“3/19/2010, 10:48am EST”
![“Whatever you want to do, do it now. For life is time and time is all there is.” This quote passed by on my Tumblr dashboard with 210 notes (for non-Tumbloggers, notes accumulate when a post is reblogged and/or “liked”). Typical.
The popularity of such inanity makes me want to go on a rampage. I want to grab the author and admirers by their lapels and shake them down into teary-eyed admissions that the content of this quote is obviously and unquestionably false and fantastical, not to mention inconsistent with their prevailing beliefs. Since I can’t do that, I’ll just explain a few of the ways in which this quote is so inadequate.
LogicallyIf we read “is” as an indicator of identity (that is, identical-ness), then if “time is all there is,” and if “life is time,” then it must be true that life is all there is. But “life,” by any standard and non-trivial definition, does not extend to the inclusion of inanimate materials, which obviously do exist and comprise the vast majority of the universe.
Alternatively, if the first “is” does not indicate identity but rather means something like “is measured in,” and if we are saying that “life” and “time” have distinct definitions (as they actually do in the language we are using), then if “time is all there is,” then life would not exist and the statement “life [is measured in] time” would be false.
An alternative reading which may at least be logically coherent is that the first “is” indicates the inclusion of subset “life” within a broader set called “time.” Okay. What does that even mean? Logical coherence is not a logical proof — it’s merely a prerequisite for proving something true, and the legwork is not even close to finishing. If anyone wants to try to prove that “life” is a kind of “time,” be my guest. But I hope the pain of such a contra-definitional endeavor is already apparent.
Ontologically Ontology is the branch of knowledge about what is, or what exists. The contradictions revealed in the bad logic of the quote prove the impossibility of the quote being true in the real world. Time is not the only ingredient to life, and time is not the only thing that exists. Moreover, until sense is made of it, none of us has any reason to believe that life is a version of time, rather than something that simply coexists with time.
MorallyI could go on about the logical and normative problems of a “do whatever you want to do” moral outlook. Instead, I’ll ask a rhetorical question: Should serial killers heed the advice to do “whatever you want to do”? No? Didn’t think so.
Yes, I know — whoever wrote this is just trying to say that each of us has a limited amount of time with which to work and should make good use of it. But, if you think that’s true — and I do too — then say it in a way that respects the value of the thought enough not to burden it with all sorts of fantastical claims about the universe, especially ones that diminish the universe’s breadth to the smallness of your extremely limited yet apparently very hubristic perspective. Say your maxims in a way that doesn’t reduce morality to an inherently incoherent relativism.
If nothing else, have the self-respect to say what you mean, mean what you say, and align yourself with ideas that make at least a little bit of sense.
—Dan](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kzildqYKlH1qzbsi7o1_400.jpg)
“Whatever you want to do, do it now. For life is time and time is all there is.” This quote passed by on my Tumblr dashboard with 210 notes (for non-Tumbloggers, notes accumulate when a post is reblogged and/or “liked”). Typical.
The popularity of such inanity makes me want to go on a rampage. I want to grab the author and admirers by their lapels and shake them down into teary-eyed admissions that the content of this quote is obviously and unquestionably false and fantastical, not to mention inconsistent with their prevailing beliefs. Since I can’t do that, I’ll just explain a few of the ways in which this quote is so inadequate.
Logically
If we read “is” as an indicator of identity (that is, identical-ness), then if “time is all there is,” and if “life is time,” then it must be true that life is all there is. But “life,” by any standard and non-trivial definition, does not extend to the inclusion of inanimate materials, which obviously do exist and comprise the vast majority of the universe.
Alternatively, if the first “is” does not indicate identity but rather means something like “is measured in,” and if we are saying that “life” and “time” have distinct definitions (as they actually do in the language we are using), then if “time is all there is,” then life would not exist and the statement “life [is measured in] time” would be false.
An alternative reading which may at least be logically coherent is that the first “is” indicates the inclusion of subset “life” within a broader set called “time.” Okay. What does that even mean? Logical coherence is not a logical proof — it’s merely a prerequisite for proving something true, and the legwork is not even close to finishing. If anyone wants to try to prove that “life” is a kind of “time,” be my guest. But I hope the pain of such a contra-definitional endeavor is already apparent.
Ontologically
Ontology is the branch of knowledge about what is, or what exists. The contradictions revealed in the bad logic of the quote prove the impossibility of the quote being true in the real world. Time is not the only ingredient to life, and time is not the only thing that exists. Moreover, until sense is made of it, none of us has any reason to believe that life is a version of time, rather than something that simply coexists with time.
Morally
I could go on about the logical and normative problems of a “do whatever you want to do” moral outlook. Instead, I’ll ask a rhetorical question: Should serial killers heed the advice to do “whatever you want to do”? No? Didn’t think so.
Yes, I know — whoever wrote this is just trying to say that each of us has a limited amount of time with which to work and should make good use of it. But, if you think that’s true — and I do too — then say it in a way that respects the value of the thought enough not to burden it with all sorts of fantastical claims about the universe, especially ones that diminish the universe’s breadth to the smallness of your extremely limited yet apparently very hubristic perspective. Say your maxims in a way that doesn’t reduce morality to an inherently incoherent relativism.
If nothing else, have the self-respect to say what you mean, mean what you say, and align yourself with ideas that make at least a little bit of sense.
—Dan
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