What is the fabric of space made of

[planck]

First of all, I'm glad that this thread is still alive and kickin!

What are thoughts "made of"?

You can quantify a thought. I would think that a synapse is fired and from there (or maybe a little before that) you could trace the path of that physical process within the brain. I think the argument could be made that the energy involved in a thought is tangible.

Space has to be tangible too.

Space-time is not "made" of something else, yet space-time is never completely empty of matter/energy.

Then why is it curved. That's the real question that I have. If space and time are intertwined, then there has to be something that links it. A "velcro" perhaps.

I'm tellin ya, space is something.

 

[GeorgCantor]

First of all, I'm glad that this thread is still alive and kickin!



You can quantify a thought. I would think that a synapse is fired and from there (or maybe a little before that) you could trace the path of that physical process within the brain. I think the argument could be made that the energy involved in a thought is tangible.

Energy is not a thought and a thought is not energy.

Either thoughts aren't real or energy isn't real. You could believe that thoughts are emergent but nothing could stop you from believing, for instance, that God is emergent from the configuartion of galaxies in the observable part of the universe.

 

[nismaratwork]

Thoughts are the result of the transmission of energy in the form of electrical impulses and neruotransmitters. It is not a matter of one synapse, but many. If you think that a thought cannot be quantified, you'll have to explain that to EEG rigs that allow people to type on a screen. Our technology isn't at the "mind reading" stage, but that doesn't mean that such would be impossible. That is a completely different issue from what constitutes spacetime.

GeorgCantor: Your either or is misleading, I assume for the purposes of introducing religion... again.

 

[robheus]

Space has to be tangible too.



Then why is it curved. That's the real question that I have. If space and time are intertwined, then there has to be something that links it. A "velcro" perhaps.

I'm tellin ya, space is something.

It's matter/energy that connects space and time.

 

[nismaratwork]

It's matter/energy that connects space and time.

That seems unlikely; energy exists within spacetime, not as some connective tissue between two 3 and +1 dimensions.

 

[GeorgCantor]

GeorgCantor: Your either or is misleading, I assume for the purposes of introducing religion... again.

I believe it's not. And it has nothing to do with religion.

Thoughts are the result of the transmission of energy in the form of electrical impulses and neruotransmitters. It is not a matter of one synapse, but many. If you think that a thought cannot be quantified, you'll have to explain that to EEG rigs that allow people to type on a screen.

Who/what is typing on the screen?

You are making it sound like it's something so simple when in fact it's the most mind-bending occurence in nature.

Either we don't have freewill and consequently thoughts are illusion, or we have freewill but matter is an illusion. One could assume emergent phenomena but it will not be satisfying to everyone.

 

[planck]

Here's some food for thought. Imagine it's T=0. At this time, existence is non-existent. But the theory is that a great explosion occurred that introduced existence. If we want to take the cosmological route, we can speculate that the hole where existence was introduced came from somewhere (parallel universe planes touching each other ?). Now, take into account that there is a theory that our gravity is leaking constantly. Where's it going? But more importantly, where's it coming from? Are there holes and fissures in our spacetime where things are coming and going? Could space itself be "leaking?" It's already stretching.

 

[alt]

Here's some food for thought. Imagine it's T=0. At this time, existence is non-existent. But the theory is that a great explosion occurred that introduced existence. If we want to take the cosmological route, we can speculate that the hole where existence was introduced came from somewhere (parallel universe planes touching each other ?).

But if there was somewhere from where existence was introduced, wasn't THAT somewhere, itself existence ?

 

[alt]

Who/what is typing on the screen?

Interesting question. Who formed that thought ? And who thought to form THAT thought ? Sounds like an infinite regress .. or emergent phenomena (whatever that means).

 

[robheus]

Here's some food for thought. Imagine it's T=0. At this time, existence is non-existent. But the theory is that a great explosion occurred that introduced existence. If we want to take the cosmological route, we can speculate that the hole where existence was introduced came from somewhere (parallel universe planes touching each other ?). Now, take into account that there is a theory that our gravity is leaking constantly. Where's it going? But more importantly, where's it coming from? Are there holes and fissures in our spacetime where things are coming and going? Could space itself be "leaking?" It's already stretching.

You are running into deep problems with this kind of propositions. A time at which time began can by definition not exist since when you referring to "begin" you already assume time to exist, so this means time can not be said to have begun at all.

 

[robheus]

But if there was somewhere from where existence was introduced, wasn't THAT somewhere, itself existence ?

right.

It's a meaningless thought to think that "existence" somehow "began".

Even though you can gramatically express such grandiloque internally contradicting statements, they have no semantical meaning.

 

[Noja888]

My Brother and I have a saying I think he said it first - not sure if we stole it from somewhere...

