Readers' Choice: Cheating the Causal Game

Marcel,

I missed seeing this. You write, "This aggregate only becomes the 'moon' when we perceive and conceive it as being there, entire, in one place and one moment. Get it?"

I get it, and answer 'so what?' One may create a moon in one's mind that corresponds to the moon external to one's mind. And? You are confusing metaphysical philosophy which has nothing to do with physics -- and metaphysical realism, which is the physics of objective reality.

" ... there is no space, lines or geometry as they are convenient projections."

Yes? Projections of what from where? Bon chance.

Tom

Working on this, but rushing off now. Stand corrected on the first part. I thought the GPS clock goes faster, since it isn't slowed by gravity...

Tom,

Scratch that previous. Forgot to post it and am now back..

GPS clocks are faster...

A point about gravity, basically these measurements are done on the surface and I've heard that if you dropped something through a hole through the earth, it would accelerate to the midpoint and continue through almost to the other side before turning back. Wouldn't the gravitational attraction of all it passed by start to drag on it?

I'm still not seeing where what seems to be a basic doppler effect of recession is especially relativistic. I do remember the history of how it came to be, that first it was simply considered an expansion in space and the redshift was simply the doppler effect of these galaxies flying away from us. Then when it was observed that all those distant galaxies were redshifted proportional to distance, with no apparent lateral motion, so it would have to mean that all those distant galaxies were moving directly away from us, so we appeared to be at the center of the universe. Then it was described as a relativistic effect and not just an expansion in space, but an expansion of space, in order for us not to be at the center of the universe. Yet it does seem the same conventional doppler effect is still being used to explain the redshift, without any corresponding temporal relativistic effect.

Consider:

"This is why special relativity as a bedrock physical principle finds that physical influences among bodies cannot exceed the speed of light in a vacuum. Colloquially speaking, there is more space in the universe than time, and always will be; space can expand indefinitely, and bodies will never exchange physical influences faster than the speed of light."

What is a vacuum, as in speed of light in a vacuum, if not a constant? If "space" can expand, why doesn't the "vacuum" expand as well, thus the speed of light keeps up with the expansion of space? It really goes to my point. The space between those two galaxies is expanding, but the "vacuum" is not, because it takes more time for the light to cross this distance???

Sorry if this is a disorganized post, as I'm trying to organize it in my head...

Regards,

John M

John,

I don`t think that time exists as a real force or thing. I do think that we have motion in our timeless Universe. We have change in our timeless Universe.

Sorry, John. We're not on the same page. In the same chapter. Or the same book. If you just want to riff, that's fine -- just don't expect me to play any more backup.

Best,

Tom

Tom,

If you can point me to the book which describes how that "space" and "vacuum" are separate properties, I would appreciate it.

As I said, sorry that post was a bit of thinking out loud.

Regards,

John M

Jim,

And time is both an effect of and way to measure that change. Much as temperature is both an effect of and way to measure thermodynamic activity. One is sequential and the other is scalar measure of activity.

Regards,

John M

John M,

As to second Tom:

In what are vacuum and space considered different? An early book explained this already in the title: Otto de Guericke: "Experimenta nova ut vocantur Magdeburgica de vacuo spatio". From this notion "empty space" you might infer that vacuo is a particular property of the subject spatio. Space (spatio) may or may not be empty (vacuo).

Of course, even empty (from matter) space may be imagined to contain e.g. electric fields that were already demonstrated also by Otto Gericke in 1660.

Michelson showed in 1881 that (more or less) empty space does not contain a light-carrying medium that was imagined to be in motion relative to earth.

Regards,

Eckard

John,

Eckard is right. Furthermore, both Descartes and Einstein repeated the aphorism, "There is no space empty of the field."

Tom

Eckard,

I realize space can be occupied. You and I occupy space. The fact is that the vacuum, empty space, that which light crosses at C, is thus being assigned a very specific dimensionality. You wouldn't say the vacuum expands or contracts relative to C, otherwise there would be no constant. Now if you and I were to walk away from each other, is that an expansion of space, or is it just increasing distance?

