Subjective Time Perception as Information Dynamics: An Ontological Formalisation of Psychological Time within the Logical Universe Framework

Abstract

Physical time is defined by atomic clocks—uniform, unidirectional, and measurable. Subjective time is defined by conscious experience—non‑uniform, compressible, expandable, and capable of standing still. This paper, for the first time, incorporates subjective time perception into the information‑dynamics framework of the Logical Universe (LU_v3.1), proposing that subjective time is the introspective mapping of the density of topological reconfiguration events occurring within an information soliton. The perceived "speed" of time does not depend on the rate of an external physical clock, but on the number of collapse–decoherence cycles completed by the soliton per unit of physical time—i.e., the frequency of field–matter–field transitions. This framework provides a unified explanation for all major subjective time phenomena: time dilation during focused attention (time flies), time expansion in pain or fear, time arrest in meditation or near‑death experiences, and time fragmentation during multitasking; it also accounts for the perceived acceleration of time with ageing. Crucially, "psychological feeling" is here defined for the first time as a measurable variable in information‑topological dynamics, no longer excluded from physical description.