Introducing Time

Title : Introducing Time
Author: Craig Callender
Year:2001

I have been meaning to read something like this since I watched dark hahaha. It's a lame reason but it's the truth. That's not the only reason I actually find time quite interesting and everyone thinks  time travelling is fascinating. Well the book starts out trying to define the concept of time. And it makes you reflect on how hard it actually is. A quote I liked is "

“What is time then? If nobody asks me, I know; but if I were desirous to explain it to one that should ask me, plainly I do not know.” 

 This book explains without much detail in other words in a very brief way the different conceptions about time that have been known through the ages. It introduces us to different points of view from Kurt Godel, Albert Einstein etc.

It starts out talking about how we perceive time and clocks. Its curious if you pause to ponder about it , how time changes depending where you are , we live that everyday with the relatives we talk to who live far away from us. We have biological clocks in us as well, but Is time merely in our head, is It a psychological idea we create to assimilate the mysterious entity that time is , does it actually exist. Toward the end of the book it is suggested that time doesn't exist. 

J.M Mctaggart was an english philospher who published ana rticle in which he seeked to convinve readers about the irreality of time.

The B.A theory could also be called tenseless theory of time in the book , but I only found it as the former in the internet explains time does't exist and that past, present, and future can all be equally real.This branch of Philosphy has much to do with physics so it focuses mainly on philosphy but some physicist and their arguments are explained as well ;for Example Isaac Newton's theories state that time is absolute in the whole universe , but Einstein's idea of time is relative , so Relativity and tenses are in a way connected. 

H.A Lorentz  a Dutch physicist and nobel prize laureate has an alternative explanation of relativity, his theory doesn't have the profound consequences for time that relativity does. 

Kurt Godel discovered an exotic species of space time that allows for time travel; he'smostly famous for his incompletenes theorem.

Taub-Nut spacetime is an exact solution to einstein's equations. Kip Thorne and Igor Novikov propose a means of time travel through wormholes which is shown in the 2014 film Interstellar, It is also the means of travel in Carl Sagan's novel Contact , there's also a film for this book (Which I have already started reading) It shows an Interesting girl with important questions about life, but her love life seems a bit odd given her personality. The possibility of wormholes has been known almost since general relativity but gravity (an attractive force) always seeks to close it.

That's a mobius strip named after german astronomer and Mathematician August Ferdinand Mobius. Spacetime might also be non-orientable in time. Think of the Mobius strip as the guide that dictates the flow of time;what rules the way we age or plants grow, at one point in time travel it might exchange places. 

Geroch's theorem proved that if the topology of space changes with time which happens when space divides and time branches then the spacetime must be non-orientable which means it allows for time travel.

Friedrich Nietzche German moral philosopher made the idea of eternal recurrence famous. The eternal recurrence theory is possible according to what we know , and here's where the big bang comes into the picture. At a certain point, the paths of any traveller would run out , it'd become a singularity , matter and energy would be so concentrated that the forces would be infinite. the big bang rules out the eternal recurrence but singularity theorems don't.

The laws of nature are invariant , so physics doesnt particularly care which takes place first either past or future.

After that , Statistical mechanics is Introduced , the main developers of this theory are Ludwig Boltzmann and  Lord Kelvin. Some concepts like enthalpy and entropy are important to discuss thermodynamics(the science of heat). French Physicist and military engineer Sadi Carnot created the most efficient heat engine cycle is the Carnot cycle, consisting of two isothermal processes and two adiabatic processes.The Carnot cycle can be thought of as the most efficient heat engine cycle allowed by physical laws.

Thermodynamics and Newtons particles are explained in terms of probability. 

One of the last examples explained is about communication with time reversed which I liked very much; In this time reversed a galaxy that lies billions of light years away from us manages to communicate somehow with us , for them our big crunch is their big bang.

Some words I didn't know: 

Plethora: overabundeance, excess (greek origin)

Some books mentioned: 

Robert Heinlein's "all you zombies"(1959)

Philip K.Dick's novel "Counter-Clock World" (1967) 

Greg Egan -Science fiction writer, doesn't mention his book but I will find it. 

The girl on the train by paula hawkins

Title: The girl on the train
Author: Paula Hawkins
Year: 2015 
Synopsis : EVERY DAY THE SAME
Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning and night. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She's even started to feel like she knows them. Jess and Jason, she calls them. Their life--as she sees it--is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost.

UNTIL TODAY
And then she sees something shocking. It's only a minute until the train moves on, but it's enough. Now everything's changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel goes to the police. But is she really as unreliable as they say? Soon she is deeply entangled not only in the investigation but in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good?





Thoughts 
Rachel is a very relatable character, her life isn't the best but that doesn't stop me from admitting she has no self-respect she keeps calling her married ex-husband who cheated on her and refuses to move on. When losing her job she looks for no options and instead takes a train everyday into London and observes a couple. So far rachel is no role-model but I can understand why she is the way she is. 
I like the concept and the way it makes the story mysterious I don't care so much about the characters. 
There's Tom and Anna her ex-husband and wife which are parents to a baby girl. Then there's also Cathy:Rachel's roommate and her boyfriend , I forgot his name (not relevant) and Scott and Megan.
Scott and Megan are the couple that lives across Rachels old house and the same she has been watching every morning since she lost her job. 
The rest of the book is about finding out what happened to Megan when she suddenly disappears. 
 

A Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare

What I liked the most about this one is the automatons, even though they weren't the good guys. I wasn't a big fan of the world building, that wasn't my favorite part so I feel like what was special about this book is the time it takes place in. I did like the place as well, Victorian London , and the atmosphere is so dark and medieval. Medieval movies and books always attract my attention. 
I will make a character list and discuss each of the characters which one I liked which one I hated etc. 
Let's start with  

 Nate Gray : too superficial to be the villain

Tessa Gray  she seems like a feminist reader, ummmm... what else can I say? Oh yeah, its been a while since I read it so the info isnt fresh on my mind. I forgot what her powers were. Ok I think its awesome shes a shapeshifter, and she likes to read. at the time there really wasnt anything other than classics I guess. shes big on literature , for instance Charles Dickens. 

  Will Herondale welll.... Will just made me plain pissed all the time pushing tessa away like that, details werent revealed but I already speculated hes the classy dark past messed up childhood cute character all the girls have to fall for. Well I dont buy it. Except for the epilogue, dammit that stupid epilogue with the ghost , I admit it made my heart feel like it got smaller but thats it I hated him the rest of the book