Related papers: We have time because we shall never know
Despite the success of modern physics in formulating mathematical theories that can predict the outcome of experiments, we have made remarkably little progress towards answering the most fundamental question of: why is there a universe at…
Time is a parameter playing a central role in our most fundamental modelling of natural laws. Relativity theory shows that the comparison of times measured by different clocks depends on their relative motion and on the strength of the…
The meaning of instantaneous action at a distance is elucidated. It is shown that the absence of a medium to transmit action (usually referred to as AAD in the literature) and instantaneous action are not identical. Since the term…
The paper defends the thesis that analysis of time meaning in a context of philosophy of physical and mathematical natural sciences and philosophical anthropology allows to clear basis of human being and to construct special model of…
Metaphysics is the science of being and asks the question ``What really exists?'' The answer to this question has been sought for by mankind since the beginning of recorded time. In the past 2500 years there have been many answers to this…
What is a physical theory? Although this intriguing question has been addressed from many different perspectives, some physicists and philosophers of physics have implicitly or explicitly embraced a philosophically-neutral definition of a…
We will prove that, in general, a system formed by several particles moving along relativistic trajectories can not be described by a mechanical system. The contradiction that leads to the previous assertion is due to the fact that a…
This essay examines our fundamental conceptions of time, spacetime, the asymmetry of time, and the motion of a quantum mechanical particle. The concept of time has multiple meanings and these are often confused in the literature and must be…
Eternalism, the view that what we regard locally as being located in the past, the present and the future equally exists, is the best ontological account of temporal existence in line with special and general relativity. However, special…
We define the time travel paradox in physical terms and prove its existence by constructing an explicit example. We argue further that in theories -- such as general relativity -- where the spacetime geometry is subject to nothing but…
What happens to the causal structure of a world when time is reversed? At first glance it seems there are two possible answers: the causal relations are reversed, or they are not. I argue that neither of these answers is correct: we should…
There is a deep structural link between acausal spacetimes and quantum theory. As a consequence quantum theory may resolve some "paradoxes" of time travel. Conversely, non-time-orientable spacetimes naturally give rise to electric charges…
In a way similar to classical mechanics where we have the concept of inertial time as expressed in the motions of bodies, in the (special) theory of relativity we can regard the inertial time as the only notion of time at play. The inertial…
The existence of initial singularities in expanding universes is proved without assuming the timelike convergence condition. The assumptions made in the proof are ones likely to hold both in open universes and in many closed ones. (It is…
A new concept of internal time (viewed as a scalar temporal field) is introduced which allows one to solve the energy problem in General Relativity. The law of energy conservation means that the total energy density of the full system of…
As time advances in our perceived real world, existing information is preserved and new information is added to history. All the information that may ever be encoded in history must be about some fundamental, unique, atemporal and…
Many macroscopic physical processes are known to occur in a time-directed way despite the apparent time-symmetry of the known fundamental laws. A popular explanation is to postulate an unimaginably atypical state for the early universe -- a…
In order to reject the notion that information is always about something, the "It from Bit" idea relies on the nonexistence of a realistic framework that might underly quantum theory. This essay develops the case that there is a plausible…
It is a quite common view among people, that are not aware of the developments in modern physics, that it is part of human nature to substitute religious faith in places where there is no knowledge. Therefore, an increase in knowledge would…
Contrary to the customary thought prevailing for long, the time reversibility associated with beam-to-beam collisions does not really exist. Related facts and consequences are presented. The discussion, though involving simple mathematics…