Einstein and Time (Humans)
by xeno6696 
, Sonoran Desert, Sunday, February 05, 2012, 16:38 (4674 days ago)
David, dhw,-I haven't read this book but its synopsis gives another way of explaining what I was trying to convey concerning Einstein's view of time:-" Nevertheless, Einstein said that time is an illusion. Nature's laws, as he and Newton defined them, describe a timeless, deterministic universe within which we can make predictions with complete certainty. In effect, these great physicists contended that time is reversible and thus meaningless."-This is contrasted with the view that "time only marches forward." -dhw's view of time as a sequence of events, is necessarily true as with no object there is no determination of time. However, Einstein's key insight was that because you can determine the state of any object from any set of current or initial conditions, that time was fundamentally nonexistent. This is why time was simply rolled into distance (space-time) and from then on never treated as an actual object of study. -In other words: Time is relative in the absolute sense. There is no fixed time, no clock, no fundamental universal reality for time--it is something that--like atoms--is contingent. Time is real in the sense that we use it to make measurements--what I stated all along. But its made up. -dhw's great bus analogy works thusly: since I can walk in front of the bus and get squished, this doesn't mean that time is a real property. From the universe's perspective, all I am is matter, and therefore even though the bus hits me and kills me, there's been no actual change of state in the universe. We can set up a model for my bus accident and recreate the event using math, and enjoy the replay as I get squished over and over again. (There's a joke in there somewhere...)-In this view however, is an inescapable sense of utter determinism, the likes of which many fundamentalists would agree...
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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
MATT (to Julia): You mention my thought processes being complex. [...] How much do you love your future children? -MATT (to David and dhw): Einstein said that time is an illusion. Nature's laws [...[ describe a timeless, deterministic universe within which we can make predictions with complete certainty.-Complex indeed. How can you have future children if there's no such reality as past-present-future? How can you make and verify predictions if there's no such reality as past-present-future? Since when did Nature's laws describe anything? It's humans who interpret Nature's laws and make grandiose statements about them. You concede that my "view of time as a sequence of events, is necessarily true as with no object there is no determination of time." But then you go on to say that according to Einstein "you can determine the state of ANY object from any set of current or initial conditions." What does it mean to "determine the state"? Current = now, and initial = before now (= sequence of time), and how can you know the initial conditions when all objects hark back to an endless sequence of cause and effect? And how the heck does all this prove that time is "fundamentally nonexistent"? -Time, you say, "is relative in the absolute sense". I'm not sure how "relative" can have an "absolute" sense, but yes, we have long since agreed that time is relative, and that we use it to make measurements, and these are our human made-up measurements. But its relativity does not mean that the sequences of before-and-after and cause-effect-cause-effect etc., are not real. (See my final paragraph, if you can stick with it that long.)-You talk about the universe's perspective. Unless the universe has a conscious mind (David's panentheist God?) it doesn't have a perspective. "Even though the bus hits me and kills me, there's been no actual change of state in the universe." I don't suppose the Milky Way will go into paroxysms over your death or mine, but that doesn't mean there was no sequence. And you needn't set up a model. All you need do is zoom off into space with a telescope that has an infinite capacity and is infinitely adjustable, and you can watch your squishing for the rest of...oops...time. But that won't alter the fact that first you were unsquished and then you were squished. -Throughout our discussions on knowledge and reality, I've constantly harped on about levels. On the philosophical level there's no such thing as knowledge or reality, because we have no way of knowing what is true or real in the great scheme of things. So if you like to argue that time, space, the sun, the earth, scoobypoo and I do not exist, no-one can prove you wrong. That is the end of all discussion. However, there is also the commonsense level, which allows us to form a general consensus on what constitutes knowledge and reality. Since our human consciousness is the only one we can be sure of on this commonsense level (I do believe that you exist, Matt), and since experience teaches us that the sequences of before and after, cause and effect are real, and since no-one has yet succeeded in reversing the onward movement of these sequences, what grounds are there for saying that the philosophical level is more real than the commonsense level? As you have now acknowledged, hierarchies are subjective. I'll go for the commonsense level and avoid getting squished. I strongly advise you to do the same!
