An Overview of the Nature of Time by Brian Fraser

Interesting ideas, worth a read...

One can investigate time from a number of interesting questions, as yout paper shows. I tend to start by asking myself this question:Where is Richard Feynmans "past", now? ;)

great paper.

Brian,

"We all

seem to be on the same clock, and so whatever embodiment we are looking for must be grand

in scope, probably Universal. It must be a physical non-thing, kind of like a zero for Roman

numerals ("Why would you need a number to represent nothing?"). The locational aspect of

time seems to help here. Time must not merely progress, it must expand (increasing the time

separation between locations). The expansion must be centerless spatially so that there is no

locatable master source or inverse square effect. But since time is non-local in a spatial

reference system, this requirement is met naturally."

Absolute zero.

The problem with geometry is that zero is assumed to be the center point of the three dimensional coordinate system, but 1(-1) doesn't mean the center point on some line, it means nothing, as in the blank sheet of paper. In this blank space, there could be any number of essential reference points.

Temperature is the average level of motion, against a general scale. If this motion is stable, it can be represented as a point. Time, on the other hand, is a unit of motion. So the only dimensionless point of motion is the complete absence of it. Absolute zero.

Hello Brian!

Enjoyed your paper!

I especially enjoyed your section on the EPR Paradox starting on page 3, where you write:

"Spatial motion moves an object from one place to another place. So we should ask this question about time. Can an object also have a temporal place, and can it move from one

temporal place to another? Remember, these temporal places cannot be seen in a spatial reference system because they are non-local. Still, there might be some effect we can detect."

Well, relativity tells us that the timeless, ageless photon stays in the exact same place in the fourth dimension!

And quantum mechanics tells us that two initially-interacting photons remain entangled, no matter how far they travel!

Both relativity and quantum mechanics exalt nonlocality, so let us see how we might unify the two with a simple principle, psotualte, and equation.

Now relativity also tells us that time is not the fourth dimension, but rather, in his 1912 paper, Einstein wrote x4=ict. And t and ict are very different things. x4=ict implies dx4/dt=ic--the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions! Now, the great thing about this is that it explains nonlocality! For the first time in the history of physics, a *physical* mechanism for the distribution of locality is provided--the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at c. And too, change is finally woven into the fundamental fabric of spacetime, while providing a *physical* mechanism for time and all its arrows, entropy, relativity, and quantum entanglement and nonlocality.

I elaborate on all this in my paper Time as an Emergent Phenomenon: Traveling Back to the Heroic Age of Physics by Elliot McGucken: http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/238

And I quote from the paper: "Einstein's Annus Mirabilis: The Photon Holds the Key to Time as an Emergent Phenomenon: As contemplations on the photon lead Einstein to the theories of relativity and quantum mechanics that revolutionized our notions of space, time, and physical reality, this paper again turns towards the photon and Einstein's original works to shed light on time. Various phenomena in Einstein's 1905 papers can be united with a simple postulate representing an underlying physical reality from where time itself emerges--the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at the rate of c. Consider the emission of a photon in free space. One second later, the photon has equal probability of being found anywhere upon a sphere with a radius of 186,000 miles, as the velocity of light is 186,000 miles/second. If we covered the surface of said sphere with detectors, one, and only one detector, would detect the photon. Although having traveled 186,000 miles through space, the photon will not have aged one iota, for time stops at the speed of light. It will not have moved one iota in the fourth dimension. And there lies a clue to the reality that the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions. For how can a photon propagate 186,000 miles in the three spatial dimensions, and yet not budge an inch in the fourth dimension, unless that fourth dimension is moving right along with it, just as a wave moves right along with a surfer?

Consider two interacting photons that propagate in opposite directions, as in experiments inspired by Bell's Inequality and conducted by Aspect et al. One second later, each photon's polarization is measured at detectors separated by 372,000 miles. According to the laws of quantum mechanics and numerous supporting experiments, the measurement at one detector instantaneously affects the measurement at the second detector. It is as if the photons are yet side-by-side during the measurement. This "spooky action-at-a-distance," as Einstein called it, is not so spooky in the context of a fourth expanding dimension, for although separated by 372,000 miles, the photons yet inhabit a common locality in the fourth dimension, as the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions, distributing locality at the rate of c. So it is that both quantum and relativistic phenomena are accounted for with the simple elegance of the postulate: the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions." --http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/238

Best,

Dr. E (The Real McCoy)

Dr. E. :

Thank you for your comments about the ideas in my essay! I am glad you enjoyed it.

