The Time Illusion

by John Gribbin

Albert Einstein said “the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion”. So, why do we perceive a flow of time? Is the future “already there”, and is the past “still there”, even though we are only aware of a single moment of time? Drawing on the latest ideas from both relativity and quantum theory, award-winning science writer John Gribbin (In Search of Schrödinger’s Cat) addresses the questions that have baffled philosophers since antiquity and Zeno’s arrow paradox. Along the way, we find that in the quantum world it is literally true that a watched pot never boils, and learn how physicists have come to terms with the idea of the four-dimensional block universe as an explanation of the distinction between past, present and future. Why do eggs break when we drop them, but never unbreak? The Universe as we know it began in a Big Bang, which in some sense marks the beginning of time. Is it possible that we need to invoke the Big Bang to explain why we never see unbroken eggs? This idea glories in the name “the past hypothesis”, but many physicists regard it as no more than an attempt to sweep the problem of the arrow of time under the rug. Read The Time Illusion and see if you agree!

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Physics, Philosophy, Stem, Psychology

29 pages, Kindle Edition

Published July 31, 2016

About the author

John R. Gribbin is a British science writer, an astrophysicist, and a visiting fellow in astronomy at the University of Sussex. His writings include quantum physics, human evolution, climate change, global warming, the origins of the universe, and biographies of famous scientists. He also writes science fiction.

Reviews

[Bharath · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a nice, informative and quick read on ‘time’. If you are looking for more detailed coverage, I would recommend the excellent book (after reading this one) “The Order of Time” by Carlo Rovelli which I have reviewed previously.

This book traces the concepts related to time since early on. Zeno, had said that our universe itself is static, and it is we who create movement. Newtonian physics tended to portray a fully predictable universe and for a time it was believed that Newton’s laws and gravity explained everything there is to know about the universe. All action was believed to happen in absolute space which is the same in all directions. This also bifurcated time into past, present and future cleanly. Subsequently, the Law of thermodynamics had implications for time. A contradiction with classical physics came up when laws of electromagnetism were discovered by Maxwell. Further major changes to our understanding of time came with Einstein's theories. The link between space and time idea came from Einstein's teacher Minkowski after the Special Theory of Relativity was published. Einstein expanded on this in his subsequent General Theory of Relativity which outlined the concept of spacetime.

The most fascinating aspect of this is the implication that we are possibly in a block universe comprised of spacetime. Then – there is no past, present & future and all time exists – laid out in spacetime. Hoyle said, human consciousness illuminates the present. So, do we perceive time the way we do only because our brains are organized and limited? Barbour added a twist to this with his idea of time capsules - quantum states which have information of the past but not future. So, time does not pass but has a direction, which we experience.

I find all of this fascinating. It is also the background for some interesting science fiction novels (such as Blake Crouch’s ‘Recursion’ which I loved). Probably a few more theories / scientific opinions could have been included.

A great short book – focused and very engaging.

My rating: 4.5 / 5.

[Fay Wu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great essay which covers a brief history of theories of time and, fundamentally, physics, starting with an introduction to the pointing arrow argument by Zeno of Eleatic philosophy and leading up to the quantum Zeno effect ("a watched [quantum] pot never boils"). It's a short read but leads to many interesting questions and also has references to other books I shall now read, such as "Fabric of Reality" by David Deutsch. My favourite part is where he builds up some intuition about spacetime, and how when space expands, time shrinks, by referencing Minkowski's comparisons between 3D (length by Pythagoras' Theorem) and 4D ("extension" with the add'l speed of light and time interval element).

[György · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Hungarian Nobel prize winner Albert Szent-Györgyi put it: "Life is nothing but an electron looking for a place to rest".
I'm convinced that review writing is essential essence of every reading -that is giving me a closure. Review may help the reader appreciate a book as it was in my case with "The Time Illusion". If can't figure where to start from I'll every time resort to Mr. Cicero's quote "docere, delectare, et movere". I'll be honest, without thinking about devising a review, I'd miss an excellent book! I think that one of Mr. Gribbin's goals was to keep it concise, no idling, no wasting of readers time and efforts. This is the reason one may got an impression of shortness and crowdedness. But, that's illusion as well. I've got the maximum during the review combined with brief second reading.
Lets see the subject and that something what could I not resist to:
Time alone and not the Spacetime, how I was used to think about. (in scientific way)
Lets put a side the space and focus on time! Is the time real?
Does anything or anybody else, except us in the vast cosmos, care for it? One is for sure - we do! So, time is real in a degree we are real.
Are we, real?! As the Hungarian Nobel prize winner Albert Szent-Györgyi put it: "Life is nothing but an electron looking for a place to rest". So, according to that, electrons truly are what makes life go round. Can you recall what Niels Bohr said about the quantum world? "Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.", and he added: "If quantum mechanics hasn't profoundly shocked you, you haven't understood it yet."! According to Schrödinger's definition of life, life is something that defies the entropy. And there is a physicist's nightmare - the measurement, the action without we can't postulate our realm, but an action that alters the subject of our measurement. So, here we are at Second Law where the process of disintegration plays quintessential role. Falling apart toward maximum disorder is the realm where the matter of the highest order known in Cosmos, the human brain, is continuously coming into existence...from ghostly particles or from field disturbances that are rather unreal than real. So, where time comes in? Does time have essential role in our realm where everything is infinite..except us? Is this short book is the one that will answer your question after reading about time? I don't know that! But, one I know, this book made me devise, new (for me), great, exciting questions! Asking clever questions leads us to a new discovery endeavors! "The time illusion" is the book that's gonna make your imagination soar - just give it a chance. Cheers!

