126 replies to this topic

[Pliny]

Fundemental Point Pliny is turning a blind eye to:



It happened, Pliny. It happened. Relative to the clock at rest the clock in motion had time pass slower. It is - absolutely - 59 nanoseconds younger. Yet you insist the younger clock must not be able to exist in the present when it obviously does.

The two-clock experiment shows that the twin-paradox is a real physical phenomena. hyuk-hyuk.

Here's the crux of the matter, explained simply - If you are using light to measure and you are traveling at the speed of light then it will appear nothing is moving and thus you could conclude nothing is aging, the clocks have perceptibly stopped, but that is a relative viewpoint. If you are still using light speed to measure time on Earth then the clock will be traveling around at light speed minus the speed and rotation of the Earth, the speed of the orbit around the sun, and the speed of the galaxy.


Mathematically, this all works out. In calculating the age of the traveling twin one must use a different speed than for the twin that remains on Earth, thus the relative time is different. The actual time is the same for both twins.

To get a correct view of time from all relative positions you would need to calucluate it from something entirely motionless. There is nothing in the universe that is entirely motionless.

Atomic clocks, like the ones used in the Earth orbit experiment, for all their accuracy as they speed up seem to be measuring the difference between the speed of atomic particles relative to the speed they are traveling. So in using that constant it appears that time slows down as they speed up. 59 nanoseconds sounds about right for the difference in speed between a motionless atomic clock, a speeding atomic clock and their relative speeds to atoms. the speed of Atoms being the constant used.

As I said it is all relative. Time is not a constant if you are measuring the motion of physical universe matter between physical universe matter - it then becomes a matter of relativity. It is closer to a constant the closer you get to measuring all things against one the thing that is motionless.

Edited by Pliny, 24 September 2011 - 11:43 AM.

[kimmy]

The question is rather does the past still exist and the future already exist? We know for sure that "now" exists.

And we know that when each clock arrives at "now", the one that has been accelerated has observed the passage of less time than the one that has stayed in place.

You seem to have a major conceptual problem with the idea that both clocks reach "now". You seem to be stuck on the idea that the clocks can't be observed simultaneously because one is 59 nanoseconds behind. That's not the case. Both clocks still get to the same point in time, but one of them has had more "ticks" along the way.


The clock experiment is hardly the only proof of time dilation anyway. (if I recall, the idea of putting a clock on an airplane was supposed to investigate the effect of *gravity* on time rather than velocity...)

There have been other proofs of this effect. One of them is that when particles with short lifespans are accelerated to high velocities, their lifespans (as observed by the physicists in the lab) become much longer. Particles that ordinarily decay in nanoseconds survive many times longer than they ought to, because time is passing at a different rate in their frame of reference than it is in the frame of reference of the physicists who are observing them.

So is it still in the past as well as now?

No more than any other object has a past, present, and future.

Actually Edgar Allen Poe theorized the space/time continuum before it was mathematically proven in a work called "Eureka".
Eureka

Interesting, but so?

Having a fundamental assumption wrong in any theory but assumed to be true will lead all astray until the fundamental assumption is corrected.

What's the fundamental assumption that's wrong?

It matters not how intelligent one is when his information is not correct. There are anomalies in Einstein's theory which indicates it is not entirely correct.
An entirely correct theory would leave no anomalies.

Newton's laws of motions aren't correct either. They break down when the objects involved are moving at high speeds. As it turns out, Newton's equations of motion are a special case of a more general set of equations, that only work properly if v/c is very small. Was Newton wrong? Of course not. He was correct, but his equations were not complete, they were only applicable to specific cases (cases which cover virtually every real-world situation, of course.)

Is Einstein wrong? There's too much empirical support for relativity for it to be flat out wrong. Is it complete? We don't know. Like Newton's laws, it might turn out to be just a piece of a much bigger puzzle.

I suppose since you are stupider than a physics scientist it relieves you of ever having to think about it.

On the contrary. I'm stupider than a physics scientist, so I have gone out and read about this stuff to find out how it works.

charter.rights said that? It is true by the way. God does exist and mental telepathy is real.

charter.rights was wrong in claiming that quantum mechanics proved the existence of either. As for asserting that both do exist, feel free to convince me. I've read lots of "proofs" of the existence of god, so I doubt you have anything new to offer on that front. I'm very interested to hear why you believe in mental telepathy, however.

Are you of the "I am an animal" school?

Yes.

-k

[Bonam]

Great to hear the voice of reason on these forums Kimmy. For being "stupider than a physics scientist" you have a great grasp of these concepts.

[Pliny]

Glad to see you continuing this and Bonam still hanging around in the background, for the purely entertainment value, of course.

And we know that when each clock arrives at "now", the one that has been accelerated has observed the passage of less time than the one that has stayed in place.

"Arrives" at now? They are only in now.

Mechanical clocks only measure mechanical relativity from a frequency standard. I guess what I said wasn't simple enough.

The usual clock is measuring the rotation of the earth and the relative position of the sun.

.

Moving a clock from Alberta to BC means the clock is in a different location relative to the sun. It doesn't mean if you are with it that you are now an hour older. Nor would you be a day younger if you traveled east to west until you met up with the sun again. You are measuring a mechanical relativity.
You have only changed your relative position to the sun. Mechanically the clock has timed what it always times.

An atomic clock is a clock that uses an electronic transition frequency in the microwave, optical, or ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum of atoms as a frequency standard for its timekeeping element.

So the question would be if an atomic clock itself were traveling at a different rate of speed relative to the frequency standard being used would their be a time difference to one that were traveling at a constant speed? I think the answer is yes. The variation would be dependent upon the difference in speed and it's duration. Why? Because the faster the clock goes the slower the electronic transition period appears to it.

You seem to have a major conceptual problem with the idea that both clocks reach "now". You seem to be stuck on the idea that the clocks can't be observed simultaneously because one is 59 nanoseconds behind. That's not the case. Both clocks still get to the same point in time, but one of them has had more "ticks" along the way.

yes. One had more ticks along the way because it measured more ticks. If the Earth started rotating faster and one clock was set to measure the standard rotation and the other the rotation of the earth the one measuring the rotation of the Earth would have more ticks. Now I am changing the standard by which they measure speed which is why they will read differently. When your standard is electronic transition frequency that will change in relation to the speed of the atoms that comprise the clock itself it will measure fewer ticks than the "stationary" atomic clock.

I will tell you what I have a major conceptual problem with. The claim that something "reaches" now. Matter and energy is always in now at some location. There is no space, matter or energy outside of now.

Time, described as a dimension, is erroneous. There can be the apparency of a dimension of time by the definition of "dimension" if one views it in vast spatial dimensions because one is looking at something that is now but originated millions of years ago. Trying to perceive all things in space at once would give one the idea of a time dimension, for instance, we are looking at stars as they existed not as they are, so we can plot a time dimension because the light that originated at a specific location a million years ago still exists at a different location light years away. But in actuality, each point in space only represents "now" and the laws of physics for this universe predict the next now.

