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[Queebeagle]

Time has been seen as the fourth dimension since the idea of dimensions and time has existed. I argue this is an assumption that needs to be questioned. I’m going to try and suggest time is actually either the zeroth dimension or the zeroth and the fourth dimension together.

Most people, including philosophers and physicists, generally see time as a single dimensional entity with a single effect. What if they’re wrong? What if time has two components to it? It has a clock tick that is a universal constant that never changes regardless of the physical reality of the point in space under consideration. It also has a total amount of expenditure of energy (perhaps) that the individual points of existence can expend per moment (clock tick). The total expenditure is directly related to the speed of the object so if the object is very fast it cannot spend much energy doing other stuff. This gives us the time dilation effect while anchoring the object in a fixed ticking base of reality. Perhaps the clock tick is between physical existence of an object and an information layer such as quantum physics seems to require. In the physical existential layer, say a binary on, the universe exists as a fixed and unmoving entity. Then it tocks to an information layer where movement and formulaic interaction occurs based on the physical laws of the universe. Then it ticks again. Woot! We’ve moved!

Many think that time dilation is evidence of time travel in a limited fashion. I suggest it is not. This can be seen if we keep in mind one of the requirements of an object for it to be considered a ‘time traveller’. That requirement is that moments must be missing between the object and the ‘natural’ flow of time. If there are 100 moments between moment A and moment B then a time traveller must experience less than 100 moments when traversing between moment A and B. People erroneously point to time dilation and surmise that there must be missing moments in the time dilated object because a chronometer on the object reads less than a resting chronometer (say on the planet). Under a single effect for time theory this would be correct, the two effects for time theory says this is incorrect.

Using two thought experiments it is possible to see why I think the single effect theory is flawed in that it predicts something that is not matched by reality. It predicts that the faster you go the more moments must be missing from the objects experience of time. (Patience padawan, keep reading.)

Thought Experiment One. Poke Me With a Stick.

Imagine a ship travelling from one solar system to another at 99.99% the speed of light, assume rapid acceleration (make it an unmanned drone if you don’t want inertial compensators and grav plating heh!). Now get a rather large group of volunteers, or slaves if the galactic emperor decrees, and stick them all in space suits on a line between the systems (we’ll need a lot). Give them all a stick each (buy wood futures). Now choose any possible arbitrary time between when the ship leaves and when it arrives and get everyone to poke their stick out to hit the ship for a single moment (ok might need robots for this). I say that no matter what time you choose to poke you will hit ship somewhere. This is NOT what the single effect time theory predicts. We need missing moments where the ship is not in this universe experiencing it. I say those missing moments do not exist and the ship does experience all the moments from time A to time B. It just cannot get as much out of each moment because of its high speed (the dilation effect).

Thought Experiment Two. The Doom of Sphere.

Get a solid sphere, or spoked I guess if you think it’s sexier, spin it around so that the outer equator edge is at 99.99999% the speed of light. Now different parts of the sphere are going to be travelling at significantly different relativistic speeds. According to the single effect of time theory a point of existence that experiences time dilation has missing moments in its time path. Surely what this means is that all the different parts of the sphere (atomic level) are going to be missing a mess of different moments. As the sphere gets faster and faster it should slowly start to lose mass as more and more becomes missing as it somehow ‘jumps’ a moment due to its speed. It predicts the mass would approach zero as the speed approaches light speed, the opposite of Einstein’s theories which predicts mass increases. Also would probably have a cohesion issue as joining atoms lose their anchors and if enough in a section of material ‘jump’ at the same time then a fracture would likely occur as the next atoms out get thrown outwards because the atom that held them just missed a moment and time travelled.

The outside area of the sphere should at the least become translucent as large sections start disappearing for more and more time the closer to the speed of light the outer equator edge gets.

I argue that what will actually occur is that the outer layer will age less than the centre and bugger all else because all the atomic (or subatomic) level points of existence simply continue their existence through each moment (clock tick) of the universe. Different parts of the sphere simply expend less energy per moment (??don’t think that is actually right, the outside of the sphere ages less than the centre for sure but does that mean less energy per moment, should be that the energy used for experience is inversely related to speed and total energy is conserved??) which is not really a big issue from a thought experiment point of view. Might end up cooking the device before close to luminal speeds but I don’t think that is relevant to the matter at hand. Technical issue not theoretical obstruction.

Does it make sense to claim that a single effect for time theory is inherently flawed as it cannot correctly describe time dilation whereas a dual effect for time theory is at least capable of correctly describing observed and theorised effects?

The issue I see with my first thought experiment is the time it takes to poke the sticks. Even though the thought experiment calls for a stick-poke of only a single moment in duration this is not practical and difficult to imagine. It is hard to imagine being quick enough to poke a stick for only a single moment and so what if our stick-poke lasts for a hundred moments because that is as fast as we can go? This would result in us finding the ship even though 99 out of the 100 moments don’t have a ship in it. We can modify the experiment to be more practical rather than technically impossible to do. We can use lasers spaced a micron or so apart in a big line and accelerate an object to near light speed. We can use CERN if we can hack their security. Go Anonymous! The protons are accelerated to energy levels of 4TeV (tera electron volts) which gives a speed of 0.9999999725c (c = speed of light) and a Lorentz factor of around 7000 +/- quite a bit, changes quickly at such speeds. The Lorentz factor can be seen as the ratio of experienced time to resting time and so gives us a measure of the time dilation effect. A Lorentz factor of 7000 means 7000 days will pass for us while a ship travelling at the speed above would experience only a single day. 7000:1 ratio.

With the single effect theory this means the proton should be in our universe for only one moment in every 7000 .. hmmm .. still might not be anywhere close to enough to see experimentally. If the number of moments in a second is some crazy number like 10 to the power of 23 then 7000 is pretty insignificant. We might have to advance in sensor tech first. Sooner or later, however, this should be a doable experiment. I’m gonna throw my hat in the ring and say we will NOT see the proton disappear from the universe like the single effect theory of time seems to predict. The proton will never leave our universe for a quick jaunt through time. It simply cannot experience the same amount of time per moment as we can because of its higher speed.

