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Author
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Topic: Universal Memory and Quantum Gravity
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Richard
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Member # 857
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posted 04. August 2003 09:34
Parallel,
One of the obvious predictions is being considered now by some scientists as a possible solution to particular problems with big bang; this is that the speed of light was greater in the past. I think that this is just the tip of the iceberg. In big shrink I present this idea in such a way that it doesn't actually contradict special relativity's assumption of a constant speed for light, showing that this phenomenon can be described in terms of time acceleration. Thus, when we look at the early Universe we can say that time was moving faster, and has since slowed down, and this gives you the impression of a faster speed for light. It is also possible that time acceleration explains the seeming acceleration of the expansion of the Universe, though this could also be a local acceleration of expansion caused by a local time acceleration.
Richard
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chimp
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posted 04. August 2003 12:20
Accelerated time could explain the equivalence of inertial mass and gravitational mass.
Russ
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Richard
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posted 07. August 2003 14:06
Russ,
I'm not exactly sure what you mean. The equivalence is assumed of course in general relativity. Earlier you stated that matter is but a form of space-time, and with this I basically agree. With the existence of time acceleration. flat space-time is simply the equalibrium point between space curved such that it causes a progessively increasing time dilation for matter, this called gravity, and space distorted such that it causes a progressively increasing time acceleration for matter, this being anti-gravity. Gravity cause an increase in the density of matter relative to space, while anti-gravity causes a decrease in the density of matter relative to space. The extreme case of the former is the primordial black hole from which the universe was born, and the extreme case for the latter is a rapidly expanding universe. I think the two should be considered to exist simultaneously, and this gives us a universe that is balanced, and this is what we perceive from our vantage point within it.
Richard
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chimp
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posted 08. August 2003 02:53
As a thought experiment, imagine a perfectly smooth homogenous liquid or "fluid" that stretches out to infinity. An open universe of infinite space-time radius, is equivalent to a closed finite "big shrink", conspanding, or compression universe. There are as many fractions from zero to one as there are natural numbers from zero to infinity.
The fluid has a small distortion or vortice moving in in it. How can the velocity of the "vortice" in the fluid be measured? Its motion can only be relative to another vortice.
Total space-time energy is given by the Einstein-Pythagorean equation:
E^2 = {mc^2}^2 + {pc}^2
Space is at right angles to time:
S
|||||---->T
The thermodynamic arrow of time, points in the direction of continually increasing space-time density. Increasing density gradients. It is a ratio adaption:
{S/T}_n = {S/T}_n+1
S and T are reducing in tandem, such, that their ratio remains a constant c, for the velocity of a photon of light.
S<--{energy}---------->T
Energy compresses{resists} space and dilates{stretches} time.
Since potential energy equals kinetic energy, gravitational mass must equal inertial mass. An increase in kinetic energy always causes resistance in space-time.
Potential energy is at right angles to kinetic energy and gravity is at right angles to inertia. Time is at right angles to space.
Russell E. Rierson
analog57@yahoo.com
[ 08. August 2003, 02:55: Message edited by: Russell E. Rierson ]
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Richard
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posted 10. August 2003 09:34
Russ,
I appreciate your explanation, though what I'm unsure of is why you think that time acceleration helps to establish the equivalence.
In regards to the thought experiment, isn't true that a gravitational field also can serve as a reference vortex?
Another idea that I have is that the past existence of a vortex can serve as a reference vortex and this gives the same velocity limit, c, as s.r. As the vortex approachs this limit it becomes more massive relative to it's own past or it's past becomes more massive relative to it, depending upon one's perspective. The extreme case leads to the creation of a black hole. The only way the vortex can escape it's past is through time acceleration.
Richard
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Richard
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posted 10. August 2003 09:46
Russ,
Another concept that relates to what you've been saying is that if one believes that reality is shrinking in size with time and also that there is an equivalence between mass-energy and space-time, then this leads to the conclusion that as mass energy-shrinks a portion of it is simply converted into spacet-time. As this applies to gravity, this would mean that anti-gravity accelerates the rate of conversion, and gravity simply converts space-time to mass-energy.
Richard
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chimp
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posted 10. August 2003 14:31
Very interesting. Yes, it could also be explained as a matter-generates-space effect:
If the locality principle is not going to be thrown into the trash heap, then a viable option is that space is something analogous to homogeneously distributed probability density functions(a perfect fluid?) i.e. increasing density gradients, giving the observed thermodynamic arrow of time. The observed cosmic expansion is a "relative" one! A "perspective effect" from our local vantage point. A shrinking object gives the illusion of receding motion. Increasing *refractive* density gradients give the appearence of a doppler-red-shift. Space increases density as matter is re-sized.
Spacetime then "remembers" the input! A quantum measurement is made, the action principle demands the shortest distance between two points be taken, whatever that may be. There is no instantaneous action at a distance!
