Dear Kate Becker,

You wrote,

For the better part of a century, physicists have been trying to reconcile the contradictions between quantum mechanics and general relativity. Both of these complex systems rely totally on assuming that the universe am constructed of a finite amount of matter and a finite amount of space. If that were the case, there would be a finite measurable time. Guess what? There am no space. The real visible Universe consists only of one single unified visible infinite surface occurring in one single infinite dimension that am always illuminated by infinite non-surface light.

Joe Fisher, Realist

Dear Kate Becker,

You wrote, "For the better part of a century, physicists have been trying to reconcile the contradictions between quantum mechanics and general relativity." Both of these complex systems rely totally on assuming that the universe am constructed of a finite amount of matter and a finite amount of space. If that were the case, there would be a finite measurable time. Guess what? There am no space. The real visible Universe simply consists only of one single unified visible infinite surface occurring in one single infinite dimension that am always illuminated by infinite non-surface light.

Joe Fisher, Realist

Correction. Light is finite, therefore, the real visible Universe consists of one single unified visible infinite surface occurring in one single infinite dimension that am mostly illuminated by finite non-surface light.

Joe Fisher, Realist

Sorry, but the topic is already described and proved. It was somewhere on ResearchGate.

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QuanTime sounds like an idea whose time has come.

With one caveat. In Quantum Mechanics, random action is assumed to be the foundational condition without any qualifying argument. It simply "is", and the preferred paradigm of an existential physical universe. For there to be a "reason" for randominity, would be to introduce a foundational causality. So we can state unequivocally that QM is "perfectly random". And that's the rub.

Psychologically we are hard-wired with an instinctive need for a sense of order, it pervades our conscious rational intellectualism as an unspoken notion. Underlying all else, there is an expectation that there must be some fundamental perfection to the universe. On one hand Quantum randominity challenges that instinctive assumption; order arises from chaos. Yet on the other hand, that very randominity is an assumed paradigm of universal perfection.

So perhaps the face on the Quantum Clock might be "imperfection". The impeccable accuracy of prediction by QM is baked into the procedural methodology by design, which assumes perfect randominity. But what if not even the universe always works perfectly, all the time, everywhere at every scale? If only occasionally, for no reason other than that inherent imperfection, some event that could, should or would happen, simply doesn't; the entire probability landscape would become profoundly altered. There would be no means of predicting where or when that imperfection would occur. But the bifurcations would become entirely different none the less. That would be truly random but not in a way that could be called perfectly so. And a causal clock could still operate properly. Just not perfectly. jrc

Interesting idea. Though there is something a bit odd about the notion of perfectly random. If something is random sequences of what appear to us order can occur just like other un-ordered sequences. If there were no ordered sequences, they were all excluded, it would not be truly random. Does something profoundly different happen when order arises from chaos? Maybe. It might be an opportunity for growth of further order but it would really depend upon the particulars of the scenario. I suppose crystallization could serve as an example. A molecule moving randomly in a solution chances upon a suspended string and is stopped by it.As that continues to happen layers build up.

I think you are right about psychology. I have been thinking about the way in which we think of scale, which is affected by our experience of a particular resolution of what is seen. I also wonder about those places where an outcome is not constrained to one possibility. As a human faced with multiple choice I might stop and think about the options, I might even become temporarily 'paralyzed' weighing up the value/potential harm of the choices. But the whole Object universe doesn't act with human psychology as a motivation. So i presume it just 'chooses' one option, there not being the material substance for multiple material outcomes relating to every possible choice. Yet if so how? i think it may come down to the tinniest factions of values that differentiate them, so the seemingly equivalent choices actually are not. That ties in with the Object universe being a chaotic system in which there is, ultimately, imprecise order, and complexity and organisation which are (over different time scales for different kinds of system (at different scales) ) transient states.

I did not mean 'tiniest' literally but in a manner of speaking. Referring to those values that are smaller than generally considered significant. So they are not considered, yet could make all the difference between one scenario or another playing out.

This article presents some very good technical work but does fail to mention a few interesting links and arguments. First of all, the very technical paper is arxiv:The Pauli objection and there is a nice G video:Criticisms to Time Quantization presentation as well.

The technical paper is difficult and the video is technical, but does explain things better. Essentially Maccone introduces a kind of hidden variable or pilot wave to define a kind of Bohmian time that exists independent of a quantum system.

