Last night's Horizon

[N-dubya]

The way i see it and this may be completely wrong that everything that could possibly happen an infinite amount of combinations. This all happens within no time and at all times. So the universe time wise does not exist and lasts forever all at once. I am sure this will be explained when our grasp of temporal physics comes out of it's infancy. I think writer of Doctor Who, Stephen Moffat said it best to explain time. It went something like "Time is like a big ball of wibbly wobbly, timey wimey." .

I,m sort of with you on this interpretation of 4 dimensional space/time. in that all possible combinations exist at once, this could mean that time in our perception of being a linear dimension that is progressive i is not at all and exists all at once and the termprogressive is in fact meaningless. So when we observe an event we are only witnessing one possible combination.

This in quantum mechanics I think is what is called the Copenhagen interpretation. We then have the problem that as observers we automatically have affected the combination by observing it to begin with I think?

[IanDarkpeak]

The idea of Fractals means the edge you are measuring could be microscopically rough, therefore not flat, and continue to be so the closer you look therefore infinite.

yes know about fractals but what I was talking about was a Möbius strip or loop. as X runner has shown above and is where the symbol for infinity come from.

[mr brightside]

yes know about fractals but what I was talking about was a Möbius strip or loop. as X runner has shown above and is where the symbol for infinity come from.

Oh sorry

[noel]

Oh sorry

On the subject of infinity, I recently taught my children the name googolplex. This is a stupidly large number (10 to the power of [10 to the power of a hundred]). It is too big to describe anything (including the number of hydrogen atoms in the known universe), and would be larger than the universe if written in full!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googolplex

This means that my youngest often says things like "imagine a monster with googolplex teeth". We then have to have the discussion that the monster would itself have to be larger than the universe and take up more matter than exists.

In hindsight I should have started them with a thousand.

[Nathaniel Lee]

IF everything, everytime and every combination of both = E

And Nothing , no time and every combination of both = N

Both these figures whether halved quartered, times with each other, divided with each other, subtracted and so on you will always get the same answer which = I for infinity. So we are going round and round in a loop that has no time and does not exist until we understand physics better the answers will appear to make no sense as our corporeal being as no way of sensing this existence. It may take evolution or a truly brilliant scientist to break this. It is argued when this happens our plane of existence will automatically change as we will see the universe how it truly is.

[noel]

So we are going round and round in a loop that has no time and does not exist until we understand physics better the answers will appear to make no sense as our corporeal being as no way of sensing this existence. It may take evolution or a truly brilliant scientist to break this. It is argued when this happens our plane of existence will automatically change as we will see the universe how it truly is.

Let me know if anyone is close to breaking it. I've always wanted to buy a sportscar on my credit card, and feel the ideal timing would be about a month before the universe changes fundamentally.

On a similar note, what's the current consensus among leading philisophical mathematicians about whether credit card debt will exist once this change comes about?

[N-dubya]

IF everything, everytime and every combination of both = E

And Nothing , no time and every combination of both = N

Both these figures whether halved quartered, times with each other, divided with each other, subtracted and so on you will always get the same answer which = I for infinity. So we are going round and round in a loop that has no time and does not exist until we understand physics better the answers will appear to make no sense as our corporeal being as no way of sensing this existence. It may take evolution or a truly brilliant scientist to break this. It is argued when this happens our plane of existence will automatically change as we will see the universe how it truly is.

I can,t contemplate a finite universe, i can contemplate a finite amount of matter in a universe, but the space in which it exists no.

If you only had one point, particle call it what you will, it would have nothing to be relative too, therfore no relativity and no space/time? But if you introduce a second particle it is now relative and the way I see it infinite space and time.

[CL]

Can't we discuss this without having a mad moment?

[CL]

I can,t contemplate a finite universe, i can contemplate a finite amount of matter in a universe, but the space in which it exists no.

If you only had one point, particle call it what you will, it would have nothing to be relative too, therfore no relativity and no space/time? But if you introduce a second particle it is now relative and the way I see it infinite space and time.

The universe pertains to all matter. Space is the relationship between things, and time is the relationship between moving bodies I.e. the earth revolving around the sun. So yes if only one particle existed then the concept of time would have no meaning.

[CL]

Shocking, who told you that? the centre of a black hole is infinitely small and infinitely dense. Mathmatical formulae can go on infinitely for example the nth term, space is reputed to be infinite. Just cos Einstein didn't like infinity due to him not being able to quantify it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Infinitely small and infinitely dense! Both are oxymoron's. Now in mathematics the concept of infinity can be used without implying the existence of a thing that is infinite. In that case it would be a concept of method