"Space is Time demonstrated - Time is Space demonstrated" - I would propose time as we observe it did not begin until space began. Both seem interconnected and I am guessing the true mechanism of space and time are on a higher tier level of existence. If you can travel light speed, time stops for you relative to everything else. Is that 'catching up with time' as space-time information 'moves' at the speed of light you are now moving at the same speed? Time will affect you less because you caught up to its motion. Its motion is not linear like the 3 spatial dimension motion we are familiar with but motion in the time direction. Loosely speaking here of course - I am not a PHD!

 

[Boy@n]

Very interesting posts. I'm missing two things though.

First, an answer to already made (and repeated) question, how can mass curve space-time if it's just mathematical geometry and not something physical?

Second, none mentioned background radiation - even if space has no physical property per-se it's still far from being absolutely empty, since there is background radiation in whole Universe plus quantum fluctuatins also present in all of space.


If you let me (a non-scientist) to do a bit of pondering and questioning...

Could it be that the more massive stellar objects the more intensite become quantum fluctuations around these objects, so that virtual particles popping in and out of existence somehow affect path of light waves by curving it which then makes it look as if space is curved but in truth it isn't?

Another thought, if a black hole curves space-time onto itself, might a 'huge' enough black hole 'suck' all of space, actually whole Universe, into itself - into ultimate singularity (following by another Big-Bang)?

What if beyond horizons of observable Universe there already are such critically super-massive black holes pulling 'our' Universe appart, thus making it appear as if it expands by itself? (Which would also dismiss the lacking mass/energy needed to explain accelerated expansion of Universe.)

I guess that via cosmological island theory one might visualize that there are many such 'special' black holes in every Universe, which affect one another by making some Universes expand and others collapse, and role if this being constantly changing.

 

[Dmitry67]

First, an answer to already made (and repeated) question, how can mass curve space-time if it's just mathematical geometry and not something physical?

There is no clear difference between 'mathematical' and 'physical' in fundamental physics.
There is even a claim ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_universe_hypothesis ) that in TOE there should be absolutely no difference.

Could it be that the more massive stellar objects the more intensite become quantum fluctuations around these objects, so that virtual particles popping in and out of existence somehow affect path of light waves by curving it which then makes it look as if space is curved but in truth it isn't?

No, light is slowed down (not curved) by virtual particles, but this effect is about 10^-33

Another thought, if a black hole curves space-time onto itself, might a 'huge' enough black hole 'suck' all of space, actually whole Universe, into itself - into ultimate singularity (following by another Big-Bang)?

No, radius of BH is proportional to its mass

What if beyond horizons of observable Universe there already are such critically super-massive black holes pulling 'our' Universe appart, thus making it appear as if it expands by itself? (Which would also dismiss the lacking mass/energy needed to explain accelerated expansion of Universe.)

It does not agree with the observational data

 

[Boy@n]

Thanks for your answers. Just one more quick question. If there are two "currents" (well, there are more, but let's say there are just two), in one where quantum activity is higher than in another, and if light travels in between these two currents, wouldn't on one side of light traveling path, with higher quantum activity, happen a "faster" effect of slowed light, than on the other side, so, make the light traveling path curve? (I am visualizing currents in water, where this would be the case, but probably not with light, just had to ask.)

 

[brainstorm]

Thanks for your answers. Just one more quick question. If there are two "currents" (well, there are more, but let's say there are just two), in one where quantum activity is higher than in another, and if light travels in between these two currents, wouldn't on one side of light traveling path, with higher quantum activity, happen a "faster" effect of slowed light, than on the other side, so, make the light traveling path curve? (I am visualizing currents in water, where this would be the case, but probably not with light, just had to ask.)

This is something I've been wondering about too, except I've been thinking about it in terms of wavelength/frequency. If two beams of different frequencies interact in a certain way, could a tension form between their tendency to travel forward in a straight line and another tendency to conform to the wavelength of the other beam it is in contact with? In other words, if a beam of yellow light runs parallel to one of red light, could the red light wavelength contract a bit when they come into contact and by doing so cause a contraction on one side of the beams so that they curve in the direction of the lower wavelength?

 

[Dmitry67]

Thanks for your answers. Just one more quick question. If there are two "currents" (well, there are more, but let's say there are just two), in one where quantum activity is higher than in another, and if light travels in between these two currents, wouldn't on one side of light traveling path, with higher quantum activity, happen a "faster" effect of slowed light, than on the other side, so, make the light traveling path curve? (I am visualizing currents in water, where this would be the case, but probably not with light, just had to ask.)

You should check this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scharnhorst_effect

The Scharnhorst effect is a hypothetical phenomenon in which light signals travel faster than c between two closely-spaced conducting plates than in a normal vacuum
The effect, however, is predicted to be minuscule. A photon traveling between two plates that are 1 micrometer apart would increase the photon's speed by only about one part in 10^-36. This change in light's speed is too small to be detected with current technology, which prevents the Scharnhorst effect from being tested at this time.