A Universe from Nothing?

[Polymath257]

I do not see how your analogy wrt lines of latitude shows the existence of spacetime. Analogies, metaphors, etc., are handy to convey principles, but if the principle itself is not valid, then the analogy is meaningless. Spacetime is a mental construct used in some models of the universe, but there is no proof that spacetime exists as something real as space is real, or matter is real.

Space and time are equally real. Motion can only happen because there is time and space together. But time (and space) are within the universe. The universe itself is through all space and all time. Hence it has a spacetime geometry. That geometry can be curved like the surface of the Earth (time corresponding to latitude in this analogy).If it is curved enough, it can even be finite.

The analogy is valid, at least as a possibility. Latitude and longitude are also 'mental constructs'. Neither is dictated by the geometry of the Earth's surface. Yet they are also quite helpful for describing where things are.

 

[Polymath257]

This is not quite true. The time we measure and experience is a function of our awareness, but our awareness takes some time to form ("quantum time") before we can begin to measure and experience time. Therefore, there IS time outside to have a process of becoming. The quantum time that enables our awareness to form is what Whitehead referred to as the "creative advance of nature" which he distinguished from our measured time. This quantum time is what enables the entire volume of space-time to expand giving the appearance of exceeding the speed of light. In short, our reality is "growing" at an increasingly accelerated rate which violates the constraints within the "measured" reality we inhabit.

We can measure time intervals much, much smaller than what we can be aware of. Our consciousness of time isn't required.

Also, you use the words 'quantum time' in a very non-conventional way. This has nothing at all to do with quantum mechanics (at least, what you said doesn't).

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Time is just as real as space. Both are, in a sense, conceptualizations. In both, we use instruments (parts of the universe) to measure them. One physicist said "Time is defined so that motion looks simple".

No, the reality represented by the concept 'space' is tangibly real, the reality represented by the concept 'time' is not tangible, it requires the mind to note change and associate the change with the the concept 'time'.

 

[ChristineM]

Finite time universes don't last long enough for heat death, typically.

It's the conclusion of entropy, whether a universe lasts that long... I'll not hold my breath.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Is space 'real'? Time is just as real as space. In fact, the two are deeply connected via the geometry of the universe (spacetime).

See my last comment, the connection is there for sure, but space is independently real and the other dependent on change, to combine the real and the abstract as spacetime may help to understand some aspects of the universe, but does a disservice to cosmology.

 

[Polymath257]

See my last comment, the connection is there for sure, but space is independently real and the other dependent on change, to combine the real and the abstract as spacetime may help to understand some aspects of the universe, but does a disservice to cosmology.

I strongly disagree. In fact, it was the realization that time is part of the geometry of the universe and just as real as space that has allowed us to probe cosmology in so much detail lately.

 

[Polymath257]

It's the conclusion of entropy, whether a universe lasts that long... I'll not hold my breath.

I agree. At this point, it doesn't look like time will be finite into the future. So heat death seems to be the conclusion. the question at that point is whether quantum fluctuations can 'catch' in a way to produce new universes within the expanding heat-death universe. That quickly leads to a multiverse model.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Space and time are equally real. Motion can only happen because there is time and space together. But time (and space) are within the universe. The universe itself is through all space and all time. Hence it has a spacetime geometry. That geometry can be curved like the surface of the Earth (time corresponding to latitude in this analogy).If it is curved enough, it can even be finite.

The analogy is valid, at least as a possibility. Latitude and longitude are also 'mental constructs'. Neither is dictated by the geometry of the Earth's surface. Yet they are also quite helpful for describing where things are.

You keep getting lost in the forest by concentrating on the trees, you will never understand what is being said to you if you keep clinging to some idea of the universe being some man made mechanical device made of individual parts. There are in fact no parts, only an eternal infinite universe, of which we can only detect less than 5% with our sensory perception.

 

[Polymath257]

No, the reality represented by the concept 'space' is tangibly real, the reality represented by the concept 'time' is not tangible, it requires the mind to note change and associate the change with the the concept 'time'.

No, it does NOT require the mind any more than it requires the mind to note spatial differences. Minds are irrelevant here. And, since I have no idea what it means to be 'tangible', I can't comment on whether space or time are tangible or not. Nor how such is relevant to being 'real'.

 

[Polymath257]

You keep getting lost in the forest by concentrating on the trees, you will never understand what is being said to you if you keep clinging to some idea of the universe being some man made mechanical device made of individual parts. There are in fact no parts, only an eternal infinite universe, of which we can only detect less than 5% with our sensory perception.

The chair in front of me is a different part of the universe than the sofa across from me. To ignore that is to miss a fundamental truth.

So, yes, there are parts. They are connected via multiple interactions, etc, but there are parts. I in no way claim it to be man-made or mechanical in any classical sense. What we can detect with our limited senses is also irrelevant. We have many ways to extend our senses to allow us to detect new aspects of the universe. For example, we cannot see infrared, but we can build infrared goggles.

