Limits of mathematics in cosmology

"On the other hand, the events go from being in the future to being in the past. Tomorrow becomes yesterday."

"Ultimately, even our lives are units of time which start in the future and recede into the past."

John,

I believe that this is an illusory perception of reality. If you take the view of reality as a flow of interconnected events (and you agreed with this), there is only one direction of flow: unless you have a very 'primitive', i.e. cyclic, universe, an unlikely scenario, an event that appears in the flow again, does so in a different 'context'. That is why, except for the basic events and very short processes, there are no two absolutely identical objects/processes, even when they belong to the same class, e.g. a protein of a reasonable size, a bacterium, an ant, a tree, a star, or a screw.

Lev,

I would say our perception of time is a flow of interconnected events, but there are some inherent caveats in that. I think it reasonable to say there are many events which are not directly connected, ie, exist outside each other's light cones, such that there is no single timeline tying them all together. Even in the context of Big Bang theory, mutiverses and dark energy provide example of one, completely (theoretical) outside events(multiverse), as well as apparent additional input into the given cause and effect timeline, that of dark energy.

It's not that I'm arguing against the one direction of of the flow of events, but I'm posing the question of: What is it flowing against? What is the constant? Is it these series of occurences, or is it the physical reality of the present? As objects we move from one event to the next, but as processes, we only exist in the present. So are we moving along a metadimension of time, whether Newton's absolute flow, or Einstein's fourth dimension, from past to future, or does the changing configuration of what is cause one event to be replaced by its successor and thus recede into the past?

For much of human existence, we viewed the sun as moving across the sky, from east to west and constructed increasingly complex explanations for this, from Apollo's chariot to epicycles. It was only been within the last five hundred years we understood it was the rotation of the earth, moving the other waqy, west to east, which caused this effect. Could it be the view of time as a dimension along which the present moves is equally reversed?

The effect of time is caused by a multitude of motions, which we tend to intellectually coalesce into one cumulative motion. A good example is how the measure of the cycles of the moon were adapted into units of the solar year and no longer reflect an accurate moon cycle.

One of the main functions of relativity is to try and explain why clocks do record their own time and are not reflective of some universal time.

Have to run.....

Lev,

Sorry for the rushed response this morning. From your essay:

"As we know, objects in nature do not pop up out of nowhere but always take some time to appear,

and in each case, the way an object appears is similar to the way some other, 'similar', objects

appear. In other words, as far as we know, there is no object in nature that does not belong to some

class of closely related objects, be it an atom, a cloud, a star, a black hole, a stone, a worm, a protein,

or a stop sign. Since we view objects as processes, we have

Postulate 1: the universe is a family of evolving and interactive classes of (irreversible)

processes."

In making a distinction between objects and processes, I would view the process as that which creates and the object as that which is created. A process usually creates innumerable distinct, but similar entities, whether it's the rotation of the earth relative to the sun creating days, or an automobile factory creating cars. The processes and entities go in opposite directions though, with the process going from past entities to future ones, while the particular entities go from being in the future to being in the past.

This is not a cyclical process, but a relational one.

Of course there are internal processes within entities, much as your brain is an entity that is also a process of distilling information into useful observations, as well as processes which are entities on a larger scale, such as that car factory being a unit within the larger economic process.

In terms of a clock, the process is the hand which moves from one unit of time to the next, while the units of time go from being in the future to being in the past. It should be noted that clocks evolved from sun dials, so the hand of the clock models the motion of the sun through the phases of the day, but to go back to an earlier point, we now know it's the earth which moves, not the sun, so if we were to translate that to the clock, it's the hand, which represents the present, that is constant and it would be the face of the clock, as the dimension of time, moving counterclockwise.

John,

I'd like to ask you about your idea that time is an emergent phenomenon, like temperature, that arises from the ever-malleable 'substance' of the universe which is generally represented by energy-momentum relations.

In other words, 3-space dimensions exist 'NOW'. These dimensions 'contain' the universe. The future may be implied, but does not exist. The past may be remembered, and the present is in a sense the 'record' of the past. But the physical, energetic universe exists only at this moment, which we know as 'now'.

Aside from questions of directionality, is this a fair characterization of your position?

Edwin Eugene Klingman

Edwin,

Basically, but remember the concept of "now" is part of the temporal construct. As such, it's generally considered as a dimensionless point between past and future, since any attempt to measure it constricts down to nothing and logic likes measurements. So in that sense, I'd tend to use the term "extant." Sort of a fuzzy "now," because motion is a prerequisite for change and if we constrict duration to nothing, there is no motion.

John and Edwin,

Please allow my entry here.

