Deciding on the nature of time and space by Edwin Eugene Klingman

You are welcome , Yes I am better , I had many problems in Belgium ,I was in a big depression due to many problems, I have lost all the important persons, they are dead like my mothers due to cancer, my godfather a suicide and my grandmother and all this the last 5 years, I am alone without nobody ,more others serious problems and a difficult past also, but I am better, I have immigrated since 7 moths here in Finland, I live with Ulla Mattfolk, she tells you hello.

I have evolved also about my theory, I learn a lot of maths and improve it, at the begining here on FQXi my English was not well, it is a Little bit better even if it is not perfect in grammar , and my theory like I said Begins to be better at my humble opinion, I will publish several papers this year in logic, I am invited too at several international Conferences, I must say that I fear, I dislike to present in front of persons lol but I must assume. Thanks for your nice message, I repeat but your essay was very relevant to read, I wish you all the best and take care also , be the force with you Jedi of the Sphere :)

Friendly

Dear Edwin Eugene Klingman:

I'm glad you liked my essay. You say:

"It's hard to argue that time 'exists' as a physical entity with one dimension, but it's an extremely useful concept."

We agree that "the so-called time" was and is and will remain an extremely useful

concept, and that it is hard to argue that it has a physical entity, simply because it cannot be

proven that it has it.

As for the experimental meaning of "so-called time" as "movement", it is not only

important, but I think I have proven that it is a constant and uniform movement that man copied from the sun movement, for reasons of practicality in the design of the clocks. In no way is it a cyclic

movement, and does not include the movement cycle count. On the contrary, the empirical meaning of

"so-called time" is "continuous". The cyclic thing is a mistake that I think originates from the internal

movements of the clock, in which there are many cyclic movements that are mechanisms like the

pendulum that were designed in order to achieve the constant and uniform movement of the clock

hands over the numbered dial.

To measure something continuous it is essential to create units, in our case, the fundamental unit was given to us by nature. The Day, which is the constant and uniform movement of the sun from one sunrise to the next, which the Egyptians after a long process managed to divide into 24 hours ... In the measure of the "so-called time" at no time does it imply the count of the movement cycles. I repeat the movement is continuous, the hours are not parts of a cycle but the arbitrary divisions of a continuous movement, which can be divided because the "so called time" is a constant and uniform movement, no other movement could be divided in equal parts.

We agreed that what is slowed down is not the "so-called time" but the clocks, the physical reason of such slows is the speed inertia and or gravity that slows the internal movements of the clock respect to the similar one on the earth surface.

To the "so-called time" dilation I would call it slowing a clock or any other

movement traveling at high speed and at a greater distance from the center of gravity, compared to the similar clock to the one on the earth surface.

If we accept that the experimental meaning of "so-called time" is "movement" we are accepting that it is a physical property and exists as such, all physical existing things are in continuous motion in the universe.

All the planets have different physical conditions, different gravity etc. so

each place in the universe has its "called time". I think there is neither the "now" nor the "instant" I

accept them as a reference to a very short period of the "so called time", this is continuous.

You could read if you haven't already done it, my explanation of the paradox of the twins, I think it's the only physical possibility that this could be possible.

I think I prove that Time is a measurement system

I think I proved that Time is a measurement system, which was most likely unintentionally created by prehistoric man. This one exists only as long as man exists like all the systems he created. This system measures "so-called time" which is actually a constant and uniform movement. With units arbitrarily created by man as already I said.

Thank you for Reading my essay,

Héctor

Thank you very much for your Words.