I read yours too, and my first reaction was, Wow!, there are a lot of similar ideas here. You state that time as an emergent phenomena can explain "diverse phenomena from relativity, quantum mechanics, and statistical mechanics" and that "time dilation, the equivalence of mass and energy, non-locality, wave particle duality. . . . the constant velocity of light, the fact that the maximum velocity is c, and the fact that c is independent of the velocity of the source" (and so forth) are accounted for. My gut feeling is that we are both on the trail of some deep and meaningful insights, although from somewhat different perspectives.

And I can see why you liked my presentation on EPR. Your paper says "it is as if the photons are yet side-by-side during the measurement" and that "they inhabit a common locality" even though separated (spatially) by thousands of miles. That was perfect! That is exactly what I think too!

I appreciated your comments about entropy. I did not address that topic.

Lorentz, Einstein, Minkowski and others enlightened us about space and time. But my gut feeling is that SR and GR are not fundamental enough. Their approach seems to be based on displacement and differentials. Motion, therein, is a spatial displacement measured over a time interval. Conventional thinking about space and time seems to be in terms of differences, not in terms of space and time fundamentally. By filling space with meter rods and synchronized clocks, they seem to be treating space and time mostly as a measurement problem. They seem to be ignoring a deeper reality.

When I sit here at my desk, my change in spatial displacement relative to the walls of the room is zero. Therefore my speed is zero, because the numerator in the speed calculation is zero. But time is still progressing. So my speed cannot really be zero, because the time in the denominator is still changing. This was addressed historically by adding the fourth dimension of ict. Two "events" can then be located in spacetime, and the separation between these events can be conveniently given by a calculation much like Euclidean distance. This is a clever device, but again does not seem truly fundamental.

I try to map out my thoughts on this problem by drawing a "speed spectrum". It is simply a horizontal line segment. At the left end I have a speed of 1/infinity. That means one unit of space divided by an unlimited (but still finite) amount of time. This is the equivalent of zero speed in space.

At the rightmost end, I have the inverse: infinity/1, which means infinite spatial speed.

But that is just another way of saying "instantaneous" or "not propagated" which in turn, according to my paper, means "non-local" or "temporal motion". The left end represents zero motion in 3D space; the right end is zero motion in 3D time. The two are exactly symmetrical concepts, and there is no preference for choosing one over the other as a fundamental "datum" or "fiducial" or "zero". At the left end, the time component still progresses, and at the right end, the space component still progresses (call it "clock space". This symmetry, incidentally, seems to lead to Lorentz invariance, and to the Bohr Correspondence Principle in Quantum Mechanics. I have a hunch it also leads to the Principle of Least Action (see Feynman). But those are subjects in themselves.)

Returning to the line segment representing the speed spectrum, the situation in the middle would at first seem to be worse than either of these choices, as BOTH space and time are progressing. But as my paper suggests, space and time become equivalent at the speed of light. That is s/t = t/s. There is only one number that can act this way, and hence I can use 1/1 = 1/1. The speed of light seems to be a unique and special speed in this respect. Furthermore, for two photons moving directly away from each other, the total differential spatial distance divided by the total differential temporal distance will progress as 2/2, 4/4, 6/6, etc. Said differently, and more fundamentally, the speed is constant, even though both numerator and denominator are changing. Uniqueness and stability are definitely desirable traits for a datum.

So I don't think Einstein and Minkowski went far enough. They covered measurement, and how events in one reference frame would appear to an observer in another reference frame. That is quite useful in itself, but the real picture seems to be fundamentally much larger than what they covered. We need to go beyond Einstein and include temporal motion, which in turn requires a consideration of non-directional motion, speeds greater than light, non-locality, and so forth. Even better, we need to learn how to think in terms of "motional dimensions" directly, instead of space and time dimensions.

Well, there are certainly a lot of fascinating things that can be said about this subject. It will keep people like us busy and entertained for a lifetime, regardless of what the "Big Science Establishment" does about it.

Thanks again, very much, for your review of my essay!

Brian F.

Hello Brian,

Love your words!

You write--"When I sit here at my desk, my change in spatial displacement relative to the walls of the room is zero. Therefore my speed is zero, because the numerator in the speed calculation is zero. But time is still progressing. So my speed cannot really be zero, because the time in the denominator is still changing. This was addressed historically by adding the fourth dimension of ict. Two "events" can then be located in spacetime, and the separation between these events can be conveniently given by a calculation much like Euclidean distance. This is a clever device, but again does not seem truly fundamental."

