Hi Ronald,
Thank you for this reference and querry for comments. I recall that this
idea, of a crystalizing space-time, appears in The Maker of Dune, a collection
of letters, short stories and essays by Frank Herbert - the Science Fiction
writer famous for his Dune series. The following are my "margin scribblings"...
pg.13. I am happy to see new discussion of Cramer's Transactional
Interpretation of QM. ;) I have often wondered what kind of multiverse would
result from using a completely time-symmetric equation...
pg. 16.It seems that we still have not gotten past the need to introduce some
kind of conditions by hand to obtain somethig that resembles our everyday
experience of a universe. The discussion of scale is also interesting but
upsetting. Is the quantum behaviour of macroscopic systems such as
superconducting magnets somehow fundamentally different from that is electrons
in atoms? If so, how?
pg. 17. "Potentiality changes to actuality at each quantum measurement process,
but some potentialities may remain undecided even as others have transmuted to
definiteness. Thus we consider that on a given world line "now" is the moment
when those aspects of reality become fixed." Cool! We have a definition of
"now" but does it stand up to scrutiny?
pg. 18. Would this crystalization's dependence on scale introduce "defects"
that could have observational consequenses? Would these differ sufficiently
from the defects that we expect from symmetry breaking? How do I line up these
predictions with resent observational results that strongly indicate that there
is no linear dependence between the speed of light and the frequency of a
photon?
pg.20. "The measurement interaction may perhaps be regarded as an interaction
between scales." This sounds a lot like a transactional version of Penrose's OR
idea! Maybe similar experiements would illuminate them...
pg. 21. "when quantum effects are significant, the Evolving Block Universe
("EBU") of classical physics cedes way to the Crystallizing Block Universe
("CBU"). On large enough scales that quantum effects are not significant, the
two models become indistinguishable." We are left with what looks like a global
time-assymetry and scale-dependence as an explanation, but such an explanation
is driven by a need for a global "ice cube".
Is the idea that "property definiteness is a purely "local" phenomena
contingent of the observational conditions therein" not ever considered? Do we
*really* have to have global definiteness?
Onward!
Stephen
----- Original Message -----
From: "ronaldheld" <[email protected]>
To: "Everything List" <[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, December 09, 2009 5:25 AM
Subject: Crystallizing block universe?
> Anyone want to give this a try and comment?
> http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0912/0912.0808v1.pdf
> Ronald
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