Possible universal structure.

The universe might be structured on time as the initial dimension, call it the zeroth dimension, then add a primal atom containing all the energy of the universe where it exists for an instant in a single quantum state of position; dimensions 1,2,3. It interacts with time and all energy of the primal atom oscillates to a motion state or information state; might be best described as unfolding the 3 dimensions on the zeroth dimension to produce the 4th dimension (dubious speculation here). As this sets the entirety of the primal atom it becomes the constant clock tick of the universe. Note that in this model the universe is a single entity that changes state and should not be subject to any cool time travel stuff, just the now exists.

Time dilation within this model is the idea that the faster we go the less activity we can actually experience on a subatomic, and hence up, level per clock tick (stop and smell the roses, go slow). Moment = speed + position-time variable(??this is ideological NOT formulaic, not meant to be an accurate mathematical formula??) where the magnitude of the position-time variable equates to perhaps the total amount of orbital motion available on a subatomic level (shrug .. total throw it in there guess). Speed is the particles speed relative to light (or absolute zero velocity if you like). Faster you go on a universal level the less local level motion you get. The less local motion per clock tick for position you have the less you will experience in a moment of time.

Note this should have the low limit of whatever is experienced at absolute zero motion for a specific point in the space-time (or should that be time-space) continuum. We can’t really get that on a rotating planet hurtling around a sun hurtling around a galactic centre hurtling through a galactic cluster and so on. I’d suggest a super accurate analysis of light frequency shift should be able to get a spaceship to have a true zero motion relative to the time-space base local to the ship. Measuring the passage of time at that point should tell us what the max experience of time per moment is. Heh! Get the most out of life, build a space station that has absolute zero motion in the time-space continuum and party on dudes! Not that it should actually make any appreciable difference between the space station and us, probably a few seconds a day or something. Shame.

It has the asymptotic high limit of the speed of light which cannot be reached because time would stop and you cannot stop the universe. You can make it really really slow by going closer and closer to the speed of light, but the entire universe must tick-tock so you cannot actually stop time or reach the speed of light. Don’t think wormholes would be an issue though as you might be able to hack the information layer of the universe and shift a set of points to another star system by rewriting a set of variables. Hmmm .. Stargate might win out, heh!

I think this is suggesting the speed of light is tied to a clock tick universal time constant which is why physical existence cannot reach the speed of light. Time also does not go backwards. That would be tantamount to inverting all of the laws of nature, basically the exact opposite of what we see as true from physics. Ooh if the universe continues to accelerate its expansion to the speed of light the entire universe might get frozen in that point of time. Lol! We’d be a giant frozen snowglobe hah! Maybe we are a God level ornament hehe! Probably waiting for us to freeze so we can be hung on a Christmas tree  Ooh and does this answer the question of whether or not I should stay off drugs? <snicker>

Aanyway .. Our idea that time is a single component does not correctly explain time dilation and was probably formed from the position we have viewed and understood time from, a linear track of past moments. We may have erroneously concluded that all of time is structured in this fashion (linear track of continually existing moments) rather than looking beneath our initial observation of personal experiences of time and realising the single moment we actually experience from is different to memory moments. The single now is reality while our memories are just shadows of the shape that ‘now’ once held.

There is no evidence to support a claim that past moments actually continue to exist once now has moved on. This also makes little sense from a physics point of view as it seems to require that now is not objects that move at all; it is objects that are created out of nothing from the fixed pattern of the last moment. I mean here that each moment must remain in existence, just on another when, and new or next moments must take the pattern of the last moment and copy it by creating a brand new universe of matter with a shape created from running the old pattern through a moment of physical interaction (motion processor).

If I was a betting person I’d use Occam’s Razor here and say ‘hmmm .. a single entity that changes over time or the amount-of-time-the-universe-has-been-around-for-multiplied-by-however-many-moments-are-in-a-single-second number of distinct entities (continually growing) to explain the same thing. The single entity follows conservation of energy laws and all other known laws of nature while the multi-moment-verse seems to defy at least energy conservation, how the hell does an entire universe just replicate like that? As far as we know you need a big bang or something equivalent just to kick things off, wouldn’t you need to expend the entire energy of the universe to create an exact copy? In the very least I’d say, so for each moment you need the last moment to retain all its energy so it continues to exist while expending another universe of energy to shape yet another universe worth of energy into another universe of physical existence (run through the single moment motion processor of course), to produce the current now. And this is supposed to be happening some insanely large amount of times per second. Not to mention how this breaks quantum physics by requiring knowing the momentum and position of everything for the same moment otherwise you couldn’t copy it exactly.

Theoretically you could have the motion processing layer of the universe create new particles for each moment I guess but it still begs the question of creation of these new particles requiring energy which seems to pop into existence from nowhere. Magic .. oooh! No wonder God doesn’t ever show up, too busy popping universes into existence. Poor sod must be exhausted by now.

Or there is a single entity of physical existence that oscillates between physical and whatever the motion layer turns out to be. End of story. No insanely large number growing by an insanely large number all the time, just one that oscillates. Sorry Doctor, no time travel cuz there’s nowhere or when to go. Does kinda open the gate for speculation about time manipulation potentially being used as wormholes to cover distance rather than time though. Apophis is coming!

Final roundup thought.

I’m hoping I’ve shown some reasoning for why time needs to be separated into a universal clock tick constant and an effect variable that is dependent on speed to correctly describe what we see occurring with time dilation and the limitation of the speed of light. And some other crazy stuff .. yeah sometimes I cross that line big time heh! Just more evidence for why we should never trust what other people say without thinking about it ourselves and experimenting the excretion out of things. (stupid filter, does the inability to swear impinge on our freedom of expression or the accuracy of our ideological expressions? Another time highlander.)


Aaand … discuss.

