I made a comment about how time runs slower down here on the Earth’s surface due to gravity than it does for them up there in that orbiting lab. This was not true as I had not realised that their orbiting velocity would create a greater time dilation effect and time would run slower for them. While I was on the subject of time dilation I retrieved a rather interesting prediction of relativity that time would actually stand still at the centre of a black hole. I was no expert you understand, I had watched a Horizon programme back in November 2000 entitled supermassive black holes.
A supermassive black hole is a place where gravity has gone mad. They have a million to a billion times the mass of a normal stellar mass black hole (where time also stands still) with truly apocalyptical destructive power where thousands of stars could just fall in and disappear from existence. At the heart of every black hole is the singularity where time dilation factors down to its prime and time stands still. The programme went on to explore the correlation between the mass of the supermassive black hole and sigma, the speed at which the stars at the edge of galaxies orbit. I remember being fascinated by the concept that this may not be such a harbinger of doom lurking at the centre of all galaxies including are very own Milky Way, instead they could even be the foundation that all galaxies were built upon being the catalyst that instigated the formation of stars. The Horizon programme is no longer available on i-player but for the programme transcript click here.
To get back to that initial thought though, although fascinating and in my mind the best galaxy formation theory that I had come across, it was not the galaxy formation side that got me thinking it was the concept that time stood still at the singularity of all black holes. It was at this point that my imagination started to go walkabouts. I went on one of my thought experiments, an oft occurrence for a dreamer like myself. I imagined myself as a deity, it's not that I have a God delusion you understand, it was so I could venture with impunity on an otherwise voyage of no return. I imagined myself on a flying visit towards a black hole so as to experience gravity in ever increasing magnitudes so as to note specifically the effects of gravitational time dilation. The thing about time dilation is you do not directly experience the change although time for you will slow down. Even if you sported a fine watch its movement would appear unimpeded. It is only when you make observations or communications to areas outside of the extreme gravity that you notice something odd. People back on Earth would be moving about much faster and their voices would sound all Micky Mouse. But to an observer on Earth you would be moving in a slow deliberate way and talking Like Dory doing her whale speak, like in finding Nemo.
As I venture ever closer to the all-pervasive black hole the effects of time dilation are cranked up ever more and the outside universe speeds up and the galaxies appear to spin like the Tasmanian devil as for every second my watch ticked, millions and then billions of years would pass in the outside universe. When I eventually reach the end of my voyage at the singularity, time itself comes to a standstill and suddenly all of time passes away in the final instance. Could this be the very end of time itself?
Could every galaxy have at its very heart a kind of ethereal tunnel to the end of time and the universe? Could they all be leading to the same place, a place so hideous it is even beyond the machinations of Dante himself? Could this be the realm of the big crunch the antipathy of creation?
I played with these musings for a little longer and pondered whether the big bang and the eventual big crunch singularity were one and the same event. If all black holes were in fact; the same place, at the end of time. The theory that would eventually unfold would have no big crunch and the apparent finality of time would be a fractionalised part of an infinite time continuum. The big bang would not be big it would be infinite and the bang is no explosion just the start of the expansion.
I try not to fractionalize my ideas down too far in any one area of topic. This is deliberate for two reasons, for one I want to view a wider topography of the scientific landscape and the other is, I do not want to mess up a good idea with my current math skills. Matt Goering the creator of the Simpsons is happy to confess to the fact that his drawing skills would not get him into his own team of animators. In the same way I think my ideas may lead to something of worth in the hands of more capable mathematicians. “The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them.” ~William Lawrence Bragg
I emerge from my fog of confusion with the vast and often contradictory information of the internet at my disposal. With technology leaping forwards ever faster we are able to see deeper and with greater clarity into the past with vast telescopes and complex scientific instruments both here and in space. What I have made of it all so far will be difficult to convey as my eclectic musings are often self-referencing and at times difficult to comprehend and impossible to convey all at once.
