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How many years will it be until we are capable of time travel into the past?
Assume humans dont go extinct first.
@freemo Julian Barbour researches this idea where time is just changes in configuration space.
I have been (casually) wondering for quite a while: what if gravity is a consequence of some sort of bias in interactions, i.e. out of number of viable interactions the bias determines the actual interaction that takes place. As-in, gravity is such a subtle force that I wonder if it is a subtle side-effect of something else. (It would reduce the whole time-space-mass thing by a lot.)
@cobratbq To a certain extent isnt that all quantum mechanics? Just random interactions that average out to having a bias?
@freemo well, sure, but you're approaching it statistically now. Looking at the theories there's all the juggling with fields and particles, force-carriers, etc. There such a comprehensive framework.
Julian Barbour mentioned in a recent presentation that I watched with a casual "letting the information flow" kind of attitude, that his recent work may have removed the need for wave function collapse. Now I have only very superficial idea but I know his ideas make a lot of things simpler.
the wave function collapsing is an oversimplification inhow we describe it, but i dont think the underlying facts any less true.
What we call wave function collapse is just entanglement from the perspective of the thing being entangled.. We are just idiots and most people dont recognize "observation" is just a fancy term for "I entangle myself with the system". The wave function never really collapses in any absolute sense (as in someone not entangling themselves with the system).
@freemo okay, maybe to clarify with another perspective: I read this thing about the Schrödinger's cat experiment but now there were more (nested) levels with the office and a next-door office with see-through mirror. Also a thought experiment. So there is this recursive notion of observation. That's why I mentioned that it's all not quite clear / clarified, as I understand it.
@freemo oh, to summarize, even if just for myself. So if gravity would be just a 'bias' of the mass, i.e. the gravitational effects, and time doesn't really exist, but because of the bias, interactions are no longer reversible, then you've got your arrow of time because the bias is enough to ruin an otherwise perfectly (symmetrical?) reversible situation.
@freemo sure, I see your point. But has the question of "what constitutes an observation" been solved? Same with the double slit experiment, .. I read something about this pilot wave idea which sounded nice, but I keep hearing how there are theories but nothing really is solved.
I get your reference of entanglement. I probably don't have a good understand of it on every level, so I'm guessing I'm missing significant parts of your comment. But I get where you're going with this.