The clock experiment is hardly the only proof of time dilation anyway. (if I recall, the idea of putting a clock on an airplane was supposed to investigate the effect of *gravity* on time rather than velocity...)

Yes, I am sure there are proofs of all sorts.

Gravity? Another erroneous assumption - apparently the only thing that travels faster than the speed of light. It's associated with mass. The larger and more dense the mass the greater the gravity - or so it goes.

Why do I say it travels faster than the speed of light? Well, if the sun were to disappear all the planets of the solar system would spin off into chaos at the same time. Light would not have reached Pluto by that time. So all would appear normal until the light passed by but of course they would have started spinning off long before that.

There have been other proofs of this effect. One of them is that when particles with short lifespans are accelerated to high velocities, their lifespans (as observed by the physicists in the lab) become much longer. Particles that ordinarily decay in nanoseconds survive many times longer than they ought to, because time is passing at a different rate in their frame of reference than it is in the frame of reference of the physicists who are observing them.

Measured by the finest atomic clocks, no doubt. So a particle speeds up. If the Earth suddenly sped up our clocks measuring it would be behind time. If we calibrated it to the new speed then it would read the same "ticks". If a particle sped up and is being measured by other particles the particles measuring it would be behind time and appear to record a longer duration because they are measuring changes in their relation to the speed of the particle.

No more than any other object has a past, present, and future.

Which tells me nothing.

Interesting, but so?

It tells me that reason can be used to understand the universe. We need correct definitions of what we are observing. The wind is not a spirit brushing your face and tussling your hair, for instance. Now all that Poe said is that space and duration exist simultaneously. Of course, the error is we assume that matter is in a continuum of past, present and future just moving along through space. So physics has wandered off into quantum mechanics and string theory, hobbs-bosun and odds bodkins. Which is fine but one should once in awhile review fundamental conclusions taken as truth.

What's the fundamental assumption that's wrong?

That matter exists in space and time, where space is the thing that matter exists in, and matter is what exists in space, and time is a continuum of space and matter.

I think the most important one that needs improvement is space but time is the weirdest one and that is probably because of a lack of a good definition of space.

Newton's laws of motions aren't correct either. They break down when the objects involved are moving at high speeds. As it turns out, Newton's equations of motion are a special case of a more general set of equations, that only work properly if v/c is very small. Was Newton wrong? Of course not. He was correct, but his equations were not complete, they were only applicable to specific cases (cases which cover virtually every real-world situation, of course.)

That is right. We only have two theories, Newton's theory of Gravity and Einstein's theory of relativity. It is interesting that Newton's theories are still used in calculating space travel - it, as you say, covers every real-world situation.

Is Einstein wrong? There's too much empirical support for relativity for it to be flat out wrong. Is it complete? We don't know. Like Newton's laws, it might turn out to be just a piece of a much bigger puzzle.

Of course, Einstein isn't wrong. His theory explains much but still leaves us with certain unexplained anomalies so it isn't entirely right, and we are off to explain them - into quantum mechanics and other vectors.

Mark McCutcheon's theory of expansion is interesting. I've read it and at the time physicists outright rejected it. I haven't read if they are giving it any serious consideration or have totally debunked it.

On the contrary. I'm stupider than a physics scientist, so I have gone out and read about this stuff to find out how it works.

Well, stupid is another one of those relative things. Didn't you find that physicists were puzzled by the physical universe and had contrived all manner of mathematical formula to predict how it is constructed and what we should find from our current theories?

charter.rights was wrong in claiming that quantum mechanics proved the existence of either.

he might have been wrong in making that claim but I am surprised he even said that.

As for asserting that both do exist, feel free to convince me. I've read lots of "proofs" of the existence of god, so I doubt you have anything new to offer on that front.
I'm very interested to hear why you believe in mental telepathy, however.

Once again good definitions are important. You have obviously rejected other people's definitions and concepts. Unfortunately, for proof, it requires, a better definition than an animal. No such animal exists. So you would have to change your definition of life as "animated matter" to "that which animates matter". You may be able to make some progress from there. Ultimately, that which animates matter has been left undefined, to my knowledge so far.

As for mental telepathy, it is heavily frowned upon. We would not be able to tell each other lies if that were possible. It must be considered impossible if we are to remain "animals" (one of the lies we like to tell each other).

All thoughts you have are of course your own from your understanding of the concept and definition of an animal which you have read somewhere from some brilliant animal with more synapses and neurons than you have. I doubt you would come to that conclusion left to your own devices but the "brilliant" animal has more degrees than you do and thus more resources to try and figure these things out for you, which you can then read and learn all about.

Nevertheless, once in a while, if we are really good friends with someone, we really like them, and they like us, we have moments of mindsync. The brilliant animal explains these things for you as well. Since they happen so infrequently and there is no apparent volition on the part of individuals (animals)no possibility of considering one animal has read another animal's mind should be considered. It is mere coincidence. How could we remain animals and play animal otherwise unless we accept certain lies as truth? And what of our crimes??? I'm certain you don't want all the gory details of other people's lives, nor they of yours.

The good thing about being a Christian is that there can always be another lie. Once you have convinced yourself that you are an animal and that's the end you cannot change your mind because there is nothing to change your mind for you - there is nothing.

Yes.

-k

That's too bad. Admittedly, it is a convincing lie when all the former lies have been exposed as such. It's a dead end though since it ends all lies.

Hope that helps.

Edited by Pliny, 30 September 2011 - 10:29 AM.

[kimmy]

"Arrives" at now? They are only in now.

Both clocks exist simultaneously when they are synchronized before the experiment. Both clocks exist simultaneously when they are compared after the experiment.

And we find that one clock has seen the passage of more time than the other.

I'm not sure if you're trying to avoid that fact, or just too dense to grasp it.

Mechanical clocks only measure mechanical relativity from a frequency standard. I guess what I said wasn't simple enough.

The usual clock is measuring the rotation of the earth and the relative position of the sun.

A usual clock does not measure the rotation of the earth and the relative position of the sun, unless your idea of a usual clock is a sun dial.

A usual clock is a mechanical or electronic process that occurs at a predictable rate. Whether it be the motion of a pendulum, the charging of a capacitor, or the vibration of a crystal, we measure time by observing a physical process that has a regular duration.

Moving a clock from Alberta to BC means the clock is in a different location relative to the sun. It doesn't mean if you are with it that you are now an hour older. Nor would you be a day younger if you traveled east to west until you met up with the sun again. You are measuring a mechanical relativity.
You have only changed your relative position to the sun. Mechanically the clock has timed what it always times.

We're not talking about time zones here. Duh.

Synchronize the two clocks in Alberta. Move one to BC. Check them again. They're still synchronized. Why? Because the one clock's trip to BC was so slow relative to the speed of light that the v/c terms in the time dilation equations become so close to zero as to make time dilation unmeasurable for such a short trip.

An atomic clock is a clock that uses an electronic transition frequency in the microwave, optical, or ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum of atoms as a frequency standard for its timekeeping element.

