Breaking News: A New Theory of Time

Time itself has three dimensions, and space is a secondary effect

We think of time as a line. Maybe it bends a little, maybe it stretches when we’re bored and races when we’re in love. But it’s still a line, right?

What if that way of thinking is the equivalent of describing a magnificent cathedral as a stick figure?

Associate research professor Gunther Kletetschka at the UAF Geophysical Institute in Alaska has proposed something revolutionary: that time is not a line, but a three-dimensional structure. Not metaphorically. Literally. Like length, width, and height that we experience in space, time itself may have three directions, each shaping reality in a different way:

• One dimension (t₁) governs the quantum: the raw soup of uncertainty, potential, and probabilistic motion at the smallest scales.

• Another (t₂) mediates interaction: where probabilities collapse, choices appear, and events crystallize into consequences.

• The third (t₃) stretches across the cosmos: the slow sweep of galaxies, the emergence of gravity, the unfolding of cosmic history.

These dimensions, he suggests, are not just curiosities—they may generate mass, determine particle families, and govern the symmetry and asymmetry of the forces that hold our universe together. They are the backstage scaffolding of all that seems real.

Do those layers feel familiar?

Could there be something inside us that mirrors them?

One layer of self is raw awareness, the kind that exists before thought… like the quantum field.

Another is where decisions happen, where stories form, where we make meaning from mystery.

And then there’s that deep, slow self… the one that watches your entire life from a distance, who knows what matters and why it hurts. The cosmic self.

Could it be that we don’t just experience time, that we’re built from it? That we are, each of us, a geometry of time walking around, wondering who we are?

From three dimensions to vertical causation

What intrigues me is how this three-dimensional model of time brushes up against a metaphysical idea called vertical causation—a term used by thinkers such as Wolfgang Smith to describe non-temporal, non-local, top-down causality.

Horizontal causation is what we are taught in school: A causes B, which causes C. It’s tidy, testable, and local.

Vertical causation means that instead of one thing causing another in a step-by-step chain, a higher level of reality steps in and influences what happens. It’s like an idea suddenly taking form, or a deep knowing appearing out of nowhere. It’s not about past events pushing things forward; it’s about something beyond time reaching in and deciding what is real.

And here’s where the overlap gets interesting.

In Kletetschka’s theory, the second time dimension, t₂, mediates between pure quantum potential (t₁) and classical structure (t₃). It’s where things cohere. Where a probability becomes a particle. Where energy takes shape as meaning.

That sounds an awful lot like what vertical causation does.

The difference is this: Kletetschka’s t₂ is a dimension: measurable, geometric, theoretically observable. Vertical causation transcends all that. It is beyond space and time. It does not unfold. It does not progress. It is.

But what if t₂ is the shadow of vertical causation? It’s a slice of it that physicists can hold in their trembling hands.

What this means for us…

Maybe the reason we feel time is “off” is because we’re sensing more of it than we realize. We’re not crazy for feeling that some moments are richer, that some decisions come from outside ourselves, that life is not a line but a knot formed by hands we can’t see.

If this view is true—if time is a shape, and not a line—then understanding reality means learning to see in three temporal directions.

It means attuning not just to what happened, or what might, but also to what is choosing to come into being through us.

And if time has depth, where is it taking you?

What now?

I don’t claim to fully understand this model. I constructed this article in a collaboration with ChatGPT, which enabled me to explore the core concepts of a physics paper without being a physicist. I also used Claude.ai to help ensure that I added my own imaginative approach without massacring Dr. Kletetschka's conclusions. For example, it pointed out that I describe t₁ as "quantum," t₂ as "interaction," and t₃ as "cosmological", while the original paper describes: t₁ as quantum-scale (Planck time), t₂ as interaction-scale (mediating quantum-classical transition), t₃ as cosmological time scales. I don’t feel that most of my readers will be disturbed by this modest simplification.

My first goal has been to understand the concept enough to prime my own intuition regarding the true nature of reality. I imagine that physicists are constrained by the limitations of their equations and the rigidity of their scientific community and their conventions. Not everything that is… can be measured.

My secondary goal is to share my perceptions with others via this piece, and in doing so increase the odds that other curious individuals (i.e. you) can share your perspectives. It is likely that someone more spiritual than I can share insights that will deepen my understanding. For example, someone used to plant medicine or meditative journeys may have an easier time grasping what can seem to many of us like highly abstract possibilities.

I also share this because it stirs something deep in me, something that logic alone can’t satisfy. If time truly has three dimensions, we are living in a richer, stranger, more meaningful reality than we’ve been told exists.

If you’ve experienced deep states of meditation… plant medicine journeys… liminal dreams… or even inexplicable shifts in awareness… have you felt these dimensions of time?

If you're a physicist, a mystic, or simply a curious human: what does this stir in you?

Reflect.

Reply.

Add a layer. Let’s explore together.