[Steve3007]

I'd like to reply more fully later. But, for now, I think one of the foundational parts of your OP that I disagree with is your use of the concept of a "moment" in time. A moment is an infinitesimally small section of time. It is an abstract mathematical concept that cannot correspond to anything in the real world except as a "limit" towards which we can asymptotically approach but never reach. The concept of a "limit" allows us to talk about non-physical ideas like zero and infinity. It's the concept on which differential calculus is based. In talking about such things as "100 moments between A and B" I don't you're understanding that. Correct me if I'm wrong.

-- Updated Tue Feb 23, 2016 12:42 pm to add the following --

Apologies: I missed out the word "think" in the penultimate sentence in that post!

[Queebeagle]

Yes I know the prevailing thinking of time is as you suggest and that a single moment is not how most view time as structured. I suggest however that this is because we need our concept of time to deal with reality that we see (scientifically) such as time dilation. A set size for a moment does not handle this at all ... unless we view time as having two aspects to it. The 'moment', clock tick, is not the aspect of time we experience it is the underlying structure we never see. The 4th dimension (2nd aspect of time) is what we experience and can play with in experiments. One of the ideas of time is that it is not broken up into discrete moments like I suggest but it is a continuous line (what you're talking about I think). Like a number line of real numbers where you can always get smaller and smaller (just add more digits after the decimal point, it never ends). My article calls this idea into question. You're right that I'm going against (partly) the currently held idea of time by suggesting it is actually made up of discrete moments, unfortunately we can never see them which sucks as we would need other methods to verify or falsify my idea.

I think the core of what I'm suggesting in the article is that the current idea of time having only one dimension, or aspect or whatever, to it does not predict reality and we need to change something. Perhaps my suggestion is not what need to change but something does. Unless y'all can explain to me how the current idea of time does predict reality and why my thought experiments are wrong.

Good question bro Did I understand you correctly? Did I provide an appropriate answer?

[Steve3007]

I wasn't talking about the prevailing thinking of the time so much as the definitions of words. You appeared to be using the word "moment" in a non-standard way. I was explaining the standard definition of that term. I wanted to check precisely what you mean by that word before continuing.

-- Updated Wed Feb 24, 2016 11:29 am to add the following --

Hi again Queebeagle. Here's a little bit of commentary on your OP. I hope it helps.

Time has been seen as the fourth dimension since the idea of dimensions and time has existed.

I'd put it slightly differently. I'd say that there are some mathematical models, that have enjoyed some success in describing and predicting observations, in which time is represented as a 4th dimension which is somewhat analogous to the 3 spacial dimensions that also exist in those models.

Other models are available. The test of the model is in its ability to describe and predict observations.

I argue this is an assumption that needs to be questioned. I’m going to try and suggest time is actually either the zeroth dimension or the zeroth and the fourth dimension together.

If you can show how this model is successful in the terms described above - more successful than existing models - you will go far!

The first question that springs to mind: What do you mean by the zero-th dimension? How does calling time the zero-th dimension result in different predictions of observations compared to calling it the 4th, or 12th or -1th dimension?

Most people, including philosophers and physicists, generally see time as a single dimensional entity with a single effect. What if they’re wrong? What if time has two components to it? It has a clock tick that is a universal constant that never changes regardless of the physical reality of the point in space under consideration.

It's difficult to see how what you're describing here corresponds to predictions of possible observations.

It also has a total amount of expenditure of energy (perhaps) that the individual points of existence can expend per moment (clock tick). The total expenditure is directly related to the speed of the object so if the object is very fast it cannot spend much energy doing other stuff.

You seem to be using terms like "expenditure of energy" here in non standard ways.

The concept of "energy", like everything else in physics, is part of a mathematical model for explaining observations. In this case, it is observed that there is a number which can be calculated by measuring various observable aspects of a physical system which seems to remain constant. i.e. it is "conserved". Because it remains constant (is conserved) we tend to think of it as a real physical thing, not just a made up bit of maths. We call that thing "energy".

So, for example, take an object suspended in a uniform gravitational field (e.g. close to the surface of the Earth) multiply its mass by its height by the strength of the gravitational field (= mgh). That gives you a number. Now allow that object to drop to zero height. Measure its speed just before it hits the ground. Multiply its mass by the square of its speed and divide by 2 (= ¹/₂mv²). You get the same number!

These are just two different numbers calculated from different observable quantities. But because they are the same we think they're quantifying a "real thing". We think they're quantifying the potential energy and the kinetic energy of that object and we think that, in dropping the object to the ground, we're converting one form of energy into another.

But it's all just some maths. It's all a model.


OK. Normally, when people talk about "expenditure of energy" they mean the conversion of one form of energy to another. E.g. the conversion I described above. I don't know any other definition and I don't know how to interpret what you're saying above, using that standard definition. In particular, I don't know why you think there is any sense in which a moving object is expending energy in a way that is related to its speed of movement.

Perhaps you could explain what you mean by this.

I can't really make much sense of anything you say after that last quoted passage until we've established these baseline definitions of terminology. So I'll leave it there for now.

[Queebeagle]

Heya Steve3007,

Yeah I know I'm grasping a bit and using terms in a non-standard way. Sorry about that but I'm not entirely sure how to describe it. I'll try here.

This is just for arguments sake. Let's assume we make a little baby universe in a bubble (there are enough sci-fi stories that do this, imagine it for the thought experiment) and we give the universe a clock tick where a moment of time is a full second for us (done so we can see stuff we want to). We're not speeding it up to do this we're changing the fundamental structure.

So far it is an empty universe but now we put two pocket watches in there to observe the passage of time.

Now we take one of the watches and speed it up to relativistic speeds so that 'time' goes slower for it. Our outside observation of this universe will always observe both watches in the universe no matter what moment we observe the universe in.

The amount of 'time' the watches can experience is a fixed total per moment but this amount of experience must be combined with the speed of the watch. The faster the watch goes means less time available to experience. This is time dilation. I'm not sure how else to describe this other than in terms of energy use, I'm clearly probably wrong here but since this is an exploration of a new idea I don't really care heh! Other minds that work better than mine in these fields can posit more realistic physics.