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Wednesday, February 08, 2012, 00:26 (4671 days ago) @ dhw
edited by unknown, Wednesday, February 08, 2012, 00:46
dhw,-I'm clearly, really, really, really, awful at communicating. I have you going down all the wrong places in the discussion of time.-I say this because you bring up the idea that I'm arguing on a "purely philosophic" level again. -Einstein's argument pertaining to time is based on the theory of relativity... in fact it is a direct consequence of the theory of relativity. This non-existence of time is largely accepted [by cosmologists] but [not well] understood. (Think Feynman.) -You raise a good question, I think, when you ask what I mean about "Time not being a fundamental construct of the universe." -The Greeks, Chinese, and Indians recognized 4 elements: earth, fire, air, and water. But all of their systems also included an entity of time: Time was given as concrete a reality as any element that we now recognize on the periodic table. -So far... so good. -Now... the tricky part comes I think, from the fact that we can observe ourselves grow old. If you remember, in my original discussion about time, one unchallenged assertion I made was this: The future does not exist. The past, since it has already happened, no longer exists. The only moment that truly exists, is "right now." -This is the same truth as expressed by Einstein. Einstein's description of travelling at the speed of light will be like Pam Reynold's experience of NDE.-We already know, that if you get in a plane, everyone's clocks/watches/whatever will drift from Universal Standard Time. -This is clue #1. What this means, is that the combination of speed and mass... directly impacts our experience of time. When you're on the plane, it doesn't feel any different. But it is.-When you run the equations, our astronaut traveler who flies away for 5 years at the speed of light... will return to the planet earth aged something like 500k years. (If you want me to be precise I can go look for it...) The point is this: The astronaut has only aged 5 years. The earth aged 500k years. -Where is the "reality of time" in this discussion? [Take a moment to think deeply about the above story here... how can you possibly argue that time is "real" outside of conscious human existence... outside of the observation of phenomena?] -What this means is that for people in a plane, people on the ground, people in a building... all experience time entirely different from each other, depending on height, weight, and the speed they are travelling. It means that fundamentally, time as we measure it slows down to almost nothing the faster you travel. You don't perceive it, but it is irrefutabl[y] true. -Now... it's possible that you might think... "Well, how about quantum phenomenon? There is a disjoint in quantum mechanics and Einsteinian relativity, isn't there? Will quantum mechanics resurrect time?"-The answer to this is also: Quantum mechanics doesn't even consider time. So time doesn't play a role in how we understand the universe at the quantum level, and has no physical reality at the relativistic level. -Clearly... I plainly suck at trying to explain this concept to you, so I will direct you to someone who has apparently written a laymen's book about it: http://everythingforever.com/einstein.htm-As for the question of the "universe's perspective," when you go through the process of deriving the laws of physics from the equations that describe the "Big Bang," you are taking "The universe's perspective." -I fear though... you will still think I'm arguing not from Science but from philosophy, and if that is the case I shall simply have to regroup, and try yet again at some future date, to communicate my thoughts...-[EDITED]
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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
Matt and I are once more locking horns over his insistence that time is not real.-Last night I began to draft a point by point reply to your post, Matt, and to the article you asked me to read. You may be relieved to hear that I soon stopped, because although it was point by point, it was pointless. We would only continue to go over the same ground. For the moment I would therefore like to home in on just one issue, which I think lies at the heart of our disagreement
lease tell us your criteria for judging what is and is not real.
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Thursday, February 09, 2012, 18:33 (4670 days ago) @ dhw
Matt and I are once more locking horns over his insistence that time is not real. > > Please tell us your criteria for judging what is and is not real.-I understand his point. Time is a human invention. It is only real within that invention. Stop the clocks and we still go from one moment in time and reality to another. Time is our measurement of sequestial events, based on division of the rotation of the Earth and its trip around the sun. The events exist, the sequence exists. That is real.
Einstein and Time
Matt says time is not real.-DAVID: I understand his point. Time is a human invention. It is only real within that invention. Stop the clocks and we still go from one moment in time and reality to another. Time is our measurement of sequential events, based on division of the rotation of the Earth and its trip around the sun. The events exist, the sequence exists. That is real.-David, that is MY point. The divisions/measurements are man-made, but the sequence IS the reality of time. There is a before-and-after, a cause-effect-cause-effect, and a not yet existing future that becomes an existing present that becomes a no longer existing past. The sequence ... not 11.25 am, 10 February 2012 ... is what I see as the reality of time. If you don't agree, find me another word to describe that sequence.-But I still need to know Matt's criteria for reality.
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Friday, February 10, 2012, 14:50 (4669 days ago) @ dhw
Matt says time is not real. > > DAVID: I understand his point. Time is a human invention. It is only real within that invention. Stop the clocks and we still go from one moment in time and reality to another. Time is our measurement of sequential events, based on division of the rotation of the Earth and its trip around the sun. The events exist, the sequence exists. That is real. > > David, that is MY point. The divisions/measurements are man-made, but the sequence IS the reality of time. There is a before-and-after, a cause-effect-cause-effect, and a not yet existing future that becomes an existing present that becomes a no longer existing past. The sequence ... not 11.25 am, 10 February 2012 ... is what I see as the reality of time. If you don't agree, find me another word to describe that sequence.-Philosophic point: we are back to if the tree falls in the forest and no one is there, is there sound? The tree creates waves in the air. They exist. but they are not observed. The same with the sequence of events; they exist, but they only become time if observed. As in quantum theory, time requires an observer.
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, February 11, 2012, 18:09 (4668 days ago) @ dhw
Matt says time is not real. > > DAVID: I understand his point. Time is a human invention. It is only real within that invention. Stop the clocks and we still go from one moment in time and reality to another. Time is our measurement of sequential events, based on division of the rotation of the Earth and its trip around the sun. The events exist, the sequence exists. That is real. > > David, that is MY point. The divisions/measurements are man-made, but the sequence IS the reality of time. There is a before-and-after, a cause-effect-cause-effect, and a not yet existing future that becomes an existing present that becomes a no longer existing past. The sequence ... not 11.25 am, 10 February 2012 ... is what I see as the reality of time. If you don't agree, find me another word to describe that sequence. > -It is here where you go astray. Because of that little equation, E = mc^2, the rate at which you experience time is different for both of us. This difference is microscopic for us doing day-to-day things. This means that there is no objective reality for time. On a galactic scale, there is no universal property for time, because of how gravity interacts with the cosmos.-There's no universal clock you can use that will allow you to put together a completely coherent timeline. Because all the objects in the universe have their own "clocks." There's no objective "master clock" in the universe. -Here's a different website: http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/review/dr-marc-space/time-travel.html-The "sequence of events" you keep talking about... they happen independently of any clock. Here's a video that discusses this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wteiuxyqtoM-Because each object in the universe has a different mass, [and travels at different speeds] ALL EVENTS occur at different "times" relative to us and each other.-[EDITED]
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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Saturday, February 11, 2012, 18:24 (4668 days ago) @ xeno6696
> Because each object in the universe has a different mass, [and travels at different speeds] ALL EVENTS occur at different "times" relative to us and each other.- dhw, that is why Einsten's theories are called theories of relativity.
