In regard to the quote

"A barista walking backwards only to see the coffee flowing up from a cup into his pot; or an animal being unborn in a wildlife documentary; these things look inherently odd and impossible to us because they suggest that time is in fact reversed. However, microscopic processes are time symmetric--collisions between atoms or chemical reactions--can occur backwards or forwards."

I don't understand how events occurring in the reverse sequence from the sequence they previously occurred in means that time is going backwards? As was discussed in the posts about the new essay contest, it seems to me that time is still going forward, and it just happens that the physical events happen to be in the reverse order of some that occurred earlier. Is the author suggesting that a chemical reaction that goes in the reverse order is time reversal? I'm just an amateur (e.g. a crackpot as described by academics), but it seems like time is just a function of physical events occurring. Time can't go backwards because you can't reduce the number of events that have occurred already. Just changing the sign in an equation in a physicist's mind doesn't mean that time can actually go backwards outside the physicist's mind. If time really is a dimension somewhere similar to the 3 spatial dimensions, could someone pleas point it out to me? Until then, it seems to me to be more of a function of things happening in the 3 spatial dimensions. I mentioned this in the other topic on the new essay contest, but if someone could clear up my misunderstanding, I'd appreciate it. Thank you!

Roger Granet, in reply to your question-

There is passage of time as you mention, things happening in space and then there is what is observed which, due to the non infinite speed of light contains a temporal dimension. Things closer to the observer are seen as they were more recently than distant objects, as it takes longer for the light to arrive at the observer from the latter. The reality the observer fabricates is from the sensory data recieved, so it has a time dimension incorporated.

    I am thinking that an equilibrium state (quantum or classical) have not time evolution, so that a classical (or quantum) network has not time evolution if there is an equilibrium state, and the dynamic of the network is near the equilibrium. If there is dynamic, then there is entropy variation, and the entropy give an information of the proximity to the equilibrium. So that a system near the absolute zero freezes the time evolution.

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    The diagram looks like a fractal. If only one of the branches of a tree to the present dies or fails a test, The path in reverse is lost for the lost branch cannot be created.

    Georgina,

    Thanks for the reply. I agree that the distance-finite light speed relationship causes more distant objects to be perceived later by an observer, but this still doesn't seem to be due to a separate dimension of time. The event, the movement of light through shorter or longer distances and the perception by the eyes and brain of the observer are all physical events happening. There still doesn't seem to be a separate time dimension. If there is, as mentioned before, could you please point it out?

    Roger

    Roger, in reply to your request;

    Yes perception from sensory data is an event and so is a part of pasage of time, change in configuration of the Object universe.

    The output reality from observation has 3 spatial dimensions and a time dimension for the reason explained. It is a space-time reality, the temporal component is fully incorporated into the reality. There is no distance separate from time. It is not due to a separate time dimension in Object reality but is an inseperable dimension of the output Image reality, the experienced reality.

    Roger,

    That is because to the physicist, time is a measure of duration and the mathematical models abstracted from such measures as distance and duration are the reality, while the actual processes being measured are assumed to only be reflections of this underlaying system. For example, both "the fabric of spacetime" and the Copenhagen Interpretation are based on the assumption the model is the reality.

    The irony here is that a "clockwork universe," as explanation for the efficacy of epicycles was effectively the same assumption; That those epicycles were physically manifest as giant cosmic gearwheels.

    The very basic argument I've been making to disprove spacetime as being physically real, is that the narrative vector, from past to future, is just our perception of the effect of change turning future into past. That events go from potential to actual, to residual and it is only in hindsight that we construct that narrative timeline.

    Consider that duration doesn't not exist as a dimension outside of some point of the present, but is the state of what is present, as the marks form and dissolve, go future to past.

    The problem is this makes time an effect of action, not its basis and as such is more like temperature, than space. Time is to temperature, what frequency is to amplitude. It is just that amplitudes cumulatively create temperature, but to our point of view, frequency cumulatively is noise. So we isolate out particular actions and measure their frequencies against each other and use the most regular as a clock. So the reason separate clocks run at different speeds is simply because they are separate actions. Consider that a faster clock/action will simply use/burn its energy faster and so recede into the past faster.

