The Wise Ry Guy

The way we conceptualize time does not cohere to the way we remember our life

We construe life linearly

We say, “well hey, would you look at that sequence of events!”

Relation, causality, and memory

The three tools of time conceptualization

plus possibly the oscillations of a caesium atom

but disregard that for now

We think our lives are a timeline

we ascribe them their places on a calendar

and no wonder

If life isn’t a line…

then what

don’t say life is a point

just don’t.

We think the timeline stretches from one ear to the other

and we just can’t access most of that diameter

Lines are easy

they stand still

They have two dimensions and one direction

They’re easy

Simple

Starting point: we are born

Then: we move forward

End point: we die

Line.

hmm

I won’t pretend to understand how the human brain works

But thoughts are not lines

We recognize relation, that one thing happens before another thing

We recognize causality, the glue that holds relation together, that one thing happens because of a thing prior to it relatively speaking

And we recognize memory, which displaces external events from their abstract residence and catapults them into the locus of human experience

the brain

memory destroys the line

Something’s mental significance is not measured by relation nor causality

Otherwise, shouldn’t I remember everything?

maybe

And further, shouldn’t I remember things in order?

Two days ago is so far away

I have to strain so hard

not so much to put myself there

but to realize the closeness of the memory

I am only a few hours past it

But it is so gone

So alienated

Relation, causality, memory

Am I missing any?

Because as things are characterized by relation and causality, memory can organize them as such

But what organizes memory?

And this is why time is not linear

or at the very least,

not experienced as linear

Because the linearly ordering principles do not correlate to the significance of a given memory in the brain

It seems instead to be arbitrary

So

Two things:

The inability to conceptualize time itself

and non-linear nature of memory

These are my talking points

I have to repeat myself because my sister is in the kitchen making noise now and I’m losing train of thought over and over

All of the passengers in the train are quite confused

“Why am I seeing the same bluff over and over again? We’re not going in a circle! But for some reason motion forward triggers a reset indefinitely…”

Ah, distraction

how you grieve me

so

let’s talk about acid

psychedelic drugs mess with the way the brain processes time

I’m not sure how

or in what way

So it’s actually not a very useful analogy now that I think about it

ha

It’s tempting to consider the alternative to the linear construction of time to be the inversion and switching up of relation and causality

Disorder is still linear

Regardless, I feel like I can’t capture my life

I can’t hold it

I’m a pawn in my own game

Knowledge precedes enlightenment in all areas of life

so it is no wonder that I occasionally experience confusion, considering I conceptualize my life as a line when I can neither remember it nor establish an abstract unit in my thoughts to measure the procession of time, and neither do my experiences reveal themselves linearly in my mental space.

When we experience the world

or act in the world,

we are thinking whilst doing so

Ok, rephrase

When we act in the world,

It’s not simply action

It is interaction.

so

When interact in and with the world

we experience it actively

obviously, because we are conscious of self and thinking as we act and interact

After an interaction

we have memory

and the memory is not the interaction itself

It the thoughts we were thinking during it

I see three layers currently, though there are no doubt more

Ecclesiastes taught me that the world is a place for action

Hearing Jordan Peterson affirm this belief of mine in a lecture just straight blew my brains

So the world is a material thing

a template, possible

a template for individual action

template isn’t the right word

its an arena

so we have the material playground (layer 1)

we have our action on the playground (layer 2)

and what we think (layer 3)

Each of us being individuals, we generally characterize a material place by our action, non-existent or otherwise, in it

and we generally characterize our action or experience by the thoughts or emotions which permeated that action

So our linear conceptualization of time implies that our lives have a primarily objective nature

But we exclusively characterize by means of memory

Memory organizes relation and causality

but our thoughts and emotions characterize individual experience, which composes the timelines of our respective lives

That is two degrees of separation from the material playground

Anywho,

It’s just a wonder to me the things which pop up in my head

they are so random

I’ve felt alienated and viscerally separated from my own life and reality itself for a long time

Because, partly, since my attention is almost always oriented inwardly and as opposed to outwardly at the material playground with its schedules and deadlines and menial tasks and petty gossip, I live at the mercy of thoughts which provide no measure for organization

I do not experience my life in a linear fashion

A strange amoeba of synapses constitutes my day-to-day Being

And I’m honestly not sure what to do about it