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Could a String be thought of, say a duration of time? I would think that as a single dimensional object it just might fit.
What you have in mind is similar to the notion of a 'string bit' moving along a string. If you'd like to learn more, check out the Sept. 2006 paper: http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/0609103" [Broken].Could a String be thought of, say a duration of time? I would think that as a single dimensional object it just might fit.
The concept ot motion makes no sense without time. For example, velocity equals distance / time. Since 'space' is merely the relationship between objects traveling along a time line, it is pointless to attempt to separate the two concepts
Not only the notions of time and motion are inseparable but also speed (velocity). Moreover, since the notion of speed implies both time and motion, it is the former that might be considered as a fundamental entity rather than the latters. In principle, it is known that time could be excluded from the equations of motion (unlike velocity).The concept ot motion makes no sense without time. For example, velocity equals distance / time. Since 'space' is merely the relationship between objects traveling along a time line, it is pointless to attempt to separate the two concepts.
Exactly! For simplicity one can imaging a two-body system with a potential well (say, an oscillator). It can be described using only space coordinates, velocity and acceleration.How is that? Motion is merely a different way of describing velocity.
To elaborate, it is possible to imagine a world which has spatial relationships but has no moving parts. There would be no motion, no change, no evolution of time in such a world.I can imagine an unmoving space, devoid of time,
but what motion could take place in time devoid of circumstance?
So is space more fundamental than time?
Er.. how so? How exactly are you able to "detect" space? How would you know that, for example, Point A is closer to you than Point B? And just in case you plan on bringing out a very long measuring tape to answer this question, consider what is necessary for you (i) calibrate that measuring tape and (ii) to actually observe various part of that measuring tape.It is possible to imagine a world which has spatial relationships but has no moving parts. There would be no motion, no change, no evolution of time in such a world.
Why are you cross-posting this when that has been explicitly prohibited in the Guidelines?I will post this simultaneously in one of the philosophy forums, but it was generated here.
Sorry, I only wanted to try my idea out on the philosophers, who probably don't read much in this forum. And it wasn't the same exact post, I made some small changes to address the academics in the other forum.Why are you cross-posting this when that has been explicitly prohibited in the Guidelines?
The other thread has been merged to this one. Please don't do this again.
Zz.
I'm sorry, but if you want us to simply drop all of physics and just make things up, you're in the wrong forum. You want a science fiction forum.Thanks, Zz
Well, I did say imagine, didn't I?
But I think you are right in physical terms. My little mental exercise does require an observer who can move from place to place, and must require time to do so. So I have merely moved the property of time into the obervation apparatus, not really removing it from the universe. That was part of the reason I chose to use the word "world" rather than using the word "universe."
I wouldn't try to measure an imaginary world, any more than I would try to calculate the unique value of an imaginary number.
I have learned this week from Wiki that the modern view of science, due to Kant and Liebnitz, is that time, space, and mass are fundamental units, which remain undefined. They are not to be thought of, as Newton did, as a kind of container in which objects float about, but as a part of the process of observing events. Not as things in themselves, but as part of the conceptual apparatus.
So as long as we are making up time and space without regard to any physical laws, why not make up an imaginary world for them to play in? And my point is that I can construct a concept of a world containing objects that do not experience time, but I am unable to construct a concept of a world without space. I can even make a picture of it. Any common photograph will do.
Then there is the idea of relitive events. I have just come across this so I am prone to mis-speak, but there is a category of events called light-like, in which the space-time interval is said to be zero. Nevertheless, there is a spacelike separation to such events, not so? So the timelike separation must be the zero factor.
This interpretation is supported, I think, by the notion of time dilation. When an event occurs very near the speed of light relitive to the observer, it experiences time dilated until it nearly passes not at all. If it is at the speed of light relitive to the observor, as in a light-like event, or just the radiation of energy in free space, then it experience zero time in the observors space.
So is light real or imaginary? We do consider it a physical quantity, and we need it for every kind of measurment I can think of.
I am honored that you have given my little thought consideration, Zz. It seems not unlikely that I have made a mishmash of physics, but I hope you can apply your critical skills to help me slice away everything that is not necessary or sufficient, so I can see for myself if anything "discreet" is left over.
Honest thanks,
Richard
The notions of space, time and motion are mostly discussed in philosophy where they are regarded as attributes of matter (i.e., they have no meaning separated from one another and, of course, from matter). In physics, however, sometimes they are used separately (for convenience). For example, take a system with a ball rolling back and forth in a potential well. This system (oscillator) can be described fully in terms of distance (spatial coordinate) and speed (as a function of spatial coordinate) alone, with the time parameter excluded. Then could it be so that the notion of time have had arised in the human mind as a reflection of periodic motions of matter around us?I think space and time are inseparable. Neither concept makes sense without the other component. The concept of space is only meaninful in terms of the time required to go from point A to point B: d = vt. If d or t is set to zero [or infinity], the other quantity cannot be quantified.
Aren't you forgetting that "speed" is the time rate of change of displacement? It appears to me that time is an implicit part of such a dynamics.The notions of space, time and motion are mostly discussed in philosophy where they are regarded as attributes of matter (i.e., they have no meaning separated from one another and, of course, from matter). In physics, however, sometimes they are used separately (for convenience). For example, take a system with a ball rolling back and forth in a potential well. This system (oscillator) can be described fully in terms of distance (spatial coordinate) and speed (as a function of spatial coordinate) alone, with the time parameter excluded. Then could it be so that the notion of time have had arised in the human mind as a reflection of periodic motions of matter around us?
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I think you need to distinguish two things : (a) the measurement of eigentime (b) time as a unmeasurable hidden variable (``God's'' clock if you want to).The notions of space, time and motion are mostly discussed in philosophy where they are regarded as attributes of matter (i.e., they have no meaning separated from one another and, of course, from matter). In physics, however, sometimes they are used separately (for convenience). For example, take a system with a ball rolling back and forth in a potential well. This system (oscillator) can be described fully in terms of distance (spatial coordinate) and speed (as a function of spatial coordinate) alone, with the time parameter excluded. Then could it be so that the notion of time have had arised in the human mind as a reflection of periodic motions of matter around us?
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"Equal footing" must mean the complete identification of space and time, which is not exactly what is happening in SR/GR, QFT, etc (Minkovskian metric is not exactly Euclidean, is it?)And as far as time being arising "in the human mind as a reflection of periodic motion", would you care to explain why time is on equal footing with space in SR/GR, and in elementary particle physics as in the CPT symmetry?
This looks like an idealised (theoretical) time unavoidable in mathematical models. But I think we must keep in mind that the mathematical models are part of our language for describing physical reality. A model might reproduce pretty well a physical process but never in full detail; and it would be crazy to identify a mathematical model with physical reality.I think you need to distinguish two things : (a) the measurement of eigentime (b) time as a unmeasurable hidden variable (``God's'' clock if you want to).
You cannot escape from using (b), any dynamical equation requires it.
I agree completelyI
Now regarding (a), I agree that eigentime is the ticking of an internal clock of a particle (periodic motion) : there exist plenty such models in the literature for spinning particles (zitterbewegung, simple rotations,...). But this implies that time and space aren't on an equal footing at all (which is kind of logical since we never measure ``time'', we only count the number of ticks on our wrist watches).
Btw : these models are (of course) all relativistically invariant.
Time in special relativity is eigentime; Henri Poincare -for example- thought one should always consider time in the sense of (b) and think of eigentime as an auxilliary concept. The problem of relativistic simultaneity only arises when one *identifies* notions (a) and (b), a mistake too often made.