Yes--the whole Minkowski spacetime is a great, clever device; but it has been built upon and used to obscure a more fundamental reality--the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at c. Einstein and Minkoswki had this fact right there, staring them in the face, with x4=ict, implying dx4/dt=ic.

You're absolutely right above--did you know that there is but one velocity through spacetime? This velocity is c! It is impossible to move at any other velocity through our 4D spacetime. This is because the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at c.

When matter is caught in the fourth expanding dimension, it moves at c relative to the three spatial dimensions and appears as photons. When matter is stationary in our lab, it is mostly propagating at c relative to the fourth dimension, which is only because the fourth dimension is expanding at the rate of c relative to the three spatial dimensions.

To move at c through the three spatial dimensions means to be stationary in the fourth dimension, as is the timeless, ageless photon. Ergo the fourth dimension is moving relative to the three spatial dimensions. The *only* way to stay stationary in the fourth dimension is to move at c. The instant a photon is measured, it is no longer timeless and ageless, as it no longer exists in a single locality defined by the expanding fourth dimension, whose expansion distributes locality.

Brian Greene has a treatment of this in the Elegant Universe, where he almost relaizes Moving Dimensions Theory, but falls just short:

MDT & Brian Greene's Elegant Universe:

In An Elegant Universe, Brian Greene almost characterizes Moving Dimensions Theory's deeper reality:

"Einstein found that precisely this idea--the sharing of motion between different dimensions--underlies all of the remarkable physics of special relativity, so long as we realize that not only can spatial dimensions share an object's motion, but the time dimension can share this motion as well. In fact, in the majority of circumstances, most of an object's motion is through time, not space. Let's see what this means." Space, Time, and the Eye of the Beholder, An Elegant Universe, Brian Greene, p. 49

Right here Brian almost grasps MDT. But time is not a dimension. Time is an emergent phenomenon that arises because the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at the rate of c. Let's rewrite Brian's paragraph with MDT's insights:

"Einstein found that precisely this idea--the sharing of motion between different dimensions--underlies all of the remarkable physics of special relativity, so long as we realize that not only can the three spatial dimensions share an object's motion, but the fourth dimension, which is moving relative to the three spatial dimensions, can share this motion as well. In fact, in the majority of circumstances, most of an object's motion is through the fourth dimension, not the three spatial dimensions. Let's see what this means." Space, Time, and the Eye of the Beholder, An Elegant Universe, Brian Greene, p. 49

Most objects are traveling far less than c through the three spatial dimensions. Thus most objects are traveling close to the rate of c through the fourth dimension. To be stationary in the three spatial dimensions implies a velocity of c through the fourth dimension. Ergo the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions. To be stationary in the fourth expandning dimension, as is the timeless, ageless, nonlocal photon, implies a velocity of c through the three spatial dimensions. Ergo the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions.

dx(4)/dt = ic

Brian Greene continues:

"Motion through space is a concept we learn about early in life. Although we often don't think of things in such terms, we also learn that we, our friends, our belongings, and so forth all move through time, as well. When we look at a clock or a wristwatch, even while we idly sit and watch TV, the reading on the watch is constantly changing, constantly "moving forward in time." We and everything around us are aging, inevitably passing from one moment of time to the next. In fact, the mathematician Hermann Minkowski, and ultimately Einstein as well, advocated thinking about time as another dimension of the universe--the fourth dimension--in some ways quite similar to the three spatial dimensions in which we find ourselves immersed." Space, Time, and the Eye of the Beholder, An Elegant Universe, Brian Greene, p. 49

What Greene misses is that the time measured on your watch--the ticking seconds--is not the fourth dimension, but it is a phenomenon that emerges because the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions. The time measured on a clock or watch relies on the emission and propagation of photons, be it in the context of an unwinding clock spring or an oscillating quartz crystal, or even the beating of a heart. And photons are matter that surf the fourth expanding dimension. As time is so inextricably wed to the emission and propagation of photons, and as photons are matter caught in the fourth expanding dimension, our notion of "time" inherits properties of the fourth expanding dimension. But the fact is that time emerges from a deeper physical reality--a fourth dimension that is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions.

Brian Green continues on, heading off in the wrong direction that just misses the central postulate of MDT:

"Although it sounds abstract, the notion of time as a dimension is actually concrete."

