OUR DUAL RECOGNITION OF TIME 101 



better analogy would be an entropy-clock, i.e. an in- 

 strument designed primarily for measuring the rate of 

 disorganisation of energy, and only very roughly keep- 

 ing pace with time. 



A typical entropy-clock might be designed as follows. 

 An electric circuit is composed of two different metals 

 with their two junctions embedded respectively in a 

 hot and cold body in contact. The circuit contains a 

 galvanometer which constitutes the dial of the entropy- 

 clock. The thermoelectric current in the circuit is 

 proportional to the difference of temperature of the two 

 bodies; so that as the shuffling of energy between them 

 proceeds, the temperature difference decreases and the 

 galvanometer reading continually decreases. This clock 

 will infallibly tell an observer from another world which 

 of two events is the later. We have seen that no ordi- 

 nary clock can do this. As to its time-keeping qualities 

 we can only say that the motion of the galvanometer 

 needle has some connection with the rate of passage of 

 time — which is perhaps as much as can be said for the 

 time-keeping qualities of consciousness. 



It seems to me, therefore, that consciousness with its 

 insistence on time's arrow and its rather erratic ideas of 

 time measurement may be guided by entropy-clocks in 

 some portion of the brain. That avoids the unnatural 

 assumption that we consult two different cells of the 

 material brain in forming our ideas of duration and of 

 becoming, respectively. Entropy-gradient is then the 

 direct equivalent of the time of consciousness in both 

 its aspects. Duration measured by physical clocks (time- 

 like interval) is only remotely connected. 



Let us try to clear up our ideas of time by a summary 

 of the position now reached. Firstly, physical time is a 