Einstein and Time
Matt says time is not real. MATT: This means that there is no objective reality for time. On a galactic scale, there is no universal property for time, because of how gravity interacts with the cosmos. There's no universal clock you can use that will allow you to put together a completely coherent timeline. Because all the objects in the universe have their own "clocks." There's no objective "master clock" in the universe. [...] The "sequence of events" you keep talking about... they happen independently of any clock.-There is absolutely nothing here that I disagree with or have ever disagreed with. You keep making the same point, but I have NEVER argued that there is a universal or master clock, and you have even quoted the passage in which twice I stressed that it is the sequence and NOT man-made clock time that is the reality. But you and David seem to think that clock time is the ONLY form of time. The word has as many meanings as I once had hairs. Here are three dictionary definitions of the time I am talking about:-"Indefinite continuous duration regarded as that in which the sequence of events takes place" (Oxford)-"A [...] continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future." (Reader's Digest Great Illustrated Dictionary) -"The continuous passage of existence in which events pass from a state of potentiality in the future, through the present, to a state of finality in the past" (Collins) No mention of clocks, because clock time is only ONE form of time (the man-made measurement). In my last post I suggested: "a not yet existing future that becomes an existing present that becomes a no longer existing past" No clocks. Since you both appear to accept the reality of the SEQUENCE, why can't you accept the reality of time according to this definition? I asked what other word you would use to describe the sequence, but neither of you has answered. You are perhaps too busy clock-watching. This brings us to criteria. Matt, in your earlier post you asked: "how can you possibly argue that time is "real" outside of conscious human existence...outside of the observation of phenomena?" That is a philosophical question, and positively demands the clarification of criteria that you refuse to offer. My answer to your question is that on one philosophical level we cannot argue that ANYTHING is real outside of ourselves and our observations. However ... hurray for common sense ... you now say: "We can establish the reality of something minimally by agreement ... David, dhw, and I can all see the sun." Yes, yes, and yes again. I do wish you had pursued that line of thinking, but I suspect you knew where it would lead you and decided to rush back to your clock-watching. Well, let me spell it out: David, Matt and dhw can all see that effects follow causes, that we were younger in the past than we are now, that events take place in sequences of before and after. THAT is the level on which time is a reality, and that is why I asked for your criteria. But I will boldly go one step further, and issue yet another challenge which will probably go unanswered:-On the understanding that we cannot "know" any ultimate, objective truth, I firmly believe (David will be amazed at such commitment!) that even if there were no humans, there would still be events going on in the universe, via a process of cause and effect, which would pass from a non-existent future through a present and into a non-existent past (e.g. the birth and death of stars). Do you or do you not share my belief? If you do, you believe in the reality of clockless time as I have defined it. That is as far as any of us can go.
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Sunday, February 12, 2012, 16:03 (4667 days ago) @ dhw
> On the understanding that we cannot "know" any ultimate, objective truth, I firmly believe (David will be amazed at such commitment!) that even if there were no humans, there would still be events going on in the universe, via a process of cause and effect, which would pass from a non-existent future through a present and into a non-existent past (e.g. the birth and death of stars). Do you or do you not share my belief? If you do, you believe in the reality of clockless time as I have defined it. That is as far as any of us can go.-Congratulations!! Your continuum goes back to First Cause!!! Or is there an infinity back there, infinite regression? Not possible if we rule out Multiverse. The Big Bang is an origin, as I believe Alex Vilenkin just told us that at Hawking's 70 B'day party. So get off your fence and recognize FC, thanks to Aristotle, refined by St. Tom.
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Sunday, February 12, 2012, 17:50 (4667 days ago) @ David Turell
David... > Congratulations!! Your continuum goes back to First Cause!!! Or is there an infinity back there, infinite regression? Not possible if we rule out Multiverse. The Big Bang is an origin, as I believe Alex Vilenkin just told us that at Hawking's 70 B'day party. So get off your fence and recognize FC, thanks to Aristotle, refined by St. Tom.-Not so fast.... I bought that book about timelessness and started reading it last night... not only do I have some revisions I need to make about the "unreality" of past and the future, Einstein's position was even more radical than I had originally thought...-He thought that the past, the present, and the future truly exist simultaneously, that any and all concepts we have about time as a sequence or a flow can be violated by relativity... [Meaning, the idea of a first-cause is irrelevant... the answer to "why is there something rather than nothing" is additionally abrogated because "nothing" IS "something."]-dhw, I will owe you a book-length reply, so sit tight...-[EDITED]
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Sunday, February 12, 2012, 18:18 (4667 days ago) @ xeno6696
Meaning, the idea of a first-cause is irrelevant... the answer to "why is there something rather than nothing" is additionally abrogated because "nothing" IS "something."]-Depends on the nothing you are discussing. Our space as a virtual vacuum is not nothing. A true void is not something, and is a true nothing. Depends upon which philosphy you wish to follow.
