michel123456

Is that too confusing? In the diagram, the only measurement is time. Speed is known. Distance is calculated on the basis of speed by time. The question is: what have we measured?

So when I measure a distance, I measure 2 things? Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged I don't think so. I don't know how to explain my thoughts. The laser beam is an example. If you replace the laser beam with a solid steel beam, you should obtain the same result, because inside the beam, the matter that makes the beam, cannot interact with itself faster than C. So if you had to measure the steel beam, you would measure the diagonal.

Chanel No 5. Why don't you close such threads?

Here a new one: There is a very long table top, going from A to B, we want to measure. We are standing at point A. We putted a laser at point B, and we will measure the time elapsed for the beam until it reaches us in order to calculate the length of the table. At time zero, we are at point A, the laser emits a light beam from B. The light beam travels through space & time and reaches us 2 seconds later. We are now at point A' (same location in space, 2 seconds later), the edge of the table is at point B' (same location than B, 2 seconds later). What have we measured? I guess the A' B diagonal. Something we could say as "6*10^8meters and 2 seconds"

Well, maybe (surely) I am the one confusing things. If you read again the thread from the beginning, you may notice I am not talking about moving objects. The difference is not due to different locations. It is due to the time light takes to travel. When I take examples as stars or distant objects, I understand it is confusing. But I am only examining objects that don't move in regard to each other. Like a cup of tea standing at the edge of a table 600.000 km long. I have to completely rethink my last diagram I guess, and change the presentation. Working on it. Waiting for further comments. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergeddiscarding the precedent diagram

Is that the arrow I putted on the Y axis that makes the diagram flawed? B' is in the past. I cannot change that. The observation of B from A is confusing. in fact, a ray of light goes from B' to A. So the Arrow on the Y axis is wrong. O.K.? or is there anything else?

It is not clear to me if we understand each other. My intention was to make clear that in each measurement of distance, there is a part of space, and there is a part of time. In other words, in each measurement of distance, time is included. Here below a simple diagram to explain what I mean. Taking only points A, B, and B'. A is the observation point, B is an object, and B' is the point where the object was 2 seconds ago.(the numbers are taken only for clear understanding). Here we are: The measured distance is AB'. The astronomer is aware of the phenomena, and makes a correction in order to estimate the AB distance, the correct one, where B is supposed to be at present time. No problem, no mistakes. As far as I can understand, that means that, in the AB' measurement, there is a part of the "real distance", wich is the AS segment, and a "correction part" due to the time elapsed, that is the SB' segment. So we have a "space part" and a correction "time part". We can see on the diagram that the "space part" (distance AS) is much bigger than the "time part" (the SB' distance). And really, if you had to measure a closer object , like your cup of tea, you would see that the "space part" of the measured distance is huge, about 99,999999999%, and the "time part" would be negligible, about 0.000000001%, maybe less. Please it is time to correct me if any mistakes, because there is a development.

Don't take me wrong. Surely reality is relative. I guess more relative than we can imagine. More relative than Relativity.

Haha. Photons have no rest mass, but they have mass when moving. They cannot stand at rest, so "rest mass" for a photon is meaningless. So, because they cannot stand still, they do have mass, but no they don't. Very simple. "Gravity bends space", so space has mass. Hum.???? wrong. Sorry. Have you ever made a Mass/Speed diagram ? Mass increases with speed. But speed is frame-dependent. So Mass is frame-dependent too. Rubbish. No it is not. Oh come-on.

My point of vue is that ST is very (very) interesting. There are some conceptual problems that make this Theory difficult to spread. But I think those can be managed. For example, Pykawit is proposing spheres. Don't forget that we are talking about fundamental elements. How could be a fundamental element a sphere, a 3d construction ? There is a contradiction, IMO, what is the sphere made of? Some other, smaller elements? It is a never ending story. The regular concept consists on finding a fundamental element (particle) that is like a geometrical point without dimension. Result of Democritos concept. String theorists make a step further, introducing fundamental elements of 1d, kind of geometrical segments. Objects that have one dimension in opposition with points that have no dimension. I think this step was inevitable from the moment we accept the concepts of quanta, the Planck length & the Planck time. Because those concepts are simply saying that null distance (a point) is physically meaningless. So that Democritos quest is ending somewhere before reaching a point. The surprising thing is that, instead of diminishing the number of dimensions in order to present only one dimension (a line), ST presents an increasing number of dimensions. That is quite bad. But I think that can be managed too. All the difficulty is in the definition of the word "dimension". All String theorists (not those on the beaches looking with binoculars: those in universities) are supposing that all extra dimensions must be spatial ones. These are the Calabi-Yau manifolds. What is a "dimension" really? I suspect there is a misunderstanding there. In my opinion, of course.

I hope we made an agreement, supposing that you have understood what I meant, and reversely, having understood what you meant. So, the question remains: when you measure a distance, is the measurement you take upon the ABCD plane, or on the diagonal ? It has been answered that "the distance doesn't involve time." And yes, of course, by definition, it is right. But what about the measurement of the distance? I really don't know if the difference is clear. One thing is the distance as defined mathematically, the other is the measurement. Be careful that in science, measurement equals observational evidence.