I agree about the theories, they evolve and it is important to add and optimise our extrapolations, and also to study still and Always more the maths , physics and sciences to see a better generality. We search answers after all with humility inside this physicality like humble travellers from stars where our consciousness and knowledges evolve also. It is fascinating I must say, I cannot stop to search these answers, maybe the most important is to accept these limitations and accept only the proved things and make a difference with these assumptions mathematical, physical and philosophical that we cannot affirm in fact, it d be very odd and vanitious to affrim things not proved by experiments or mathematical proofs after all. This infinite eternal consciousness bless you also Professor Klingman, happy to know you , wish you also all the best for all, take care, friendly

Hi Edwin,

I wrote my essay to conform to the contest specifications. If you want to look at an actual article on my conceptual model, (which I hope you will) click here to download

Best Regards,

Harrison

Dear Edwin,

I have just finished reading your essay for the second time, and I must say I am impressed. I believe you are absolutely correct when you advocate focussing on ontology in order to make progress in physics. Be sure to read Israel Perez's essay as he makes some very similar points.

As you may have noticed in Marts Liena's essay on the aether, where he quotes some work of mine on time, I also developed a time-energy theory seven years ago. It works best when there is a preferred frame - so in your essay example with the kiddie car in the railcar, my time-energy theory totally supports your observation re the stationary observer looking through glass walls.

The support of ontology in developing physical theories is that we help dismantle paradoxes. The twin paradox is easily explained without resorting to using 'space-time' in the answer, as Einstein did.

There are no time paradoxes in my theory, but it is best explained when an aether is considered as a preferred system of reference (borrowing that term from Perez). I liked your quote from Mermin "...the concept of time is nothing more than a convenient...device for summarizing compactly all relationships holding between different clocks."

It is a concept I hold as well, as I believe in an infinitude of clocks, (a clock being any defined volume of space, each with its own individual tick depending on the embodied energy of that space).

I am interested in the physicality of dimensions (as distinct from their mathematical being). I think I understand three dimensions of space, as that is the world I inhabit. However, I do not understand zero, one or two, or four or more dimensions of space from an ontological point of view. To my point of view there is only volume, down to the smallest of scales, and volume means 3 space dimensions. String theories propose multiple curled up space dimensions, (comes from the maths), but I have no idea what these can be, as in my humble view there are only 3 space dimensions, and anything curled up inside a volume must have some other property that defines it. I do not mind having other types of dimensions (time, temperature, pressure, energy, etc) as long as their meaning is made clear.

I like your point "I am ever more convinced that many of our nasty problems in physics have very little to do with the issues on which this essay contest is based", which is also made by Perez.

As my entry was my first ever FQXI essay, I tried to stick to examples of undecidability, computability and unpredictability, in my considerations of a TOE, although I do wander on to the philosophical time topic of presentism which I currently endorse.

I am currently reading some of your previous FQXI essays and look forward to further discussions with you. Good luck in this one, your essay is most interesting.

Lockie Cresswell

Dear Edwin,

I've been reading your essay and finding it of interest, have a few comments. I'll also rate it - btw, I'd appreciate it if you'd rate mine, as you said it was of interest, and it has only had one rating so far.

You say that if time runs differently in different frames, being able to look inside the railcar at the small car would violate the principle of relative simultaneity. Firstly, one thing SR does not have a problem with is self-consistency. It's counterintuitive, like a lot of things (the Earth is spinning, but it doesn't seem to be). Whatever else it is or isn't, SR is self-consistent.

And it's a description of the real world, including what we see, if you're prepared to calculate the light travel times.

It's worth pointing out that all three things in the example - the station, the train, and the small car, have relative velocities. Any pair of them have a relative velocity. These three velocities don't add up in the expected way, but you could look through glass walls and see everything for that reason.

The simultaneity aspect is even less related to what we see - the visible picture gives no direct clue as to when the event we see happened. Hence galaxies are seen as they were a long time ago. So what you see won't be affected by simultaneity issues.

In answer to another point, I think the goal of physics is both a mathematical and conceptual description, and that the conceptual side is not axiomatic, but more like a visual picture. And it's very much part of science, and should not be relegated to philosophy. Some people tried to boot it out of science, because the conceptual side started doing very badly in the 20th century. But that wasn't its fault, we just weren't yet ready to interpret all the mathematics we had.

