we could achieve the eternity of time, we wouldn't
experience the past present or the future. All things would become one, and as a
result time would not pass. He further explains that time isn't all at once, it is made
of many motions passing by and every motion put together makes up the time
continuum we know. The past it made up of time which has been pushed back by
time that comes, and time that will come.
Augustine starts out by asking the questions, what had been before God created
time. How can there even be a before when there was no time? Thus, he
concludes that the time on earth must be quite different to the eternal time of God.
He also explains how time is experienced differently by humans and God. God is
the same as eternity and humans are beings who experience past, present and
future in that order. God being eternal - has no past, no tomorrow nor a today
like we do. God's "... years neither come nor go; whereas ours both come and go,
that they all may come."6
If God, however, created the world as suggested in Genesis He must have
done that in temporality in earthly time. This means, God is also part of it, thus
limited by time and consequently not eternal anymore, which obviously constitutes
a paradox.
The action of creation needs a beginning which is a moment in linear time. In
theological term this would mean: the creator is separated from his creation. But
god did not create this world in time, if there is no space then there can be no time.
In other words, he created this universe and everything else from nothing. God
created this word by speaking. Not in the literal sense but a different kind of
speaking than we humans know. Gods word is eternal and so is still being
spoken. That would result in the creation still taking place.

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 everything which begins to be and ceases to be begins and ends its
existence at that moment when, in the eternal reason where nothing begins
or ends, it is known that it is right for it to begin and end (needs quotation)
This states that god is the first word, the first cause, an unmoving and unchanging
source that a changing system needs, that it can start from and refer to.
The source equals the wisdom: "Wisdom is the beginning, and in the beginning,
you made heaven and earth." (needs quotation) This means that the beginning is
not to be understood as the first point in a line but as the theological point, the
wisdom which is in itself eternal and has become accessible to people living in
time through Jesus. In this wisdom, God eternally creates the world at an instant,
as there is no time with God, since time is only characteristic of a created world.

2.2 temporality

Time is a very complex thing, Augustine addresses the fact that, when no one asks
one about time, we all know what it is. But when we are asked about the nature of
time, what it is and how it came to be there is no clear answer. We use the phrase
"a long time" and "a short time", now the question is, what are there short or long
in relation to? If we for example take a hundred years, is that long? Are those
hundred years the present? To explain these questions, we need to take them
apart.
If the first year is the present then the others are yet to come, which would mean
that a hundred of years is not the present. One can also take the first year into
consideration, if we do this we see that there are again 12 months concealed
within one year which would mean, one year isn't the present either. This process
can be done infinitely, in a month there are days, in days hours, in hours minutes
and so on.
So really, we have to take a position and compare it to everything else. As an
example, the year 2017 is the present year and every year after it would be the
future and every year before it is the past. Although there are a lot of hours and
days in a year, which would make our past and present in accurate, we can still
define the past and the future in a meaningful way.