I posted the following in http://www.fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/59

"If we admit the idea that duration in time and motion (mass-energy) in space do not interact with duration and motion being simply concurrent realities, then the idea of an infinite past and future time would be easy."

If we allow the idea that duration and motion are separate and non-interacting but concurrent occurrences, then the whole physical/material universe would be just a construct of motion (i.e., energy) with the overall motion (energy) transformations occurring 'alongside' the temporal occurrence.

The whole dynamic existence of corporeal motion transformations would then have the irreversible history, with the temporal (duration) 'transformation' simply an abstraction.

The way I see it, there'd be the separately fixed 3-D space dimension and the 1-D time dimension. The motion and duration occurrences would be the only 'changes' that occur - i.e., the energy transformations and the temporal transformation with the space and time dimensions merely the backgrounds.

castel

castel,

From my reading of what you wrote, we would seem to be in general agreement, in that the changing configuration of what exists is the underlaying reality, while spacetime geometry is a mental model of the narrative process in a spatial context.

The essential reality amounts to a fluctuating vacuum, resulting in an expanding background, interspersed with contracting gravity wells to balance it, resulting in an overall flat space. Time being an emergent effect of this process.

John and Castel,

I will reread Castel's essay, but agree with John that spacetime geometry is a mental model. What I have the most trouble with is the 'fuzzy' now, the "point" when it is all happening. I hope we can make sense of that. I'd like to try to nail down some of the reasons for concluding that now is the ultimate reality.

In GR 'block time' nothing changes. There is no 'now', nor can there be free will if the future already exists (I don't consider splitting universes worth thinking about.) GR 'block time' is surely a mathematical fiction.

However, let's assume that the future does not exist, but that the past really does exist. This would mean that the past physical reality grows larger with each moment. This would imply that new universes materialize every moment, bringing into real physical existence all of the energy and information of the universe, endlessly. This is inconceivable to me.

For these reasons I don't believe that the past or future exist as physical reality, but only as conceptual ordering categories.

What are the problems with 'now'? Some argue that Einstein's special relativity demolished the concept of 'simultaneity' (as in it's simultaneously 'now' over all 3-space.) I disagree. What he did was demolish the picture of a 'God's eye view' of the whole thing in which all reality is seen at once. He replaced this with operational local observations requiring the speed of light be taken into consideration.

If we're in rough agreement on these points, let's move on to the 'fuzzy' now, and try to deal with 'momentary duration' or whatever is implied by the existence of change in space.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

The main problem, if time is not to be considered as an everlasting linear 'dimension' stretching from the eternal past to the far future, seems to be the need for some concept of 'duration' or 'time of change'.

First, does duration exist? That is, is now 'fuzzy' or a perfect 'point'?

If we consider physical reality to be best characterized by energy and momentum, then these seem to imply some finite or infinitesimal time duration that is real in some sense.

But momentum and energy, useful as they are, do not seem to be fundamental. What *does* seem to be fundamental, both in my theory and in the rest of physics, is 'action', in units of Planck's constant, h.

Conceptually, we seem to have a hard time with 'action', and I suspect it's because of this 'built-in' duration. My basic quantum flow condition is presented in my essay,

http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/561

as

(dm/dt)(dx)**2 = h

but lets look at Heisenberg's version:

dE dt = h

If a given local event exhibits one Planck unit of action, h, then we see that both the change in energy, dE, and the duration, dt, are somewhat 'fuzzy'.

This is my first cut at understanding the concept of 'duration' as it applies to the reality of 'now' in 3-space. I think that the next effort might be focussed on understanding the meaning of 'local' in the above description.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

My discussion of the 'built-in duration' implied by Planck's constant of action led to the concept of 'local', so I'd like to examine a few relevant concepts here.

Since we are focused on the energy that characterizes the changes in 3-space, then an obvious related concept is that of "energy density" which almost certainly means "local energy density".

There are several things to note here. First, quantum electrodynamics (QED), our most 'successful' theory until recently, was developed with the idea of a "roiling frenzy of quantum foam" (Brian Greene in 'The Elegant Universe'). The major problem here is that circa 1998 we learned from cosmology that the 'vacuum energy' was off by 120 orders of magnitude. That's a big deal. In fact, if you or I were off by that much, we would be expected to recalculate everything that depended on vacuum energy. Wanna bet whether all QED calculations since 1948 were redone? I didn't think so.

Further, Greene makes the following statement:

"...the uncertainly principle tells us that the size of the undulations [in the quantum foam] of the gravitational field gets larger as we focus our attention on smaller regions of space."