Hum, pause. You said No. Sorry for being abrupt. Everything I see is in the past. It may look weird but think about it twice. Choose a target. You want to go to the Moon. Or to the kitchen. Look at the kitchen door, which is about 5 meters from you. The door you are looking at is some micro-seconds in the past because the image of the door needed some time to reach your eyes. For simplicity, let's say the door is 5 microseconds from you (in reality it is much less). You make one step in direction of the kitchen, and the door is now at 4 microseconds from you. Another step, the door is three microseconds from you, and so on, till you reach the door, at zero microseconds from you. O.K.? The door that you saw, the target, is not in the future. You just made a construction in your mind putting this door as your target, a meeting point in the future. But the observed object was in the past. Everything we observe belongs to the past. Nothing observable in the future. And, what is most astonishing, nothing observable in the present.

Hello-o. Is there anybody? I feel quite alone with my pencil. Do I have to ask a question in order to take some comment? (that was a question). Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedWell, most probably, there is an error. From the right beginning. From the first diagram. Why that? It looks so simple. And it looks quite well to a simplified Minkowski diagram. What is wrong? Look: The vertical axis representing Time is the representation of the value of time (seconds). It is a representation used formally in mathematics to represent functions. The horizontal axis is representing the projection of 3d space upon a line. It is geometrical representation. To see the difference, you can for example put positive & negative sign upon the vertical axis, something you do upon a mathematical diagram. On the horizontal axis, you cannot do that. The left & right instance indicates a direction, not plus/minus. You can put for example East & West right & left. Then you obtain a bizarre hybrid diagram. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged

You'll have to rewrite your script so it fits in a few days or years.

Silly question: what is its value? .............. Wait a moment. Are you saying that this a(t) factor can be interpretated as acting upon time? Instead acting upon space?

The "at rest" situation is the most bizarre. All you physics books, from the right beginning, are interested in motion. When you ask someone what happens at rest, he will answer you that to be at rest or to be in motion is just a matter of Frame Of Reference. So, instead of postulating that A is moving, I can postulate that A is at rest. In this case, I know what FOR to choose, it is the FOR of point A itself. Examining what happens in this specific situation (a examing himself), we can see that "something" is happening. That "something" is what we call "time". And if we exclude all the metaphysical and philosophical blah blah, we can see that the situation of being "at rest" is simply a translation in time. Exactly similar to motion. Except that in this case, it is not motion in space, but "motion in time", a concept that has IMO no specific name in physics. Wow, that was a long disgression. You are in Galileo's workshop, with Isaac and Albert. What an opportunity. Let's see what they are discussing. They are examining Galileo's balls. Spheres. He has fabricated three spheres of exactly same radius, but of different mass. The one is in wood, the second in bronze, the third in polypropylene. You are presenting the above diagram you borrowed from this forum, and ask Galileo to represent one of his sphere. The greatest mind of all times (Galileo), draws the following diagram: fig.01 Isaac ,the greatest mind of all times, takes a look and understand immediately that Galileo is not used to this kind of representation. He says, sorry Master, I think I can make some improvement to this representation. The sphere you know as a 3 dimensionnal object cannot simply be drawn this way, because the 3d space has been reduced to a single line. So the entire volume of the sphere must be reduced to a segment. And, as I have shown in my Theory (have you read it?) the entire mass of the sphere can be represented as if it where concentrated into its center of mass. As a matter of consequence, the sphere must be represented as follows: fig.02 Albert, the greatest mind of all times, takes a look at Isaac's drawing. Well, this is surely an improvement, my dear Isaac, but you forgot Time. In my Theory (have you read it?) nothing can travel faster than C. In order to be accurate, independently of the size of the sphere, be it a small wooden sphere in a laboratory, or a huge planet, the principle is the same. In regard with an observator standing at point A of the diagram, the existence of the sphere takes place both in space & in time, because time & space are a continuum. So that the sphere should be represented extending in the past as follows: fig.03 Galileo is surprised, but the greatest mind of all times understands everything. Something bothers him. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedTo be continued.

Exactly. Yes & no. Yes it is inaccurate in the sense that the star is not where it appears to be, as you said, see my comment below. And No, because we can make quite accurate mesurement of distance to the star as we observe it at point B'. Yes. But in the verb "is" you mean "is at present time".It looks self evident, but it is not. In fact, what happens is that the star was at point B' (belonging to the past), and at present time, the star is somewhere else. A is yourself, the observator, it is the point of your own FOR. The measurement AB' is valuable only for you. In order to figure out where B is, you have to apply a projection of your measurement upon the ABCD plane. Projection means geometry, and for each geometry, for each Theory, you will obtain a different position of B, and a different AB distance. According to the Standard Model , the projection is not orthogonal, due to the expansion of the Universe. The AB distance is estimated as a multiple of the AB' measurement.(about 6 times larger, if I recall well) Sort of. All the above concerning the star position is exactly the same as concerning your cup of tea. There is no scaling in Relativity that changes the Theory in regard with dimension. The Theory is the same for big & for small: a reason why there is no common understanding with Quantum Mechanics. The fact that there is no scaling in Relativity makes me think that what is true for a star must be true for a cup of tea as well. In other words, as I mentionned before, when you measure the distance from yourself to your cup of tea, even with a solid iron stick, the measured distance is always the AB' diagonal. But I may be wrong on this. Some interaction with other forum members should be good here.

