Naked Science Forum
Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: vlad2010 on 03/05/2010 05:26:52
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Hello everyone my name is Vlad from North Carolina and this is my first post here, I am not any type of science major but all sciences fascinate me. Please note this is an idea I had 30 minutes ago and really struggling to work it out, any help toward disproving, proving, adding to the idea, etc, would help.
Quick story: I was driving home from work and thought about destiny (am I destined to crash tonight type of thinking). The main question was, "is our life set on a predetermined course?" I thought man...I get a lot of philosophical answers about this but no real scientific, concrete, it can be proven answers. I started to think about time dilation and thought to myself about the GPS satellites in orbit and how they have to be adjusted a billionth of a second back due to Einsteins theory of relativity.
I thought a bit more about it and thought WHAT IF..there was no such theory of relativity, time did not change at all regardless of the mass of object you are near or speed it is traveling at...I thought, what would happen in this make believe universe? I am more than likely wrong but I thought that if time was constant regardless of location or speed of object than any "cause" (cause/effect) would cause an immediate effect all throughout the make believe universe at the very same time, leaving no time for options of different outcomes.
Anyway... I am thinking that time dilation is the buffer between everything which allows for alternative outcomes to happen for various "causes" (cause/effect). Basically the idea is that time dilation is the reason for an infinite amount of possible outcomes to occur...some how...still thinking...please help.
Thanks for your time, hope I didn't bore you and make you lose all hope in humanity after this post.
Vlad
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Welcome to the forum, Vlad. Your question is a very good one. The idea of whether everything is predetermined by physical laws has interested scientists and philosophers for a very long time. Historically speaking, before the 20th century the models of physics basically said that that everything was predetermined, since the models used then said that if you knew everything about the universe at one instant, you could know everything about it at some future instant as well.
I don't think it's Einstein's theories that have changed that. They still say that if you know everything about the universe, you can predict exactly what will happen in the future. Actually, the fact that nothing travels faster than light makes it in some ways even easier to believe that everything is predetermined. Since only things within a certain distance will have time to reach the object in a given period of time, its future only relies on things happening withing that distance, not on the entire universe.
I think the big philosophical change happened with quantum mechanics. Quantum mechanics put fundamental limits on how much you could know about something and said that even if you know as much as possible about some object, that the best you can do is to predict the probabilities of different outcomes for its future. In a very loose sense, things are still predetermined since you can predict the probabilities based on what you currently know about the object, but unlike other theories, you can't determine exactly what will happen in the future, no matter how much you know about the present.
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Time dilation isn't relevant, Vlad. You can't calculate everything you need to calculate, because to do this you need to move particles around. This means you can't calculate the position/motion etc of all the particles in order to work out the future state.
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There is no physical predetermination because there is no physical constant. Specifically, the smallest distance in the universe is one plank unit. Same for time. Accordingly, what happens to matter, and for that matter light, as it passes through this granulated expanse is much less then then certain? Certainly matter is discontinuous. As it moves from point A to B it does not exist at all the infinite points in between.
My own SWAG is our 4D universe is entangled with at least one more dimension [string theory has at least nine], and they are not segregated from one another. Even the non-string guys are perplexed by the inexpicably week gravitational force, and speculate a 'leakage'. In five dimensions the entire question of cause and effect may be moot. Everything will just BE....
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You seem to connect time to predictability here Vlad :)
don't know if I'm really following your thoughts rightly though?
Predestination is the idea of all being a 'clockwork' and 'free will' being an illusion.
If it have to do with time? In a way it has in that meaning that without time, no thoughts will be as far as I know. But as long as there is time for you to ponder then you will do so, right :) as well as me.
So the question then seem to become if different types of time possibly could change our universe, and ourselves, to some 'clock work'? I don't think so, our inability to foresee destiny will be there, the same as always I expect, as long as time exist, no matter how it expresses itself inside whatever universe.
That we talk about events, and use clocks to measure time with, doesn't make it a linearly process. And even if we lived in a universe where we had one 'objective frame' of time we would still be thinking, and deciding our choices. So Time isn't the answer to that one I think. That is if I understood your idea right?
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Yoron,
That's easy. If there is predestiny, you might think you are having original thoughts, but they were all figured out ahead of time. You are just an actor in a play, like Hamlet, and you should know.
Wait a minute! No, that's not right. I got confused between Helsingor and Helsinborg.
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If all is illusion :)
But we still have the question of those not 'possible outcomes' to see too don't we?
As in 'many paths' where a photon do take all possible paths until measured.
Either those paths also existed before our measurement, or we are totally in the wrong using that as a description, it seems to me? So even in a universe defined by predestinination you still have the question why those exists?
Heh.
Yoron aka Hamlet :)
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If all is illusion :)
But we still have the question of those not 'possible outcomes' to see too don't we?
As in 'many paths' where a photon do take all possible paths until measured.
Either those paths also existed before our measurement, or we are totally in the wrong using that as a description, it seems to me? So even in a universe defined by predestinination you still have the question why those exists?
Heh.
Yoron aka Hamlet :)
Alas, poor Yoron!
'tis simple. You must succumb to the aether. Photons are but rabbits that burrow into the aether.
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The Geezer doth protest too much, methinks.
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If we didn't have free will, then no one would be guilty of a crime.
People in the same circumstances should make the same decision, but they don't.
Two people are hungry. One eats since it maintains good health. The other fasts in protest for civil rights. Both are aware of healthy habits and social issues. Why should they make different choices?
Reasoning before acting is the preferred way of making decisions. Reasoning involves analysis using a set of values. Our current actions are based on current reasoning which is based on current values. That's why, given the same circumstances today I might choose differently than 20 years ago.
All those self improvement seminars would have no value. You left out motive, which can override all that reasoning.
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All objects in the universe are not interactive. The earth is not aware of the nearest galaxy or influenced by it. There is no (known) instant communication that would allow simultaneous interactions.
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examples?
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Science is philosophy augmented with measurement, its verification tool. That means it can only study what it can measure. In a correct application, it can promote knowledge of the world we inhabit, and separate fact from speculation.
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Destiny may exists.. .or may not....We are still extremely primitive for these kind of things.. believing in destiny makes the believer's life more easy and with lack of fears..=more happy..
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I can see that my reply was short lived.
You kept it for few days, some conversations were allowed, and then you deleted all my posts.
I hope it was not unintentional.
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Is our future destiny predetermined?
Entropy and chaos would lean me in the no direction.
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If we didn't have free will, then no one would be guilty of a crime.
My personal opinion is people that evolved in the identical circumstances will act almost the same. If there is any difference it will be because of quantum mechanics probabilities assuming they are real. This source of differencies is random. This means that people who do bad things are not fundamentally guilty, however punishment prevents future unwanted actions an also contributes to a selection of a desired behavior individuals.
We have laws intended to prevent unwanted actions. People genetically adapted for a certain set of rules folow them easily as oposed to those not adapted. Introducing punishments helps those unadapted them to adapt as well.
Back to the original subject,I'm not a specialist but, I have think the fumdamental free will doesn't exist not evet if we accept quantum mechanics randomness. Random things do not account for free will, in my opinion.
That is all.