Re: Have you ever wondered.....
From: AllYou! (idaman_at_conversent.net)
Date: 12/02/04
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Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 08:35:02 -0500
"Kees Roos" <croos@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:41af023b$0$37789$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl...
> Excuse me for the delay. Had visitors.
> "AllYou!" <idaman@conversent.net> schreef in bericht
> news:cuadnYxE8v5r-DHcRVn-iA@conversent.net...
> >
> > "Kees Roos" <croos@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
> > news:41ac37a1$0$566$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl...
> >> "AllYou!" <idaman@conversent.net> schreef in bericht
> >> news:Lb6dnaiKa-FuGjbcRVn-og@conversent.net...
> >> The size and scope of our discussion is ever increasing.
> >> To keep things manageable, I have shipped parts, and
> >> kept two things which I think we can settle first:
> >
> > That's fine by me. The incessant parsing of my comments is what got us
> > there. To comment
> > on each paragraph is fine, but on each sentence fragment?
> >
> >> -In physics, time is no longer connected to any motion
> >
> > You've actually touched on an important point here. What does it tell you
> > that even
> > before the discovery of the black box, time was still taken in science as
> > it is now?
> >
> I am not sure that I understand this sentence. By 'black box', are you
> referring to an atomic clock? It does not tell me anything that the concept
> of time has not changed since the introduction of the atomic clocks.
> It was a change of the way in which we calibrate clocks when we changed
> the definition of the time unit from a fraction of the time of one rotation
> of
> the earth, to a number of oscilation periods of a very specific frequency
> of photons emitted by a very specific process.
> The need was there because it had become apparent that the earth's rotation
> is irregular and deteriorating. The specific process we chose is regular and
> constant as far as we know. The thing we are measuring is the same thing.
> The change is equivalent to: We don't any longer measure objects by counting
> lengths of actual human feet any longer, but we use a measuring tape
> instead.
> What we measure is the same thing, we use a more accurate means of
> measuring.
Then why did you shift focus to the black box? Yes, by black box I mean the atomic clock
because you cannot say with any degree of certainty that it's not motion or a phenomena
equivalent to motion which tiggers the generation of events. If it's only a better
clibration standard, then you should have no problem staying with old fashion mechanical
clocks in which we're reasonably sure are driven by motion. so not only were you never
able to say with any degree of reasonableness that "In physics, time is no longer
connected to any motion", but now we know it shouldn't matter.
>
> >The
> > same fantasy was still there. But more importantly, I'll express what I
> > said previously:
> > I'm hypothesizing that either motion or a phenomenon equivalent to motion
> > is causing the
> > black box to tick, or, alternatively, that which you use for your clock,
> > the frequency
> > emitted, is at the heart of your clock.
> >
> Your first alternative is irrelevant, your second is true. What we use to
> calibrate the clock is the frequency.
The frequency of a wave? The point is that whatever generates the events is not time.
Time does not generate the events. The interval between two points in space, that
distance, is a quantity of space. The interval between two ticks on a mechanical clock is
a quantity of motion, and the interval between two ticks of an atomic clock may be motion
and may be something else, but just because you don't know what it is does not allow you
to brand it time and move on. Stop there and figure out what it is, but you've got no
evidence to support that it's time when you've got no evidence to support that you've ever
observed any physical trait of time before.
[snip]
> > What I'm doing a lousy job of articulating is that some natural, physical
> > phenomenon is
> > what is causing the clock to tick. With old fashion mechanical clocks, it
> > was motion.
> > With your black boxes, it may be motion, it may be something equivalent to
> > motion, or it
> > may be some yet to be explained phenomenon. But no matter, something
> > particle or energy
> > related is causing it to happen. There is a definite cause. Whatever
> > that is, we can use
> > that phenomenon, or another such as motion, as the benchmark or the index
> > by which we can
> > order all other events is history.
> >
> I think that the conceptual error you make is that you think that
> physical properties of a measuring device make a difference on the
> thing you measure with it.
No I don't. I understand, for instance, that the physical properties of a mercury
thermometer have nothing to do with temperture but simply react to changes in heat. No
problem. But with the thermometer, I can also see that there's a valid theory that links
the behaviour of the fluid in it to changes in temperature. but where is the theory,
other than a blind assertion, that links a clock, any clock, to the passage of time?
> Of course there is a physical cause that a clock, any clock, does what
> it does, and how it does that.