2.3 Time continuity

Following Aristotle, everybody seems to know what time is at least until asked.
Time is defined by past (things having passed away or being passing away)
present (things existing) future (things to come, things arriving). Thus, time
depends on things arriving, then staying for an instant and fading away, passing
by. Consequently, time is constituted by a movement toward the non-existent:
indeed we cannot truly say that time exists except in the sense that it tends
toward non-existence." (needs quotation) - which is paradoxical: we cannot move
towards something that is not / that does not exist.
Hence Augustine concludes that the past and the future do not exist: the past, as
well as the future are simply constructed by pictures in our imagination. If they
were time, they would be present. (circular argumentation: time is present, past
and future are not present, ergo: past and future do not exist depending on the
definition of time. To Augustine time is only what exists now! Past and future do
not)
What is more, the present cannot actually be pinned down. What is present / the
moment / now? Is it the instant of a second? Actually, it is impossible to grasp the
present as well. Augustine concludes does not occupy any space, which is
obvious, but it does not occupy any duration as well. It is the presence of the mind
and in that it equals what he said before about eternity. It is everlasting always
there but not to be pinned down in space or time.
But time must exist in some way as we all can talk about it without
misunderstandings. We do share a mutual concept of time. Moreover, we can also
measure it, which would clearly not be possible with something inexistent.
Augustine answers that time can only exist with memory and prediction. The past
is existing in the present as pictures in the memory and the future does so by
anticipating pictures in memory, drawing from signs in the present. (There are dark
grey clouds in the sky it is going to rain)
We can say that the time progression is linear. Since time is not eternal, there is a
beginning the creation and an ending. Although it may be true that we all
experience time differently, and thus we could say time isnt really linear but more
chaotic, that would be true but in the grand scheme of things, there is a start and
end, otherwise our world wouldnt be temporal but eternal.
Moreover, there is a way we could distance ourselves from the idea of the linearity
of time, in that there is a kind of non-linear, cyclic property, to time. If we were to
look at the bible, and the idea that time not the eternal one but the temporal one
is a property of the soul, where it was created, due to mankind being banned
from the heavens, then there is something cyclic about what has come and will
come.
Humans lived in eternity until we ate from the fruit, which was forbidden to us. We
were cast down from the heavens into a temporal world, as a result humans
became temporal, but not everything became temporal. Just our bodies, our flesh
that binds us to this world is what is temporal, our soul in Augustines view is
eternal but it gets stretched in the temporal world to stimulate time. And then after
death, parting from the temporal world, we go back to god, to the eternal paradise
where were before god cast us out.
So, although time is linear as in there is a starting point, and an ending , there
are events which make time seem like a circle, always repeating and never
ending.
Time is also related to each person, as Augustine says that time is a property of
the soul, then that would mean that there is no real time, which governs the world,
or if there was one it wouldnt be an absolute time. We can illustrate this by just
looking how we experience time differently. Some experience time slower than
others, which states that there is not an absolute time in the sense that, everything
is the same for everyone. But more that there is an absolute progression of time
but the experience is more related to the soul of one person.
This is later also stated by physicists, and is the basis of albert Einsteins general
theory of relativity.

2.4 Human-experience

How do we measure time? What do we measure it in relation to? The only thing
that we can really measure is space, but time is not space. Do we measure time
from the past, present or future? When the sun rises and sets, does the motion of
the son make the day or the day make the motion of the sun? Does motion make
time? That would be a very simple question, the answer is no. There is time
without motion but there is no motion without time.
Do we by a shorter time measure a longer, as by the space of a cubit, the space
of a rood?.7 Whence it seemed to me, that time is nothing else than protraction. 8
Augustine tries to make sense of what time is by measure it with different
examples. One example is space. He also uses the example of stanzas, the space
of a stanza with verses, verses with feet, feet by long syllables and so on. If the is
no future and no past, then what do we measure when we say this is double as
long as that. If it is not the future because the future not reality yet, and not the
past because the past doesnt exist anymore, then what do we measure?

We measure time not by the impression, but by which is still present. Augustine
believes either this is how we measure time, or we are not measuring time at all.
We measure silence by comparing it to the voice that came before. The silence
lasted for one minute. We can measure it because we compare it to the time we
heard a sound. This is done by going over poems and sentences in the mind and
measuring the time in respect to that. Repeating anything is made up of two
things, Memory which represents the past and expectations which represents the
future. There is a third component which Augustine calls consideration.
Augustine also states the more we do this, the shorter the expectation gets and
the longer the memory becomes.

7 http://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/augustine/Pusey/book11 11.26.33
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8 http://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/augustine/Pusey/book11 11.26.33 (zugriff am

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According to Saint Augustine the assumption that there is a past present and
future is wrong.
"What now is clear and plain is, that neither things to come nor past are. Nor
is it properly said, "there be three times, past, present, and to come": yet
perchance it might be properly said, "there be three times; a present of things
past, a present of things present, and a present of things future. For these
three do exist in some sort, in the soul, but other where do I not see them;
present of things past, memory; present of things present, sight; present of
things future, expectation."9
Augustine suggests that time might be distention of the soul. Our soul, created by
god in the heavens should be eternally in paradise, but for the sins that humans
have committed, we were cast down to the earth, a mortal world, a temporal word.
Therefore, time is not a property of the external world, but more a property of the
soul itself. This refers to the assumption that time other than the eternal time, does
not exist, but we measure something in our memory.