So the question would be if an atomic clock itself were traveling at a different rate of speed relative to the frequency standard being used would their be a time difference to one that were traveling at a constant speed? I think the answer is yes. The variation would be dependent upon the difference in speed and it's duration. Why? Because the faster the clock goes the slower the electronic transition period appears to it.

Yes, there's a time difference. Yes, the difference would be dependent on the difference in speed. No, you're not going to be able to dismiss this as a quirk of how atomic clocks work.

yes. One had more ticks along the way because it measured more ticks. If the Earth started rotating faster and one clock was set to measure the standard rotation and the other the rotation of the earth the one measuring the rotation of the Earth would have more ticks. Now I am changing the standard by which they measure speed which is why they will read differently.

You are arguing that ... duuuurrr maybe the physicists don't understand how clocks work. In an experiment that's been thoroughly scrutinized by the entire physics community and repeated several times since.

You can read about the famous atomic clock airplane experiment here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafele%E2%80%93Keating_experiment

It is worth pointing out that they accounted for the rotation of the earth. They sent one plane east and one plane west. Due to the rotation of the earth, the clock on the eastbound plane is moving faster than the clock on the ground, and the clock on the westbound plane is moving slower than the clock on the ground. This allowed them to calculate the dilation due to both velocity and gravity, and found that (surprise!) time dilation due to velocity is what they predicted and the time dilation due to gravity is also what they predicted. Win for relativity, epic fail for flat-earthers.

Another thing to point out is that the experiment has been repeated and verified with higher precision since the original.

Time, described as a dimension, is erroneous. There can be the apparency of a dimension of time by the definition of "dimension" if one views it in vast spatial dimensions because one is looking at something that is now but originated millions of years ago. Trying to perceive all things in space at once would give one the idea of a time dimension, for instance, we are looking at stars as they existed not as they are, so we can plot a time dimension because the light that originated at a specific location a million years ago still exists at a different location light years away. But in actuality, each point in space only represents "now" and the laws of physics for this universe predict the next now.

Time as a "dimension" is a kind of philosophical idea that's not important to the issue under discussion.

What's important is this: the idea that there's a single absolute time reference that is equally valid from every frame of reference has been proven false. It's a conclusion you can't avoid once you accept the fact that the speed of light is the same from whatever frame of reference you observe it from.

Yes, I am sure there are proofs of all sorts.

...but you think the scientists doing the experiments must be doing it wrong, because the results disagree with your assumptions, right? Kind of like how the church knew better than Galileo?

Gravity? Another erroneous assumption - apparently the only thing that travels faster than the speed of light. It's associated with mass. The larger and more dense the mass the greater the gravity - or so it goes.

Why do I say it travels faster than the speed of light? Well, if the sun were to disappear all the planets of the solar system would spin off into chaos at the same time. Light would not have reached Pluto by that time. So all would appear normal until the light passed by but of course they would have started spinning off long before that.

General Relativity addresses the "speed of gravity problem". The proposition that gravity isn't a projected force at all but rather a curvature of space caused by mass is a premise that even people who don't know anything about modern physics are aware of, so I'm sure you've probably heard of it.

The curvature of space has been observed by the effects of stars on passing light, and observational evidence supports General Relativity very strongly.

I don't know what would happen if the mass of the sun were to instantaneously vanish, and neither do you, and it's an event that in itself would defy the laws of physics so I doubt there would be a way to discuss it intelligently anyway.

I can't discuss General Relativity because I simply don't know much about it. Neither do you. I'd think that Toadbrother, and maybe Bonam, have actually studied General Relativity, but I doubt anybody else here has read more than the odd article about it.

Measured by the finest atomic clocks, no doubt. So a particle speeds up. If the Earth suddenly sped up our clocks measuring it would be behind time. If we calibrated it to the new speed then it would read the same "ticks". If a particle sped up and is being measured by other particles the particles measuring it would be behind time and appear to record a longer duration because they are measuring changes in their relation to the speed of the particle.

Inane, and irrelevant. The longer lifespans of rapidly moving particles aren't measured by little clocks strapped to them, or a clock on the wall, they're measured by how far they travel in a particle accelerator.

Which tells me nothing.

It tells me that reason can be used to understand the universe. We need correct definitions of what we are observing. The wind is not a spirit brushing your face and tussling your hair, for instance. Now all that Poe said is that space and duration exist simultaneously. Of course, the error is we assume that matter is in a continuum of past, present and future just moving along through space. So physics has wandered off into quantum mechanics and string theory, hobbs-bosun and odds bodkins. Which is fine but one should once in awhile review fundamental conclusions taken as truth.

That matter exists in space and time, where space is the thing that matter exists in, and matter is what exists in space, and time is a continuum of space and matter.

I think the most important one that needs improvement is space but time is the weirdest one and that is probably because of a lack of a good definition of space.

That is right. We only have two theories, Newton's theory of Gravity and Einstein's theory of relativity. It is interesting that Newton's theories are still used in calculating space travel - it, as you say, covers every real-world situation.

Newton's laws work fine for NASA because planets and objects in our solar system and anything that we put into space has a velocity relative to earth that is very slow compared to the speed of light.

I said that Newton's laws cover *virtually* every real-world situation. They work fine for cars and baseballs and even rocket ships, but they don't cover things that astronomers are observing, and they don't cover things that physicists can make happen when they fire up their cyclotrons.

Mark McCutcheon's theory of expansion is interesting. I've read it and at the time physicists outright rejected it. I haven't read if they are giving it any serious consideration or have totally debunked it.

A lot of alternate theories to modern physics have been presented over the years and simply been found lacking.

Well, stupid is another one of those relative things. Didn't you find that physicists were puzzled by the physical universe and had contrived all manner of mathematical formula to predict how it is constructed and what we should find from our current theories?

And all these predictions can be tested. And if they're wrong, we figure out why. Some of the biggest scientific advances in history have resulted from experiments that produced results that were different from what were expected. (was the Michelson-Morley experiment a failure?)

Stupid doesn't mean wrong. Stupid is a function of how you react to being wrong.

Once again good definitions are important. You have obviously rejected other people's definitions and concepts. Unfortunately, for proof, it requires, a better definition than an animal. No such animal exists. So you would have to change your definition of life as "animated matter" to "that which animates matter". You may be able to make some progress from there. Ultimately, that which animates matter has been left undefined, to my knowledge so far.

I have no idea what you're trying to say.

As for mental telepathy, it is heavily frowned upon. We would not be able to tell each other lies if that were possible. It must be considered impossible if we are to remain "animals" (one of the lies we like to tell each other).

All thoughts you have are of course your own from your understanding of the concept and definition of an animal which you have read somewhere from some brilliant animal with more synapses and neurons than you have. I doubt you would come to that conclusion left to your own devices but the "brilliant" animal has more degrees than you do and thus more resources to try and figure these things out for you, which you can then read and learn all about.

We're animals is a much more sensible conclusion than thinking we're somehow magically different from animals. I don't need some animal with a PhD to tell me that. You've decided otherwise because some other long-dead animal wrote some nonsensical book telling you so.