Consider the space between those galaxies is being denominated in lightyears, ie. if the universe expands to twice its current size, they would go from being x lightyears apart, to 2x lightyears apart. The distance is being denominated in the stable unit of lightyears. The numerator, x, 2x, is how many of these stable units there are between those points. There is no stretching of those units, only an increasing number of them.

At the top of this particular thread, John Cox made the following point; " You have to envision the theory model being it's own co=ordinate system, not in any particular reference frame."

The fact is that C, the speed of light in a vacuum, is the reference frame, the denominator, so space, the distance between you and I, or two galaxies billions of lightyears apart, is denominated in that stable reference frame.

Space is what you measure with a ruler and the cosmic ruler is C.

Regards,

John M

" ... the cosmic ruler is C."

No it isn't. John, I am disheartened that I spent hours researching and trying to simply the facts for you -- even directly answering your specific questions in a way that I thought you could understand -- only to have you ignore it and continue to just pontificate on anything that happens to enter your head.

Tom

" ... please offer any scientific (rather than just belief based) reason why option 1 has any advantages over option 2."

Okay.

"(1) we have a local framework ('at rest') to work with, and simply ignore any other such local frames, which is convenient as otherwise they might prove problematic. We assume then that as many as we wish can simply 'co-exist.'"

Peter, relativity is coordinate free. It is not "problematic" that every local inertial frame is independent of every other, because all physics is local. Inertial frames that are timelike or spacelike separated are precisely reconciled to a common spacetime locality by the Lorentz transform. If this is not "scientific" to you, good luck falsifying it.

"The discrete field interpretation (2) follows Einstein's ultimate 1952 concepts more closely (i.e. 'small space 's' in motion with large space 'S', 'Infinitely many 'spaces', in motion, and Bodies not 'in space but spatially extended' etc.)."

This a completely superfluous assumption to the physics of relativity and as such has no meaning. As I told you, it is simply a restatement of Mach's principle that all motion is relative. That is also scientific.

Tom

Tom,

So again you provide no scientific falsification. You simply;

1) Re-state the other interpretation, which we both already well know.

2) Re-state that all else (i.e. consistency with observation - of FTL, plasma refraction etc.) is 'superfluous' to that interpretation.

Well of course it is. That wasn't what I asked, or the important matter. You were supposed to be 'comparing' the models scientifically, not just 'chanting' what you believe. If that's all you have then you've failed.

I see no logic or evidence for your views (all evidence applies to both). You also seem to remain head-in-the-sand about the apparent FTL motion

Pete,

I'm a little fuzzy about the distinction between 'optional interpretation'.

It still goes back to the method of the math. GR dispenses with force on the grounds that we have not established a unification between gravity and EM. It is not a contradiction by Lonesome Al to then say 'there is not a region in space that does not have a field'. Force is the product of mass and acceleration and GR relies on both but does not employ the product. It is thereby through acceleration that the math describes the surface as a boundary of a boundary which is shrinking to describe gravity geometrically, not as an energetic dynamic. In concept gravity is not mass/energy taking up space which must then push outward, it describes gravity giving way to 'flat' space as the reason why discrete fields aggregate into greater masses. And Einstein was painfully aware that the math did not extend down to a scale where energy can be described as gravitating into mass. I think what Tom tries to get through, is that GR is firstly a General Theory (and) of relativity (comes later). It's your own personal mind-held computer.

also I just posted a correction about the refraction delay. jrc

...dammit, I used the 'up to' arrow again and it chopped the post. It was the irrefutable proof of FTL quasar pulses, at up to 46c I referred, which are fatal to SR if you are correct. Is that what you want?

Do you really believe that is; "not problematic" and that the solution to it (also deriving the LT) will prove entirely "superfluous."?

I can find no logic or reason for your view whatsoever, and you haven't offered any.

Peter

" ... . It was the irrefutable proof of FTL quasar pulses, at up to 46c I referred ..."