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Monday, February 13, 2012, 22:53 (4665 days ago) @ David Turell
Meaning, the idea of a first-cause is irrelevant... the answer to "why is there something rather than nothing" is additionally abrogated because "nothing" IS "something."] > > Depends on the nothing you are discussing. Our space as a virtual vacuum is not nothing. A true void is not something, and is a true nothing. Depends upon which philosphy you wish to follow.-I will be discussing this next in more detail, but Giorbran flatly states that we confuse the idea of "nothing" with "nonexistence." The former is always tied by language to some object. The latter is completely unfathomable. "There's nothing in the refrigerator" presupposes that objects exist, only they aren't present. -There is no "void" that we can possibly fathom. And even the existence of a God is necessarily--not "void." -Giorbran plans to demonstrate that the idea of true "void" is equally as complex as that of existence. He challenges the idea that "nothing" is a simpler primordial state than "something." (Because this is exactly how most of us think.)
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Tuesday, February 14, 2012, 01:23 (4665 days ago) @ xeno6696
> I will be discussing this next in more detail, but Giorbran flatly states that we confuse the idea of "nothing" with "nonexistence." The former is always tied by language to some object. The latter is completely unfathomable. "There's nothing in the refrigerator" presupposes that objects exist, only they aren't present. > > There is no "void" that we can possibly fathom. And even the existence of a God is necessarily--not "void." -I await your next explanation of Giorbran's thinking.
Einstein and Time
Dhw: On the understanding that we cannot "know" any ultimate, objective truth, I firmly believe (David will be amazed at such commitment!) that even if there were no humans, there would still be events going on in the universe, via a process of cause and effect, which would pass from a non-existent future through a present and into a non-existent past (e.g. the birth and death of stars). Do you or do you not share my belief? If you do, you believe in the reality of clockless time as I have defined it. That is as far as any of us can go.-DAVID: Congratulations!! Your continuum goes back to First Cause!!! Or is there an infinity back there, infinite regression? Not possible if we rule out Multiverse. The Big Bang is an origin, as I believe Alex Vilenkin just told us that at Hawking's 70 B'day party. So get off your fence and recognize FC, thanks to Aristotle, refined by St. Tom.-Ah, you never miss a trick, do you? But 1) if you believe in a First Cause, you have no choice other than to accept that time as I have defined it is a reality. 2) Big Bang is still just a theory, and we still need to know what went bang. 3) Big Bounce seems just as feasible to this layman. And 4) an endless series of mindless bouncing universes or, for that matter, mindless universes that go bang in the blank of nothingness, seems no less and no more incredible than an endless intelligence that just sort of happens to be there. Come and join me on my clockless fence.-Matt, this correspondence has already reached "book-length", and I wonder how productive a "book-length reply" would be for either of us. I feel guilty already at subjecting you to so many unreal, earthtime hours of writing and research when for us subjective earthlings the question of time's reality is ultimately one of definition, philosophical criteria, and personal belief. The only way you and I might possibly find out the objective truth about anything will be if there's an afterlife, so as far as the subject of time is concerned, are you sure you don't want to leave it till then? (Yeah, "till then" implies there's a difference between now and then, present and future, in a continuum. Sorry. LOL.)
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Monday, February 13, 2012, 17:33 (4666 days ago) @ dhw
Dhw: On the understanding that we cannot "know" any ultimate, objective truth, I firmly believe (David will be amazed at such commitment!) that even if there were no humans, there would still be events going on in the universe, via a process of cause and effect, which would pass from a non-existent future through a present and into a non-existent past (e.g. the birth and death of stars). Do you or do you not share my belief? If you do, you believe in the reality of clockless time as I have defined it. That is as far as any of us can go. > > DAVID: Congratulations!! Your continuum goes back to First Cause!!! Or is there an infinity back there, infinite regression? Not possible if we rule out Multiverse. The Big Bang is an origin, as I believe Alex Vilenkin just told us that at Hawking's 70 B'day party. So get off your fence and recognize FC, thanks to Aristotle, refined by St. Tom. > > Ah, you never miss a trick, do you? But 1) if you believe in a First Cause, you have no choice other than to accept that time as I have defined it is a reality. 2) Big Bang is still just a theory, and we still need to know what went bang. 3) Big Bounce seems just as feasible to this layman. And 4) an endless series of mindless bouncing universes or, for that matter, mindless universes that go bang in the blank of nothingness, seems no less and no more incredible than an endless intelligence that just sort of happens to be there. Come and join me on my clockless fence. > -And as one of my new favorite physicists Gevin Giorbran echoes, "A creator simply moves the question of existence back one layer. Instead of 'why is there something rather than nothing,' we then ask 'why is there a creator rather than nothing?'" It is no more a solution the the problem than many worlds or many universes. And though he writes agnostic to creators, he asks, "Why then, couldn't a universe--a simpler object than the creator--also be uncreated?"