The Nature of Time

Vesuvius Now

Perspectival QM and Presentism: a New Paradigm

We motivate and develop a perspectival A-theory of time (future/present/past) and probe its implied interpretation of quantum mechanics. It will emerge that, as a first take, the time of relativity is a B-series (earlier-times to later-times) and the time of quantum mechanics is an A-series. There is philosophical motivation for the idea that mutual quantum measurement happens when and only when the systems' A-series become one mutual A-series, as in the way qualia work in the Inverted Spectrum. This seems to account for certain quantum phenomena, including that the electrons of a Bell pair do not have definite spins until measurement, as 'until' here is a (perspectival) A-series notion. Various issues in the foundations of quantum mechanics are canvassed.

http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/18921/

Georgina Woodward

Correction. Looking at the listing on Amazon.com, it says 'independently published' So maybe I'm the publisher. I thought it was Kindle as I used their software make the cover, upload the paperback book and get an ISBN. I didn't use my own ISBN.

Amazon are starting to print in Australia. So it may be possible to get the book if outside of USA.

Jonathan Dickau

I am making an announcement here...

I find myself in an elite group of researchers talking about time at the 16th Marcel Grossmann conference. The list of people presenting includes a few FQXi members and other prominent scholars. The invited speakers before me are Carlo Rovelli, Wayne Myrvold, Abhay Ashtekar, and Barbara Drossel. Norman Sieroka and Claus Laemmerzahl will speak before me and Adele Naddeo will talk afterward.

Explaining Time's Passage

In a kind of poetic justice; this came about in part because of Lorraine Ford's dogged insistence that quantities in Math cannot vary on their own, and the fact that this remains an open question among top scholars. I researched this heavily. This is not something everyone agrees on. Nicolas Gisin does not favor using the modular flow of Tomita like Connes (and also Rovelli) to extract time evolution, because he like Brouwer dislikes the idea of invoking infinities. But there is enough of a reasonable basis for it to be food for thought among scholars.

Best,

Jonathan

Jonathan Dickau

And I can further announce...

The paper on which my talk is partly based was accepted for publication. It will receive some attention and a few additions or corrections before being published, but I am sharing the preprint version here to facilitate discussion or start a conversation. I will attempt to respond if there is interest.

Best,

JonathanAttachment #1: Intrinsic_Time_Final.pdf

Steve Dufourny

Hi Jonathan, happy too see you again on FQXi, but where were you my friend? Great your conference , it seems interesting. This time is a parameter difficult to define really , the evolution is correlated for me and the motions rotations of these spheres . It becomes very philosophical I d say even when we want to understand it in its deepest meaning considering that we have an infinite eternal consciousness, we live inside a finite universe with infinities and timelifes, so it becomes very complex whenwe consider the body mind soul problem. Regards

Steve Dufourny

This time is a concept different than the others in physics, we measure with the clocks what this time is in fact in our scales and techologies of measurments. It is like a foundamental quantity of course , like a scalar but different than the mass, the lenght, the charge...

For me it is purelly like I said correlated with the kinetic energy and the motions. And I beleive strongly that it is irreversible considering the entropy on its arrow of time, like if the evolution was irreversible also. Now of course we have our minds, brains and the psychology and we can interpret it differently. This time can be ranked in fact, the quantum mechanics time, the psychological time, the subjective time, the thermodynamic time, the cosmological time, the entropical time, the eternal time also but we arrive at these deep philosophical and ontological questions and there we are limited in knowledges unfortunally , the same for the origin of the universe and the concept of infinity or the foundamental objects and why we exist.

We have also this spacetime of the general relativity and the time in this special relativity , that implies big philosophical questions about the clocks, internal, cosmological and considering the motions also if we take into account the special relativity , paradox appears. That implies also intriguing alterations near the gravitational fields and there still that implies deep philosophical questions about the dilations. But must we consider the observations of the real absolute time at all scales. And if we have the two other ethers to superimpose, it is more intriguing in my model.

I believe strongly that the general hamiltoniam evolutive time irreversible is an universal law at all scales . That implies that we must be prudent about some abstracts mathematical extrapolations with the general relativity, the special one and the two other ethers that I explained.

