--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel J. Milton" wrote:
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "m_iacomi <m_iacomi@...>"
> <m_iacomi@...> wrote:
>
> It's not that obvious. Which way is which on the time axis? I,
> and I think most Westerners, think of time as a journey toward
> the future.
That's expressed by "going to" formulas. Or, changing the reference
system: the future "comes" to us. The two are equivalent and are
relating motion (in the positive sense of the time axis, the only
one we really know of) to events in future. That's obvious in our
culture we were discussing here. It might be different somewhere
else, but the issue was around Romanian, and European modalities
of representing future.
> But I've read of cultures (sorry I can't remember which) that
> think the future must lie behind, where you can't see it.
I think "behind" from the above text does not refer to "time axis"
but merely to a space representation of something you can't explore
(visually). The future lies unknown and it's reaching you from
behind (in space), from a region you don't have a clear image of
it. But that does not involve a kind of "time reversal". Be it from
behind, the future still "comes" to us.
> What seems a striking image to us, Marvell's
> "But at my back I always hear
> Time's winged chariot drawing near"
> pretty much matches their common viewpoint.
Yes, the winged chariot of yet unhappened events we're not aware
of and might reserve us some surprise. A nice poetical image. It's
only my feeling that "drawing near" from the second verse can be
replaced without loss of practical information with "coming" (near)?
at least that's the meaning given also by Webster's Dic: "to come;
move; approach [to draw nearer]".
Regards,
Marius Iacomi