I admire your cold blood. "Creation Museum"??????? From the Museum' web entry page: "Welcome and Prepare to Believe The state-of-the-art 70,000 square foot museum brings the pages of the Bible to life, casting its characters and animals in dynamic form and placing them in familiar settings. Adam and Eve live in the Garden of Eden. Children play and dinosaurs roam near Eden’s Rivers. The serpent coils cunningly in the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Majestic murals, great masterpieces brimming with pulsating colors and details, provide a backdrop for many of the settings." Is this a joke? I thought I had to protect myself from such elucubrations coming from the East, I couldn't figure I had to care for the West too.

There are 2 meanings. 1.First go back to the first diagram, This kind of diagram you will find in any school book about the difference between distance & displacement. This is such a basic I don't want to go futher in. See for example here:http://physics.info/displacement/ You will observe that the concept of Time is absent. For an object travelling upon the path ABCD, distance is a certain amount of space (measured in meters or feet) and displacement is null. But once you introduce the time axis, you realize that some "displacement" has been taken place. This is not a regular displacement, because the word "displacement" we learn at school means displacement "in space". The new "displacement" takes place in time, and should be called otherwise, to eliminate any ambiguity. So in other words, all the above has been set up only to show what happens when the concept of time is introduced. 2.About my last question concerning the distance from a star. Take the second diagram & eliminate everything.Except point A, point B, and point B'. If B is a star, the only way you have to measure its distance from you is through its EM radiation that is subjected to the restrictions of Speed Of Light. The star in point B, is not observed at point B, but at point B'. And the distance measured is of course the AB' distance. There is no doubt about it, and anyone having some basic information in astronomy will explain that better than I do. The question was meant only to introduce a doubt and make people think. Point B' may not be a star, the diagram has no scale. It may be the cup of tea upon your desk. And in this case too, the distance measured is also the diagonal AB'. It is always the diagonal AB' ,if you accept the cornerstone of Relativity i.e. that C is absolute & nothing can travel faster than C. In this case, if I am right, the measured distance is never the AB distance. But I may be wrong.

What language? Most of the times you are just scr... Large embassies have translations departments, some have scientific department. But it is a painful procedure. Sometimes, the author of the paper has already made a translation in english. Go to the source & try to reach him. Russians may answer, and Chinese. German & French are usually too proud to go into such an humiliation (translating).

I can't argue with anything you said. We have reached a 100% agreement. Now, if B' were a star, and if we were standing at point A.... The ray of light coming from B' travels at SOL, both in time & space, along the red line. I suppose you agree. Where is the distance? Or in other words, measuring the redshift of B', are we measuring a distance upon the red trajectory, or its projection upon the ABCD plane?

Martin, my photo has been taken today with a VLT focusing on a point 41 LY from us. No kidding, on the picture I am about 8 years old. Today I am 49. I am architect, no physicist, quite far from my standard occupation. I won't tell you the story of my life. Some other time maybe. I like your posts because they are quite (not nervous), coherent and full of content. Back to the point. I didn't expect anything of what you said. I was waiting for something like the Scale Factor. Correct me, but the expansion of space is often mentionned as a "scale factor", which is a very weird and difficult concept for common people. The scale factor is this instance related to "increasing-distance-due-to-the-expansion-of-space-without-motion". I have to admit I have lost exactly the point I wanted to raise. My mind goes at speed near to C and my typing like a snail. There is so much to say. I think that this search for immobility is wrong. Also I think that Newton was more relativist than Einstein, and if Isaac was still there, he would laugh at us. Also I am sure that something is wrong at the basis of our understanding of physics. Not being a physicist, I am "Out of the dance" (as we say in Greek), so I can throw ideas freely. Ridicule does not reach me. Ah, I am Belgian french-speaking, I live & work in Greece now than 25 years. I speak & write fluent Greek language. I have 2 eyes, a mouth, etc. I like beer (belgian beer of course). Genealogically speaking, I am your cousin. And I can follow what you wrote about CMB.

Here is a new Universe for thinking about in 2010. Wishing everybody all the best. We begin with a simple diagram (i love that): fig.01 We are living in Space at Present Time: the red spot in the center. the universe is there around us. Where is it? We know that all that we can observe belong to the Past.We cannot observe events from the future, and Relativity says that we cannot see anything from the present either, because information is always transmitted at speed max=C. So here is the Observable Universe: fig.02 Great. But, wait a moment: The Universe, by definition, must belong to Present Space, isn't it? So, the "real" present Universe must be as indicated in the following diagram: fig.03 As if the "real" Universe was standing perfectly at rest in present time. A screenshot of the Universe. A solid block in which nothing can happen, like a piece of wood. The Pencil Universe: fig.03 And what we are observing of this Universe, is a broken pencil. Like this: Now, imagine yourself looking at yourself, there exactly where you stand, what do you expect to see? A broken piece of the universe.