-Another good quote, relating to the Big Bang: "In the theory of relativity, the concept of time begins with the Big Bang the same way as parallels of latitude begin at the North Pole." (Kari Enqvist)--> Matt, this correspondence has already reached "book-length", and I wonder how productive a "book-length reply" would be for either of us. I feel guilty already at subjecting you to so many unreal, earthtime hours of writing and research when for us subjective earthlings the question of time's reality is ultimately one of definition, philosophical criteria, and personal belief. The only way you and I might possibly find out the objective truth about anything will be if there's an afterlife, so as far as the subject of time is concerned, are you sure you don't want to leave it till then? (Yeah, "till then" implies there's a difference between now and then, present and future, in a continuum. Sorry. LOL.)-I know you're laughing at me right now (in a good way) but since I started reading this book, These key thinkers in the last 100 years came to the same conclusion about time: -1. Albert Einstein 2. Richard Feynman 3. Stephen Hawking 4. Niels Bohr (<--not sure about this last name, but I don't have the book at hand. It could have been Bohm.) -Now, you know I don't prefer arguments from authority, my point for looking at these thinkers is because of this:-Their manner of thinking about the universe was each as revolutionary and counter-intuitive as the previous. The fact that they each came to the same conclusion--each from studying a different path--lends credence to the idea that they may not be crazy. And they all faced fierce opposition for their ideas.-The key in the video I was posting to you before, about the train, is that BOTH views of the lightning flashes are correct. They really DID happen simultaneously for one observer, and sequentially for the moving observer. -What it means, is that there is a sequence of events--true, but time is necessarily separate from the sequence of events. Time requires an observer. Of course in physics, an observer doesn't mean an intelligent one--any time two objects interact that is an "observation." But the very fact that mathematically--both observers are correct--means that there isn't a binary relationship in regards to time. It isn't a "yes/no" question.-I don't yet agree with the idea of the past and the future co-existing with the present, but I also haven't been faced with that argument yet. -The differences here aren't philosophical as you keep insisting. Relativity is an experimentally verified phenomenon. Clocks run slower orbiting the earth, because reality is different there. -Giorbran starts his book with a discussion about "nothing," and I think it will breathe some fresh life into our discussion as well... Your homework question is to come up with some thoughts about why "Nothing" is necessarily simpler, more primordial than "something." What is "nothing?" (This one goes for you too David...)
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Tuesday, February 14, 2012, 15:05 (4665 days ago) @ xeno6696
And as one of my new favorite physicists Gevin Giorbran echoes, "A creator simply moves the question of existence back one layer. Instead of 'why is there something rather than nothing,' we then ask 'why is there a creator rather than nothing?'" It is no more a solution the the problem than many worlds or many universes. And though he writes agnostic to creators, he asks, "Why then, couldn't a universe--a simpler object than the creator--also be uncreated?"-The great disparate authorites in theology always describe the creator as pure simplicity. This is one of the great divides: atheists want God complicated. Religions claim He isn't! > > Giorbran starts his book with a discussion about "nothing," and I think it will breathe some fresh life into our discussion as well... Your homework question is to come up with some thoughts about why "Nothing" is necessarily simpler, more primordial than "something." What is "nothing?" > (This one goes for you too David...)-Anything, something has a cause of existence. Nothing does not exist, has no cause and is necessarily simpler. Very simple and very complex are two poles of a comtinuum.
Einstein and Time
MATT: The differences here aren't philosophical as you keep insisting. Relativity is an experimentally verified phenomenon. Clocks run slower orbiting the earth, because reality is different there. Screams of dismay, disbelief, despair, dis AND dat. Am I an illusion? Are you an illusion? Is everything an illusion? I speak, but no-one answers. I am alone in the universe. But I am British. Stiff upper lip. Never give up. If at first you don't succeed...If at the one hundredth time you don't succeed...Once more unto the breach, dear friends...-Matt, nobody has the authority to make statements like "Time is necessarily separate from the sequence of events", or "Time requires an observer". It all depends what you mean by "time", so please listen carefully to the following points as I make them for the umpteenth "time": 1) I have never questioned relativity or any of the examples of it that you have given. 2) I am not talking about clock time. 3) There are many different uses of the word "time". The time I am talking about is: a sequence in which the not yet existing future becomes an existing present that becomes a no longer existing past. (Similar definitions of "time" are to be found in multiple, perfectly respectable sources.)-Now here are three questions for you:-1) Do you believe in the reality of the sequence defined in Point 3) above? 2) If you do, what do you call it? 3) Do you believe, as I do, that even if there were no humans, this sequence would continue to occur in the universe (e.g. the birth and death of stars)?-Are you with me, Matt? Have you read and understood the questions? Please answer questions 1) and 3) with yes or no, and I promise I won't tell Einstein.
