Rev, I, too, went back to page 3 to remind myself of the context in which I talked of time as a "static entity". I am bringing the appropriate paragraph into this post so as not to have to keep going to and fro.
"With regard to your questions, I would suggest trying to think of time as a static entity, through which we are moving. In that way, time does not have to change from being “frozen” to being variable, any more than space has to change when we start to move about.
Only in the frame of reference of an observer does time appear to change. True, relativity tells us that an observer in motion relative to something else can with equal validity consider herself to be moving, or the “something else” to be moving, but in the case where the “something else” is time that may make no more sense than Einstein’s alleged question: “Does Oxford stop at this train?”"
By a "static entity" I mean nothing more than an indeterminate thing that does not have movement as an essential, diagnostic feature. I was not stating definatively that time, even in my opinion, is a static entity; just suggesting thinking of it that way as a thought experiment.
Obviously, one could apply the same thought experiment to space.
OK. Now I have done what so often happens in discussions like this: I have answered both your questions without actually answering either.
This is probably as near as I can get to a straight answer: In the present state of my knowledge/understanding, static time makes more sense to me than flowing time. I suspect the same may be true of space, but relativity casts some doubt on that.
