[bourgwaletariat]

You need time to differentiate, but the universe does not. The one and the one and the two of them are always here in the universe. You just need time to speak it. You need time to observe the difference between the neuronal pattern between an awareness of one and the other one and the two of them.

But they are all at once.

[dotsam]

To have the one and the two in the first place grants spatial dimensions, to separate them. Otherwise you end up with a single point, or maybe not even that.

I can't get my head around how anyone can generate time (whether an illusion or not) just from spatial dimensions. If I have to assume spatial dimensions to get anywhere, can I also assume time?

[bourgwaletariat]

These are just analogies, so let's just accept that first and foremost. Words are just a way for us to make sense of it, which we can't really do. Even math itself is just an approximation for reality.

But, in "this world," the one we "think about" time is the path between two simultaneously existing universes. The universe a minute ago still exists. The universe a minute from now exists already. Time is how we got here and will get there.

We aren't generating it. It's always here. It only exists when it is observed. You observing it makes it exist. That's the path. You haven't observed the universe an hour from now, so it doesn't exist yet, but that's only true in your mind. It's already here. It's there. All potential universes exist simultaneously.

Time isn't an illusion. It's a path. It's like the trail from your house to mine.

For a point to get from one point to another, it needs another dimension, a line. A line needs a plane. A plane needs a cube, a cube needs time, time needs... what? The fifth dimension. Through the fifth dimension, we can create paths from one time to another.

We just aren't there yet. We haven't observed that happening, but it's there. Always was, always will be.