You find yourself in the cretaceous

[Jokodo]

Like a god.

I don't know, I feel it rather takes considering yourself a God to conclude reality ends at the edge of your visual field.

As soon as you show me any observer that can pick up the broken glass whole you have a point.

Reality is not what I can observe.

It is what is possible for any observer to observe.

It is obviously possible for Lincoln's contemporaries to observe Lincoln, so that makes a living Lincoln real, unless you add another stipulation. Like that the observers' coordinates have to have the same t-value as yours, as measured in your reference frame. If we add such a stipulation, why not add the stipulation that the observer needs to be a at a similar longitude to yours and conclude that the sun actually disappears in the night? The only difference is that you have decided to accept that reality extends to points in spacetime that are obscured by the body of the earth but not to points that are obscured by our perception of time.

Reality is that which could possibly be observed or detected in some way.

The past can be observed and detected in many ways. So the past is real?

No observer can go back and observe Lincoln without changing reality.

And no observer of Lincoln exists anymore.

Are you sure about that? Lincoln died 156 years ago. Several species of vertrebrates are known to reach ages between 200 and 450 years.

 

[Bomb#20]

What do you mean by look inside the past? If you mean to look at Andromeda is to see it as it was 2.5 million years ago that's no different than watching reruns of MASH. It's a record of the past as it exists in the present.

I.e., the photons from Andromeda are floating along in space like videotapes, exerting fluctuating electric and magnetic fields on empty space 500 trillion times during each elapsed second, just waiting for some atoms to get in their way and absorb them? That's a very classical-mechanics way of looking at it. According to relativity, no time passes for the photon between emission and absorption. The entire universe is relativistically foreshortened to zero along the Andromeda-Earth axis, since the photon is moving at the speed of light, so the emission in Andromeda and the absorption in a human retina occur at the same location. And as far as I understand, according to quantum electrodynamics the emission and the absorption are the same event.

Relativity is a mathematical representation of reality. Its equations can be rendered graphically. At each point on that graph you can calculate a tangent and a slope. Space-time is thus said to be curved with a particular rate of change associated with each point. And the curve differs depending on the perspective of the observer. (I think that's about right.)

Yes; but I'm not seeing how a curved mathematical representation could be such a good representation unless reality itself is curved too.

Of course showing that the universe needs to store at least a few hours of Andromeda's past in order to make sense of our observations doesn't imply every configuration of the universe is stored. ...

What observations are you citing?

Just all the usual observations that imply the universe is relativistic, from the Michelson-Morley experiment to satellite frame-dragging measurements.

These observations appear to imply that an event in Andromeda in the present of one Earth observer can have happened four hours ago in the present of a different Earth observer. As far as I can see, to assume that the event is actually gone from the universe is to assume the observer who calculates that it's in the present is simply wrong. And to assume one observer can be right but the other is wrong is to assume that an observer who's right is in a preferred reference frame -- the universe's one reference frame that's real among an infinity of illusory ones -- which would mean the universe contains such a thing as absolute simultaneity. It's a picture of time physicists discarded a hundred years ago. The only way I can see for both observers to be right is for the truth to be something along the lines of the concept of block space-time that you say you don't believe in.

I want you to tell me what time it is in Andromeda right now. How much time has passed in Andromeda between that gamma ray burst and the slice of Andromeda's timeline that you think actually exists, because it isn't in Andromeda's past or in its future? ...

I believe that can be calculated using the equations of special and general relativity whether you are on one side of the Earth or the other. The results will be the same when the conditions of the observers are taken into account.

That's just another way to say each observer can calculate how it will seem to the other. It won't tell them whose perspective is real and whose is an illusion.

 

[untermensche]

As soon as you show me any observer that can pick up the broken glass whole you have a point.

Reality is not what I can observe.

It is what is possible for any observer to observe.