The reason I went with energy is because I was thinking about how the hell a particle travelling relativistically is acting. In my laymans view I saw the quarks making up the particle having to take more time to complete an orbital motion because it has to fight against the direction of motion at relativistic speeds. As an analogy imagine you had a ball on a string and you spin it around yourself in a circle. If you are not moving it is easy enough. Now go really fast on a flatbed truck and you'll find the faster you go the hard it becomes. For us it is due to the friction of the air which is not the same as relativistic speeds in space (no friction of course, or very little) but the analogy still holds I think. It takes us much more energy to push against the friction of the air the faster we go. Yes this is not a direct relation to particles in space at relativistic speeds but I'm not sure how else to put it across.

The upshot is that the amount of time a particle can experience in a moment is inversely proportional to its speed. The faster you go the less time you have to experience. I didn't really want to use 'time' though because I don't think time is something that can be used up like energy. Using energy seems to make more sense ideologically. If you have energy X available for a single moment then you subtract energy Y which is related to the speed you are going and the energy Z that is left is what you use to experience. Yes I know that is totally wrong physics! It's ideological to put the thought across. Anyone with a better idea please feel free to express.

Is that a better explanation of the idea?

[Steve3007]

Queebeagle:

Yeah I know I'm grasping a bit and using terms in a non-standard way. Sorry about that but I'm not entirely sure how to describe it. I'll try here.

That's fine, and I think this is an interesting subject, and I don't want to coldly pull apart your ideas like a sadistic child methodically pulling the legs off a spider. But in order to say anything constructive about ideas like this I have to clearly understand what they're trying to say first. So I hope you'll forgive me if I'm over-analytical! In cases of uncertainty, I'll try to see your words in context to work out what you mean by them.

This is just for arguments sake. Let's assume we make a little baby universe in a bubble (there are enough sci-fi stories that do this, imagine it for the thought experiment) and we give the universe a clock tick where a moment of time is a full second for us (done so we can see stuff we want to). We're not speeding it up to do this we're changing the fundamental structure.

Ok, so I reckon, judging by the context, you're using the word "moment" here not as an infinitesimally small amount but as a sort of temporal atom. A small but finite-sized indivisible unit of time. Perhaps a bit like the so-called "Planck time".

My first question about any proposal like this is: what are you saying in terms of what can actually be observed by a real observer? If this little universe is as you describe it, what does that look like to various observers? What does it look like to someone in that universe? To someone in our universe? If you're proposing that there is some sense in which we can look into this little universe from our own, then what exactly do you mean by the word "universe"?

So far it is an empty universe but now we put two pocket watches in there to observe the passage of time.

Now we take one of the watches and speed it up to relativistic speeds so that 'time' goes slower for it.

What do you mean (in terms of what can be observed by real observers) when you say that time goes slower for it?

If an observer travels at a significant fraction of the speed of light, at constant velocity, relative to another observer, the Special Theory of Relativity says that for both observers the laws of physics remain the same. That is, any experiment which the moving observer does within his own moving reference frame will not allow him to determine that there is any sense in which he is the moving observer and the other is stationary. From his point of view, time keeps on ticking away as normal. He observes his own pocket watch ticking at the same rate as it did when he was stationary relative to the other observer. The other observer observes the same thing in his pocket watch. But if they look at each other's watches they both observe each other's watches to be running slowly.

So I don't think it's accurate to simply say that for a moving watch time goes slower. You have to ask: "Time, as observed by whom and as measured by what?" This is why Einstein defined time as the thing that is measured by clocks. He wanted to emphasize that, at least in the context of empirical science, it's only by reference to possible observations that anything is meaningful.

Our outside observation of this universe will always observe both watches in the universe no matter what moment we observe the universe in.

OK, from the context I'll assume you're using the word "universe" to mean a small sub-set of our universe which can exchange information with the outside.

The amount of 'time' the watches can experience is a fixed total per moment but this amount of experience must be combined with the speed of the watch. The faster the watch goes means less time available to experience. This is time dilation. I'm not sure how else to describe this other than in terms of energy use, I'm clearly probably wrong here but since this is an exploration of a new idea I don't really care heh! Other minds that work better than mine in these fields can posit more realistic physics.

As I've said above, the way I suggest you tidy up these concepts is to think in terms of observations. What do you mean by "the amount of time the watches can experience"? Do you mean the number of ticks observed by an observer moving with the watch?

The reason I went with energy is because I was thinking about how the hell a particle travelling relativistically is acting. In my laymans view I saw the quarks making up the particle having to take more time to complete an orbital motion because it has to fight against the direction of motion at relativistic speeds. As an analogy imagine you had a ball on a string and you spin it around yourself in a circle. If you are not moving it is easy enough. Now go really fast on a flatbed truck and you'll find the faster you go the hard it becomes. For us it is due to the friction of the air which is not the same as relativistic speeds in space (no friction of course, or very little) but the analogy still holds I think. It takes us much more energy to push against the friction of the air the faster we go. Yes this is not a direct relation to particles in space at relativistic speeds but I'm not sure how else to put it across.

I think the best thing to do would be to look up a bit about the Special Theory of Relativity. When you say "travelling relativistically" I guess you mean travelling at a speed, relative to another observer, which is a large fraction of the speed of light. As I said above, one important thing to remember is that even if you're travelling at 99% of the speed of light, relative to another observer, the laws of physics as observed within your moving reference frame are the same as if you are stationary relative to that other observer. So, although I understand that your mention of friction was just an analogy, I don't think it's a relevant analogy.

The upshot is that the amount of time a particle can experience in a moment is inversely proportional to its speed. The faster you go the less time you have to experience.

Again, it's not clear what you mean when you talk about a particle experiencing an amount of time. An observer travelling with a particle experiences time locally just the same as everyone else.

I didn't really want to use 'time' though because I don't think time is something that can be used up like energy.

Energy can't be used up either. Just converted to other forms.