I realized that if time started in the big bang and comes to an end in the heart of every black hole that time was beginning to appear finite for at least what we perceive to be our universe. For me time being finite was in conflict to a long held belief of mine of an infinite universe. Something infinite cannot be divided by that which is finite. From the age of seven I have been happy with the concept that the Universe is infinite. I realised the futility of trying to invent a boundary, for any boundary would have to be infinite and so self-defeating (the boundary may be finite on the universe side but the other side has to be infinite). When I later learnt of the big bang theory I always imagined it to be part of a cycle. Although the big bang implied a beginning I never thought it to be the beginning rather the beginning of another cycle. I then realised that I had long ago resolved this paradox as infinite time could be fractionalised into cycles and that we exist within one of these.
“There is no rational reason to doubt that the universe has existed indefinitely, for an infinite time. It is only myth that attempts to say how the universe came to be, either four thousand or twenty billion years ago.” Hannes Alfven.
For me the big bang should not be considered the moment of creation but part of a continuous self-reflexivity continuum synonymous to the emblematic serpent of ancient Egypt and Greece the mythical Ouroboros, the serpent that eats its own tail in a cycle of destruction and re-creation.
Anyone who has used a three dimensional drawing program using coordinates will be familiar with Euclidian geometry where the three dimensions are represented by x, y, z, where you have a starting point where the dimensions are represented as three lines that all cross in the middle of the screen with the x line going from left to right and the y line going up and down and the z line going into the computer screen and out of the computer screen to hit you on the chin as it were. These lines are indexed with the Cartesian coordinates, for instance the x line will have negative coordinates to the left and positive to the right and all three in the middle at 0 (zero).
In an infinite universe the three dimensions carry on until infinity. In a closed universe that some suggest if you travel the x+ line you eventually re- enter in from the x- side. I have a problem with that way of thinking, for any one dimension to reach the opposite to its start direction must simultaneously encroach on the other two dimensions in both their directions to be able to make such a transgression. This is further complicated when we alter the starting reference frame as we must then encroach upon infinitely more pseudo dimensions of other reference frames and a little self-defeating. This is probably a little hard to picture so imagine it is like the lines of magnetism around a movable magnet but with six poles. I think this way of resolving how a finite universe can exist without a concept of an edge to be confined there in, should be left to the domain of computer games.
If in an infinite universe we take the x axis and extend it to infinity then just like the analogy that two parallel lines meet at infinity, then either end of this single dimensional line could also be analysed as to meet at infinity, but the x+ and the x- of this line unlike the finite example do not need to transcend the other real dimensions z, or y their meeting is abstract or imaginary. The circle they draw has no curvature left or right for this is an abstract imaginary circle as it is imaginary in the zdimension in fact it is imaginary dimensionally in all three dimensions, making the single x dimension multi-dimensional only in a complex and abstract way. Each real dimension has an imaginary multi-dimensionality x(xi, yi, zi) y(xi, yi, zi) z(xi, yi, zi). If you have difficulty visualising this then just think of it this way………… nope no analogy springs to mind.
The real dimensions are infinite yet fractionalised by the imaginary dimensions and due to the indivisible nature of infinity their complex dimensionality must be fractal. I now see that space has a fractal topology. The way that interaction between the three dimensions is what produces our fractal depth.
To reach my current understanding I have explored ideas that I later realised are not quite accurate. I will include these ideas and use them as a toy theorem to help convey an otherwise difficult concept.
Gravity
When we think about gravity many think of a force that pulls us down on to the Earth. The nearest most of us will come to being without the effect of gravity is when we travel at speed over a hump back bridge; our hearts seem to float to the top of our chest. For a longer period of free fall we could go on a high altitude sky dive parachute jump but even this, the effect is quite short lived as the resistance to our fall is met by the air resistance and equalled before we reach 200 mph.