It is obviously possible for Lincoln's contemporaries to observe Lincoln, so that makes a living Lincoln real, unless you add another stipulation. Like that the observers' coordinates have to have the same t-value as yours, as measured in your reference frame. If we add such a stipulation, why not add the stipulation that the observer needs to be a at a similar longitude to yours and conclude that the sun actually disappears in the night? The only difference is that you have decided to accept that reality extends to points in spacetime that are obscured by the body of the earth but not to points that are obscured by our perception of time.

It is not possible for people that no longer exist to observe anything.

Find me an observer that can observe Lincoln and you are not some insane crank.

The past can be observed and detected in many ways. So the past is real?

No observer can observe anything except energy hitting their eyes in the present.

No observer can observe the past.

Your ideas are insane.

Are you sure about that? Lincoln died 156 years ago. Several species of vertrebrates are known to reach ages between 200 and 450 years.

An observer is only known to be an observer based on what they can report or record.

Show me some vertebrate that tells you they observed Lincoln so you know such a thing exists.

Your ideas are insane.

 

[skepticalbip]

... snip ....

That's just another way to say each observer can calculate how it will seem to the other. It won't tell them whose perspective is real and whose is an illusion.

My understanding is that both perspectives are real and neither is an illusion for the person making the observation.

 

[skepticalbip]

It is not possible for people that no longer exist to observe anything.

Find me an observer that can observe Lincoln and you are not some insane crank.

The past can be observed and detected in many ways. So the past is real?

No observer can observe anything except energy hitting their eyes in the present.

No observer can observe the past.

You are an insane crank.

Are you sure about that? Lincoln died 156 years ago. Several species of vertrebrates are known to reach ages between 200 and 450 years.

An observer is only known to be an observer based on what they can report or record.

Show me some vertebrate that tells you they observed Lincoln so you know such a thing exists.

You insane crank.

Just because you can't understand spacetime and relativity is no reason to resort to personal attacks.

Personal attacks are a violation of the terms of use.

 

[untermensche]

Two people looking at the same thing have two different perspectives of it.

It is all about the limitations and uniqueness of a single observer.

Not about the past existing eternally.

 

[untermensche]

It is not possible for people that no longer exist to observe anything.

Find me an observer that can observe Lincoln and you are not some insane crank.



No observer can observe anything except energy hitting their eyes in the present.

No observer can observe the past.





An observer is only known to be an observer based on what they can report or record.

Show me some vertebrate that tells you they observed Lincoln so you know such a thing exists.

Just because you can't understand spacetime and relativity is no reason to resort to personal attacks.

Personal attacks are a violation of the terms of use.

You are the only person posting those words. You should stop it.

It is an observation based on insane fanciful ideas.

Your claims that Relativity tells us anything more than what will happen in the future is wrong.

What is your evidence?

Thinking an observer can observe the past is insane. To believe it is like believing in the gods.

A mild form of insanity called faith. Belief in things where there is no evidence.

 

[Jokodo]

It is not possible for people that no longer exist to observe anything.

Find me an observer that can observe Lincoln and you are not some insane crank.



No observer can observe anything except energy hitting their eyes in the present.

No observer can observe the past.





An observer is only known to be an observer based on what they can report or record.

Show me some vertebrate that tells you they observed Lincoln so you know such a thing exists.

Just because you can't understand spacetime and relativity is no reason to resort to personal attacks.

Personal attacks are a violation of the terms of use.

You are the only person posting those words. You should stop it.

It is an observation based on insane fanciful ideas.

Your claims that Relativity tells us anything more than what will happen in the future is wrong.

What is your evidence?

Thinking an observer can observe the past is insane. To believe it is like believing in the gods.

A mild form of insanity called faith.

Editing out insults when you realize you overstepped is one thing. Editing them out only to accuse the other person of lying when they quote the original version is a whole other game.

 

[untermensche]

You are the only person posting those words. You should stop it.

It is an observation based on insane fanciful ideas.

Your claims that Relativity tells us anything more than what will happen in the future is wrong.

What is your evidence?

Thinking an observer can observe the past is insane. To believe it is like believing in the gods.

A mild form of insanity called faith.

Editing out insults when you realize you overstepped is one thing. Editing them out only to accuse the other person of lying when they quote the original version is a whole other game.

