A Beautiful Threesome: Time, Entropy and The Big Bang
For my first post in my contemplation corner, I feel it fitting to post a paper I wrote over a year ago for my highschool Physics class. This discusses the correlations between time, space and the uncertainty principal. Furthermore, it speaks about seeing the future in a very different way than normally assumed.
A Beautiful Threesome: Time, Entropy and The Big Bang
Time – what is time? Time, in my eyes, is a non-spatial dimension in which events occur in what is a seemingly irreversible and intangible linear succession. As the timeline progresses from the past, moves through the present, and continues to proceed to the future, those who perceive the events occurring down the line of the continuum, which we call time, apparently develop memories of those now past events – the question is, however, “why can’t we remember the future?” One might, with a hasty demeanor, retort “Well, you just said it, we generate memories based on our observation of past occurrences,” but is that really what happens?
Defining time, as I have previously done, is an asinine way of going about answering this question. Since when do we need a definition for time? To us, we instinctively recognize what time is - or, at least, what we believe it to be. If you read carefully as I gave my rough definition of time, it is quite probable that the term “seemingly” arrested your attention. Why did I say this word, seemingly? Am I trying to suggest that we perceive the reality of time to exist in a totally different manner than it, in actuality, exists? Yes, I am.
If you delve deeply into the laws of Quantum Physics, you will eventually come across what is called the EPR Paradox. As one begins to understand the EPR Paradox, they inevitably take heed of what is known as Quantum Entanglement. In a nutshell, Quantum Entanglement articulates that any two or more particles created simultaneously will be entangled; they will instantaneously and identically react when either of their quantum states change. This means that either information about quantum change is traversing a path between entangled particles infinitely fast, or, more likely, everything is actually touching and what we view as space is just the fabric that creates the illusion of the spatiality of our universe.
The law of Quantum Entanglement, the way I look at it, touches back to a quote from a very famous physicist: “The reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once.” When I read this quote from Albert Einstein, my mind was immediately riddled with thought. Before I heard this quote, time never needed to be explained; it seemed to be obvious and strictly apparent. I made the assumption that time was time because it was time, and left it at that. However, subsequently to hearing what I would describe as a multitude of wisdom summed up in the most elementary dialect possible, incessant thought and careful calculation lead me to better understand how our universe works.
Time, being a dimension, is perceived as linear, as I previously stated. Think back to the last time you looked at a paper. Now, imagine constructing a line that runs directly up and down on that piece of paper. Secondly, imagine repeating the action, but with the span of the line advancing right to left. Most people would gander at this imaginary paper only see lines. What they, most likely, won’t ponder is the fact that the lines on the paper are drawn in two dimensions, each dimension presenting a new linear continuum in which infinite representations of the lower dimension exists. What this means is that, for example, every step we move in the Y plane contains an infinite amount of steps in the X plane. As we jump back into our three dimension world, we realize that every step in the Z plane also represents infinite steps in the Y plane. Time, existing as the fourth dimension, holds what might visually look like an infinitely long film strip containing representations of the past as it advances to the future.
Just as we perceive depth as forward and back, width as right and left, and height as up and down, we also perceive time as past and future – because that’s all we know. While, according to the laws of Entanglement, we perceive space - our three dimensions - to be separate even though they aren’t, we also perceive time to be linear, even though it’s not. Past, present, and future have both already happened and are still happening. This information gives birth to a new question: “We can see left, we can see right, we can see up, down, forward and back, so why can we only see past and not future?”
The answer is that we truly live in the dimension of time, where we can see all aspects of the lower spatial dimensions. That said, we would see the continuum of time as a spatial entity if we lived in the dimension above, the realm of probability. More understandably, we remember the past because, as Einstein covertly stated, it presents itself as to not let all events happen infinitely fast. Its presentation invokes our senses to cause the synapses in our brain to pass data to our neurons, which store information, known as memory.
However, who is to say that the presentation of events is the only way we can remember them? Memories are in-fact just mental images stored in our mind, aren’t they? In actuality, we can “remember” the future, but to understand how we must deeply inspect the nature of cause-and-effect. If we, as example, toss a ball at a wall, we would naturally view the event of the ball hitting the wall as the effect of throwing the ball in the walls direction. However, whose place is it to infer that the wall is not the cause for the ball hitting it? I mean, come on, we threw the ball in the direction of the wall with intentions of striking it, so wouldn’t the anticipation of the ball hitting the wall, a future-tense event, be the cause of the ball being thrown, in turn hitting the wall?
How can we honestly, without room for argument, imply that we cannot see the future, given that we actually do actions based on future “causes” numerous times a day? Is it really that we can’t “remember” the future, or is it that the universe interferes with the future after we construct it? The real question is finally affirmed: “Why can’t we clearly see the future?”
Contemplate this question: “If I used given data of the past to logically assume future events, and no unknown factors were to interfere, would the future turn out as I predicted?” The answer is a resounding “Yes!” If I throw a ball at a wall with enough speed, I know for a fact that if nothing interferes with that ball that it will hit the wall. However, Chaos Theory communicates that every system tends to move naturally towards disorder, such that there is a measurable quantity of chance, determined by the Uncertainty Principle, of the outcome of every event in a system. This quantity is known as entropy, and, more times than not, is usually in strong favor of disorder.
Now, imagine a closed system, such being a finite representation of an empty replication of our universe. Pretend that placing two atoms adjacent each other in this system will result in the formation of a molecule. We will consider formation of this molecule as orderly, as it is the desired outcome. If we place two atoms within our system at random positions, it is obvious that the chances of them being adjacent to one another are slim to none. This shows that the entropy within this small, closed system undoubtedly points to disorder.
So, once more let’s set an imaginary objective of making a ball hit a wall. We can, within our minds, speculate that if we throw the ball, it will indeed make contact with the wall. Pretend that right as we release the ball from our hands, a random nearby region of air with unevenly proportioned heat shifts, creating a gust of wind thereby knocking our ball off course, changing its trajectory so that the effect of the throw turns out completely different than we expected. Due to the entropy of our universe, our perception of the future is changed as we perceive the ball being caught by the wind, and, given sufficient data and time, we can essentially assume a new outcome for this event.
Some people would dismiss this reasoning as absurd, or even just a radical misunderstanding of what “Seeing the future” really means. I, however, think those people are the ones who have misinterpreted the concept. If using accurate data to draw conclusions and formulate assumptions about a certain point in time is wrong, non-sensible, or a misinterpretation of concept, then the collective histories of our country, planet, galaxy and universe as a whole would just as certain be non-sensible. Moreover, science as we know it would be nothing but a stew of ignorant stupidity, and any rational person knows that that simply isn’t the case.
Take, for example, big bang theory. Factually, this is our past – there is evidence supporting it and data backing it up. Through careful assumption, hypothetical reasoning, and tedious study, science has “remembered,” or better yet put a visual picture in their minds of, the creation of our universe.
Stephen Hawking asks the question “Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?” Time, space, and the Big Bang Theory play a paramount role in actually supporting the mystery behind this question. The question he proposed along with the quote I shared from Albert Einstein, truth be told, actually touch back to my implications of future effects being cause of past events. Time is here so everything doesn’t happen at once, and the universe would have absolutely no bother with its own existence if that existence were to end simultaneously to its creation; the universe bothers only so that it can coexist in harmony with time.
This coexistence between time and the matter created in the big bang is what sums up our universe, and our spatial perception of this matter and its changes over time is what constructs the man-made concepts of past, present, and future. By carefully analyzing data about the present, we can hereby make assumptions about the events of, for lack of using the general term “remember,” both the past and the future; it is only by chance of entropy that the future be unclear.
