Dear Mr. Armstrong,

Thank you for taking the time and trouble to read my essay and for your positive comment about it. The answer to your first question is that I know what my reality is because it helpingly persists for me here and now. I have no idea what reality could have actually been like before the present state of human evolvement was arrived at. All paradoxes are abstractions and lack substantiation in reality. As there are no real identical states anywhere in the real Universe, it follows that although abstract simultaneous events can figuratively take place as measured in abstract identical states of measured time, each real event is unique as to its locality of a real here and only endures for a real now.

I regret having asked you about Notts County. I feel sure I saw Tommy Lawton play once in a wartime friendly at Maine Road.

Thank you for providing your answers to my questions, Mr Fisher.

I am intrigued by your interpretation of reality. It is similar to the philosophical stance of 'idealism' where the reality we experience is actually a mental construction. I agree with this to a certain extent. For example, if - by chance - the genes that confer, what we call colour blindness, happened to be more popular among the human population and the ones with "normal vision" were a minority; no doubt society would agree that those with, what we would call, "normal vision" perceived the 'wrong colours.'

This would apply also if most of the population had some form of, what we call, synaesthesia. In this situation, society would probably agree that the minority of 'normal people' perceived reality in an incorrect, limited way.

Or imagine if most people had an eidetic memory, we - now the minority - would no doubt be considered to have some kind of deficiency of memory!

So I think we can be sure that what each of us experience is not really objective reality, just a mental representation of it.

Anyway, would I be correct in venturing to guess that you take a conventionalist view of mathematics?

(You don't need to apologise about your comments on Nottingham, I think that I ought to have mentioned in the "author bio" section that, while I was born in Nottingham, I have lived most of my life in Lincolnshire! It is a shame one can not revisit and change past events, isn't it Joe ;) )

Mr Dufourny,

I understand your concerns. As I understand it, time is not separate from space so it seems to me that you must technically refer to events at any time point actually as locations and therefore distances between locations. Therefore, when I say that the universe may or may not be infinite, I am referring to whether or not it is infinite in distance, which is to therefore necessarily imply an infinite number of events. Following this, with regards to light, since photons do not actually "experience" time, I think referring to it as infinite is misleading since that would surely be to suggest that it travels a distance? (Clearly put: Light travels 3 dimensional spatial distance but does not travel temporal distance)

I am arguing that the universe is finite in 4D distance (Spatial and temporal) and that by assuming so one can solve Loschmidt's paradox and conclude a symmetrical evolution for the universe.

Dear Reeve

Congratulations for your essay. I found it very well written and interesting. You address questions that certainly can be labelled as the deepest ones, and by being so young anyone can conclude that you certainly have a bright future. Keep going in this direction. I wish I could discuss your ideas in more detail, but I´m just not confident enough about my knowledge on general relativity and statistical mechanics for making any relevant points, and I don´t have much time to study it now. But I see that if you can objectively prove that finite cosmological models solve Loschmidt's paradox then this should receive a lot of attention.

My studies in GR have focused more on its origin. GR can be recovered from Machian first principles, and a finite universe is also interesting because these principles on the nature of space and time can be easily implemented (see Julian Barbour´s work).

My essay, Absolute or Relative Motion...Or Something Else? discusses how one can extended machian considerations to search for new physics. You might find it interesting ;)

Best regards, Daniel

    Reeve,

    While I haven't finished your essay, I compliment you on having studied the subject so deeply at such a young age.

    A few points; The advantage of infinity is that it negates entropy. Entropy only applies to closed sets, so if the universe is open, then energy is just traded around, as what is radiated from one area, is gained by another.

    As for Zeno's paradox, it overlooks the absolute, ie. zero is inert, not just fractional infinity.