There is no accusation of lying.

There is a false accusation of an accusation of lying however.

From you here.

I did edit the words.

But not because they are anything bad. They are mild and meant to attack ideas.

But I think rules of decorum are fine even if they offend my sense of freedom of speech.

 

[Jokodo]

You are the only person posting those words. You should stop it.

It is an observation based on insane fanciful ideas.

Your claims that Relativity tells us anything more than what will happen in the future is wrong.

What is your evidence?

Thinking an observer can observe the past is insane. To believe it is like believing in the gods.

A mild form of insanity called faith.

Editing out insults when you realize you overstepped is one thing. Editing them out only to accuse the other person of lying when they quote the original version is a whole other game.

There is no accusation of lying.

There is a false accusation of an accusation of lying however.

From you here.

I did edit the words.

But not because they are anything bad. They are mild and meant to attack ideas.

But I think rules of decorum are fine even if they offend my sense of freedom of speech.

"You are the only person posting those words. You should stop."

In reply to a post that quoted the original version of your post, adding only emphasis.

 

[untermensche]

Faith: The belief in things without evidence.

 

[untermensche]

There is no accusation of lying.

There is a false accusation of an accusation of lying however.

From you here.

I did edit the words.

But not because they are anything bad. They are mild and meant to attack ideas.

But I think rules of decorum are fine even if they offend my sense of freedom of speech.

"You are the only person posting those words. You should stop."

In reply to a post that quoted the original version of your post, adding only emphasis.

He was the only person posting those words at that time. It was a fact at the time.

Not an accusation of lying.

No accusation of anything except that if these bad words were not allowed he should not be posting them.

But this is all distraction from a failed bad position that can't be supported except with one fanciful claim on top of another.

 

[Jokodo]

There is no accusation of lying.

There is a false accusation of an accusation of lying however.

From you here.

I did edit the words.

But not because they are anything bad. They are mild and meant to attack ideas.

But I think rules of decorum are fine even if they offend my sense of freedom of speech.

"You are the only person posting those words. You should stop."

In reply to a post that quoted the original version of your post, adding only emphasis.

He was the only person posting those words at that time. It was a fact at the time.

Not an accusation of lying.

No accusation of anything except that if these bad words were not allowed he should not be posting them.

But this is all distraction from a failed bad position that can't be supported except with one fanciful claim on top of another.

There are species of seagulls who have eggs with a slightly bluish tint. Given there environment, where nothing else of approximately the right size has a similar blue tint, and certainly not the cuckoo's eggs, they have developed an excellent cognitive shortcut to help them avoid falling victim to nest parasites: They go for the blue eggs, the bluer the better. This strategy has worked for millions of years, to great benefit.

Until an ethologist came along and put some bright blue eggs next to theirs: They started abandoning their own pale blue eggs.


There's a species of fish whose males' bellies turn bright red during the mating season. An an easy and obvious, and in their natural environment unmistakable signal. Until, you guessed it, a bunch of ethologists came along and put some sticks that were painted red on the underside and grey on the upper side into the aquariums: The females got agitated, deposed their eggs, and never understood why those males didn't want to inseminate their perfectly fine eggs.


We are no different from those seagulls and fish in principle: Evolution has endowed us with cognitive capacities sufficient to successfully navigate our natural habitat. Our natural habitat does not include relativistic conditions, so intuitively understanding the world in Newtonian terms is a perfectly acceptable shortcut, evolutionarily speaking.

You, on the other hand, are like the seagull that insists that those colorful plastic eggs really are their own eggs more so than the inferior pale ones next to it only some evil spirit killed the embryos inside, or the fish that accuses the stick to be a mean teaser.

 

[skepticalbip]

There is no accusation of lying.

There is a false accusation of an accusation of lying however.

From you here.

I did edit the words.

But not because they are anything bad. They are mild and meant to attack ideas.

But I think rules of decorum are fine even if they offend my sense of freedom of speech.

"You are the only person posting those words. You should stop."