[Roberto Rigolin F Lopes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, time! You are surely wasting some while reading this. But this book remind us that the universe is so vast + reversible making time an illusion. A very vivid illusion for short-life carbon-based machines living in funny societies, though... no time to finish this review, read the dawn book!

[John J · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good Capsule Summary of Theories about Time

Gribbon's essay is short enough that can be easily digested in a single sitting. It clearly and concisely covers a number of competing theories about the mystery of time. For those reasons I gave the essay four stars.

Unfortunately, it appears that the author adheres to the Block Universe model, which holds that the "arrow of time" is an illusion. According to BU model, space-time is likened to a block of cheese, where events are like pieces of string, called world lines, embedded in the cheese. The lengths and positions of the world lines are fixed within the block, so time does not actually unfold ; past, present and future coexist as an unchanging eternity. This implies time is fundamentally reversible, as in LaPlace's clockwork universe where all information regarding the future has already been encoded in the past and present.

The fallacy with the BU model is that the total amount of information contained within the "block" must remain constant along the entire "time axis"; however, this is demonstrably false. First, information is equivalent to entropy, and like entropy it cannot be constant. Every physical process is inherently irreversible with an amount of entropy/information that must increase between the cause and effect. Thus, if information were to remain constant according to the BU mode, it would be inconsistent with causality. Second, it has been repeatedly proven by experiments that measurements of quantum states are entirely stochastic; there are no hidden variables that determine what the next quantum state will be. Each observation of a quantum generates a brand-new set of bits of information that simply did not exist prior to making the observation. Furthermore, not only is the future fundamentally unknowable because there is insufficient information available in the present; there is no mechanism that can erase information in the present in order to "go back to the past" when there was less information. Time is unidirectional and there truly is an arrow of time, and it is not just an illusion.

[Brono · Rating 4 out of 5]

What is time? Why is it that we are so conditioned and entrapped to yesterday, today and tomorrow? Do they really exist?

From a scientific point of view (which is what this book is about) you have some weird equations (for the brain I have cannot understand or grasp) from the most respectable scientists of all time but "according to spacetime physics, the openness of the future is an illusion, and therefore causation and free will can be no more than illusion as well...in reality, we make no choices. Even as we think we are considering a choice, it's outcome is already there, in the appropriate slice of spacetime, unchangeable like everything else in spacetime, and impervious to (unable to be affected by) our deliberations." (Deutsch)

By reading this lines I wonder what's the outcome of that blue dot in this infinite spacetime?

In a letter of condolences to Besso's family (Einstein's old friend) he said: "Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion. But our language, which has built in to it our subjective feeling of time passing, struggles to deal with this concept." Few weeks later on 18 of April 1955 Einstein died leaving behind this illusion in which we all remain.

[william ellison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Time, time, time...

The science ultimately seems to complicate what is a matter of individual and collective perception but is nonetheless compelling a read. That is ultimately it is each and all of us in our witness state that can attest to the vagaries of time but our collective drive over the last couple of hundred years has been to tie down this knowledge to a series of objective observations , the very endeavour which quantum events seem to defy. Even so as far as one can deduce, Gribbin is in harmony with the great souls that time, as past present future, is illusory but the present has a special relation to our perception.
Though there remains the danger that Now is not seen as a coordinate in (space)time while the capacity of the present to open into a dimension beyond time, the eternal, is of so little consequence in the scientific survey of the topic. A very enjoyable and informative treatise, while always worth remembering it's just another way of looking at something we all have intuitive access to. Will read it or similar again.

[Rob · Rating 3 out of 5]

(3.5 stars) This short book by the prolific science writer John Gribbin sketches out some of the theories of time that have been propounded in philosophy and science. While succinct, he does not talk down to his readership, making this a handy overview and entry point into ideas from relativity and quantum theory. It is broad-stroke writing, enticing us to consider the different ways of imagining time, whether Zeno's arrow-splits or the moving trains and veils of relativity. Once inside this box, we need to think our way out of it or around it, seeing what others have done, deciding to what extent we want to consider the transversal leaps into other dimensions or planes. Or go inward, or moving into nano worlds. Either way, this is a good use of this format as a way of whetting the appetite of a certain kind of reader, giving them enough of a guidebook to go searching for larger works.

[Gareth · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading "before the big bang" I had to try another of John Gribbin's books, and this one didn't disappoint. The whole aspect of time is laid out over the 35 pages that this book consists of, and for such a small book it is very detailed and very well written.