This may be what Greene and other QED'ers believe, but this is most definitely *not* what the uncertainty principle tells us. We cannot 'focus' on smaller regions of space! We can 'probe' smaller regions of space via the use of higher energy (shorter wavelength) particles. But in this case *we* are putting the energy into the smaller region of space. Heisenberg's principle did not put the energy there simply because we "focused" our attention on the space.

This is examined in more detail in my book, "Gene Man's World".

Next I'd like to look at the consequences of this misunderstanding of vacuum energy.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

The idea of excessive vacuum energy led to further concepts such as a 'sea of quarks' and the general idea of the 'polarization of the vacuum' due to the virtual particle sea. Brian Greene again:

"Even in an empty region of space... energy and momentum are uncertain. They fluctuate between extremes that get larger as the size of the box gets smaller. It's as if the region of space inside the box is a compulsive 'borrower' of energy and momentum, constantly extracting 'loans' from the universe and subsequently 'paying' them back."

[I don't mean to pick on Greene, but his 'Elegant Universe' has apparently met the approval of most QED'ers, since these comments are over a decade old, with no corrections.]

The above misunderstanding is the source of problems in quantum field theory. [For those who haven't heard, the vaunted dozen place accuracy associated with the hydrogen atom has just been reduced to almost one place accuracy WRT the proton radius seen in muonic hydrogen!] In essence "unlimited credit is the root of the ultraviolet catastrophe", where the ultraviolet catastrophe is the name for the fact that infinite values always show up at high energies. In Gene Man's World I explain that:

"In terms of the 'borrowing analogy', it's as if one believed his local bank had all the money in the world, only to find out that it holds only one peso."

Physicists speak of 'borrowing energy' from the field, yet they seem to believe in 'unlimited credit'. To assume that the (local) region can borrow energy, without specifying where the energy is to come from, is just sloppy thinking. I cannot go to my local bank and borrow billions of dollars. My local bank does not have billions of dollars! Similarly, a particle cannot borrow large amounts of energy from a local region of space that does not have a huge amount of energy. The implication is that no particle can be supported in a volume of space that has no dimensions greater than or equal to the particle wave length. If true, so much for the 'sea of virtual particles' that QED is based on. Since the fqxi comments are not equation or diagram friendly, I simply refer to Gene Man's World for the details of this analysis.

Since the above has been conceptual, I should touch base with experiment. In 2007 a HAPPEX collaboration of over 100 physicists reported Jan 2007 Phys Rev Lett that:

"there is little room for observable nucleon strangeness dynamics."

In other words, they don't see any sign of the strange quarks that they expected to find in the 'sea'.

This hasn't resolved our problems of 'fuzziness' of now, but it's been fun.

Next I want to treat some consequences of the above, but I'll back off now and let others have their say.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

Edwin,

The idea is that time is an effect. How do we experience it? Our lives exist as series of perceptual impressions and so it's natural to think in terms of the narrative effect. So what would a point in time be? It wouldn't be an event, as they require some duration of activity to exist, be perceived and processed into a conceptual impression. This duration is a unit of time, like a second, minute, etc. A point in time would be the hypothetical division between one unit and the next. The assumption is it is dimensionless, but this is mathematically flawed, because anything multiplied by zero, is zero, so any point, spatial or temporal, cannot be dimensionless, or it doesn't exist. There would be nothing to divide one unit from the next. It is though, a handy concept and useful modeling tool, but that doesn't mean a dimensionless point can be real. So if you think about it from that perspective, the real question might be to ask why anyone would think "now" could even be a dimensionless point.

Consider that in terms knowing the position of a particle: Can a particle even be said to have an exact position, if there is no such thing as a dimensionless point in time? It would require isolating the actual object from any motion it might exhibit, should it even exist independent of motion. Think quantum string without the vibrations. We don't even know they exist, except as an explanation for the vibrations. Could it be there is no there there though? We think the noun must precede the verb, but does function follow form? Possibly one motion is simply matched by its opposite. The fact is that the more we explore the evidence, it seems this is the case, though we reject it instinctively. The search for the God Particle continues.

From the perspective of physical reality, there is just a bunch of energy bouncing around. To this energy, there is no time. No beginnings or endings. Events require some frame, or perspective, to be anything other than random activity. The pulsing of activity which brings together form and tears it apart always exists in larger networks of activity. These forms have a beginning and end, these are the units of time, whether lives of beings or the celestial cycles we call days. As they go from potential to actual to residual, the future becomes past. We think of this historical record as constantly increasing, but the reality is this information evaporates, as the energy manifesting it cycles through other forms. So there is no more direction than a hamster running in its wheel. Of course that same activity which destroys, also creates, so we can't have our cake and eat it too.

