Topics Time

Question When people claim that in "non-Western cultures, time is cyclical rather than linear", what do they mean by this? Is this nothing more than another way of stating the truism that history repeats itself? It seems that even within cycles, there must be linearity of some kind - consider for example the carbon cycle, where the cycle is little more than a repeating linear loop. Throughout my life, I have only ever been growing older, and I will not suddenly be young again - or start getting younger - when I stop aging. So what does it mean to say that time is cyclical and not linear?

Accepted:
August 11, 2011

Comments

I have nothing to add here except to say that this question has often occurred to me -- has anyone truly believed (say) that when spring rolls around each year, it is precisely the very same "time" that it was the year before, rather than being merely a "similar" environment recurring? I suppose if something like Nietzsche's 'eternal recurrence' were the case (taken literally), then there could be some question of a genuinely recurring ie cyclical time -- but even then wouldn't it be far more plausible to hold that time remains linear even if the events occurring in time might go through cycles?

Will be curious if anyone else weighs in with an endorsement of the opposing view -- or even of the claim that any culture has endorsed such a view.

best, ap