Interesting... Either a creator with infinite god-like intelligence created this universe as a clockworks mechanism, or the creator and the mechanism are one and the same.
A universal quantum computer?
Antisymmetric time [ t = -t ] would give the observed "spin statistics" for particles. Antisymmetric time i.e. the fluid vortice.
[ 10. August 2003, 14:35: Message edited by: Russell E. Rierson ]
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chimp
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posted 18. September 2003 03:26
Stephen Hawking's excellent book, "Universe in a Nutshell", explains holography as a phenomenon of interference of wave patterns. Light from a laser is split into two separate beams, one bounces off the object and gets reflected onto a photo-sensitized plate. The other beam is reflected into a lens and collides with the reflected light of the object. When a laser is shone through the developed plate, a fully three dimensional image of the original object is created.
According to conventional theories, the surface area of the horizon surrounding a black hole, measures its entropy, where entropy is defined as a measure of the number of internal states that the black hole can be in without looking different to an outside observer, who can only measure mass, rotation and charge. This leads to another theory which states that the maximum entropy of any closed region of space can never exceed one quarter of the area of the circumscribing surface, with the entropy being the measure of the total information contained by the system. So the theorists came to realize that the information associated with all phenomena in the three dimensional world, can be stored on its two dimensional boundary, like a holographic image.
Since entropy can also be defined as the number of states within a region of space, and the entropy of the universe must always increase, the next logical step is to realize that the spacetime density, i.e. the information encoded within a circumscribed region of space, must be increasing in the thermodynamic direction of time.
Spacetime = Memory storage?
A universal computation?
Intelligent design?
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Mark
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Member # 888
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posted 25. September 2003 23:33
Russell,
When a person tells me that "there is no absolute truth," my standard reply is: "Are you absolutely sure there are no abolute truths?"
If there are no absolute truths, how could anyone possibly know that?
With respect to "uncertainty," I suspect some confuse "uncertainty" with an absence of truth (absolute or otherwise). Take Wheeler's photon making its way to Earth for all those millions of years. It is in a state of suspended "uncertainty," for a long, long time, until its destiny is decided by the participant/observer on Earth. In this case, we could say that the photon's "uncertainty" as to its path is, simply stated, the truth (the absolute truth, if you like).
Taking Wheeler's speculations a step further, we could say that much if not all of the present is in a state of "uncertainty" until the future participates in the proper way to determine our destinies, and again this uncertainty is the truth (whatever is real, is the truth, even if the real is, in some sense, "uncertain").
I have some questions.
You stated:
quote:
There is realization that the law of conservation of energy may be violated for brief periods smaller than the Planck time.
Has this "realization" been published? I would like to read a little about it if you have anything handy.
You also said:
quote:
The Second Law of Thermodynamics may be a consequence of the spacetime expanding in the universe. . . .
First question: Does this expansion also account for the unidirectional arrow of time?
Second question: If the universe contracted (the Big Crunch), what of the Second Law?
With respect to your idea of space as a fluid, with a "density," you are not the only one with the notion that space is not "empty," but rather is quite full (of waves of varying frequencies, and therefore of energy). Physicist David Bohm, in his book "Wholeness and the Implicate Order," pp. 190-91, says:
quote:
. . .[W]e note that when quantum theory is applied to fields . . . it is found that the possible states of energy of this field are discrete (or quantized). Such a state of the field is, in some respects, a wavelike excitation spreading out over a broad region of space. Nevertheless, it also has somehow a discrete quantum of energy (and momentum) proportional to its frequency, so that in other respects it is like a particle (e.g., a photon). However, if one considers the electromagnetic field in empty space, for example, one finds from the quantum theory that each such wave-particle mode of excitation of the field has what is called a 'zero-point' energy, below which it cannot go, even when its energy falls to the minimum that is possible. If one were to add up the energies of all the 'wave-particle' modes of excitation in any region of space, the result would be infinite, because an infinite number of wavelengths is present. However, . . . there may be a certain shortest possible wavelength, so that the total number of modes of excitation, and therefore the energy, would be finite.
When this length [the shortest possible wavelength] is estimated it turns out to be 10^-33 cm. This is much shorter than anything thus probed in physical experiments. . . . If one computes the amount of energy that would be in one cubic centimetre of space, with this shortest possible wavelength, it turns out to be far beyond the total energy of all the matter in the known universe.
What is implied by this proposal is that what we call empty space contains an immense background of energy, and that matter as we know it is a small , 'quantized' wavelike excitation on top of this background, rather like a tiny ripple on a vast sea.
. . . It may be said that space, which has so much energy, is full rather than empty.
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chimp
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posted 26. September 2003 03:58
quote:
I have some questions.
You stated:
quote:
There is realization that the law of conservation of energy may be violated for brief periods smaller than the Planck time.
