Real-Time Physics

Thomas Ray

"Suppose space and action are married and time is the measure of their offspring, change?"

That's correct. Which is why all action is stationary (zero) and reversible. Which makes your speculation from here onward unphysical.

John Merryman

Akinbo,

I am very much in agreement the bastard children of spacetime are something out of a bad dream.

One point I keep making about cosmic redshift being due to some relativistic property of space is they forgot that if space is relativistically expanding, then clock rate/propagation of light has to increase proportionally, in order the speed of light to remain constant to this expanded space and it can't be papered over as four dimensional, since the space between two points is only one dimension. Nor does the idea light is just being 'carried along' by this expansion make much sense either, since the distance is being denominated in lightyears, such that more are required, making them the 'ruler,' so the expansion can only be the numerator, making it an expansion in space, not of space. Leaving us to appear at the center of the universe.

Some optical effect will eventually be discovered.

Tom,

I thought you were done discussing this with me? We just went through a long exchange on the Ripping Einstein thread, where you could not show how thermodynamics and spacetime are compatible, since spacetime cannot explain why time is asymmetric and so insists it isn't, while thermodynamics doesn't go in reverse.

A model does not incorporate all characteristics of that which it models, for the purpose of clarity and simplification. Therefore it cannot explain all factors of that which it models. That spacetime cannot explain why time is asymmetric doesn't mean time is asymmetric, only that spacetime is a very basic model of relational measurement and does not incorporate dynamics as anything other than static measures.

The reason time is asymmetric is for the same reason thermodynamics doesn't go in reverse; inertia. The energy manifesting these processes would have to be replaced by an opposite energy and a tendency toward lower entropy. In my contest entry(which I can't find, since the list of loser entries is currently unavailable) I argued that in its obsession with information, physics overlooks the fact that information is an effect of energy, not the other way around. So you can't just switch some mathematical sign and expect the entire universe to flip over.

I still think the reason Wall St. went to quantum theorists to build their gambling bubbles is because accountants learn you can go to jail for bad math, but physicists think they have some inside track with nature. Out here in the real world, that is called hubris.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"I thought you were done discussing this with me?"

But not necessarily finished pointing out glaring errors. Of course, I can't keep up with them all.

Thomas Ray

"Says who? Divine Albert? Minkowski?"

And the math. And the experimental results that correspond to it. And the rational science you and the rest should acquaint yourselves with.

John Merryman

Tom,

And I'm still waiting for you to point out the error. In our previous conversation@Oct. 22, 2013 @ 16:26 GMT, you offered two links;

Thus no truly reversible processes exist. However, many systems are

approximately reversible. And assuming reversible processes will greatly aid

our calculations of various thermodynamic state functions.

which is many orders of magnitude longer than the current age of the universe. Thus, although the system will return arbitrarily close to its initial state, the time required for this is unphysically long and will never be observed. Over times relevant for observation, given similar such initial conditions, the system will essentially always evolve in the same way, which is to expand and fill the box and essentially never to the opposite.(To which I pointed out, this only entailed the gas potentially returning to the corner, not the particles returning to their original positions.)

Yet both rather explicitly contradicted your argument that thermodynamic processes can reverse and not just be simplistically modeled to do so. Spacetime is a useful map, but it is certainly not the whole territory. It would be much easier to keep up, if you had a coherent argument to begin with.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

" ... I'm still waiting for you to point out the error."

And I'm waiting for you to find it.

Do you still not understand how the symmetry of least action works?

John Merryman

Unifying the various laws of physics with the help of action principles has been an ongoing activity for centuries, not always successful, e.g., successful for particle mechanics and geometric optics by Maupertuis and Hamilton (Yourgrau and Mandelstam 1968), and not completely successful for particle mechanics and thermodynamics by Helmholtz, Boltzmann and others (Gray et al. 2004), and continues to this day with some of the modern quantum field theories. The action principles have occasionally assisted in developing new laws of physics (see comments at the end of Section 9). The Hamilton and Maupertuis principles are not applicable, however, if the system is nonholonomic, and usually not if the system is dissipative (Section 4).

John Merryman

Hint: Reality is nonholonomic, ie, dependent on all factors, while models are holonomic, ie. dependent on parameters.

Thomas Ray

John, I'm afraid you suffer from the same deficiency as most posting here -- assuming that "reality" is some thing you can believe in, and then mucking about for some set of physical phenomena that conforms to what you believe.

