The Fundamental Nature of Time by Edwin Eugene Klingman

I had to make a new post sorry I oouldn't reply to your first comments.

Thank you and a big thanks to Armin as well (he sent me a reply that made clear what he meant by his comments).

Your comments have been wonderful and I really do appreciate your time and effort in responding. Since I cannot work how to put equations and images into this post I have attached a PDF it contains Peter Jackson's red/green sock trick and a "two slit" diagram as well. Also if you have more question see the first post in my thread there is a FAQ rejoinder. Your and Armin's remarks and deep intuitions have been very very helpfulAttachment #1: Edwin.pdf

Ed,

That is an excellent answer. I believe I owe you a few beers:-)

Very Best Regards and Good Luck,

Gary Simpson

Dear Mr. Klingman,

your essay is interesting indeed.

I would be glad if you find a moment to go through my essay, and to have a discussion about convergences and differences between our works.

Best of luck,

Flavio

Thank you for the answer. I accept your point about not being able to represent Einstein given the space limitation. I also agree that Poincare's conventionalism has long-since been surpassed by Einstein's relativity. In fact a lot of people fail to understand the difference in Poincare's philosophical view and therefore claim he discovered relativity before Einstein. He was almost there but not quite. It is easy for us to see the right idea now but at that time conventionalism must have seemed like a reasonable alternative to some.

I posted this on Gary D. Simpsom comments --

I try to justify +i and -i and the pure number i=c with c(metre)=i(sec)

Read the 4-square essay by Gary Simpson here https://fqxi.org/data/essay-contest-files/Simpson_Four_Squares_rev00.pdf

here is my comment on Equation 1 below the double lines

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Every time I read your essay I seem to understand, it more and more.

I have a couple of questions about Equation 1

(a² + b² + c² + d²)u² = f²u²

A quote page 3

"The meaning of Equation 1 is that in a 4-D geometry, if a right triangle is constructed from an integer number of basis lengths in each of the four dimensions (a, b, c, and d), then the hypotenuse (f) that traverses through the 4-D space will also have an integer number of the basis lengths."

In Equation 1

Clearly it is the area u² that is common to both sides. Since its area's four squares when summed gives a transcendent "number" to both (a² + b² + c² +d²) and the area f². So if we have a 5-d hypotenuse cut from area f² within our 4-d space-time based on a well understood four squares geometry with an invariant length "the square root of s²". How do you avoid this "cut" being s and not the area s²=(a² + b² + c² +d²) which what equation 1 is saying. That the total area of (a² + b² + c² +d²) times the common area u² equals the common of area of u² times the area f². And ever body knows that (the sign of s²) times (the sign of area u²) equals (the sign of area u²) times (the sign of the area f²).

"Yes, I am treating an octonion as a bi-quaternion. That is what makes the multiplication table work.

The matrix multiplication is interesting. If the complex i commutes normally with the unit vectors, the coefficient matrix uses B. But if the complex i anti-commutes with the unit vectors, the coefficient matrix uses B*."

Bi-quaternions are just directed areas, that is, an area with a + and - sign. Clearly the matrix works because we have the invariant area ijk which then allows us to use octonian logic "based on + and - signs" which are attached to the bi-quaternions' areas. Hence in equation 1 the need of the 5-d hypotenuse cut from the area f² in our 4-d world which is based on an invariant four squares space-time summation.

Your 5-d area's four squares summation gives us the length of 4-d hypotenuse "the invariant length of the square root s²" not the total invariant area summation. You have 4-d areas with a 5-d hypotenuse length of the four squares for the area f². We have literally have a 5-d hypotenuse length within our 4-d space-time that any four square summation must obey. Since the area of u² is the one common transcendental number that bridges both sides of Equation 1, while the 5-d hypotenuse is an invariant 4-d length that any summation must have available to have closure for the geometry of the area of f².

A number (which is a perfect square) is the summation of four squares. If the area of f² is n square metres d²ct, then the physical manifestation of that area is a n invariant unit lengths of dct in our 4-d space-time. Not an area. We have an area f² on the right RHS, then on the LHS, equation 1 has a 5-d hypotenuse cut -- length c(metre) -- an invariant length that, by the 4-S theorem and equation 1 - each and every, any and, all - four square invariant summations must obey within our space-time.