In 1960 an American air force pilot Captain Joe Kittinger experienced free fall with much less air resistance by climbing far above the denser air of the troposphere when he climbed to the edge of space 31 kilometres up in a giant helium filled balloon. This was an early part of the space flight program and considered close enough to actually going into space to prove that man could survive there. With the black sky above wearing a pressurized space suit to stop his blood boiling and a parachute for the final leg of his intended decent he jumped from the highest step then known to mankind.
In the upper stratosphere the air is so thin that his initial decent did not even rustle the fabric of his space suit. With 99% of the atmosphere far below he had no sense of falling at all until he looked up at the balloon as it appeared to shoot up into space. He felt no acceleration yet the speed of his decent climbed to 990 km hr-1, he was the first person to exceed the speed of sound without an aircraft. Then came the deafening yet reassuring sound of the passing air when he hit the troposphere where he could finally deploy his parachute for the last phase of his return voyage. Had he been dropped in a similar way onto a planet with no atmosphere he would feel no effects except possible apprehension and the all too brief planetary resistance.
So the idea that gravity is pulling us to earth is not quite correct after all; when Kittinger left his balloon he did not feel the force coming from the Earth, he did not feel the Earth pull, he did not in fact feel anything to cause acceleration and felt no acceleration. I think, as did Einstein, that gravity is a property of space and time and it is the effect that mass has on space and time that factors gravity.
A popular analogy of Einstein’s geometric gravity is to imagine space-time as a rubber matt, being bent by massive objects. This video explains this quite well along with the idea of gravitation waves – Einstein’s Gravity
This theory describes very accurately what we observe in our solar system. It is however only a description, it does not say how mass distorts space-time or what this space-time actually is. So gravity; as warps and curves in space-time, is a rather incomplete theory until it is possible to say what if anything is being warped and curved.
Space.
The substance or ether of space has long been debated by scientists. No substance has ever been found. The most famous failed attempt to prove the ether existence was the Michelson Morley experiment with their interferometer that was expecting to detect a change in the velocity of light in the direction of travel and therefore be able to calculate a velocity relative to the ether of space. The ether of space was thought to be a medium that light waves used to travel, like air is the medium through which sound waves move. It failed and it was this failure that led to the ideas for length contraction in the direction of travel and that light always travels at the same speed regardless of any velocity through space, this contradicted classical relativity. Classical relativity is explained well by this shortvideo.
Poincaré said of the ether
“Does our ether actually exist? We know the origin of our belief in the ether. If light takes several years to reach us from a distant star, it is no longer on the star, nor is it on the earth. It must be somewhere, and supported, so to speak, by some material agency."
Einstein said (at the end of a speech in 1920, Ether and the theory of Relativity)
“Recapitulating, we may say that according to the general theory of relativity space is endowed with physical qualities; in this sense, therefore, there exists an ether.According to the general theory of relativity space without ether is unthinkable; for in such space there not only would there be no propagation of light’ but also no possibility of existence for standards of space and time (measuring rods and clocks), not therefore any space-time intervals in the physical sense. But this ether may not be thought of as endowed with the quality characteristic of ponderable media, as consisting of parts which may be tracked through time. The idea of motion may not be applied to it.”
And to quote from a conclusion about space by Sir Oliver Lodge and in my opinion one of our unsung heroes of science;
“,….and every part of it must be squirming internally with the velocity of light.”
It is not just the empty void that exists between the stars and galaxies that should concern our curiosity but also all matter as the atom consists almost entirely of empty space. It is space that will endow everything with the property of size or distance.
To try and understand the properties of space and the interaction with mass I tried to imagine a space particle. I started by thinking of the most obscure particle that I could, and that in my mind is the neutrino and thought it may have some similarities. A neutrino travels through objects like our earth with impunity and has little or no effect on its motion.
