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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.
@freemo it's like having a alternative view to not get stuck in the hype too much.
@freemo again, I'm not arguing the current models are wrong.
@cobratbq sure a simpler model that is as complete is certainly possible. Someone may create a whole new form of math that makes this stuff trivial to calculate.
@freemo sure, of course. If the math works for it, then you can use it. I'm just saying that there are some alternatives that sound interesting that may just work because it turns out to be a simplification of a subset of the math formulas involved. It's not unthinkable, and I'm just left with the idea that the current mainstream models seem complicated. Also, different math could end up approximating just slightly better/worse. (I'm a CS guy, so no physics background, just casual interest.)