Now philosophically speaking ,I consider that beyond this physicality it is an infinite eternal consciousness like I explained and it is in 0D without time, space. But paradoxally this thing that we cannot define is everywhere also inside this physicality. What is this physical system? why we evolve, why the consciousness is a reality and what is the future if this evolution continues.

Jonathan Dickau

Always good to hear from you Steve,

I will read your entries and try to appropriately respond.

Best,

Jonathan

Steve Dufourny

thanks it is nice, the same for me, always good to read from you, I like your generality in sciences, physics and philosophy even if we see differently and have different interpretations, we search answers to this universal puzzle. I will look at this conference, hope it will be recorded and that we can listen the ideas of different thinkers on internet, friendly

John Cox

Jonathan,

nice to hear from you. I'm sure you will enjoy the conference.

Whatever we conceive time to be, I think it important to recognize that how we treat time theoretically has never been simply one dimensional. Always there is the clear implication that even if we treat it as a one dimensional arrow of time, a la Newton, we still also treat any action as having a time span of its own. Certainly within the broader context but also as time being an ingredient of the action. And in higher dimensionalities, we have time taking time to act and being an actor. r=1, so how fast does time go? best jrc

John Cox

Time itself seems meaningless. Take a zero dimensional point, for instance, and ascribe Time to it. Time only becomes meaningful in relation to more than one zero dimensional point, and that is the the literal paradigm of Quantum Mechanics... disassociative points. Crowd a manifold of such points together and we encounter the granularity of quantum gravity, Mathematically we then confront the problem of separation of points because no matter how closely packed we could always cut the distance of separation in half and still miss the point. Putting a Planck scale in by hand serves the purpose of saying "This far and no farther!" but we still have the uncertainty principle literally describing a continuum. So granularity presents a mathematical opportunity to treat time as a point value but in more than one way.

Time between points without a construct of space beggs the question of how time could (colloquially) know how fast it goes to delineate a measurable separation, for it could be across any immeasurable distance no matter how closely packed the zero dimensional points might be. Endless argument ensues of Time and/or Space being emergent.

Rather than this historically untenable approach, of treating Time, Space and Energy as existentially, physically distinct; let it be proposed on an ad hoc provisional basis, that physically all three properties exist in unity, and that granularity is NOT primordial but emergent. That Quantum Gravity results from the peculiar properties of a sphere, and that in unity the three properties manifest a self-limiting range of optimum volume to energy quantities which if exceeded will produce a wholly consistent set of three properties having at least the minimum quantity of energy to separately manifest a universal proportional density to constitute a physically material dimensional point. (Enter: Max Planck and Maxwell's Demon)

Jim Snowdon

Hi John,

"Time itself seems meaningless." In my view, time does not exist as a thing or force. Instead, we have durations elapsing.

Clocks do not measure time passing, they measure duration elapsing.

We have motion in our timeless universe.

John Cox

Hello, Jim,

I think that states the Quantum argument quite succinctly, and will likely be expounded at length at the coming Grossmann conference.

It should not be forgotten, however, that Quantum's primacy came about in default of lapses in understanding and unresolved contradictions in the Classical field paradigm. And conspicuously absent in the Quantum Mechanical argument is the embarrassing admission that the world's greatest minds in mathematics and physics had simply given up on finding a solution to the problem Newton admitted having no answer for... how Galileo's inverse square law could hold across a separation of distance in a gravitational domain. And in a paradigm of a continuous field of (energy?) some aetherial medium, a successful rationale would have to account for the distribution of a specified finite quantity of energy throughout a spherical boundary in accord with inverse square law such that it would determine the physical boundary of that energy quantity. Numerous attempts were made usually by reiteration of integration over 1/r^2 partial differentials which invariably leads to a feedback loop at the extreme margin and the typical 'wave' model of matter, rather that a truly continuous gradation of field density.

The default position has been to account for observed behavior by a multitude of convoluted sphere packing algorithms begetting space filling shape rationales, all of which are mathematically complete and even elegant. But none of which would suffer from being embedded in a continuous gradiant field.