A forest is made of trees. The universe is made of things inside of it.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

I strongly disagree. In fact, it was the realization that time is part of the geometry of the universe and just as real as space that has allowed us to probe cosmology in so much detail lately.

The universe has no geometry, geometry is merely a mental construct created by man, reality is forever on the other side of mathematics!

 

[Ben Dhyan]

The chair in front of me is a different part of the universe than the sofa across from me. To ignore that is to miss a fundamental truth.

So, yes, there are parts. They are connected via multiple interactions, etc, but there are parts. I in no way claim it to be man-made or mechanical in any classical sense. What we can detect with our limited senses is also irrelevant. We have many ways to extend our senses to allow us to detect new aspects of the universe. For example, we cannot see infrared, but we can build infrared goggles.

A forest is made of trees. The universe is made of things inside of it.

No, the universe is one, it is not made, nor is it born, nor did it not evolve. Unless you start with the one (the forest), you will lose sight of what is important and get lost in looking at aspects (the trees) of the one , and there is where you get lost.

 

[Polymath257]

No, the universe is one, it is not made, nor is it born, nor did it not evolve. Unless you start with the one (the forest), you will lose sight of what is important and get lost in looking at aspects (the trees) of the one , and there is where you get lost.

But it is by looking at the aspects of the forest that we learn about the entire ecosystem and the unity of the forest. So, again, I strongly disagree on this.

And, again, we have to consider the universe throughout time and space as a unit. And yes, that *is* a geometrical thing. You get so caught up in whether something is conceptual that you miss that the concepts refer to real things.

 

[Polymath257]

The universe has no geometry, geometry is merely a mental construct created by man, reality is forever on the other side of mathematics!

Funny then that math and science have helped us to understand so much about it. Your denials only show your limited perspective. You write on a computer designed using scientific principles. We could not be having this conversation except for a whole range of infrastructure designed to make such things possible and based on the use of scientific principles. Yet you deny that science allows us to understand anything.

Clearly, you are wrong in this.

 

[Thief]

Ok, then the void is a part of the universe....the universe is an indivisible one.

Names for all the aspects do not represent the whole, they are just distinctions made to help man in understanding it conceptually.....gravity, zpe, redshift, void (as you define it), dark energy, dark matter, mass, C, space-time, space, time, em radiation, atomic particles, singularities, etc., etc.... the reality represented by each concept are describing observed or theorized aspects of one thing, the universe, the one that is the all.

so....toss it all in one pot a stir until boiling
rinse and repeat....

it should have been sufficient ....there is one universe (one Word)

 

[Thief]

space is real enough....
movement is real enough

the measure of such things is all in your head
time is a quotient on a chalkboard

 

[gnostic]

See my last comment, the connection is there for sure, but space is independently real and the other dependent on change, to combine the real and the abstract as spacetime may help to understand some aspects of the universe, but does a disservice to cosmology.

Without time, you cannot possibly understand spacetime in physical cosmology.

Without time, you would not understand changes, movements, speed and acceleration.

Without time you would not understand General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics.

A large part of understanding the universe is to recognise that both space and time are real.

You keep getting lost in the forest by concentrating on the trees, you will never understand what is being said to you if you keep clinging to some idea of the universe being some man made mechanical device made of individual parts. There are in fact no parts, only an eternal infinite universe, of which we can only detect less than 5% with our sensory perception.

Actually you are seeing neither trees, nor the forest. What you are seeing mirage of pink elephant wearing red clown shoes.

You keep talking of "eternal universe" but presented no evidences to support your claim.

You want to polymath to accept your claim, but unless you provide the evidences (empirical) or present the mathematical proofs/equations (theoretical), your claim is just simply pseudoscience and wishful thinking.

 

[ChristineM]

I understand how you understand it, but I am explaining that the concept of time is meant to represent a measurement of change as seen from within the universe, it does not exist outside of the human mind. Now the relative change observed in any aspect of the universe is real, and we can measure it, but this is merely an aspect of the eternal nature of the indivisible universe, if there was not some relative change, we could not observe it, but the universe would still keep on keeping on.

What we call time is not something that exists as some independent real entity, but merely a concept related to our noticing relative change happening in the eternal movement of aspects of the universe, within an eternal changeless universe.

That concept is illusory, as you say, of the human mind. On the other hand, times arrow is reality, it points from past to future, it has done since the start of the universe and will point in that direction to the end.

 

[ChristineM]

I agree. At this point, it doesn't look like time will be finite into the future. So heat death seems to be the conclusion. the question at that point is whether quantum fluctuations can 'catch' in a way to produce new universes within the expanding heat-death universe. That quickly leads to a multiverse model.

Some hypothesis that a multiverse and colliding universe's explain the bruises on the CMB and adjacent galaxies that are moving contrary to the general expansion.

Perhaps the definition of universe should be updated.

 

[Thief]

and the experiment won't fit in the petri dish