  The world is four-dimensional according to fundamental physics, governed by
basic laws that operate in a spacetime that has no unique division into space
and time. Yet our subjective experience is divided into present, past, and
future. This paper discusses the origin of this division in terms of simple
models of information gathering and utilizing systems (IGUSes). Past, present,
and future are not properties of four-dimensional spacetime but notions
describing how individual IGUSes process information. Their origin is to be
found in how these IGUSes evolved or were constructed. The past, present, and
future of an IGUS is consistent with the four-dimensional laws of physics and
can be described in four-dimensional terms. The present, for instance, is not a
moment of time in the sense of a spacelike surface in spacetime. Rather there
is a localized notion of present at each point along an IGUS' world line. The
common present of many localized IGUSes is an approximate notion appropriate
when they are sufficiently close to each other and have relative velocities
much less than that of light. But modes of organization that are different from
present, past and future can be imagined that are consistent with the physical
laws. We speculate why the present, past, and future organization might be
favored by evolution and therefore a cognitive universal.