Nevertheless, once in a while, if we are really good friends with someone, we really like them, and they like us, we have moments of mindsync. The brilliant animal explains these things for you as well. Since they happen so infrequently and there is no apparent volition on the part of individuals (animals)no possibility of considering one animal has read another animal's mind should be considered. It is mere coincidence. How could we remain animals and play animal otherwise unless we accept certain lies as truth? And what of our crimes??? I'm certain you don't want all the gory details of other people's lives, nor they of yours.

So, to summarize... "nobody has ever managed to demonstrate mental telepathy, but I'm sure it's real!"

I'm not going to say mental telepathy is impossible. What I am going to say is that if somebody can demonstrate that it actually exists, we'll be able to find an explanation of how it happens. If that involves some completely new field of science that doesn't even exist right now, so be it.

The good thing about being a Christian is that there can always be another lie.

Not sure if that was intentional or not, but that was laugh-out-loud funny. Yes, always plenty more lies coming for Christians.

Once you have convinced yourself that you are an animal and that's the end you cannot change your mind because there is nothing to change your mind for you - there is nothing.

Not sure what you're trying to say. I need Jesus to tell me I'm not an animal, but since I don't believe in Jesus nothing can convince me otherwise?

That's too bad. Admittedly, it is a convincing lie when all the former lies have been exposed as such. It's a dead end though since it ends all lies.

Hope that helps.

I think your magic book is one of the primary sources of widely-believed lies that have been exposed over the years.


-k

[Bonam]

General Relativity addresses the "speed of gravity problem". The proposition that gravity isn't a projected force at all but rather a curvature of space caused by mass is a premise that even people who don't know anything about modern physics are aware of, so I'm sure you've probably heard of it.

The curvature of space has been observed by the effects of stars on passing light, and observational evidence supports General Relativity very strongly.

I don't know what would happen if the mass of the sun were to instantaneously vanish, and neither do you, and it's an event that in itself would defy the laws of physics so I doubt there would be a way to discuss it intelligently anyway.

I can't discuss General Relativity because I simply don't know much about it. Neither do you. I'd think that Toadbrother, and maybe Bonam, have actually studied General Relativity, but I doubt anybody else here has read more than the odd article about it.

This is an interesting question. Fortunately, the answer is actually quite well known. Perturbations to the arrangement of masses in a given region of spacetime result in gravitational waves that travel at the speed of light. If you think of the standard analogy of spacetime as a sheet of canvas deformed at locations where there is a concentration of mass, then that perfectly explains what will happen when that mass is suddenly removed. The canvas will elastically destretch and send out a ripple pattern of waves outward.

Planets orbiting the Sun will only notice the change in mass after the gravitational information has propagated the necessary distance. That is, once the ripple in spacetime has reached the location of the planet.

So if the Sun disappeared, the Earth would continue in its circular path until the same moment where the Sun visually disappeared from the Earth. The light that originated at the Sun and hit the Earth at that time would be 8.5 minutes old, just like the front of the gravitational wave.

Remember that in relativistic terms, the disappearance of the Sun in its own reference frame, and the time that the Earth sees that the Sun is gone (through light) and feels that it's gone (no more gravitational force from the Sun) are simultaneous events.

One of the most fundamental results of relativity is that you cannot communicate information faster than light. You can't do this using electromagnetic waves (light), and neither can you do this with gravitational waves (the appearance/disappearance, or, more realistically, the relative motion of masses).

I asked my dad this question and got this answer when I was 13 or 14 I think He has a PhD in theoretical physics focused on black holes and general relativity. This description also exists in popular physics books.

Edited by Bonam, 01 October 2011 - 02:12 PM.

[Pliny]

One of the most fundamental results of relativity is that you cannot communicate information faster than light. You can't do this using electromagnetic waves (light), and neither can you do this with gravitational waves (the appearance/disappearance, or, more realistically, the relative motion of masses).

I just wanted to address this point right now and will get back to kimmy and the remainder of your post later.
Entanglement

The research team says their finding disproves the more comprehensible hypothesis–that the particles were sending signals at faster-than-light speed–and instead supports the stranger theory of instant communication. Dr Terence Rudolph of Imperial College, London, remarks that “any theory that tries to explain quantum entanglement… will need to be very spooky – spookier, perhaps, than quantum mechanics itself” [Telegraph].

[Pliny]

Both clocks exist simultaneously when they are synchronized before the experiment. Both clocks exist simultaneously when they are compared after the experiment.

And we find that one clock has seen the passage of more time than the other.

I'm not sure if you're trying to avoid that fact, or just too dense to grasp it.

On this issue, all I am saying is that, the measurements are made by physical universe means and are thus subject to relative physical universe factors, some of which are theoretical which leaves a window of error.

An exaggerated simple example to illustrate the inadequacy would be McCutcheon's theory of expansion, which explains gravity by expansion - the earth is expanding at a rate of 9 meters per second per second. All other things and the whole universe is expanding at a relative rate so the expansion is undetectable. You can't use a ruler to measure the expansion because it is expanding at the same relative rate as all other things. You could not take a physical universe object and and make the claim the universe is not expanding because you measured it with your ruler.

Basically, the theory of general relativity is not the final word on the makeup of the physical universe just as Newton's theory of gravity was not the final word.

It is best to keep in mind the idea is a theory and we can use it as such but it shouldn't close our minds to other possible theories. The public will accept scientific discovery more easily than the scientific community will and some, I would call them zealots, will promote a scientific theory as the final word on a subject.

Actually, I am a bit disappointed in the science communities willingness to be sullied by political purpose.

You can read about the famous atomic clock airplane experiment here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafele%E2%80%93Keating_experiment

It is worth pointing out that they accounted for the rotation of the earth. They sent one plane east and one plane west. Due to the rotation of the earth, the clock on the eastbound plane is moving faster than the clock on the ground, and the clock on the westbound plane is moving slower than the clock on the ground. This allowed them to calculate the dilation due to both velocity and gravity, and found that (surprise!) time dilation due to velocity is what they predicted and the time dilation due to gravity is also what they predicted. Win for relativity, epic fail for flat-earthers.

Another thing to point out is that the experiment has been repeated and verified with higher precision since the original.

I would only point out that you are using speed relative to atomic speed. If you have a plane traveling west it is traveling at a different speed (faster) in atomic relation to a clock stationary on the Earth's movement in the galaxy and the galaxy's movement. Perhaps, 59 nanoseconds difference. The atomic clock going eastward in relation to the speed of the earth is going slower in the general direction of the Earth. So there is an increase (westward) in the speed of the atoms and a decrease (eastward) in relation to the speed of the Earth.

Do we know that the speed of our atomic particles are a constant? Is this a case of using a ruler to measure the expansion of the universe and claiming it isn't expanding?

Time as a "dimension" is a kind of philosophical idea that's not important to the issue under discussion.

As it relates to the explanation of the physical universe it is important to the issue under discussion. Time as a dimension is a part of the current scientific description and not "a kind of philosophical idea".

