I always hear ‘time of year’, but I think that’s wrong; seasons aren’t a time but a place. Yes, yes, it’s kind of both, but I think that the spatial value is more important than the temporal one in this case given that the ‘time’ only works insofar as our planet’s velocity remains relatively constant, or the orbital period remains consistent–whereas the spatial point would theoretically remain the same regardless of velocity. For demonstrative purposes, say we have a tram system which follows an elliptical track and has a giant fireball at its center (the intersection of the major and minor axes). The closer we get to the fireball, the hotter it gets (and the converse), so if the tram car stalls at perihelion for a couple hours, years, eons, and assuming the fireball burns at a relatively constant temperature, it’s still going to be colder than were it to rest at aphelion. Of course, the sun’s output cycles, its relative location, and our orbit isn’t as static as all that (the sun kind of wobbles and orbital tracks form cool flower-like patterns; they don’t retrace themselves), but I think the point remains that ‘seasons’ are primarily a spatial rather than a temporal distinction (a point moving from perihelion to aphelion, and the converse).
I don’t think too many people who are aware of astronomical knowledge advancements since, say, the dark ages would disagree with you there, insofar as by ‘seasons’ you mean ‘the weather we associate with eg Summer, Winter, Fall, Spring’. I think it’s pretty uncontroversial that the major factor in causing the weather to change over the course of the year is not just some time passing, but the changing position of the earth relative to the sun.
But I don’t think that negates the relationship seasons have to time necessarily. Thinking about it further, all ways that we currently measure time have a basis in physical reality. When the clock ticks each second, it’s not because a second passed; it’s because the pendulum was moving in a physical way in a physical place that caused a clicking sound.
So the relationship you’re noticing between the view of seasons as time and seasons as a physical thing are, I think, something you can notice with all measurements of time. Even an understanding of atomic clocks will strengthen this view.
I think time is physical change, fundamentally. For example, what would it mean for all matter to stop moving but time to continue? The concept seems conceivable, but I think on close inspection it’s quite possibly nonsense, a contradiction in terms.
Your theory may contradict the idea that the spatial relationship is a primary cause of the seasons; it takes more than an alternative theory to falsify that idea, though. Namely, it takes a certain amount evidence against the idea.
That’s a common misconception… it’s actually earth’s angle relative to the sun that makes the difference, not the distance… hence why it’s summer time south of the equator when it’s winter time north of it and vice versa.
That’s not even a cum hoc – it’s significantly worse. When you’re farthest from the sun, it’s warmest, and when you’re closest to the sun it’s coldest. It would be a cum hoc if you were in the southern hemisphere - in the northern hemisphere, it’s just backwards.
To be fair, I didn’t catch the mistake either.
Now, when you realize that (a) northern winter / southern summer is when the sun is CLOSEST, and (b) northern summer / southern winter is when the sun is FURTHEST, you might think that the seasons in the southern hemisphere are more extreme. That’s a reasonable hypothesis. It turns out not to be true, mostly for the reason that the southern hemisphere has a lot more water than the northern hemisphere; the water moderates the temperature a bit, so the seasons end up being quite similarly extreme in north and south.
