Language and Reality (Humans)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Tuesday, April 05, 2011, 00:36 (4984 days ago) @ dhw


> On a philosophical level, nothing can be called real if it depends on observation, because no observer can guarantee the objectivity of his perception. The best we can offer, I repeat, is a consensus. My commonsense view that a rapid sequence of static states (your definition of time) exists independently of an observer is unprovable, but then so is your next point: "Real things, such as photons, we can assume exist independent of the observer because a single photon can be measured and observed." How can our measurement and observation of a photon prove that it exists independently of the measurer and observer? We measure time, we observe and comprehend the sequence of cause and effect, the changes that take place in the course of the movement from present to past. Common sense therefore enables me to "assume" (your word) that the sequence of states is real, and we call that sequence time. But on the philosophical level it is not real. NOTHING is real. Not even your photons.-
I was pretty good with everything that you said up to the statement in bold. The key difference between time and a photon, is that a photon is a photon is a photon. If you define a second as 1000ms and I define it as 1200ms, then our observation of the same time will produce different results. I.E. you will observe 1 second while I observe a fraction of a second. When we each observe a single photon, will each see the same photon, and that photon will not change its attributes to suit.