2.5 conclusion

It is very important to differentiate between eternity and infinity. These two terms
are very essential to the understanding of time. Considering infinity is a bundle of
finite things being put together to no end, something which is so large that it cant
be counted, and eternity being seen as a single, very compressed point. Eternity is
the present, not like the present in time where there is no duration for it because it
doesnt really exist, but a present where everything is happening at once. If we see
time as a change relative to another object, then eternity would be defined as an
unchanging state of being.
Thus, the argument that god is infinite, is not right, since there is nothing to count
when talking about god, but rather he is eternal, meaning he is not bound by time.
Time itself is both infinite and temporally. Just like how photons behave differently
depending on the experiment performed on them, time also changes it properties
depending on the situation.

9http://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/augustine/Pusey/book11 11.20.26 (zugriff am

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3 Modern Physics versus Philosophy

In modern physics, scientists have a concept of time, one of the most revolutionary
and important ones is the theory of relativity. This theory consists of two theories
presented by Albert Einstein, special relativity and general relativity.
When you are courting a nice girl, an hour seems like a second. When you
sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity.10
This quote summarizes the theory of relativity in relation to time almost completely.
In this theory, there are a few paradoxes which havent been answered yet, and
we will also take a look at some of them to grasp a better understanding of the
problems time can cause in the theory of relativity.

3.1 theories

There are mostly two theories that explain time in physics.

Linear time put forth by newton

Theory of relativity by Einstein which is built on newtons theory

Were going to take a look at Einsteins theory and compare it with the ideas
philosophers had hundreds of years ago.
3.1.1 Special Relativity
The special theory of relativity is a theory regarding the relation between space
and time. For this theory to work Albert Einstein stets a few rules:
1. In ever inertial system, every law of physics behaves the same way.
2. The speed of light in a vacuum is always a constant.
Firstly, everything is relative.

10 Albert Einstein
The picture above shows a line passing through every point at the same time. V=0
is just an indication that there is no velocity in our inertial system.

3
Now when we change speed to 10 of c (in fact any velocity higher than 0 will

have the same effect), our grid gets deformed and out line passes through each
point at a separate time.
This explains the relativity of simultaneity. If you have a different speed than the
second observer the closer your speed gets to c, the more you see the effects
you will see things differently.
Now that we know everything is relative, and that mostly depends on the speed of
the observer, we can take a look at the phenomena of time dilation.
3.1.2 General Relativity
General relativity, would be best and simply explained, as the curvature of space-
time.
Every object, curves the so-called foam of space-time, with respect to its mass.
The higher the mass, the bigger the sinking hole. Objects like planets have a
much smaller influence on space-time, then something like a black hole. Now this
curvature of space, can bend light, distort a particle or influence time. (Wikipedia
find source)
Time dilation depends on two factors:
1. Velocity (Special relativity)
2. Gravity (General relativity)
Depending on which of these two factors is causing the time dilation, the effects
are different.
If we look at two objects with different velocities, then one can say, the object that
is moving faster has a slower clock relative to the object which is either stationary
or is moving slower. Problems like the twin paradox arise as a result, where one
cannot really say which clock is progressing slower.
If Gravity is responsible for time dilation, then it is due to the curvature in space-
time. A very important factor is the distance to the gravitational object. The closer
the object to the center of gravity, the slower clock is. Again, this is also very much
influenced by how much mass the object has, and what the difference in distance
is.
These two circumstances can be summarized. For example, the ISS has a
different velocity than the earth, relatively seen from our position on the earth, it is
moving faster. Which would mean time on the ISS is slower than on earth, but
because we are closer to the earths center of gravity our clocks run slower which
more or less cancels the difference in velocity out. However, it is important to note
that the magnitude of change isnt the same. (Wikipedia, find source)

3.2 Comparison

Now lets compare philosophy with physics, the ideas that the philosophers of old
came up with, with actual facts that we know are more or less true.
3.2.1 Similarities
There is one possibility that time is indirectly infinite. If the universe is said to be
infinite, then time would be too. Since time is bound to space, also called space-
time, and the universe, i.e. space, might be infinite, that would mean time is infinite
as well.
Time is very much temporally. If viewed from Einsteins perspective, time changes,
it is not eternal and unchanging. The simple act of moving changes the length of
time as not just experience in our minds but actually passing.
Plato and Aristoteles also associated time with motion, which we now know is true.
Since space-time is one, then anything that should happen in space also has
something to do with time.

