Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

What is time? St Augustine famously claimed that he knew the answer as long as no one asked him for it, but as soon as he tried to explain it he no longer knew. Part of the problem is the intricate nature of the question. Every individual will approach the question 'what is time?' from a different perspective. We find ourselves asking whether time is linear or cyclic, whether it is endless, whether it is possible to travel in time, how the experience of the flow of time arises, how our own internal clocks are regulated and how our language captures the temporality of our existence. In this volume eight eminent researchers explore how investigations in their respective fields impinge on questions about the nature of time. These fields encompass the entire range from the arts and humanities to the natural sciences, mirroring the truly interdisciplinary nature of the subject.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Introduction
• 1 Time and modern physics
• 2 Cyclic and linear time in early
• 3 Time travel
• 4 The genetics of time
• 5 The timing of action
• 6 Talking about time
• 7 Storytime and its futures
• 8 Time and religion

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

The notion and nature of time have fascinated people since ancient times, if only because time is one of the few world features with deeply subjective as well as objective aspects. Cultures, philosophers, scientists, and ordinary folk, let alone poets and writers, have reflected on time in different ways. All we can say for sure is that each of us is thrown, as it were, into the stream of time in which we float for a while, and then we are taken away from it, while the stream continues indefinitely. In this collection, nine thinkers from a variety of backgrounds reflect on the nature of time from their various perspectives. The essays offer information and some insights, but the multidisciplinary mingling makes it difficult to feel truly enriched by the book. Perhaps a concluding essay would have helped. It is surprising that a book on time includes no mention of Boltzmann or Hawking, nor of entropy or the second law of thermodynamics, though there is an aside on the second law of spiritual dynamics. Francis Bacon described time "as the author of authors"; the contributors here are authors of Time. All levels. V. V. Raman emeritus, Rochester Institute of Technology