From explanations of everything from the standard "arrow of time" that is referred to often in books like this to how we actually define time, the passage of things into a higher state of entropy all up to how it doesn't really matter, or exist, in a quantum world.

Just like his other work this is very well when and presented, I had a bit of an issue trying to get my head around the experiments about things not happening when they are observed, but to solve that problem you need to evaluate your definition of "observe".

Well worth a read and well recommend.

[Premanand Velu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Time is one entity which has fueled a lot of fantasy and interest from long since ( how paradoxical is this statement!). Many so called 'science' fictions have been raved and rated. Many philosophies and religions tried explaining and thriving on that.

A transforming essay that bursts the myth of time as continuous flow that we are so conditioned to think. This breaks the philosophical logjam that one way or other end up in a knot trying to unravel the mystry of time reversal. Right from Zeno and Newton to Einstein, and quantum physics, Gribbin breaks the bubble to reveal the scientific basis of how time is not sequence but a discrete affair. A nice primer to delve more. Certainly interesting.

[Jim & · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite read on the nature of time

The outline for the content is perfect and ingages the reader to put on their physics hat and analyze every premise. The nature of Time has been my Passion for over right years now. I admit that I'm still uncertain about any attempt to quantify the nature of time. However the author has confirmed many of my laymen deductions and provided strength to my own beliefs. This is a well written book and the author writes in a style that anyone should be grateful.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Time Illusion

Gribbin attempts to describe that in spite of common perception, time does not "flow" from the past, to the present, to the future. Rather all three exist together and intermediate states do not exist (or equivalently can not be detected). I confess that I could not understand or follow what he was saying.

The historical review of late 19th through 21st century interpretations of times was individually accurate, but the jumps were not explained to my satisfaction or ability to follow.

[Phil · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lucid essay framed by analogies the layman can relate to.

Read this short book, more of an essay really, about why time only moves in one direction; viz, past to present to future.

In the end the passage of time is an illusion that works in classical physics, but, as usual, good old Quantum Theory upsets the applecart.

However, I think this subject will be endlessly argued for years to com.

Read it slowly and carefully - it’s thought provoking.

[Shane Orr · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is more of an essay than a book. Quantum physics shows that time doesn’t flow the way we generally perceive it to. Instead, it‘s closer to a block concept of the universe where past, present, and future all exist at once and are set and unchanging. What does this say about free will? Fascinating stuff.

[Neil S W Murray · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Is the future “already there” and is the past “still there”, even though we are only aware of a single moment of time?”

If you have any interest in “time” and how we experience it and would like a better understanding of quantum theory then I highly recommend this essay.

(Note: If you have an average or above understanding already then I’d consider this to be more of a beginner’s guide)

[John Michael Strubhart · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, I found some experiments done on quantum systems that I'd never even heard about. Fascinating! I don't know that I'm convinced of Gribbin's view on time, but he certainly makes a compelling argument. I won't spoil it. I'll just say that if you're into the nature of time, read this with an open mind peppered with some skepticism.

[Jody Avila · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book really dug deep into the quantum states of time. There was a lot I learned including the Quantum Zeno Effect which has to do with the observation of time in the quantum state. This was well written, although a bit deep for a simple physics enthusiast like myself with no formal education on the subject. I look forward to learning more.

[Bob Colvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of many in this genre of scientific treatises. Interesting arguments but I am not sure I buy all of them, including the concept that there is no such thing as motion in an instant. Perhaps the arrow is moving along a planck length in the instant of time. Worth a look.

[Chris Bull · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just never know where I am

The author in this short read introduces a number of new concepts to me for which I am grateful. I only wish that he made use of illustrations/drawings here and there to underline his statements

[Louise · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really interesting read on the question of what is time and quantum physics. Just mind boggling stuff that really makes you think outside the box but at times was a little to scientific. Enjoyed it though.

[Joseph Allen Paine · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's about time

It's literally about time and it's about time someone wrote about time in a comprehensive and articulate manner. I especially liked the story of Fred and the pigeonhole analogy.

[Douglas Phillips · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting but it ends just when it gets really good.

[Marc · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting

The subject fascinates me but would have liked it to go into a lot more detail. Very easy to follow though.

[Derrick Norris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short but worthwhile

Managed to pack some good info into the length. I found especially interesting the discussion of quantum systems resisting change while being observed.

[Michael Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

Go ahead and try it this time.

An easy to read but challenging to accept this exposition on the nature of time in our quantum world ‘today’!

[Riggs · Rating 5 out of 5]

That was/is/will be a trip

[gius · Rating 3 out of 5]

se eu entendi 40% do livro foi muito, mas mt interessante. 3 estrelas pela referência a doctor who

[Rod Haper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quantum Emergent Time

Interesting essay on time from the quantum mechanical viewpoint. Time appears to be on emergent macro property resulting from quantum state changes.

[michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short book on a heavy concept. One of these days I will grasp time and all of the illusions to which the arrow points.

[Mark Moss · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent short introduction to the treatment of time across classical mechanics, thermodynamics, relativity and cosmology, with a dash of philosophy thrown in as well.