Using energy seems to make more sense ideologically. If you have energy X available for a single moment then you subtract energy Y which is related to the speed you are going and the energy Z that is left is what you use to experience. Yes I know that is totally wrong physics! It's ideological to put the thought across. Anyone with a better idea please feel free to express.

If you read what I said in an earlier post about the exchange from potential to kinetic energy of an object which falls to a lower height in a gravitational field, I hope that will explain it a bit.

[Queebeagle]

That's fine, and I think this is an interesting subject, and I don't want to coldly pull apart your ideas like a sadistic child methodically pulling the legs off a spider. But in order to say anything constructive about ideas like this I have to clearly understand what they're trying to say first. So I hope you'll forgive me if I'm over-analytical! In cases of uncertainty, I'll try to see your words in context to work out what you mean by them.

You will not offend me regardless of what you say. It is my foundational understanding of philosophy that we must be open to all criticism of our ideas. I seriously think it is the main way we learn new things. If you want to tear me a new one feel free, should be fun! If my theories have logical holes and that is pointed out I get really excited not upset hehe! I’m not precious about ideas, figure they belong to everyone and so must be rigorously attacked by everyone for us to be sure they are right. Otherwise we might end up believing delusional stuff for millennia and that’s just sad.

Ok, so I reckon, judging by the context, you're using the word "moment" here not as an infinitesimally small amount but as a sort of temporal atom. A small but finite-sized indivisible unit of time. Perhaps a bit like the so-called "Planck time".

Ooh Planck time, I like it. And yes but this is not the only aspect of time. This Planck time is unaffected by speed. Whereas what we experience as time is. Call it QueeTime, actually that sounds dirty heh, call it BeagleTime (for the sake of argument only of course).

My first question about any proposal like this is: what are you saying in terms of what can actually be observed by a real observer? If this little universe is as you describe it, what does that look like to various observers? What does it look like to someone in that universe? To someone in our universe? If you're proposing that there is some sense in which we can look into this little universe from our own, then what exactly do you mean by the word "universe"?

Ahh this is just a thought experiment. Imagine we are Gods outside any universe and we can create whatever we like as a universe to test theories out in. We can observe anything in these test universes without the need for interaction or physical consistency between us and them. The only requirement is that the universes we play with should internally follow the same physical laws of our universe otherwise the thought experiment would not show us anything relevant about our own universe.

What do you mean (in terms of what can be observed by real observers) when you say that time goes slower for it?

As an outside observer to this universe assume we have no motion and so no time dilation effect on our BeagleTime. If we look at our own pocket watch and look at the watches in the test universe we would see that the one that does not move matches our own while the fast moving one appears to tick the seconds by slower.

If an observer travels at a significant fraction of the speed of light, at constant velocity, relative to another observer, the Special Theory of Relativity says that for both observers the laws of physics remain the same. That is, any experiment which the moving observer does within his own moving reference frame will not allow him to determine that there is any sense in which he is the moving observer and the other is stationary. From his point of view, time keeps on ticking away as normal. He observes his own pocket watch ticking at the same rate as it did when he was stationary relative to the other observer. The other observer observes the same thing in his pocket watch. But if they look at each other's watches they both observe each other's watches to be running slowly.

So I don't think it's accurate to simply say that for a moving watch time goes slower. You have to ask: "Time, as observed by whom and as measured by what?" This is why Einstein defined time as the thing that is measured by clocks. He wanted to emphasize that, at least in the context of empirical science, it's only by reference to possible observations that anything is meaningful.

Actually this is exactly what I want to argue about heh! I agree with Einey entirely except that I’m suggesting this is only with regard to BeagleTime and not PlanckTime. I’d also suggest that the reason both see the others’ watches as moving slower is only because of the issue of information travelling at the speed of light. If we were omniscient and could know things without this limitation then we would know the stationary clock was ticking as fast as possible in our universe (no time dilation effect) while the fast moving watch was ticking much slower because of the time dilation effect on it. The observers are not in such a fortunate position; the light they need to observe the other’s watch coupled with their relative speed results in both watches seeming to go slow to the other. But as an omniscient observer we know this is in fact not true, it is just the lie the light tells the unfortunate observers.

OK, from the context I'll assume you're using the word "universe" to mean a small sub-set of our universe which can exchange information with the outside.

Yes, kind of. In a thought experiment we can create little pocket universes to our hearts content so long as the rules of physics remain the same as ours. Assume we are Gods amusing ourselves with experiments involving empty universes that we can populate with whatever we want in order to see what happens.

The amount of 'time' the watches can experience is a fixed total per moment but this amount of experience must be combined with the speed of the watch. The faster the watch goes means less time available to experience. This is time dilation. I'm not sure how else to describe this other than in terms of energy use, I'm clearly probably wrong here but since this is an exploration of a new idea I don't really care heh! Other minds that work better than mine in these fields can posit more realistic physics.

As I've said above, the way I suggest you tidy up these concepts is to think in terms of observations. What do you mean by "the amount of time the watches can experience"? Do you mean the number of ticks observed by an observer moving with the watch?

Noooo! We need to get away from the observer biases and imagine ourselves as omniscient Gods so we are not limited by the lying light. Every PlanckTime tick is a universal thing, the whole universe goes ‘tick’, then it drops out of physical existence for the ‘tock’ which is where it exists as one big ass formula that calculates what happens, then it goes ‘tick’ and a lot of the substance of the universe is now in a different position (physics happened), then it goes ‘tock’ and the next calculation occurs. Fringe (loved it) might actually be possible (except for the time travel stuff hehe!) as this style of universe would allow for two universes to exist in the same space just with one ticking when the other tocks.