    So the reason time only goes one direction is simple inertia. Energy and mass do not invert.

    Suffice to say, this point makes no impression on physicists, because I also am a crank/outsider and paychecks are for espousing on strings and multiverses.

    Regards,

    John M

    The idea of palindromic time symmetric gates is perfect for impedance matching phazed arrays in experimenting with time domain electromagnetics. In this setup a series of quantum shepard tones pass through the overall length of the palindromic circuit of billions of nodes. Then an assymetric signal is introduced in just one place on one side of the circuit to be detected assymetrically in time on the other....The chiral quantum walk needs to be built with GaImAr and other materials using the advantageous tunelling effects of matter at small scales. Could this be done? I enjoyed the referenced article very much but do not see where the six degrees come to play a role, perhaps i missed something

    John,

    Hi. If I understood you correctly, I think you and I are saying kind of the same thing: that time is due to action, or what I called events happening.

    I'm also a crank/outsider/amateur/crackpot, but being a crank isn't the same as being wrong. It just makes providing evidence for our ideas that much harder. A friend at work has a nice saying: A PhD is no substitute for an IQ. At least in biochem., I can vouch for the correctness of that!

    Roger

    Roger,

    Just as an example of sloppy logic, consider that current cosmology is based on the premise of spacetime being physically real. This is because when they discovered that all those distant galaxies appear to be moving directly away from us, such that we appear at the center of the universe, it was then argued this was due to an expansion of space itself, based on the premise of spacetime and thus every point would appear as the center. What is completely overlooked is that in order to be relativistic, the speed of light would have to increase, in order to remain constant to this increased space, yet that is not the case. For one thing, if it actually did, there would be no redshift effect and those galaxies would not appear to be moving away, since our only measure is the speed of light. The Doppler effect requires that stable frame in which the source moves relative to the receiver, in order to work. Now when I point out to the true believers that if those sources are actually moving away, such that it takes light longer to cross this distance, that is not expanding space, as measured in lightspeed, but increasing distance, the response is usually that lightspeed is just measured locally and the light is being "carried along" by this expansion. It doesn't seem to occur to them that since the proof of this expansion is presumably the redshift of light that travels intergalactically and that as those galaxies recede, it will take that light longer to reach us, they are talking utter nonsense. If accountants tried this sort of math, they would find themselves in legal troubles.

    There is a simple and obvious reason why we would appear at the center of this expansion and that it would if it were an optical effect. We accept gravity is "equivalent" to acceleration, but the surface of this planet isn't rushing out in all directions to keep us stuck to it, so why wouldn't there be some effect "equivalent" to recession, which causes redshift? According to Einstein, gravity causes space to contract, given that measures of mass points pull together and so he added the cosmological constant to balance it and keep the universe from collapsing. Now it is already observed that expansion balances gravitational contraction, resulting in flat space, but given the overwhelming power of belief in an expanding universe, it is now argued that inflation blew it up so big initially, that it only appears flat from our perspective, much as the surface of the planet appears flat. Yet, again logically, if the space between galaxies is expanding and the space in galaxies is contracting and they balance, wouldn't some kind of relationship make sense, such as a cosmic convection cycle of expanding radiation and collapsing mass? Of course that would negate another popular notion, that black holes are windows into other dimensions and mean that what is falling in gravitationally is balanced by what is being radiated back out.

    I'll leave it at that. From one crank to another.

    Regards,

    John M

    Quantum walks are a nice complement to the random walks of classical physics and this work shows how quantum walks have the arrow of time if there is a little extra chiral term in the Hamiltonian.

    The six degrees to emergence of reality is related to quantum walks, but is really a separate topic altogether. Six degrees refers to human relational networks which are different beasts from random and quantum walk networks. The two issues are presented in a very confusing way.

    There really is no magic to the arrow of time in this work since the assumption is that there is an arrow of time in the chiral gates imposed by the model. The issue is simply whether this particular chiral trick will be useful for quantum computing, thus the nature of the grant.

    The article would have benefited from a better description of the quantum walk and what makes a quantum walk different from a random walk. For example, a beamsplitter divides a photon into a superposition of two paths and the exact path the photon takes is therefore unknowable. Given another set of beamsplitters, and then another, and so on to n, you now have an n node quantum walk. Although the single photon appears at only one detector, the path of the photon is a superposition of all possible paths and a single path is unknowable.

