Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash.
To understand Infinite Universe Theory, it is absolutely critical to know what time is. The popular press seems to think time is a mystery. Nowadays, you may be excused if you think time is a dimension, an illusion, a concept, or a product of imagination. But the key to understanding time lies in the Fourth Assumption of Science, the famous dictum from Hegel, which we call inseparability (Just as there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). That is the ship abandoned by Einstein and his regressive followers in 1905. Classical mechanics had assumed the universe displayed only two fundamental phenomena: matter and its motion. Newton's Second Law of Motion implied all events were the results of collisions between objects.
This essay is an update of one of our most popular PSI
Blogs. It has received the most comments, with “time is motion” appearing at
the top of your Google search. It is the one thing Einstein and I are in
agreement: Everything in the universe is in motion with respect to other
things.
My esteemed co-author,
Steve Puetz, asked:
“I still disagree with the statement.... Time is motion. To be more precise, it should be worded
as.... ‘Time is an aspect of motion.’
According to almost all conventional descriptions of motion, it has three
aspects -- an object, a path, and time.
To suddenly state that motion only has one aspect (time) is confusing to
many readers, including me.
For example, Wikipedia gives a good description of motion at
the following link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_(physics)
‘In physics, motion is a change in position of an object
with respect to time.... Motion is
typically described in terms of velocity, acceleration, displacement, and time.’
When people think of motion, they tend to think this
way.... the path that something follows,
and the time it took the thing to follow the path.
By changing the definition of motion (it only involves time
and not the path that a thing follows), then I need to know why. In previous discussions, you insisted that
time is motion, but never explained why the current definition of motion needs
to exclude the distance that a thing traveled.
To continue making the statement that time is motion, it seems essential
to give reasons why the object and the path are being excluded from
motion. A lot of readers of our work
will want to know why, including myself.”
[GB: Steve, thanks for the question. There is a wealth of
detail underlying my claim that “Time is motion.” I believe that there are only
two fundamental phenomena in the universe: matter and motion. Of course, with
our Fourth Assumption of Science, Hegel’s
famous dictum I call inseparability (Just as there is no motion
without matter, so there is no matter without motion), we “tie” these two
phenomena together. In other words, “motion” is simply the mechanist’s
shorthand for the “motion of matter.” You are essentially voicing the
criticisms of Newton’s First Law of Motion, which go like this: What could we
possibly say about an object in motion if there is no other object to which
that motion can be measured against? Newton’s ideal object moves through a
finite universe, which at some point may be thought by the idealist as “pure
empty space.” That is why he uses the word “unless” rather than the word
“until.” Despite the critics, Newton’s First Law was accepted as the most
important law of the universe. I also consider it the most important
observation ever made, making Newton the greatest scientist who ever lived.
Newton’s failure to include a referent other than his
concept of “absolute space,” was always handled in classical mechanics by being
very careful to include one. If you did that, you could be like Newton; you
would not have to choose between finity and infinity. You could measure the
distance between object A and object B by comparing it to some conventionally
agreed upon standard you hoped would remain unchanged. Then, you could measure
time by comparing the object’s motion to the motion of some conventionally
agreed upon standard you also hoped would remain unchanged. The rest of
classical mechanics followed, with rampant success throughout all of science,
as noted in Wikipedia.
In neomechanics,
however, we use the Eighth Assumption of Science, infinity (The
universe is infinite, both in the microcosmic and macrocosmic directions). This
automatically provides the referent—we assume that there always is a referent.
We still have to do the measurements in the same old way, but we now can think
about them differently. In the infinite universe, things are always moving
toward or away from other things. There is always a path and travel over that
path occurs either quickly or slowly with respect to the motion of other
things. Foremost, we do not have to be there to measure any of this.
The fact is that both matter and motion are abstractions. In
neomechanics, we define matter as that which contains other matter, has xyz
dimensions, and location with respect to other matter. We define motion as what
matter does. Abstractions are generalizations we use for thinking. Fruit, for
example, is an abstraction. One cannot really eat a fruit; one only can eat an
apple or an orange, or some other specific member of the category. Thus, there
is no matter and no motion per se, only specific examples of matter exist and
only specific examples of motion occur. In other words,
matter exists; motion occurs. Motion, like matter, has an infinite number of
“aspects” or qualities. To choose one of these aspects of motion as “time” and
some other aspect of motion as “not time” is illogical. Time and motion are
identical.
As I mentioned, all phenomena in the universe can be
categorized as either matter or motion. When it comes to time, we have a
choice; we can consider it to be matter or motion. I choose motion. Einstein
chose matter. Einstein’s objectification of time makes SRT and GRT invalid, as
I showed in my paper on “Einstein’s
Most Important Philosophical Error”. Anyone who really understands that
paper will understand that time is the motion of matter and that relativity,
with all its paradoxes need not be entertained any further. In particular, the
seemingly endless discussions of the Twin Paradox are a waste of time.
Universal time is the motion of everything with respect to everything else. Of course, we can only measure specific time, the motion of one thing with respect to another thing. Nonetheless, time is not a measurement. The dinosaurs experienced time (motion), but they did not measure it. Again, time is not an aspect of motion; time is motion itself, whether it be specific time or universal time. I realize that it takes a bit of time to get your head around that concept. We are all struggling to escape from the conundrum that Einstein left us with. That is why I define modern, regressive physicists as those who do not know what time is. The average person seems to think that time is a great mystery or that “it” flows or that one could go back in time, as if it was a thing like a house with receding doorways. Again, many with solipsistic tendencies believe that time does not occur unless it is observed or measured. That is our background, and it takes each of us a while to overcome the propaganda surrounding such a simple phenomenon. Half measures embodied in the term “aspect,” which characteristically strive to keep the observer in the picture, nonetheless are steps toward the escape. They might eventually satisfy Wikipedia, but they are only steps. The complete liberation comes when we finally realize that: time is motion.
Thanks to Jesse for this heads up on current speculations involving the assumption that time might not exist and that “People are starting to put the pieces together…..slowly:”