As for energy of that expansion, for there to be a flat space, where expansion is balanced by contraction, as is observed, it would seem that what falls into gravity wells is distributed back out across the space between them.

When Einstein first understood gravity to be contracting the measure of space, he added the cosmological constant to balance it out. While much is made of the fact that Big Bang theorists predicted the existence of background radiation, it should be also noted they seriously missed explaining how flat it is, as well as explaining the curvature of the redshift. Rather than reexamine the theory, two major patches, inflation and dark energy, were added. As you say, " if you or I were off by that much, we would be expected to recalculate everything that depended on" Big Bang theory.

Now Einstein himself proposed that for the universe to be balanced, there had to be an effect known as the Cosmological Constant. Every successive measure of redshift since 1998 has more accurately shown this redshift to equal what Einstein predicted, rather than that predicted by BBT. It is generally accepted that the space we observe is flat, that expansion and gravity balance out. That means there is no observed overall expansion, only expansion between the gravity wells. So why is it that we have both theory and observation that support a balanced universe, yet there isn't even a suggestion of discussion about the possibility?

We keep building ever more powerful telescopes and as far as they can see there are mature galaxies and galaxy structures and the only response seems to be; My, they grew up fast! Yes, they say those most distant galaxies only show the light of the lightest elements, so they must be young, but given the distance, wouldn't any light from heavier elements have been completely shifted off into black body radiation? Which is what we see a preponderance of, from the edges of the visible universe, but that's supposed to be the afterglow of the Big Bang.

Now that have built this theory of the entire universe as a single entity, going from its birth to its death, we can't help but suppose there are other such entities out there. What if the space we exist in is simply infinite and we are constrained by the horizon line of how far light travels before it falls completely off the visible spectrum? Do we really understand the properties of light well enough to insist this redshift could only be due to recessional velocity? The theory is that space itself expands and that is why we appear to be at the center, but if it was an optical effect, due to distance, the result would be the same appearance. When gravity wells bend light, such that the source appears to move, we know it is only the path of the light being bent. Wouldn't it be simple enough to consider a similar effect causes the other galaxies to appear to recede, as opposed to assuming they must actually recede? We only have a few decades of observation to go on.

If space itself were to expand, why wouldn't the speed of light increase proportionally, since it is our most elementary ruler of galactic space? What would determine C otherwise?The Doppler effect, as it is properly understood, isn't due to the expansion of the frame, but movement within the frame.

I better leave it at this, for the moment.

John,

Apparently, the idea is more like - the space dimension, the time dimension, the ethereal substance of existence, the ephemeral instance of existence, the motion, and the duration are all co-existential essences.

To KISS all these (as per Occam's suggestion), the space dimension would simply be the 3-d volumetric container of the ethereal substance of existence; the time dimension would simply be the 'container' of the ephemeral instance of existence; the motion simply renders the mass-energy definitions to the substance in space; while the duration simply renders the definitions to the instance in time.

It is not necessary to ascribe motion (curvature, expansion, etc.) to space. It is enough to have the motion transformations (curvature of motion, acceleration, etc.) - actually the correct picture than the pseudo-picture of the curvature/acceleration of space or space-time.

It is not necessary to have duration reversals in time either. Duration reversal is never a possible effect on duration, since we only a single temporal vector in the time dimension.

KISSing the view for space makes the space dimension the unchanging essence that gets occupied by the ethereal substance which is rendered its definitions by the motion transformations.

KISSing the view for time makes the time dimension the unchanging essence by which we regard the ephemeral instance according to the effects of duration. In the question "What time is it?" - we actually mean the span of duration that has been effected relative to a certain point in time.

One common problem in discussions is the problem of language - our manner of conveying ideas. There is the logical language (properly, the language of words) and there is the mathematical/rational language (properly, the language of numbers). The use of appropriate language to make the discussions understandable is important. This is probably why we have the thread topic "Limits of mathematics in cosmology".

There is a confusion in the use of the mathematical languages in the discussions. The mathematical languages used are either for that of the geometrical or dimensional measurements or for that of the dynamical/mechanical/kinematical or vectorial measurements.

The dimensional measurements are properly for the measurement of the static realities in nature (volumes and lengths in the space and time dimensions). The vectorial measurements are properly for the measurement of the changes in the realities in nature (motion transformations and duration transformation). It becomes a big problem when the mathematical languages are improperly used - the ideas get interchanged and/or confused (mixed up).

If we talk about the dimensions, we need to admit that the dimensions are the unchanging realities. And if we talk about motion and duration, we need to admit that the motion and duration are the carriers or vectors of the change in nature, the essences of the change in nature.

