Time: "Time is God's
way of keeping everything from happening at once"
Unknown. Time is an elusive concept.
We speak of the past, present, and future.
Our memories confirm the
existence of a past world, and our imaginations envision the future.
The present is ever fleeting and cannot be caught. We know time
subjectively and we measure its passage by the ticking clock, but
what is time?
Time seems to be the persistence of space, energy, and matter. We
measure this persistence by periodic motions. Any particle or planet
that has a regular periodic motion can serve as a clock for the
measuring of time. We consider the diurnal rotation of the earth as
marking a day and we have arbitrarily divided the day into 24 hours.
We know that the rate of time changes with velocity according to the
Special Theory of Relativity and at extremely high velocities we can
determine the dilation of a second of time using the relativistic
equation.
The Time Dilation equation for Relativity is:
In the relativistic equations time is a
fourth dimension. Could there be another dimension to time? Some
physicists think so, but this leads to further paradoxes.
If we look at how we use time in physics, in units of seconds as
determined by the vibration of atoms, then we are treating the
vibration as a constant with a fixed period. What if there is a
fundamental vibration?
A string in M-theory has different modes and
frequencies of vibration.
Whether a string or ring, these vibrations
can determine the character of fundamental physical particles. What
if there were vibrations out of phase with our universe? Would they
be detected? Could a time frequency define a universe?
Other than an extra extended spatial dimension for another universe,
the possibility of frequency universes may also be a hypothesis that
could ultimately be tested and allow for communication between
universes.
One of the fundamental frequencies that can be attributed to
sub-atomic particles is spin frequency. If we combine the energy of
a photon and the energy of mass we could derive a spin frequency
equation:
F = mc2/h
In this equation h refers to
Planck’s constant. Both c and h contain units of time.
If these spin rates vary, it is possible that such matter will not
interact with photons and thus be invisible from our perspective.
Just like a spinning fan which speeds up until one can no longer see
reflection from the blades.
This is conjecture at this point and experiments on changing spin
frequency of elementary particles are not something our scientists
have a handle on at present. Anecdotal stories of spectral sights
that are seen in moments of psychic vision seem to imply the
existence of invisible worlds. Metaphysical tradition states that
these other worlds are vibrating faster than the world we sense.
This is one possibility which can be modeled.
Space
The extension of objects in space is
something that is also fundamental to physics and most hyperdimensional physical theories, such as the Kaluza-Klein theory,
string theories, and M-theory deal with the mathematics of extra
spatial dimensions.
Spatial dimensions beyond the three of our everyday world are
difficult, even impossible to visualize though some mathematicians
have tried. If we visualize a cube in three-dimensional space, could
we extend this to visualize a hypercube in four-dimensional space?
The problem is that we define a dimension as orthogonal to other
dimensions and we can only perceive three orthogonal extensions
which we have defined as length, breadth, and width. We do not know
how to rotate another 90 degrees to point to that fourth spatial
dimension.
In M-theory the extra spatial dimensions may form closed loops that
are as small as 10-33 cm (Planck length) and are said to be compactified.
“Many physicists hope that string
theory will ultimately unify quantum mechanics, the theory of
small-scale interactions, with general relativity, the theory of
gravity. String theory requires at least nine spatial
dimensions, so proponents normally claim that all but three of
them are compactified and only accessible in extremely
high-energy particle collisions. As an alternative to compactified dimensions, Lisa Randall of Princeton University
and Raman Sundrum, now of Stanford University, describe a
scenario in which an extra, infinite dimension could have
remained undetected so far.
Other researchers have pointed out that if extra dimensions
exist, the strong, weak, and electromagnetic forces and their
associated particles might operate within a three-dimensional
"subspace" of the higher dimensional world. Like beads on a wire
that lies on a table, the particles would be restricted to their
own set of dimensions, unable to move beyond them. But gravity
is different: It consists of the motions of space-time, which
includes all dimensions simultaneously.
So Randall and Sundrum
imagine a world with four spatial dimensions, where gravity
exists in all four, but the other forces --and all of our direct
experience-- exist in 3D.
They say we live in a "3-brane" located
at some specific position along the fourth spatial dimension.”
(2)
Many physicists believe that these
extra-dimensional theories are very speculative and that ultimately
we could not prove the existence of extra dimensions, but the
rejoinder is that these theories are successful in predicting
particle masses and energies.
The future may bring new theories and
discoveries.
Many Worlds
Theory
In 1957, Hugh Everett III proposed a
radical new way of dealing with some of the more perplexing aspects
of quantum mechanics. It became known as the Many-Worlds
Interpretation.
According to this interpretation, whenever numerous viable
possibilities exist, the world splits into many worlds, one world
for each different possibility (in this context, the term "worlds"
refers to what most people call "universes").
In each of these
worlds, everything is identical, except for that one different
choice; from that point on, they develop independently, and no
communication is possible between them, so the people living in
those worlds (and splitting along with them) may have no idea that
this is going on.
The Many-Worlds Interpretation is an interpretation of
quantum
mechanics, and pertains to quantum events. But it also has
implications for macroscopic systems like you and me. Although you
may think that there are certain alternatives you would never
choose, can you really be sure of that?
There are a practically
infinite number of versions of you, who have all split off at some
time in the past from the path you are now following. There may be
versions of you that split off five or ten years ago, or perhaps
five minutes after you were born, to whom those choices may not seem
unthinkable.
But in a very real sense, those people are still "you"
(but it can be argued that we should not use the word "are", or even
"were"; we need to invent a new kind of tense...)
(3)
Bubble Universes
Alan Guth’s evolving theory of an
Inflationary
Universe, one that rapidly expanded from the Big Bang, a fluctuation
of the false vacuum led to the concept of many such universes
bubbling out of the vacuum and our universe is only one of these
bubbles floating around in a superspace.
Transdimensional travel
The exciting world of science fiction
contains many stories of
transdimensional travel in space and time.
Perhaps as we proceed in our understanding of how the universe
works, we may someday realize these stories and they may become a
real part of our technology.
Already such marvels as photon
teleportation and quantum computing are being explored in
laboratories around the world. It is exciting to think that someday
we may visit another universe which would have to be very similar if
not identical to our own in physical principle if we are to survive
the journey.
We may also find doorways in time and visit other
times.
