Dear Daryl Janzen:

As you said the concept of "time" in physic is a mess, more than that at least since the beginning of written history men did not know what he was measuring, but doing it satisfied the practical need to know the duration of things. Always till now days, people relate the so called "time" to "motion" and attributed to it quite a few characteristics, like flow, direction and many others than nobody ever proved. People always was asking themselves for definition and empiric meaning, instead of what they was measuring, when the last was find, physicist, specially theoretical physicists had everything they need for their work with it. When you know the experimental meaning of the so called "time" "space-time" not only become understandable, but also understandable is why can't be separated.

So I sending you a summary of my essay because I am convince you would be interested in reading it. ( most people don't understand this essay and is not just because of my bad English) "Hawking, A brief history of time" where he said , "Which is the nature of time?" yes he don't know what time is, and also continue saying............Some day this answer could seem to us "obvious", as much than that the earth rotate around the sun....." In fact the answer is "obvious", but how he could say that, if he didn't know what's time? In fact he is predicting that is going to be an answer, and that this one will be "obvious", I think that with this adjective, he is implying simple and easy to understand. Maybe he felt it and couldn't explain it with words. We have anthropologic proves that man measure "time" since more than 30.000 years ago, much, much later came science, mathematics and physics that learn to measure "time" from primitive men, adopted the idea and the systems of measurement, but also acquired the incognita of the experimental "time" meaning. Out of common use physics is the science that needs and use more the measurement of what everybody calls "time" and the discipline came to believe it as their own. I always said that to understand the "time" experimental meaning there is not need to know mathematics or physics, as the "time" creators and users didn't. Instead of my opinion I would give Einstein's "Ideas and Opinions" pg. 354 "Space, time, and event, are free creations of human intelligence, tools of thought" he use to call them pre-scientific concepts from which mankind forgot its meanings, he never wrote a whole page about "time" he also use to evade the use of the word, in general relativity when he refer how gravitational force and speed affect "time", he does not use the word "time" instead he would say, speed and gravitational force slows clock movement or "motion", instead of saying that slows "time". FQXi member Andreas Albrecht said that. When asked the question, "What is time?", Einstein gave a pragmatic response: "Time," he said, "is what clocks measure and nothing more." He knew that "time" was a man creation, but he didn't know what man is measuring with the clock.

I insist, that for "measuring motion" we should always and only use a unique: "constant" or "uniform" "motion" to measure "no constant motions" "which integrates and form part of every change and transformation in every physical thing. Why? because is the only kind of "motion" whose characteristics allow it, to be divided in equal parts as Egyptians and Sumerians did it, giving born to "motion fractions", which I call "motion units" as hours, minutes and seconds. "Motion" which is the real thing, was always hide behind time, and covert by its shadow, it was hide in front everybody eyes, during at least two millenniums at hand of almost everybody. Which is the difference in physics between using the so-called time or using "motion"?, time just has been used to measure the "duration" of different phenomena, why only for that? Because it was impossible for physicists to relate a mysterious time with the rest of the physical elements of known characteristics, without knowing what time is and which its physical characteristics were. On the other hand "motion" is not something mysterious, it is a quality or physical property of all things, and can be related with all of them, this is a huge difference especially for theoretical physics I believe. I as a physician with this find I was able to do quite a few things. I imagine a physicist with this can make marvelous things.

With my best whishes

Héctor

    Daryl,

    I'm really not trying to be hard-headed here, but I'm not getting it. Whether calculus or rubber bands, it seems to relate one unit to another and insist they are both space. I don't see how they both can be the denominator.

    Dear Héctor,

    Thanks for the summary of your essay. It does indeed sound interesting to me, and I look forward to reading it. From what you said, I suspect you would find some interest in the above discussion I've been having with John Merryman--especially the first part.

    Thanks for commenting here, and best wishes!

    Daryl

    Dear Daryl

    Thanks for your extensive reply. First of all, I'd like to make clear that it was never my intention to insult you or anybody else. Please accept my apologies if I say something that made you feel insulted.

    With respect to the dimensionality of reality. I agree with most of your points. In math, points are defined in terms of lines, lines in terms of planes and planes in terms of solids. So there is implicitly, as you said, a higher dimension defining lower dimensions.

    You: I mean that I would define time just as Newton defined absolute time, except that I'd add a note that by "flow" I DO NOT mean flow through a substantive dimension, which the definition can easily be taken to mean. Rather than flow along a substantive dimension, I suppose I'd say more properly I mean flow as an absolute dimension, so that, as with classical mechanics, I mean that at any instant the three--dimensional Universe, constitutes all of reality.