    In my essay, I take issue with the current treatment of time. The sequence of events, which physics treats as a measurement issue, emerges from the changing configuration of what is. Not the present moving from past to future, but future becoming past. Does the earth really move along a fourth dimension from yesterday to tomorrow, or does tomorrow become yesterday because the earth rotates? As for the whole non-simultaneity thing, because events are perceived by different observers at different times, it's just a signalling issue. It's like saying because the news of Lincoln's death reached Kansas City before San Francisco, he must have died earlier to the people in Kansas City. Both observers are in the future of the actual event. Duration is simply what is happening between events. It is not external to the present. This means time is simply an effect of action, rate of change, not some geometric basis for it, which would invalidate the conceptual foundation for an expanding universe in the first place. Leaving redshift as lensing effect, likely because light travels as a wave and is only detected as a quantum.

    You are very young and very smart, but we trade intelligence for wisdom and so don't always believe what is fashionable. When you are my age, you will have seen many fashions come and go and be less than impressed with many. Consider the title of this contest, Questioning the Foundations. Think through some of the patches applied to Big Bang cosmology, from inflation to dark energy, as well where the speculation leads, multiverses, etc. Just because the math tells you something, ask yourself if it seems logical, otherwise you will find yourself going round an Escher staircase and thinking you have found perpetual motion. Read through these essays with an open mind. It is one thing you don't have to give up yet.

      Hello Mr Amstrong,

      I am understanding also your concerns. Here is my humble point of vue.

      In fact, it depends of what we want interpret at my humble opinion.The infinities appear inside our reals and rationals.So it is always due to our adds, multiplications....we can indeed multiplicate a serie giving so an infinity. The time is an other story.First of all, this time is constant in its pure locality and generality. And second this time is irreversible.

      Now of course we can superimpose for an understanding of our evolution, in its pure generality. If we want to have the correct simulations, so we must insert indeed the good linear road. But can we insert violatiopns of our generality.Let's take the principle of equivalence. It is essential to take it with the biggest rationalism. How can we formalize so the universal dynamic of this sphere? the events are rational. The system, physical, the sphere is a 3D system and a time constant correlated with the duration correlated with the rotations of spheres.

      The infinity is complex and so simple in fact.

      The symmetrical evolution is rational and dterministic.So the superimposings also must be rational and dtderministic.If not, never we shall understand the evolution since this Hypothetical BB. We must insert the good parameters of rotations of spheres at all scales in 3D and a time constant of evolution. It implies that we can travel in space only and in the future. Because we can decrease our internnal clocks due to rotating spheres and their rotations. But is it important to go in the future if we cannot return at our present.

      The irreversibility of this times is essential for a real universal irreversible dynamic.

      Thanking you

      Steve the crazy spherical belgian.

      Loschmidt's paradox: Why is there an inevitable increase in entropy when the laws of physics are invariant under time reversal? The time reversal symmetry of physical laws appears to contradict the second law of thermodynamics.

      I think Loschmidt paradox has paradoxlcal solution:

      Past is the future.Future is the past.Time is the circle.

        Mr Merryman,

        Thank you for the comments, I will take them into consideration. I will read your essay also.

        I assume, since you say:

        "This means time is simply an effect of action, rate of change, not some geometric basis for it, which would invalidate the conceptual foundation for an expanding universe in the first place. Leaving redshift as lensing effect, likely because light travels as a wave and is only detected as a quantum."

        And suggest that the universe could be an open set; you support a steady-state cosmology for the universe.

        If this is so, how do you explain the uniform Cosmic microwave background radiation?

        If I may ask another question: Since you do not think that time is not part of spatial geometry, how do you interpret time dilation?

        Sincerely,

        Reeve

        Reeve,

        The background radiation would be the solution to Olber's paradox. Since redshift is proportional to distance, this is light that has been shifted completely off the visible spectrum. That it is so smooth, at 3.7k, suggests some phase transition at that level. Possibly it is only stable to that level and then starts to shift to other forms of energies. I think gravity is not so much a property of mass, but energy converting to mass and condensing into ever denser forms of matter. They can't find dark matter, but there is an unexplained excess of cosmic rays on the perimeters of galaxies. When mass breaks down and releases energy/radiation, it creates pressure, so possibly the opposite process would create a vacuum. Which goes back to the 3.7k. Possibly that is an initial condensation point of radiation into some primary particle like entity.