Einstein came close in describing the problem of accounting for effect between diverging radii, and Lorentz glimpses the problem in his electron model which recognizes that the greater the concentration of force, the smaller the volume of energy. And these are again issues that become necessary to resolve to find a solution for Quantum Gravity. cordially, jrc

Jim Snowdon

We think that time exists as some kind of real thing or force, because we have evolved on this swiftly rotating planet. The overwhelming, ceaseless, and repetitive effects of our rotational motion has conditioned our cognitive grasp of the nature of time.

For us, time seems like a real thing.

John Cox

Yes, Jim,

I understand your point. What I don't understand, given that point, is how you can say the planet is swiftly rotating.

Jim Snowdon

Hi John,

It seems swift to me, it`s about 1,670 kilometers per hour at the Equator.

Jim Snowdon

The Earth rotates once a day. The Moon rotates once every 27 days.

John Cox

Jim,

I am perhaps more fully aware of the paradigm you promote than most Quants. Please take no offense, but it is obvious to me that you are expressing an abstract idea rather than speaking from experience of psychological loss of the sense of passage of time. Allow me to share a personal note; in about a week it will be my golden anniversary, and after about two weeks in recovery I was included in groupings of half a dozen patients at a time for occupational therapy. Given the size of the ward I can reckon the day shift would have half an hour to assemble each group and move to a room outside the ward and back, so the actual time of activities would have been about 20 minutes. I will always remember one day the activity was to string translucent plastic beads on a small bungy to make a bracelet and I chose alternating clear and yellow. These were triple spoked rounded beads a half inch across that would nest together with a hole in the center a full half inch in diameter and the little cloth covered bungy was about a 1/16th. I kept the bracelet for years afterward, and would think often of the nurse whom at the end of the day's activity reached an arm around each side of me and taking an end of the bungy from my fingers in each of her hands, laid it on the table a softly said, "That's very good, John, we'll see if we can finish it tomorrow." And, yes, wheels on some of the chairs on the ward went round and round. :-) jrc

John Cox

drat! no edit tab! !/8 inch hole should be

John Cox

Jonathan,

Bravo! I very much liked your paper and hope your presentation at MG16 was well received. It is very readable and sensibly laid out. You make a compelling argument that we have built math up from rudimentary elements into diverse higher mathematics in a continuing quest for better understanding and description of our universe, so it argues well that we can take a top down approach from higher maths to delineate elements of reality. I can agree with Connes also. Non-commutative geometries would evolve with time. The dynamics do seem strange at first, but really if we look at the Platonic solids for instance, they are idealized forms we have abstracted from natural objects and experience. And if we put them arbitrarily into space we can assume that form could in reality enclose that space, just as any other form could. But it being an idealized form firstly, it would reform that space and evolve a natural form, not returning to our original idealized form but not disallowing evolution into a different idealized form. Nature does the calculating we can never really know, but which we can abstract. A morphology of a shared set of properties, like those shared by a sphere, a square and an octahedron, while each of those forms have mutually exclusive properties as well.

I don't begrudge anyone's personal preference on Time. It's just so much more useful the more dimensions and degrees of freedom we allow Time in our theorizing. And so far, the field equations of GR do provide a rationale for the otherwise inexplicable survival of parent isotopes of measurable half-lifes across billions of light years of intergalactic space, found in the estimable census in deposits of radio-isotopes here on good old Earth. It argues well for Time being real which Quantum Gravity may well have to accept.

I hope you had a great time at the conference and took time to enjoy the city. Reading the overview of the Marcel Grossmann Conference it was refreshing to see such a large participation in fields of General Relativistic research, we keep hearing its a dead science when in fact its the continually expanding, and only science of gravitation. Quantum Machinists, eat your hearts out! all the best jrc

Steve Dufourny

Hi, yes indeed he has pondered a very good paper about his researchs. These maths are a tool and permit to go deeper in the actual general relativity.

Now like I said all is a question of philosophy about the origin of the universe and about what are the foundamental objects. This E8 and other geometrical algebras correlated with the strings or pounts in 1D permit to create topologies, geometries ,...with the fields and so the connection is made between a kind of 1D comsic field of this GR and this planck scale and 1D.

