Observer-Dependent Temporal Construction: Flicker Fusion, Schrödinger's Cat, and Informational Accessibility

Abstract

Time is treated here as the ordered construction of accessible informational distinctionsunder causal and energetic constraints, following the framework developed in Echoes of Time.On this view, temporal density is not fixed by a universal background flow. It depends onthe regime in which distinctions are stabilised and ordered.Two cases are examined. First, comparative sensory physiology shows that critical flickerfusion frequency varies across species. Insects that resolve higher temporal frequencies stabilise more visual distinctions per unit of metric time and thereby construct a denser effectivetemporal experience. Second, the Schrödinger cat thought experiment is reinterpreted withinthe Informational Observer Framework: the paradox concerns unresolved informational access at the observer level, not an ontological superposition of the macroscopic system.Together, the biological and theoretical cases support a single claim. Different regimes ofaccessibility — whether set by sensory sampling rate or by observational interaction — yielddifferent constructions of temporal order. Metric time, as defined by clocks and spacetimegeometry, is left unchanged. What varies is the informational temporal structure built fromaccessible distinctions.