Greek astronomers observed intricate motions of the sun, moon, and planets on the two-dimensional sky. They explained them—saved the appearances—by p… - Julian Barbour

[I]f you imagine two NOWs... there will be some difference between them, and if you work out some weighted average of all of that difference... you can call that... the amount of time between them. ...[T]his has nothing to do with some substance... It's just difference between those two things. ...[T]his is the quantity that is... being measured by my watch...

[W]hat we call yesterday is self-contained and has its experience of being yesterday, and today has memories of yesterday; and therefor I say that it's later... but each is completely self-contained, and there's no reason why you should put one... here, and another one there...

It is a mistake to believe that the digits 0 and 1, being abstract, represent the immaterial. Quite... the contrary... they stand for something quintessentially concrete.