(no subject)
heres something from the book im reading: "We take it for granted that the intention of clocks is to measure time. but perhaps this familiar notion is, after all a rather peculiar one when we pause ti scrutinize it. what is it for an instrument to measure time? the oddity of the idea of measuring time is well captured by a story of O.K. Bouwasma's the mystery of time. the hero of the story is puzzled by clocks. he has been told that they measure time, although he has seen that at work doing their measuring, he has not been able to see what it is that they measure. with other kinds of measuring instruments, there is no problem. a tape measure, can measure a length of cloth. a scale can measure a quantity of flour, a jug a volume of water, and so on. what is being measured in theses cases is plain to see. but clocks seem to be able to register something that does not affect our senses at all. perhaps there is some invisable, ethereal fluid flowing throught these instruments, making the hands go around the dial? or perhaps, there is nothing at all, and the mechanism operates without and external prompting. our hero begins to suspect it is all a con trick. in effect, the story is an inverted version of the emperors new clothes-- there is in fact no trick: the clocks genuinely are measureing something that cannot be seen." that was in the first chapter and kind of puts you in the mindset of how to go on analyizing the contents of the book, errr come at it with an open mind. the book also gives questions at the end of each chapter. one is: "What would you say to [the man in the story mentioned above] who did not know what time was. (explain what time is). who ever actually read this far, please comment with your answer. id like to hear it.