So I started to think of my own imaginary particle so small that it could pass with impunity through any object as it propagated at the speed of light. So as these particles were not constantly colliding I imagined them as being mono dimensional in other words instead of unimaginably small peas I was thinking of little bars or strings with one third moving in the x dimension one third in the y dimension and one third in the z dimension. For now I will ascribe to them a size (this is a toy model of my theory to further our understanding), the smallest possible size, the planks constant. Such a particle that possesses the constant of speed and the Planks Constant that is the constant of size/volume and therefore also distance, must therefore be instrumental in the creation of time for speed is; unit of distance over the unit of time e.g. mph or km s-1. I thought of space as undetectable particles seething everywhere at the speed of light in same way as did Sir Oliver Lodge but with dimensional separation.
We now have space but travelling through space? A paradox to be resolved the same paradox as time but that is a future article.
If a percentage of these “space” or let us call them aether particles (after the ethereal air of the gods) were to disappear as they travel through the atoms of the Earth so that about one in every 2x109fail to exit then; as these particles are of space and time; the continuous deficit of particles coming up through planet Earth would mean less space-time particles closer to the Earth’s surface than further away proportional to how much of the horizon the planet takes up (this gives an inverse square law to any effect). They are the particle of distance and time, one effect is very small as you are in an area of less time and space so time will run a tiny bit slower, this is gravitational time dilation, the other effect is small but a lot more significant, there will be less distance in existence on a second by second basis in the direction of the Earth. This is not the small and subtle effect of time or space dilation for it is proportional to the speed of light, for this is gravity. The idea that there was something at the heart of an atom that could consume particles of time was a useful idea at this stage in my toy model.
When floating in space any sizable object such as a planet will cause a time/distance deficit planet side. This deficit is on-going regardless of any velocity you have directly towards the planet so a relative acceleration towards the planet will be observed but not felt. And when standing on our planet we are continuously falling through a zero distance, being held in position by the planet. The planet is continuously altering our propensity to remain in a frame of rest relative to ourselves. This will feel like a 1G acceleration force in an upwards direction because it is, in an obscure way.
Few will get this concept straight away, all the space particles that are in side of you at one moment are 186,000 miles away and scattered evenly in every direction a second later. It is not their movement that makes the effect of gravity it is there directional absence in the vicinity of and between bodies with mass.
Although I gave the aether particle a length, this length is fictitious whilst it propagates at velocity C due to the Lorentz Fitzgerald length contraction (or preferably a multi-dimensional contraction to zero size) and being mono-dimensional that makes them “imaginary” and therefore it must be their interaction with the energy that preserves our reality. I consider another imaginary particle to be the photon. It also “travels” at velocity C and that puts it in a frame of reference where time stands still for the travelling. Before a photon exists it is part of the energy of an atom. As soon as that energy is emitted, and becomes a photon it is in a frame of reference where time stands still until it is absorbed by another atom and becomes part of the energy of an atom once again. That energy never experiences being a photon for any length of time, did the photon ever exist? In our frame of reference we can only detect the energy from the photon we can never see it as a photon we can only imagine its path through space, an imaginary path is just as tangible as a real path as space is also an imaginary media and we can assume this path to be real as in for instance our concepts in optics. Put our hand in front of our laser pointer and we can predict we will see a red dot. The photon must exist we see the evidence in the form of energy in our eyes but I think we should consider the photon particle as an imaginary one for the photon is only in space for a length of our time and for a zero length of the photon’s time. In the frame of reference of the photon it is only a particle but in our reference frame where time has a relevance it arrives as a wave, a wave through something that is imaginary. Uncertainty is the product of trying to merge the frames of reference as they cannot co-exist. The aether particle is an imaginary one that we cannot see and only exists as a type of aether particle, is the photon carried by one of these eather particles or is a photon one of them along with anything else with luminal velocity?