But it is not. Can you move to where your watch reads three seconds back in time? Or can you move to where your watch reads an hour back in time? We can walk left or right. We can climb up or down. We can move forwards or backwards. But we can't move through time like we can through the three spatial dimensions. This is because time, as measured on our watch, is not the fourth dimension, but it is a construct we have devised which is based on the fundamental fact that the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions, governing the emission and propagation of photons, by which time is known and measured on our watches.

Brian Green continues on,

"When we want to meet someone, we tell them where "in space" we will expect to see them--for instance, the 9th floor of the building on the corner of 53rd Street and 7th avenue. There are three pieces of information here (9th floor, 53rd Street, 7th avenue) reflecting a particular location in the three spatial dimensions of the universe. Equally important, however, is our expectation of when we expect to meet them--for instance, at 3 PM. This piece of information tells us where "in time" our meeting will take place. Events are therefore specified by four pieces of information: three in space and one in time. Such data, it is said, specifies the location of the event in space and in time, or in spacetime, for short. In this sense, time is another dimension."

But again, time is different from the three spatial dimensions. Time is inextricably wed to our sense of the past--the order stored in our memory, long with our ability to imagine and dream of future events. The present is where we put our dreams into action. However, the time defined by past, present, and future is not a dimension akin to the three spatial dimensions, but rather it is a phenomenon that emerges because the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions, at the rate of c.

You write, "So I don't think Einstein and Minkowski went far enough. They covered measurement, and how events in one reference frame would appear to an observer in another reference frame. That is quite useful in itself, but the real picture seems to be fundamentally much larger than what they covered. We need to go beyond Einstein and include temporal motion, which in turn requires a consideration of non-directional motion, speeds greater than light, non-locality, and so forth. Even better, we need to learn how to think in terms of "motional dimensions" directly, instead of space and time dimensions."

Yes! Feynman sought this mechanism for the ever constant motion of time! He sought source of time's arrows and assymmetries!!

And MDT provides this *physical* mechanism for time and all change, and a while host of other physical phenomena.

Indeed, MDT finally provides, in Feyman's words, "the thing that makes the whole phenomena of the world seem to go one way." Time has a definitive arrow because the dx4/dt=ic, or the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions at the rate of c. Ergo radiation, which is but matter caught upon the expanding nonlocality of the fourth exapnding dimension, expands outward, but never inward. Ergo time and all its arrows and asymmetries, as well as entropy, as more fully elaborated on in my paper.

Feynman stated, "Now if the world of nature is made of atoms, and we too are made of atoms and obey physical laws, the most obvious interpretation of this evident distinction between past and future, and this irreversibility of all phenomena, would be that some laws, some of the motion laws of the atoms, are going one way - that the atom laws are not such that they can go either way. There should be somewhere in the works some kind of principle that uxles only make wuxles, and never vice versa, and so the world is turning away from uxley character to wuxley character all the time - and this one-way business of the interactions of things should be the thing that makes the whole phenomena of the world seem to go one way. But we have not found this yet. That is, in all the laws of physics that we have found so far there does not seem to be any distinction between the past and the future. The moving picture should work the same going both ways, and the physicist who looks at it should not laugh."--(The Distinction of Past and Future, from The Character of Physical Law, Richard Feynman, 1965)

MDT has finally found "the thing that makes the whole phenomena of the world seem to go one way."

To be stationary in a lab means to move at c through the fourth dimension. So it is that absolute rest may be defined as maximal aging, but this can never be ascertained in an inertial frame cutoff from the surrounding environment, as time is measured relative to the velocity of light and distance, which are ultimately measured relative to time. This tautological definition of time and the velocity of light and the velocity of light and time is something Einstein noted.

Best,

Dr. E (The Real McCoy)

Whew! Here is what I am getting out of all this:

Brian Green: " . . .not only can spatial dimensions share an object's motion, but the time dimension can share this motion as well."

Dr. E.: "the time measured on your watch--the ticking seconds--is not the fourth dimension, but it is a phenomenon that emerges because the fourth dimension is expanding relative to the three spatial dimensions." (and, the fourth dimension is not time all by itself, but is actually ict)

Feynman: " . . . in all the laws of physics that we have found so far there does not seem to be any distinction between the past and the future. The moving picture should work the same going both ways, and the physicist who looks at it should not laugh."

Paul Valletta blog (above): Where is Richard Feynmans "past", now?

