Look who's back on the program

I had totally forgotten I had this. I had this idea to do a blog, not remembering that I had done a blog before. Well actually I had remeembered I did a blog before, but I didn't remember about this blog. So that's good. I already this and don't need to set anything up.

Anyway, I wanted to talk about some time related things. One time related thing I wanted to talk about relates to how time has a sense or a direction.

"Now this fact that there is a change in the B series which goes from earlier to later is sufficient to show that, of the two generating relations of the series, the relation of the earlier term to the later is more important than the relation of the later term to the earlier. For the relation of the earlier to the later takes us in the direction from earlier to later. Starting from any point P in the series, we shall find it to be earlier than Q, and shall then find Q to be earlier than R and so go on continually from earlier terms to later terms. On the other hand, if we start from P and take the relation “later than” we shall find that P is later than 0, which is later than N, which is later than M and so go on from later to earlier terms. And thus the relation of “earlier than”; gives us a sense of the series which agrees with the direction of the change, while the relation “later than” gives us a sense opposed to the direction of the change. The first of these relations, then, expresses the nature of the series more adequately than the second, and we may call the sense from earlier to later the Fundamental Sense of the series."

Anyway, I was thinking about the concept of earlier-later having an intrinsic sense, which Nathan thinks is such a big deal to making something the time-generating relation. And yet Nathan really is unable to specify in a clear way what it is for the earlier than (or later than) relation to have an intrinsic sense. It's a bit frustrating and disappointing to be honest. I suppose I should not worry about what in the world that might mean. I don't really know what he means when he says it and I don't have an independent grasp of any concept or phenomenon that might be 

Anyway. I'm now in Michigan on vacation. In a hotel room. Because it's a rainy day and the coronavirus means everything indoor is closed plus my daughter doesn't want to brave the weather. I think that covers it.