    The six degrees connection alludes to a relational network that uses quantum rules to relate nodes to each other instead of just determinism. Quantum rules allow for phase as well as amplitude and therefore have interference effects. Classical relational networks do not show interference due to superposition of paths. The fact that six degrees connects most humans to other hummans does not seem to have much to do with quantum walks.

    John,

    I totally agree about the sometimes sloppy logic and unfounded assumptions used by physicists. I think the same is true of mathematicians and academic philosophers. To add to your examples, my favorite example of what seems to me to be bad logic deals with infinite sets. If you start off with a single infinite set of the positive integers and want to know how many positive integers there are in the set relative to the total number of integers, the method is to remove the positive integers from the initial single set, and then pair them off with all the integers to get a one-to-one correspondence and the same size for the subset and the original set. This seems similar to removing a nucleus from a cell and studying its properties and assuming they're the same as in the intact cell. This is often not the case and the wrong results are called artifacts in biochemistry. I think mathematicians' thought experiments are still experiments and so you can't just assume that removing a subset from its natural milieu of a single set of the positive integers will give the same results as those obtained in the single set system. But, this is what mathematicians and physicists do. To me, it's sloppy logic and sloppy experimental technique.

    Yours in crankiness,

    Roger

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    quanta move only in space (not in time) time is a mathematical parameter of quanta motion

    http://link.springer.com/search?query=sorli+amrit+

      Roger,

      Very true. Though it is easy to step on toes when dealing in these subjects. One of the points I keep raising, as I just did with John Cox over on the contest thread, is the idea that dimensions are anything more than a mapping device. Three dimensions really are a coordinate system and have to be treated as such. They are no more the foundation of space, than longitude, latitude and altitude are foundational to the surface of this planet. Time as dimension really is based on the narrative, as Tegmark's analogies make quite clear.

      As conceptual reductionism, math describes, it doesn't explain. It gives you a skeleton of the reality, not the seed from which it sprang.

      One of the ironies of this situation, is that if you go back to the ancients and consider that astronomy and astrology started from the same dichotomy. Astronomy described cosmic order, while astrology sought to explain it and then they went of in very different directions, with astronomy part of the foundation of geometry and thus math, while astrology and the mythologies formulated around it, as part of the basis of religion.

      We are surrounded by order, but explaining it can be quite tricky.

      Regards,

      John M

      Amrit,

      Hi. This is very similar to what John and I were talking about in the above posts and what I've got at my website. Needless to say, I agree! Good luck.

      Roger

      https://sites.google.com/site/ralphthewebsite/filecabinet/time1

      John M., Georgina, et al...

      Nice to see some growth in thinking, I've gained significantly in my level of understanding from this forum as well.

      I won't reiterate my conjecture of an imperfect universe here, which I concisely presented on the contest thread in my first post to Jonathan that John M. referred to [thanks], though it does fit well to the topic of this thread. Where I see QM lacking is in the analytical Cartesian background of a presumed static absolute space and time, which if one looks beyond the artifice clearly implies that if matter is present, the background permeates the particle without either effecting the mass-equivalence or its motion, nor being effected by that material entity. This is really not too different from the thinking that 3D is nothing more or less than an analytic methodology.

      Where I part company with that, is that no mathematician worth their salt is going to assume a Cartesian reference to be anything other than analytical. But that does not preclude a real physicality that follows an inherent geometric, universally. One can rotate a 3D orthogonal infinitely, the point being that it requires three coexistent axes to analytically confirm that either a sphere or a cube changes size uniformly. Arguably, in a cubic relationship the time parameter would be no different from a spatial parameter; space would be flat and time would be static... a cube topologically extrapolated to infinity is the most efficient 'filler' of space. In a spherical relationship which is the most efficient 'encapsulation' of space, a single axis can analytically define the volumetric change to infinity; but... pi is an irrational number, there is no end to the difference between the length of radii and the length of circumference, and so time is dynamic not static.