Brian Fraser (essay): "Time and space in the human experience always occur together. We experience time at a particular place in space, and likewise we experience a place at a particular time."

Let's start with the last one (a quote from my paper). I can go back in space and revisit my desk. I return to my desk at the same place in space, but I cannot return there at the same time. By symmetry it follows that I CAN go back in time, but I cannot do it at the same place. If I return to the spatial coordinates of my desk 10 minutes from now, the time coordinates are found on an expanding sphere that has a radius of 10 light minutes. This makes "time travel" in the science fiction sense impossible. That should answer Paul's question, and also Feynman's concern about past and future. And be a heavy clue about what drives entropy.

And Dr. E., it also explains why we have no visitors from the future testifying that time travel is possible. :-) If they came back to our "when" coordinates, our "where" coordinates would be scattered all over the galaxy.

My view thus seems to combine what I understand of Brian Green's view and that of Dr E.: time is BOTH emergent AND dimensional. In other words, time EXPANDS. All bare time coordinates of the Universe move apart in a centerless expansion at the speed of light. Our planet is moving at the speed of light IN TIME, but not in space. That is what I call "temporal motion". Gravitation is a manifestation of temporal motion, as per my essay. It also accelerates things, but it does not move them any "where". That is why, after being stuck on this planet all this time, and being accelerated at 9.8 m/sec^2, I STILL have not changed my spatial location. I am still stuck to the planet. I have not gone any WHERE, but I HAVE gone any WHEN.

The photon does not age because (in my picture) it is locked into a time unit and the time unit is what actually does the moving. The photon is swept along in the stream, so to speak, and does not experience the flow of time.

But how about this one: by symmetry, the photon must ALSO be locked into the same SPATIAL unit. It therefore cannot experience motion in space. In the ultimate fundamental view of the universe, the photon must be spatially and temporally stationary! It is swept along in a stream of centerless space/time expansion at the ratio of c, the speed of light. The expansion originates any where and at any time and so photons can fly every which way at any time.

You will probably think about this last one a bit and have the same reaction that most physicists do: "that is idiotic. That means that the planet --matter itself-- has to be the stuff that is really doing the moving (fundamentally, foundationally), not the photon. " And, yes, I freely admit that is the intended picture. That is why I am so concerned about finding THE fundamental datum. The planet is engaged in temporal motion at the speed of light. Again, this manifests itself as gravitation. And, fortunately, it also manifests itself as multidimensional spatial motion. If it did not, the photon motion envelope would not be spherical; it would be a disk, or a line.

Does this clarify matters any? Or does it just make things more confusing?

If we ever got together at the same place and at the same time, we would all have one heck of a discussion!

Brian F.

I'd like to thank everyone who read my essay, even if they did not comment on it. Reading essays is a lot of work, especially when they are this technical. Your efforts are appreciated!

I wrote this essay for two reasons. First, Fqxi.org has a noble cause in promoting foundational physics outside the mainstream physics community. It seems to be adequately organized, and adequately funded. The organizers wanted an "inaugural" essay article about the nature of time that met their criteria. It had to be "on topic", understandable by a wide audience (like articles in Scientific American or a review in Nature), and relatively short. I did not find any in my brief perusal that met such criteria and so I wrote my own and submitted it as a kind of gift (I usually don't have anything to do with forums)

Second, I wanted to draw attention to the concept of temporal motion. I believe it is a foundational concept that is essential to the development of "third-generation physics", and that it will lead to dramatic and fascinating insights, as well as to practical applications. But the subject is not for the faint-of-heart. A particular mindset is required to handle what, initially, seems to be a continuous stream of non-intuitive conclusions.

There are still many things that I did not mention in my essay that should be investigated. I'll mention one more here: high redshift astronomical objects.

Wikipedia under "Redshifts" states that "objects with the highest redshifts are galaxies." Galaxy IOK-1 has a redshift of z = 6.96. A certain quasar has z = 6.43. A certain radio galaxy is at a redshift of 5.2. Molecular material has been found with a redshift of 6.42. A gamma ray burst had a redshift of 6.7. All these redshifts imply speeds that are much greater than that of light. We need an explanation for these redshifts that will not make physicists laugh (as per Feynman; the redshift of the cosmic microwave background radiation leftover from the Big Bang, for example, is a whopping z = 1089. I think we should be laughing at that one, and the assumptions that underlie it.)

