Universal time constant

[LaurieAG]

Hi Modest,

 

I'm glad that you have been following the 'Universal Scale' thread along with Reason.

 

I'm still reeling from modest's explanation that I am larger compared to a plank length than the entire universe compared to me.

 

In reality we can never reach absolutes but in practice 'near enough is good enough' for an extremely large proportion of the time, especially on the atomic scale. I would think that, considering your explanation, you would realise that we probably have better odds on universal scales verses atomic scales?

 

A clock by itself in a universe all by its lonesome would keep its own global time - granted. That's unrealistic and hardly needs said.

 

If you define your universal boundaries according to the physical proximity to mass and, just as we use the Planck length as a scale boundary, our 'universal' boundary is reached at the certain 'tipping point' where objects with mass can have no possible physical influence on objects at the boundary.

 

I explicitly said in my post above that the proof doesn't apply for a clock outside the universe. The boundary condition you're proposing (outside the influence of any matter) is no different. You want to isolate a clock by itself and at the same time say it measures some property of our universe - that's not coherent.

 

As I said before, we cannot reach the absolutes of our 'physical universe' but we can get close enough to make things happen. Albert Einstein never claimed that an absolute singularity could be reached, he only thought that you could approach it.

 

Considering the total lack of anything absolute in our universe, including its boundaries, and the amazing things humans have done (both good and bad) despite this limitation, I don't know why you think something like a linked network of timesignal beacons that operates in the closest thing we'll ever get to a pure vacuum, could not be regarded as a coherent solution.

 

For all we know it may already exist, I don't really know.

[LaurieAG]

That phrase is a contradiction in terms. You can't be relative and absolute.

-Will

 

Hi Erasmus,

 

I didn't mean relatively (to the speed of light) absolute because that is exactly what you claim. I mean relatively (close to the absolute) absolute which is about as far as we do go and can ever go.

[eloxer]

Since every area of space is at lest some distance r from some mass m then there is nowhere in our universe that experiences coordinate time. So, we can say with confidence that no clock in our universe keeps global time... If we're saying there's a timekeeper outside the universe, well then, I wouldn't know how to make a proof for that

~modest

 

Your proof looks right, but that's not the point, because the tensor mathematics and GR were developed just in such a way that they provide you with this (by observation correct) kind of result. Tensor mechanics are result of a specific model, where one does not want to care about possible implementation of the universe (Mathematics IS the science that is supposed to hide details behind a model in order to predict future "observations"). The tools were developed in order to predict future observations. BUT if somebody (philosophically) asks, if there is a universal time, then mathematical deduction is just to little. One must get into the model discussion and find a model that explains, why the universe occurs to us in an absolutively relative manner. And yes, you are right, even when you had this universe simulation at your PC's desk, you would not be able to make a proof of it. Reality and its mechanics are given things, not things to be proven. To prove, that a mathematical model is coherent with other mathematical assumptions is the job of the Proof-Theory (mostly deduction - this is what you did nicely). One must use an experiment in order to show coherence of model and observation. (This is what other people have done a lot, nicely)

 

So what is time? We often think of time as a sequence of states. That's a valid global notion of time. If our universe is indeed a discrete simulation, then universal time is an integer describing which state the universe is in, no matter whether the universe's value has changed or not. Ten subsequent generations of the same values describing a universe means that the absolute time has gone forward by ten units, while the time within the universe has gone zero units (some hypothetical extreme example that produces an extreme time dilation)

But in physics we ask how do we observe time? Here the question and the answer is quite different (no matter whether the universe was Newtonian or relativistic): Any entity that "observes" (be that an electron whose observations are electric and magnetic "input") perceives time as the ratio of input signals to own states. If the recorded input drives the electron's answers then the observation ratios influence the actions that the electron will undertake (if we put it equal with some software agent). The observation of time is based on this kind of observation-relationships among entities and therefore observable time is relative by nature.

 

Gedankenexperiment:

There is an electron that flips its spin up and down every step of the simulation. Then nothing can be said about the "speed" observed by an entity within the universe, when we can not say at what rate new unique states are achieved by that entity (not even mentioning aliasing). If that entity was a human and it took human neurons to perform a switch in 100 jiffy cycles and in other case in 1000 universal time cycles, then the observed speed ratio is ten. If we assume that the variables influencing neuron speed also influence all other local interactions (like the mass of the nearby planet) then measuring apparatus is influenced equally. :doh:

 

This is what I mean by saying, that providing humans with a hacked access to the universal clock would not help them make any kind of predictions about their environment. Probably the absolute time exists, but is quite pointless for us to know it. So this is kind of also the argument why I don't like astronomers compute how old the universe is. This number is guaranteed to be wrong - if not even on orders of magnitude. Saying that something is 10000 years old tells us that on earth, where the gravitation has been similar since then, 400 generations of people existed and therfore had 400 times the chance to change either culture or genetic material. But in the whole universe, where things are not so homogeneous, what does it mean 14 bilion years or 7bilion (of earth-) years? It is quite nonsense apart from the fact, that it assumes a specific kind of big-bang model.:eek:

 

:) Nothing is wrong with math, we should use it more! :)

Best regards,

eloxer.

[raymond723]

I don't know what do you mean by