Ghibbsa, The "implications of block time for individual lives" are very clear. It means you are a zombie with no free will in a mindless dead universe in which nothing actually happens and your miserable life and death are already written.
Of course it's not true, but that's what it means. Edgar On Monday, February 3, 2014 10:56:39 PM UTC-5, ghi...@gmail.com wrote: > > > On Monday, February 3, 2014 11:11:18 PM UTC, Liz R wrote: >> >> On 4 February 2014 11:48, <ghi...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >>> >>> Hi Liz, thanks for doing this thread, the history metaphor was also a >>> great help. I wasn't clear what block time was and now I've got a better >>> idea. >>> >> >> Good, that was the point. A lot of people seemed to be attacking it on >> the basis of straw man arguments, so obviously not everyone "gets" it. >> >>> >>> I remember reading someone argue against it in terms of energy, and I >>> think this was thrown out by others with explanations, but can't remember >>> any details. Any chance you could me by the explanation of that? >>> >> >> I do remember that, but only very vaguely - so I can't really say what >> the problem or resolution was. Sorry. If anyone can remember, please let me >> know. >> >> (Maybe it was something similar to the fallacy that the MWI violates >> conservation of energy because it's constantly "creating new universes" ... >> ?) >> >>> >>> I was also able to get a good beginner foothold understanding of your >>> explanation how SR gives rise to blocktime via relativity of simultaneity. >>> Best I can I do see the implication is compelling and hard to avoid - I >>> can't think of any criticism directly. But then I wouldn't expect to be >>> able to do that from the level I am at. >>> >> >> I haven't been able to come up with anything. Of course any type of >> physics that treats time as a dimension implies block time, for example >> Newtonian mechanics does, as illustrated by Laplace's comment about an >> omniscient being that could know the past and future given the >> configuration of the universe at a single moment. >> >>> >>> But more generically speaking, would this inference for blocktime sit at >>> the edge of relativity or at its core. What I mean is, beyond that it is an >>> implication of relativity, have there been or are there any prospects for >>> developing blocktime as it arises from relativity to such point, >>> predictions get made? Or any other kind of reinforcement? Or does blocktime >>> go on to imply something beyond blocktime? >>> >> >> The idea of space-time seems to be central to SR, and even more so to GR. >> (It was also central to Newtonian physics, but as "space and time" which >> taken together have the features of a block universe.) >> >>> >>> If not then out of interest, what sort of strength would you personally >>> attach to blocktime? Say compared to the speed of light, or big bang? >>> Genuinelly curious. >>> >> >> I'm not sure what you mean about the speed of light. I'd say block time >> is the best interpretation of what phyics is telling us about the universe >> because (a) the theoretical and experimental evidence is very strong and >> (b) the ontological basis for it is good - it's the minimal explanation >> necessary. Although other variants like "presentism" are theoretically >> possible, they're unnecessary to explain all existing observations, and >> only push the problem of time back a step, since presentism just says >> there's an extra time dimension in which our universe is being continually >> created and destroyed - but of course another time dimension can also be >> viewed as a block universe, one step removed. If *that* time dimension >> is also given a time dimension in which *it's *happening, that can also >> be viewed as a block universe, 2 steps removed ... and so on. >> >>> >>> The intuitive problem I would have with blocktime would veiry much be >>> along the same themes as a lot of other inferences in one way or another at >>> the 'edge'. The same assumption seems to come into play, that nature has >>> infinite resources at her fingertips...is able to get those resources >>> pretty much anywhere she likes too. Which might be true, but I return to >>> that worry that, whether true or not, the explanation is always available >>> to us, and will always deliver this kind of resolution, regardless of >>> context. So long as the problem is at the edge of knowledge. >>> >>> Is that a worry for you as well? >>> >>> It might be for some things, but block time has been so uncontentious >> amongst the vast majority of physicists since Newton that I don't have any >> problems with it. It's been very well thought through by many minds, and no >> one has come up with a viable alternative that I'm aware of. >> > Thanks for all that. Very interesting. So what sort of implications would > block time have for individual lives. Do they happen only onetime while > their time is being actively blocked in? Or does blocktime exist statically > as the end-to-end story of the universe? > > I appreciate the construction is the chain of relations, but does anyone > say whether the relations necessarily happen like a domino effect from the > big bang through, just the one time? Or can they get washed through like > waves of an incoming tide? is another version of me happening on the wave > just behind the one I'm on? > > I think what I'm realty asking is what is blocktime giving the world? It's > giving us a deeper vision of reality (if true). But if it is objectively > true, what purpose or utility does it serve, if any? > > My experience when I ask something like that is normally > puzzlement..."what do you mean what purpose/utility?' It's an implication > of relativity! :o) > > But it's strange really. Where are knowledge is strongest, at the core of > our own universe, there is no part of it that does not serve a fundamental > purpose in the workings of physical law. If someone asked what purpose were > served by neutrinos, or dark matter, or gamma rays, gravity....there would > be several interpretations involving some utility in the scheme of things. > > But what happens at the edges..of our theories, of our knowledge, is > completely different. And tightly linked to what action we take. This one > here is in the same class as what takes place with QM. An interpretation. > Both times then, MWI and this time, the result is an - albeit completely > differently configured - sort of translation even from a set of > relations in one universe, to the same relations distributed in a > multiverse-like construction. > > Obviously we don't see this as a multiverse in that blocktime happens > along the passage of time we associate with this single universe. But > relative to the old concept of a single version of objects moving through > the passage of time, blocktime is a multiverse-like construction IMHO. > > Guess what we're getting could be objective , or it could be an artefact > of doing something improper, brought about by circumstances involving > invoking a process of interpretation of some sense of an exposed edge of a > theory. > > Two possibilities > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
