Hi jcns,

Your enjoyable essay is easy to read and easy to agree with. You reject the simple logic of Greene, to the effect that "if all space is out there, then all time must be out there too." That's pretty simplistic. Instead, you seem to opt for an 'everywhere simultaneous' approach of a universal present, with messages from very far away places reaching us in the far future. Much more believable.

As you point out, there is nothing about the operational definitions of "time" or "clocks" that necessarily implies "block time" or an existing past, present, and future. You seem to conclude that there are real distinctions between past, present, and future. One perspective on this is that only the present is real; past and future are mental constructs --past based on records or memory and future based on logical projection from the past.

If your "wrong assumption" that you are rejecting is "block time", I agree with you, and one wonders how such an idea could have survived for a century.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

    Hi Edwin,

    Thank you for reading my essay and for your kind words.

    Your comments are directly on the mark I'd say, with just one minor exception; block time, per se, is not the assumption I'm challenging. Rather, block time is just one of several "hard-to-swallow" conclusions which mainstream physic currently holds as stemming logically from the assumption I *am* challenging, which is that the operational definition of time (i.e., time is that which is measured by clocks) is the final word of science on the nature of time. This assumption is largely unspoken, and although certainly not held by all scientists, it is sufficiently pervasive that I believe it constitutes a serious roadblock to the advancement of science (especially physics).

    I honestly suspect that many scientists have never even given the topic much thought. The equations we've developed with the help of the operational definition work well and give us good answers which allow us to do useful things such as build the Global Positioning System, for example. Physicists, Einstein included, appear to have taken the attitude that if we're forced to believe some seemingly odd and counterintuitive but "harmless" notions such as block time as part of the bargain, then so be it; it's probably worth the candle. I argue that we can keep the useful tools developed from the operational definition but jettison the unhelpful baggage such as block time.

    My argument is not based simply on the fact that block time appears to fly in the face of "common sense." As we've learned the hard way over the course of history, so-called common sense can and has misled us badly on many occasions. It certainly was "common sense" to hold that the sun revolves around the earth. No, my real argument is that the operational definition is not a complete explanation for the nature of time or for the nature of our underlying reality. I believe that in order for physics to break through the sort of conceptual logjam typified by the failure of efforts to merge general relativity and quantum mechanics we need a new paradigm for the nature of time, one which will *complement* the operational definition. Should you be interested, I've amplified this theme in another paper, 'Toward a Helpful Paradigm for the Nature of Time'.

    In defense of Brian Greene, by the way, his ideas certainly are not as simplistic as might appear to be the case from my necessarily sketchy portrayal of them. As I wrote in a footnote to my essay, I'm actually an admirer of Greene's thinking and writing. (I fear that I may have done him an injustice by quoting him so liberally. If so, I apologize and recommend that readers of my essay look at Greene's original writings for the full context of what he has to say on the topic. With admirers like me, who needs enemies?) I believe that one of the snippets of his writing which I quoted is Greene's version of what is known elsewhere as the Andromeda Paradox, which was advanced by Roger Penrose. Georgina Parry alluded to this briefly in her essay.

    But as usual, I've rambled on far too long. Thank you again for your kind words and thoughts.

    jcns

    Dear jcns,

    I would direct your attention to Daryl Janzen's essay. It is a fantastic essay and also provides a link to his recent PhD dissertation which is, believe it or not, a very exciting read. He arrives, I think it's safe to say, at much the same conclusion that you and I do, but in a much more scientific and professional manner. Perhaps the most important essay yet published in this contest.

    Edwin Eugene Klingman

    Dear JCN:

    I enjoyed reading your paper, especially as the nature of time described in the paper is described in quantitative detail based on the Gravity Nullification Model (GNM) described in my posted paper, From Absurd to Elegant Universe, and my book, The Hidden Factor: An Approach for Resolving Paradoxes of Science, cosmology, and Universal Reality.

    My paper describes the classical time as that experienced in the Newtonian frame (V=0) and no-time or fully dilated time in the relativistic frame of a light photon (V=C)In between these two states, there are infinite number of intermediate clocks and times.

