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New space-time theory does away with big-bang, dark energy etc.

stanford.edu — A new theory presented by Alexander Franklin Mayer at Stanford claims time is not just linear, but points in different directions, just like gravity does not point in the same direction everywhere.

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  • ravenmuffin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7But what does the brainy guy in the wheelchair think?
  • AjaxDiggz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4He uses the Ganymede flyby as one of his prime examples for this anomalous shifting but doesn't say whether the readings of the mass anomalies detected on Ganymede occurred on the redshift side for the excessive mass reading and on the blueshift for the negative mass reading or whether this was averaged knowing the shifting paradigm. Lessee, before I get flamed, the lesser mass detection would be found on the blueshift side according to conventional physics, right? Nevertheless, an interesting concept and it'll be interesting what sort of mechanical device they come up with to prove or disprove the theorem. Dugg.
  • born, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4The thing is that existance will never make rational sense to the finite nature of the human mind. We won't ever be able to fully grasp our own mental or phsyical being. Simply too intagible.
  • skydivingdutch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@born: You just accept that and stop caring?
  • kalphegor, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4250
  • pupa, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3LAME

    First of all, he's not a professor, he's a "visiting scholar". Second, revolutionary ideas (or even mundane ones) should be published in scientific journals, not broadcast to the public (who have no ability to assess his claims). This is a sure sign of a crackpot.
  • wheremyarm, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Born,

    Our intelligence is our evolutionary advantage. Look how far we've come in just a few thousand years. To put such an arbitrary cap on our greatest strength seems more than ridiculous.
  • timewarrior, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Direct PDF

    Lecture 1 http://www.stanford.edu/~afmayer/docs/Lecture1Signed.pdf
    Lecture 2 http://www.stanford.edu/~afmayer/docs/Lecture2Signed.pdf
  • WaterDragon, on 10/12/2007, -6/+7Anyone who discounts the ultra-stupid, pathetically materialiatic Big Bang theory is worth reading.
  • jimbo92107, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Dammit, just when I was getting used to 12-dimensional Heim Space, now some nutty perfesser comes along with a new twist on "flex time."

    Will somebody tell these eggheads to make up their minds? I'm booked on the first rocket to Alpha Centuri, and the ship needs an engine!
  • domr, on 10/12/2007, -4/+12If time is non-linear, then this article is not new.
    So, no digg.
  • x3n1, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Digg, nice theory -
  • ezkiel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Born,

    Our intelligence is our evolutionary advantage. Look how far we've come in just a few thousand years. To put such an arbitrary cap on our greatest strength seems more than ridiculous."

    But we still dont know ***** about ourselves and our limits.

    Eastern philosophy trumps this in many regards. But what the point no one will listen anyways. We only discover ***** in psychology and say hey it does correlate to what those eastern guys are saying.
  • Zorn, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ Born. That's just nihilism pretending to be humility. Ezkiel—not knowing our limits is what allows us to go forward. This is no confirmation of Eastern spiritualism. You're a nihilist as well. We know plenty about ourselves—it's an ethical problem as to what we do with it, and there is blueprint for ethics. We have to make that up as we go along.
  • fatlip, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ domr: rock on
  • Battleman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ domr: I think tomorrow we should read this again for the first time.
  • Otto, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0a) This is not a new theory, by any stretch of the imagination, and
    b) The headline is completely and utterly inaccurate.

    Does anybody read this crap before they submit it?
  • Mapou, on 10/12/2007, -5/+1There Is No Time Dimension

    Time is abstract. A temporal dimension makes motion impossible. Why? Because (surprise) nothing moves in time or spacetime as time is not a variable by definition. This is the reason that Sir Karl Popper called spacetime "Einstein's block universe in which nothing ever happens" (Conjectures and Refutations).

