Surprisingly, Your Past, Present, and Future Could Be Happening Right Now, All at the Same Time
TL;DR
The block universe theory suggests that time doesn’t flow and all moments—past, present, and future—exist simultaneously in a four-dimensional space. This challenges our conventional experience of time as a linear progression. According to Dr. Kristie Miller, traveling to the past or future might be possible, but changing events isn’t; you’d only fulfill what’s already set. Critics argue that the future can’t be predetermined, with models like the evolving block universe proposing a growing spacetime block. While the debate continues, this theory reshapes our understanding of time and existence. Don’t forget to share your thoughts and join the discussion below!
We seem to experience time as moving in a single direction. After all, we can’t just leap forward to the future or revisit our past whenever we wish. Every minute of every day seems to push us forward, dragging us through life towards an inevitable end. At least, that’s the traditional perception of time. But what if your present, past, and future all exist simultaneously? From this perspective, time wouldn’t flow at all.
The block universe theory proposes that the universe can be thought of as a vast four-dimensional block of spacetime, encompassing everything that ever happens, according to Dr. Kristie Miller, co-director of the Centre for Time at the University of Sydney.
In the block universe model, there is no “now” or present moment. All moments exist relative to one another within three spatial dimensions and one time dimension. Your perception of the present simply reflects your position in the block universe at that specific moment. The “past” is just an earlier segment of the universe, while the “future” is a later segment.
So, is time merely an intricate illusion? And more intriguingly, is time travel possible?
Dr. Miller’s answer to that is “yes.” Hypothetically, at least, since we would first need to figure out how to travel at “some reasonable percentage of the speed of light.” Traveling to the past would involve using wormholes, which act as “short cuts through space-time.”
However, if you managed to travel back in time, you wouldn’t be able to change it. This is because your past is always someone else’s future occurring simultaneously. So if you travel to the past, you’re simply contributing to that future as it is. Therefore, there’s no need to worry about “grandfather paradoxes”—your time machine is already part of the existing framework.
“If I travel to the past, I am part of the past,” said Miller. “Importantly, I was always part of the past.”
Furthermore, perhaps the past has already been altered by time travelers. How could we know if it hasn’t been? “For all we know, the reason the past is the way it is, is in part due to the presence of time travelers,” Miller added.
By this reasoning, your actions tomorrow will make the future what it is, with you playing a role in fulfilling a destiny that is set in time, which is arguably more of an illusion than a basic aspect of nature.
Naturally, the block universe theory has its critics. One major critique is that the future shouldn’t already exist. Physicist Lee Smolin argued that “The future is not now real and there can be no definite facts of the matter about the future.” Additionally, at a 2017 conference, he stated that what is real is “the process by which future events are generated out of present events.”
Another downside of the block universe idea is that if it is static, what’s the purpose of anything? Can progress even occur? To address this, the “evolving block universe” model suggests that the block of spacetime is not static but grows over time. The surface of this growing volume would represent the present moment, where “the indefiniteness of the future changes to the definiteness of the past,” as cosmologist George Ellis explained. In this model, the future is the evolving aspect.
While the debate is far from settled, the block universe theory remains one of the most promising concepts for reconciling the cosmological view of time with our everyday experience. One thing is certain—time is far more complex than it seems. Understanding its mysteries is key to grasping the essence of human experience.
When Einstein’s theory of relativity effectively states that there is no time AND space, but space/time, what that really means is that there is only energy and space and movement and interactions between energies and masses.
In other words, there is no past, there is no future. As much as things that happened lead to the present, they no longer exist in that state and never will again. The future is nothing but a projection in our minds. Yes, we can sometimes accurately predict it and therefore we think that there is some sort of permanence or reality to it, but there is not. By all indications, only the present exists.
There is no need for some sort of linear pipeline called “time”. Just like language, or numbers or hammers, “time” is a tool we use to try and predict outcomes and give a measure of control to our worlds, both personal and professional. It is a concept and a label. The “universe” so to speak has no more respect for our idea of time than it does for our favorite color or the dream you had last night. In fact, that dream you had last night, is possibly more real than that memory you have from 1995.
We have been taught the movement needs a “time” to move in, but this most likely is not the case at all. Movement is just something that the universe does. Change.
Hey, maybe we are all inside a gigantic construct like the Matrix and we can be saved like video game characters, but inside this vast universe, all there is is NOW.
No, that would completely ignore the whole meaning of the word simultaneous, which means “existing/happening at the same time.” Space involves dimensions, that doesn’t mean everything happens in the same place.
Yes. Linear time is a human construct. The theory of quantum physics theorizes that it’s all dimensional. The past and the future are all happening concurrently in a different dimensional space and everything is connected.
It is not only possible – it is so.
OUR perception of life as self-aware living organisms is combined into each moment we exist.
We therefore coexist in the past, present and future while we are alive from second to second until we are suddenly not alive.
This may explain this in a way that most can understand. The linear perception of time is the interpretation of the next higher dimension than the dimension that we exist in. We exist in the 3rd dimension and perceive the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd dimension in their entirety. We can also perceive the 4th dimension but, since we are 3rd dimensional beings, can only experience the 4th dimension linearly. We are unable to experience any dimension beyond the 4th dimension. If we were a 4th dimensional being we would experience the 4th dimension in its entirety and would perceive the 5th dimension linearly as time. If we were a one dimensional being (a dot) and a vertical 2 dimensional line were drawn to our left we would not be able to perceive the line in its entirety. We would instead experience this line as a series of 1 dimensional dots appearing to be a single dot moving from top to bottom. The movement of this dot would be our 1 dimensional perception of time as a result of the creation of the line in the 2nd dimension. So… time is only our interpretation of the next higher dimension and is relative to the dimension that we exist in.
This one I find interesting
I have believed that the past, present, and future have all been happening simultaneously as long as I have been able to process thoughts. It makes much more sense than linear time to me.
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