        Time dilation is due to the fact that since nothing can exceed C and the internal activity of atomic structure, the spin/vibration of electrons, approaches C, if that structure is accelerated to some fraction of the speed of light, the internal activity has to slow, so the combination of velocity and spin doesn't exceed C. So if you have a clock, the rate of atomic activity is affected by velocity and gravity, given the equivalence principle. It's not that the clock in the accelerated frame is traveling a different time vector, but that it has a faster burn rate. It's not traveling into the future faster, but into the past faster, since it ages quicker. This distortion of atomic structure also explains length contraction, since the atom is flattened by the action.

        While this effect is apparent for GPS satellites, I think various scenarios put forth, such as time stopping for someone falling into a black hole, are nonsense. Safe to say, if you fell into the core of a galaxy, you would quickly be fried and the ashes scattered. It's a bit like saying that time has stopped for that log I threw on the fire, since it turned to light and light has no internal structure, therefore a clock traveling at the speed of light wouldn't record any change, but time still goes on for me, as I watch the log burn.

        In this cycle of expanding energy and contracting mass, I think galaxies are gravitational vortices, not warped space. If they account for all the energy being radiated away, as well as that shot out the poles, it would likely equal all the mass which fell in. It's then radiated for billions of lightyears, until being absorbed by other mass, or finally reaching that degree of being spread so finely and becoming part of the black body radiation of the cosmic background and the cycle starts over.

        Some interesting reading;

        http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/2007/9/modern-cosmology-science-or-folktale

        http://www.fqxi.org/data/forum-attachments/2008CChristov_WaveMotion_45_154_EvolutionWavePackets.pdf

        http://phys.org/news/2011-06-physics-einstein.html

        http://phys.org/news/2011-12-strange-species-ultra-red-galaxy.html

        http://phys.org/news/2011-12-spitzer-hubble-telescopes-rare-galaxy.html

        http://phys.org/news/2012-04-fermi-gamma-rays-unearth-clues.html

        http://phys.org/news/2012-06-rare-case-gravitational-lensing.html

        http://phys.org/news/2011-12-mysterious-red-galaxies.html

        http://phys.org/news/2012-07-earliest-spiral-galaxy-discovery.html

        There is another topic worth considering and that is the nature of space. Basically physics treats both space and time as measurements, but does measuring space create it? There is a strong tendency to describe it as something, such as the ether, but that doesn't explain inertia. Consider an object so far away from everything as to be in a void. Would it be possible to say it is spinning, without any outside reference? Yet for anything on the surface, spin would create centrifugal force. How could such an effect be due to some outside reference? The only explanation is inertia. That goes back to Zeno's paradox. It overlooks inertia. The only way it would make sense is if for every fractional divide, Achilles and the tortoise both also slow their speed in half. Quite quickly though, they would both be going so slow as to be effectively motionless, as the forward velocity would be less than biological processes, then molecular and then quantum dynamics. Zero has, throughout the course of math and logic, been a poorly considered subject, yet one staring us in the face. We only think in terms of form and motion, not their absence.

        Hi Reeve:

        I thoroughly enjoyed your interesting essay.

        Based on arguments and results presented in my paper - -" From Absurd to Elegant Universe", it is shown that the current cosmological models are inconsistent and paralyzed by several paradoxes including the two described in your paper due to the missing fundamental physics. The first paradox - "If the universe is finite, what caused it?" is caused by the Big Bang singularity resulting from the assumption of an absolute beginning of time t=0. Similarly, the second paradox - "It should not be possible to deduce time-asymmetrical effects from time-symmetrical laws. This specifically refers to the "second law of thermodynamics" which is sometimes called the 'arrow of time" is also an artifact of the assumption of an absolute cosmic time or clock that does not exist in the universe.