    Newton said that mathematical, true time flows absolutely without reference to anything else and its other name is duration. Is this what you mean by substantive dimension? I'm sorry but I don't get what you mean by "absolute dimension". I don't see the epistemological distinction between substantive dimension and absolute dimension because as far as I understand Newton's notion of time is both substantive and absolute.

    You: Actually, the statement that the mathematical formalism is all that matters for practical purposes is incorrect. In practice, in order to correctly make use of the mathematical formalism, we need to take observation into account as well.

    Of course, I agree that we have to consider observation. Perhaps you misunderstood me. What I meant to say is that if we don't put our ideas in a mathematical formulation, i.e., a formal theory, they will remain at the level of ideas or mere philosophy. For the physics community what matters is that theory agrees with the observations, the problem sometimes is that these observations are nothing but data and data can have many interpretations.

    You: The point that I tried to make in my essay with the Albert and Henri example is that this is actually wrongheaded. Sure, Henri is free to frame things in such a way that the clock across the train car "remains at a fixed distance from him, and both of them remain motionless". But if he opens his eyes to the world around him, he should see that he's actually moving--i.e. he's not "truly" motionless.

    Yes, I agree with this, one can easily infer that there should be an absolute frame. The problem is that is not easy to define which one is and how to find it. This is in connection to what you later say that we know for sure that the earth is moving with an ABSOLUTE velocity of 370 km/s.

    I assume that you are referring to the speed of the earth relative to a frame at rest with the CMB radiation. Here one should question: is this velocity interpreted within the context of SR or GR (or what theory)? For the sake of consistency test theories of SR have to assume that there exists at least one inertial frame of reference where the one-way speed of light is isotropic. Such frame is considered to be the frame at rest with the CMB (Test theory of special relativity:I, II, and III Mansouri et al. Gen. Rel. Grav. 8, pp., 497, 515 and 809, 1977). For other frames the speed of light could be, in general, anisotropic and this would depend on the choice of clock synchronization. SR is a theory with a particular clock synchronization that leaves the one-way speed of light invariant for all frames. However, strictly speaking, one should acknowledge that in SR there are no absolute frames of reference. Therefore, for SR, 370 km/s is not an absolute velocity but a relative one.

    To be continued

    Israel

    Cont. from the previous post.

    Within the context of the GR, the interpretation is not different at all. From the cosmological perspective, relativists distinguish two classes of reference frames, that is: (a) those that go a long with the expansion of the universe (Hubble's flow) or comoving frames and (b) those that don't follow the space expansion. For an observer in a comoving frame the universe appears to be static and isotropic. As well, this frame also defines a cosmological time. For any other frame different than the comoving frame the observers will see the universe expanding (redshifted). Thus 370 km/s is the speed of the earth relative to the comoving frame and, again, according to relativists, this frame is not an absolute frame but only a frame that is selected, for the sake of simplicity, among the infinite frames; just as when we select the sun to simplify the motion of planets. Moreover one should keep in mind that the rate of flow of a clock is function not only on the speed of the clock with respect to the absolute frame but also with respect to its position in a gravitational field. Therefore, how would we know what the best standard of time is? I mean, for experimental matters the rate of flow of a clock in the neighborhood of a black hole is not the same rate of flow as on earth, or on the sun or between two galaxies where we assume there are no sources of gravitation. So, one should acknowledge that relativists have a strong point. What do we mean by cosmic time if the flow of time would depend on where the clock is placed in the universe? For practical matters, relativists assumed that in the comoving frame all clocks are synchronized. But how are these clocks synchronized? This question leads us again to the problems of clock synchronization and the one-way speed of light which is a vicious circle. From this circular reasoning one realizes that it seems that nature is conspiring against us (as in the case of the measuring problem in quantum mechanics). This is a topic that has been extensively discussed in the literature and I wouldn't like to open a discussion on this topic here, I just wanted to let you know about it. In the book of gravitation and spacetime from Ohaninan and Ruffini, one can read in relation to the "absolute speed of the Earth": this determination of velocity of the Earth in no way contradicts the principle of relativity, since the measurement is not made relative to empty space, but relative to the photon gas in the blackbody radiation. As you can see, for relativists there is no absolute frame of reference.

    You: First of all, the "clock paradox" that you refer to is not IDENTICAL to the "twins paradox", as you've suggested. The "clock paradox" is an important result from SR that's used in *constructing* the "twins paradox", which runs specifically as follows...

