Re: When did time start?
- From: Scaly Lizard <scalylizard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2007 22:45:38 -0400
On Sun, 14 Oct 2007 00:32:11 -0700, "Jimbo" <chris150@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Another question: where did time start?
Where is the universe?
Where's Waldo?
Yes, I get it. My lengthy rambling did drag on a lot longer then it should
have.
Don't mind "mikeranch87", he's just got the same curiosity
about the tough questions that you have. I don't think he's
poking fun at you: i think he really wants to know where the
universe is.
Sidenote to mr87: there is a progression of events which
preceded the Big Bang, so there was a time 'before'. All
evidence of the 'before' or the 'elsewhere' is inaccessible
from within our 'closed yet unbounded' universe, by the
definition of "closed". So we don't know where time had
a starting point, but the Big Bang could well have been
the outcome of a Big Crunch of a previous universe.
The BB seems like a good point to reset the clock to
0:00:00:000, but the clock of *someone else* would still
be counting, even if all specks of it are gone. I know
that sounds like a platonic ideal, blech, but it illustrates
a possibility of a time count existing outside of our
present universe.
Where is the universe? We don't know yet, but there are
a couple good theories so far.
Our universe could be a single bubble which arose from a
pervasive substrate of quantum potential... an energy/matter
field, in other words. If this is so, then the universe has no
location, as it would be the only feature in an otherwise
featureless 11-dimensional quantum field. If there is only
one distinguishable location, then the idea of location
becomes moot. There is only "here" and "not-here".
The other popular theory is that there are many universes,
collectively called a multiverse. If this is so, then our universe's
location could only be defined by the adjacent universes, with
which ours may (or may not) interact. We might be unable
to ever observe other universes, and we may never be able
to define "adjacency" in 11D space. If this theory is true, the
only thing we might ever be able to say about our universe's
location is that we are adjacent to the next one.
You guys did clear up something for me though.
If I understand correctly, I was in error about how I thought about time and
space.
I always thought that time was a concept independent of our universe. If the
expansion of our universe speeded up or slowed down or even collapsed in
upon it self, time would still be a constant measured in some unknown way.
However, viewing time as a "feature" of our universe does make some sense.
So if I understand it correctly, that means that if every electron orbiting
the nucleus of an atom, every photon, every bit of matter and energy in the
universe came to a complete stop or pause then so too would time itself.
This is because time is a concept that is based upon an active universe. Or
put another way, time can be viewed as a measurement that uses the
comparative differences in levels of energy of a sample, the change in
distance or properties between samples of matter, etc. as a basis of
comparison and the concept of time is the end result of that degree of
change. The degree of all these aggregate changes biased against our
perceived known constants gives us the illusion of time.
Is that it?
Yeah, that sounds pretty good. Comparing things leads to
discovery of relative differences, which is what Einstein got
the Nobel for. Now we know that Einstein was wrong, but
100 years ago he did an outstanding job of relating current
observations to physical science theory.
Albert's major mistake was considering the speed of light to
be a constant: "C". We now know that a photon's path
through space can be altered not only by matter's gravity
field, but also by energy. If C is not a constant, famous
truths like E = M * C^2 might be closer to E=MC^4 under
certain conditions.
The classic view is that an object traveling at C is
unaffected by time, and fractions of C distort locally
perceived time accordingly. But now that we know
C is not a dependable constant, we must re-evaluate
the concept of time. It seems likely that time does affect
free-range photons after all, and also likely that the
very existence of matter and energy in particle form is
not affected by time at all.
Yes, this is a contradiction. It is the same fundamental
contradiction expressed in the famous particle/wave
experiment which exposed the photon's dual nature.
A possible way to untangle the contradiction might be
to separate the concept of time into two parts: local time
and whole time. For local time, follow Einstein's theory
of relativity. For whole time, consider the superset of
all extant local times as a function dependent on the
quantum probability of local particle persistence.
I know that's confusing, but i hope i can simplify it
for this thread: everything around you is blinking in
and out of 'existence' trillions of times every second.
A particle which blinks out as an electron has a very
good chance of reappearing as an electron when it
blinks back into existence, but this is not guaranteed.
If it does come back as the same particle, we can say
that it "persists".
A piece of a quark in a neutron which is part of a
hydrogen atom could blink in with a slightly different
state, affecting the spin of the quark, making the atom
more likely to attract and hold another neutron and
become a hydrogen isotope. Or this could change the
neutron to a proton, making it a helium atom.
The point is that particles persist for very long times, so
you don't have to buy a new table every week. But
there is a rate of nonpersistance which is not zero.
Particles can -and do- change state spontaneously
all the time.
All events we see can be collected into a local time
for us on Earth. In 1054 AD, we saw a bright star,
and today there is the Crab Nebula in that spot. We
say that 31,358,205,000 seconds 'passed' between
that event and October 15, 2007.
Consider an observer placed on the line between the
Earth and the Crab Nebula, but an exact doubling of
distance, farther from us. 31,358,205,001 seconds
might have passed between when the observer saw
the supernova and "right now".
If one could measure such tiny differences in local
times, then the value of time at any point in the universe
could be assigned via a function which takes into account
the *relative* speed of light between the target point and
every other point in the universe at that moment. And that
would depend on the level of matter between A and B,
because matter has a non-zero rate of nonpersistance.
I guess it's a matter of faith to believe in whole time, since
to compute it would require a device with as many switches
as there are subatomic particles in the universe, which would
logically require the entire resources of three other universes
to build.
We can't get at the basic unit of time, but it looks likely
today that our devices are simply not accurate enough,
rather than concluding that all time is a locally relative
function of matter/energy density.
If time is a function of the density of space, then we
would not see the structure of the universe that we see
today. Sky surveys reveal vast holes bereft of visible
matter, giving the universe a spongy appearance.
If time were a function of matter/energy, then we
would not see these voids: they would 'collapse'
into thin layers under observation.
But since a photon travels across intergalactic voids, we
know there must be a time when it enters, and a time
when it exits. The exit can only come after the entrance,
which is a partial definition of "time".
Inbetween, the dominant effect is quantum persistance.
If we can quantify persistance probabilities, then we can
take another small step towards understanding whole time.
As the original poster of this thread, I reserve the right to refrain from
continuing on about other branches of said thread, at least for now. :-)
No prob, delving into a Q like "when did time start" might
take some time. The time remaining to investigate this
question is (logically) equal to "all the time in the world."
SL
.
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