Now for BeagleTime. Each fundamental unit of PlanckTime can only have a specific amount of BeagleTime in it. The amount of BeagleTime that an object experiences is the maximum allowed in the single PlanckTime unit MINUS our speed. This means as we approach the speed of light the amount of BeagleTime we have available for physics to do stuff gets smaller and smaller. This results in the time dilation effect. It actually should be called time contraction under this model. Does this make sense? Not meaning do you agree but does it make sense what I’m trying to say? I’ll try something else…

Assume the PlanckTime fundamental unit is a huge second of time (we would all end up looking like old stop motion cartoons that jump from one position to another in an observable way). If at subrelative speeds you could move say 1 metre in that single clock tick. Now go to relativistic speeds and that 1 metre capability starts to decrease. At a relativistic speed where we observe a 50% reduction in time being experienced by the moving object (2 years at this speed and the object only ages 1 year) then each PlanckTime fundamental unit will only allow ½ metre of local motion as the rest of the BeagleTime is somehow used up by our frame of reference moving so fast.

How did that go?

Oh .. point to make .. When I’m talking about the metre of motion above I’m not talking about a slow progression from one point to another. I’m talking about a point of existence dropping down to the ‘tock’ layer, physics happens and it ‘ticks’ 1 metre away from where it last was. The stop motion thing. Also remember we’re just looking at this at such a large scale for explanatory purposes. Any reality based on this model would have the maximum amount of motion per tick-tock as far smaller than the smallest particle of existence. We’re just scaling for the purpose of understanding.

Got away from the stupid use of energy etc at least. Now we just have stupid BeagleTime and PlanckTime hehe! Keep bringing it Steve3007, I’m loving it!

Note also this removes the necessity of having to always relate time to observers as that is only with regard to BeagleTime and not PlanckTime. Means we can’t say time is relative any more we would have to say our observation of time is relative but that is not the full picture.

Was a bit tardy in my response time but that annoying thing called work keeps getting in the way.

[Sy Borg]

Planck time is theoretically/mathematically the smallest period in which an event can occur, the theorised granulation of time.

QB, imagining the mini universe of your thought experiment (which assumes a multiverse model), I would expect the mini universe to actually run in extreme fast forward. The mini universe would be part of our universe and subject to the same laws, and the time cycles of smaller things always fun faster. I'm guessing that the only way to slow it down would be by cooling it.

I don't have the physics chops to work this out properly, but I suspect that if a mini universe the size of a grapefruit had a longevity proportional to its size, then it would appear and disappear in an instant, like an instantly appearing and bursting soap bubble.

That would mean our galaxy, solar system, Earth, selves etc are "suds'" travelling out from the burst - basically explosive debris on its way towards dissipation. I'm sure we are more than that :), but one thing that we appear to be is explosive debris.

[Steve3007]

Queebeagle:

Was a bit tardy in my response time but that annoying thing called work keeps getting in the way.

Me too! So I'll have to keep this one short and just discuss one of your points for now.

Noooo! We need to get away from the observer biases and imagine ourselves as omniscient Gods so we are not limited by the lying light.

It's not observer bias. Bias means giving the view of one observer, or one set of observers, greater weight than others. The principle relativity is that there are no privileged reference frames. All observers' viewpoints are equally valid. Every observer has the right to regard him/her self as stationary and the others as moving (for example). The laws of physics are the same for all observers. Galileo applied that principle to Newtonian physics. Einstein extended it to electromagnetism.

The trouble with trying to make sense of the world we observe around us by imagining ourselves to be omniscient Gods is that, by definition, we cannot ever know anything at all about what we will see from that imaginary viewpoint. We can only imagine. The basic purpose of science is to make sense of our observations. This means describing and predicting them. To do that you need to consider observations that can, at least in principle, actually be made, not those that you can only ever imagine.

-- Updated Thu Mar 03, 2016 9:14 am to add the following --

On Queebeagle's and Greta's thoughts about mini universes: If we are going to imagine mini universes and we are going to imagine that they interact in some way with our universe, or are even a part of our universe, then I think we have to clarify exactly what we mean by the word "universe".

-- Updated Thu Mar 03, 2016 10:03 am to add the following --

Queebeagle:

We can observe anything in these test universes without the need for interaction or physical consistency between us and them. The only requirement is that the universes we play with should internally follow the same physical laws of our universe otherwise the thought experiment would not show us anything relevant about our own universe.

One more quick point: The first sentence is not consistent with the second sentence. (Particularly the parts I've highlighted in bold.) The physical laws of our universe, as we understand them, include the fundamental principle that it is impossible to observe anything without affecting it in some way. The observer and the observed are part of the same system. To talk of an observer that does not in any way interact with the observed is contradictory to the concept of observation.

-- Updated Thu Mar 03, 2016 10:20 am to add the following --

One more question, and then I really must do some work!. When you say this:

If we were omniscient and could know things without this limitation then we would know the stationary clock was ticking as fast as possible in our universe (no time dilation effect) while the fast moving watch was ticking much slower because of the time dilation effect on it.

You seem to be talking as if there is some absolute sense in which one watch is moving fast and one is stationary. Which one is moving? What exactly do you mean by the word "moving"? Are you using that word in its standard sense? i.e: its position relative to another object is changing with respect to time.

[Queebeagle]

hmmm .. using a pocket universe like I am is not proposing they actually exist. The sole purpose of them in philosophy is to look at whatever is in question without having to deal with other extraneous things. Like conducting an experiment in a sealed environment such as science does all the time in reality. When we want to study quarks we cannot conduct an experiment on our desks because of all the other interfering stuff around. We go to a lab and a super clean room etc etc. This is what the imagined universes are in philosophy, they are our laboratories. We use them to try and understand our theories.

When I say imagine an empty universe this means make a clean room we can conduct experiments in. The imagined universe must abode by our physical laws meaning it is easy enough to imagine a universe where our laws of physics do not strictly apply (change Planck's constant to something else) or do not apply at all (DnD universe full of magic). I'm simply asking you not to do that and to have the universe in your imagination adhere to our physical laws.

