The Geometry of Time

[mfgoode]

[0]sciencenews writes to tell us that a physicist at Stanford has just
recently published a peer review website for several physics lectures
focusing on a single underlying idea that "[1]time is not a single
dimension of spacetime but rather a local geometric distinction in
spacetime." The science is presented quite clearly and originally uses
GPS systems as a point of focus. From the article: "Not too long ago,
people thought the Earth was flat, which meant they thought that
gravity
pointed in the same direction everywhere. Today, we think of that as a
silly idea, but at the same time, most people today (including most
scientists) still think of spacetime as if it were a big box with 3
space
dimensions and 1 time dimension. So, like gravity for a flat Earth, the
single time dimension for the 'big box universe' points in one
direction,
from the Big-Bang into the future. A lot of lip service is given to the
idea of "curved spacetime", but the simplistic 3+1 'box' remains the
dominant concept of what cosmic spacetime is like."

Links:
0. mailto:sciencenews@comcast.net
1. http://www.stanford.edu/~afmayer/

Mally
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Numbers]

On reading this I had two thoughts:

1) In trigonometry we are told that we can think of a straight line as being the circumference of a circle with infinite radius.

2) At school, in the chemistry class, we had models of various molecules hanging from the ceiling. I don't suppose that the guy who made them, the teacher who hung them from the ceiling nor any of the students who saw them imagined for one second that that is what they really looked like. They were just an aid to understanding.

Put these two thoughts together and I arrive at the conclusion that it really doesn't matter how we think of the time dimension; as a straight line, a curve, or even as a spiral shaped whoopie cushion. What matters is that the model is an aid to understanding, not that it should look like the thing it represents.

So, your guy may be on to something, or he may not. The test is whether any alternative model to the "simplistic 3+1 box" leads to greater understanding.

[Citrix]

The lecture has dissapeared in time. Any one with a time machine to go back and provide me a copy of the pdf?

Citrix

[mfgoode]

Originally Posted by Numbers

On reading this I had two thoughts:

1) In trigonometry we are told that we can think of a straight line as being the circumference of a circle with infinite radius.

2) At school, in the chemistry class, we had models of various molecules hanging from the ceiling. I don't suppose that the guy who made them, the teacher who hung them from the ceiling nor any of the students who saw them imagined for one second that that is what they really looked like. They were just an aid to understanding.

Put these two thoughts together and I arrive at the conclusion that it really doesn't matter how we think of the time dimension; as a straight line, a curve, or even as a spiral shaped whoopie cushion. What matters is that the model is an aid to understanding, not that it should look like the thing it represents.

So, your guy may be on to something, or he may not. The test is whether any alternative model to the "simplistic 3+1 box" leads to greater understanding.

Geometry and time.
This is a very controversial subject and we must be careful how we tread.
I do not agree with your logic in toto but will entertain it as an alternative opinion if you don’t mind.
Time is not only a ‘physical quantity’ but a metaphysical one as well.
It is as much a property of the universal consciousness as it is supposed to be a dimension.
Models are used as an aid to the conception of an abstract idea. The extreme case encountered is by different relations trying to portray God in the image of an
Idol.
Yet Zeno’s paradoxes, the double helical DNA molecule, Einstein’s thought experiments or the EPR paradox all go to show that materialising an idea, is important for understanding a problem, to make progress theoretically.
As one of the wisest thinkers, St. Augustine said of Time:
“If you don’t ask me I know ; If you do, then I don’t.”
Mally

[David John Hill Jr]

I just happened to check this forum yesterday, and since I wrote my first
essay on time in an ethics class, a long time ago, thought I'd put in my two cents.
Firstly , as we try to fathom how to understand Mars, as other planets and celestial history, I feel it an important topic. I,also would like a copy of the
work , linked to in the original post.

I try to keep the door in that direction open, with such statements, for my own consideration mainly,as
"To everyihing that IS , there is both structure and motion: to every motion there is structure; to every structure there is motion."

Of course if there is motion, then time by its very definition as a tool in measuring such,exists.
From there, that subject may go on and on.(In fact I have 4 homemade journals more or less on the topic, but far from complete)

On issues that are earth related in app[ication,or religiously upheld, I prefer, personnaly , to desist in comment,for the density and application, might be tied and bound by history, on earth and indeed, the time process as the earth alone proceeds.
However, not that examples should not be extracted, quite the opposite:Got to start somewhere,even as tempered by earthbound
experience.
As far as the use of the word god, I must confess, in trying to communicate
a sense of everything, I have used the word. Beyond that my use of the word
desists. I wish not to insult they that consider everything ,as I do myself,
as god-like,and beyond that the analogy ,as it is only,desists. Some philosophers of past times, perhaps in their own defence, have been rather crude on this issue,I understand.