        It is shown in my paper that the observed universe and galactic expansion can be successfully predicted without any explicit consideration of time in the cosmological model.

        My paper provides a new fundamental understanding of the Cosmological Constant and relativistic universe expansion as an alternative to the widely accepted linear Hubble expansion. The current paradoxes and inconsistencies are shown to be artifacts of the missing (hidden) physics of the well-known phenomenon of spontaneous decay. A new Gravity Nullification Model for Universe Expansion (GNMUE) is proposed that integrates the missing physics of the spontaneous mass-energy conversion into a simplified form of general relativity. The model predicts the observed expansion of the universe and galaxies and other data. The model provides answers to key fundamental questions and resolves paradoxes among general relativity, quantum mechanics, and cosmology. It also bridges the gap between quantum mechanics and relativity theories via revealing relativistic understanding of the inner workings of quantum mechanics. The impact of the new understanding on widely-accepted fundamental assumptions is discussed and a new wholesome perspective on reality is provided.

        I would greatly appreciate your comments on my paper.

        Best Regards

        Avtar Singh

        5 days later

        Dear Reeve,

        In my essay the Theory of Infinite Hierarchical Nesting of Matter is studied. In this theory your questions are resolved in such way. The problem of 'arrow of time' must be investigated in view of all levels of matter. A reason for the 'arrow of time' is different rate of time at low levels of matter. At the level of atoms time goes much more quickly then at the level of star, so any macro-event first of all take place at the low levels of matter. On one hand the physics equations are symmetrical in time, on the other hand the arrow means different probability for inverse processes. Other reason for the arrow - action of fundamental fields (gravitational and electromagnetic) is such that there is only spherical planets, stars, nucleons and so on are formed. These fields may be explained in the concept of Le Sage as it is applied to all levels of matter. One direction of gravitational field gives one direction for all other events. And at the atomic level of matter there is strong gravitation.

        Since particles can formed in Universe in one scenario here no problem with the similarity of properties in different parts of Universe. I invite you to have a look to my essay.

        Sergey Fedosin Essay

        A highly intellectual approach to a fundamental assumption of physics (that the universe is infinite).It's easy to accept the infinite view,seeing that space extends endlessly in all directions, even a child staring into a night sky wonders where it all ends.As you point out, the laws of thermodynamics,BB and expansion rule out an infinite universe.Inferential measurements also obtain a definite mass for the universe,therefore it is finite.The expanding spherical shell (brane) model is ,in all likelihood,correct.Your solution proposes a heat-death as the maximum entropy of such a model when all its mass will have decayed ,but then you wonder how you'd describe space-structure thereafter.Would that not be the end of it? Consider Steve Dufourny's infinite light eventuality( Aug. 22, 2012 comment) as the singularity you yourself envisage but spoil with the reversed thermodynamics(time reversal cannot happen because of the grandfather's paradox).On the other hand, if you were that heretic out there( doesn't mean you are one) ,unbound by space-time,the universe is not dead as you can still see it evolving from beginning to the end,just like a movie. but then,as you said, one cannot exist that way.Here,QM comes in to describe existence as 'states' of the quantum wave (mind?),possibilities of which are infinite.

          Dear Reeve,

          Why do think that in the Theory of Infinite Hierarchical Nesting of Matter should be a heat-death as the maximum entropy? It is not so. Firstly, the entropy of stars is negative, and if the radius of star is little the entropy is more negative. Secondly we must take into account entropy of gravitational fields. Gravitons of low levels of matter carry negentropy to the high levels of matter.

          Also the Universe is not a closed system so the law of maximum entropy do not work.

          Sergey Fedosin Essay

          6 days later
          5 days later