Tao and Time?

Question

I posted this in the religious/spiritual section, and one of the responders recommended that I post it in philosophy, so here goes:

Taoists believe that time is cyclical rather than linear, as is believed in the west. My question is: how is this possible? I don't mean how is it possible that someone can believe this, but rather what is a good explanation of cyclical time? Does this relate to the belief that the universe has always existed, but has collapsed in on itself over and over again, only to re-expand? Can this be tied to the emerging hypotheses that it may someday be possible to see before the time of the Big Bang? When answering, please include any references that you can, and please be respectful of others. Thanks!

Answer 1

Cyclical doesn't mean you go back to same time. You can metaphor it like a wheel is rolling, so when the wheel complete a circle it's in different location. Like, after spring-summer-fall-winter you get spring again, but it's spring of next year. Westerners just put it on linear line, Easterners put it on a circle.
In Taoism, microuniverse operate in same way (Tao) as the macrouniverse operate. When a person born, grow, get old and die, the person reincarnate and be born again. Same thing for the universe - it was born (big bang), grow (expand), and time will come as the universe shrink (I.. personally believe in the plasma theory) up to the point of death (moment right before a new big bang) yet you'll never see time flows backward. (Since spiritually we don't need such experience. No.) We'll just see things get closer and closer during the universal shrinkage, in a rate we'll never feel. Hey, we'll not exist at that time, so what the worry is for?!

Answer 2

The history of Science, in some ways, resembles Tao. Science seen from a distance, anyway.

Big Bang and the expanding Universe emerged as theories based primarily attempts to extroplate meaning from Doppler. The red shift and the implications seemed to offer a scientific hope, for a better understanding of how the universe behaves.

The Universe cooperated for a surprisingly long time, and Big Bang solidified in the bastions of scientific theory for several generations. Most scientists still embrace it.

But Big Bang, if it goes out, probably won't be with a Big Bang. The termites of Quantum Physics are gnawing away at the foundations, the ceiling joists, the rafters.

There's a growing body of scientific theory in Physics that the flaw lies, not so much in Big Bang, but nearer the core of all scientific thought. The 'mechanical' universe approach.

On the other hand, another body of thinkers during the past few decades have begun looking to subatomic behavior as a possible microcosm of how the Universe behaves.

Subatomic particles are pesky on issues involving time, reality, and expectation. They don't respond well to theorizing yet. In many instances they defy the demands made by human logic.

So, also, with time.

Unlike Taoist thinkers [as an ideal], scientific thinkers have tended to grasp theory and hold onto it almost as a religious doctrine, forgetting it's merely theory.

As with what's already been exposed in Physics during the past three decades, as the pieces emerge and become incorporated into scientific thought, that doctrinal approach, and mechanical approach might be eroded enough to vanish, though it's unlikely.

Scientists of the future might have to abandon what's been more a rigid religious doctrinal approach to their disciplines and adopt Tao, if they wish to understand the Universe, and time.

It's early here and my mind's still a bit fuzzy. Maybe I've meandered a bit. Maybe I've not even come near your question with these words.

Apologies.

Answer 3

Some physicists believe, as you mention in your question, that it is possible the the universe exists in a perpetual state of expansion and contraction: the "Big Bang, Big Crunch" state of affairs of which you have probably heard. Unfortunately for this view, it is slowly falling from favor in the field, being attacked from two sides.

On the one hand it looks less and less like there will be a crunch, but rather an ever-expanding "heat death" of the universe where all matter and energy eventually reach a state of maximum entropy and the story ends (or at least takes a long hiatus).

On another hand, a mounting group of radicals are suggesting that the Big Bang theory is fatally flawed, and there never was such a thing. They believe in one or another sort of "steady state" universe, in which matter and energy are always shifting form, creation and destruction happening constantly and eternally. Closely allied to the field of "plasma physics", this will possibly someday upset the popular notion of the Big Bang, which was cobbled together before many variables had been figured out.

Eastern philosophy has a tendency to anthropomorphisize. Because we experience cycles all over the place in our lives, they extrapolate that perhaps everything functions in the same way, from seasons, to birth and death, to time and the universe. These sorts of claims to "wisdom" need no sorts of empirical proof, but rather these memes survive by brute force of charisma alone.

It is inherently appealing for people to believe the universe acts in ways that they can grasp without too much work, and the human brain has evolved to succeed best at one single task: the discovery of pattern. This wonderful characteristic often backfires, inventing pattern where none can be found.

This is my explanation of where the idea of cyclic time comes from (the same place as most religious or "mystical" ideas): it is an answer which appeals to our limited human capacities in a way that is apparently sensible but just enough out of reach to seem wise and profound. When this sort of idea is championed by a charisma, it is nearly unstoppable from gathering a following.

One more point to keep in mind...cyclic time (no matter how you look at it) necessitates a finite amount of matter. There is no reason to suspect that matter is finite, this is one way to strike down the (admittedly attractive) idea of cyclic time.

Hope I've helped to answer your great question (at least better than those nuts in the Religion section!) :P

Answer 4

Well, I don't know the why, but I'll tell you how I stumbled across Taoism and why it fit with my beliefs. About 10 years ago I watched a show on the Fibinache Sequence. My eyes were open, my thoughts were in motion. It was an "a ha" moment for me. Everything(I discovered)is connected.

Later through free writing and making inspirational journals I really saw the truth. Why are things cyclical, because that's the shape of life. In the womb how do we lay? If you cut open a sea shell, what shape do you see? If you look at the way a flowers seeds are placed, or it's leaves, what pattern do they make? If you look at a storm on this planet, a hurrican maybe, or a tornado, or maybe the way the water goes down the toilet, do they resemble each other? Do they resemble the storms on other planets, say for instance Jupiter's big red dot, then look at a galaxy, what shape does it take? It's not hard to see why Taoist see life and death as cyclical, once you think about it.

Answer 5

Eventually all the stars will burn out and even the black holes will die. Then a new universe begins (Theory by Sir Roger Penrose) however some "information" is carried over from the original universe. This "cycle" continues in perpetuity, so there is no "before" the big bang in the absolute sense, and also because time ceases to exist at each "singularity."

Note: I don't study science, only some really general knowledge when it comes to things about the origin of the universe.