115. Martin Heidegger, “Einführung in die Metaphysik” (1935), in Gesamtausgabe, vol. XL, p. 90 (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1983).
116. Martin Heidegger, Sein und Zeit (1927), in Gesamtausgabe, vol. II, passim (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1977); trans. Being and Time.
117. Marcel Proust, Du côté du chez Swann, in À la Recherche du temps perdu, vol. I (Paris: Gallimard, 1987), pp. 3–9.
118. Ibid., p. 182.
119. G. B. Vicario, Il tempo. Saggio di psicologia sperimentale (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005).
120. The observation, a quite common one, can be found, for example, in the introduction to J. M. E. McTaggart, The Nature of Existence, vol. I (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1921).
121. Lichtung, perhaps; in Martin Heidegger, Holzwege (1950), in Gesamtausgabe, vol. V, passim (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1977).
122. For Durkheim, one of the founders of sociology, like the other great categories of thought, the concept of time has its origins in society—and in particular in the religious structure that constitutes its primary form; in Les Formes élémentaires de la vie religieuse (Paris: Alcan, 1912). If this can be true for complex aspects of the notion of time—for the “more external layers” of the notion of time—it seems to me difficult to extend it to include our direct experience of the passage of time: other mammals have brains roughly similar to ours, and consequently experience the passage of time like we do, without any need for a society or a religion.
123. On the foundational aspect of time for human psychology, see William James’s classic The Principles of Psychology (New York: Henry Holt, 1890).
124. Mahāvagga I.6.19, in Rhys Davids, Sacred Books of the East, vol. XIII (1881). For the concepts relating to Buddhism, I have drawn particularly on Hermann Oldenburg, Buddha (Milan: Dall’Oglio, 1956).
125. Hugo von Hofmannstahl, Der Rosenkavalier, act I.
13. THE SOURCE OF TIME
126. Ecclesiastes 3:2.
127. For a lighthearted, engaging but informed exposition of these aspects of time, see Craig Callender and Ralph Edney, Introducing Time (Cambridge, UK: Icon Books, 2001).
THE SISTER OF SLEEP
128. Mahābhārata III.297.
129. Ibid., I.119.
130. A. Balestrieri, “Il disturbo schizofrenico nell’evoluzione della mente umana. Pensiero astratto e perdita del senso naturale della realtà,” Comprendre 14 (2004): 55–60.
131. Roberto Calasso, L’ardore (Milan: Adelphi, 2010).
132. Ecclesiastes 12:6–7.
INDEX
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acceleration, 17n, 216n7, 216n12
Albert, David Z., 226–27n96
Anaxandridas, 46, 47
Anaximander, 11, 14–15, 100–101
Aristotle, 63–66, 69–71, 77, 78, 84, 97, 220–21nn48–49, 221n54
astronomy, 14, 65, 102
atomism, 86
atoms, 29, 85, 99, 101–2, 210
Augustine of Hippo, 180–83, 212
Bach, Johann Sebastian: BWV 56 cantata, 206
Bede, the Venerable, 85
Beethoven, Ludwig van: Missa Solemnis, 212
Besso, Michele, 114–15
black holes, 54–55, 127
block universe, 109, 195, 222n62
Boltzmann, Ludwig, 27–36, 136, 145, 157, 225n81
Boltzmann’s constant, 217n20
brain, 153, 166, 167, 176, 179, 180, 182, 186, 189, 207, 210
and fear of death, 207–8
frontal lobes, 207, 209
neurons. See neurons/neural structures
and Proust, 188
synapses, 107, 108
Buddha, 190
Carnot, Lazare, 22–23, 216n10
Carnot, (Nicolas Léonard) Sadi, 23, 28
cause and effect, 20, 21, 33, 168–69, 176
change
and complexity, 109–10
relations, events and world dynamics without a time variable, 117–28, 195–96
time as measurement of change, and Aristotle’s space, 63–79, 97
time when nothing changes, 63–4, 72
and world as network of events, 95–104, 195
Clausius, Rudolf, 23–25, 157
equation of entropy, 27, 157, 188–89
Cleomenes I, 45–46, 47
clocks, 15, 59–63, 67, 74, 96–97, 197, 216n8
and effect of speed on time, 40n, 197
slowed by a mass/gravitational field, 9–13, 75–77
synchronization of, 61–62
Connes, Alain, 138–42, 225n85
consciousness, 63, 173, 182–87, 199–203
internal consciousness of time, 183, 186
continuity, 84, 96
Copernicus, Nicolaus, 11, 201, 218n26
death, 206
fear of, 206, 207–8
delirium, collective, 211
Democritus, 85, 101, 221n54
Descartes, René, 176–77, 220–21n48
DeWitt, Bryce, 119, 121–22, 124
diurnal rhythms, 62–63
Dorato, Mauro, 215n3
Duino, 36
Durkheim, Émile, 229n122
Earman, J., 226n90
Ecclesiastes, 131, 198
Einstein, Albert, 10–12, 37–40, 44, 52–53, 197, 218n26, 223n66
and Besso, 114–15
general theory of relativity, 16
and the gravitational field, 74–79, 195
on illusion of time, 108–9, 114
simultaneity, 218n27, 222n62
special relativity theory, 48, 218n26
at Swiss Patent Office, 61
electrons, 85, 87, 89–90, 124, 138
Ellis, George, 219n34
energy, 159–60
conservation of, 27, 135–36, 159
thermal. See heat
and thermal time, 134–37. See also thermal time
entropy, 25–36, 136, 143, 145–51, 155–57, 159–66, 196–97, 198, 217n15, 217n20, 226n94
and blurring, 21–36, 135–37, 144–51, 154, 155–57, 199
Clausius’s equation, 25–27, 157, 188–89
and coarse graining, 217n18
in distant past, 143, 146–51, 161, 163–64, 167, 169
increase, 161–66, 189, 196, 217n15
low, 31–32, 143, 146–51, 156–57, 160–63, 167, 169, 196
and perspective, 147–50
second law of thermodynamics, 23–28, 149, 160, 165
eternalism, 108–9. See also block universe
events
relations, events and loop theory without a time variable, 117–28
world as network of, 95–104, 195
evolution, 207–10
fear of death, 206, 207–8
flow of time, 1, 2–3, 193–97
and cause and effect, 20, 21, 33, 168–69
Durkheim, religion and, 229n122
heat, entropy, and our blurred vision of, 25–36, 135–37, 145–51, 154, 156–57, 199
in Hindu mythology, 2
internal consciousness of, 183, 186
and particularity, 16, 30–34, 91, 146–51, 162, 170, 188–89, 194, 196, 198
past, future, and the arrow of time, 19–36, 146–51, 194, 195, 196
and relativity, 138. See also relativity
slowed by a mass, 9–13, 76–77, 194, 197, 198
slowed by speed, 37–40, 194, 197, 198
source of Rilke’s eternal current, 20–36
and the structure of spacetime, 48–56, 73–79, 106–7, 109, 184
and subjectivity/identity/consciousness, 3, 5, 20–21, 57–58, 63, 171–92, 199–202. See also perspective