    I disagree, they are IDENTICAL. The clock paradox according to Einstein himself runs as follows: Imagine we have initially two synchronized clocks and one of them is set in motion in a journey at a constant speed. According to SR and given the symmetry of the problem both clocks should show the same time when they reunite. Einstein GUESSED that when the traveling clock returns it would read less time when compare to the clock at rest, in contradiction to the theory predictions. It was Paul Langevin who in 1911 argued that living organisms are also clocks and he introduced twins instead of clocks in this problem. The twins obviously represent two synchronized clocks. Therefore the clock paradox is the same as the clock paradox. It seem to me that you are confusing "time dilation" (which is used to construct the paradox) with "clock paradox". The case in your essay is the clock paradox better known as the twin paradox.

    My comments from the previous post, where aimed at trying to delimit the paradoxical part. This part consists in that both observers should conclude that time should tick slowly for both because, according to SR, time dilates equally for two systems of reference in relative uniform motion. Therefore, given that in SR there are no absolute frames, observers cannot decide whether time really dilates or not. Since they cannot decide this, it's impossible to conclude that when both clocks reunite one clock will read less time than the other. It was Einstein that BET or GUESSED (without any theoretical argument) that the traveling clock will read less time than the other. Thus one should distinguish the two paradoxical aspects of the "paradox": (1) that time dilates for both observers in relative motion in the same amount and so they cannot decide if time really dilates or not and (2) that one cannot conclude that the traveling twin (clock) will be younger than the other. From what theoretical (within the context of SR alone) argument can we conclude that the traveling twin will be younger? This is the second paradoxical aspect. Most people think that the clock or twin paradox consists in aspect (2) whereas I argue that it consists in aspect (1).

    As you correctly argue, when we introduce the absolute frame of reference [which for you is the CMB and that for me the CMB is only a manifestation of space (conceived as a material field)] then actual motion comes into play and the clock that is set in motion is the one that really undergoes time dilation.

    You: The resolution has nothing whatsoever to do with acceleration.

    I agree. I just mentioned that relativists resort to acceleration to solve the "paradox".

    Well, I just wanted to clarify those points. As you can see I actually have one question which is related to your notion of time and I hope you have some time time. These days, I have been reading the arguments of Brian Greene about time and the loaf picture but that picture of time seems to me like a linear vision of time as a dimension, but as you and Brain put it, seems to be paradoxical. My notion is more Newtonian. For me time is just the transformation of things, it is change, but it seems that the transformation is gradual and follows a transformation law.

    Well, thanks a lot for your time.

    Best Regards

    Israel

    Dear Israel,

    Thanks very much for responding. First of all, on the twins paradox thing, I see your point. I forgot that in the scenario in my essay I did have each of them claim that the other shouldn't have aged enough. It's just that that wasn't the point I meant to illustrate, so I didn't think of it. You'll notice that I didn't describe in any way how they got back together, but just said that they did. I didn't say anything about the train turning around, for instance. What I was really meaning to illustrate at that point was the symmetry of relative time-dilation between two systems in uniform translatory motion.

    I also see that I only managed to confuse the issue on time. I think Newton's definition is right. I was just trying to say something about the fact that when we think of something flowing, we may tend to think of it flowing through space. In fact, it's flowing through space in time, which is more complicated yet. Do you see how it's confusing to use verbs (like flow or rest or change) to describe time, when time is actually the denominator of those verbs? i.e. things flow or rest or change *in time*. I think that already starts to do a good job of defining time, but there's something more to it. That's the metrical structure, which is the "equable" part in Newton's definition.

    But when Newton says time flows equably, he makes a point of saying that that flow is without reference to anything external. So he's saying that it doesn't flow through any space, which is the point I was trying to be careful about, although I see I was just confusing the issue. He calls this equable flow without reference to anything external "duration", which is what I mean when I say it's the denominator of all verbs, and that it has well-ordered measure, or metrical structure.

    But then that metrical structure has to be a part of the Universe, if we're saying that only the present Universe is real at any given moment. That's another important point, I think.

    So, to summarise, I think time's a tricky thing to define because in defining it we'd like to use verbs (like "flow", etc.), but time is already implicit in those verbs. I think the "flow" or "passage" of time has well-defined metrical structure, but I think it's worth cautioning (as Newton did) not to think of that "flow" as occurring through a space that has that metrical structure.

    The other point you brought up was about observing absolute rest. I think looking at local clock synchronisation and relative motion is really the wrong way of going about this.