3.2.2 Differences
Time may be infinite, but it is not eternal. There is one theory which states that it
may be eternal, but its highly unlikely. If space had a beginning, that being the big
bang, then time must have had a beginning to.
Augustine also states that the eternal time has a connection to god, a being that
does not really exist in physics. So, for eternity to exist, god is needed, and if there
is no god to prohibit the existence of eternity, then there is no eternity.
4 Conclusions

4.1 Philosophy versus Physics

Time in physics is always bound to space, states in Einsteins theory of relativity,

time is influenced by space and vice versa, just like in philosophy where Plato and
Aristoteles associate time with motion.
If we look to the past and the future of our universe, there is are 3 possibilities for
our universe.
One of them makes the eternality of the universe possible. Eternity as in never
ending. In this eternity, there are an infinite series of events, but these events
always repeat themselves, so one could say the universe is never ending, or
eternal.
The others would state that there is a time continuum for us humans, one where
the big bang happened, as in it is past, and where the universe will end in some
way, as in the future.
Time can also be eternal, if our understanding of the fourth dimension is correct.
We humans are being who control the three dimensions of motion freely and are
trapped in the prison of the fourth dimension, where we cannot do anything but
watch as time goes past us. If the fourth dimension is controllable, like the three
dimension that we can control, then time might by eternal.
Eternity in that sense would be much like the idea of eternity put forth by
Augustine. Everything being all at once and never changing since all of time is
there before our eyes in that instant.

4.2 Philosophy versus Experience

We humans certainly experience time as a continuum. Our lives have a direction,

as in they move forward, we grow up, things change until we become old and at
some point, die, hence the end of our perception of time.
If you look at a movie that's being played backwards, you know it
immediately because most things have a distinct time direction attached to
them: an arrow of time. For example, eggs can easily turn into omlettes but
not the other way around, and milk and coffee mix in your cup but never
separate out again.11

11 https://plus.maths.org/content/what-time-0 (zugriff am 20.01.2016)

For us humans there also is no absolute time. Time is relative for us, not only
regarding our motion but in our minds as well. If ones having a good time, then
time flies by and you wont feel it. But if ones not having a good time, then the
same 10 minutes that past, which felt like two minutes earlier, feel like an eternity
now.
The perception of time can also change with a lot of other factors. Such as, age,
emotional states, drugs etc. there have been psychological studies regarding this.
The elderly experience time slower than young people. A study proved this by
choosing a specific number of people between 60 and 80-year-olds and 19 and
24-year-olds. Both groups had to estimate when 3 minutes had passed. The
younger group took about an average of 3 minutes 3 seconds to feel 3 minutes
passing, while the elderly group took 3 minutes 40 seconds. Children also first
experience time when their attention and short-term memory capacities form.
Drugs also have different effects on ones perception of time depending on the
effects the drugs have on our brain.
This shows that the perception is not universal but individual.
Bibliograph
List of Figures

Ill. 1: http://www.esotericscience.com/lightclock.jpg
Ill.2/3:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativity_of_simultaneity#/media/File:Relativity_of_Si
multaneity_Animation.gif
Ill. 4: https://i.stack.imgur.com/3vGJJ.png
Betreuungsprotokoll

8.9.: 5 Seiten des ersten Kapitels zusammengefasst- abgegeben. Kapiteleinteilung

besprochen

21.11.: Platos Zeitkonzept zusammengefasst -> Umstrukturierung besprochen,

andere Philosophen und Physiker
12.12.: 1 Kapitel + Inhaltsverzeichnis -> Korrektur und Ergnzungen
8.1.: 2. Kapitel + Ausblick -> Korrektur und Ergnzungen
13.2.: Fertigstellung und Abgabe der VWA
Eigenstndigkeit Erklrung

Hiermit besttige ich, dass ich die vorliegende Arbeit selbstndig verfasst und
keine anderen als die angegebenen Hilfsmittel benutzt habe. Die Stellen der
Arbeit, die dem Wortlaut oder dem Sinn nach anderen Werken (dazu zhlen auch
Internetquellen) entnommen sind, wurden unter Angabe der Quelle kenntlich
gemacht.