Jean-Jacques Mass
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Newton's Cradle
I have recently been looking at current models that demonstrate common physical attributes of the universe, in an attempt to construct a primer for understanding the behavior of temporal attributes. The physics model called "Newton's Cradle," which is used to demonstrate the conservation of motion and energy, can be used to think about temporal events as well. This is a theory I've been drawing out and am still working on, your feedback is appreciated!
Consider Newton's Cradle, above. The five balls can be considered to be five distinct events, occurring along a timeline in relation to each other. In order of left to right,
1) I enter a room.
2) An acquaintance of mine sees me.
3) She remembers a question she had for me.
4) She walks over to me.
5) We begin a conversation.
From the order given above, we can think of this as a complete causal chain, with event #1 (me entering the room) eventually leads to event #5 (the woman talking with me). Various models of time label it's "direction" as either omnidirectional or monodirectional, meaning that time can either go forwards and backwards or it goes only forwards. However, this example lends strength to the argument that a causal chain has an inverted nature, as I will show.
The initial direction of this causal chain is familiar to all of us, and is easily distinguishable. If I hadn't entered the room, I wouldn't have ended up talking with the woman. Therefore, my entering the room lead to a chain of events that ended (not necessarily ultimately, but in the causal segment we are looking at) with me talking with her. In this way, we can think of a temporal Newton's Cradle, with the "ultimate" (here I use this to mean an event at an extreme end of a temporal segment) cause striking a series of intermediary steps to finally end in an "ultimate" result.
However, as the symmetrical condition of Newton's Cradle above shows, there is an inherent similarity between ultimate causes and ultimate results. While the traditional view holds that #1 caused #5 (and all steps in between), it can also be said that event #5 caused event #1. This is because of the fact that if I had not entered the room, those events wouldn't have happened that way (although they might have eventually happened in a different order at a later time). Thus, if you "read" this causal chain backwards, you would see the conclusion, and be able to say that the specific result of any action causes its antecedent because it necessitates it.
This is to say that, since every result needs a cause, that necessity links the two together in a way that reciprocates their causal relationship. A cup shatters because it fell (result - cause); a cup falls so that it will shatter (cause - result). This is the temporal equivalent of a ball on Newton's Cradle falling back, thus causing the exact same series of events as were caused by the opposite ball. We don't normally think of things happening to get a result - the cup falling was an accident, after all - however, it seems to be so. A result instigates its own cause because it would not have happened without that cause.
EDIT: Clarity.
I have recently been looking at current models that demonstrate common physical attributes of the universe, in an attempt to construct a primer for understanding the behavior of temporal attributes. The physics model called "Newton's Cradle," which is used to demonstrate the conservation of motion and energy, can be used to think about temporal events as well. This is a theory I've been drawing out and am still working on, your feedback is appreciated!
Consider Newton's Cradle, above. The five balls can be considered to be five distinct events, occurring along a timeline in relation to each other. In order of left to right,
1) I enter a room.
2) An acquaintance of mine sees me.
3) She remembers a question she had for me.
4) She walks over to me.
5) We begin a conversation.
From the order given above, we can think of this as a complete causal chain, with event #1 (me entering the room) eventually leads to event #5 (the woman talking with me). Various models of time label it's "direction" as either omnidirectional or monodirectional, meaning that time can either go forwards and backwards or it goes only forwards. However, this example lends strength to the argument that a causal chain has an inverted nature, as I will show.
The initial direction of this causal chain is familiar to all of us, and is easily distinguishable. If I hadn't entered the room, I wouldn't have ended up talking with the woman. Therefore, my entering the room lead to a chain of events that ended (not necessarily ultimately, but in the causal segment we are looking at) with me talking with her. In this way, we can think of a temporal Newton's Cradle, with the "ultimate" (here I use this to mean an event at an extreme end of a temporal segment) cause striking a series of intermediary steps to finally end in an "ultimate" result.
However, as the symmetrical condition of Newton's Cradle above shows, there is an inherent similarity between ultimate causes and ultimate results. While the traditional view holds that #1 caused #5 (and all steps in between), it can also be said that event #5 caused event #1. This is because of the fact that if I had not entered the room, those events wouldn't have happened that way (although they might have eventually happened in a different order at a later time). Thus, if you "read" this causal chain backwards, you would see the conclusion, and be able to say that the specific result of any action causes its antecedent because it necessitates it.
This is to say that, since every result needs a cause, that necessity links the two together in a way that reciprocates their causal relationship. A cup shatters because it fell (result - cause); a cup falls so that it will shatter (cause - result). This is the temporal equivalent of a ball on Newton's Cradle falling back, thus causing the exact same series of events as were caused by the opposite ball. We don't normally think of things happening to get a result - the cup falling was an accident, after all - however, it seems to be so. A result instigates its own cause because it would not have happened without that cause.
EDIT: Clarity.