Of course your multiplication matrices Eq 5.4 and Eq 5.5, clearly ties "i" with c(metre), via the common area u² which is on both sides, where we have units of the summation of transcendental i if we use the 4-S theorem on both sides at once but using your multiplication rules A,B*,A,B* for - and + sign matrix Eq 5.3, which is, after all, a + and - sign summation using "octonian" logic directed bi-quaternion areas i.e. the column [C,D], using Eq 4.1 about a stationary "ijk" invariant the area f², using f a length "the square root of the area of f²" to transverse the equal sign, Equation 1 uses a 5-d length, so cannot be associated 1-1 with a summation of four square labelled A,B,C,D thought of as a "a perfect number as an area". It is - the area u² - that is, the common "four square summation" i.e. the perfect square, that spans the equal sign using the 4-S theorem on both sides of Equation 1. A number (which is a perfect square) is the summation of four squares). Your Eq 5.3 is a dance using A,B,C,D where A,B,C,D do integral steps on directed areas ALL on the geometry of the area of ijk. More simply the dance is with the directed areas which have a + or - sign, that is, i and * are not moving, i.e. they don't lead! It is --- i and * --- that are stationary and it is Eq 5.3 that moves areas that equal + or - throughout a basic multiplication table page 6, clearly Eq 5.3 only gives the square root of s², a length not an area for how the multiplication table works in your matrices Eq 5.4 and Eq 5.5.

The full 4-S multiplication "of the areas on both sides of Equation 1" is:-

(the sign of the area (a²+b²+c²+d²)) times (the sign of the area u² on the LHS) equals (the sign of the area u² on the RHS) times (the sign of the area f²).

You will find Eq 5.3 octonian area + and - logic uses only the "square roots for the area u²" on the LHS for the bi-quaternions areas plus and minus signs attachment. That is, it is the common area of the transcendent "number" (a summation of four squares) which transverses the equal sign in Eq 1. as perfect numbers). Not your A,B*,A,B*,-,+ matrix dance Eq 5.3. which is after all + and - sign summation using "octonian" logic directed bi-quaternion areas i.e. the column [C,D]; clearly uses Eq 4.1 a stationary "ijk" invariant the area f².

More simply, the area of f² is ijk equals -1 and then we take the square root of the area of ijk. that is, √-1 the imaginary unit. Clearly the full 4-S multiplication table for the "equal sign" invariant + and - unit count across the equal sign for Equation 1 is a transcendent dimensional process with "a unit of the square root of the area u² (see below)"; we will call the invariant unit of the times table a "sec"" for the area of the total summation of the area of the four squares of space-time. Then the 5-d hypotenuse cut would have a pure number a "transcendental" 5-d number c=i and it's "4-d length" of the times table is i(sec). The full 4-S sign multiplication times table used for how the LHS and RHS signs of the area u² common area behave across the equal sign, are;

same signs on the LHS and RHS give +ve while different signs on the RHS and LHS give -ve.

Or the appearance of the bridge (common area) across the equal sign is in units of -- +i and -i -- that is how we cross the equal sign using the area of u² on the LHS and using the area of u² on the RHS.

Gary said in my comments

You have some interesting ideas but they are very speculative. Essay contests such as this are a good place to present such ideas:-)

I don't think you can set i=c or i=h but I do think you can construct something similar to the following:PSI = exp(omega) = sqrt[1 - (v/c)^2] + (v/c)i

Then for v=c, PSI=i. I looked at your work instead, to see how you bridged with a common 5-d length (of the square root of f²) the areas on both sides of the equal sign. Your method mixes lengths with areas across the equal sign. While in the full 4-S, it is the four sums of +i and -i that are the "invariant count" lengths of the area u². The hypotenuse of the area geometry of f² is an invariant 5-d length "f" which isn't an area on the LHS.

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Hello Edwin,

Thank you for your comments on my essay and apparent rating of 7, it's only the second rating I've had - and thanks for saying you enjoyed reading it immensely, and that it deserves to be doing better than it is.

I'm glad we both think (the apparent flow of) time is not emergent, as the 2015 experiment I've outlined makes it harder to take that view. Although it needs reproducing, the experiment had press coverage at the time, as it showed for the first time that the world at the quantum scale is not reversible, but is subject to entropy, just as in the large-scale world. It leaves time very much unexplained.

I've seen quite a few attempts to explain the direction of time, where the given cause turns out to be a process, needing another flow of time underneath it. I don't know about your idea that the direction of time arises from the self-interaction of the gravitational field, but any forces (or pseudo forces) are at risk of needing time already in place, if they are to have what we call effects - just as cause and effect implies a time sequence.

Good luck, best regards,

Jonathan

Edwin Klingman,

[My pledge: goo.gl/KCCujt] First I will assess your essay, then discuss your conclusions. Positives:

-- Wow, you know your targets well! I sort of kept hoping for Maxwell to drop by to, but it would have distracted Einstein from the main topic. I think the main reason that Einstein never modified SR after GR forced him back to the ether was , well... he couldn't quite figure out how to do it? You really need a more modern computer modeling concepts of how to handle binding times to implement the virtual frames with absolute fidelity, and that concept suite and was flatly not available to him. So ironically, he stayed block universe to keep SR happy, even as he defined a unique "ether slice" sequence that was curved but on average remained orthogonal to your universal simultaneous time.

