Re: A Proposal for Wrapping Up

Folks,

   Ted's crisp summary reminds me once again of one recurring theme
surrounding the sturdy issue on the difference between dynamics in time and
dynamics of time.

   Recently, I had an opportunity to spend some time with a young fellow
just 1 year and 2 months old both in the morning and in the evening for
about a month. Of course, she does not speak, but is very sharp in pointing
to what she would like to do. She likes to eat pear much more than apple.
She never fails in pointing to a piece of peeled pear when both pear and
apple are on the plate. When her mouth is full of juicy pear, she does not
care even if I have eaten up all pieces of peeled pear on the plate. But,
she got angry to find no pear to take when she was ready for another piece.
This incidence has again waken me up to the simple fact that dynamics of
time is more basic empirically. Even if one does not have a clear perception
of what time looks like, experiencing time-phenomena or dynamics of time can
proceed as facing no obstacles.

   A difficult problem, however, arises to those who can speak. Those who
take framing whatever statements in present tense for granted has to have
some preconception of time as a criterion of what present tense is all
about. One popular vehicle for this objective is space-time continuum.
Theoretically, it may be okay. Empirically, it is not. My young fellow has
been quite sensitive to the discontinuity between the movement in progress
(pear in her mouth) and the movement perfected (ready for another piece)
without being bothered by the global context referred to in the present
tense (somebody eats up all the pieces on the plate).

   Cheers,
   Koichiro

     Koichiro Matsuno
     Department of BioEngineering
     Nagaoka University of Technology
     Nagaoka 940-2188, Japan
     http://bio.nagaokaut.ac.jp/~matsuno
     Voice & Fax: +81 258 47 9420
Received on Fri Jan 17 09:11:16 2003