In reply to a post that quoted the original version of your post, adding only emphasis.

He was the only person posting those words at that time. It was a fact at the time.

Not an accusation of lying.

No accusation of anything except that if these bad words were not allowed he should not be posting them.

But this is all distraction from a failed bad position that can't be supported except with one fanciful claim on top of another.

The posting used the "reply with quote" function. Although I did highlight the insult to make the infraction clear. Your editing your post after I pointed out the personal attack then claiming you never posted it is disingenuous.

 

[untermensche]

He was the only person posting those words at that time. It was a fact at the time.

Not an accusation of lying.

No accusation of anything except that if these bad words were not allowed he should not be posting them.

But this is all distraction from a failed bad position that can't be supported except with one fanciful claim on top of another.

The posting used the "reply with quote" function. Although I did highlight the insult to make the infraction clear. Your editing your post after I pointed out the personal attack then claiming you never posted it is disingenuous.

I agreed with you.

The words should not have been written.

They should not appear.

Nothing disingenuous besides your caring about this.

I do not believe the person I spoke to cared one bit. It did not effect them at all.

Just like I don't care what a tiny few believers in miracles think about rational thought.

 

[untermensche]

You, on the other hand, are like the seagull that insists that those colorful plastic eggs really are their own eggs more so than the inferior pale ones next to it only some evil spirit killed the embryos inside, or the fish that accuses the stick to be a mean teaser.

Because I don't believe in miracles?

Please!

Humans are not born rational but can learn to think rationally.

 

[Jokodo]

You, on the other hand, are like the seagull that insists that those colorful plastic eggs really are their own eggs more so than the inferior pale ones next to it only some evil spirit killed the embryos inside, or the fish that accuses the stick to be a mean teaser.

Because I don't believe in miracles?

Please!

Humans are not born rational but can learn to think rationally.

Because you insist that where the models of modern physics and your intuitive ideas of what sounds plausible diverge, it's modern physics that is wrong.

Some humans never learn to think rationally.

 

[skepticalbip]

You, on the other hand, are like the seagull that insists that those colorful plastic eggs really are their own eggs more so than the inferior pale ones next to it only some evil spirit killed the embryos inside, or the fish that accuses the stick to be a mean teaser.

Because I don't believe in miracles?

Please!

Something being real that you don't understand does not make it a miracle.

Those in the 1500s and very early 1600s who's world view was geocentric would think it a miracle that people would not be thrown off the Earth if told the Earth was spinning a 1000mph at the equator.

Those who can not grasp spacetime and relativity are in the same position.

 

[untermensche]

Something being real that you don't understand does not make it a miracle.

I do not lack understanding.

I lack evidence for an extraordinary claim.

The claim that an observer can be sent to some past moment in time they did not exist within or even a past moment in time they already existed in.

No evidence. No method to do it.

Miracle.

Those in the 1500s and very early 1600s who's world view was geocentric would think it a miracle that people would not be thrown off the Earth if told the Earth was spinning a 1000mph at the equator.

They made claims in the absence of evidence.

Yes.

Those who can not grasp spacetime and relativity are in the same position.

It is not about grasping spacetime. That is reduced to equations that can be used to predict the future so we say it is accurate.

This is about believing a miraculous claim about the universe made by humans without any evidence to believe it.

 

[skepticalbip]

I do not lack understanding.

I lack evidence for an extraordinary claim.

The claim that an observer can be sent to some past moment in time they did not exist within or even a past moment in time they already existed in.

No evidence. No method to do it.

Miracle.



They made claims in the absence of evidence.

Yes.

Those who can not grasp spacetime and relativity are in the same position.

It is not about grasping spacetime. That is reduced to equations that can be used to predict the future so we say it is accurate.

This is about believing a miraculous claim about the universe made by humans without any evidence to believe it.

There is tons of evidence. The fact that relativity is a damn good description of reality is necessary or much of our modern scientific equipment wouldn't work as designed. There is even astronomical observation of the bending of spacetime.

You being unaware or denying it does not alter reality.