What's important is this: the idea that there's a single absolute time reference that is equally valid from every frame of reference has been proven false. It's a conclusion you can't avoid once you accept the fact that the speed of light is the same from whatever frame of reference you observe it from.

I believe that that spooky "entanglement" experiment changes that conclusion.

...but you think the scientists doing the experiments must be doing it wrong, because the results disagree with your assumptions, right? Kind of like how the church knew better than Galileo?

If, I represent the view of the forward looking Galileo and you represent the view of the church, then yes.

It is not me who is accepting the general theory of relativity as the final word on the subject of physics, nor am I saying it be ignored. It was the scientific consensus of the time that rejected Galileo. Unless, you admit to it being overwhelmingly politically influenced, and science toadied up to the powers that were. I hope that era is gone but my fears are it isn't.

General Relativity addresses the "speed of gravity problem". The proposition that gravity isn't a projected force at all but rather a curvature of space caused by mass is a premise that even people who don't know anything about modern physics are aware of, so I'm sure you've probably heard of it.

Perhaps this is why we use Newtonian physics to calculate our space travel. It's too difficult to calculate in the curvature of space - isn't that just another philosophical idea?

The curvature of space has been observed by the effects of stars on passing light, and observational evidence supports General Relativity very strongly.

many things support general relativity very strongly or else it wouldn't be a theory used for further discovery and explanation. Like Newton's theory It isn't wrong - it is just not the final word as it leaves certain anomalies unexplained.

I don't know what would happen if the mass of the sun were to instantaneously vanish, and neither do you, and it's an event that in itself would defy the laws of physics so I doubt there would be a way to discuss it intelligently anyway.

We could postulate it and from what we know and could scientifically predict the outcome.

I can't discuss General Relativity because I simply don't know much about it. Neither do you. I'd think that Toadbrother, and maybe Bonam, have actually studied General Relativity, but I doubt anybody else here has read more than the odd article about it.

While there are scientists here on this forum, like Bonam, that are far more qualified than myself that does not eliminate the puzzlement that exists in the field. I am of the opinion that their puzzlement will only discover further puzzlements until they review past fundamentals that are theoretical but accepted as fact.

Inane, and irrelevant. The longer lifespans of rapidly moving particles aren't measured by little clocks strapped to them, or a clock on the wall, they're measured by how far they travel in a particle accelerator.

The conclusion made is that the lifespan of a "particle" is related to speed. It was traveling faster and covered a greater distance so its lifespan was greater? There is something missing in that statement.

Newton's laws work fine for NASA because planets and objects in our solar system and anything that we put into space has a velocity relative to earth that is very slow compared to the speed of light.

I said that Newton's laws cover *virtually* every real-world situation. They work fine for cars and baseballs and even rocket ships, but they don't cover things that astronomers are observing, and they don't cover things that physicists can make happen when they fire up their cyclotrons.

Oh - it does. It predicts the presence of objects in space quite well and astronomers use it to focus on where Newtonian physics predicts things should be.

A lot of alternate theories to modern physics have been presented over the years and simply been found lacking.

Nice. Great positioning.

We're animals is a much more sensible conclusion than thinking we're somehow magically different from animals. I don't need some animal with a PhD to tell me that. You've decided otherwise because some other long-dead animal wrote some nonsensical book telling you so.

Actually, I have made some of my own conclusions based upon experience and not education.

your world is based entirely upon education. Since experience is unexplainable.

Seriously, it is only my decision and your decision that make the worlds we live in and how we view things.

You have to be able to assume the view of being an animal in order to see it that way. And that is your preference. It does make for a very stable world but making the conclusion you are an animal closes off ability to view things outside the parameters of your concept of an animal because it assumes there is nothing to view. And if you look past the conclusion toward some evolutionary concept of man there is nothing there. It is an endgame. Man is an animal is a finality. There is nowhere to go from there. That's fine if you want to accept that but you close off the ability to experience anything and leave yourself open to having to be told everything. In other words, things you can't explain to yourself don't happen to you. You cannot perceive them. It's a self-prophesying conclusion as are all others.
The Christian explains things from his point of view - God did this or God did that, it's a wonderful abrogation of responsibility and an explanation of the unexplainable, at least he still has the option to refute his conclusion and can choose to be an animal. But one can't go back from the point where he concludes he is an animal. So there is no hope for you basically. You must continue being an animal and when an animal dies that's it. It turns to dust. You might take a peek to prove to yourself you are dead but that's about it.

Science has explained a lot of our mysteries about the universe that were previously attributed to the doings of God, when it rained after a long drought, when the crops failed, when the crops were bountiful, when we fell upon good fortune, when we fell upon bad fortune, why men are evil, why men are good, and therefore it has replaced religion as an explanation of the universe. It is true that a religion will teach us nothing new about the universe since it has answered all the mysteries to the satisfaction of the Pope. Science offers us the promise of explaining it all for us just as religion did. It allows us to ignore our experience and supplant it with scientific discovery. An experience they don't cover must not have been experienced or is something else.

So, to summarize... "nobody has ever managed to demonstrate mental telepathy, but I'm sure it's real!"

There are quite a few things to overcome before mental telepathy can be demonstrated. Not the least of which, is that man is an animal.

I'm not going to say mental telepathy is impossible. What I am going to say is that if somebody can demonstrate that it actually exists, we'll be able to find an explanation of how it happens. If that involves some completely new field of science that doesn't even exist right now, so be it.

How can animals project a thought?

Not sure if that was intentional or not, but that was laugh-out-loud funny. Yes, always plenty more lies coming for Christians.

It is quite hilarious. We are only serious about our own lies.

Not sure what you're trying to say. I need Jesus to tell me I'm not an animal, but since I don't believe in Jesus nothing can convince me otherwise?

Well, it's a progression. You don't generally work backwards. You have already rejected one lie and decided on the one you like. It explains most things for you and everything else is irrelevant anyway. Of what use is mental telepathy - crooks would just find a different way to hide their lies and dirty deeds.

I think your magic book is one of the primary sources of widely-believed lies that have been exposed over the years.

-k

Nyuk Nyuk. We just need lies that promote more fun than we are having and I am basically really down on fun killers that promote destructive lies. The Pope is happy with his, you are happy with yours what could be more fun. The truth obviously sucks - whether you or the Pope is right.

Have a glorious day.

[Bonam]

On this issue, all I am saying is that, the measurements are made by physical universe means and are thus subject to relative physical universe factors, some of which are theoretical which leaves a window of error.

An exaggerated simple example to illustrate the inadequacy would be McCutcheon's theory of expansion, which explains gravity by expansion - the earth is expanding at a rate of 9 meters per second per second. All other things and the whole universe is expanding at a relative rate so the expansion is undetectable. You can't use a ruler to measure the expansion because it is expanding at the same relative rate as all other things. You could not take a physical universe object and and make the claim the universe is not expanding because you measured it with your ruler.

Er, that theory of gravity doesn't hold water if you think about it for more than a second. If gravity is caused by expansion of objects, what it is that's causing the planets to revolve around the Sun? They aren't touching its surface and being pushed out by it.