The most straight-forward interpretation of these figures is that these objects are engaged in temporal motion. In another blog I commented about the speed spectrum. From zero spatial speed at the left end we have to add 1c of speed to get up to the speed of light. And then we have to add another c to get to the temporal zero speed at the right end. And so the line is 2c in length. But that is only ONE "motional dimension". For three motional dimensions, the maximum should be 2^3c or a z of 8c maximum. An object moving at 8c would be completely non-local in a spatial reference system, and could not be seen as a discrete object.

Gamma ray bursts are yet another mystery. The one mentioned above had a z of 6.7. Do these come from discrete objects in our spatial neighborhood, kind of like super stars that burp gamma rays? Or are they something more exotic? Could they be temporal objects that are completely non-local from the spatial standpoint, but which undergo some sort of energetic burst that brings the speed of the material up to 8c from the temporal zero? This would place them at the far left end of the speed spectrum, and cause them to localize in space momentarily as identifiable, high energy, high redshift objects. (This also implies that there may be a whole class of objects out there that we cannot see, but which are giving hints of their existence, to a mostly unwilling audience.)

I am fascinated by these possibilities. But I do not have the time or resources to investigate them. The work is now up to you folks at this forum (and others like it). You are now embarked on an extraordinary and fascinating journey!

Brian F.

Pardon me for being a mathematical layman, but from what I can tell you gentlemen have given a possible definition of what 'Dark Matter/Energy' is: concentrations of mass in a different fram of temporal expansion. It's gravity, being instantaneous would exhibit the effects that we appear to see on mass in our own frame of temporal expansion yet we would not be able to see the photons that come from it because it is expanding at a different energy potential: one that does not interact with our own mass since it is in a totally different time location.

Your explanations would also appear to have a proof with what we know of Black Holes, in that the effects of the gravity from these objects exert a temporal force on the photons that is faster than the spatial motions of said photons, in essence, greater mass is equal to faster time effects in a spatial view. This also provides a mechanism for Hawkings Evaporation of said Black Holes in that they may well be evaporating in a temporal expansion via gravity. It may well be that while it takes more energy to increase one's speed in a spatial frame of reference, it may take LESS and Less energy to travel what appears to us to be faster in a temporal frame of reference. This may actually be the way that gravity operates: objects will settle towards the direction that takes the least energy, thus moving Towards the greater mass.

I may be totally wrong with my surmises kicked up by your discussion in the 15 minutes it took me to read them, but it certainly provides possibilities for modeling and food for thought does it not?? I thank you for your enlightening me (and expanding my temporal view of the Universe)

I can be reached at chucksweet@myway.com for e-mail

I had it pointed out to me that I had my symbols wrong, that time Slows Down in greater gravity fields due to the acceleration and Einstein's Theorem of General Relativity. Time in a greater gravity field would appear to be slower compared to our frame of reference however, objects would still settle to their lowest energy potential within the gravitational/temporal frame so rather than appearing faster, as I wrote above, they would appear to us to be Slower. Besides this, the other surmises would likely still hold true

Regarding Chuck Sweet's comments:

Thank you for refering to your comments here via the Cosmic Log forum (http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/07/13/1995171.aspx )

In my previous blog I stated: "This also implies that there may be a whole class of objects out there that we cannot see, but which are giving hints of their existence, to a mostly unwilling audience." I do NOT believe that this is the dark energy/dark matter currently being sought by the astromomers, so some clarifications are in order.

I was trying to suggest that there may be such things as "temporal stars" that are exactly like (statistically speaking) the spatial stars we see in the night sky. But instead of having the usual space/time makeup, these stars would have a time/space makeup. That means that from the standpoint of our spatial reference system, these temporal stars, if they exist, would have some kind of "inverse characteristics" about them. Specifically, their localized radiation in their system would be seen as non-local or widely diffuse "background" radiation from our standpoint. High frequency radiation would be seen as low frequency radiation. The atoms of the stars would be also be seen as non-local (diffuse, homogeneous, isotropic, high energy particles) with "inverse mass". And the graviation for temporal stars would be in coordinate time, instead of coordinate space.

The "Inverseness" requires that some sort of "unit quantity" be designated for calculational purposes. For radiation, the Rydberg frequency would be a good guess. If this is the case, these stars would manifest their existence as diffuse background radiation that is mostly in the infrared and microwave portion of the spectrum. However, there should also be some fairly abundant diffuse X-ray background. It turns out that all of these have been detected by modern astronomy. What is missing is a good interpretation that makes sense of it all.

