Apportioning the Finite Quantity.

Kate Rusby’s song Old Man Time is about a ‘rare old man’ who controls the sands of time, taking it from the old and giving it to the young. So it caused me to ponder…

Suppose time really is a matter of finite quantity. Suppose it’s apportioned to living beings at their birth in accordance with a life expectancy prescribed by the determinist principle, and then re-apportioned to other new lives as it’s used up. And suppose all the sand of time is in circulation, so that there’s none to spare.

That would mean that as one form of being – say, the human being – proliferated, other forms of being would have to contract. Or, alternatively, that the proliferating form would have to have its average life expectancy reduced.

But then this would also have to apply to non-living beings, like mountains and beer cans, since they’re subject to the ravages of time, too.

You know, I truly wonder why I waste my mental energy on such pointless speculation.