A Two-Time Universe? Physicist Explores How Second Dimension of Time Could Unify Physics Laws

PhysOrg ^ | May 15, 2007 | Tom Siegfried

[SunkenCiv]

For a long time, Itzhak Bars has been studying time.. Einstein's theory of gravity and quantum theory don't fit together. Some piece is missing in the picture puzzle of physical reality. Bars thinks one of the missing pieces is a hidden dimension of time... With two times, Bars believes, many of the mysteries of today's laws of physics may disappear. Of course, it's not as simple as that. An extra dimension of time is not enough. You also need an additional dimension of space... Other dimensions could exist, however, if they were curled up in little balls, too tiny to notice. If you moved through one of those dimensions, you'd get back to where you started so fast you'd never realize that you had moved... Something as tiny as a subatomic particle, though, might detect the presence of extra dimensions... Adopting the more symmetric two-time approach may help. Describing the 11 dimensions of M theory in the language of two-time physics would require adding one time dimension plus one space dimension, giving nature 11 space and two time dimensions. "The two-time version of M theory would have a total of 13 dimensions," Bars said.

[RightWhale]

Saw where the String Theories are like islands in a swamp. When you drain the swamp to the bottom M-theory is the result that joins the islands as local peaks of the same mountain mass.

[snarks_when_bored]

Thanks for the pings, g_w.

I guess it's a little late₂ to find time₂ to explain why I did₁n't find time₁ to reply earlier₁...

[snarks_when_bored]

Which time would Jim Croce have wanted to save in a bottle: time₁ or time₂?

[bvw]

Okay. Maybe been done already, or would have except for the untimely sudden fatal appendicitis of the great Minkowski.

[grey_whiskers]

Great answer! (LOL!)

As long as your time doesn't fold into a Riemann curve, or go all fractal on you, I'm good with it.

Cheers!

[The_Reader_David]

Google it. I’m sure you can find papers citing it on arXiv.

[The_Reader_David]

So this time gaseous Vulcan is made of swamp gas?

[grey_whiskers]

Well, thanks for your helpful suggestion.

Not that I'd heard of arXiv...

Cheers!

[SunkenCiv]

It’s tough to say, because he states he’d save it every day, which could have resulted in something like Ursula LeGuin’s “Darkness Box” story.

[SunkenCiv]

Luckily in another reality your head isn’t hurting. Or somethin’ smart...

[SunkenCiv]

Hey, don’t hold back, tell us what you *really* think. ;’)

[grey_whiskers]

With planar time causality goes away. Cosmologists know this and it has been around a long time unless time is planar in which case it’s hard to say.

LOL!

Circular reasoning, see reasoning, circular.

For my twisted logic, I prefer a Mobius strip.

Cheers!

[grey_whiskers]

Just great. I googled his home page and he's FRENCH. Right below the navigation links on the left, beneath "Home", I see the word "Agenda".

That's all we need. Hannity and Connes.

Cheers!

[The_Reader_David]

Yup, but French or not, the symmetry group of the Standard Model drops out as the unitary symmetries of more or less the most simple noncommutative geometry.

The preprint at

hep-th/9501077 (Google this, and the page rank 1 entry is a link to download the paper in pdf)

and the papers it cites (all in English by their titles, at least, including those by Connes) lay it out fair and square.

[grey_whiskers]

I was making a pun on his name; just as whenever I see the Discover Institute's "Wedge Document" I am apt to mis-read it as "Wedgie Document".

No sense of humor tonight, eh?

I am in the middle of a job change, not much time for anything heavy right now.

I will add this to my exponentially increasing list of bookmarks; thanks for telling me.

Cheers!

[Veto!]

Evidently ‘days’ spent there can equal minutes here or some such.

Oh goodie! That blows Genesis out of the water, at least the "6 days are 6 days" version. Why not a billion-year day? NOT sarcasm.

[Quix]

Quix:Evidently ‘days’ spent there can equal minutes here or some such.

Veto!:
Oh goodie! That blows Genesis out of the water, at least the “6 days are 6 days” version. Why not a billion-year day? NOT sarcasm.

Those assumptions are not mine.

Doesn’t alter Genesis at all. We do NOT know precisely in exhaustive terms what “a day is as a thousand years” to The Lord means . . . It could mean a list of things—some mutually exclusive and some not.

The reports that indicate that Heaven’s timeline is not the same as ours could also mean a list of things—most to all of which would not indicate any altering of Genesis at all.

It may even be that time is something that God can adjust as we’d adjust our watches or the afghan on the sofa.

We just don’t know. Speculations can be fun but aren’t to be treated as foundations for anything of any import or substance.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you for the ping and for sharing your insights!

For more on how six days from the inception space/time coordinates is some fifteen billion years from our space/time coordinates based on relativity and inflationary theory, here is an article by Jewish physicist Gerald Schroeder:

Age of the Universe

[Veto!]

Nachmanides the Kabbalist expands the statement. He says that although the days are 24 hours each, they contain "kol yemot ha-olam" - all the ages and all the secrets of the world. Nachmanides says that before the universe, there was nothing... but then suddenly the entire creation appeared as a minuscule speck.

Gorgeous link. Thanks.

I absolutely agree with Schroeder and particularly relate to quotes from Nachmanides, though "nothing" was something imo. But what? Ask string theorists.

. Kol yemot ha-olam makes utterly perfect sense to me--all the ages before and after this moment are contained in the Now. His "speck," imo, was/is consciousness (God), which decided to create creation by enlivening it with energy (also God). It was not a somber moment when God begat the world. The decision was The Word. I like to think that the word was Love. Or, Yes.

Zen scholar Alan Watts wrote, "The Universe is a celebration of love and delight that, were it otherwise, would simply not go on happening."

The promise of Christianity is love. Love one another. And yet I see such hatred and harshness and nastiness in churches, I simply cannot fathom how they attract people of good will.

[Alamo-Girl]

I'm very glad you enjoyed the article. And thank you so much for sharing your thoughts!

The promise of Christianity is love. Love one another. And yet I see such hatred and harshness and nastiness in churches, I simply cannot fathom how they attract people of good will.

Oh, they do attract people of good will - and people of ill will - and hypocrites, too. But I can think of no better place for them to be.

Faith is always declared grammatically speaking, in the first person.

To God be the glory!