Jokodo
Veteran Member
@untermensche - does it ever bother you that the exact same reasoning you're demonstrating here can be used to support a flat earth, by just exchanging a few words?
You don't. The past exists as part of the space-time continuum. Or more precisely: there isn't even such a thing as the past. There are only points in spacetime. Which of those appear to be synchronous (and therefore part of a (not the) present is a matter of perspective. An event that appears to be in the past for an earth based observer may be in the present or future from the perspective of another observer.
Asking "how do you return to a past that doesn't exist" is like asking "how do you go to the bottom of the world and not fall off?"
Not anymore than thinking that you can descend to the bottom of the world requires believing that they have a gravity-reversal apparatus in Australia. You objection only makes sense if we accept as fact that there is universal linear time, just like mine only makes sense if we accept that there is a universal "down".
To believe that Australians have a gravity-reversal engine is not a rational belief. To believe that they'd need one in the first place in order not to fall of is symptomatic of an understanding of the surface of the Earth, and the concepts of "up" and "down", that's over 2000 years out of date. Similarly believing that a past is "stored somehow" may well be irrational, but claiming that this is a prerequisite for time travel is symptomatic of an understanding of the nature of space-time, of the past, present and future, that's over 100 years out of date.
Present, past and future are no more universal than up and down. In order to demonstrate that the earth is not flat, it is sufficient to show that Vienna's "Up" is off 4.3° from Munich's "Up". A "slightly bumpy" present is all that's needed to discard linear absolute time, just like a slightly off "Up" is all that's needed to discard the idea of a universal up and down.
That's true, given our current technology. Until the telephone was invented, it was also true that two observers talking to each other necessarily had the same "Up", to within the measurement error. We can't shout loud enough to be heard on the other side of the globe, or even just a couple dozen miles away, and we can't travel fast enough for relativistic effects to become massive. That's on us though, not on the universe. Two observers standing at opposite ends of my backyard have pretty much the same "Up" and the same "Down" even today. That doesn't exactly prove the earth is flat. And neither does time looking very similar for any two human observers who communicate with each other using current technology while both sit on (and travel with) the earth, solar system, milky way on its path through the universe show that time is in fact linear and absolute.
It's evidence that "the" present doesn't exist.
Sure, and if I demonstrate you that the curvature of the Earth is measurable even between Vienna and Munich, you're going to tell me the surface is just bumby, that's not evidence that Australians have gravity-reversal technology?
You don't. The past exists as part of the space-time continuum. Or more precisely: there isn't even such a thing as the past. There are only points in spacetime. Which of those appear to be synchronous (and therefore part of a (not the) present is a matter of perspective. An event that appears to be in the past for an earth based observer may be in the present or future from the perspective of another observer.
Asking "how do you return to a past that doesn't exist" is like asking "how do you go to the bottom of the world and not fall off?"
Not anymore than thinking that you can descend to the bottom of the world requires believing that they have a gravity-reversal apparatus in Australia. You objection only makes sense if we accept as fact that there is universal linear time, just like mine only makes sense if we accept that there is a universal "down".
To believe that Australians have a gravity-reversal engine is not a rational belief. To believe that they'd need one in the first place in order not to fall of is symptomatic of an understanding of the surface of the Earth, and the concepts of "up" and "down", that's over 2000 years out of date. Similarly believing that a past is "stored somehow" may well be irrational, but claiming that this is a prerequisite for time travel is symptomatic of an understanding of the nature of space-time, of the past, present and future, that's over 100 years out of date.
Present, past and future are no more universal than up and down. In order to demonstrate that the earth is not flat, it is sufficient to show that Vienna's "Up" is off 4.3° from Munich's "Up". A "slightly bumpy" present is all that's needed to discard linear absolute time, just like a slightly off "Up" is all that's needed to discard the idea of a universal up and down.
That's true, given our current technology. Until the telephone was invented, it was also true that two observers talking to each other necessarily had the same "Up", to within the measurement error. We can't shout loud enough to be heard on the other side of the globe, or even just a couple dozen miles away, and we can't travel fast enough for relativistic effects to become massive. That's on us though, not on the universe. Two observers standing at opposite ends of my backyard have pretty much the same "Up" and the same "Down" even today. That doesn't exactly prove the earth is flat. And neither does time looking very similar for any two human observers who communicate with each other using current technology while both sit on (and travel with) the earth, solar system, milky way on its path through the universe show that time is in fact linear and absolute.
It's evidence that "the" present doesn't exist.
Sure, and if I demonstrate you that the curvature of the Earth is measurable even between Vienna and Munich, you're going to tell me the surface is just bumby, that's not evidence that Australians have gravity-reversal technology?
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