The language of space-time transformations just don't cut the standard for the language. Thus, the idea of space-time transformations is a confusion.

It is more appropriate to consider the transformations in space (not 'of' space) that are effected by motion and the transformation in time (not 'of' time) that is effected by duration, with motion and duration as separate but concurrent realities.

So, duration is not the effect of motion per se. We measure motion against the background space and time dimensions. And we measure duration against the background time dimension with relations that regard certain motions. But motion and duration are concurrent realities, the former with the corporeality and the latter as a purely abstract reality. It does look proper that one would be emergent because of the other, after all they simply co-exists as the two main aspects of the change that occur in nature.

A prime example of the Maths is E=mc2. This formula expresses the idea of velocity or motion transformation that relates the transformation effects in terms of mass and energy.

castel

corrections -

(Duration reversal is never a possible effect on duration, since we only HAVE a single temporal vector in the time dimension.)

and

(It does NOT look proper that one would be emergent because of the other, after all they simply co-exist as the two main aspects of the change that occur in nature.)

Sorry about that...

castel

John,

Apparently, the idea is more like - the space dimension, the time dimension, the ethereal substance of existence, the ephemeral instance of existence, the motion, and the duration are all co-existential essences.

To KISS all these (as per Occam's suggestion), the space dimension would simply be the 3-d volumetric container of the ethereal substance of existence; the time dimension would simply be the 'container' of the ephemeral instance of existence; the motion simply renders the mass-energy definitions to the substance in space; while the duration simply renders the definitions to the instance in time.

It is not necessary to ascribe motion (curvature, expansion, etc.) to space. It is enough to have the motion transformations (curvature of motion, acceleration, etc.) - actually the correct picture than the pseudo-picture of the curvature/acceleration of space or space-time.

It is not necessary to have duration reversals in time either. Duration reversal is never a possible effect on duration, since we only HAVE a single temporal vector in the time dimension.

KISSing the view for space makes the space dimension the unchanging essence that gets occupied by the ethereal substance which is rendered its definitions by the motion transformations.

KISSing the view for time makes the time dimension the unchanging essence by which we regard the ephemeral instance according to the effects of duration. In the question "What time is it?" - we actually mean the span of duration that has been effected relative to a certain point in time.

One common problem in discussions is the problem of language - our manner of conveying ideas. There is the logical language (properly, the language of words) and there is the mathematical/rational language (properly, the language of numbers). The use of appropriate language to make the discussions understandable is important. This is probably why we have the thread topic "Limits of mathematics in cosmology".

There is a confusion in the use of the mathematical languages in the discussions. The mathematical languages used are either for that of the geometrical or dimensional measurements or for that of the dynamical/mechanical/kinematical or vectorial measurements.

The dimensional measurements are properly for the measurement of the static realities in nature (volumes and lengths in the space and time dimensions). The vectorial measurements are properly for the measurement of the changes in the realities in nature (motion transformations and duration transformation). It becomes a big problem when the mathematical languages are improperly used - the ideas get interchanged and/or confused (mixed up).

If we talk about the dimensions, we need to admit that the dimensions are the unchanging realities. And if we talk about motion and duration, we need to admit that the motion and duration are the carriers or vectors of the change in nature, the essences of the change in nature.

The language of space-time transformations just don't cut the standard for the language. Thus, the idea of space-time transformations is a confusion.

It is more appropriate to consider the transformations in space (not 'of' space) that are effected by motion and the transformation in time (not 'of' time) that is effected by duration, with motion and duration as separate but concurrent realities.

So, duration is not the effect of motion per se. We measure motion against the background space and time dimensions. And we measure duration against the background time dimension with relations that regard certain motions. But motion and duration are concurrent realities, the former with the corporeality and the latter as a purely abstract reality. It does NOT look proper that one would be emergent because of the other, after all they simply co-exists as the two main aspects of the change that occur in nature.

A prime example of the Maths is E=mc2. This formula expresses the idea of velocity or motion transformation that relates the transformation effects in terms of mass and energy.

castel

castel,

I would take issue with the idea that "dimensions are the unchanging realities."

If we consider the evolution of the concept, dimensions originate as a modeling tool. They are based on geometric coordinates. As they were applied in real world situations, such as geography, it became evident such models were inherently flexible, such as a straight line in space and a straight line on the earth's surface were not the same thing. As topography became ever more complex and we started laying holographic spaces on top of one another, dimensionality multiplied. The fact remains though, they are a model of reality, not some mathematical basis for it. Your coordinate system and your neighbor's could very well produce completely different perspectives of the same space, so wouldn't there effectively be a three dimensional coordinate system for every point of reference and thus space is infinitely dimensional?

