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minio
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Maybe stupid question, but if time is dependent on matter would there be time, if there are only photons? Or are they considered matter in this case?
DaveC426913 said:No. The process is reversible, and energy is conserved. It is just an unlikely sequence events events given entropy.
minio said:Maybe stupid question, but if time is dependent on matter would there be time, if there are only photons? Or are they considered matter in this case?
gendou2 said:If you want to measure the passage of time, you can use a clock.
So far as I know, a clock must be a physical entity made of matter.
If you assume no matter, there can be no clocks, so no way to measure the passage of time.
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phinds said:I'm not exactly sure what you have in mind with that, but it seems to overly trivialize time.
salvestrom said:@budrap: Time is part of the way we measure the separation of events. Whether we use human inventions such as the second, or simply say 'it took awhile', these things relate to an actual property of the universe that exists regardless of how we describe it.
budrap said:The point is that time cannot be demonstrated to exist independent of the physical processes by which we claim to measure it and therefore the concept of time as an independent phenomenon doesn't have any scientific basis. This is not an attempt to trivialize time but to attribute to it only those characteristics that have an empirical foundation. Think of it as the Occam's Razor approach, minimizing extraneous assumptions
salvestrom said:My remark about additional energy was referring to the energy 'lost' when the cue strikes the ball producing a sound. In order to physically reverse the process that energy needs to be put back into the cue. While this is mathematically a reversible process, physically I know of no process that would allow it, anymore than the embers of a fire can regain the radiated heat. I consider these things beyond unlikely.
DaveC426913 said:.
The original point of comparing the universe to the billiards table was that, trillions of years in the future, there are no low-entropy objects such as pool cues or atmospheres. You just have a uniform soup of billiard balls all with random motion. They carom off each other but, since they're all just billiard balls bouncing around, there is no further increase in entropy, no increase in disorder. Thus the arrow of time is lost.
budrap said:The assertion that time is "an actual property of the universe" as opposed to a property of material processes lacks, I believe, any empirical support and therefore isn't really scientifically substantive.
lukesfn said:According to the Poincare Recurrence Theorem, the balls on the billard table will return to near to there starting position after a finite amount of time which can be estimated.
As I undertand, Entropy and the 2nd law of Thermodynamics are relative to an observer. I'm not sure if there can be an observer in a matterless universe, but I would assume events continue to occur separated by time weather observed or not because I personally assume that the moon still exists even if I am not looking at it.
I guess that weather or not time needs matter ends up a bit like asking if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound. I depends on how you define time for one thing.
DaveC426913 said:Now that I think about the far, far future where the universe is just a lukewarm homogenous soup, I can begin to conceive of a universe where time is ambiguous. If nothing evolves from one state to another, then what does it mean to have time pass?
In the second law of thermodynamics, Entropy isn't required to increase, only forbidden to decrease. Also entropy can be calculated differently from different perspectives.Lord Crc said:It's my understanding that measuring "actual" time, which enables motion, requires an increase in entropy. If the universe is in a state where there is no way to increase the entropy further, then it will be impossible to measure time, and thus it might as well not exist.
Would be a nifty trick, wouldn't it?...salvestrom said:recording the interval between two non-events
Lord Crc said:This seems analogous to the big bang. Perhaps there was something before the big bang but if we can't measure any effects from it then it's irrelevant to us and we say that it doesn't exist.
It's my understanding that measuring "actual" time, which enables motion, requires an increase in entropy. If the universe is in a state where there is no way to increase the entropy further, then it will be impossible to measure time, and thus it might as well not exist.Then again I'm just a layman so...
No, in the condition you describe in your first post, time does not exist.phinds said:My question has been, and remains, does it EXIST --- does it in some physical sense continue to "flow" as it now is flowing.
Albert Einstein said:People before me believed that if all the matter in the universe were removed, only space and time would exist. My theory proves that space and time would disappear along with matter.
Fuzzy Logic said:Saying that time ceases to exist is just a scientific cop-out. Just because it can't be perceived doesn't mean it doesn't exist. If it ceases to exist, then how does it renew? How did it begin in the first place? It just spontaneously came into existence? Rubbish! I can't think of anything in nature that is not ultimately cyclical.
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shifty88 said:the flow of time is an illusion perceived by an observer to make sense of his or her conscious perception of change.
Time is not intrinsic to the universal laws of nature, rather it is intrinsic to the human psyche. It is simply a concept used in the human mind to explain the passage of one event to another.
It is a tool that we use to describe the motion of 'stuff' in the universe. Time does not exist.
OCR said:No, in the condition you describe in your first post, time does not exist.
At least, according to...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hole_argument#Einstein.27s_resolution
OCR
lukesfn said:that time might as well not exist after you die.
phinds said:Although I tend to agree w/ you, one of the things I've found is that the universe doesn't give a flying <expletive deleted> what you or I think, and what you have posted is just personal speculation with no tie to any factual information.
You're welcome,phinds said:Thank you.
Fuzzy Logic said:Definitely. However, when there are two equally valid solutions to a problem, the simplest solution is always more correct. Show me where in nature anything ever spontaneously comes into existence and I will reconsider my perspective.
phinds said:You should read more on quantum mechanics. Stuff pops into existence CONSTANTLY at the quantum level, and at least one model says our entire universe started that way, so your point is totally at odds with current understanding of how things work. You are probably, like me, more comfortable in a Newtonian universe where that weird stuff doesn't happen, but whether we like it or not, it's what happens.
Fuzzy Logic said:Even in QM things don't just come into existence. Matter is energy. Energy is never created or destroyed. It is the essence of infinity.
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I don't think you will find a satisfactory answer to your question. We don't understand time enoughphinds said:Interesting personal opinion but with no tie to any factual information not really helpful in resolving the question.
shifty88 said:If time ceases to have a meaning when heat death is reached it suggests to me that time is not a law of nature.
Fuzzy Logic said:Heat death does not suggest zero energy, only that the energy is not usable.
The energy would be completely homogenous in the universe (as vacuum energy?).
Since energy has mass, I think this means that it would still affect gravity and you cannot have effects without time.
budrap said:The assertion that time is "an actual property of the universe" as opposed to a property of material processes lacks, I believe, any empirical support and therefore isn't really scientifically substantive.
Ynaught? said:So do you believe the same goes for space?