On 7 November 2014 12:56, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > On 11/6/2014 3:15 PM, LizR wrote: > > > On 7 November 2014 09:56, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > >> I'd say that expansion of the universe is almost necessary, not >> contingent. The AoT has to point in the direction of entropy increase and >> in almost all models that's correlated to the expansion of the universe. >> If it is bigger at one time than at another then the AoT will point toward >> the bigger end. I say "almost" because there are some ways around it. If >> the universe recontracts the AoT will probably continue to point toward the >> Big Crunch, at least until the total entropy equals the Bekenstein bound. >> Or on the other possibility, L.S. Schulmann has written a nice little book >> about his investigation of universes in which the AoT reverses so it always >> points to the biggest phase of the universe. >> >> > Yes, that is indeed exactly the position I have long argued for on > this very forum. > > To summarise my argument, which has at times been vigorously opposed, I > think by you amongst others, > > > Not me. I helped edit Vic Stenger's books that presented exactly that > view. >
OK, sorry, maybe it was Bill Taylor on FOR. He tends to sound as though disagreeing when he actually agrees too, so I get you confused sometimes. > but not yet actually shot down (kaon decay comes closest, but doesn't > appear to be very important in generating the AOT, although it's possible > it actually had/has a pivotal role we're unaware of). > > a) the universe is expanding for some reason, possibly necessary in the > sense of being built into the laws of physics (e.g. as a result of eternal > inflation ... perhaps?) - or perhaps contingent, that is to say not > mandated by the laws of physics, but maybe the result of some symmetry > breaking etc. > > > You seem to overlook that the "expansion" is very likely just > tautological, i.e. it is nomologically necessary that the AoT points in the > direction of bigger. > > Yes, sure, not overlooked but maybe glossed over. That's the point, or part of it. I'm at work and don't want to spend TOO long going into all the details (insert innocently whistling smiley here). Anyway I've said it all in past posts - I think it was here, maybe it was FOR or FOAR even....but yes, I can elaborate, and am happy to see other people agreeing considering the huge amount of flak I've taken from presenting this idea in the past (or was it the future? :-) > > b) all the other things regarded as the AOT emerge from (a). I have > given details of this at some length on previous occasions, but briefly > it's that various bound states (nucleons, galaxies etc) can emerge from the > cooling caused by the universal expansion. > > > Right. Because the universe expanded very rapidly it is very far from > equilibrium. The actual entropy is at least 22 orders of magnitude smaller > than the maximum possible entropy. Being far from equilibrium leads to > complex structures. > > Yes the fine details may mean a period of inflation was involved etc, but the basic idea is that expansion produces what can be called sources of negative entropy - e.g. bound particles, gravitationally bound objects etc. There are 2 obvious caveats to this idea 1. kaons 2. black holes These both appear to violate the idea that the expansion imposes the AOT on otherwise time-symmetric physics. Any thoughts on those? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
