Something from Nothing

As I stated above I don't want to get into the absolute maths, I don't pretend to understand it myself. You can google Minkowski where you will find lots of details. My point and the point of the quote is that time is treated very differently to any of the other dimensions. If you wish to go any deeper than that then you would really need to go to a physics forum.

However yes c is the speed of light but d is not anything per se. it is a differential equation where d refers to the difference in a value so dx is the difference in the x coordinate etc. Here is a quite nice brief simplified description of the equation though:

Re: What is the Minkowski metric?

All I'm trying to do here is show that time, the 4th dimension, cannot be and is not treated the same as the three spatial dimensions using one of the most fundamental triognometrric equations - Pythagorus, which gives the distance between two points in 2 dimensions as:

s^2 = x^2 + y^2

Where x^2 is x squared (I can't be bothered generating superscripts :))

in 3 dimensions we have

s^2 = x^2 + y^2 + z^2

But in 4 we can't simply add time in the same way; most importantly we have to reverse the sign:

s^2 = x^2 + y^2 + z^2 - c^2t^2

My only real point being that time is different.
 
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Thanks Vertigo. I've gotta rush this morning, but will check it out later ...
 
Makes my eyes go all blurry. Have to take your word for it. I'm not being sarcastic. I can't get my mind around the mathematics, but do find the conclusions ... what's the word? Enlightening? But it has to be explained to me in words. It comes down to the main issue: how do you travel faster than light?
 
Like Winkle van Rip? Or else throw it a bone, while you burgle the house -- a T bone? So, actually, you have to out-think it? Thought travels faster than light?
 
OMG! That's the answer!

We've found the solution while scientists have been scratching their heads for over a century!

Now, let's crack "The Meaning Of Life".
 
This computer was originally a thought. This computer is the product of millions of highly trained minds minds concentrating on a single idea, but spread out over years, each mind working in a specialist area. Thought made this computer. Thoughts can be transferred. e=MC2 is a thought. These words transfer thought, not that its worth much, in this case. Thought can move things. I think about typing this, thought causes my hand to move.
Suspend a ping-pong ball in space, get a million highly trained minds, of some future generation who understand these things, to WILL it to move -- all focussed through some sort of lens, not over years, but all at the same instant -- for an instant of highly concentrated, pure will. Is that ball going to move a fraction of a millimeter? Or not? Hmmm?
 
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