Now consider how it is that time is treated as a dimension, rather than a dynamic process: The basis of human knowledge and causal logic is the linear narrative. Whether the ability to tell a coherent story, or construct a rational argument, it is the ability to draw out the series of consecutive steps. This is the basis of every discipline you can name, whether it's history, math, literature, science, etc.

The problem is that this is an observation of the process, rather than participation in it. We think of time as though it were a book, going from beginning to end, with each step following the previous. The dimension of time then, is like the frames of a film, with each step as its own unit and we, or the light of the projector, goes from one to the next.

Consider though, how the process of time actually happens, as we are physically participating in it: There is this sea of energy all around us and we move through it, as it swirls about, we consume information carrying doses of energy and out of them, process conceptual units of thought. Then more information/energy pours in and we have to transition to the next thought. So for our minds, time is that series of thoughts we process. The larger reality is less linear and more cumulative though. While we must mentally maintain a coherent stream of consciousness in order not to become completely disoriented, the environment isn't always so cooperative and frequently relevant and necessary information isn't provided in a linear fashion. For that reason, our brains have two sides. The rational, left brain is a form of clock, that coalesces information into a reasonably coherent train of sequential thoughts, while the emotional right brain is more of a thermostat, in that it is constantly acting on and reacting to the cumulative energies and processing the information at a subconscious level, then feeding what is deemed most important to the conscious brain in order to steer the physical actions.

So for this subconscious emotional brain, reality is not a neat sequential series of constructed perceptions, but a mass of input that must be edited quickly and mostly ignored. Its main area of concern is not consideration of past events and planning for future ones, but merely processing what is constantly present. Instead of being the frames of the film, all neatly laid out in a series, it is more like the projector light, flashing on what is in front of it, as this information streams by, from being in the future, to being in the past. The need to sequence is a consequence of our mobility and need to navigate. Plants have very effective thermostats to monitor their physical reality, but no central sequencing function because they don't have to move. That sequencing function is a higher order developmental trait.

This dichotomy plays out across much of our conscious existence. Men tend to be more linear, while women tend towards a more cumulative view of life. Western religions tend to be more action oriented and based on narrative tales of moving through context in search of ideals, while eastern religions tend to be more contemplative and observant of natural processes as they happen, rather than being the agent of change. Also they tend to worship the ancestors which are their foundations, rather than worshipping ideals to which they aspire/wish to travel to, as western religions do.

So it happens they have opposing views of time, with the western view being that future is in front of the observer and the past behind, because that is how ones motion carries ones perspective. The eastern view is of the past in front of the observer, because it has already happened and can be seen, while the future is behind, because when one is not moving, but witnessing, the information of events goes by, on to other places and observers.

I do agree that space is fundamental, as both absolute equilibrium state and infinitely boundless. I don't know that I would consider it a substance though, but permeated by substance. As you say, it isn't space which bends, but the matter traversing it. There are two, somewhat contradictory, descriptions of Relativity, which seem to co-exist without being fully acknowledged. One holds that space is completely relative and it is only the relative motion of one frame to another which distorts the perception of rates of motion, aka time, in each other. So that if two frames moved by one another at C, it would only appear the other frames clock has stopped. The other description holds that a clock in a frame at rest actually moves faster than one in a frame affected by velocity, acceleration or gravity.

In the second, space acts as a form of equilibrium state, such that anything moving through it will have their atomic motion slowed, since the combination of external velocity and internal activity cannot produce any motion exceeding C. Thus something traveling at close to C will still measure light traveling at C because their own sense of time has been slowed. Since clocks of GPS satellites must be calibrated to their gravitational fields and accelerated frames, it would seem there is a real effect and not just perception of other frames. A possible experiment would be to scatter clocks out in space and determine which runs fastest. This clock would then be the one closest to the pure equilibrium of space.

I think the first is wrong. It would mean another reality could be passing through ours as a form of light and we would be passing through theirs as light. Obviously difficult to disprove, but if the second description is true, then the first cannot be. Someone with more knowledge might tell me where I'm wrong on this, but so far it's been a point which receives little response.

Which is to say that I many regards, we are in agreement, but I think some concepts, such as dimensionality and especially the dimensionality of time, fall in the category of emergent models/language tools, rather than aspects of a more fundamental reality.

John,

As to how we experience time, I'm having trouble distinguishing between a feeling of duration versus simply a feeling of continuity as I write this now and then write this now. Your 'narrative effect' captures a lot, but doesn't quite resolve the 'duration' problem.