An empty universe has only space-time in it, no primal atom or anything else. Now we can play (experiment) and see what happens. The reason to be Gods and require no interaction is the same reason we require our experimenters in real world experiments not to interfere with experiments. We don't want to affect the outcome with anything other than what is in question. Since we're discussing things that are affected by speed of light information we need to be able to observe the experiments without this need so we are not influencing the outcome of the experiments. Requiring us to be outside the experiment while the experiment retains physical consistency is not a contradiction. Sure it is technically impossible unless you believe in Gods but this is a thought experiment where we don't want to accidentally influence our experiment with a sensor malfunction.

I strongly disagree that there is no such thing as absolute motion or being stationary in an absolute way. If this was not the case then why would there be a restriction on objects speed being less than the speed of light? If we had an empty universe (clean room) and put a single object in it we could not accelerate it to the speed of light. Why not? There is no other thing in the universe to be relative to so what is restricting it? It is because that is a fundamental law of the physics of the universe. Surely if we can accelerate an object to 99.999999999% the speed of light then we could also decelerate said object to 0% the speed of light. Wouldn't that be absolute zero motion? We are not capable of it in reality here on Terra because of our planetary, solar system, and galactic motion. We could only get close to zero motion. But in space we should be able to. Perhaps if we produce light of a specific frequency and shoot it in all 6 directions, X, -X, Y, -Y, Z, -Z, and measure any frequency shift then absolute zero motion would be where there is no frequency shift in any direction (or is that equal in all directions for an expanding space-time?). Thoughts on this would be welcomed because we could actually conduct this experiment, perhaps not accurately enough yet but at least it is technically possible I think.

On that basis I put the watch in my empty universe (clean room) with no motion. I guess you could also say the object is travelling at the speed of light minus 299 792 458 m/s but this would only be observable from a Gods eye point of view I think as a moving observer might affect the results of measurement due to its own motion, not sure.

Can you see how if you have the limitation of the speed of light for an object then there must actually be a zero motion too? So I guess this means no I'm not using "moving" the way you seem to view it which seems to require at least two objects in a universe. I only require one and I can still measure movement or lack thereof, I'm a God with a clean room universe conducting experiments after all. If you think this is not right then explain why a single object in an otherwise empty universe can still not break the light-speed barrier.

Hadn't heard the term Planck time before Greta, thanks. Have you two really never played with thought experiment universes? Thought it was a standard philosophy tool <shrug>. To reiterate, the thought experiment universes are not proposed realities, they are not set sizes, we do not have to interact with them to see into them, they are only imagined for the purpose of understanding by providing a clean room to conduct experiments in. Although it is possible to imagine a universe that goes by different laws of physics, for all experiments I conduct I create universes that do, otherwise I'd create a universe where magic exists and have a chat with Frodo about whether he was actually hot for Gollum.

[Sy Borg]

On Queebeagle's and Greta's thoughts about mini universes: If we are going to imagine mini universes and we are going to imagine that they interact in some way with our universe, or are even a part of our universe, then I think we have to clarify exactly what we mean by the word "universe".

Yes. I always felt "universe' was prematurely names and I like the idea of the "universe" being one "supercluster of superclusters". Not so long ago we thought the Milky Way was the universe's only galaxy and suggestions that there were others were scoffed at. The jury is out on the multiverse as far as I'm concerned.

A "pocket universe" (in the true sense) being inside our universe (also in the true sense) would seem physically impossible and perhaps easier to envisage mathematically - smaller infinities within larger infinities.

[Steve3007]

Greta:

Yes, I've heard that when other galaxies were first seen for what they are they were referred to as "island universes". Of course, the fact that we can see them shows that they are not.

If a true pocket universe is as you've described it then presumably there could never be any way, even in principle, to know anything at all about it. No way to know it exists, to influence it or be influenced by it. Arguably that is the same thing as not existing.

-- Updated Fri Mar 04, 2016 2:09 pm to add the following --

Of course, all of this rests on precisely what we mean by the word "exists".

[Sy Borg]

An empty universe has only space-time in it, no primal atom or anything else.

I don't want to irritate with over literalism or pedantry, but my understanding is that spacetime - the stuff that is stretched and warped by gravity - was created in the big bang.

Now we can play (experiment) and see what happens. The reason to be Gods and require no interaction is the same reason we require our experimenters in real world experiments not to interfere with experiments. We don't want to affect the outcome with anything other than what is in question. Since we're discussing things that are affected by speed of light information we need to be able to observe the experiments without this need so we are not influencing the outcome of the experiments. Requiring us to be outside the experiment while the experiment retains physical consistency is not a contradiction. Sure it is technically impossible unless you believe in Gods but this is a thought experiment where we don't want to accidentally influence our experiment with a sensor malfunction.

Yep, you cannot escape the distorting influence of perceiving a reality in which we reside. Most times the effect is insignificant, but quantum scale entities are so small, reactive and volatile that we have difficulty "getting out of the way".

I strongly disagree that there is no such thing as absolute motion or being stationary in an absolute way. If this was not the case then why would there be a restriction on objects speed being less than the speed of light? If we had an empty universe (clean room) and put a single object in it we could not accelerate it to the speed of light. Why not? There is no other thing in the universe to be relative to so what is restricting it?

An empty universe, if such a thing existed, probably would not set a light speed limit and, avoiding more pedantry, I won't say that complete nothingness it would immediately annihilate anything that came close

Sorry for the piecemeal response. No doubt, I'm still not getting what you're driving at. There is no evidence of anything being stationary in what we've observed.

Hadn't heard the term Planck time before Greta, thanks. Have you two really never played with thought experiment universes? Thought it was a standard philosophy tool <shrug>. To reiterate, the thought experiment universes are not proposed realities, they are not set sizes, we do not have to interact with them to see into them, they are only imagined for the purpose of understanding by providing a clean room to conduct experiments in.

Mea culpa. My imagination seems limited to possible extrapolations on known reality rather than constructing new ones. If we treat the multiverse as true then there's limitless possibilities for reality's configuration. Like almost everyone, I do not understand time.

[Zayl]

To me it is obvious that time as a dimension is nothing more than a shallow model.

There is no denying that cause and effect exists in the universe. A concept such as time, must be the byprodct of cause and effect. This byproduct is NOT the properties of a dimension of space. Thus time as a dimension becomes redundant.