    Sincerely,

    Avtar Singh

    5 days later

    Dear JCN Smith

    I enjoyed reading your well-written essay - it addresses an important and timely question (no pun intended). You have reconciled the world of physics with that of human beings swept on the wave of continuous mutability. I found however that there is one related topic you have not addressed (unless I read your essay too quickly!): Einstein's treatment of time in SR as a dimension that can expand when measured from another inertial frame. This notion that time *itself* dilates, clever as it is, is really bizarre but has come to be accepted as a reasonable notion by modern man. Rather, following Lorentz it is clocks that slow down, not time itself, (and measuring sticks contract not space itself contract) in those situations.

    In any case both in my FQXI essay and my 2005 Beautiful Universe Theory I concluded that time as a dimension is unnecessary to formulate a working theory of physics. But that still leaves my heart beating, more or less in synchronicity with the watch ticking on my wrist!

    Vladimir

      Hi Vladimir,

      Thank you for reading my essay and for your comments.

      "I found however that there is one related topic you have not addressed (unless I read your essay too quickly!): Einstein's treatment of time in SR as a dimension that can expand when measured from another inertial frame."

      Not addressed explicitly in my essay is the idea that what we single out and refer to as "inertial frames" are simply portions of, or subsets of, one, all-inclusive, evolving universe. Particular times are identically equivalent to particular configurations of the entire universe, including the configurations of any and all inertial frames. What we perceive as the flow of time is, in reality, nothing more and nothing less than the evolution of this physical universe, an evolution governed by rules which we strive to understand and which we refer to as the laws of physics. The only "clock" which really matters in this context is the universe itself.

      I'll take a look at your Beautiful Universe Theory. If you ever have both the time and inclination to read more about my view of time I'd recommend my essay Toward a Helpful Paradigm for the Nature of Time.

        Vladamir

        "Einstein's treatment of time in SR as a dimension that can expand when measured from another inertial frame...."

        Clocks do not slow down, as in timing is affected. They are just objects, like those measuring sticks. The hypothesis was that dimension altered under certain circumstances. This may, or may not be correct. The explanation of it was incorrect from the outset. But an incorrect explanation of a hypothesis does not mean the hypothesis is incorrect. The fault lay in their understanding of time (simultaneity by Poincare), and then substituting light speed for distance in an equation with the fault inbuilt.

        SR, as defined by Einstein, involves:

        -no gravitational forces

        -only motion that is uniform rectilinear and non-rotary (which is in effect, stillness)

        -fixed shape bodies at rest (no dimension alteration)

        -light which travels in straight lines at a constant speed (no curvature)

        Please read my posts in my blog, 11/7 19.33 & 13/7 11.24

        Paul

        JCN

        Please note the above response to Vladimir. Although the first draft of what is now 13/7 11.24 appeared here on your blog (5/7 12.18).

        The significance of an inertial frame of reference is that it is (according to them) not undergoing dimension alteration. If a reference is, then calculations can be done, but they are more tricky, and you need to be aware first that this is taking place.

        Paul

        4 days later

        Paul,

        you may well be right, but my understanding of relativity is just enough to cling to a few notions. I need to study the matter more deeply and mathematically before I can respond to your statements. My problem is lacking the stamina for and interest in the sort of extended discussion of historical positions that you have! Perhaps we are saying the same thing in different ways, who knows? No hard feelings I hope.

        Cheers

        Vladimir

        (Paul, please see my reply above to explain why I respectfully do not want to go into this tack further).

        JCN,

        I touched on Einstein's notion of flexible space and time in Q3 of my essay: it is one of his three assumptions that I do not agree with. The others being the point photon and that gravity warps spacetime. In the accompanying figure I drew a box labelled One Absolute Universal Frame so I pretty much agree with your position. In my other comments and writings I theorize that the Universe is absolute and that it is possible to assign a Universal Time to local events as they evolve. It will take too long to explain this further and clearly, even if I could.

