850 Prof. L, T. More on the Postulates and 



except to an organic being so specially developed as to have 

 the powers of reflexion and memory. After reading his 

 theory of relativity, one has the feeling that one's life would 

 be shorter or longer according as clocks ran faster or slower. 

 Can it be that the relativists seriously believe that our 

 recording of the speed of a clock can have any bearing on 

 our sequence of events or on our interpretation of objective 

 phenomena ? 



Einstein places great emphasis on the meaning of simul- 

 taneity of events. Here again he omits the fundamental fact 

 that for simultaneity we must start from a common point of 

 time or event. He considers simultaneity of time as if he 

 were dealing with a problem of objective phenomena de- 

 tached from the subjective observing mind. If two flashes 

 of lightning are impressed on the eye at the same time, they 

 are simultaneous or else the word has no meaning. If by 

 any means the observer can prove that one flash came from a 

 greater distance, he can reason from experience that if it 

 travelled with the same speed as the other, then it must have 

 occurred before the other. And while the two flashes may 

 not be simultaneous to another observer, they are to him. 

 In other words, simultaneity has no meaning to two observers 

 unless they are in the same relation of conditions or can by 

 memory or history refer back to a common simultaneous 

 event. Thus, now, to A on the earth, is what passes at the 

 instant through his mind ; NOW on the earth to B, stationed 

 on a star 300 light years distant, is what A has learned took 

 place in 1620. If A tries to inform B of what now is to him 

 on the earth, B will not receive the intelligence until 2220, 

 if he is still there. Einstein has done a singularly unfor- 

 tunate thing in trying to establish time as an objective 

 phenomenon. Time is not a physical quantity, as it is 

 essentially subjective. , This page is impressed on the retina 

 of the eye as a whole ; it is only when the mind attempts to 

 interpret the objective phenomenon that time enters as a 

 sequence of events or as if one word came after another. 

 We m ly also illustrate this principle by the simple case of a 

 horse passing from rest to motion. We say this is accom- 

 plished by the reaction of the earth ; but the push of the 

 earth and of the horse are simultaneous and motion does not 

 occur unless the horse had previously willed to bend his leg. 

 In objective science there is no law of cause and effect; the 

 priority of a cause to an effect is solely the intrusion of a 

 subjective mind which cannot interpret events except in a 

 sequence. 



