My views on what you are missing? I'll keep it short. Here goes: 1) You say "a spiritual absolute would be the essence of sentience." We don't know this. We don't know what spirit is, or what is absolute. 2) You say "no literal dimension of time." I disagree. I think evolution is proof that time is something very real. The universe has evolved from a singularity to now, and is still evolving. That's what nature is. 3) You say: "Energy is the present." I say energy changes, manifesting itself myriad different ways over time. That's what we call natural history. But all this is just my opinion, of course. I have no complete knowledge of the universe. No one does. We're all just winging it, creating narratives that science eventually discredits. Too bad we can't make a philosophy out of science. But science is a method, not a philosophy. It informs our worldviews, but it cannot tell us what is absolute.