Has this "realization" been published? I would like to read a little about it if you have anything handy.
You also said:
quote:
The Second Law of Thermodynamics may be a consequence of the spacetime expanding in the universe. . . .
First question: Does this expansion also account for the unidirectional arrow of time?
Second question: If the universe contracted (the Big Crunch), what of the Second Law?
With respect to your idea of space as a fluid, with a "density," you are not the only one with the notion that space is not "empty," but rather is quite full (of waves of varying frequencies, and therefore of energy).
[1.] A quote from Stephen Hawking:
http://clinton4.nara.gov/Initiatives/Millennium/shawking.html
quote:
The possible particle histories have to include paths that travel faster than light and even paths that go back in time. Before anyone rushes out to patent a time machine let me say that in normal circumstances at least, one can not use this for time travel. However paths that go back in time are not just like angels dancing on a pin. They have real observational consequences. Even what we think of as empty space is full of particles moving in closed loops in space and time. That is they move forward in time on one side of the loop and backwards in time on the other side. These closed loops are said to be virtual particles because they can not be measured directly with a particle detector. However their effects can be measured indirectly. One way is to have a pair of metal plates close together. The effect of the plates is to reduce slightly the number of closed loops in the region between the plates relative to the number outside. There are thus more closed loops hitting the outside edges of the plates and bouncing off than there are hitting the inside edges. One would therefore expect there to be a small force pushing the plates together. This force, which was first predicted by the Turkish physicist Hendrick Casimir, has been observed experimentally. So we can be confident that closed particle loops really exist.
[2.]
http://www.hawking.org.uk/lectures/bot.html
quote:
However, I now realise I was wrong, as these solutions show. The collapse is not the time reverse of the expansion. The expansion will start with an inflationary phase, but the collapse will not in general end with an anti inflationary phase. Moreover, the small departures from uniform density will continue to grow in the contracting phase. The universe will get more and more lumpy and irregular, as it gets smaller, and disorder will increase. This means that the arrow of time will not reverse. People will continue to get older, even after the universe has begun to contract.
Mass "m" is a form of condensed space-time.
Yes, the mass-energy equivalence is given by the equation
E = m*c^2
Really, the equation is:
E^2 = p^2 c^2 + m^2 c^4
For a photon, the rest mass is zero, the equation reduces to:
E^2 = p^2 c^2
Since p is the momentum of a photon of light, the equation becomes:
E/p = c
Light is also a wave with a frequency (f) of oscillation and its energy is also given by the equation:
E = h*f = p*c
wavelength, Lambda = c/f
E/f = h = p*Lamda
Waves are ripples in a basic medium. Einstein explains that the ether is unecessary as a medium, so the ripples are vibrations of spacetime itself. Mass-energy is a form of condensed space-time.
As the ripples intersect with each other, it becomes a domino effect with the ripples coninually increasing in density. Very similar to taking a penny and doubling it as an iterative sequence.
2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, ... 2^n
Since the ripples are increasing in density they are "compressed" . As spacetime becomes compressed, matter is re-configured as a balancing effect, so the force of gravity and accelerations are perceived as they presently are.
Configuration space refers to how the state of a system evolves in time. This seems to be an ill-posed idea according to the various writings in general relativity, because the evolution is different for different observers. Each object has its own measure of time. One must specify the gravitational field "all at once" throughout all of spacetime, then one can look at what any individual observer will measure. Or, the choice of an arbitrary slicing of spacetime into space and time. It seems that the best choice would be spacelike slices in units of the Planck scale.
Then the geometry of space, processed by time, evolves from slice to slice. This is the 3+1 or ADM formalism. Since the process involves artificially slicing up spacetime, it obscures the underlying spacetime geometry. But by extending the ADM formalism, a Euclidean "dual" formulation OF non-Euclidean general relativity could? be derived. T-Duality???
A geometric interpretation, means that the laws of physics are the same in every Lorentz reference system. Local Lorentz invariance. Since the universe has no exterior reference frame, and it must refer to itself, its world line intersects with itself. The quantized-evolution of spacetime dictated by GR and QM, means that the world line of the past intersects with the world lines of the present, for the universe. A geometric stacking of space like slices, parameterized by t. Spacetime becomes compressed. As the time evolution proceeds in the thermodynamic direction of t, the space like sheets continually increase in density. The information storage of space time.
[<->[<->[<->[U]<->]<->]<->]
The increasing spacetime density must be background independent.
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Mark
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posted 26. September 2003 12:42
Russell,
Thanks for those links.
You said:
quote:
The increasing spacetime density must be background independent.
What do you mean by "background"?
Thanks for your help.
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chimp
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posted 27. September 2003 02:17
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loop_quantum_gravity
quote:
The incompatibility between quantum mechanics and general relativity
The fundamental lesson of general relativity is that there is no fixed spacetime background, as found in Newtonian mechanics and special relativity . To a certain extent, general relativity can be seen to be a completely relational theory, in which the only physically relevant information is the relationship between different events in space-time.