Einstein and Time
I'm feeling a little guilty at having tried to bully Matt into answering three loaded questions concerning the reality of time. (Sorry, Matt.) -It might perhaps be fairer if I develop my answer to the question you posed in your post of 8 February at 00.26: "How can you possibly argue that time is "real" outside of conscious human existence...outside of the observation of phenomena?" I did respond to this on 12 February at 14.21, but the subject was not followed up, and it seems to me so fundamental to our discussion that it needs to be highlighted.-Our concepts of reality can hardly be based on anything other than human observation and the inferences we draw from our observations. Another of your comments was: "...there is no objective reality for time." In most areas of life we have no way of knowing whether our observations and inferences correspond to objective reality. But that doesn't mean that our concepts are wrong. As you have pointed out yourself, six witnesses describing an accident will give six different accounts, but the subjectivity and relativity of their observations does not mean that the accident itself wasn't "real".-As far as time is concerned, we have agreed that there is no objective way of measuring it, because it's always relative to its context and to the situation of its observer. But there is also a general consensus that things change, and the something DURING which they change is what we humans have always called "time". This applies as much to the birth and death of stars as it does to our own movement from babyhood to old age. -The discussion we're having hinges on definitions and hierarchies. What form of "time" are we talking about (see above), and what do we consider to be "reality"? Of course we humans do create our own realities (and woe betide you if you ignore them!) ... money, machines, jobs, art ... which in relation to the cosmos have no "reality". If there were no humans, none of these would exist. But my (subjective) view is that you can't say the same about time, because even if there were no humans, I firmly believe there would still be a moment-to-moment-to-moment sequence (which we call "time") in the course of which present conditions would change to past. I would even go so far as to say that without that sequence, you and I would not be here. My three questions still apply, but I hope this will be a gentler way of explaining why I feel I have to ask them.
Einstein and Time: Effect on Earth's core
by David Turell , Thursday, May 26, 2016, 22:38 (3101 days ago) @ dhw
It has been calculated that the Earth's core is 2.5 years younger than the surface due to time dilatation, as predicted by Feynman.-http://phys.org/news/2016-05-earth-core-younger-thought.html-"A trio of researchers in Denmark has calculated the relative ages of the surface of the Earth versus its core and has found that the core is 2.5 years younger than the crust.-***-"During one of his famous lectures at Caltech in the 1960's, Richard Feynman remarked that due to time dilation, the Earth's core is actually younger than its crust—a difference he suggested that was likely a "day or two." Since that time, physicists have accepted both the notion that the core is younger than the surface, and the amount of time given by Feynman, without checking the math.-"General relativity suggests that really big objects, like planets and stars, actually warp the fabric of spacetime, which results in a gravitational pull capable of slowing down time. Thus, an object closer to Earth's center would feel a stronger pull—a clock set near the core would run slower than one placed at the surface, which means that the material that makes up the core is actually younger than the material that makes up the crust. This seems counterintuitive to our sense of reason. Such oddities have long been taken for granted in physics, as has the degree of time difference offered by Feynman during his lecture. In this new effort, the research trio ran the math to discover the actual number involved. They found that over the course of our planet's 4.5 billion year history, the pull of gravity causes the core to be approximately 2.5 years younger than the crust—ignoring geological processes, of course."-Comment: The universe is as weird as ever.
Einstein and Time; Vilenkin is back!!
by David Turell , Friday, April 27, 2012, 02:17 (4592 days ago) @ David Turell
This universe and/or any other multiverses had a beginning:- http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27793/
Einstein and Time; Vilenkin is back!!
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Friday, April 27, 2012, 02:39 (4592 days ago) @ David Turell
This universe and/or any other multiverses had a beginning: > > > http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27793/-The corollary: God is finite.
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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time; Vilenkin is back!!
by David Turell , Friday, April 27, 2012, 05:03 (4592 days ago) @ xeno6696
This universe and/or any other multiverses had a beginning: > > > > > > http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27793/ > > The corollary: God is finite.-Unless He is eternal and outside the math, which He created. The reality of math is that it exists whether we are here or not to discover it. I know yhou know that. We only discover it, not invent it.
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, April 28, 2012, 19:54 (4591 days ago) @ David Turell
This universe and/or any other multiverses had a beginning: > > > > > > > > > http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27793/ > > > > The corollary: God is finite. > > Unless He is eternal and outside the math, which He created. The reality of math is that it exists whether we are here or not to discover it. I know yhou know that. We only discover it, not invent it.-It goes back to the basic discussion we had regarding panentheism/pantheism and the universe. Existence/nonexistence. -If God is part of the universe, then God IS the universe. If God is separate from the universe, than God is not part of the universe. These are the only two possible distinctions. -It really comes down to, do you take the western notion of a completely transcendent God (Abrahamic) or the all-inclusive God is "in everything." -There is no mixture. -As for the reality of math, you need to go back to an ancient post I had. You're conflating Physics with Mathematics. -Mathematics is language only. Mathematics, is ultimately "made up." We use it to describe the world in physics. As I've asked before, should we be surprised that the most precise language ever invented can precisely describe the world? -If you push deep enough into the structure of mathematics, you will ultimately ascertain that the foundation or bedrock of mathematics itself is based on tautologies... Not on observation. As a computer scientist I have to be intimately aware of the "nature of numbers." The superstructure of mathematics is ultimately based on pure, raw logic. The corollary of this is that if math has a "real" and "independent" existence, then a mathematical "theory of everything" isn't just plausible--it necessarily exists!-However, Godel's incompleteness theorem forever shut the door on the Platonic view that there was a "mathematical reality." This contradicts the notion that a "theory of everything" exists. Well. In mathematical terms. Enter Physics: the counter-claim to my position is that physics isn't an axiomatic system. Therefore, a theory of everything can exist. But Godel still constrains this view, because if you ditch axioms, then you have to have inconsistencies and holes in your understanding. -To try and communicate the ephemeral quality of mathematics: If you take a pencil, and then take a glass. Set them down. -What does mathematics allow you to do? Just to say that you have "two" objects in front of you. -This property of "twoness" is however abstract, a relationship that doesn't really exist outside of the realm of the observer's mind. It is extremely difficult to be able to determine if the property you're discussing with mathematics is one based only upon logic or based on observation. An entire study of the philosophy of mathematics is in fact, predicated on exactly this kind of study. And it's NOT a fun read. Even for me. -All of that is really a fancy way of saying this: I think your real point is that you're amazed that we can predict events in our universe. But even if you study malformed universes--they still all behave predictably. In short, predictability is a necessary property of existence itself, and I don't think we should be amazed at that.