        I skimmed through your Towards a Helpful Paradigm but of course it deserves closer reading...when I have more...TIME :)

        Cheers

        Vladimir

        JCN,

        I've been thinking about why I haven't commented on your clear and entirely correct essay. Basically it is because you don't go into the point I seem to obsess over, that our perception of time as the present moving from past to future is only a reflection of the changing configuration of what is, that turns future into past. Not wanting to appear churlish, egotistical or petulant, but not being able to avoid the observation, I refrained from commenting. From my perspective, trying to understand the issue of time as effect of motion, not eternal flow, or geometric foundation, without referring to this, is like trying to refute epicycles and a geocentric cosmology without mentioning the earth is spinning west to east, rather than the heavens moving east to west. Yet it seems no one else finds this important, even those whom I otherwise agree with. For the life of me, I cannot figure out why.

          Hi John,

          Not to worry; we all know you're not churlish, egotistical, or petulant. Thanks for your comments, with which I agree. In the excitement of all the give and take in these various blogs, you may by now have forgotten a brief exchange we had over on the blog for your own fine essay. It went as follows:

          ________________________

          JM: "It is not the present moving from the past to future, but action turning future into past."

          jcns: On this point, I would suggest a somewhat different formulation. For what it's worth, I believe it would be a more accurate description of reality to say "it is not the present moving from the past to future, but action turning present into different present."

          JM: I read your comment earlier on my phone and it set some wheels turning. You are correct that it is a series of presents, or rather the changing configuration of what is present, but the gist of my essay was not so much just a description of time as effect, but why we understand it the way we do and how what seems so evidently obvious, isn't so clear on further reflection. . . . So my efforts are to counteract this presumption of linear progression from past to future as fundamental and to do that means to emphasize the nature of the events as particular configurations that are being created and replaced. Many people do spend much of their present fixated on events other than the present, to the extent the real present can be quite nebulous. In order to deconstruct that mindset, I have to use the tools in the toolbox.

          _______________________

          It's my sense, John, that we're in pretty good agreement about all this. In the unlikely event that you ever find any spare time (didn't I read something about you working multiple jobs?) you just might enjoy taking a look at another, longer essay I've written, Toward a Helpful Paradigm for the Nature of Time.

          Thanks again for the comments.

          jcns

          JCN,

          I know we are in agreement, that's why I'm running this situation by you, to see what you think. For me, it is a point that stands out like a sore thumb, but it just seems inconsequential to others and I'm trying to figure out if I'm making more of it than necessary, or if I am just far enough ahead of the curve that it's over the conceptual horizon to others.

          Physics, with its focus on measurement, only re-enforces the sequential vector. One only has to listen to Julian Barbour and his version of block time to see just how far down the rabbit hole this assumption is carried. Yet viewing it from the perspective of future becoming past, it is just dynamic physical reality and so many of the pieces fall into place; why clock rates are variable, multi-worlds not being destiny, but probability, etc. It's not like there is much debate over the nature of temperature, yet both are effects of action and both underlay our conscious understanding of reality. The only difference with time is our confusion over which is the scale and which is the needle. By treating the physical present as the needle, we lose sight of the fact it encompasses all of reality, not just a dimensionless point on some larger scale.

          Just picking your brains in what I see as a cooperative effort.

          John, Georgina,

          Thank you very much, John, for your timely "heads up" on Julian Barbour's new time blog! I'm embarrassed to say that I was totally unaware of it until you called it to my attention. So much to read and so little time! I see that there is already a lively discussion going on there, including comments by Georgina and others. I'd prefer not to comment further until I've had an opportunity to take a close look at the videos and to digest the comments already posted on the blog.