On the other hand, quantum mechanics since its invention has depended on a fixed background (non-dynamical) structure. In the case of quantum mechanics, it is time hat is supposed to be given and not dynamical. In quantum field theory, Minkowski spacetime is the fixed background of the theory. Finally, string theory started out as a generalization of quantum field theory where instead of point particles, string-like objects propagate in a fixed spacetime background. No attempt will be made to describe string theory in more depth in this article, since it wouldn't be possible to do it justice.
The dissatisfaction with this apparent inconsistency of all previous quantum theories with the necessary background-independence of general relativity drove the original efforts to find a background-independent quantum-mechanical theory. LQG is the fruit of these efforts.
Topological quantum field theory provided an example of background-independent quantum theory, but with no local degrees of freedom, and only finitely many degrees of freedom globally. This is inadequate to describe gravity, which even in vacuum has local degrees of freedom according to general relativity.
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Mark
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posted 27. September 2003 11:03
Russell,
Interesting. Now I know what you mean by your use of the phrase, "no absolute truths." I assume you were thinking of the limited extent of any given light cone. I was thinking in other categories. Perhaps we should say, given the limited extent of any given light cone, and the fact that any given observer must be within the universe, there is no "absolute information." Is this more descriptive? Surely, events within spacetime, although beyond any given light cone, still "exist"? Or are you saying that any event outside any given light cone doesn't "exist" at all, at least for any observer within that light cone?
Are you comfortable with the division of time into "sheets"? It seems artificial to me, or if you like, it attempts the "quantization" of time, which seems counter-intuitive given that time is relative.
Your last sentence, regarding "background independent," seems to recognize this.
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chimp
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posted 27. September 2003 19:43
Absolute truth can exist within certain limited contexts, as we define it. But if absolute truth is defined as "the whole truth", then forget it. The total sum of human knowledge is just one small droplet in an infinite sea of TRUTH.
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%F6del's_incompleteness_theorem
quote:
In mathematical logic , Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two celebrated theorems proven by Kurt Gödel . Somewhat simplified, the first theorem states that:
in any consistent formal system of mathematics sufficiently strong to allow one to do basic arithmetic , one can construct a statement about natural numbers that can be neither proven nor disproven within that system.
[...]
Gödel's second incompleteness theorem, which is proved by formalizing part of the proof of the first within the system itself, states that any sufficiently strong consistent system cannot prove its own consistency.
Actually, spacetime does not really need to be "sliced up" in that it can proceed in discrete steps, yet, still be continuous.
[density 1]--->[density 2]--->[density 3]---> ... --->[density n]
h represents Planck's constant
G is Newton's universal gravitational constant.
c is the speed of light in vacuum.
S = distance scale
T = time scale.
p is momentum
Planck length = sqrt[hG/c^3] = constant ratio
Planck time = sqrt[hG/c^5] = constant ratio
[Planck length]/[Planck time] = c = [S/T]_n = [S/T]_n+k
Discrete quanta = hf
Continuous wavelength = h/p
Since we are continuing to discover how symmetry is violated in the universe, it should be possible to devise an experiment to determine how the spacetime expansion vs. matter contraction symmetry, is violated. Then it should be possible to prove, or disprove Eddington's idea.
A quote from the book "The Expanding Universe" by Sir Arthur Eddington:
quote:
All change is relative. The universe is expanding relatively to our common standards; our common standards are shrinking relatively to the size of the universe. The theory of the "expanding universe" might also be called the theory of the "shrinking atom" .
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Mark
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posted 04. October 2003 12:13
Russell,
I did want to add one comment to your (creative) idea that the universe acts as its own holographic memory. You use a blackhole as the baseline of your analogy. As I understand it, a black hole has an "event horizon," beyond which light cones cannot go (thereby providing a template for "memory" of those light cones).
However, as Hawking describes it, the universe, though finite, has no boundary (that is, no "event horizon"). It seems this "no boundary" condition of the universe therefore fails to provide the template for any universal memory. Do you think this contradicts your analogy?
Also, you stated:
quote:
Actually spacetime does not need to be "sliced up" in that it can proceed in discrete steps, yet still be continuous.
I agree that spacetime is continuous. This is one of the central postulates of science. I don't necessarily agree that spacetime proceeds in "discrete steps." I think "discrete steps" reflects the reductive tools we use to analyze the natural world, and it does not necessarily reflect the natural world itself (or, at least, all of it).
Just an offhand rhetorical example: Please describe the "discrete steps" of an electron as it passes through 2 slits at the same time.
I think we use "discrete steps" because it is harmonious with our common sense notion that one event follows on another in an orderly, cause and effect way. Would you agree that QM challenges this notion?
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