Does spacetime explain to us what the Now is?
You answered that with 'No', which is a good answer.
The reason that it is a good answer has to do with the subject matter of Spacetime.
It turns out that Spacetime is not about space and not about time. Newton and Einstein were fully focused on the behavior of matter as their subject matter.
So, Spacetime does not declare what time is nor does it declare what space is. The essential aspect is how matter behaves, and matter as we know it is always on the move. There is no matter that exists at a standstill.
That gives us handles to matter because matter travels a distance that we can measure and it takes up time that we can measure. Hence, we have two handy tools to declare what matter is doing.
Then, with the anomalous precession of Mercury, we need to explain why this is occurring.
It turns out that Einstein did not provide an explanation. He 'just' provided us the framework that is correct.
Naturally, it is fantastic that he was able to provide us that framework. Yet it is not an explanation why it is happening (unless we make time and space somethings that are doing the controlling over matter).
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The fact that you are focusing on a phenomenon is of course really troubling. Yet worse, far worse, is that you are not the single person saying this so we can all laugh about it. Ten million scientists are all saying the same thing: time dilates.
They are inside the framework (which we can declare correct), and they point to a component of the framework and work with it as if it were something real.
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In the example of the tape measure, no one reads it the incorrect direction.
When an old person got measured and is measured shorter than 30 years ago, the old guy jokes that the tape measure stretched. Everyone laughs, because we all know which way is which. The old guy did not want to admit in front of everyone that he was less than his former self.
The secondary part is that the tape measure is based on humans establishing a measure for distance. By embracing the foot or the meter, a standard got incorporated into what we measure.
For time, we can find a similar story of an older runner doing the 100 meters in a time that is 1 second longer than his record. He said he ran as fast as before, so the clock must have dilated, he said.
Same story therefore, the runner is pointing to the mechanism and not to what happened in reality.
The secondary aspect is true here as well. The second is nothing but a standardization of the measurement of time [and I think it was smart thinking that the inventor called it 'seconds' and not 'firsts' because there is no starting point to time].
Obviously, if we don't have our feet on the ground then the emperor ends up without clothes and everyone around agreeing how beautiful his clothes are.
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Marios, I can help, but you need to see the mechanism as separate from reality. The distance is real, but the expression of the distance is man-made. The duration is real, but the expression of the duration is man-made.
So, yes, spacetime delivers the correct calculations. But the whole point is that it is a framework and not the reality itself. That is the distinction. Don't make the framework be the same as reality.
Let me try the following different approach:
1 + 1 = 2, correct?
In reality, there is nothing mentioned here but a framework.
1 apple + 1 apple = 2 apples
Finally, we do have something real. Without actual items, we are not holding anything real in our hands, other than something structural that our brains can comprehend as correct.
The difference between both examples is that the first one is not real, even though it is correct. The second one is real and correct.
To paraphrase your question:
When we have 1, does the first one declare what 1 is? The answer is No.
When we have 1, does the second example declare what 1 is?
The answer is Yes.
Then, let's complicate matters a bit.
1 apple + 1 orange = 2 pieces of fruit
The equation is still correct, though we have to use our brains to make it correct because we are using two different items that are made generic to find the final answer.
When we have 1, does the third example declare what 1 is?
The answer is 'No' first and 'Yes' after explaining the setup.
No, because we do not have a single answer.
Yes, because we can point to the generic version of fruit.
If you get this, then we are already in a good spot. We are discussing reality, but we are not doing that via the actual items, but via the structural construct.
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Then, let's look at the binary system and the decimal system.
We can do with either system anything we can do with the other system as well, mathematically. And yet they are not the same.
In the decimal system, we have 1, and this time we can declare that this 1 is either used for a unit (of whatever kind) or for the whole (good word is for, instance, Unity).
Now, when we go for the binary system, then we cannot say the same about 1. In the binary system, 1 does not represent a unit or Unity. Rather, 1 represents 'on' in contrast to 0 which represents 'off'.
Still, we can establish Unity in the binary system. Yet the point is that we need to establish it first, and that is the big explanation.
We can, for instance, declare '11100100' the same as Unity, and as long as everyone agrees to this, then from that moment on we have Unity captured.
If you get this, then we can look at the decimal system once more, and it turns out that all numbers from 0 to 9 are shortcuts. Each number represents a specific idea, mathematically. Each meaning got established and all agree on it.
Marios, that is the deeper level.
Everything we talk about, every word or symbol we use, is an agreement.
So, if we then look back at the Now, then we know it is part of reality, but if we want to find the base for time then we cannot declare more than its nomenclature of the word Now.
It stands in between the future (from French "that what will be") and past (from English "that what passed").
Just like we cannot point to the future or past with anything solid but memorabilia or expectations, we can also not escape the Now. It is omnipresent.
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Lastly, what is a phenomenon?
A good example is the Eye of the Hurricane. The Hurricane is based on wind force, and yet there is no wind inside the Eye. A butterfly can flutter inside the Eye, just like on a sunny day without a breeze. Yet no butterfly can enter the Eye from the side because the Wall of the Eye is beyond strength. The storm and then particularly the Wall of the Eye will prevent any butterflies from entering.
That is a phenomenon. It is absolutely real, we can see the Eye on satellite images, yet there is no wind in the Eye. What makes the Eye the Eye is not based on the Eye.
Time and Space are absolutely real, but they do not have attributes of their own.
Einstein threw a monkey wrench in the picture when he explained the anomalous behavior of Mercury as a space-time occurrence.
Einstein did not know about the Big Bang. He left out one most-vital behavior of matter. He did not know. Worse, once he knew, he did not look for a normal explanation for the anomaly of Mercury. There is a good explanation available, but Einstein nor anyone else looked.
You do know now. I hope you'll use it to ensure the ideas in your mind are based on solid ground and not on a framework that is not real itself, even when it is correct.
Good luck.