The big actual questionj so is , must we consider this general reasoning to explain our emergent geometries or must we consider a deeper logic superimposed to this GR. Like I explained I consider 3 main spacetimes , one that we observe the photonic one and the two others that we can add , the cold dark matter and the dark energy anti gravitational. Personally I beleive that we just analyse this luniniferous aether actually and so we play with maths to explain our reality and the emergent baryonic matter.

But my humble reasoning can be true also, if we have these 3 main ethers merging together and that we have these 3D spheres like foundamental objects, the deformations of these 3D spheres with the symplectomorphisms preserving the volumes can be also a reality. The cold dark matter has a mass non baryonic and the photons are massless, so the fact to consider this dark energy possessing the main codes and that the cold dark matter and the photons merge with this space vacuum coded , so can explain all our actual fields and matters of our standard model.

I know that the persons working about this E8 have difficulties to accept my theory , It is logic they have worked hard and are persuaded about their general correlated philosophy. That implies that I am a problem, but there is a conjecture between all this , the strings , the dimensions, the 3D ,l the spheres , the 3 ethers. Frankly I doubt that this universe has only created photons and that the universe, god or not oscillate the photons at this planck scale to create this ordinary matter. Personally we need these 3 ethers and furthermore there are important ontological and philosophical problems considering only the photons and the strings or points. That does not explain the evolution and nor the fact that we are under a specific system made of particles not emerging but foundamental in a kind of superfluidity. This E8 can be utilised it seems a very good mathematical tool, I am not against this, I just tell that we can utilise 3 E8 superimposed and replace the strings by the 3D spheres and their series finite primoridal.

So the conjecture can appear in sorting the parameters in all this puzzle. If the thinkers focus on my humble theory, it can be very revolutionary, for this, they must forget maybe a little bit their persuaded philosophy and think beyond this box of the relativity. The photons are just a tool for the universe, they are quanta of Energy permitting the observations of this photonic space time , they permit the heat and electromagnetic quantum forces of our ordinary matter , but we need this cold dark matter and this DE to better understand this standard model and our cosmological scale. The photons even with the higgs mechanism need a mass somewhere, and this cold dark matter encoded explain the quantum gravitation, th antiparticles and the mass with the higgs added and photons, it is really the fact that all the 3 spacetimes merge wich is essential.

Furthermore the life deaths and the evolution and deepe philosophical questions arrive with my humble reasoning. I prefer to not explain my assumptions about the body mind soul problem and the evolution but the fact that these DM and photons merge with the DE explain the continutity of souls maybe also , and the DM disponble at this cosmological scale explains the evolution and the DE also. The DM and DE are different than these phtons and don t come for me from this GR.

ps congrats jonathan, you are a specialist of all this and the philosophy also is interesting, I just try to give a different general road about the philosophy , friendly

Regards

John Cox

Hi again Steve,

I think we speak in different tongues but in a general agreement.

Your mention of a 1D cosmic field of GR might sound daft to some but I've found I've had to ponder the same question. Keeping in mind that it took decades for me to stop growling about the lack of what I would come to learn to be 'sufficient degrees of freedom' in SR to rationalize it to the physical. SR is afterall only complete mathematically, and a tool of measurement. And one we can correlate as an invariance transform to a similar invariance Gallean transform in Inverse Square Law. But there is precisely where the 1D cosmic field is measurable but only, and because, both transforms operate along a direct "line of sight", not volumetrically where a general co-variance must be found. And I agree that such a covariance would also entail some universal standard, proportional to light velocity, which would unite DM, DE, Baryonic Matter, and a Photonic and Neutrino Mass.

It took me many years to accept the consequence of SR that both Time and Space are not only physically real but not absolute. And I can recognize that the typical "rubber sheet" illustrations of mass deformation of space is only a child's bad drawing of what is actually a spatial contraction to make room enough for too much energy to fill a space at the minimum density it would seek if there was enough time for it to do so. The speed of time must slow to condense that energy into matter. Space warpage which seems as simplistic as a mirror in a funny house, is typically misunderstood (and too frequently incorrectly illustrated) as liked to tossing a pebble into a still pond. Its just the opposite, it is condensate matter making room for space to try to flatten out!

