Is time really a dimension and why is it associated with relativity?

[Mentat]

Originally posted by LW Sleeth
Okay then, draw a four dimensional representation and indicate where time is.

This is exactly what I disapproved of. You are asking me to help you visualize it, and implying that you won't believe it, unless I do.

I've not defined a dimension any way I wish, I am just trying to see how it makes sense. I can see it very easily if time represents rate of change . . . the unstoppable dynamic of change is very clearly observable. Time as a spatial coordinate however I have never seen, nor anything like it. What sort of experience can you refer me to that will help change my mind? [/B]

I never said it was a spatial dimension.

You have never gone fast enough to appreciate the distortion of spacetime. In order to experience the distortion of time, you need either extreme speed, or extreme gravity.

 

[Les Sleeth]

Originally posted by Mentat
This is exactly what I disapproved of. You are asking me to help you visualize it, and implying that you won't believe it, unless I do.

You are the one treating it like a coordinate. If it is, then explain where you place it with space coordinates. I say, the only way you can depict time is as a pace/rate, and that's because time is movement, not an actual "place" or coordinate that can be treated the same way as a spatial dimension. It has entirely different rules and dynamics than space, yet you attempt (at least in the past you have) to theorize with time as one would with space.

Originally posted by Mentat
You have never gone fast enough to appreciate the distortion of spacetime. In order to experience the distortion of time, you need either extreme speed, or extreme gravity.

That isn't a valid counterpoint.

I have never suggested that time is not altered. That is NOT our debate. The debate is, what does the term "time" represent in actual, physical reality.

 

[drag]

May I suggest that purhaps you should continue
discussing the original subject of this thread.
Or do you guys like arguing about this, unsolvable
as it is, preference of definition too much...

Live long and prosper.

 

[Les Sleeth]

Originally posted by drag
May I suggest that purhaps you should continue
discussing the original subject of this thread.
Or do you guys like arguing about this, unsolvable
as it is, preference of definition too much...

I enjoy all of it as long as people are thinking and interested. Of course I'd rather put things back on track, but people stopped commenting on my original idea a long time ago. So if "time" is stimulating thought, so be it!

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by LW Sleeth
You are the one treating it like a coordinate. If it is, then explain where you place it with space coordinates. I say, the only way you can depict time is as a pace/rate, and that's because time is movement, not an actual "place" or coordinate that can be treated the same way as a spatial dimension. It has entirely different rules and dynamics than space, yet you attempt (at least in the past you have) to theorize with time as one would with space.

You seem to be having the same problem as (Q), on another thread. I can tell you that Relativity posulates that time is a coordinate, which warps and changes, due to the presence of matter. If you want another source, pick up a book about Relativity. As a matter of fact, if you get the book, The Elegant Universe (by Brian Greene), you can get at least a very basic idea of Relativity's view of the time dimension. I also suggest reading the book, "Relativity, the Special and General Theories", by Albert Einstein (obviously a reliable source, as to what Relativity postulates ). You don't have to believe what these - or any other - books say, but you apparently don't think that that is what Relativity postulates, and so I suggest that you read about it.

That isn't a valid counterpoint.

It wasn't intended to be. It was intended to show you that I can't help you visualize the warping of time, any more than I can help you visualize Quantum Uncertainty, or what we look like from the Fourth Spacial Dimension. But, as I said before, I don't approve of people dismissing an idea, just because they can't visualize it. It is unreasonable, and irrational, to do so.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by LW Sleeth
but people stopped commenting on my original idea a long time ago.

That's because you're right, and people like arguing something that they think they can prove wrong .

 

[Les Sleeth]

Originally posted by Mentat
You seem to be having the same problem as (Q), on another thread. I can tell you that Relativity posulates that time is a coordinate, which warps and changes, due to the presence of matter. If you want another source, pick up a book about Relativity. As a matter of fact, if you get the book, The Elegant Universe (by Brian Greene), you can get at least a very basic idea of Relativity's view of the time dimension. I also suggest reading the book, "Relativity, the Special and General Theories", by Albert Einstein (obviously a reliable source, as to what Relativity postulates ). You don't have to believe what these - or any other - books say, but you apparently don't think that that is what Relativity postulates, and so I suggest that you read about it.. . . . I can't help you visualize the warping of time, any more than I can help you visualize Quantum Uncertainty, or what we look like from the Fourth Spacial Dimension. But, as I said before, I don't approve of people dismissing an idea, just because they can't visualize it. It is unreasonable, and irrational, to do so.

Sorry Mentat, I hadn't seen this post. I think possibly Drag is correct afterall, we seem to be going nowhere. And when someone starts telling me I need to read books and papers I've already read, I figure it's time to stop before I get angry.

My parting remarks are that I don't need help visualizing time warping. I have said that several times but you don't seem to believe I mean it. I also am not dismissing your idea, it just doesn't make sense to me, so I press you to explain why it makes sense to you. Saying "others" think time is a dimension is not a good explanation; still others think of time as I do. So we are left with our own understandings in such debates.

To repeat, the issue for me has never been time warping, but rather what the term "time" actually represents in physical reality, and why the term "dimension" has been associated with it for relativity. That and only that has been the dispute (for me). You want to insist that the use of the word "dimension" must mean it is endowed with some of the same properties as spatial dimensions. I disagree.

I remember at the last PF site too there were people who disagreed with your interpretation of time as a dimension, and that's because there is no concensus. So I am not saying you are wrong, I am saying that none of your arguments (nor those of any other time dimensionalist) have convinced me of the truth of your position. I don't believe, for instance, that time travel is possible or that time can "expand" along with the universe . . . and that doubt stems from nothing other than what I believe time is.