Growing up, my father was a science teacher in a public school. He told both my sister and I that we could do anything we wanted when we "grew up"  except be a public educator. We could even be teachers, just not in the public school systems. Having a father well grounded in science meant that I learned a lot when I wasn't at school. When I would get bored and no one else was around to play with, I would run experiments. I had more microscopes and chemistry sets then I can remember, although the chemistry sets never had enough chemicals because we made too many stink bombs and fireworks from them all. His love of science was imparted into me, and became a reason I am an engineer. A few nights ago I was talking with him, and he mentioned The Big Bang Theory. Now, in theory, I should be a fan of this show. It is nerds, making nerdy jokes about abstract scientific theories. In reality, I don't watch the show, but it got us talking about theoretical physics.

Oftentimes people describe time as the fourth dimension. This is not a scientific based observation, however, as mathematicians and scientists do not treat time as a dimension. It is an important aspect, but not one as the standard 3, x, y, and z axes. One reason for this is that time is affected by gravity. The how and why of this is a deep physics explanation, the short of which is dealing with Einstein's relativity theorem. Suffice it to say, because of its relative properties it is a poor method to measure something in terms of a defined unmovable axis. A second simply isn't the same as every other second.  

Another theory of physics is the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Most people know of this through Star Trek where it was "handled" in the transporter technology by simply  including a Heisenberg Compensator. Sounds sufficient anyway. Basically Heisenberg said that you can either know an objects velocity or you can know its location you cannot know both. This is because in measuring it you have to physically (on a microscopic minute level) interact with the object such that you change one or both properties. There is some level of momentum, energy, or inertia that is removed from a particle in measuring this. The easiest way to explain this is to remember that NASCAR drivers do not have speedometers in their vehicles because measuring something as useless to them as speed would slow their vehicles just enough to make a difference. They only care about their velocity relative to the others, and not relative to the ground or grandstands.

Now taking these two principles together, time, which is affected by external stimuli, should also be changed by measuring it. This is easily demonstrated by an old cliché, a watched pot never boils.

I told you at the beginning it was a complete waste of time.

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