      If universally the reality is that all of creation seeks to be both flat, smooth and static; and at the same instant (for want of a better word) curved, variegated and dynamic... then it is probabilistic as to where or when an encapsulation of space through time might occur. If the universe were only flat space and static time, there would be no creation of energy. So the question is properly; why is there the same pi relationship in any event if there is not an inherent physicality of existence that we come to recognize and formulate as geometric mathematics?

      Break time, Happy New Year All. jrc

      John C,

      "If universally the reality is that all of creation seeks to be both flat, smooth and static; and at the same instant (for want of a better word) curved, variegated and dynamic..."(network)

      The point I keep making about time, that our linear perception of a sequence of events, with the "point of the present" moving from past to future, is an effect of activity changing the configuration of what is, creates this effect, by the "future becoming past." Potential, to actual, to residual.

      So then what we are measuring is frequency. Such that as an effect of action, it is similar to temperature, which is amplitude en masse. Now we think of time as fundamental, because this sequential effect is foundational to our rational perception, the linear function of the left brain which is the basis of narrative and thus history, as well as cause and effect logic.

      Meanwhile we think of temperature as emergent, the effect of all those energetic forces bouncing around and exchanging energy, yet they are seeking a state of equilibrium, while as a linear effect, frequency en masse is static/noise. What would be called "chop" by a sailor. That is why we have to isolate out a particular frequency and define it as the measure of time, yet it has to be extracted from that larger reality, just as temperature is an expression of the larger reality. So we see temperature top down and time bottom up.

      Newton said that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. What he didn't say is that the reaction is naturally non-linear. Basically a dispersal of the energy and this creates feedback loops throughout the entire system, which serve to balance that particular action and so those particular, linear actions and the sequence we experience, are part of the larger whole of thermodynamic activity. It should be noted that the non-linear, emotional and intuitive right side of the brain amounts to a scalar function, like a thermostat, or pressure gauge and that is why emotions are often referred to in terms of heat, or pressure, while intuition emerges as a cumulative effect of one's knowledge base.

      So now if we take away time and treat it as an property of activity, this leaves space. Yes, the three dimensions are a coordinate system and no more foundational to space than longitude, latitude and altitude are foundational to the surface of the planet. They are mapping devices and as such are descriptive, not prescriptive. Like frequency and amplitude as descriptive of waves, not their cause.

      So if we remove all physical properties from space, this leaves the non-physical qualities of neutrality and infinity. Since neither are physical, they don't require physical explanations.

      While infinity might seem obvious, the interesting aspect is neutrality, ie. equilibrium. General Relativity implicitly assumes this by using the speed of light as its constant. Basically we could conduct an experiment, based on GR, by placing clocks around in space, until we find the one which runs the fastest and that would be closest to the state of equilibrium of space. Literally the foundation of reality inherent to all space. So then we go back to temperature and how it is energy seeking that state of equilibrium. Since space is infinite, energy disperses infinitely, but because space is infinite, energy lost from one area is replaced by energy radiating from adjoining areas.

      Still trying to model it beyond this, but since no one seems willing to even consider this, I don't get any feedback.

      Regards,

      John M

      Hi John R.,

      you wrote "Where I see QM lacking is in the analytical Cartesian background of a presumed static absolute space and time......" Which, as I see it, is as it should be.It doesn't fit easily and it doesn't belong there. Transmission of light from object to observer has nothing to do with the Object reality of unobserved quantum particles.

      It isn't necessary to encapsulate space with time. If the passage of time is recycling and continuation of what is into the new what is, the former arrangemenet being replaced :then there is just an imaginary sequence along an imaginary time line, and what is. Prior to observation all possible orientations of referenvce frame are possible and so the object is in a superposition of states being all that it might possibly be obsered to be. Observation imposes the reference frame and due to the non-instantaneous transmission of light, wherby the environment is detected, an emergent temporal dimension to the output Image reality is introduced.

      You wrote " If the universe were only flat space and static time, there would be no creation of energy. " Energy is the change or potential for change. Everything is in motion even if it appears static in a particular reference frame.I have been fascinated by the demonstration of this using Foucault's pendulum. It just obeys Newton's Law of a body in motion remaining in the same motion, while the Earth rotates below it. Its beautiful. If passage of time is equated with universal change then it does not need to be added to the mix as an aditional parameter. One might, I'll argue, just as legitimately chop the imaginary sequence into equal slices and label them A,B,C,D,E,F,G rather than asign times to them, ie correlating each iteration to a position of a 'clock's hands'.