These kinds of hidden variable approaches are very popular right now because they result in very complicated math and are usually impossible to test by measurement. So there are any number of different papers that seem all too familiar to multiversy, stringy, and loopy notions that then can all argue endlessly with each other. All involve complex math and theories that are not possible to test with measurement...and yet, they continue to evolve and propagate.

Maccone's observer clock is a particle on a determinate geodesic path in spacetime and the quantum jumps along that geodesic path are the quantum jumps for a quantum clock. The key notion is that this clock is independent of a quantum system and so keeps an independent quantum time that always runs in one direction.

Of course, the conundrum of a quantum clock is that there is no prefered direction and so giving a quantum clock a prefered direction makes it a classical and not a quantum clock. This approach just seems to surround a classical clock with a lot of quantum math but of course atomic clocks are already the clocks of classical science and relativity. This approach goes a long way around to end up back at the same place they started. The geodesic path of Maccone's quantum clock gives the determinate time of relativity while the uncertainty of Maccone's quantum system gives the indeterminate confusion of a quantum clock's past and future.

Maccone does appear to be on the right track in that determinate geodesics are a direct result of quantum gravity actions. However, there remains a fundamental uncertainty between the conjugates of matter and action along that determinate geodesic path. Since a collection of matter actions comprise a particle's path, it is the decoherence of those matter actions that then determines their sequence and therefore determines the direction of time.

Discrete quantum aether includes the uncertainty of past and future but it is aether decay that then points the direction of both quantum and classical times. Since the quantum and gravity clocks now both emerge from same aether decay of a collection of matter actions, there is no confusion of time.

    Maybe the Object universe is 'irrational', in that there is always a difference between options at some place beyond the the decimal point- so to speak. Maybe it is a human scale issue that we see rational number solutions, overlooking the extremely tiny differences. Or tying in with John's idea that we seek order, perhaps the tiny differences are seen as inaccuracies, because they spoil the neatness. Rather than considering being them the natural 'roughness'.

    Still not sure i said that quite right. I'm proposing that maybe there always will be a hypothetical relation value that makes a difference in likelihood of the outcome, though it may be many places away from the decimal point. I mean there possibly isn't constraint to 'finite' rational number values that must pertain. Given the irrational number sequence beyond the decimal point is infinite and the variable profile for an object will contain many different values pertaining to relations with its surroundings It is extremely likely there is a difference in likelihood somewhere in the variable profile aggregations for two seemingly (without sufficient fine detail examination and discrimination) identically likely outcomes.

    I think i am probably saying that in a way that will make mathematicians cringe. I understand the values are finite rational numbers but the sequence of the abstract numbers from which the values of (individual variables pertaining to) the outcomes can be drawn do not have to be. They could be infinite. So there is always another very slightly different value if finer discrimination is used. As humans we are used to having a set discrimination range, that relates to the discrimination of our sensory system. When enhanced by technology it is then limited to the resolution that technology permits. Yet the Object reality is that all scales co-exist and our level of discrimination applied to a scenario is artificial.

    How that affects determinism: Rather than many possible equally likely outcomes doing away with determinism, as i had hoped, there is with the new suggestion, determinism but in a chaotic universe. Which could give the effect of randomness because the infinitesimal differences within relation profiles are unknown. We don't know why it does this and not that but at some scale of discrimination there is a value that makes the difference. It could be thought of as the butterfly effect but operating at an extremely small scale A very small difference having a relatively large effect.

      Thanks Steve,

      that was well and plainly written. I appreciate your providing information about Maccone's work while keeping your own interpretation aside. That's good editorial practice in my book. jrc

      Georgina,

      yehh, that's the bone of contention between quantum and classical, discrete vs. continuous. From here to infinity, where does symmetry break? And, I think, it's that conundrum which persuades most to cut the Gordian Knot and just go with granular Quantum. Like Marx did after chasing a dialectic that would come full circle and make human nature ultimately beneficent, until he got finally exasperated and said, "Oh Hell! Rebel! :-)

      John, even accepting quantum for the states of things there still is the question of why random.

        Dear Georgina Woodward and John Cox,

        Reality does not consist of humanly contrived finite abstract complex ideas. Please try to remember that Nature must have built the only eternal simplest construct of the real visible Universe obtainable millions of years before man ever appeared on the planet. There am only one single unified visible infinite surface occurring in one single infinite dimension that am mostly illuminated by finite non-surface light.