Perhaps this is why we use Newtonian physics to calculate our space travel. It's too difficult to calculate in the curvature of space - isn't that just another philosophical idea?

No. Relativistic phenomena are routinely taken into account when designing interplanetary spacecraft, their maneuvers and navigation, and their communication systems. I've done some of these calculations myself for the analysis of a mission to Jupiter, and the relativistic correction makes enough difference that if you didn't include it, that particular mission scenario would end in complete disaster.

The conclusion made is that the lifespan of a "particle" is related to speed. It was traveling faster and covered a greater distance so its lifespan was greater? There is something missing in that statement.

Look it's a very simple reality. Let's say a particle lives for 1 second. If it is going 1 m/second, then it will travel 1 meter before it dies. Now suppose it is going 299,999 km/second. You'd expect it to go 299,999 km, right? Well, that's not what the experiments show. They clearly show it going much farther than that in one second, many times farther. In fact, in that particular example, the particle would have been observed to travel 4.1 million km, 13.76 times farther than you would have expected. Furthermore, you would have measured it arriving at its destination 13.76 seconds after leaving its source.

How can it do that? It can't (and doesn't) go any faster than light. And it can't live more than one second. What happens? The passage of time in its reference frame is slower than the passage of time in the reference frame of a stationary observer. This is one of the first and most fundamental results of special relativity, and has been experimentally confirmed ad nauseam.

There are quite a few things to overcome before mental telepathy can be demonstrated. Not the least of which, is that man is an animal.

How can animals project a thought?

Umm, the technology to implement a basic level of "mental telepathy" is already there. We have devices that can read your brain waves. These have been used in everything from advanced prosthetics to commercially sold controllers for computer games. It would not be difficult to take one of these devices, connect it to a wireless transmitter and receiver, and have it communicate with another device which is measuring someone else's brain waves.

Direct neural feedback from a computer interface has also been demonstrated in various experiments, for example where brains of lobsters were interfaced with artificial neural networks that then "thought" as part of the lobster's brains, among a wide variety of other experiments. Sending signals into the brain non-intrusively is also being worked on.

I predict with a high level of confidence that devices for silent mental communication between two individuals, that is, "mental telepathy", will be commercially available within the next two decades, and possibly within the present decade.

If and when we discover or implement mental telepathy, it will not be at all scientifically mysterious. The underlying mechanisms will be well understood.

Edited by Bonam, 06 October 2011 - 11:18 PM.

[Pliny]

Er, that theory of gravity doesn't hold water if you think about it for more than a second. If gravity is caused by expansion of objects, what it is that's causing the planets to revolve around the Sun? They aren't touching its surface and being pushed out by it.

Well, you have to think about it more than a few seconds, I guess. you can draw a planet on the centre of a piece of paper and have it expanding at an exponential rate representing 9m/sec/sec and have an object, say the moon, moving away in a straight line keeping the same distance and you will see that from the perspective of the planet it would appear to be orbiting it. If the moon were not traveling at a greater speed than the expansion rate then it would appear to "fall" into the Earth in the same parabolic vector as any object does.

You can't use the old theory that the Earth is revolving around the Sun to explain expansion theory. You have to look at what would happen using strictly expansion theory and not mix up Newtonian theory or General relativity theory as you have done.

No. Relativistic phenomena are routinely taken into account when designing interplanetary spacecraft, their maneuvers and navigation, and their communication systems. I've done some of these calculations myself for the analysis of a mission to Jupiter, and the relativistic correction makes enough difference that if you didn't include it, that particular mission scenario would end in complete disaster.

It was kimmy that said that time as a "dimension" was a philosophical idea. You're saying it actually is a kind of dimension tied in with the fabric in space which can be affected by gravity.

Look it's a very simple reality. Let's say a particle lives for 1 second. If it is going 1 m/second, then it will travel 1 meter before it dies. Now suppose it is going 299,999 km/second. You'd expect it to go 299,999 km, right? Well, that's not what the experiments show. They clearly show it going much farther than that in one second, many times farther. In fact, in that particular example, the particle would have been observed to travel 4.1 million km, 13.76 times farther than you would have expected. Furthermore, you would have measured it arriving at its destination 13.76 seconds after leaving its source.

I understand that. I am saying there may be at atomic levels something wrong with the increments on the ruler. The universe, that is "space", is after all expanding, even if you disagree that matter is expanding there is general agreement that the universe is expanding. You should be able to tell me what calculation of the universe expansion was for that measurement and that it was subtracted from the distance it travelled. At the speeds being measured it would not be an insignificant amount I don't think.

How can it do that? It can't (and doesn't) go any faster than light. And it can't live more than one second. What happens? The passage of time in its reference frame is slower than the passage of time in the reference frame of a stationary observer. This is one of the first and most fundamental results of special relativity, and has been experimentally confirmed ad nauseam.

The passage of time in the particles reference is still one second and appears to be 13.76 seconds to the stationary frame of reference. Answer to problem: Time dilates at high speeds. I got it. This is explained by special relativity.

Common sense tells me that time is not something that dilates. I would say there is a problem with the theory. And as for the measurement I would say that the distance, space, is expanding at a rate less than the speed of the neutrino, the neutrino has surpassed that rate of expansion, thus the distance measured is longer.

Does the following have legs? And what of the phenomenon of "entanglement", of which you choose to not make comment?

Neutrinos faster than light??

Umm, the technology to implement a basic level of "mental telepathy" is already there. We have devices that can read your brain waves. These have been used in everything from advanced prosthetics to commercially sold controllers for computer games. It would not be difficult to take one of these devices, connect it to a wireless transmitter and receiver, and have it communicate with another device which is measuring someone else's brain waves.

Direct neural feedback from a computer interface has also been demonstrated in various experiments, for example where brains of lobsters were interfaced with artificial neural networks that then "thought" as part of the lobster's brains, among a wide variety of other experiments. Sending signals into the brain non-intrusively is also being worked on.

I predict with a high level of confidence that devices for silent mental communication between two individuals, that is, "mental telepathy", will be commercially available within the next two decades, and possibly within the present decade.

If and when we discover or implement mental telepathy, it will not be at all scientifically mysterious. The underlying mechanisms will be well understood.

Well, no one will submit to electro/mechanical means to mental telepathy. We have all sinned, I'm afraid and will avoid it. It may help us to better control our thoughts and maybe not have any wrong thoughts - although a cannibal would have a different set of values and not hide some of his thoughts that you might think were wrong.

I have run out of time. Gotta go! Have a glorious day!

[GostHacked]

Is there some absurdity in the fact that all matter and space and energy are only now?

My body is in a particular location now and was approximately in the same location a second ago. Some portions of it haven't moved. All of me is now and none of me is in the past. Everything that was in the past is now in now. How could they be in a different time? Only what is occurring now is all that is occurring with me. The past is gone and the future is yet to be created.