      Dartmouth professor on Foucault's pendulum

      Georgina and John Merryman,

      Agree to disagree as we mutually do, so far Time Hypotheses have proven testable only within their own construct. Some folk, such as Steve Agnew, treat space as emergent.

      While I would agree that any future event is only a potential, physically it would not exist. As a crude illustration, I had been encouraged as a child to be an artist because doodling in mimicry of my Grandpa's cartoons kept me out of Mom's hair, I came to learn to know I'd never make a living at it. On a few memorable occasions however, I have had the experience of having studied a subject thoroughly enough that in the act of drawing, the perception of the emergent form as the line scribed on the paper was almost like being poised on the future. It is exhilarating, but rare. Not all that is possible is probable.

      The view of Descartes that there is only particulate matter bumping in the void, and extentions of that which require an accompanying field, have been largely disproven experimentally. The Wave Structure of Matter, being an energy field which is somehow self-gravitationally bound, is the most testable hypothesis to date. Superposition and time symmetry have strong evidence in experiment Quantum Mechanically, but I'd have to hunt around for citations on that.

      The point should frequently be stated, that it was the culmination of experiment and analysis in Classical Mechanics that established that light velocity was constant, finite and absolute. Einstein did not simply make an ad hoc assumption, SR was developed to explain how measurement could possibly be made, given absolute light velocity. Chaotic Speed of Light theories ignore, that as Maxwell showed, electrodynamic interactions such as chemical reactions would not be possible without electromagnetic radiation always being the same translational velocity. Yet the oft stated epiphany of Einstein that time stops at light speed, is I think a misperception. Light velocity is perhaps absolute because that is the limit to which time in realtion to space can extend. And I seriously think that can be mathematically defined as the dynamic.

      So my personal prejudice is that spacetime is physically real and energy is the profoundly transient consequence of tension between dynamically extending dimensions of differing operational scales of each. Like a common spiral bi-metal spring rolled out flat on the wotkbench, different intial scale junctions make different size springs. Why would not such a dynamic be a continual creation of existence in an extention of real spacetime evolving particulate matter as a conservation of space?

      'Unitemporal' time is what the end term of SR is about. The only thing relative in relativity is simultaneity. Mathematically it can be said that the observable universe can be measured down to a common moment, given enough super-computer runs. Explaining the true physical nature of the Fitzgerald Lorentz Contraption that makes that common simultaneity measurably possible should be a Holy Grail of physics, though most insist that it has long been fully understood [to which I would say, 'only operationally'].

      je suis Charlie, jrc

      John C,

      Keep in mind that when you measure time, you are measuring an aspect of action. Whether it is rotations of the planet, cycles of a cesium atom, swings of a pendulum, or beats of a heart, it is still a frequency of some particular process.

      While when you measure space, whether it is one dimension of distance, two of area, or three of volume, they are all aspects of space being measured. Meanwhile the argument that lines or area, etc, consist of infinite numbers of dimensionless points, isn't mathematically valid, since even infinity multiplied by zero is still zero. You need space to have space.

      Now the reason Einstein says time stops at the speed of light is because no activity in a frame moving at the speed of light can occur, because the combination would exceed the speed of light. So in order to have action within the frame, be it rotations, cycles, swings, etc, the frame has to be going slower than C and the slower it goes, the faster that internal activity can go. Which leads to my point; If we locate the position of a frame where its internal action can fluctuate the fastest, that would be closest to the equilibrium of space. Now there is an infinite regression, where we might be able to stabilize it even further and so it could run faster, which only goes to show that like a temperature of absolute zero, we can only get very close, not necessarily there.

      It seems ironic they cornered the assassins in a print shop.

      The point I keep making about monotheism is that the absolute is basis, the equilibrium, not an ideal, so a spiritual absolute would necessarily be the essence of being from which we rise, not an ideal of knowledge and judgement from which we fell. Those who assume their cultural ideals are absolute, are merely extremists. We all inhabit particular frames, backed by narrative storylines, within the larger space.

      Regards,

      John M