Time, Trees, and Bees

Did time exist before we started recording and measuring it?

Does time really exist within the universe or is it a human construct?

Great minds have struggled with understanding time. Scientists and philosophers over the centuries have postulated over tense or tenseless time, Newton’s absolute time, relativists’ perspective, and Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

Time fascinates.

Here I will look at time from a linear perspective, but in doing so adopt a relativist view point; that there is no one unique time, rather there are a plethora of times, one for every inertial frame of reference, and that they are all equally legitimate.

A massive fig tree stands in a rainforest. This tree is a mother tree, she is connected to many trees throughout this part of the rainforest. She communicates with her community, her family, and shares nutrients to nurture the future of the forest. She has been doing this for 800 years, and with all going well she may continue for another 800. She is in the prime of her life.

Humans live in this rainforest and they pass by this tree. They see her as static; she looks substantially the same every day. Seasonally she changes, but they cannot see the changes in her like they see their children grow and mature.

Mother fig tree, though, has seen the forest change over the centuries. Over time, she has seen mighty mother trees fall and nurtured the growth of saplings that will one day be as mighty as she.

Her time signature is different from that of the humans. They buzz about her like flies buzz about humans. From the mother fig tree’s perspective humans tend to move quickly, flitting from one place to the next, never settling. Little does she know that they have but 60 or 70 years on this planet. Their time is perceived within the span of decades, not centuries. Their movements and actions are governed by the cycles of the sun and the moon and the nature of the wet and dry seasons.

Communities of insects live on and around this mighty fig. At times she feels the benefits of their cleansing work and the symbiotic relationship of the good insects. At other times she suffers illness and damage from the invasive and parasitic nature of the less desirable insects.

The time signature of these ants and bees and the like is so short and their activity so rapid that she cannot see them, nor at times feel them. She is only aware of the collective good or bad they incur based on their activity. They are more akin to the enzymes in our stomachs or the viruses that make us ill. Like insects to the tree, we Humans cannot see these, but we feel the good and the bad of their presence.

For generations of human this mother fig was a landmark. Static, ever enduring, a mother tree, a birthing tree. They sheltered under her, and hunted animals and birds which rest or live within her vast array of roots and branches. They use her leaves and fruit. She felt their impact and was aware of their existence. She was a symbol of the consistency of the forest to them. To this band of humans she was eternal.

New colonies of bees, ants and fruit bats discover her every new season of flowering and fruit. She watches the humans flit by, she feels the benefit of the bees pollinating her flowers and the bats hanging in her branches feasting on her fruits. They spread her seed and influence throughout the forest and ensure its continuation and renewal.

The time signature of each of these creates is very different and they only experience their world from within their time signature.

The humans of the rain forest have been here for tens of thousands of years. They’re a continuous, stable culture which has grown prosperous due to the plentiful nature of their surroundings, their nurturing, balanced approach, and custodianship of the forest. That said they are extremely conscious of the thin balance between the over use of resources and their survival needs. Over the centuries they have developed practices, rituals and beliefs that ensure the fine balance of nature are maintained. They see themselves as part of the land and custodians of the land.

One day a new type of human arrives from another land. They see themselves as explorers and discoverers. They come from a culture of exploiting the riches of nature. They place value on minerals and resource, and force nature into unnatural production to feed their ever-growing population and their insatiable greed.

Their focus is on the individual and the collection of wealth for themselves and their commanders.

They have come to claim new lands in the name of their king. New lands for their people to develop. They see themselves as modern nation builders and developers. They cannot believe that the existing people have simply lived off what nature can provide and have not “advanced” in any way. They cannot believe that these people of the rain forest are happy to subsist on nature, rather than to control and command nature to produce. They see it as their duty to make the most of what this “new” land has to offer, to build a new nation and reap the benefits of the riches it holds.

For the custodians this is against all that they have lived for and all that they believe, but they are overcome by the technology, weaponry, and aggression of these new nation builders. The custodian’s time signature is one with nature. They see their world in terms of generations and their role as one of harmony and nurture.

The nation builders are in a hurry. They carry with them an urgency, a need to capitalise of every moment. They have the mindset of the builder and exploiter. They measure their progress against how they have shaped and change their world around them solely within their life time. They consider that they are in control of nature and their surroundings. Their time signature is very different to the people of the rain forest. They do not understand the mindset of custodianship.

The custodians cannot understand the perspective of the builders and exploiters. The builders and exploiters have no time for what they perceive as the “slow, primitive” custodians. One thinks harmony the other thinks domination. The mother fig is cut down to make way for a road through the rainforest to allow the builders and exploiters to access a gold mine.

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