I don't buy a 'dimensionless point in time' and I do believe particles are real, not wave functions. And although it's true that "there is just a bunch of energy bouncing around" I'm pretty sure that 'action', not 'energy' is the fundamental reality, and this includes some concept of duration. With all my words and your words we still haven't resolved this 'fuzzy' aspect of NOW.

I've read your arguments about red shift and big bang theory, but I haven't worked through the details. Partly this is because my theory produces an inflationary force as soon as the perfect radial symmetry breaks, but also because of the vacuum energy arguments I made above. The extreme C-fields that produce particles in my theory are available at the big bang but not so evident without the bang.

Finally, I am a Unitarist and believe in one Universe that evolves in a way consistent with my experience, as opposed to many dimensions and many universes that make no sense to me. So my theory not only seems to match our physical knowledge of reality but it matches my conscious experience as well.

Rather than address all of Castel's points, I would like to focus on your remark that 'dimensions originate as a modeling tool, based on geometric coordinates'. Elsewhere I believe that you have referenced Jill Taylor's "Stroke of Insight" in which the neuro-anatomist describes her loss of metric awareness and the corresponding 'merging with the Universe'. Similarly Georgina's pre-birth memories of a time when she knew no bodily limits. Also LSD experiences of connectedness to all. So I am convinced that the most basic awareness is of topological connectedness, and the imposition of a metric on the Universe happens in our heads. It is for the simple reason that it is of utilitarian value to know that I can reach the apple, but I cannot reach the moon, despite their visual similarity. So the brain produces 'metric'.

It is this same "in our heads happening" that establishes time as a dimension, having the narrative utility that you describe. In fact I agree with most of your remarks about the brain and processing reality.

But whereas there is no natural unit of energy or of momentum, there is a natural unit of action, that I believe is every bit as fundamental as the speed of light, and, like light, has an implicit idea of duration (or travel time).

It may be that these two fundamental constants are as close as we can get to understanding time. They seem to imply very specific characteristics of (what I believe to be the field that fills) space. This further seems to imply something beyond emergent utility.

Edwin Eugene Klingman

John,

I tend to simplify to the most fundamental.

I simply see six fundamentals: space, substance, motion - these have both the phenomenal and noumenal aspects/characteristics; and, time, instance, duration - these have only the noumenal aspects/characteristics.

Space contains the corporeal (the tangibles); the substance fills space; motions move motions and form kinetic constructs that render definitions in the substance; the substance per se is aethereal because it is the kinesis/motion that renders tangibility.

Time contains the abstract (the intangibles); the instance reside in time; the transformation effected by duration renders cumulative definition to the instance; the instance per se is ephemeral (must be what Tegmark refers to as "ephemeris time") because it is constantly transformed by the fundamental essence of duration.

My analysis takes the breakdown of the existence to the most fundamental level of the existentials.

I understand the dimensional analysis methodology that has been evolved and confused as a representation of the dynamic. But I believe the correct approach is to use the vectorial analysis methodology because fundamentally vectors are used to represent the dynamic.

I adhere to the fundamental suggestion of the pure kinematics wherein fundamentally "motions move motions" - that is why I prefer the idea of the transformations of motion instead of the idea of the transformations of space and time.

There used to be time - the dimension, time - the instance, and time - the duration. And there used to be space - the dimension, substance - the aethereal space-filler, and motion - the definitions wrought in the aethereal substance... The ideas regarding time was rather clear in Newton, but later confused by Einstein. The ideas regarding space, the aether, and motion were somewhat clear. But it has never been clarified that mass and energy are kinetic constructs - not by Newton, Maxwell, nor Planck. There was the suggestion in Einstein, but which he also later confused. I like my own clarity now on all these ideas (although I am considered irrelevant by many).

Also, it used to be that 'dimension' refers to 'length' (specifically when we talked about space) and we say that a point is dimensionless because it is without any length. But now the idea of dimensions has conventionally been very much confused - foremost by Einstein... Yet, try to closely consider the conventional 'dimensional' methodology in the analysis and you will find that the 'dimensions' referred to are actually 'vectors'.

castel

Edwin,

(I realize you probably prefer Gene, but Edwin's an old family name, brother, cousin, uncle, grandfather, great...)

Doesn't solve the duration problem, as in?

Consider it from my point of the dimension of time going future to past, rather than traveling the dimension from past to future: The clock ticks. Duration isn't it moving along a fourth dimension to the next tick, but the effect of that first tick fading away, like ripples on a pond and then preparing the action of the next tick. Duration isn't a vector, but a cumulative process. It is only when we try to think of both ticks in some form of order that the vector and the linear conception of duration arises. The hamster isn't going anywhere. It's just spinning that wheel.