The same reasoning also applies to the atoms of the temporal stars. They would likewise be non-local and constitue a diffuse background of high energy particles. They would have individual masses that are LESS than that of any atoms in the Periodic Table. Cosmic rays seem to fit this description, and again, what is missing is an explanation for their source.

I think the explanation will most likely be found in the concept of temporal stars.

Can characteristics of these two schemes ever become mixed together? Could spatial stars ever acquire temporal gravitation, for instance? If this is possible we should be able to find stars that are "inside out". That is, the heavy stuff (metals) gravitates to the surface, and the light hydrogen and helium, graviate to the center--just the opposite of what normally happens. Such stars, if they exist, would show spectra rich in metals, but "depleted" in hydrogen and helium. (Astronomy buffs, how about some factual feedback on this one?!)

I don't think that any of this solves the "dark energy" problem. But I believe that space progresses just like time. Space "expands" and tends to move stars and gaxalxies apart. Gravitation, however, moves them together. The expansion is linear and centerless; gravitation has a center and has an inverse square force distribution. This necessarily implies some kind of astronomical equilibrium distance where the "towards" motion of gravitation is exactly balanced by the "away" motion caused the progression/expansion of space. That may explain why globular clusters and galaxies do not collapse, but instead seem to be rather stable structures.

Your comments do indeed give food for thought. I have wondered about the Principle of Least Action in the context of temporal motion. (See Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_least_action

and

http://www.eftaylor.com/leastaction.html

for demonstrations.

Note that the Principle of Least action applies in a gravivational field (i.e.: temporal motion as per my essay).

Entropy is another one that may have its foundations in temporal motion. Unfortunately, I have not had time to investigate these topics and must leave them for others.

I believe Einstein was right about his cosmological constant (presumably the "dark energy" that I equate to the outward progression of space). I also wish Einstein had covered temporal motion. His relativistic correction (gamma) maps temporal motion into a spatial reference system. That is very insightful and useful, but really addresses only half the problem. And of course there are still the "paradoxes" that events in the temporal system produce when viewed from a spatial reference system. He could have clarified that too. And I have no doubt that he would have come up with a truly brilliant unified field theory had he considered this topic.

Brian F.

This gibberish of this article tells us far more about the author's ignorance of science, and physics in particular, than about the nature of time itself. His concepts of motion are far more immature, devoid of realism, than anything the ancient Greeks thought of.

If the author really wants to understand time he'll need to learn and do the mathematics of physics. Physics is not done in prose. It is obvious that the author is proudly ignorant of Albert Einstein's theories of relativity.

The entire article is a fairy tale. At best the author is simply intellectually lazy. At worst he dupes the reader to believe in his own self-delusion, self-con.

@Brian

Your article contents very fascinating and valuable ideas. I´m still thinking about them. And please ignore people like David W, they can only repeat what they once were taught! Of course, if your article is supposed to become a theory, then you would certainly need a lot of mathematics!

Einstein itself was first just thinking, and his theories of relativity initially based only on ideas. So I appreciate really anyone, who is thinking and trying to understand the real nature of the universe, like Einstein and others did before! A theory, even if it works very well, is not supposed to be a religion, a theory is supposed to be replaced by a better theory, which then hopefully could be verified by experiments. This is called scientific advance. But for a better theory we need new ideas, and a real scientist should always be open for any new ideas, even if -or sometimes because- they may be unusual.

By the way, bigmouth physicist David W: Can You tell us anything about the true nature of time or gravity?

The real friends of truth are those who are seeking it, and not those, who claim to already own it!

Interesting thoughts here, it is how math really should be seen to understand what is behind it.

I will give one different hint. In computer science exist many different models of time. First is Universal Continuous Time. It is the one people usually think as time, it is the same everywhere and measured by real numbers. Can be interpreted as time coordinate. But it does not exists, sorry about that. Second is Discrete Time, advancing by discrete ticks and measured by integer numbers that count ticks. It is better, classical single processor computer is well described by it. The main property is that tics can be counted, but there is no information about how long they are, meaning two different sources of ticks cannot be compared. This give the next time model, the Branching Time. This model systems that consist of multiple interconnected computers. Each computer have its own ticks, but periodically two ones synchronize by exchanging information. This create network of ticks with occasional synchronization points that make also some common metrics possible. If to look from far then it converge to the first model, to the Universal Continuous Time. Thus revealing mechanism of how Universal Continuous Time may be created.

So, may hint is that in elementary level the time, and may be also the space in general may be created as network of occasional synchronization of normally not synchronized events. The light and other massless carriers fit well for synchronizing agents.

