John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#31

Post by anonymousiam » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 3:42 AM UTC

philosophyfirst wrote: post #9

zibby8 wrote: post #3

> There’s another way in which the giant firecracker idea misleads us, because even scientists often talk about the “universe springing into existence.” Well, it didn’t, as far as we can tell. The opposite is true. There is no first moment of time, just as there is no smallest positive number. In physics we have equations and laws of nature that describe how one situation changes into another, but we have no equation…

Yeah this is kind of a laughable position in the article. I don’t mean the conclusion, which might be right, but the method. The laws of physics as we know them are just reflections of … nothing more than what we know. The fact that we have no account of what came before the big bang is not evidence of anything except that we don’t know, especially when a very plausible theory is that what came before is totally diff…

It's not laughable at all. Before the existence of our universe, there was no time. Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence." It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed. This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#32

Post by aasasd » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 3:47 AM UTC

gorgoiler wrote: post #21

”The observable universe was once compressed into a volume the size of a golf ball, but that golf ball was only a tiny piece of a universe that was infinite even then.” What a helpful way of thinking about it. I’m surprised I’ve never heard this before. Mind expanding, no pun intended.

Rather the opposite for me, I'm now even more confused about what was where. Not that I quite get the picture of an infinite universe anyway, which I guess is the prerequisite here.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#33

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 3:51 AM UTC

anonymousiam wrote: post #31

philosophyfirst wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this is kind of a laughable position in the article. I don’t mean the conclusion, which might be right, but the method. The laws of physics as we know them are just reflections of … nothing more than what we know. The fact that we have no account of what came before the big bang is not evidence of anything except that we don’t know, especially when a very plausible theory is that what came before is totally diff…

It's not laughable at all. Before the existence of our universe, there was no time. Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence." It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed. This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

[deleted]

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#34

Post by fallingfrog » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 3:57 AM UTC

The way I understand it, time is defined in terms of entropy- the points in the space of configurations of the universe adjacent to ours are all possible, but the ones that are most likely are all possible future points and the ones that are least likely are points in the past. Entropy is always increasing, on the macro scale. (The past, like the future, is uncertain and there could be many past states leading to this point.)

But, in the early early universe, all the configurations are equally likely, or rather there are no points any more unlikely, so there is no past, every direction is the future.

That’s not very precise but basically as I understand it that’s why there is no earliest moment.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#35

Post by paulrouget » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:00 AM UTC

anonymousiam wrote: post #31

philosophyfirst wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this is kind of a laughable position in the article. I don’t mean the conclusion, which might be right, but the method. The laws of physics as we know them are just reflections of … nothing more than what we know. The fact that we have no account of what came before the big bang is not evidence of anything except that we don’t know, especially when a very plausible theory is that what came before is totally diff…

It's not laughable at all. Before the existence of our universe, there was no time. Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence." It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed. This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

> Before the existence of our universe, there was no time

We don't know that.

> Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence."

These are just speculations. Some theories indeed mention that, but they are not part of our standard models.

For now, we just don't know.

> it's difficult for most people to grasp.

Oh come on…

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#36

Post by fallingfrog » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:01 AM UTC

xwdv wrote: post #20

Not only might there not be a first moment, there might be no time at all. Every possible instant of time could be randomly distributed with some very small but not infinitely small probability of occurring. On an infinite timeline, everything should occur, forever. When a moment occurs, a structure of your brain exists coded with memories of past events that feel real but never happened. Since each moment is pure an…

“On an infinite timeline, everything should occur, forever.”

I can imagine scenarios where that isn’t true- maybe the universe cycles through a long loop of states and just repeats that infinitely for example.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#37

Post by interpenetrate » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:02 AM UTC

anonymousiam wrote: post #31

philosophyfirst wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this is kind of a laughable position in the article. I don’t mean the conclusion, which might be right, but the method. The laws of physics as we know them are just reflections of … nothing more than what we know. The fact that we have no account of what came before the big bang is not evidence of anything except that we don’t know, especially when a very plausible theory is that what came before is totally diff…

It's not laughable at all. Before the existence of our universe, there was no time. Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence." It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed. This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

Time, as component of the universe, itself "sprang into existence?"

Despite "sprang" being a fantastical word to use in this context, it at least carries with it one thing for sure: a temporal component. "Springing" on its own indicates some sort of motion, which can only take place in time. Furthermore, "sprang" indicates a past tense, so that this "springing" took place at some (primordial) moment in time. According to your account, time presupposes itself.

You're applying the terms of experience to non-experience. The error is in a sophism of figure of speech.

Unfortunately you haven't explained anything at all. All you've demonstrated is that Kant was justified in writing the Antinomy.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#38

Post by mistermann » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:03 AM UTC

anonymousiam wrote: post #31

philosophyfirst wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this is kind of a laughable position in the article. I don’t mean the conclusion, which might be right, but the method. The laws of physics as we know them are just reflections of … nothing more than what we know. The fact that we have no account of what came before the big bang is not evidence of anything except that we don’t know, especially when a very plausible theory is that what came before is totally diff…

It's not laughable at all. Before the existence of our universe, there was no time. Time was created along with the space, matter, and energy when the thing "sprang into existence." It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed. This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

> It's not valid to extrapolate backward to a time before our universe existed.

And yet, you've managed to do just that!

> This is a concept that I've tried to explain to others for years, but it's difficult for most people to grasp.

Not surprising since not all people experience the same reality.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#39

Post by idealmedtech » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:05 AM UTC

kadoban wrote: post #30

idealmedtech wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he proved that under existing axiomatic systems, there are some statements which cannot be proven to be true axiomatically, even though they are true; such axiomatic systems are, in his terminology, incomplete. A subtle but important difference.

One thing I've always wondered is if there's any _interesting_ statements that can't be proved or if they're all kind of self-referential nonsense statements.

There's whole _fields_ of inquiry that either take or leave the axiom of choice; so yes, absolutely.

Re: John C. Mather: “There is no first moment of time” (2017)

#40

Post by dllthomas » Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 4:11 AM UTC

kadoban wrote: post #30

idealmedtech wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he proved that under existing axiomatic systems, there are some statements which cannot be proven to be true axiomatically, even though they are true; such axiomatic systems are, in his terminology, incomplete. A subtle but important difference.

One thing I've always wondered is if there's any _interesting_ statements that can't be proved or if they're all kind of self-referential nonsense statements.

On the one hand, I've often understood that it would be nice if we could assemble a list of "all the axioms" and prove it's consistent - at least that's how it was presented to me and roughly my interpretation of what eg. Russell and Whitehead were trying to do before being derailed by Godel proving it's impossible. On more recent reflection, it seems a little silly to want a proof in system X of the consistency of system X, even before we get to Godel, because if system X is inconsistent then it can definitely provide a proof that it is consistent by the principle of explosion.