    See Nasty Little Truth About Spacetime: http://www.rebelscience.org/Crackpots/notorious.htm for more info.
  • jOOs, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I agree with Otto
    A bit of a heavy read though
  • kuhnsalatlai, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I agree with Born that existance will never make rational sense. I don't agree that he says we won't ever be able to fully grasp our own mental or phsyical being. Yes, it is intagible, but not too intangible.

    Rationality is as much a gift to human kind as it is a curse. Most people in this forum seem to experience and approach the world around them mainly through rational thought. However useful, it is only a partial and indirect experience of 'reality'. Because it is only partial, answering questions with rational thinking only, gives you partial answers only. This creates more questions and more partial answers and theories and big bangs and black holes. Nothing wrong with that. But it may be an idea to take a peek outside rationalism and see what that bears.

    Eastern philosophy has something to offer here. However, approaching Eastern philosophy with the same rational mind only is missing the point entirely. It must be practised and experienced, rather than discussed and thought about. In the experience itself you can find answers that are not just rational but encompassing a greater whole, leaving you with fewer questions than before.
  • TheKillDoctor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@mapo

    Your rebel link is a known site for brainiac blunderings of the lowest quality.
  • Mapou, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0@TheKillDoctor wrote: "Your rebel link is a known site for brainiac blunderings of the lowest quality."

    Sir Karl Popper (of falsifiability fame) wrote:

    "At the same time I realized that such myths may be developed, and become testable; that historically speaking all — or very nearly all — scientific theories originate from myths, and that a myth may contain important anticipations of scientific theories. Examples are Empedocles' theory of evolution by trial and error, or Parmenides' myth of the unchanging block universe in which nothing ever happens and which, if we add another dimension, becomes Einstein's block universe (in which, too, nothing ever happens, since everything is, four-dimensionally speaking, determined and laid down from the beginning)."

    What part of "nothing ever happens" don't you understand? Are you (TheKillDoctor) calling Sir Karl, one of the greatest philosopher of science that ever lived, a crackpot? ahahaha...
  • TheKillDoctor, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1@mapo

    I'm talking about your rebelscience link by "Louis Savain".
    The same person who gives us "AI from the Bible".
    I have no idea who your Karl person happens to be.
    BTW nice cut and paste job.
  • Mapou, on 10/12/2007, -4/+0@TheKillDoctor wrote: "I have no idea who your Karl person happens to be."

    You never heard of Sir Karl Popper? And you think you have an opinion on a science issue about time that is worth more than two cents? ahahaha...
  • comet, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I don't buy this: "just like gravity does not point in the same direction everywhere".

    It seems to me that it has been established that gravity points in only one direction. -Towards the center of mass. Time always points towards the increase of entropy, a.k.a. the future. Otherwise, all thermodynamics is screwed.
  • DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0No math? Not physics. Sounds like something one of you guys would write up and try and pass off as a "theory".
  • DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/crackpot.html

    10 points if you spend more time on the cover page than you do on the paper... especially if you didn't submit any papers before you started writing a book.
  • Brian.Honaker, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I had my own theory about the structure of time. It had to do with time fields. Won't bore ya with that. It is possible that time is an abstraction. It is equally as likely that Einstien was on the right track. I personally beleive that the time dimension exists. I find it much harder to swallow that Nothing is really happening. The one thing we can know for sure is that it will be "now" forever.
  • DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -4/+0First of all, KillDoctor, I actually study physics at a reputable university (okay, it's called UNC). Second of all, that link is part of a website belonging to a mathematical physicist at another reputable university.

    I can solve the time-dependent Schroedinger equation for the hydrogen atom. Can you? No. So shut the ***** up.
  • JAWA, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I broke my wookie.
  • Mapou, on 10/12/2007, -7/+0@TheKillDoctor wrote: "So STOP being a digg spammer, or a clueless fan-boy of junk science links and post links that have direct sources and then someone might take you seriously."