> However, let's suppose we simultaneously measure a particular time
> interval (or 'motion interval' as you would probably want to formulate it)
> with all different kinds of clocks we have available, and let's suppose that
> they are all accurate, so they all give the same result. Can you claim that
> that particular result has any special relation to anything which has
> happened in any one or more particular clock(s) out of all the clocks used
> in the experiment?
No, and I wouldn't want to. I guess I miss your point. In fact, I think you may be
making mine.
> Why not another thing, which has happened in any
> other one or more of the clocks used? Why anything at all which has
> happened in one or more of the clocks?
Again, your point escapes me. I'm not even sure what you're asking.
> As I have said earlier in our discussions, I think it would be theoretically
> possible to use motion as a calibrating unit for time measurements, but
> the practical difficulty is that we have never been able to find any form
> of physical motion which satisfies the first criteria of regularity and
> constancy. That's why motion was abandoned and a motionless process
> was found.
I have no objection to shifting away from motion to calibrate or clocks. I'm not
convinced that there is anything else, but it wouldn't bother me if there were. But
whatever that is, it would have the same priority in science in that it would be a natural
phenomenon and so claiming it as time would still be invalid.
> However, keep in mind that all this is about calibrating clocks, not about
> what clocks measure, which for the time being (no pun!) is called
> 'time'.
Where's the theory that links the behavior of any clock to the notion you call time? I
can see the link with every other instrument which measures every other phenomena, but I
don't see that link in the case of time. All I see is a blind assertion.
> To give a parallel about measuring the size of objects, which you find
> less perplexing:
> The size of an object is independent of any properties of the measuring
> device you use, whether it be a physical foot, a measuring tape, a
> caliper, a rolling wheel or any other device which yields the correct value.
> Actually presently the most accurate spatial measurements are made
> by means of no physical object at all, but electromagnetic radiation
> instead.
Fair enough. and with each of these, either we use direct comparison of a calibrated
quantity of the phenomenon we're measuring with that to be measured, or we're using an
instrument, combined with a theory of what makes it work as it does in response to the
phenomenon we're measuring so that we can make sense of the output of that measurement.
So tell me how either of these is accomplished with time?
> >> -What comprises simple observation, space first.
> >
> > I don't know what this means.
> >
> Actually, the part you snipped was my first instalment covering the topic.
> That I choose space first is because I want to show you that the concept
> 'space' is just as abstract as the concept 'time'
I can sense space. I receive sensory impulses that confirm the phenomena of space. I
receive no such sensory impulses from time.
>
> I repost that part of my article:
> >> > What this all amounts to is that you've got a
> >> > spacetime continuum but in space you've got a property that is physical
> >> > and observable and
> >> > can be described and is measurable.
> >> >
> >> You relate to the property of spatial extent. Could you try to give a
> >> description
> >> of spatial extent without referring to a measuring device?
> >
> > I know that space is physical because the interval between two spatial
> > points is
> > observable with my sense of sight,
> >
> Would that be true if there would be no visible objects at those
> spatial locations?
First of all, if there were no visible objects, then there would be no points in space for
me to evaluate and so you're asking a hypothetical question here is already flawed.
Points with no objects to define them are pure imagination. I didn't claim that I could
observe every instance of space, but just that the phenomena or property of nature called
space is observable.
>
> > And I do
> > I really have to
> > show you yet again how it's measurable?
> >
> No, please don't. I asked for a description, without referring to any
> measuring device.
> So please don't try to show how you would measure it, because that
> would introduce a measuring device, which I specifically asked to avoid.
>
> So far you have said that you can see it and you can feel it, which I very
> much doubt, but the description is still to come.
> You say 'there is a thing which I can see and feel'. My question is:
> Give me a description of that thing.
>
> Example: Suppose I ask you to describe an elephant.
> Your above description amounts to: 'An elephant is a thing which I can
> see and feel.'
> The kind of description I am after is: 'An elephant is a thing with a trunk
> up front and legs at four corners and a tail at the backside, etc. ...'
> See the difference?
>
> End of repost.
You wanted to regroup and now you're going back to a post I can't even find much less
figure out what it is you want a description of. I think it's space. Yes, space is the
property of the physical realm which allows for the occurrence of all matter and energy.
It is that which is sensed when observing the occurrence of any physical object or the
potential for the occurrence of a physical object. Or were you asking about motion?
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