False. All our sensory input is slightly delayed, and it takes time for our brain to process it anyway. So the past is the only thing that exists and we are all, always living in it.
this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2026
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False. We are only able to perceive what we experience, and by extension, what we experience is what we call "The Present" or "now". Sensory delay thus plays no role, other than shifting personal "present" a bit forward or backward. What doesn't change is that we all only exist at the present. What does change is that present == present but present !== present.
Our conceptual understanding of what “the present” means does not align with the facts.
The problem with redefining “the present” to mean “our perceived present” is that any reaction we take is already too late. The stuff we experience as “now” is done and gone. Just like if the sun suddenly went out, we would not notice it for 8 minutes or so, but there would be no possible reaction to it to try to “fix” or otherwise change it. It would have already happened.
Edit; also my point is just that the comic is correct except for the titles. Move the text and images to left, and it’s correct.
Time is relative and inexorably tied to space. What we think of as the speed of light is the speed of causality. What is now for you is not now for Alpha Centauri. They see us in the past as we see them in the past and Tau Ceti sees us both in the past. Yet we are all in the now. All these things are true.
I’d say that none of it is in the now, because it all involves distance and time. All those “nows” are different yes but also the “now” at the tip of my nose is different than the “now” inside my eye, is different than the “now” in different parts of my brain. And all of those are different than the “now” that I believe myself to be experiencing. And all of these things are in the past.
But what about atoms that briefly assemble through stochastics in a form that is just your brain with all your memories
just because we're acting on information from the past doesn't mean we arent still in the now. we just get all our data with a little lag. we still interact with the way things are now, even if it takes a little time for us to perceive it. in some ways we're constantly operating in the dark, relying on our internal predictions about the world to get us through the short little delay before we can see what happened.
Yes, I have been to the past. So have you. Both of us came from there.
You remember having been there, but can you prove it's not just hallucination or fake memories injected to your brain floating in formole in a laboratory ?
Mmmmmm…lab grown trauma!
I'm a firm believer in Last-Thursday-ism, so I know in my heart of hearts there are at least 5 days of past
My wife is always mad at me because I cannot plan more that 1 week in the future. I'll use the Last-Thurdays argument the next time.
Oh yeah? Prove it! I don't see you there, do you?
I have video and photographic and data analytic proof and a large number of eye witnesses.
I just wanna give a shoutout to "later" and "some other day" because that's when I'll be doing that thing I don't wanna do!
Eat shit future me, you fucking jabroni!
The past:
- contains valuable information
- may be used to evaluate the present
- helps make informed predictions about the future
Also, I've been there. You don't have to believe me. I know what I saw.
It's also where all my stuff came from. Love that stuff.
The past existed, but now it doesn't.
Past: contains hitler
Present: doesn't
Present wins
there are still nazis in the present :(
The past is far behind us. The future doesn't exist!
All moments in time are equally real, there is no privileged 'now' outside of the reference frame used to identify it.
Hey kiddo
(gives me chills every time TT)
(warframe)
Is this what Gen Z motivational posters look like?
Yes!
ryan.gosling.stan should understand better than most that love also numbers among life's hardships.
It really annoys me that according to Laplace, a demon knowing the state of any particule in the universe could predict its evolution in the future, but quantum theory just say the opposit. Knowing current state of the univers, you can "predict" everything that has past, but not how it will evolve in the future. Like if present was the cause of everything that happened in the past and we just experiencing time backward.
Knowing current state of the univers, you can “predict” everything that has past
The observer effect is irreversible. Quantum mechanics is reversible only because the effect technically falls outside of the mechanics.
In related news, the entropy of a closed system is usually not constant.
Wouldn't the act of observing be baked in from the start, and therefore accounted for?
I don't know what you are trying to say. But you can't predict the state something had before you observed it from the stuff you see.
I believe the documentary The Langoliers was about this
and most of the stars from the sky are already dead so were staring at the past when we look at night sky. also to underestimate someone you have been in the past or forget what you have done and put that to zero value is wrong. just saying in my case at least. i like the now, in the same time i don't.
But right now... Is by now already the past.