    But I think cosmology does show, in a totally different way, that there is an absolute rest frame. Historically, this evidence came as follows: if there were no such thing as absolute rest, and all motion were just random, then the relative motion of everything, from any perspective, should be uniformly distributed on the interval (0,c). The fact that the stellar velocities are orders of magnitude less, was already taken by Einstein as motivation enough to assume a cosmic time variable in 1917. Then came the discovery of the redshift-distance relation, which was taken to indicate cosmic expansion--i.e., the redshifts are not thought to be due to relative motion, but due to the expansion of space through which the light travels. Over time, we've discovered tens or hundreds of thousands of objects with redshifts greater than 1, confirming this suspicion. These cosmological redshifts are therefore many orders of magnitude greater than the motion of any galaxy through space, including our own. What this means is that we can neglect the motions of all bodies through space and model redshifts in an expanding universe under the assumption that they're all absolutely at rest. The model, which is a very accurate fit to the data, assumes absolute space and time, which we call the Universe and cosmic time.Through the model, we therefore have a means of measuring cosmic time *even without knowing our own absolute motion*. That's simply a handy thing about living in an expanding universe.

    But you know that's not the whole story. Cosmic expansion suggests that maybe the Universe was much denser and hotter at some finite time in the past. This led to the prediction of the CMB, which was confirmed. The CMB is a radiation field that's supposed to fill all of space, cooling uniformly as the Universe expands. One feature of particular interest is the dipole anisotropy, which tells us that the Solar System is moving through the CMB towards the constellation Leo at 370 km/s. Since the CMB is supposed to be an isotropic and homogeneous radiation field that fills all of space, we take the CMB's rest-frame to be the absolute rest-frame, and therefore infer that our own absolute motion is 370 km/s in the direction stated. This motion is the combination of the Sun's velocity through the Galaxy and the Galaxy's velocity through the Local Group and the Local Group's velocity within the Local Supercluster, etc. How that combination actually comes together doesn't really matter, though, because we have a direct measurement of our absolute velocity, and that's what mattered.

    Now there's a really good consistency check that indicates to us that this picture is correct: the CMB's multipole anisotropy signature. Again, before it was even observed, the calculations had been done, to describe the effects of vacuum fluctuations at the time the CMB was created, as we would observe them today in macroscopic anisotropies in an otherwise isotropic CMB signature, as these anisotropies would have expanded along with the Universe. The measurements, as you know, are consistent with the model parameters that have been derived through the redshift observations.

    Therefore, we do have strong empirical support for an absolute frame of rest. But that's all that it is: empirical support. We have no way of proving that it's right, any more than we have of proving anything else through observation. But it's a really consistent picture, and it at least refutes the claim that "we can't ever observe absolute motion, so we might as well assume that there isn't any".

    I hope I've answered your questions here. I'm sorry if I was cranky before. Thanks for taking the time to clarify where I had been mistaken or unclear.

    Best regards,

    Daryl

    Daryl,

    I hope we can continue the string conversation (June 27th) above when you have time. Reading my essay first may allow greater insight if you are able. I value your views, ..I think! and hope you'll see the value in my essay.

    I know time is short. My eyes are sore from reading! But I do have your essay down for a much better score in due course, and can't quite understand why it not yet doing better.

    Very best of luck.

    Peter

      Dear Peter,

      Thanks very much for the gentle reminder this morning. I've been struggling to get through a few things, but managed to read and rate your essay today. Well done! It was an interesting read.

      And thanks for the supportive words about my essay. It hasn't been nice seeing how many people hate it without bothering to comment why they do, or alternatively simply hate me.

      Anyway, maybe it will be better to continue our discussion from above in this thread, since it might be easier to find?

      There are a couple of things that concern me in what you wrote. Your proposal of comparing descriptions of different things from different frames of reference doesn't seem right to me. I don't see why you are suggesting that the description of A in frame A should be compared to the description of B in frame B. That seems like comparing apples and oranges, but maybe I'm missing something. I think we can compare A and B in frame A, or A and B in frame B, or even compare the descriptions in frame A to the descriptions in frame B, but comparing A in frame A to B in frame B doesn't make sense to me. Here's what I'm thinking: suppose I took a rubber band and marked off centimetres on it using a ruler, and then used it to measure my foot. Say it's 27 cm. Then I stretch the rubber band out and measure your foot. If it reads 15 cm, would I really be justified in saying my foot is bigger? The other point I don't really see the reason for is considering the Doppler shift at all. Are you saying light should travel faster or slower if it is Doppler shifted? I might still just be missing something.