You are in the same spot relative to the earth, if you have not moved. However, since the earth is orbiting around the sun, you have moved relative to the sun in that one second. Then there is the whole solar system orbiting the center of our galaxy, and our solar system has moved relative to the galactic core. And then our whole galaxy is moving relative to other galaxies. So from one second to the next, you have never been in the same location.

[kimmy]

As Bonam already addressed much of this, I will skip a lot of it.

Common sense tells me that time is not something that dilates. I would say there is a problem with the theory. And as for the measurement I would say that the distance, space, is expanding at a rate less than the speed of the neutrino, the neutrino has surpassed that rate of expansion, thus the distance measured is longer.

Ultimately, your only argument against time dilation is that it contradicts what your "common sense" tells you, and your response to all these experiments that prove it happens is ... "well, there must be something wrong with the experiments!"

Has it ever occurred to you that your "common sense" doesn't really have any bearing on how things operate when they're traveling at near the speed of light?

Have you ever actually sat down with a textbook and a pencil and paper and tried to walk through the thought experiment that illustrates why events that appear simultaneous in one frame of reference don't happen simultaneously when viewed from a different frame of reference? Have you made any real attempt to understand any of this, or do you just sit there and say "that can't be true because it disagrees with my common sense" and flail around for some way of dismissing it to spare yourself the mental discomfort of dealing with a universe that contains things that are bigger and broader than you experience when you're driving your car to work?

Neutrinos faster than light??

Don't look now, but...
Dutch researchers solve the "speedy neutrino problem".

And you're going to love the explanation:

The CERN scientists used GPS satellites to synchronize the time at the sending station and receiving station. But since the satellites are moving 9000 miles per hour relative to the earth, the time sync signal at the receiving station came from a frame of reference where time is moving more slowly than in the scientists frame of reference.

Due to time dilation in the satellite frame of reference, the GPS told the scientists at the receiving station that the trip took less time than it actually had.

(common-sense analogy: my Malibu can do a 12-second quarter-mile... if you time it on a stop-watch that's running slow.)

I believe that that spooky "entanglement" experiment changes that conclusion.

Nope. It might not be explainable under current theories, but it does nothing to help your arguments against time dilation.

If, I represent the view of the forward looking Galileo and you represent the view of the church, then yes.

Actually, I'm thinking your inability to accept that there's no single absolute time reference is a lot like the church's refusal to accept a heliocentric solar system.

You'd like to imagine you're forward-looking, but your "open-mindedness" is actually just a result of your willingness to jump on any possible theory that lets you cling to your Flat-Earth-like opinion that time couldn't possibly be relative. It's not actually open-mindedness at all, it's the desperation of denial.

It is not me who is accepting the general theory of relativity as the final word on the subject of physics, nor am I saying it be ignored. It was the scientific consensus of the time that rejected Galileo. Unless, you admit to it being overwhelmingly politically influenced, and science toadied up to the powers that were. I hope that era is gone but my fears are it isn't.

It wasn't the scientific community that opposed Galileo, it was the church. The scientific community was already aware that a geocentric universe didn't explain observations about the movement of the planets as far back as the time of the ancient Greeks. The scientific community had already seen evidence by astronomers-- Kelper, Tycho-- showing that other planets must orbit the sun. The scientific community saw the heliocentric model by Copernicus. The science and astronomy communities were discussing heliocentric models of the solar system for a hundred years before Galileo got arrested.

In short, it wasn't the scientific community that considered Galileo's views radical. He was confirming stuff that astronomers and mathematicians had been talking about for a long time. It wasn't until Galileo published a best-seller that contradicted the church view that he got arrested. It wasn't the scientists who arrested Galileo. It wasn't scientists who made him recant. It wasn't scientists who banned his book.

Actually, I have made some of my own conclusions based upon experience and not education.

your world is based entirely upon education. Since experience is unexplainable.

Seriously, it is only my decision and your decision that make the worlds we live in and how we view things.

You have to be able to assume the view of being an animal in order to see it that way. And that is your preference. It does make for a very stable world but making the conclusion you are an animal closes off ability to view things outside the parameters of your concept of an animal because it assumes there is nothing to view. And if you look past the conclusion toward some evolutionary concept of man there is nothing there. It is an endgame. Man is an animal is a finality. There is nowhere to go from there.

I'm quite baffled by all of this. It seems as if you're arguing that life doesn't have any meaning unless you can find some way to convince yourself to believe in fairy-tales. I find that to be quite sad.

That's fine if you want to accept that but you close off the ability to experience anything and leave yourself open to having to be told everything. In other words, things you can't explain to yourself don't happen to you. You cannot perceive them. It's a self-prophesying conclusion as are all others.

And that's just nonsense. The belief that there's a natural explanation for everything does not in any way imply that we know everything or discount the possibility of new and unexplained experiences.

The Christian explains things from his point of view - God did this or God did that, it's a wonderful abrogation of responsibility and an explanation of the unexplainable, at least he still has the option to refute his conclusion and can choose to be an animal. But one can't go back from the point where he concludes he is an animal. So there is no hope for you basically. You must continue being an animal and when an animal dies that's it. It turns to dust. You might take a peek to prove to yourself you are dead but that's about it.

My plans for myself certainly don't involve doing anything after I'm dead. And anybody who puts off making the most of their few decades on earth because they're expecting bigger things after they die is, in my opinion, making the biggest possible mistake.

Science has explained a lot of our mysteries about the universe that were previously attributed to the doings of God, when it rained after a long drought, when the crops failed, when the crops were bountiful, when we fell upon good fortune, when we fell upon bad fortune, why men are evil, why men are good, and therefore it has replaced religion as an explanation of the universe. It is true that a religion will teach us nothing new about the universe since it has answered all the mysteries to the satisfaction of the Pope. Science offers us the promise of explaining it all for us just as religion did. It allows us to ignore our experience and supplant it with scientific discovery. An experience they don't cover must not have been experienced or is something else.

This is just inane. The believe in a natural explanation for everything doesn't in any way discount anything you experience.

Nyuk Nyuk. We just need lies that promote more fun than we are having and I am basically really down on fun killers that promote destructive lies. The Pope is happy with his, you are happy with yours what could be more fun. The truth obviously sucks - whether you or the Pope is right.

The truth is a grand and wondrous thing. It doesn't suck at all. And the more you learn about our universe, the more you'll appreciate how amazing it really is.


-k

[Wild Bill]

I think where some, including Pliny, have gone wrong is that they have misunderstood what Einstein actually said in the first place!

For the record, he said that the speed of light is a constant, to all observers in all frames of reference.

A frame of reference is the environment of the observer. It can be a train traveling at 100 miles per hour with respect to an observer on the ground beside the track. It can be a rocket traveling at 90% of the speed of light, with respect to an observer on its home planet.

All frames of reference are arbitrary and all must measure their velocity as relative to each other.

If we launch a rocket from earth at 90% of the speed of light, if we measure the speed of light on earth and IN THE ROCKET observers both on earth and in the rocket will get exactly the same figure!

If you stop and think about it, at first glance this seems odd, especially for the rocket. If it is already going 90% of the speed of light, how could a passenger get the same velocity figure?