The 1D spacetime I like to imagine as one of those precoiled bi-metal springs used as thermostatic controls; the more heat it aborbs, the more it wants to uncoil. So in 1D, that spring unrolled cold on the workbench would illustrate the physical stress between a curved line and a straight line. And this we can imagine to correlate with an initial span of duration of time and an unequal initial span of a distance in space which would race towards an equilibrium and reach a self replicating constant difference such as the Golden Mean at light velocity. And Yes! how could we geometrically take that Full D, and how many degrees of freedom must we allow? Jonathan's argument for infinite degrees of freedom starts to make sense, doesn't it?

I could go on, but why discourage readers with a lengthy copy block? Best as always, jrc

Steve Dufourny

Hi John, I don t want to discourage, I just want to give new roads of thoughts. I have remarked that these strings and the GR alone are more than an institution. It seems that the problem is philosophical. Maybe they had not other lines of reasoning and I can understand that it is difficult to change for the thinkers. They have worked hard and are persuaded also. I have nothing agianst these works, I like this GR and SR, I just think that they are not absolute and the only one piece of puzzle. I am a problem with my theory of spherisation, an optimisation evolution of the universe and the foundamental mathematical objects , the 3D spheres. They are not emergent for me from these fields, they are the choice of the universe . I believe that there is a conjecture between these works about the fields and these spheres.

I can understand that I irritate with my spheres and the correlated philosophy, but between us, I could be true and like all I am persuaded, we are inside a community in theoretical physics very vanitious unfortunally and it is difficult to change our thoughts. You know John, When I see the generality of the universe , and our young age in sciences , I believe strongly that we know nothing still and that this GR and these photons alone are not possible to be the primordial essence, there are many philosophical and ontological problems . The real improtant thing that I d like to gove to this community is that they are not emergent from the geonetrical algebras and the fields these spheres, they are the choice foundamental of this universe, from what ? I don t know, I consider an infinite eternal consciousness in 0D having created a kind of super matter energy, the central cosnological sphere and that this thing sends informations coded in these series of 3D spheres. There is like a mechanism of evolution where the cold dark matter , the DE, the photons merge and dance in a partition to create these matters evolving when we consider the consciousness also.

I don t want to discourage, or to irritate me you know, I just share a theory that I beleive is important in all humility and I improve it in adding things . It is not because this theory can unfify all that it is a TOE, a toe is not possible seen the details that we must find. When Garret Lisi has published his paper and I respect him and his work about the E8, I was surprised by the title, a theory of everything lol, it seems odd for me. We must be humble and recognise our limitations, we are far of truths , and I repeat this GR and photons alsone and the strings or points in 1D cannot solve our deepest unknowns. But when I explain them this, they are angry against me, because like I told you , this vanity inside the community is important.Between us John, lol you believe really that this universe has created only photons from an infinite heat and hop after they oscillate and we have extradimensions like in the strings ??? it seems odd for me.

John Cox

lol no, Steve,

I have never said that. What I reiterate is that for there to be a covariance volumetrically where a 1D cosmic field must go global and therefore by necessity, higher dimensionality; there must be found some foundational property which exists as a universal proportionality to light velocity which unites DM, DE, Baryonic matter, and Photonic and Neutrino mass. My own personal favorite is that energy density varies in direct inverse proportion to velocity within the bounded interval of one magnitude of light velocity, but that does not limit compounding magnitudes of existential density gradient. A Photon for instance exhibits a ballistic characteristic of momentum under certain observation systems, and a hyperbolic characteristic of a wave in momentum transfer by a different kind of observing system. Observed as a ballistic (classic photo-electric effect) event the photon energy crashes to a stop and its density value momentarily reaches the minimum density necessary to register as mass, a property of inelastic energy density characteristic of the maximum density achieved to be classified as matter. The universal proportionality is the density proportionate to energy quantity necessary for a gravitationally bound finite quantity to exhibit inertia, I = e(c^2). And to quote AE, "The energy of a closed system is equal to its inertia". Lesser than that density for any localized or global quantity would exist as Dark (undifferentiated) energy, perhaps somewhat like the Higgs Ocean. Dark Matter may be found to exist as that I=ec^2 density relative to the aggregate field as suggested by the flat hat curve of rotational velocity in galaxies. Spherical galaxies are ancient, newer ones are spiral.

