Apr 18 2009
Motionless Time
A new, super-precise clock . . . ah, mechanism, I guess . . . has been developed. And it got me thinking about the nature of time. Here’s the news-
The new techniques make JILA’s strontium clock 50 percent more accurate than the results reported last year, so that it now would neither gain nor lose 1 second in more than 300 million years.
First, a tangential thought: If a clock “loses” a second of time, where does that lost unit of time “go”? You might not want to think too hard about it. You could lose some sleep. And you might not want to ponder where the lost sleep goes to as well.
Second, the whole topic of quantum-events-based clocks is, to me, like a metaphysical scab. Makes my mind itch and I feel there is a protruding edge. But pick at it too much and you might lose some sleep. Why? Because an atomic clock measures time without motion — at least motion in the sense of our classical understanding.
Most clocks do rely on motion to measure the events and generate the units we call time. A sundial relies upon the motion of a shadow; a pocket watch upon the motion of springs and gears; a digital wristwatch upon the vibrations of a quartz crystal. But we can’t really say an atomic clock relies upon motion to generate units of time. There is instead an oscillation between quantum states without any apparent motion between. First state one, then state two. Never state one-and-a-half.
It is said that time flows. Which implies motion. But what does it do on the quantum level? And what does it mean in terms of the nature of time? It could mean a whole lot.
