The Window of time
J.R. Silva Bittencourt
The Window of Time Some say if you wanted to lie you should talk about time. Everyone shares the same sense of being in the present of the universe, even though this dimension of time seems to be always escaping through our fingers. If we were to think of an alien who was living his reality in the distant galaxy of Andromeda, he would have to be our contemporary without depending on the immense distance that separates us. The present, here, should be the same over there. The future and the past are not part of the physical reality of the universe, but they can be thought of. That is exactly what we will do in this article. Let us "think" about what the universe would look like in the past and in the future using, therefore, a way of extrapolating concepts that, in principle, will be elaborated from the present. All that has been said so far about the distant or near universe is nothing more than extrapolations of this kind, because of the known relation of uncertainty in the position or velocity of particles. It was first described in the 1920s by Werner Heisenberg. From there, our common concept of reality was put in check.
By some internal mechanism, related to our memory, we can remember only what is already in our past. You could not do the same for what would be happening in your future. Any star, as far as we know, does not think. Therefore, it is unlikely that it will be affected by our idea of time, in the sense that it might be relatively in the future or in the past. Without having a particular "point of view", the star would have no difficulty in remaining in the present. In our case, and because we can not remember what happens in our future, it was perfectly normal to assume a tendency to extrapolate, in that direction, the result of our direct observation of the past. As we need our memory to interact with the distant or near universe - and it depends on the collection of information from remote points in outer space - we will be, in this process of extrapolation, reversing the real direction of the arrow of time. In other words, we are waiting for the future to fit into the patterns and stereotypes that we draw from the present. A practical example is to believe that if the speed of light is limited to 300,000 km / s, the same concept should extend for the entire period of time in which that light was retained in the future (such as a distant star was still traversing the space that separates us). If the concentrated beam of light from
a laser cannon only takes 1.3 seconds to reach the Moon, then it seems logical to conclude that the reflected light from the Moon would need the same amount of time to reach where we are. This may even coincide with reality, but it will always be dependent on the viewpoint of an observer endowed with a memory. If time does not exist or can not be measured in the future, no motion of the light particles could be measured directly in that direction of the time arrow, which is provided in the definition of the concept of instantaneous velocity. According to Paul A. Tipler "At any given instant a particle is situated at a specific point. If it is positioned at one point, how could it move? If it is not moving, how could it have speed? This paradox is solved if we remember that in order to observe and define a movement, it is necessary to look at the position of the object in more than one time ". (Physics - vol.1, page 22, ed. LTC). Our inability to directly measure the travel time of the light emitted by a distant star could be creating some kind of "flotation" in the vacuum - an apparent void causing rupture and discontinuity in the input of light-carried reports. As the observer depends on the constant presence of the information to interact with the reality around him, the input of the light from the
stars and distant galaxies has become seemingly continuous. For all intents and purposes, and at least for the observer's point of view, such vacuum fluctuations cease to exist, since motion can not be measured directly in the future. All the events that seem to unfold instantly around us, are part of what astronomers often call the "cone of light" of the observer's past. Nothing would exist outside of this cone even though it was there, which would also apply to the very light that allows us to look behind the stars and the distant planets. This form of containment of time or its "retardation," resulting from our total dependence upon the arrival of light and cosmic radiation as a whole, made us think that there should be some place in the universe that would be putting itself outside the present, either in the future or in the past. What is it that allows us to see the stars? It is the light they send us through space. This light, in principle, takes a variable time to travel the distances that are separating us, and that can be of the order of millions of light-years. A light-year is the distance light would travel for a year, traveling at a speed of 300,000 km / s. So what we see shining
in the night sky is the photograph of a star, depicting the very moment when it has sent us its light. As this holds true for all other stars and for the galaxies they form, the night sky seems to show us an image of our past. However, if we looked at things from the point of view of a distant star, people on Earth would look at its present late, for to see it shining in the night sky, they would have to wait for the light emitted. Thus, only those who looked consciously at the night sky, or who could decode the information carried by the light, would be relatively in the past. In fact, the observer on Earth continues in the present, although in order to interact with the distant star he needs an already consolidated memory. That is, the observer can only see a star because he already remembers it. There is an evident delay in the communication of distant events, which can be of the order of millions of years and which would not depend on the position that the observer would occupy in space. The zero mark, the beginning of the count of time, will always be placed in the position of the observer (not in the position of the stars) wherever he is in space, for nothing exists outside his memory. We can only remember what is already in our past. If we place this zero time frame on Earth, the only place where one is certain of
intelligent life, the image of the star will always appear in the past of the celestial vault. If the observer were occupying the real position of the star, however, the Earth would seem to have its position evaluated as if it were in the past. In reality the observer, the Earth and the star occupy the same dimension of time - the present. The future results from the paradox of always looking at the present of the universe "as if we were in the past", because we depend on the input of the information that would have been retained previously. This gives us the impression that we assume the very time of the images observed in the night sky which, of course, would be a sensorial illusion. We can understand, therefore, that there is no past or future. Excluding the influence of our point of view, everything in the universe would coexist at the same moment of time. Once it has reached our position, the light that the stars send us will continue to reach us without apparent interruption. On the day that one of them dies it will no longer send us its light, but the interruption of the flow of that light will only happen after many years of its death. Man only achieves his goal of delimiting the celestial bodies in space, if time permits his direct
