EDIT - 3/21/10 -
In natural units (general relativity) the units of distance are redefined:
Distances are uniformly divided by the speed of light, changing units:
$ = d/c = m/v = m*s/m = s
Where $ is "relativity distance", not regular distance. Relativity distance is distance divided by the speed of light. This means units of relativity distance are meters divided by velocity, which is meters times seconds over meters, which is simply seconds.
So, "relativity distance" = regular distance divided by the speed of light. The speed of light is constant, so relativity distance is perfectly proportional to regular distance.
Seconds are perfectly proportional to meters times some constant just as centimeters are proportional to meters times some constant (in this case the constant is 1=0.1 cm/m).
Therefore, just as centimeters can be used for distance instead of meters, seconds can be used instead of meters. The math is perfectly valid.
That's the mathematical reasoning for space-time equivalence.
How many centimeters is a meter stick?
1 m*(100cm/m) = 100 cm
How many meters is a centimeter?
1 cm*(m/100cm) = 0.01 m
How many inches is the meter stick?
100 cm*(in/2.5cm) = 40 in.
How many seconds is the meter stick?
1 m*(s/3*10^8 m]) = 1/[3*10^8] s
1 m/c = 1/[3*10^8] s
How many meters is an hour?
1 hr*(60 min/hr)*(60 s/min)*(3*10^8 m/s) = 10800*10^8 m = 1.08*10^12 m
I bet you didn't know hours were so big!
Which is a greater distance; the distance from the Sun to the Earth (called an Astronomical Unit, AU), or an hour?
1 AU = 1.5*10^11 m*(1 hr/1.08*10^12 m) = (1.5/1.08)*10^(-1) hr
Wow, so the distance from the Earth to the Sun is a little less than 0.15 hr. How many minutes is that?
0.15 hr*(60 min/hr) ~ 9 min with a lot of rounding of numbers. Wow. One AU is about nine minutes plus or minus a little.
It takes a little over 8 minutes for sunlight to reach the Earth. Hmmm.
Maybe an AU is around nine minutes because it takes light about nine minutes to go one AU?
First posted by me at
http://www.playtheimmortalgame.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=127957&page=4#post_2409592
3/22/10 -
I guess the simple way to look at it is - distances can be counted in hours if you're travelling at a steady speed.
Going to San Francisco to Los Angeles takes roughly six hours at a steady speed on the freeway. So, when you want to tell someone how far you've gone, you can go "we've been driving for two hours".
Distances are divided by c so that they are measured in seconds, just like time. Distances are measured in light-years, light-months, light-days, light-minutes, light-seconds. Time units.
The following is the original text of 11/11/09:
To Atheists:
Is there anything else besides space and [matter/energy]? ...[If so,] I'd like to know what you might think about what it would be like if there wasn't any space or [matter/energy].
josephw
...tentatively, I'll say, no, there is nothing else....information describes how matter or energy is distributed in space I believe [and abstractions are properties of the brain, which is matter/energy in a certain spacial arrangement]. The fundamental laws simply describe the properties of matter and space...
When you say "what would it be like" - what is "it"? There would be no people to experience anything in such a case...
When it is said that [matter/energy] and space exist, all of the characteristics of both are contained within that statement. When one says information exists they have added nothing to the set of what exists, because it was implied when [matter/energy] and space were said to exist. You could also say mass exists, and protons exist, and electrical charge exists, and rocks exist, and gases exist, and density exists, and volume exists, and cubes exist, etc. but all that has already been implied simply by stating that [matter/energy] and space exist.
In other words, information, abstraction, etc. are not "anything else" other than space and energy/matter as the OP puts it...
Objects differ from one another because of entropy...an even distribution of order would have less entropy than a disordered one. The singularity at the beginning of observable time was highly ordered, and in order to get to a state of maximum disorder it has to go through all states in between. It does so in a non-orderly fashion.
In other words, order is left over from the singularity, and that order is distributed in a more and more chaotic fashion over time...
I don't know why the singularity was ordered, and theoretically it is impossible to know. This thread is about what exists, not why.
Entropy refers to how many possible arrangements of matter would have the properties of the matter in question. Roll two six sided dice; the total "7" would have more entropy than the total "2" because there are 6/36 ways to make 7 and 1/36 ways to make 2. If you took a million pairs of dice and put every die so the "1" was facing up (ordered situation) - and began to vibrate the surface the dice are resting on, you would end up in the long run with more 7's than 1's. Why? Entropy. Why? Because there are more ways to make 7 than 1. That's all entropy is...
The Big Bang occurred and the singularity was shattered. As with the dice, when the singularity shattered, there were more possible ways that ME could be distributed in a disordered fashion than an ordered fashion on a grand scale. However, chunks of order still remained of various "sizes" just as you would still find patches of 1's with the dice.
Now, we know about quarks forming hydrogen early on, and then fusion reactions in stars creating the other elements (at least up to iron, the most stable element). All of these things take place because of electrical and gravitational forces the effects of which are not symmetrical on a grand scale as before described.
I won't bore you with how the solar system formed, etc because I don't think we will have any disagreement there.
So, we have a solar system, and various atoms, including carbon, oxygen, iron, hydrogen etc.
The iron atoms do not tend to have complex chemistries because of the arrangements of valence electrons and the metallic nature of the element (allowing valence electrons to be delocalized instead of associated with particular atoms), so generally just react with oxygen and sit there in the dirt in the form of rust.
Carbon, on the other hand, due to it's small size and four valence electrons, has very, very complex chemistry. All kinds of different forms of carbon molecules with or without other atoms form spontaneously. Some of these will have an enzymatic activity on other substances. Some of those will be floating around in water where lipid molecules drip into the water, forming micelles which help concentrate the enzymes into a localized area, and cells begin to form. Then we have an evolutionary process which again I don't think we'll disagree about and end up with humans and fish, and humans, in order to help feed themselves, mine iron and make spoons with it.
Every single step is simply a complex interaction of various forces and matter and spacial relationships which helps contribute towards universal entropy. Organisms especially are good at manufacturing entropy. We take food and oxygen and turn it into poop and carbon dioxide; take pure water and turn it into urine; etc.
Entropy is not a "selector". It is simply a recognition that the vast majority of possible arrangements of matter will show the same macroscopic properties. I don't know which atom will be where, but it doesn't matter. All I know is that they almost certainly won't randomly all roll 1's. Is entropy "selecting" 7's when you roll pairs of dice? I suppose you could say that, but only barely.
AThousandYoung
http://www.playtheimmortalgame.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=121269
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