The conscious present feels flowing because it is composed of phenomenal distinctions (moments) that are directed and related via inclusion, connection, and fusion, according to Integrated Information Theory (IIT). IIT aims to account for both the presence and quality of consciousness in objective, physical terms. Unfolding the cause-effect structure of directed grids can explain why time feels flowing. Time, on this view, is not a process in clock time but a structure specified by the system's current state. Implications for the psychophysics, philosophy, and neuroscience of time are outlined.
Time feels flowing because the conscious present is composed of directed phenomenal moments that are related through directed inclusion, connection, and fusion, according to Integrated Information Theory (IIT). IIT accounts for the presence and quality of consciousness in physical terms by unfolding the cause-effect structure of a substrate's architecture and current state. Previous work showed how non-directed grids can account for the feeling of space as extended; here, directed grids are shown to account for the feeling of time as flowing. The experienced present corresponds not to a process in clock time but to a cause-effect structure specified by a system in its current state: time is a structure, not a process.