      Best regards,

      Daryl

      Dear Daryl

      Thanks for your clarifying reply. I'm glad we are understanding each other.

      you: In fact, it's flowing through space in time, which is more complicated yet... ...i.e. things flow or rest or change *in time*.

      When people say *in time* they usually think that, just as in the case of space which is conceived as the container for physical objects, time is a container for events. So events occur IN time as if time were a thing capable of containing events, being events different from physical objects (material bodies or fields). In this notion of time, events are organized as a linear sequence and thus are put in terms of a dimension. Time as a way of organizing events is fine for mathematical purposes but unfortunately causes intuitive confusion. This is why a prefer to conceive time as "change" or "transformation of things" in the universe. To me all things are constantly changing but the change is so minuscule that for some processes (such as the evolution of a star) it is not noticeable. So we assume that some things don't change whereas other do change. By comparing processes that change and those that don't change we realize or feel a passage of time, a flow. If nothing changed or transformed we would not be able to tell whether time flows or not. Certainly, the change of things is not arbitrary it follows certain laws, this is why it appears that time has a preferred direction, what we call the arrow of time, but this is another issue.

      You: But when Newton says time flows equably, he makes a point of saying that that flow is without reference to anything external.

      Based on my notion of time, I interpret "time flows equably" as "constant change". Everything in the universe is constantly changing, therefore, I feel a constant and invariable flow. When Newton says that the flow of time is "external" I understand this as the change, motion or transformation of things can never stop. Since change can never stop we think that it cannot be affected by anythings. But since time is nothing but motion or change, relativity teaches us that motion will affect the rate of flow of time. That is, that the motion will affect the rate of change or transformation in a given process. This is because there should be an absolute frame (the vacuum, space itself or the material field, as you wish to call it) and because there is a limiting speed. For observers that are at rest in the absolute frame the change of things, i.e., the passage of time, goes at some rate. For frames in motion relative to the absolute frame the passage of time goes slowly because electromagnetic fields has to cover more absolute distance which in turn will make a process to appear slower than when this same process occurs at rest (as an illustration of this consider, for instance, the light clock).

      You: Then came the discovery of the redshift-distance relation, which was taken to indicate cosmic expansion--i.e., the redshifts are not thought to be due to relative motion, but due to the expansion of space through which the light travels....

      And also: The CMB is a radiation field that's supposed to fill all of space...

      As I have expressed before, the interpretation of the cosmological redshift as space expansion is valid under the conception that space is a DEFORMABLE EMPTY CONTAINER mathematically represented by a pseudo-Riemannian manifold. Being space an empty container is then, as you said, FILLED with matter and fields (I don't agree with this notion of space). For relativists, the space is permeable to light in the sense that offers no dissipation or dispersion to the propagation of electromagnetic waves. So, if we accept the relativist view of space, I agree with the interpretation of the redshift but, I don't believe space is a geometrical container and therefore the redshift has a different interpretation which I also discussed with you in previous discussions. You may wish to read my new essay where I give a clear example that strongly suggest that space is not a geometrical container as relativity assumes.

      You: These cosmological redshifts are therefore many orders of magnitude greater than the motion of any galaxy through space, including our own. What this means is that we can neglect the motions of all bodies through space and model redshifts in an expanding universe under the assumption that they're all absolutely at rest. The model, which is a very accurate fit to the data, assumes absolute space and time, which we call the Universe and cosmic time.

      I'd like to insist on the following point and I would be happy if you could understand it. I asked the question "is this velocity interpreted within the context of SR or GR (or what theory)?" in a previous post because I wanted to elucidate the importance that the theoretical framework plays. The physical meaning of the data depends on the theoretical framework under consideration. I assume that when you say "the model" you are talking about the concordance, the big bang or the lambda-cold-dark matter model. This model, as far as I know, assumes that GR is the correct theory. The physical interpretation of the redshift is given within the context of GR where there are no absolute frames, despite that the observations strongly suggest it. For relativists, that's not an absolute frame, it is just a frame more convenient than others. From my view, it is contradictory to construct a model, that assumes absolute space and time, with the aid of a theory (GR) that denies absolute motion. So, for relativists, 370 km/s is not an absolute velocity as you and most cosmologists stated it. For this reason, one has to build a model based on another theory in which the notions of absolute space and time are allowed. This is why, I don't follow relativity and its notion of space.

      Well, I hope you have grasped my message.