In my other article Dark Flow and the Expanding Universe I explained how all distances can be thought of as the product of past time. We now have a conflict with the idea that a small amount of the particles of time and distance somehow disappear as they permeate at the speed of light through objects with mass. I then realized that I was thinking of it the wrong way around! To have an existence in reality all matter produces these imaginary eather particles the particle of time and distance and they permeate the whole of space expanding the universe evenly. None are ever lost for they are the past, and all distances. Because mass needs to be accelerating slowly through time and distance (space-time) to produce space-time it is producing it ever slower than the mass of the past. Locally there is always less time and distance in the direction of a body of mass where time runs slower creating the gravity effect. On a universal scale the universe has to be for ever expanding. Space-time then has a duality as it expands the universe and creates the gravity that holds things in orbit etc.
This duality explains how the galaxy works as an entity. Localised gravity accounts for the falling apples and planetary orbits. Star formation will naturally occur where the local gravity effect is in equilibrium with universal effect of expansion motion. You can imagine this as a kind or stationary or non-orbital Lagrange point. Chaotic effects and galactic mergers account for binary stars etc. To understand the movement of the stars around the central super-massive black hole we have to understand how a black hole effect there surroundings.
Gravitationally a stellar black hole will have the same effect on its surroundings as a large star of at least 3 to 4 solar masses. They could in theory at least hold planets in orbit around them. Such a planetary system would be very hard to find with no light to illuminate the cold planets and no starlight to be interrupted by the transit of such stars. In this next thought experiment I will be falling into a black hole that is not accreting other mass and so has no frame dragging going on. Think of me floating through space in the vicinity of the black hole or dropped near there like Joe Kittinger jumping to earth from his giant helium balloon. As future time and distance is always less; directionally towards the black hole singularity; I increase my velocity relative to the position that I would perceive this black hole to be. Just like Joe I feel no acceleration. This time there is no gas to offer any resistance or surface to hit. There would seem nothing to limit my increasing relative velocity. As my velocity increases I become smaller in all three dimensions. All the heat in my body would be occupying a smaller and smaller place dimensionally. Although I am not being compressed like a gas in a pump I would nonetheless get hotter just as if I was under pressure. This is the exact opposite to what was happening to the hot gas in the radiation epoch of the early universe where the gas cooled (where the gas was dimensionally bigger in a universe that was spatially smaller but always infinite). As I get closer to the event horizon I would get hotter and more dense but with no spaghettification. I would undergo the same nuclear reactions as a collapsing star producing huge (comparatively) amounts of EM radiation and other particles with some going over the event horizon and some escaping.
During this decent as I increased velocity and I became dimensionally smaller all distances except to the invisible black hole would become greater. The stars would appear as if they were deserting me. As time for me slows down I do not see time elsewhere in the universe speed up after all it is the relative distances that are changing, that preserves the “now moment in time” (this phrase will be in a future article as part of a greater theory). As I approach the event horizon the stars will rush away to an infinite distance, the stars see me slow down towards the event horizon and disappear. At the singularity I am at the same singularity as all black holes. Time stands still at a black hole and so a black hole does not contribute to the expansion of the universe it has in its frame of reference already done so. The super-massive black hole at the centre of our galaxy has a more or less equal gravitational effect on all but the closes stars. This is a one way effect and it is this that creates the unexpected fixed wheel like motion of stars in our galaxy. If this is correct then there is no need for the illusive, abstruse dark matter to maintain this type of galactic motion.
To recapitulate thenthe duality of the gravity effect as a lack of future distances on a second per second basis causes a space-time deficit in the direction of a body of mass butis past space-time and so expands the universe as a whole. As I put the notion under the microscope. I realised that black holes do not poses this duality as time there does not exist and although on average the super-massive black holes’ in the centre of our and most galaxies only account for 2% of the total galactic mass the effect is only one that is apparently attractive. It is in fact just a total lack of future space-time coming from the direction of the super-massive black hole, and to anything that is traveling through time this is the same as a real attractive force on a per second per second basis.
