Two distinct viewpoints on time divide many philosophers.

One view is that Time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe, a dimension in which events occur in sequence.

The opposing view is that Time does not refer to any kind of actually existing dimension, that events and objects move through, nor to any entity that flows.

But that it is instead an intellectual concept (together with space and number) that enables Humans to sequence and compare events.

Antiphon the Sophist, in a fragment preserved from his chief work On Truth, states: Time is not a reality (hypostasis), but a concept (noêma) or a measure (metron).

Parmenides went further, maintaining that time, motion, and change were illusions.

Time as an illusion is also a common theme in Buddhist thought.

Every event has the characteristic of being both present and not present (future or past), Time is a self-contradictory idea.