      Best Regards

      Israel

      Hi dear Daryl,

      I have read your nice work (in first approximation) and have find there many of honestly judgements. Actually I was intrigued when I see you have discussed the problem of ,,time,, with my friend Vladimir R. Both of you are excellent people of course, but I must tell you that about ,,time,, there exist certainly and correct, in my view, definition, which gives Einstein. ,,Time,, is a concrete, energetical parameter of matter and it can be only local. Meantime, you are very right with bringing up this very important question in physics because for most of people the ,,time,, continued seen as something absolute, that going himself and independ from anything. That is why I have decide to rate your work as ,,high,, Hope my work ESSAY text will be interested you and I will get your impression on it.

      Best wishes,

      George

        Daryl,

        Thanks. I don't think the low scores are anything personal. I'm sure I've had perhaps a dozen 1 scores, as many others. It may be indicative of the integrity of many in science. As effectively a 'professional' over 3 fields I can see the differences, but I've also seen the honesty and integrity in most, certainly yourself. I've just rated yours, taking it closer to it's deserved level.

        You say my derivation; "doesn't seem right". That's good! As Feynman predicted; the 'correct' answer cannot first look right as it must be different!

        Now let's study that rubber band, because it is THAT which we are here analysing! In current 'interpretation' of SR it's just a hand waving effect with some manipulated symbols to maths it, but no real mechanism. (Remember it's only in an interpretation NOT the theory itself, which as Einstein made very clear in 1952, is; "entirely contained within the postulates."

        I now invoke the bit you've agreed, that light representing an 'event', once emitted, is just physical evidence 'at large' so liable to Doppler and other effects on refraction (which is change of propagation speed in a dielectric medium). What changes then is wavelength lambda (the first wave is slowed before the second) and, similarly the 'distance' between the flashes.

        How is that changed? Because each 'flash' is absorbed by the matter in the new FRAME and then re-emitted at c in that frame. That is an effect additional to any refractive index difference between the media. It is also precisely what is found in optical sciences (as all experiments inc. Fizeau, Sagnac, Wang etc. etc.) That is also what gives the 'nonliear optics' effects not presently explainable theoretically.

        Now of course it's unfamiliar to you. But it's entirely consistent with all observation, and indeed resolves paradoxes (i.e.; recovers Snell's Law and Fresnel refraction at Maxwell's near/far field transition zone, also explains KRR and the Kerr effects). So lets test it again;

        Flash C1 is emitted IN the front of the train. The train and air represent a single 'inertial system' through which light propagates at c, (so a 'discrete field' = DFM). the observer also at rest, so the event remains 1ms, and with no Doppler wavelength change.

        Flash C2 from the light on the side of engine is outside the train but in the same inertial FRAME (at rest with the observer). Again no delta lambda on observer interaction ("detection"). However, it arrives BEFORE C1! This is because is DID change speed to propagate at c in the frame of the air outside the train, but then changed back on re-entering the original (emitter/detector) frame. That surprisingly is as found and as SR.

        Flash C3 (from a fixed post by the track) ALSO arrives before C1, so with C2, as it also propagates at c in the outside air frame. It then also shifts on meeting the observer frame, but this time there had been no INITIAL shift, so it is found to be blue shifted; i.e. both wavelength lambda AND the 'space-time period' have undergone 'length contraction'. (A flash from behind would be dilated or red shifted).

        Shocking at first I know, but not for long, and none the less far more consistent that current incomplete interpretation, and deriving SR direct from the quantum mechanism invoked (= unification). Just imagine the elephant in the room ~200 times as big as you were expecting and you should then be able to make it out. The elements in my essay are just a few of the rather powerful consequences. You may recall others from last years.

        Peter

        John,

        I'm really sorry that I missed your last post. I didn't mean to give up trying. Maybe we could think of it another way: you've been on a moving walkway at an airport, right? The whole thing is quite similar, except that rather than expanding, the moving walkway surface is moving. If you walk along a 60 m walkway at 60 m/minute, and you go in the same direction that the walkway is moving, you'll get there in less than a minute, and you'll actually have walked less than 60 metres. If you go in the opposite direction, it'll take more than a minute to cross and you'll have walked more than 60 metres. That's really basically what's supposed to be happening according to standard cosmology.