          Regarding picking my brains, I trust you've heard the phrase "mighty slim pickin's"? That said, it's certainly a topic near and dear to my heart, so I suspect it will be virtually impossible for me to resist the urge to jump into the fray at some point. Will get back to you here later, and also may jump in directly at the Barbour blog. Thanks again for the heads up; I owe you one!

          jcns

          Georgina,

          I thank you for the appreciation and recognition and mostly that you do see sense in my ramblings. I know you understand the logic of this point and I suspect part of the reason you don't give it more attention is because you don't want to poach anyone else's ideas anymore than can seamlessly fit in your own framework. Consider though, that all those professional physicists out there are not idiots. In fact a significant reason why this idea is so foreign to such disciplined minds is because the sequential order of time is not simply a foundational component of human knowledge, but the foundational component. It is the basis of history and cause and effect logic. It is the navigational and narrative linearity on which our minds and very sense of self rests. Our emotions and circulatory systems might be more networked and thermal based, but our minds function by choosing one path over the others. To distinguish and decide.

          So this is not just physics that would be impacted if this idea were to be given serious consideration, but would reverberate throughout many of our religious, social and political assumptions. I know some of the participants on these boards reject the idea on principle that something so basic couldn't be a real factor, but I find in more philosophic setting, some people don't like it for far deeper reasons. It really does force you to look off the edge of the abyss and outside the box of what is supposed to be "real." Reality is no longer ones own narrative, or the narrative of one's preferred group, but more a sea and tapestry where connections and walls rearrange themselves. One's demons and angels have to be re-ordered. Basically the sub-conscious is no longer quite so isolated. It forces you to live much more in the present. So while I may have turned you off the idea even more, I want to set the gears in your much more organized mind than I and see if there are connections you may want to further consider.

          JCN,

          I avoided that conversation since it seemed Barbour was looking for more of a rapt audience than he was getting and I tend to disagree with his theories. Sometimes in long form, they are more nuanced, but when he goes to those short form interviews, it seems like blatant block time.

          Here are my critiques of his winning essay in the nature of time contest:

          John Merryman wrote on Mar. 9, 2009 @ 18:07 GMT

          Can I please be a little nitpicky here?

          In Julian's paper he does a very nice job of establishing there is no fixed unit of duration, then at the end, turns around and tries to provide one with the principle of least action. I agree time is a consequence of motion and not the basis for it, so that yes, units of time are no more precise than the methods used to define and measure them and Dr. Barbour clearly understands this, but it just seems that at the last moment, he has a failure of nerve and seeks to grasp something solid. If he has truly established that the principle of least action provides an irreducible unit of time between two configuration points of the universe, doesn't this prove time is a fundamental dimension between any two configurations of the universe, as opposed to saying two configurations of the universe cannot co-exist, therefore the difference is a process where one is becoming, as the other is departing, not an established unit between two specific configurations, because if time is simply a consequence of motion, how can there be dimensionless points of configuration from which to measure, without stopping the very motion that created time in the first place?

          Think about this in physical terms. If you freeze framed quantum activity, would it just be a still life of reality as we see it, or would the picture simply vanish like a non-fluctuating vacuum?

          Hopefully someone is willing to set me straight in terms I can understand.

          John Merryman wrote on Mar. 10, 2009 @ 21:11 GMT

          Elliot, Georgina,

          There is an interesting object lesson here.

          Consider that any potential judges, be they fqxi members or not, are professionally invested in either a version of block time, or a method for doing away with time as fundamental. Yes, I'm sure they are very busy people, but it is safe to say that judging an issue that is fundamental to their profession and that has been discussed for longer than any of them have been alive, is probably not at the top of anyone's to do list.

          Why does this make Julian the best pick? Not only is he the leading public name in time theory and his essay was exactly what was called for, a clear concise, beautifully written piece, with just a touch of mathematics, that would make the perfect SciAm article, but it smoothly and effortlessly came down on both sides of the issue. It starts out as a clear presentation for why time is based entirely on motion, then describes how these non-existent units are irreducibly determined.

          So Julian understood what the situation of the contest and the judging was and, whether consciously or subconsciously, responded with what was required to win.

          The life lesson here is that if you are going by the written rules, you are not a real player, but just one of the pieces on the board, because the real game is being the first to figure out what the rules really are. This is what emergence is. The world is entering a period of real chaos and complaining that no one is playing by the old rules anymore will do you no good.