Objective science depends on closed logical judgments, not inductive generalizations.

Thomas Ray

While you're giving me hints on how to do physics, let me give you a hint on how to read mathematics: All those terms equal to zero mean anything to you?

John Merryman

Tom,

It isn't that I believe/trust in reality, but that I know models are constrained. They are like all assumptions; necessary and useful, but never to be trusted completely, because they are limited.

You can have nothing, or you can have everything and it all cancels out. We have to live somewhere in the middle here, where it is not all zero.

I realize I'm not going to convince you models are not the only reality, but you have yet to convince me that treating them as though they are, is such a brilliant idea. It's not as though people haven't been doing just that since the dawn of history. Each belief system gets set in stone and if you want to be part of the community, you better subscribe. Eventually though, it gets too limited and subsequent generations move on. Another example of punctuated equilibrium.

Regards,

John M

John Merryman

Tom,

Keeping in mind that QM and GR are two models of reality that rather notoriously don't quite fit together. So you would have us believe there is no larger reality beyond them, that they are the reality and any disconnect is only a test of faith. I think even some physicists might find that hard to accept.

Regards,

John M

Eckard Blumschein

Tom, Akinbo, and John M,

"Objective science depends on closed logical judgments, not inductive generalizations." That's why I was skeptical about complete induction long before I got aware of G. Cantor's naive but nonetheless influential up to now set theory.

"*#The principle of reciprocity was introduced by Einstein# ...Is reciprocity at all really a general principle introduced by Leibniz?* Did Newton's third law not predate this?"

Newton's actio = reactio was definitely not introduced by Einstein, and I wonder if Leibniz introduced reciprocity as a general principle. Newton and Leibniz were not stupid. They would never have accepted the future symmetrical to the past.

*"Then on what you attribute to Lee Smolin,"

...I will posit that the past influences the present and future, but the reverse is not true; no event in the past can be affected by anything that happens in its future. I ask: Is the past, a substance? Or is the future one? I submit that only that which has extension can influence another and also be influenced in return.*

The past extends endlessly to the left of the timescale and includes possible influences. The future extends to the right and includes expected effects. You will hopefully agree that a singular moment has no extension and cannot have any effect.

Well John, reality is a nonholonomic system.

Eckard

Thomas Ray

"I realize I'm not going to convince you models are not the only reality ..."

Convince me? How could you convince me of anything about the usefulness of a model, when you don't even know what "model" means?

Thomas Ray

"You will hopefully agree that a singular moment has no extension and cannot have any effect."

I absolutely do not agree. I think that along with John, you should learn why all those terms he cuts and pastes are zero.

John Merryman

Tom,

A model models.

Zero still doesn't get thermodynamics going in reverse.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

"A model models."

A truly meaningless statement.

"Zero still doesn't get thermodynamics going in reverse."

It doesn't?

John Merryman

Tom,

"A truly meaningless statement.'

If I make a comment, I'm a naive idiot. If I use someone else's comment, I'm 'cutting and pasting.'

Now the very words have no meaning!!!!!

Model:

noun;

11: a description or analogy used to help visualize something (as an atom) that cannot be directly observed

12: a system of postulates, data, and inferences presented as a mathematical description of an entity or state of affairs; also : a computer simulation based on such a system

verb;

1: to plan or form after a pattern : shape

3b : to produce a representation or simulation of

"It doesn't? "

As I recall, there is no reversed activity on the other side of absolute zero.

Regards,

John M

Thomas Ray

A model -- in the technical meaning that we should be using -- is a solution to an equation. You don't get to use it any way you please, and then pretend you are engaging in an objective rational discussion.

"As I recall, there is no reversed activity on the other side of absolute zero."

You recall that from ... where? And what do you mean 'absolute zero'? Not from anything I said.

John Merryman

Tom,

And weren't giant cosmic gear wheels the solution to the equations of epicycles? As multiverses, inflation, dark energy, super symmetry, etcetc, are the solutions to the various equations floating around now. Are the equations the final arbiter? Are the solutions inviolate?

Absolute zero is the thermal minimum, not just the center point on some graph. We are still trying to figure out how thermodynamics, the real physical processes, not just bare models, can go in reverse.

You keep waving these concepts and sources around as though they are some totem to prove your point, but when it finally gets down to unraveling all the mystery, they don't. So how long does this; "You don't understand zero!" go on for?

Regards,

John M

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