-- I like very much that you pulled out the GR ether connection. People still are shocked by that, and at the time Einstein's fellow physicists tried very hard to pretend Einstein never went back to the ether. There is an attraction in the mathematical symmetries of SR that is incredibly appealing to many folks, especially if you are mathematically inclined. The idea that such symmetries might be nothing more than virtual limits in a reality that like to fake people out does not appeal in the same way, unless you happen to be more computer-science-ish in mind set.

-- You pull in lots and lot of really good, highly specific threads of though, though there are so many that a seriously deep look at them could take days or months (or years).

-- Your conversation format is entertaining, though at times it makes it a bit difficult to recognize exactly what the main point is going to be.

Negatives:

-- You pull in lots and lot of really good, highly specific threads of though, though there are so many that a seriously deep look at them could take days or months (or years).

-- Your conversation format is entertaining, though at times it makes it a bit difficult to recognize exactly what the main point is going to be.

-- My standard complaint: The intent of the FQXi request as I read it was to write an essay on how to recognize a fundamental theory, rather than write an essay to provide a fundamental theory.

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Now, let's see if I understand your point (I may not!). When you end by saying:

"the fundamental nature of time as universal simultaneity"

I think you are saying that there exists a singular curved foliation of spacetime, which Einstein in his post-GR years would have called "the ether", in which all causality unfolds at the "same time" (e.g. as measured by a hypothetical solid sheet of tiny clocks all making synchronized hand-shake time measurements with their immediate neighbors).

That is of course utterly heretical to SR perspectives, because it would make that single foliation absolutely unique and the only "real" source of causality. However, again, it is not even all that difficult from a computer simulation perspective to define structures in which the primary foliation creates asymmetric embedded virtual foliations -- other frames -- that internally look exactly like the primary frame though a combination of directionally-dependent early and late binding of causal events in the primary frame. In fact, you can do that so well that there is no way to distinguish internally between the cases... which is of course exactly what SR requires!

Again, assuming that I'm even understanding you correctly, your frame of temporal simultaneity would almost certainly be the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) frame, the frame that has undergone the least number of acceleration-deceleration events over the history of the universe. As long as matter in that CMB frame remains unaccelerated, any other matter in the universe that "come to visit" the lazy CMB matter will be guaranteed to have less elapsed time; that is, the CMB frame will always have the fastest time in such comparisons, and no arrangement of other matter in the universe can overcome that speed advantage, no matter how you arrange the test.

The CMB frame will also be the only frame that "sees" the real minimum energy of the universe as it looks out and assesses the total relativistic energy of the rest of the universe. Any frame moving relative to the CMB will see overly high energy totals.

So, your "single simultaneous time" will both be the fastest possible time in the universe -- which just makes sense if it is the real driver of all causality in all possible frames -- and it will be the home of the only accurate "view" of the total mass-energy of the universe.

Finally, I think a test for the existence of such a primary frame - that is, for your simultaneous-time ether foliation -- may in fact exist, but it will necessarily be a very subtle test. I brought this issue up in a comment under Del Santo (topic 3017).

Hi Edwin,

Thank you. I think the concepts we use when we think about these things are so dependent on an implied flow of time, that it's hard to remove that. You mention 'action', as in 'interaction' or 'self-interaction' - to me you can't explain time with those concepts, because you need time already in place to use them, as they wouldn't exist. You say there's only one thing that exists, so it can only interact with itself, but if so, in some sense it has 'moving parts'.

So it's hard to 'get underneath time' in order to do any physics and try to explain it, for instance with a mechanism, because it's hard to find a mechanism that would work at all - mechanisms need time if they are to work.

And I think mathematical concepts are equally at risk of having this kind of problem, or more so, as they're often two steps away from what we need to get at, instead of one.

I felt there were four or five main avenues for getting to a better understanding of time, and explored them while trying to write a book. The conclusion was that all of them, without exception, are blocked in some way. I then looked at the question of whether any of them might become unblocked if there was a fundamental change to the underlying assumptions, and found that one of them, and only one, had the possibility of becoming unblocked.

I'm all for creative thinking on the subject, and don't want to sound otherwise, but I think the way people take time out of the mathematics, and feel they can move things around here and there, is often inappropriate. Incidentally, Huw Price, who takes absolutely the opposite view from me, is also very strict about removing a pre-existing flow of time from our thinking. But he does that for different reasons!

Anyway, best regards,

Jonathan

Dear Edwin.

Thank you for kindly comments

I agree many points in your essay, concerning fundamental question, is very interesting as it gives rationally explanations that focus most imortart fundamental aspects of nature of the Gravity and light which I also have implications of 19th century's benefits of philosophy linked physics namely Classical Physics.

"TK: No. I hope we can discuss the proposition that: all light propagates in local gravity. Photons have energy, hence mass, and bend in gravitational fields"

It suggests that even photon mass was included the concept mass energy equivalence.