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
by David Turell , Sunday, April 29, 2012, 07:43 (4590 days ago) @ xeno6696
> It goes back to the basic discussion we had regarding panentheism/pantheism and the universe. Existence/nonexistence. > > If God is part of the universe, then God IS the universe. If God is separate from the universe, than God is not part of the universe. These are the only two possible distinctions. -I agree that God is the universe, as you interpret it. > > It really comes down to, do you take the western notion of a completely transcendent God (Abrahamic) or the all-inclusive God is "in everything." -Yes, God is everything, the way you state it. > > As for the reality of math, you need to go back to an ancient post I had. You're conflating Physics with Mathematics. > > Mathematics is language only. Mathematics, is ultimately "made up." We use it to describe the world in physics. As I've asked before, should we be surprised that the most precise language ever invented can precisely describe the world? -I'm not surprised. But I understand that math is conceptual, to be found. The concepts always exist and we discover them because we have consciousness can can conceptualize. > > If you push deep enough into the structure of mathematics, you will ultimately ascertain that the foundation or bedrock of mathematics itself is based on tautologies... Not on observation. As a computer scientist I have to be intimately aware of the "nature of numbers." The superstructure of mathematics is ultimately based on pure, raw logic. The corollary of this is that if math has a "real" and "independent" existence, then a mathematical "theory of everything" isn't just plausible--it necessarily exists! > > However, Godel's incompleteness theorem forever shut the door on the Platonic view that there was a "mathematical reality." This contradicts the notion that a "theory of everything" exists. Well. In mathematical terms. Enter Physics: the counter-claim to my position is that physics isn't an axiomatic system. Therefore, a theory of everything can exist. But Godel still constrains this view, because if you ditch axioms, then you have to have inconsistencies and holes in your understanding. -Understood. > > This property of "twoness" is however abstract, a relationship that doesn't really exist outside of the realm of the observer's mind. -That makes perfect sense.-> > All of that is really a fancy way of saying this: I think your real point is that you're amazed that we can predict events in our universe. But even if you study malformed universes--they still all behave predictably. In short, predictability is a necessary property of existence itself, and I don't think we should be amazed at that.-I am amazed at predictability, but math viewed the way you point out makes perfect sense. It fits my idea that the universe is really mind and consciousness. I don't believe that inorganic material can become alive and invent consciousness, unless consciousness already exists. Thank you for this post!
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
MATT: If God is part of the universe, then God IS the universe. If God is separate from the universe, then God is not part of the universe. These are the only two possible distinctions.-DAVID: I agree that God is the universe, as you interpret it.-I am struggling with the logic of this. With regard to Matt's statement, if God is part of the universe, then there must be parts of the universe that are not God. Therefore God is NOT the universe. With regard to David's statement, if God IS the universe as Matt interprets it, God could not have created the universe. I was always under the impression, David, that you thought God HAD created the universe.-There is a third possibility, however, which reconciles the two ideas and which I think is actually David's concept. If God exists, he IS the universe in the sense that he is the primal energy that has always existed and that consciously transforms itself into the matter which we call the universe. Atheists believe that the primal energy is not conscious, and that is the difference between theists and atheists.
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
by David Turell , Sunday, April 29, 2012, 16:24 (4590 days ago) @ dhw
edited by unknown, Sunday, April 29, 2012, 16:33
MATT: If God is part of the universe, then God IS the universe. If God is separate from the universe, then God is not part of the universe. These are the only two possible distinctions. > > DAVID: I agree that God is the universe, as you interpret it. > > I am struggling with the logic of this. With regard to Matt's statement, if God is part of the universe, then there must be parts of the universe that are not God. Therefore God is NOT the universe. With regard to David's statement, if God IS the universe as Matt interprets it, God could not have created the universe. I was always under the impression, David, that you thought God HAD created the universe. > > There is a third possibility, however, which reconciles the two ideas and which I think is actually David's concept. If God exists, he IS the universe in the sense that he is the primal energy that has always existed and that consciously transforms itself into the matter which we call the universe. Atheists believe that the primal energy is not conscious, and that is the difference between theists and atheists.-I've produced the last post by dhw completely. I am not a logician with strict worry about every nuance. I don't care if Matt uses the word 'part'. dhw is correct in his paragraph as to my concept. And I have it at the end of the post he is commenting on:- "It fits my idea that the universe is really mind and consciousness. I don't believe that inorganic material can become alive and invent consciousness, unless consciousness already exists." That mind of course is God, who must be the first cause. It is nice that dhw has delved so deeply into my thinking that he must explain me to me! As I have always stated I know what I believe even if it doesn't sound logical to others. I'm with Alban in La Cage, 'I am what I am". I do appreciate dhw's efforts, don't be mistaken about that, and perhaps he is interpreting me for others on the website. I am only a simple former physician following my nose in my own diagnostic way!