          John Merryman wrote on Mar. 15, 2009 @ 16:12 GMT

          Lawrence,

          The question I raised earlier was that he presented a very cogent argument for why time is based on motion and not the other way around, then he goes on to describe how the coordinates for time are irreducibly fixed by the principle of least action. My point was that while it seems reasonable to assume there are fixed coordinates for time, if you believe time is the basis of motion, but if you believe it is a consequence of motion, than fixed coordinates are only as meaningful as the method of measurement.

          To quote Barbour, "You choose in U two points - two configurations of the universe. These are to remain fixed."

          If time is a consequence of motion, than fixed points in time are nonsense.

          To quote my posting further up the thread, "Think about this in physical terms. If you freeze framed quantum activity, would it just be a still life of reality as we see it, or would the picture simply vanish like a non-fluctuating vacuum?"

          To quote Barbour again, "The key thing is that no time is assumed in advance. A time worthy of the name does not exist on any of the non-extremal curves. Time emerges only on the extremal curves."

          The flaw here is that as a consequence of motion, time would be equally relevant to the non-extremal curves, as it is to the extremal curves. It would simply be relative to the system being described.

          The point of Barbour's essay is self contradictory. It starts as a denunciation of absolute time, then sets about determining it through the principle of least action.

          "Regarding picking my brains, I trust you've heard the phrase "mighty slim pickin's"?"

          Don't worry. My brains are invariably scattered all over the place. Between the motorcycle and the horses, one day they might be for real, but then my bubble would be popped and the inside and outside would be the same, as I'm smeared across the universe for real.

          George,

          If I may just add a thought to that, what if we were to go the full three dimensions and consider time as volume? Would it be a form of temperature, ie, the higher the levels of activity, the faster the rate of change and vice versa? Would that explain variable clock rates, that at the speed of light, there is no internal atomic activity, thus no change and no time?

          Isn't C2 essentially an expression of volume, that when we release the energy in mass, we get that exponential increase in volume, ie, an explosion? If so, than wouldn't gravity be the opposite; M=e/c2, a contraction of volume as energy condenses into mass? Possibly such that the missing mass on the perimeter of galaxies is actually due to the excess of cosmic rays actually discovered there and how they might be coalescing into interstellar gases?

          The arrows of time then pointing both inward to ever denser mass and ordered structure, but also outward, as energy is released, expanding out to take up other forms and structures, thus a cycle of generation and regeneration, as the energy of the present moves onto other forms and events, while the resulting structures of these forms and events recedes into the past....

          Sorry to interrupt.

          Dear George Ellis,

          Thank you for reading and commenting favorably on my essay. Having read your April 2010 article in FQXi on 'The Crystallizing Universe,' and other papers you've written, I know you are among those who have given this topic a great deal of thought, thus making your opinion of even greater importance to me.

          Rather than go into specific details here, I would ask you for one huge favor: if you could add yet one more item to your undoubtedly already daunting reading queue, I would be deeply grateful if you could eventually find or make time to read my somewhat longer essay Toward a Helpful Paradigm for the Nature of Time, which spells out my thinking in a broader perspective.

          Suffice it to say here that I believe physics has reached what Thomas S. Kuhn called a "crisis," and it is only through a thorough and candid reexamination of fundamentals that real and meaningful progress will be made.

          Best Regards,

          jcns

          John,

          I hope you will forgive me if I don't comment at length here on specific details of your long post from earlier today and directly above. I'm trying to digest too much information too quickly. Not being a speed reader, this becomes problematical.

          Thanks to your helpful "heads up," yesterday evening I viewed Julian Barbour's 81-minute lecture on shape dynamics at the Perimeter Institute. Very interesting! I love the quotation from Mach which he cited: "It is utterly impossible to measure the changes of things by time. Quite the contrary, time is an abstraction we arrive at from the changes of things." Yes, exactly! Clearly, the thinking of Mach and Poincare are as fresh and timely as ever! I'm currently reading Poincare's 'The Value of Science.' Brilliant. Highly recommend it. Agree that much is lost or distorted in efforts to condense Barbour's ideas into 5-minute sound bites. More later.

          jcns