    You have no idea who Sir Karl Popper is or what he was about and you think you have a valid opinion about what is and what is not junk science? ahahaha...
  • Swift2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0It's really a simple question: is our living space infinite, or only practically so. If we find that out, it will be a great achievement of science, but from the ontological point of view, a finite universe begs the question: what's on the other side of the boundary? I believe that would be unknowable. About all this religious/philosophical brouhaha, I take the eastern position on that: relax. If we resolve this physical question, it won't answer one damn metaphysical question. We'll still have all that to play in.
  • ForbesBingley, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Either time is non-linear and I read it before it was posted, or this post is a duplicate.

    Either way, I didn't digg it the first time, so I shan't be diggin' it again...
  • xeigen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Not too long ago, people thought the Earth was flat", no they didnt, its just a myth that people used to think that.
    The ancient Greeks even calculated its circumferance with surprising accuracy.
  • Mapou, on 10/12/2007, -5/+0Swift2 wrote: "It's really a simple question: is our living space infinite, or only practically so. If we find that out, it will be a great achievement of science, but from the ontological point of view, a finite universe begs the question: what's on the other side of the boundary?"

    Good question. The answer will surprise you. The idea that there exists either a finite or infinite space independent from matter is without foundation. Truth is, there is no such thing as space. Nonspatiality makes it possible to travel from anywhere to anywhere without going through the intermediate positions. This is possible because space (distance) is an illusion of perception. This is already corroborated in experiments with quantum tunneling. In certain circumstances, particles are observed going through barriers in a way that defies classical physics. Interestingly, they seem to do so at speeds greater than the speed of light. For more on nonspatiality, see this link: Nasty Little Truth About Space: http://www.rebelscience.org/Crackpots/nasty.htm#Space.

    Quantum tunneling (long distance quantum jumps) is not to be confused with teleportation which is just another example of Star-Trek physics nonsense. Imagine a world where you can travel from anywhere to anywhere instantly. Cheers!
  • headswine, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Fascinating read. It reminds me why I didn't go very far in physics though. Isn't it fun to read a complete sentence and not have any clue what it means?

    -----
    http://www.gfx.com
  • rekrapt, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0What spoon?
  • scott1, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0The guy isn't even a physicst!This is what secientist call a crackpot theory.This article isn't even secience it's philosphy
  • DWatch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0My favorite theory of all time.....

    Albert Einstein:
    Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.



    The comments in this thread only prove that theory.
  • timewarrior, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The anomalies in the Pioneer trajectory and in the GPS requires some explanation.the quality of theoretical physics is going down.Nothing will happen until the gravity theory is fixed.
  • Werdock, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2This Mayer guy says a lot of interesting stuff. He actually manages to explain how stuff works and does it well. Sounds very logic and simple. Wondering why noone else could come up with that earlier on. Looks a lot like true.Digg.
  • Theodorant, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=176275&threshold=1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&cid=14644146

    Not a crackpot scientist . . .
  • DrEbola, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0The Kill Doctor must be a philosopher. He keeps talking about what science is and isn't. Anyway, have you honestly never heard of John Baez?
  • lamprey187, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0we all will be dead before this puzzle is solved, so go watch the superbowl, and my theory states the Steelers have already won.
  • TheKillDoctor, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0Drebola must be a wanna be science major. He keeps talking about how much he knows to impress digg users who could care less. He actually gets Joan Baez confused with John Baez.
  • sketchstudios, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0@ shiptoshore:
    yea Ive been to that house its totally the weirdest thing Ive seen. i remember walking and opening a door, but then all of a sudden I felt like I was walking "on the side of the wall" then in the same room it changes where you walk upside down, its totally freggin weird. to be honest i wanna go back. do you happen to remember where it was? or what it was called?
  • Doodad, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Existence will never make rational sense..."

    Yet you have no problem using a *computer* to *write messages* to *other people* across the *internet* to convey a *'logical' argument* that you hope will read, interpreted, and thought about using their experiences to reach the same conclusion. Don't bite the hand that feeds you.
  • antonblaga, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Rationality only works on the small scale
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