Hi Lorraine, I don't disagree with the first two paragraphs.

In the final paragraph you say the 'underlying' universe "distinguishes". Do you just mean treats differently? I think you are over-complicating matters. Isn't it just the 'properties' you call 'categories of information', that could be called physical attributes are different from each-other in underlying material reality.

I think a sports car and and apple are different too, in a number of ways, that we can separate out and identify ( and might call properties, or categories of physical attribute e.g. distribution of mass, density of whole, material properties, volume. I don't think there needs to be the assumption the universe does the same. They (car, apple) just are different so behave differently. Physics applies to the whole objects too.

Distinguish: "Recognize or treat (someone or something) as different", https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/distinguish

Georgina,

The equations of physics show that the underlying universe "treats" mass differently to the way it "treats" position or charge. The universe does not treat apples differently to sports cars because the underlying universe does not distinguish an apple from a sports car.

The equations of physics do not apply to whole objects, the equations only apply to (e.g.) mass, position and charge.

Lorraine, how does the universe, the entirety of existence, treat things differently? You seem to be making an argument for involvement- that the entirety is doing something that is separable from what happens because of the condition of minute parts in certain contexts. "The equations of physics show that the underlying universe "treats" mass differently to the way it "treats" position or charge. " wrote Lorraine. I think physics just differentiates attributes that are different. The entirety of the universe is not involved, other than their being (unspoken) an assumption that the rules apply throughout the universe. The physics applies to the whole/ complete attributes of the objects- the whole mass of the car, the whole volume of the car etc. Different outcomes in a given scenario happen as the car and apple are existentially different.

Physics, the science, does treat attributes of objects as if separable. Certain aspects can be considered independently. However what is happening outside of the intellectual considerations, to real objects, is not separated out. Attributes such as, mass, volume, location, velocity, density are all aspects of the objects existence/ happening. They do not exist alone without the object but together contribute to what the object is/does.

Georgina,

The laws of physics are equations that show relationships between information. Physicists have found relationships between information; physicists have not found relationships between things like particles, apples and cars.

So the underlying universe "knows" information; it does not "know" things like particles, apples and cars. To say that the underlying universe knows a thing (e.g. a particle, apple or car) is to say that a set of basic identifying information has been given a higher-level classification as a "particle", "apple" or "car". Physicists know particles, apples and cars, but what physicists know is different to what the underlying universe "knows".

Lorraine I don't know what you mean by "knows". Like knowing but not exactly knowing; 'In a manner of speaking', is my understanding from the speak marks. Are you implying; comprehension?, perception?, awareness?, sentience?

What are your thoughts on concepts such as temperature, pressure, air flows and lift, resistance , voltage, current, magnetic flux, attraction and repulsion of charged particles, that are also parts of physics?

Georgina,

I have used loose terminology: I will put it another way.

There exists fundamental law of nature relationships (information relationships) representable as equations. These are "known by the universe" [1]. Categories like temperature and pressure are not "known by the universe", but are larger scale consequences of small-scale particle outcomes due to the fundamental law of nature relationships. Many of the "laws of physics" are in effect "laws of consequence".

What we call "temperature" and "pressure" is higher-level information, known by organisms because this knowledge is necessary to the survival of organisms which can only survive in a limited temperature and pressure range. Physics has mathematically represented and quantified the effects, consequences and regularities (e.g. temperature and pressure) that human beings have noticed. There is no need to get overawed by equations: they just our representations of something about the universe. Temperature and pressure are categories of information that don't exist at the particle, atomic or molecular (simple molecules) level: I think we can presume that particles, atoms and simple molecules are not trying to survive.

1. I don't mean that information abstractly exists in the universe, or that the universe is an actual entity that knows information. The basic units that "know" different levels of information are particles, atoms, molecules and living things.

Hi Lorraine,

You have argued that "Physicists have found relationships between information'...." So the underlying universe "knows" information; " I understand now that when you say " the universe "knows", you are referring to particles, atoms , molecules and living things "knowing". It doesn't follow that because physicists know, the underlying universe; particles, atoms etc., but not physicist, knows. Physicists have structural and functional brains that can process inputs into meaning. They also have memories and recall, allowing not just fleeting awareness but (learned) knowing. Particles, atoms and molecules can not know in the same way. They lack the wherewithal; the structural and functional organization. You still haven't explained the meaning of "knows" in speak marks.

Georgina,

You have correctly summed up what I wrote.

I am saying that no mysteries/ magic/ miracles occurred when living things, and later human beings, came on the scene. Both particles and living things (including human beings) know information. But with living things, information is more organised: it has been algorithmically analysed and collated. With particles, information is lower-level: it is not the type of knowledge that living things have. I put "know" in inverted commas because people, in their hubris, like to think that only human beings can know information.

Vitaly, in one of your papers you transformed t = i(tau). What is imaginary time? What is it like to go through it? What happens as you go back in time?

You two are great! On the one hand, physicists find relationships beteen information and on the other, there are no mysteries...

I still don't know the difference between particles and atoms "knowing" information (i.e. what that means) and atoms and particles just being and doing, according to their kind, within the contexts they encounter. How do the different ways of thinking differ so that "knowing is the preferable understanding of what is happening?