assessment. Time is the essential tool used by our memory. A real window, through which we look at the sky. Without time, we would not see anything. Thanks to time, still, all the particles that form the physical bodies are seen in continuous movement. There is no absolute immobility, at least for our limited senses. The very concept of instantaneous velocity could only be defined when looking at the independent positions that the same particle would occupy in two consecutive time intervals. Otherwise, it would remain motionless. Everything we see and know about distant galaxies - and that holds true for the universe of subatomic particles - depends on the light emitted or reflected by them. To be seen, the particles need to be illuminated. Therefore, it would be prudent to adopt an attitude of extreme caution, whenever dare to make full statements about the reality of the infinite universe, based on the information that it makes available late. The evaluations made in this field result from the extrapolation of concepts, which were elaborated out of the real time of events or that are related in some way to our memory. We remember only what is already in our past and, without a plausible justification, we extrapolate our
observations towards the future, as if it were an image of the past reflected in a mirror. The star and the lamp Alpha of the centaur is a star that belongs to the constellation of the Centaur, and can be seen at night to the north of the constellation of the Southern Cross. It appears well south of the centaur, next to its companion of lower brightness - which forms a binary. Alpha of the centaur has physical characteristics very similar to those of our Sun. If it substituted our star, we probably would not notice the difference. Another feature of this star is that it moves relatively quickly in the night sky. This has given astronomers assurance to claim that it is the star that is closest to us, being located 4.4 lightyears from where we are. If we considered that the behavior of Alpha of the Centaur was similar to that of one of these incandescent lamps and that, to shine in the night sky for the first time, depended on the actuation of a current switch, we could try to understand some principles of the relativistic view of events, which applies both to the universe of the infinitely great and to the level of the atoms. It is likely that Alpha of the Centaur had shone in the night sky for the first time, long before the first
intelligent being noticed his presence. The moment the current switch was set to the "on" position, the distant star-lamp would have emitted light, which we might consider to be our zero time frame. For the observer in the distant Earth the lamp could only be sighted after 4.4 years due, in principle, to the limited speed with which the light goes through the vacuum. In that case, and to the point of view of that observer on Earth, the light of the star would be traveling from the future (present of the star) to the past (present of the observer). Even so, both would remain in the same real dimension of time (present), because the universe does not depend on our points of view. Curiously, when the light reached the Earth for the first time, the star-lamp could be instantly sighted north of the Southern Cross constellation, without the lucky observer measuring any interval that had elapsed before that event. The zero reference of time, which was supposedly placed in the position of the star, suddenly appears at the position of the observer, allowing the influence of the force of gravity of the star to be felt instantaneously (and at a distance). This inversion movement in the direction of the time arrow next to the observer would therefore occur by a principle of exclusion of direct access to time in the future, or for
the whole period of time in which the light of the star was being "packaged". The problem has become insurmountable, since it is now known that this packaging (quantization) does not demand any measurable time-lapse:- nature gives us the package completely ready. This would have been materialized in the thought that the light of the star would be delayed, due to having assumed a limited speed in the space. As the Earth moves rapidly in the night sky, as the star itself does, as soon as the light comes near the observer, Alpha of the Centaur would be sighted outside its real position. After this first moment, the star continued to provide access to the reports carried by its light, even keeping the uncertainty of its position or speed. To our point of view time would have been flowing ever since, apparently continuously. The information will only stop coming to Earth when the "death" of the star is communicated, which means that the event can not be seen in real time. The finding that the current switch could be simultaneously in the position of the star and that of the observer, by a principle of exclusion of direct access to the future, would place the zero mark of time continuously in our position, since it is our subjective interpretation that gives sense to the events we observe at a distance. The
placement agrees with the idea that everything in the universe would be coexisting at the same moment of time. We would not have been able to shift the zero reference time from the position of the observer to that of the star, unless an intelligent observer on an exploratory ship was moved to its vicinity. In their journey, the displacement in space would imply displacement in time, even without removing the observer from the present of the universe. Physicists would be taking serious risks if they claimed that the gravitational wave, that would be caused by the abrupt death of the Sun, would only reach us after 8 minutes. This would involve the act of putting the beginning of the time count next to the position of our Sun, or out of the position of the observer. In this case we would be making an abstraction by extrapolating, in the direction of the future, concepts that depend on the memory we develop in relation to events. We would no longer be dealing with our own events. This is the case for the precise measurement that is obtained for the speed of light, although the 300,000 km / s results in some form of report tracking. That is, the speed of light could only be measured indirectly. If we are more rigorous, the time that the light of the Sun would need to reach the Earth would be considered
indeterminable, due to the relation of uncertainty as to the real position that our star would be occupying every moment. The reason for this is that the speed of starlight is always established after the reports are provided. This is very difficult to accept without some mistrust, but it allows one to suppose that the observer, somehow, has his share of responsibility in this whole process. It seems that, being dependent on his memory to interact with the distant or near universe, reality would always be placed outside the direct reach of the observer. The observer looks at the present of the universe "as if he were in the past," which must be some kind of illusion, supported by his memory. Looking at things from this angle, we see that we could not avoid abstractions. This would cause some embarrassment when we remember that, at least apparently, physicists and cosmologists do not like to abstract, preferring only to opt for the existence of what can be measured directly. For its part, the universe would be "not even there" for our points of view.
Santa Maria, RS, Brazil, 03/24/2018.