As for whether particles are waves, or waves are a bunch of particles, it seems to me that particles, as they are described, amount to tiny vortices and are more a function of polarities, rather than what we might think of as mass, but I haven't studied it enough. My approach to physics is peeling away as many layers as I can comprehend and knowing when I'm getting lost.

As for the fuzzy part, think of a Planck unit: Presumably it is the smallest possible measure, but in order to actually be a measure, we would have to define its parameters, which would require an even smaller measure, no? So it would have to be fuzzy, right? It just seems to me that when you push the concept of measurement to its limits, it naturally breaks down. This seems to be the problem with Quantum theory.

As for being a Unitarist, is that based on the concept of unity, or unit, because they are profoundly different. Unity is a state of connected equilibrium, while a unit is a defined set. Which is not unified, because it differentiates between what is inside and outside the set. Confusing these two is the primary fallacy of monotheism. The unified state of the absolute is basis, not apex. It is source, not ideal. A spiritual absolute would be the primordial essence of life and being from which we rise, not a moral and intellectual ideal from which we fell. Good and bad are not a metaphysical dual between the forces of light and darkness, but the basic biological binary code. Amoebae are attracted to the beneficial and repelled by the detrimental. What is good for the fox, is bad for the chicken, yet there is no clear line where the chicken ends and the fox begins. Life is a process of creation and consumption as it bootstraps itself upward. Between black and white are all the colors of the spectrum, not just shades of gray.

Organized religion was originally polytheistic. That is because gods were what we would call memes today. Basic concepts to which the larger group accepted, such as the singularity and status of the group one is immersed in, geographic and astronomical features, seasons of the year, cultural activities, such as celebration, war, death, sex, sleep, illness, etc. All the myriad connections between these concepts naturally lead to a pantheistic network in a mythology of allegorical relationships. This pantheistic wholism is difficult for many to grasp today, let alone thousands of years ago, so it was natural to have this state defined as a unit and then to give it some form. The adult human male being the logical default option, but as an ideal it overlooks the regenerative process by which the old die and are replaced by the next generation and so monotheism doesn't naturally recycle itself, as the various forms attest.

I tend to avoid religious discussions, since minds tend to be set, but this seems similar to your views, though from a sociological, rather than physical perspective.

Also, a Big Bang model of the universe is unit based, not unity based, since it posits the entire universe as a single unit and the mind is naturally drawn to the possibility of others, as is arising in multiverse proposals.

Ask yourself a simple question about geometry: Is zero, in geometry, the initial point, or is it the blank state?

By and large, zero is generally considered the initial point, but as I argued with dimensionless points, this is not logically so. In reality, zero in geometry should be the blank state. This neutral field is the fundamental unity. It is the absolute of space. Geometry doesn't create space with all its dimensions, but only defines it.

I think with your conscious field theory, you are adding an emergent property by ascribing it volition. Yes, we cannot truly have physical consciousness without the manifestation of will, but that asks: Will against what? That is the initial division. We as mortal, mobile beings cannot function without divisions, in order to distinguish, to create, to progress, etc, but I think if you really want to jump off into the void, much like the eastern mystics, you need to see even beyond volition, beyond the attraction of the good and repulsion of the bad. Not to say you want to stay there long and you won't come back quite the same, but it does put everything in its context.

You are thinking of consciousness in terms of the point, the singularity. What I'm asking is for you to think of it in terms of the unbounded state. It isn't unity in the sense of a central entity, but a network of connectedness. Much more of the original polytheistic entities in a pantheistic context. Tribal gods and guardian angels, Gaia and Apollo. Coming and going, birth and death. The fact is that while we might recognize the sense of self in others, that doesn't always make it a connection. Especially if these entities have reason to compete, since there is not a sense of fundamental loss, should one be lost, as the self always wins and becomes stronger. As they say, the winners write the history books. It is a bottom up process and every living being is a complete line of connection back to the origin of life on this planet, but in every generation, many who start life, fail to pass it on and their connection is broken. Not trying to be harsh, but this is a discussion of how the laws function. This is why you need to distinguish between a unit and unity.

I like your idea of consciousness as a field that is stronger in the human brain and weaker in less complex contexts. You compare it to gravity, but another comparison might be focus, as in a lens. We are a focusing of this field of consciousness, compared to a tree, which would be rather unfocused consciousness. In a sense, these are opposite, but complementary descriptions, since gravity is a concentration of mass, while focus is a concentration of energy. Gravity would represent the multiplying structural order of thought, while energy would be the expanding vitality of raw beingness.