Sigh. Peter, this is no refutation of special relativity. Even if the quasar jets are actually traveling faster than light speed (a big if) one would still need show that quasar events are exchanging physical influences with other bodies in the universe at a speed greater than light.

There is no "proof" at all in a scientific theory, let alone "irrefutable." A theory only lives or dies on its correspondence to phenomena, and special relativity shows such strong correspondence.

I suggest you take your own wise advice to slow down and think.

All best,

Tom

Tom,

Aha! Too fast twixt parry and lunge! you have just described and adopted the foundational proposition of the Discrete Field Model.

"one would still need show that quasar events are exchanging physical influences with other bodies in the universe at a speed greater than light."

So who was it who didn't slow down enough? ..not I Monseur Ray!. We now see you never did understand the proposition as you clung onto another!

One would not; "need to show...exchanging physical influences" at all to support the DFM or to show the assumptions "surrounding" SR as inconsistent, because even 'apparent' superluminal speed is not permitted using those assumptions. But where we DO agree is that there is no 'actual' superluminal propagation.

This is where the well understood 'two fluid' plasma mechanism does it's job, which is the physical modulation of all EM wave propagation to the speed c with respect to the rest frame of that particle. If you read the PRL/MNRAS quasar jet analysis I posted you'll have seen the derivation of the 'hypersurfaces' which do this, and the 'cancellation' of plasma charge over the Debye length, (annihilation) well known in plasma as the instantaneous 'virtual' electrons. The mechanism avoids the whole prospect of "physical influences" between "bodies."

I think our difference is Tom that I do real 'science' (study and analyse data and findings), not just 'theory'. I then don't have to rely on any 'beliefs.' A pure theorist must select his own 'theoretical' foundations, so he feels challenged when they are.

Feeling challenged does not encourage objective scientific analysis. Chanting the same beliefs as you have is 'tiresome' to use your word, as you know from Pentcho. You don't need to feel challenged.

Peter

"I think our difference is Tom that I do real 'science' (study and analyse data and findings), not just 'theory'. I then don't have to rely on any 'beliefs.'"

Peter, you are welcome to show by your study and analysis that your findings are not superfluous to the theory of special relativity.

You claim not to falsify special relativity out of one side of your mouth, and out the other you claim that special relativity is not consistent with your analysis of the data.

Just what is it? -- is the real science of special relativity true or false?

Tom

Tom,

Thank you for the effort, but if I may review some relevant parts of the conversation;

I said, "Clock rates slow as gravity contracts space/time. Correct/not?"

To which you replied, " If we remove an identical atom, or clock, further from the influence of the gravity field where we first synchronized the beats, and then bring the clocks back together, we will find that the clock that traveled outside the local frame has recorded fewer beats than the one that stayed at home. Why?" "...because this vertical acceleration is indistinguishable in principle between some force pushing bodies upward and another force pulling bodies downward -- there is equivalence between inertial mass and gravitational mass, and therefore between gravity and acceleration."

Yet this is not my point. Yes acceleration will increase the drag and further slow the clock, but I did not say acceleration, I said gravity and a stronger gravity field does slow a clock, relative to a weaker one, so when you compare a clock already in a higher orbit, it runs faster than one on the ground.

"Time dilation cannot be separated from length contraction when we speak of real measurement parameters. The contraction of time and space is covariant but not symmetric -- "We measure time with clocks," said Einstein, "We measure space with rods." You can do the calculation, and find that at about 85% of the speed of light, a body is contracted to about one-half its length at rest."

Presumably then, the clock rate is slowed to about half its sped at rest. Yes/no?

"This is why special relativity as a bedrock physical principle finds that physical influences among bodies cannot exceed the speed of light in a vacuum."

So what is this vacuum, if not empty space?? I don't think this should be considered some kind of trick question or ignoring your considerable efforts to explain. Pardon my ignorance, but I cannot see what the difference is and it is a question you are not addressing directly.

Regards,

John M