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Monday, April 30, 2012, 01:37 (4589 days ago) @ David Turell
David,-I guess I don't really see how you're getting from A to B here... could you enlighten me?
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time: The \"reality\" of math
by David Turell , Monday, April 30, 2012, 16:10 (4589 days ago) @ xeno6696
David, > > I guess I don't really see how you're getting from A to B here... could you enlighten me?-See the two following posts.
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, February 11, 2012, 17:42 (4668 days ago) @ David Turell
Matt and I are once more locking horns over his insistence that time is not real. > > > > Please tell us your criteria for judging what is and is not real. > > I understand his point. Time is a human invention. It is only real within that invention. Stop the clocks and we still go from one moment in time and reality to another. Time is our measurement of sequestial events, based on division of the rotation of the Earth and its trip around the sun. The events exist, the sequence exists. That is real.-Bullseye.
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, February 11, 2012, 17:41 (4668 days ago) @ dhw
Matt and I are once more locking horns over his insistence that time is not real. > -Time is not an objective property of the universe. It is relative to the point of irrelevance... -It exists because we MAKE it exist. -> Last night I began to draft a point by point reply to your post, Matt, and to the article you asked me to read. You may be relieved to hear that I soon stopped, because although it was point by point, it was pointless. We would only continue to go over the same ground. For the moment I would therefore like to home in on just one issue, which I think lies at the heart of our disagreement: > > Please tell us your criteria for judging what is and is not real.-dhw is asking me for my own "order of rank" here. No offense, but I think this is a worse question than the issue that spawned it. -We'll start simply, then modify as needed. -We can establish the reality of something minimally by agreement--David, dhw, and I can all see the sun.
--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"
\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"
Einstein and Time
by romansh 
, Sunday, February 19, 2012, 21:46 (4659 days ago) @ xeno6696
My two cents worth (or tuppence in the inflationary UK).-I don't have a good handle on the concept of time - relativity and more importantly evidence that supports relativity shows me that time is not as I perceive it. Almost by definition an illusion. But is it a delusion? -I don't know.-I have a sense of colour, pain, free will, dualism, self and much, much more. Plainly these things are not as they seem. Adding time to that list is no big deal.-rom
Einstein and Time
by David Turell , Monday, May 02, 2016, 15:18 (3126 days ago) @ xeno6696
Another essay which points out that time is a series of 'nows' and death is the last now for that person:-https://aeon.co/opinions/there-is-no-death-only-a-series-of-eternal-nows?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=7590d0ab15-Daily_Newsletter_02_May_20165_2_2016&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-7590d0ab15-68942561-"If you try to get your hands on time,' said the physicist Julian Barbour, ‘it's always slipping through your fingers. People are sure that it's there but they can't get hold of it. Now my feeling is that they can't get hold of it because it isn't there at all.'-"He and many other physicists see each individual moment as a whole, complete and existing in its own right. We live in a succession of ‘Nows'. ‘We have the strong impression that [things] are there in definite positions relative to each other,' says Barbour. ‘[But] there are Nows, nothing more, nothing less.'-"Indeed, Einstein's colleague, John Wheeler (who popularised the word ‘black hole') also postulated that time is not a fundamental aspect of reality. In 2007, his ‘delayed-choice' experiment showed that you could retroactively influence the past by altering a particle of light, called a photon, in the present. As light passed a fork in the experimental apparatus, it had to decide whether to behave like particles or waves. Later on (after the light had already passed the fork),a scientist could turn a switch on or off. What the scientist did at that moment retroactively determined what the particle actually did at the fork in the past.-***-" Werner Heisenberg, the eminent Nobel physicist who pioneered quantum mechanics, once said: ‘Contemporary science, today more than at any previous time, has been forced by nature herself to pose again the question of the possibility of comprehending reality by mental processes.' It turns out that everything we see and experience is a whirl of information occurring in our head. We are not just objects embedded in some external matrix ticking away ‘out there'. Rather, space and time are the tools our mind uses to put it all together.-"Of course, as you're reading this, you're experiencing a ‘now'. But consider: from your great-grandmother's perspective, your nows exist in her future and her great-grandmother's nows exist in her past. The words ‘past' and ‘future' are just ideas relative to each individual observer.-***-"In short, death does not actually exist. Instead, at death, we reach the imagined border of ourselves, the wooded boundary where, in the old fairy tale, the fox and the hare say goodnight to each other. And if death and time are illusions, so too is the continuity in the connection of nows. Where, then, do we find ourselves? -***-"Einstein knew this. In 1955, when his lifelong friend Michele Besso died, he wrote: ‘Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.'"-Comment: In pure physics time is an arrow in both directions. God doesn't exist, but if He does, physics' conclusions are wrong.