Hope this makes sense, just my own opinion. Best regards,

Jonathan

Thanks Edwin,

I appreciate the high score you gave my essay. I think you're right that the title was a mistake - I tried to make a point in the title, but titles aren't for that!

I've heard you say before that SR has a separate time dimension for each frame, back in 2018. I think that's only one interpretation of it - same with what you say about relativistic mass. In my book I say that SR is like a Rubik's cube, it can be put into many different configurations, but it may be that only one of them leads to a better understanding.

Relativistic mass is a frame-related effect, which means it's a viewpoint-related effect. So is relativistic energy. The same kind of effects are found in relational quantum mechanics, and in the documentary (the link is in my essay) I point out to Rovelli the similarity between RQM and SR, with those frame-dependent effects.

It's also worth noting that in SR fixing a frame can bring matter's properties into existence. In my paper I point out that in QM the collapse of the wave function can also bring matter's properties into existence. No-one has pointed out this common ground between SR and QM, perhaps because it's so weird. I'm sure others have seen it, but I didn't for years - it was staring me in the face. According to my interpretation for QM, which I discuss with Rovelli in the film, state reduction fixes a frame (among other things), which shows that the same thing is happening in both SR and QM. Fixing a frame can bring some of matter's properties into existence.

But returning to relativistic mass, a useful loose analogy is perspective. Matter can have 'observed properties', a bit like an object can have an observed configuration, and it depends on the viewpoint. So calling relativistic mass 'unphysical' is not necessarily right.

The last point is about experiment. If you're questioning SR, it can't be ignored. Relativistic energy has been confirmed by experiment, and can't be avoided. And it's very like relativistic mass. And so has what you call the 'standard unit', c, common to all frames. There was one experiment with pions at CERN in 1964, that was a bit similar to your example with the station, the train, the small car. But with light being one of the three things. Neutral pions were made to travel at 0.99975c, and then they emitted photons. The photons travelled at c in relation to both the lab and the pions.

Anyway, best wishes, and wishing you luck,

Jonathan

Dear Edwin,

Once again thank you for your comments. I think we are generally on the same page regarding time but you would need to read my various writings which unfortunately I have never placed on the internet. I concur with Julien Barbour that we can dispense with time altogether, but this is still problematic because all of our theoretical frameworks rely on it.

I have a non self-referential definition based on energy, derived from the Einstein-Planck formula, that seems to give a better understanding of relativity, so long one assumes an absolute reference frame (aether) to accommodate momentum.

When I distill the ideas even further it is all about the interaction of matter with the aether. My matter particles have the property of (volume, spin, and charge) and my aether particles have the property of (volume and state). I have borrowed 'state' from John Conway's game of life, as having a binary meaning of 'alive' or 'dead' with respect to the 'state' of the aether particles neighbours.( it is quite involved requiring several rules that form the basis for my TOE). I have a well developed matter theory that I previously mentioned, which has great predictive power. I have been exploring nuclear physics with it and believe I can explain many of the mysteries of how various elements get their atomic structure.

I do not know of David Mermin's take on relativity, but I liked the quote you gave for the wrong reasons. Maybe we both misunderstand. But misunderstandings are good because they sharpen our reasonings if dealt with properly, just as paradoxes are good. It's good to know that both of us can get rid of all the time paradoxes with our respective energy-time theories.

There is one thing you may be able to explain to me re time. I have never understood why the concept of a tachyon (faster than c) means backward in time. My definition of time allows faster than c as a concept (but not for electromagnetic radiation), but nothing can travel backward in time. And I particularly do not like Feynman's take on antimatter - time symmetry, where a positron is an electron travelling backward in time.

Thanks for the link on your paper on the primordial spacetime metric, which I will read when I have finished 'Everything's Relative'

Keep exploring!

Lockie