Considering the points of your coments I will focus on it more and will discuss later.

". My suggestion would be to focus on mass and charge, in terms of gravitational fields and electromagnetic fields, as described in equation 1 in my essay. You state that "strong and weak force are both a gravitational force." Since gravitation interacts with itself, while the electromagnetic field does not have charge, so does not interact with itself, we have a linear field and an interacting nonlinear field. I do not believe the situation has been......"

In fact this hypothesis is based on idea that is a collectively view " picture in mind" of all scientific theories and facts. Deeply thinking to many possible imaginations considering Nature's similarities and after choosing one rechecked and compared its relation to the facts. Since this Hypothesis is based on scientific ingredients it must agree/confirm all known facts and also recorrect it's interpretation or make predictions. By searching some parallel approaches in the contest I found many related in somehow but focusing deeply on specific aspect. In other words, I believe that all scientific facts are somehow right, no matter whether it's classical Physics or Quantum Mechanics, except of some fundamental interpretations.

I think what is missing is only (interpretation) fundamental theory that compiles all scientific theories into same ground (same basis). Since this Hypothesis is a different view, it's basics assumption is that clustering process of the Nature began with absolutely one kind of extremely large quantity of small-sized particles (photon) and one kind of attraction force (Gravity) as it may agree with Big Bang event, There are some expected communication Challenges it may face and overcomes namely;

Terminological metaphors may make term confussion unless redefinition, example; "Photon is particle that gives elementary charge (e) character and basic energy quanta (1eV) therefore its really the natures elementary particle" may sound quite strange.

It may be far from the Current Physicist's way of viewing the Nature's Physical phenomenon ( expectations ), and best communication would be Spherical Geometrical modelling. I think similar principle that the architect and philosopher, Buckminster Fuller used.

Under consideration of gravitational force as basic with categories;

Linear interaction interactions: electrostatic force and planet's centrifugal force.

Non liniear interactions: Orbiting object( charged vs non charged or magnetic non magnetic) influencing other external particles(electro, gravity, magnetic,........ Dynamics) Electromagnetic waves as Gravitational waves type (dynamics charged particle)

and Spherical quantum modeling of charged/neutral magnetic.... and its detection system (giver and sensor) could be good, for studying and simulating Nature of particle clusters and related effects, such as Quantum correlation/monogamy, intermolecular forces, multi spatial dimensions string theory, I propose simplest octopole magnitetic cube like. Spherical clustered particles of rotating (dynamics). In other words spherical modelling of homogeneous spheres packed could reveal secrets and the beauty behind Physical science Mathematics. It would be necessary studying both matter formations and related effects and relationship between our number sequence, parity and quantum such as;

Electron proton Neutron Neutronstar. Black hole.

Pauli exclusion, Nuclear Magic numbers, DNA cell...

Elementary quanta can be applied to al matter.

We know necessary fundamental constants namely elementary energy E (1eV) for single elementary particle and speed of light (c) hence we can accurately calculate it's proportionality to any particle charged, neutral or both. The ratios of Energy and mass are exactly same, and no any other particle which can have such property.

[math]\[n\frac {M_{earth}}{m_{photon}}=\frac {E_{earth}}{e_{photon}}=\frac {Mc^{2}}{mc^{2}}=3.35*{10^{60}}n\][/math]

Best regards

Bashir

Thanks Edwin,

I've said that neither a mechanism, nor anything with moving parts, can explain time, or generate time, because those things need time to exist already. There are quite a few examples of attempts to explain time with concepts like those.

Then there are attempts to explain the direction of time, by saying it emerges from thermodynamics. One of several problems with this is that emergence itself is a process, so it's another of those concepts that needs time if it's to function. And it's hard to make something that moves and changes emerge out of something that doesn't.

Another problem with this is a point near the top of page 2 of my essay, which I'd say entirely removes emergent time, and shows it not to work. A third problem with emergent time is the 2015 experiment, which found entropy at the quantum scale, and time working just as it does in the large-scale world, showing the reversibility we imagined at that scale was false.

Illusion time is also removed - emergent time is a wider set of possibilities, which includes illusion time, as illusion time would be an emergent effect.

So this is part of a process of elimination I've done, where I think we can get clues about what time really IS like, by eliminating various pictures that it ISN'T like. That's what my book's about, and the essay is a potted version, with some of that process. And yes, I ruled out all avenues except one, which though also blocked, had a blockage that could be removed, with a change to the underlying assumptions. Then, exploring that particular avenue, and the solution it offers, you get the change to the assumptions that it leads to, and selects out of many possibilities.

Yes, good discussing these things with you, best regards,

Jonathan

Edwin Eugene,

You had me at Einstein, until you went all Newton on me!

Find a perfect clock in my essay.

Nevertheless, decent score. :-)

All best,

Tom