reply to post by geo1066
No, I don't get into string theory, I don't pretend to understand it, and from what I have read those who propose string theory also don't
understand it. Most of the theories like string theory, dark matter, dark energy, etc. were designed to account for some problem with our current
perspective on the Universe. These theories are unproven, because they are unprovable and their flaws will eventually be shown.
My background is math and computer graphics. So, I have a pretty good understanding of 3D space and how to represent it in 2D. So I tend to think that
the Universe is made up of multiple dimensions and that we only interact with 3 of them. The Universe that we see is made up of height, width, and
thickness, and that is what we comprehend best.
Time is something that we don't really see, we see only the effects of the passage of time. So from our perspective there are two directions, forward
and backward. We think this about time, because this is what we see with the 3 dimensions that we are familiar with.
However, as you and I know, when we interact in 3D we have more to consider than just forward and backward. We can alter our path to the right, left,
up, or down, to get where we want to go. When I do this, I can move around obstacles, visit mulitple places, or work out the most efficient route. We
can do this without disturbing other objects or creating any paradoxes with those objects.
I think that the true nature of time is something like that. There are more dimensions than one and so more directions than just forward and backward.
I don't think that time paradoxes are any more real than paradoxes in our 3D space. If I am sitting in a room, all objects are present in that room
simultaneously and I can interact with any of them that I choose usually without causing any problem, unless I break something.
If time is multidimensional, then everything in history is present at the same time and I could, in theory, interact with any of the objects there at
any time they are present, without causing any paradox, unless I break some rule.
I think that Quantum Mechanics has stumbled upon part of this idea, but has not yet grasped the full meaning of it. Physicists learned a long time
ago that objects at the quantum level do strange things. An electron for example does not seem to exist at any particular place or time, instead it
exists at all potential locations simultaneously according to the probablilities for it to exist at a particular location. This discovery resulted in
the Heisenberg uncertainty principle and the Schroedinger equations, which revolutionized chemistry, physics, and even mathematics. I won't get into
the equations here.
To me, what it means is that time is multidimensional and that the electron is able to interact with time in the same way that we interact in 3D. All
probabilities exist simultaneously because time is not linear, there is no real before and after, only parts of a much bigger whole that we percieve
on a straight line. At any rate, the points on a timeline that we see are only a very small part of the whole.
Taking the grandfather paradox, could you travel back in time and kill your grandfather without altering the future? The answer is yes you could,
because all probabilities exist simultaneiously. There is a certain probability that you would kill your grandfather, and as long as your actions did
not break the rules of probability, then there would be no paradox. Doing your grandfather in, would simply take you to a different place in our
timespace, a place where your grandfather was killed, or did not exist at all. To me, it would look like you jumped to a different timeline, but in
fact nothing has really changed, only your location in time.
What would that look like to an outside observer? I don't know. Maybe you would be a different gender, or have different genes, or maybe you would
not exist either on their timeline. You would in reality however, still exist but your presence in time might be obscured to the observer, until you
traveled back to a part of the room where you intersect his timeline. That would look very different to the observer, but to you, you would not notice
anything different at all. To you, it would look like you moved across the room and then back.
I think that the theory of relativity actually supports this view. As you pointed out, traveling close to the speed of light time travels more slowly
for me, compared to someone who is not traveling as fast. If I actually reach the speed of light, then time seems to stand still and I don't age at
all, compared with the rest of the Universe that is not traveling at the speed of light. For me though, time seems to progress normally, and I see no
difference at all. This is simply a matter of altered perspective.
If I have a pair of dice in my hand, I can alter my perspective to look down the edge of one of the dice. The edge seems to shorten to my perspective,
and if I look directly down the edge it looks like a point. The dice did not change shape however, what changed was my perspective of it. If an object
is traveling very fast, my perspective of it as it relates to time changes, but in reality nothing has changed for the object. For the object, time
has remained constant and everything is normal.
For me, this is evidence that time is in fact multidimensional. Moving faster, just takes you to a different location in time, relative to other
objects. Just like moving around my room faster and faster, simply changes my location relative to the other objects in the room. There is in fact no
real change to anything in the room.
Now the last part. What we see of ourselves and our Universe is just that part that intersects our own perspective on our timeline. Every possibility
for every object in the Universe exists simultaneously. Our star, exists as it is, but also as a white dwarf, or a black dwarf, or a red giant, and
every other possible combination.
We are much bigger than what we percieve, every decision we made, every choice, and every possible outcome for us, exists and is a part of us. There
is a part of me that died in the womb, or that died in infancy, there is a part of me that is homeless and a part that is rich, there is a part of me
that is a father, and a part of me that is a criminal. What I see though is an unbroken chain of events that make up the part of my reality that I
can see. If I could see all of time, then I would see all of the possibilities as well. If I could travel in time, then I could visit those other
parts of my being without altering the reality of the whole.