I have to mow before it rains. bye now :-) jrc

Steve Dufourny

We don t know in fact all this, nor what are really the dark matter, the dark energy. And the higher dimensionalities are just mathematical plays of strings with the general relativity, it is an assumption. The equation of einstein with the mass and energy is just a part of the puzzle, because we just take the photons encoded in a space vacuum. The ordinary matter is a tjing that we just analyse in surface , and the heat, electronagnetism, photons are the only one things analysed actually and so we conclude. What I try to explain is that the GR and SR are correct but at their level of analysis simply, we have deeper logics to superimpose . The thermodynamics and heat , it is the same, we just take the photons encoded in a matter , but if the cold dark matter and the dark energy also are there and have properties, it is relevant to search the answers. You beleive that the mass becomes a mass like this due to fields and oscillations of the energy of photons ? that has no sense for me , we need a mass, see that if the dark matter is there also , this matter has a mass and if the dark energy possesses the codes and the photons are a fuel massless, so all is explained. We don t need oscillations, vibrations of photons to create the matters , God does not play at guitar for me. We can repeat the actual things known , that will not change that we don t know really the philosophical origin and how is really transformed the energy and how appear the topologies, geometries. Lol don t forget to sing under the rain :) friendly

Steve Dufourny

What I try to tell in fact John is that the energy and the matter are not the same thing. If we take E=mc^2 , it is not that they are the same, it is just that the photons are the energy and the orinary matter has encoded photons , that is why if you take the 3 main series in my model, one serie of 3D spheres for the space vacuum of the DE and the two others are the cold dark matter and the photons, see that they explain the equation but we must add also the two others, that is why I have this eqyuation intuitive E=m(c^2+Xl^2)+Y where in fact the cold dark matter having a mass is there and is distributed activated by the photons and higgs under the codes of the DE , the bosons are just photons encoded in this space vacuum , so no the matter and the energy are not the same at the basis when they are created in the series sent from the central cosm sphere . Hope you understand my reasoning, the energy with cosmic fields and oscillations of photons cannot become a mass like this.

John Cox

No. No. No. Steve,

Please differentiate. What I am saying is that energy density varies with velocity, and that mass quantity is the limiting factor of acceleration to light velocity. A small enough mass will be accelerated to light velocity with little impulse, but at rest it will be near a universal density which would be detectable as mass. An even smaller quantity of energy would have a correspondingly lower rest density and hence would require a greater impulse to effect acceleration. Like the difference between blowing on a ping pong ball and a ball of soap suds. And the smaller the photonic energy quantity, the shorter the wavelength. So at higher frequencies we find higher energy photons. There are two ways to go with this paradigm, variations of a single standing wave or a cyclic positive/negative acceleration event sequence generating the classic wavelength observation with a longitudinal cross-section of a transverve or sinusoidal wave. But this is ONLY for quantities below a sub-luminal threshold.

Baryonic Matter would be too large a bound quantity to be accelerated to light velocity and the determinant would be for your spheroidal form to enclose a quantity which would be distributed across the volume in a gradient where the core density would reach inelastic density. Again, this is consistent with your own argument that shape can change but volume remains constant. If acceleration reduces density then it must also alter shape (because I say so!) and if the density is inelastic due to larger quantity then it would be more resistant to acceleration.

So in this paradigm we have inelastic density being the demarcation line of acceleration, and on either side greater energy must be introduced the farther we get from the DMZ, but for different reasons.

No strings attached. Those might just become the catalogue of radii bending as a mass:energy quantity undulates shape. I'm getting Grossed out. later jrc

Steve Dufourny

Lol , thanks for developping, sorry for the confusion ,ok I see clearer what you told me, you are surprising I must say dear friend John. If the 3 series merge and that these series with their volumes preserve these volumes and can be deformed, so you imagine the infinite combinations possible with the motions, rotations orbitral and spinal, the angles ,the densities,the senses this and that more their oscillations on surface maybe permitting to rank the quasi particles with the hopf fibrations,

« Previous Page Next Page »