        The metric uses comoving coordinates, so that the positions of galaxies all remain the same, but space is just expanding. You can think of dots on a balloon that's being blown up, which all keep the same angular position, but separate from each other. Therefore, the physical distance between each point is increasing, but at any moment light traverses the same distance. It doesn't traverse the same angular separation in a given moment, because that physical distance is increasing. For example, by the time these physical distances have doubled, light's only traversing half the angular separation. The rate that's fixed is the physical distance that is travelled in a given instant. This is easy to think of in the moving walkway example, because it isn't expanding: if you take a 1 m step each second, against the direction that the walkway is moving, then in 30 seconds you'll have walked 30 meters and gotten nowhere; if you walk in the same direction as the walkway, you'll have walked 30 meters in 30 seconds again, but the distance between your starting point and your end point will be 60 meters. Similarly, using the comoving coordinate representation in cosmology, we can determine the physical distance travelled in moving from one position to another, if we know the form of the scale factor.

        Please let me know if that gets us anywhere.

        All the best, and again, sorry I didn't see your response.

        Daryl

        Dear Israel,

        I mostly agreed with your first paragraph, except where you wrote "If nothing changed or transformed we would not be able to tell whether time flows or not." I don't think so. I think space-time has an objectively well-defined metrical structure, or background, which I think is a fundamental property of the Universe, and that this would be the same whether things moved around in space over the course of time or not. It comes down to a chicken/egg thing, but I do think ordered duration is needed in the first place. I've already discussed this a lot with John Merryman here.

        In the next paragraph, you wrote "When Newton says that the flow of time is "external"," but Newton defined absolute time as flowing "without reference to anything external". Maybe that's what you meant, as I'd infer from what you wrote after that, but it seems you said the opposite. But on that point, it does puzzle me why you think he must have meant, then, that the flow should be in reference to things internal? I personally do think of that as being a convoluted way of thinking. Things have to exist if anything is going to change, but not the opposite. As I said, I discussed this a lot with John, and I can't see that there's much more to say on the matter. People like George Ellis would certainly side with you as well, but I think you're trying to put the cart before the horse.

        On the next point, I think you've got the relativist's view of space all wrong. I would strongly recommend reading Einstein's "Relativity and the Problem of Space", the fifth appendix to his popular "Relativity", where he clearly opposes what you describe. His view is entirely consistent with cosmology. None of this has anything to do with my views of the matter, however.

        And on the last point, GR is completely consistent with the definition of an absolute time, through an objective foliation of space-time. Just because it's not generally required to do so, because from a relativistic point of view it's commonly thought of as superfluous, doesn't mean it's actually inconsistent with the theory. You can define an absolute simultaneity-relation in GR, which is just what's done in cosmology.

        Best,

        Daryl

        Peter,

        Thanks for rating, and for continuing to press the point here. We're still not seeing eye-to-eye on--not that that has to be a bad thing, as you've said.

        It seems to me that you're conceiving of a "frame" as a space, or a medium through which light propagates. But a frame of reference is just a coordinate system that one uses to describe space. You can run a tape measure along train tracks and use that as the coordinate in your frame of reference, and say that the train is "moving"--or you can run a tape measure along the floor of the train and use that as the coordinate in your frame of reference, so you claim that the outside world is "moving". We can analyse the situation in different frames of reference, and relate those descriptions to each other through covariant coordinate transformations; but when you speak of light entering one frame, etc., it seems that you're thinking of these different frames as different spaces, rather than just different ways of measuring space.

        It still seems like you're saying, "A happens with the rubber band unstretched and B happens when it's stretched, so B happens more quickly", but I think you've got to make your measurements either with the band stretched or unstretched. Sorry if it seems like I'm being obtuse; it just seems inconsistent, but I am trying to keep an open mind.

        Daryl

        Daryl,

        Thanks for the vote! Bumped me up to 3. I admit I'm just paddling around the edges of this contest and the voting is pretty brutal.

        I do understand how these two factors are being related to one another. Consider though, that you are using the steps/lightyears as the denominator. Such that 30/1 means you have walked 30 steps. Now matter how it moves, your steps remain constant.

        As you say, "the physical distance between each point is increasing, but at any moment light traverses the same distance. It doesn't traverse the same angular separation in a given moment, because that physical distance is increasing. For example, by the time these physical distances have doubled, light's only traversing half the angular separation."

        It is the distance between the galaxies, the numerator, which changes/increases. The denominator, the distance light travels in a year, remains constant, therefore it takes more of them to cover the distance between the galaxies.

        So if you are going to say that the very fabric of space is the numerator, what metric is the source of your denominator?

        Say two galaxies expand from x lightyears to 2x lightyears. There is simply more space, as measured in lightyears, between them. So the space, as measured in lightyears, isn't being stretched, or it would always take just as many lightyears to cover the space between the two points. There is an increased distance, as measured in the stable units of space called lightyears.