À! C'était à peu près autant que il ya beaucoup de qui n'attend pour la droite.

This was pretty provided that there are a lot of out there just waiting for the right.

@Lex

Thanks for the encouragement.

Here is another new idea. It is about antigravity. The essay stated that the space/time dimensions of mass are t^3/s^3. Dimensions of other quantities can be worked out too. An electric field has the dimensions of t/s^3 . The second time derivative of an E field is therefore t^3/s^3, which is the same as the dimensions of mass. This means that a very rapidly changing electric field may have a "motional effect" just like mass. For the effect to be detectable, the change would have to be asymmetric, say with a fast rise time, followed by a slower decay time. A spark pulse would be an example. Are there any examples of such an effect? There seem to be at least two.

One is the Podkletnov Gravity Impulse Generator:

"Podkletnov maintains that a laboratory installation in Russia has already demonstrated the 4in (10cm) wide beam's ability to repel objects a kilometre away and that it exhibits negligible power loss at distances of up to 200km.聽 Such a device, observers say, could be adapted for use as an anti-satellite weapon or a ballistic missile shield."聽 ( Jane's Defence Weekly 29 July 2002, Anti-gravity propulsion comes 'out of the closet', By Nick Cook, JDW Aerospace Consultant, London)聽 See聽 http://www.gravity-society.org/

For a technical description see "Investigation of high voltage discharges in low pressure gases through large ceramic superconducting electrodes" ( Evgeny Podkletnov, Giovanni Modanese, 26 Apr 2003 (final version), http://www.arxiv.org/pdf/physics/0209051 )

Physicist Paul A. LaViolette states that "at a聽higher discharge voltage, of around 10 million volts, the gravity wave pulse became so strong that it was able to substantially dent a 1-inch thick steel plate and punch a 4-inch diameter hole through a concrete block!"

For a discussion and list of references, please see my article at:

http://scripturalphysics.org/4v4a/ADVPROP.html#MotionCancellers

An introduction to the math is at:

http://scripturalphysics.org/4v4a/motion_couplers.html

The other effect is the Biefeld-Brown effect. It uses a different technology, but still involves pulsed high voltage electric fields or electric fields with an asymmetric geometry. See:

http://scripturalphysics.org/4v4a/ADVPROP.html#Biefeld-BrownEffect

I hope people with "the right stuff" will investigate these ideas.

@Computer geek

Here is another view of time from my article "Intuitive Concepts in Quantum Mechanics" at: http://scripturalphysics.org/qm/qmconcpt.htm#EffectsOfSpin

"Finally, this is probably a good place to remind readers that our concepts of space and time come from motion. Motion is what we actually observe and measure. Our concepts of space and time are derived from the type of motion we observe. Motion is the primary concept (the basic "substrate"), whereas space and time are secondary concepts (or abstractions). Think of a box. The box has an "inside" and an "outside", but these are secondary concepts. They are not needed to construct a box; but if the box already exists, the concept of an "inside" and "outside" can then be defined in terms of the box. Without the box, the concepts cannot be defined. . . .

In Quantum Mechanics the spatial component of motion is fixed at one unit, and so quantum mechanical motion can [only] be translational temporal motion or rotational temporal motion. The latter leads to the concept of, literally, "rotational time". If you were accessing a world of rotational time, what would that world look like? Besides expecting it to be non-local, you would also expect it to be repetitive or periodic. So it is not surprising that the math of quantum mechanics involves many periodic functions like sine and cosine, complex exponentials, and various "wave" representations. These too are indeed the "effects of spin". "

The universal standard for motion is the speed of light. I believe it progresses as a quantized ratio: 1/1, 2/2, 3/3, etc. The "size" of the perceived time unit is thus linked to the space unit. Time can appear to be continuous even though it is apparently quantized. Space and time are symmetric about the speed of light, implying that they are somehow equivalent to each other (that whatever arguments apply to one, have to apply to the other; or that 1/3 is somehow equivalent to 3/1). Note that the ratio remains unchanging, even though the numerator and denominator are changing. This implies that the real "zero" for motion (no movement, no activity) is actually 1/1 -the speed of light! This has A LOT of implications in physics and implies that our view of the universe is indeed very skewed.

See also:

"In Search of the Geometry of Space, Time and Motion"

at

http://scripturalphysics.org/4v4a/ADVPROP.html#GeometrySpaceTimeMotion