        Joe Fisher, ORCID ID 0000-0003-3988-8687. Unaffiliated

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        The notion of spacetime doesn't imply that phenomena and spacetime are identical manifestations of an underlying reality. In QFT we have the conviction that the main quantum fields (existent everywhere in the universe) create reality (observable and non-observable phenomena). The Planck-Einstein relation - energy of the electromagnetic wave related to frequency - shows that the wave length is a constant. Thus the wave length of every electromagnetic wave is a multiple of the "standard length". The consequence is that time is a constant too.

        However, what is the cause of relative time? That is really simple because the invariance of the speed of light, length and time shows that the conservation of energy is also a conservation of all the quantum transfer in space. Thus the amount of quanta transfer is related to volume (space). And that's just what we observe when an altering particle has a velocity of nearly the speed of light. The "internal" alterations of the particle are slowed down because of the conservation of quanta transfer in space. In fact, annihilation shows that mass is a number of concentrated quanta. The reason that mass carrying particles don't move with the speed of light has the same cause, the conservation of quanta transfer in space.

          Georgina,

          I quite agree. Which also is why I kind of like the notion of an imperfect universe. It relieves the problem that you lay out on an infinitely long number line where a choice has to be made at some point where the value becomes so small as to trivialize out of what would be analytically a reversible computation. Imperfection suggests that it isn't so much a correlation to mathematical choice, but a random physical failure to progress. Albeit at a relatively low value of causal response at quantum scale, and at macro extremes being comparable relative to large numbers.

          Its an interesting idea, and I do agree that excluding at least a philosophical rationale for randominity is an Achilles Heel for QM. jr

          W. Benshy,

          In any given Quantum Field which might be any given multiple of Planck Value energy, does QFT view that 'internal' alteration at velocity in terms of density variability? And Does QFT provide a volumetric for a unitary Quantum Field at relative rest, and how does one field volume meld with the energy quantity(s) of surrounding field volumes? In short, has QFT advanced to where a Quantum Field can be defined as a volume of energy creating a specific spherical boundary within which energy density varies continuously between empirical upper and lower bounds in accord with inverse square law? Thanks, jrc

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          @John R. Cox,

          I am not a native speaker of the English language so maybe I misinterpret your comment partly.

          There is no consensus about the exact structure of the main quantum fields but at least there must be 1 scalar field and 1 vector field. The structure of the combined field - in relation to the volume of the universe - is fixed. Thus there are 2 kinds of alterations: alterations between the structure of the "solitary" fields and mutual alterations between both fields. An example of the latter is rest mass (energy from the scalar field - Higgs field - to the vector field).

          Within the QF the transfer of an object from A to B isn't real. It is a transfer of "properties" within the structure of the combined fields. The "properties" have a discrete value (h) because the volume of the combined fields is invariant. Alterations within and between the fields are constant, synchronized and therefore topological. Not because someone likes the concept but because of mathematical/physics laws. So it is easy to understand why our universe is non-local and why the velocity of a local alteration (1 quantum) is the constant speed of light.

          The total amount of topological deformation/alteration in our universe is constant. However, we see concentrations of quanta (e.g. particles) thus phenomena are the result of spatial transformations (invariant alteration). That's why a concentration of mass (e.g. a galaxy) is obtained from the "emptiness" around. However, when all the alterations are constant and synchronized every "grain" of the structure of the QF alters at the same "speed" and time ("grain" = spatial unit). Thus quanta transfer in space is conserved (like the main law of physics - the conservation of energy - shows). So there is quanta transfer everywhere in space, at any time and between every "grain" to/from adjacent "grains".

          When we observe a local concentration of quanta (particle) the volume of the particle is just a small number of "grains" but the number of quanta (deformation) within the boundary is enormous. The transfer of the particle from 1 point within the structure of the QF to another point - that's some "grains" away - is limited to the speed of light. Now the transfer of all the quanta will last much longer so we say that the velocity of the particle is less than the speed of light.

          So there is already a "quantum clock" and there are "quantum rulers". Relative time and curved spacetime emerge from the creating quantum fields. Relative time is caused by the decrease of internal alterations of a fast moving object (or by a strong gravity field) and curved spacetime is forced by the scalar field. It is the scalar field that influences the direction of the alterations within the vector field.

          I hope that this comment covers your questions.