        Dear George,

        Thanks very much for reading and rating my essay. I've read through parts of yours before now, and had intended to post a comment and rate it when I'm able to read through the whole thing, but I wanted to say in response to your comment that I'm glad you were able to appreciate my essay because I see a lot of value in your epistemic viewpoint.

        Many thanks again, and best wishes,

        Daryl

        Hi John,

        You're welcome for the rating; but I did enjoy reading your essay, so the pleasure was mine.

        In this last post, however, I'm really having a difficult time knowing what you're saying. It seems you think a distance in expanding space, stated in units of lightyears, should say something about how long it would take light to traverse the distance? Is that what the issue is?

        Since space is expanding, it takes light much longer to cross what is 1 lightyear to begin with, because space is going to expand the whole time. It might take 5 years to cross from A to B, and when it does, the distance from A to B might be 8 lightyears. But the question is: how far did the light actually travel? It's 5 lightyears.

        If the moving walkway is 60 m, moving along at 1 m/s and you jog against it at 2 m/s, then each second you gain 1 m and it takes you a minute to get across. How far have you run, at 2 m/s, in a minute? You've actually run 120 m, even though gone 60 m from A to B.

        The speed of light is constant, and therefore so is the lightyear. But whether light actually can make it all the way from A to B in a year (say AB is initially less than 1 ly) or only half the distance totally depends on the rate of spatial expansion. If you speed up the moving walkway to 2 m/s in the above example, but hold your jogging rate constant, you'll still run 120 m every minute, but now you won't actually get anywhere. If the speed of the moving walkway now varies, but still you hold your jogging speed constant at 2 m/s, the distance you actually move along the walkway in a minute will be different again, BUT STILL the distance you actually run in a minute will be 120 m.

        Does that get us anywhere?

        Daryl

        Daryl,

        I am really happy to meet you. Thank you very much for compliments and kindly words. I understand your critical remarks also. I can say that I have some explanations and answers on these. But, I will tell now you one thing only. I am never pretended to be fully right on the all aspects. The same approach I have use in relation to our deserved pioneers as will. I never accept that any of them must be perceived by us as the indisputable and finitely authority. We must remember always that they was ordinary/normally people first (same as we are) So, we have right to make mistakes and we must not excluded that our teachers also can have it.

        Then why I am talking so sure and criticizing on left and right? Matter is - I have use some approach that give me many incredible RESULTS! I am talking sure with this only. (And lot of people just do not take in attention mentioned ,,trifle,,!) Let me just offer you my works (mentioned in references) Try study these. I really believe it will interesting for you. Then you can continue my ideas, reject some points, suggest new modifications that will bring to new RESULTS etc. That is the normally way of development of our knowledge.

        My Best wishes,

        George

        Dear Darryl,

        Your treatment of the subject of time is particularly interesting to me, and very thorough, too. In reading your work I realize that I've been considering time, too - though from another perspective.

        As you point out, Wheeler was hoping for a 'deeper physics' that would define time properly. Your comparison of the 'block' space-time as opposed to the more sequential flow of reality we experience crystallizes my own outlook very nicely: I link the issue of time to the correlation of the evolving observer with the Cosmos.

        Though my paradigm has cosmological consequences beyond this - the underlying significant fact is that in our immediate environment, there is always an observer present in any observation - while over very great distances, the observer becomes a problem and parameters unravel.

        I think your example of the clocks and the train shows this - none of these phenomena, or distortions, affect us in our immediate circumstances - and in fact the experiment shows in a highly compressed frame of reference how things appear at great distances.

        I say there is a block of space-time, but we evolve from it to create sequential flow, and it is this that limits our explorations to the nearer space-time regions.

        Therefore, we must consider that the evolving observer needs to somehow be incorporated into physics - which, in turn leads to the conclusion that we will always be playing with the borders of the Cosmos, and that they will never be fixed and permanent - since evolution can never end, and is never absent from our perceptions.

        In this broader perspective, the definition of It and Bit clearly must be expanded to something more than Wheeler intended (but then, how else can we achieve a 'deeper physics?); indeed, the interaction of It and Bit can only be defined as one of continuous and simultaneous shifts - or more precisely, of correlation.

        It was thoroughly interesting for me to read your essay (and of course, I've rated it too) - and I hope you'll read my work, as I think you'll find much of interest in it.

        Best of luck in the competition,

        John.

        Dear Daryl,

        I have down loaded your essay and soon post my comments on it. Meanwhile, please, go through my essay and post your comments.

        Regards and good luck in the contest,

        Sreenath BN.

        http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1827