Knowing information necessarily means neural action potentials. Atom and particles do not know, but do make up the neural action of the brain. Without neural action, there can be no free will or free choice, only determinism with the randomness of chaos...

Steve, Lorraine is writing about a simpler "knowing " rather than the knowing of human beings/ higher animals. I am trying to understand what that "knowing" means.

10 days later

On the permanently dark side of the Earth, the stars would appear to stay in the same place in the sky.

Of course, the stars would, very slowly, move across the sky as the Earth revolved around the Sun.

9 days later

A View to Time, inter alia

The Big Picture - Universal Time

Carlo Rovelli presented in his book "The Order of Time" the fundamental idea that universe is consisting solely of processes, also matter is a process, chancing by time. Some processes might be reversible, so that of their point of view it makes no difference witch direction time flows. This are not Carlo's words, but universe itself is also a process, the mother of all processes, chancing by time. Universe is not a reversible process because it has continuously increasing entropy, therefore the time of universe is unidirectional. Particles may have different relative times, but it doesn't affect to universe's aging. GR's far observers time can be regarded as universe's general time, indicated f.e. by CMBR's aging, redshift, and entropy. Beyond cosmological horizon, universal time is flowing normally, we just cannot communicate there because of slow EM media.

Extreme cases - Zero Time

According to GR, in spacetime there exists objects of witch time flow goes to zero compared to far observers time.

The first case are particles at apparent (event) horizon of black holes. These seem to freeze to horizon and their time flow to stop. Their time does not proceed in practice at all, in Planck's time unit of the their proper time the hole universe could advance to the end of it's lifecycle, if particle would stay at horizon that short moment. In this zero time state, events are not finding time to proceed, all chemical and quantum processes would be stopped. And because of wave-particle duality, the matter stops acting as normal matter, and couldn't therefore either be contagious by gravity anymore. Matter's energy would all be transformed into gravity field, as bent spacetime. Therefore this timeless and energyless state is continuing inside horizon, too. The hole inside horizon would be filled by some kind of dead non-vibrating null energy, but information preserving, fluff or fuzz. It could awake to living matter again if touched by positive time, f.e. by the collision of black holes, therefore not allowed to escape.

The second case is light. At light's speed time stops too and traveler at light speed would also seem to froze from outer observer's point of view. But light's inner wave motion does not stop. This could be explained so, that light's energy doesn't go to absolute zero, it's not dead fluff or fuzz as in previous case. Light has a vanishing small mass-energy and therefore it's time flow doesn't go down to absolute zero.

There is also third exceptional phenomenon according to time flow, tangling. Tangled particles seem to be in two distant sites simultaneously, so that the information delivery about it's status is not spending any time at all. In this case, transferred information seems to be completely massless, no energy is transferred. Therefore the delivery speed is faster than light's speed, witch is transmitting mass-energy. GR is ok for massive particles, but real massless information could move faster, actually without spending any time at all.

Neither the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics nor those phenomenons described above are affecting to the big picture of time, there ain't no evidence of time travel.

a year later

1. Conspicuously lacking in this whole forum is discussion of McTaggart's A-series and B-series. It is necessary, in my opinion, to understand these to be up to date on the philosophy/physics of time as of 2020.

2. There are recent semi-popular books about time from Smolin, Carroll, Rovelli, and probably some others I am missing, that are interesting.

3. I hope I may be forgiven for referring to two of my own unpublished papers, but I think these might be of interest:

A Mathematical Definition of the Present and its Duration

https://philpapers.org/rec/MERAMD-4

Non-locality in the AB-time interpretation of quantum mechanics

https://philpapers.org/rec/MERNIT

    10 days later

    There exists no known evidence of the presence or elements of, an actual thing or force, called time. There is no practical reason for an actual thing or force called time, to exist.

    Hi Kuyukov,

    The universe (spacetime continuum) is about 150 billion light years across. 13.7billion years ago, at the big bang, it was smaller than a pea (some say it was even smaller, approaching the Planck scale). Yet the speed of light is the speed limit of the universe; in fact, we're told that all inertial frames are subject to the invariance of the speed of light. So how can the universe be 12x larger than its age in light years?

    Another question is: we're told that quantum mechanics and general relativity should be able to unify. I think it can. I think the graviton actually does exist. I just think we will be surprised to find out how it really behaves. The very idea of describing the graviton as a particle, as if were something that will always be small, is how nature has fooled us. There is no reason why the graviton cannot have a radius that changes in time, dr/dt = c or r = ct. The graviton probably comes from the Planck scale and expands outwards with a spherical geometry. There are 10^80 particles in the universe; all of which are part of one or more quantum systems. Every quantum system is solved for by calculating the wave function solution to the Schrodinger equation. Yet, the philosophy of the physics community says that the wave function is only a mathematical calculation and has no existence beyond that.

    There are operators in quantum mechanics for momentum, position, spin states. The whole idea of calculating [eq](PSI^*)(PSI)[/eq] is to get the probability that a particle is in one of those states. Sort of like if you lose your keys and you're trying to figure out which room they're in. It looks to me like particles of made up of the excitations states of gravitons.

    I think that gravitons are not conserved. They are constantly being created. They are quanta of spacetime. They begin as a point, expand at the speed of light. They become part of quantum systems and become the "things" that wave functions are describing. Or, they can expand very quickly, overlap, interact, and become part of spacetime.

    Jason