There is no reasonable motivation nor foundation for modeling time as a dimension.

[Queebeagle]

An empty universe has only space-time in it, no primal atom or anything else.

I don't want to irritate with over literalism or pedantry, but my understanding is that spacetime - the stuff that is stretched and warped by gravity - was created in the big bang.

This is actually only an assumption that has been made by some physicists. There is no evidence to support (or refute) this claim or its opposite. Prominent physicists argue about whether spacetime is a product of the physical, because of the dependence of the amount of time an object experiences based on its speed (time dilation), or whether time existed before the big bang. My theory could support both really by having PlanckTime as existing without any need for the physical and BeagleTime which is our physical existence's experience of time.

An empty universe, if such a thing existed, probably would not set a light speed limit and, avoiding more pedantry, I won't say that complete nothingness it would immediately annihilate anything that came close

My thought experiment asked that you hold all the physical laws of our universe as the same so there is a light speed limit. Also nothingness doesn't annihilate anything or space travel would be impossible not to mention anything created in a big bang would be instantly annihilated. Opposites annihilate, antimatter, such as positrons versus electrons, if they meet they annihilate each other. Empty space doesn't do anything except sit there being .. well .. empty, if something goes through it then the empty does nothing at all. Nothing does nothing, but it might do so eternally

Let's back up a little. You're having trouble with a thought experiment empty universe so how about this then. The universe has superclusters of galaxies that are in kind of blobby arms with unimaginably large areas between them. Lets conduct our experiments there then, in the middle of a vast empty area of space between superclusters of galaxies. Does that work? You can see by necessity the laws of our universe must exist there because it is our universe. You should also be able to agree that there is no other matter out there, or perhaps one atom per cubic parsec, not enough to interfere with our experiments (which we wouldn't have to worry about in a clean room but what the hell, I'll conduct the experiment in the wild rather than in a lab since you insist). Unfortunately I can't really get away from background radiation (which I could in a clean room) but if it interferes with the experiment in any way I'll just have to control for it as they control for extraneous variables in all other sciences. Dark matter is an interesting one but the latest theories I've seen have dark matter closely linked to the areas of space where superclusters are, not in the gaps between the blobby arms of superclusters. So, for arguments sake lets assume no dark matter is in this area of space either. No gravity wells as there is nothing remotely close with mass. So we now have our stage set, a big empty [section of the] universe where we can play with stuff without interference from other stuff in the universe. No multiverse, which was never my intention to propose. Any future thought experiments will be conducted in this (mostly) empty region of space. Not as experimentally clean as a clean room but whatever.

We got a bit off topic. I was trying to put across the idea that time has two aspects to it, PlanckTime which, as you suggest, is the smallest divisible section of time (yes this contradicts the claim that time cannot be so divided but these two ideas are being argued about in science now with no clear winner, which is why we're discussing it here). My argument is that PlanckTime is where the universe's physical existence manifests for that moment (1 PlanckTime = 1 moment), the 'tick'. And this 'tick' is a universal constant unaffected by speed or gravity or anything else. Then the universe goes 'tock' where the physical manifestation of existence only exists as information, this is so we can actually move. The information about our universe during this 'tock' phase is processed by our universe's physical laws which gives us all our motions and collisions etc. This means when the universe goes back to the 'tick' phase movement, if physics dictates, has occurred in this information layer. The 'tick' is just the physical manifestation of the end of the 'tock'.

During a 'tock' phase where physics is applied to the universe how much in the way of physics can actually be applied? Without some limiting factor it is theoretically possible to go any speed and there is no obvious reason for the limitation of the speed of light. But what if there was an upper limit? (the speed of light limitation suggests this limit is exactly that). This is what BeagleTime is all about. BeagleTime is 1 PlanckTime minus a correcting calculation for our speed and this is what gives us time dilation. Essentially for each moment that passes in the universe something that is travelling at speed must 'experience' less than that. By experience I mean the application of physics on the information layer or 'tock' phase. So if we have a space ship capable of high speed such that there is a 50% time dilation effect on the ship this means the people on the ship might travel for 2 years (relative to us if you need this) but they would have aged only 1 year, then each moment of PlanckTime will only be able to process 50% of the physics that the ship would normally process in a moment if it was not travelling at this high speed. To the object itself nothing would seem different, which is what we need for it to line up with Einstein's theories, as the physics would still be acting normally (just kind of slower) but to an outside observer such as ourselves we could see them slowing down, not in their forward speed but in their local physics.

The reason that I suggest we need some mechanism like this to explain time dilation within our universe is because if we only have a single dimension of time then any ship travelling at really high speed (99.9999999% the speed of light) should not act the way we expect. It should actually jump out of existence for extended periods of time. With a single time dimension if a ship had a 99% time dilation effect so 1 day passed on the ship for every 100 on Terra then the ship should disappear for 99 days worth of time so that it can travel for 100 days and only age a single day. With two dimensions we don't need to worry about this problem of a ship disappearing on us. Two dimensions means it never has to stay out of existence until its time is up for it to reappear with the correct time dilation. Every moment the ship will continue to exist which, hopefully, is what everyone expects would happen.

Hah! Didn't even use the not-so-clean room. Next time I play with clocks in space I will though.

Like almost everyone, I do not understand time.

That would be the point of this discussion, neither do I and it annoys the hell out of me From great confusion great wisdom and understanding may emerge if we are rigorous and vigilant in our application of logic and science.

To me it is obvious that time as a dimension is nothing more than a shallow model.
There is no denying that cause and effect exists in the universe. A concept such as time, must be the byprodct of cause and effect. This byproduct is NOT the properties of a dimension of space. Thus time as a dimension becomes redundant.
There is no reasonable motivation nor foundation for modeling time as a dimension.

'Obvious' huh? 'must be' huh? Clearly not a logician or scientist. Did the deep booming voices in your head tell you these absolute truths without evidence to back them up or arguments to validate or falsify?