There's only one way this could be true - time must travel at a different rate within the rocket, WITH RESPECT TO EARTH!

Within the rocket, time would appear to pass normally. The speed of light would measure the same as it does anywhere else.

On earth, if it were possible to see inside the rocket, things would seem to be moving MUCH slower than here on earth!

If the rocket returned to earth, it would have to match speeds with the earth before it could land. At that point, it would have returned to the earth's frame of reference. Any passengers would have had no sense of time having passed much more slowly but when they compared clocks with people who had stayed on earth they would then see a time discrepancy. Weeks may have passed on the rocket but on earth it could be centuries.

The popular example of this is shown in sci-fi movies about characters on a ship being trapped in a black hole. While they are trapped time for them appears to be traveling normally. They have no way to tell there is any difference. For them, there IS NO difference! However, if due to some plot twist they escape the black hole's influence when they emerge back into the universe again centuries, if not eons, may have passed!

I particularly enjoyed one episode of the show Stargate which portrayed this phenomenon quite accurately. The episode opens with a team having passed through a Stargate to find themselves on a planet about to be swallowed by a black hole. Black holes have such immense gravity that they can actually trap light itself and prevent it from escaping from its gravity. Objects within what scientists call the "event horizon" not only are trapped forever, at least as long as the universe is around, but the men in the episode would never experience the millions of years passing!

To them, time would continue to pass at the same rate it always had. If they had a way of measuring the speed of light they would get the same old result they would get anywhere else, but to an observer outside the event horizon and thus the influence of the black hole's gravity, the men would look as if they were frozen, like flies in amber.

Hopefully, I haven't added to the muddiness of the waters!

Just as an afterthought, this aspect of the laws of the Universe means that we could never see a Star Trek Fedeeration of Planets. At least, not one that operated in a common time frame. Every star has its own vector and velocity, shooting off at vastly different speeds in any and all directions from each other. This means that there is no common time frame! Time on Vulcan would likely not travel anywhere near the same speed as it does on Earth, or on Orion or any other star, for that matter. How could a Federation function? Call a meeting for a year from now and everyone shows up on a completely different date, yet all swear that their clock show'd a year had passed while on their home planet. The discrepancies would range from minutes to centuries, all depending on their home planet's speed and direction compared to an observer on Earth.

[Bonam]

Just as an afterthought, this aspect of the laws of the Universe means that we could never see a Star Trek Fedeeration of Planets. At least, not one that operated in a common time frame. Every star has its own vector and velocity, shooting off at vastly different speeds in any and all directions from each other. This means that there is no common time frame! Time on Vulcan would likely not travel anywhere near the same speed as it does on Earth, or on Orion or any other star, for that matter. How could a Federation function? Call a meeting for a year from now and everyone shows up on a completely different date, yet all swear that their clock show'd a year had passed while on their home planet. The discrepancies would range from minutes to centuries, all depending on their home planet's speed and direction compared to an observer on Earth.

Actually the relative velocities of stars and planets within a given galaxy (or even galactic supercluster) are generally low enough that the effects of relativity would be rather small. Sure, you'd have to account for them for navigation and timing, but you certainly wouldn't have order of magnitude differences where some experience hours while others experience centuries as in your example. For example, stars at opposite edges of the Milky Way have a relative velocity of just 500 km/s, or 0.17% of the speed of light. That results in relativistic corrections (Lorentz factors) of only 0.000128% when it comes to time dilation, space contraction, and related phenomena. And that's the most extreme effect you get in our galaxy (besides traveling close to black holes).

It is only when you start looking at the large-scale structure of the universe, that is, the recession speeds of galactic superclusters from each other due to the inflation of spacetime, that you see relative velocities on the order of the speed of light.

That being said, the obvious limiting factor to a "federation of planets" would be the speed of light itself. Even if we could travel close to the speed of light using futuristic propulsion technologies, it would take decades between even relatively nearby star systems (though from the crew's reference frame this amount of time could be much less if they travel very close to the speed of light). That means interstellar trade, commerce, and warfare are essentially impossible. However, humanity could still colonize the galaxy, but every star system would have to be largely a self-sufficient society, sharing only information and the uttermost of the rarest of physical goods with its neighbors.

Unless, of course, we can find ways to circumvent the speed of light barrier between pre-defined locations. General relativity offers tantalizing hints of ways that this could be done, from the Alcubierre warp-drive solution of Einstein's equations, to the creation of artificial wormholes using negative energy as manifested in the Casimir effect. Like the warp drive metric, the traversable wormhole is also a theoretically valid solution of the Einstein equations. One thing we can be sure of is if there is even the tiniest loophole in the laws of physics that could allow us to construct FTL pathways between points in space, technological progress will get us there.

Edited by Bonam, 16 October 2011 - 09:25 PM.

[Wild Bill]

Actually the relative velocities of stars and planets within a given galaxy (or even galactic supercluster) are generally low enough that the effects of relativity would be rather small. Sure, you'd have to account for them for navigation and timing, but you certainly wouldn't have order of magnitude differences where some experience hours while others experience centuries as in your example. For example, stars at opposite edges of the Milky Way have a relative velocity of just 500 km/s, or 0.17% of the speed of light. That results in relativistic corrections (Lorentz factors) of only 0.000128% when it comes to time dilation, space contraction, and related phenomena. And that's the most extreme effect you get in our galaxy (besides traveling close to black holes).

It is only when you start looking at the large-scale structure of the universe, that is, the recession speeds of galactic superclusters from each other due to the inflation of spacetime, that you see relative velocities on the order of the speed of light.

That being said, the obvious limiting factor to a "federation of planets" would be the speed of light itself. Even if we could travel close to the speed of light using futuristic propulsion technologies, it would take decades between even relatively nearby star systems (though from the crew's reference frame this amount of time could be much less if they travel very close to the speed of light). That means interstellar trade, commerce, and warfare are essentially impossible. However, humanity could still colonize the galaxy, but every star system would have to be largely a self-sufficient society, sharing only information and the uttermost of the rarest of physical goods with its neighbors.

Unless, of course, we can find ways to circumvent the speed of light barrier between pre-defined locations. General relativity offers tantalizing hints of ways that this could be done, from the Alcubierre warp-drive solution of Einstein's equations, to the creation of artificial wormholes using negative energy as manifested in the Casimir effect. Like the warp drive metric, the traversable wormhole is also a theoretically valid solution of the Einstein equations. One thing we can be sure of is if there is even the tiniest loophole in the laws of physics that could allow us to construct FTL pathways between points in space, technological progress will get us there.

Thanks, Bonam! You gave us back the dream of a Federation of Planets! I didn't realize that the vector differences were mostly that trivial. And if we do achieve FTL, clocks might get out of sync on Rigel IV compared to ours here on Earth but it sounds like this would be a simple resetting, like adjusting for time zones when we take a jet vacation.

So we'll have to be careful! If one were to get an Orion slave girl pregnant the rate of time would be congruent enough that we would still be around when the baby was delivered! Relativistic time effects would not be as effective as a bus ticket out of town!