Anti-Relativity Site Debunked

[RabbitMunch looks at the "nasty secret" site]
RabbitMunch: i'm not sure if this [the nasty secret site] is worth arguing against.
eadon-com: Rabbit is best qualified to assess this site, being an expert in the field
ThatFatMoogles: i'm in trouble. :P
RabbitMunch: for one, of course you can tranform to units in which velocity is dimensionless. Even in special relativity, you say beta = v/c. From then on you can express velocities as beta rather than v. They will still follow the same rules, but will be dimesionless.
ThatFatMoogles: but you aren't moving through spacetime then? If you have a dimensionless number
RabbitMunch: My boss collects letters that crackpots send him. He posts the letters outside his office.
eadon-com: what about the moving through spacetime question rabbit?
ThatFatMoogles: is that page completely wrong?
RabbitMunch: ok, ill read on
RabbitMunch: well he says, "Velocity must be given in units of velocity such as meters per second or whatever standard units are being used. For this reason, there is no motion in spacetime."
ThatFatMoogles: yeah he's talking about dt/dt
RabbitMunch: ok, what is wrong with dt/dt?
ThatFatMoogles: x * dt/dt = x?
ThatFatMoogles: it doesn't mean anything?
RabbitMunch: sure it does. it mean that for a paricle travelling along a geodesic, time passes as unity rate with respect to itself
RabbitMunch: but that is obvious
ThatFatMoogles: it travels at 1?
RabbitMunch: yes, 1 second for a clock in the same frame will pass as 1 second for the observer.
ThatFatMoogles: 1 second/second
RabbitMunch: again, really obvious, right?
ThatFatMoogles: 1 second per 1 second? When will it not pass as 1?
RabbitMunch: when an observer in one frame is observing a clock in another frame.
ThatFatMoogles: one major point of his argument is that dt/dt is meaningless
RabbitMunch: well i just gave its meaning
eadon-com: time is relative, so dt for one observer is quantifiably different to dt for a different observer in a different gravitational field or a different speed or what have you. So dt/dt need not be 1
ThatFatMoogles: what you are taking the dt of is a wordline on a spacetime manifold chart, correct?
ThatFatMoogles: worldline
eadon-com: then it is unity i suppose
ThatFatMoogles: but the 1 doesn't mean anything. The worldline is a history of the evolving of the particle with respect to time
RabbitMunch: ok, let me give you the general equation. You say u (bold) is a 4-vector giving the velocity of a particle. Now u will involve an observer and the moving particle, right?
ThatFatMoogles: only the particle. How does the particle 'move' through space-time
eadon-com: I'm saying that the particle doesn't move through spacetime, and relativitists do not claim it does either, hence that site is hogwash. But i am saying that spacetime itself *can* move
RabbitMunch: well if the perticle is the only object in the universe, then sure it is hard to say how it moves through space-time. But do you really think this is the case?
ThatFatMoogles: the particle is observing itself
eadon-com: spacetime is merely a static plot in 4D rabbit? xyzt. So a particle cannot move in spacetime by definition
RabbitMunch: it can be static.
ThatFatMoogles: the vector is t,x(t),y(t),z(t)?
RabbitMunch: yea, the velocity will be u where u_v = dx_v/dtau
RabbitMunch: tau is the proper time of the particle
eadon-com: [no movement is allowed in 4D spacetime] because movement is represented by a static vector in spacetime
RabbitMunch: yes, it can.
ThatFatMoogles: if it is moving through spacetime, what is the evolutionary parameter?
RabbitMunch: evolutionary parameter?
RabbitMunch: huh?
ThatFatMoogles: the worldline has to be moving with respect to something then?
eadon-com: that site talks about time as being an evolutionary parameter, fancy words to put the uninitiated off guard
ThatFatMoogles: isn't that what time is?
eadon-com: evolutionary? time doesn't evolve anymore than distance evolves
ThatFatMoogles: it is a parameter through which to consider particles through space to evolve
RabbitMunch: is the question here, "what is time?"?
ThatFatMoogles: time is the abstract inverse to change?
eadon-com: the question is, we have a 4D framework, with dimensions xyzt and all events past present and future can be plotted in that coordinate frame. those events that are plotted cannot move within that 4D frame. that is the question. Is that assumption right or wrong?
ThatFatMoogles: the particle is moving in 3D, at a certain rate, I am not arguing that. I argue that it is NOT moving through 4D
RabbitMunch: ok, i see.
ThatFatMoogles: if those are the 4D we are only looking at, at the moment
RabbitMunch: so this really is a philosophical question.
ThatFatMoogles: what? :P
eadon-com: no its a physics question
ThatFatMoogles: i thought it was a physics question :P
RabbitMunch: because the same question could be asked for any deterministic system.
eadon-com: the guy on the site claims that relativitists claim that particles move through spacetime. is this correct? That is the key point here!
RabbitMunch: I mean a train leaves NY at 6:00 and passes through DC at 10:00 did it really move in 4D space?
eadon-com: you tell us!
ThatFatMoogles: of course not, because you can't travel through time
RabbitMunch: well strickly speaking, its path was fixed from the beginning. But how does this lead to a contradiction?
ThatFatMoogles: the site is arguing against people who claim it is possible to go back in time. Using a model that precludes any possibility of motion
RabbitMunch: well it seems to be saying much more than that.
ThatFatMoogles: it does :P
eadon-com: if the paths are fixed in 4D then what you are saying is that physicists agree that you cannot move through spacetime. So the site's premise is wrong. the site is attacking a straw man
ThatFatMoogles: he later talks about non-spatiality. How do you go back in time if you are not travelling through time!
RabbitMunch: but as far as backwards time travel is concerned, I don't think its possible, but certainly not for the reasons he gives. There are cases where you can have closed, space-like loops though. (In black holes). Thats the closest youll get to backwards time travel.
eadon-com: an event horizon is one example i beleive
ThatFatMoogles: oh, you mean when you get accelerated beyond the speed of light?
RabbitMunch: no, the event horizon has a bunch of peculiarities, but it does not have a closed space-like loop
eadon-com: rabbit, what about the idea that a wormhole can provide a time machine if the spacetime tunnel *itself* moves?
ThatFatMoogles: does spacetime 'move'?
eadon-com: can spacetime move?
RabbitMunch: these really are philosophical issues.
ThatFatMoogles: physics issues! :P
RabbitMunch: you are kind of asking whether all times exist "somewhere" but we cannot access them.
ThatFatMoogles: I'm going to further argue that time is not a physical mechanism but only an abstraction
RabbitMunch: This question is irrelevant in physics because if there is no mutual casuality, other times cannot be accessed.
eadon-com: ok, so thee we have the answer Moogles, rabbit is a physicist and rabbit says that movement in a 4D spacetime coordinate frame is not possible because all paths are fixed. Assuming that all physicists thing the same way (or the vast majority of them) then the "nasty secret" site is attacking a straw man
ThatFatMoogles: it is attacking travelling back in time. Is that a straw man?
RabbitMunch: No, it is attacking more than that.
ThatFatMoogles: it's attacking the spatialization of time
RabbitMunch: Specifically the part on units.
ThatFatMoogles: the abstract evolutionary parameter
RabbitMunch: Any time these guys try to get into mathematical descriptions of their complaints, they shoot themselves in the foot.
eadon-com: But I'm pleased that I identified the flaw in that sites reasoning about spacetime. The nasty secret is in fact a con. The nasty secret is true, but no one believes in the opposite, so that is the con
RabbitMunch: It is best to say "spacetime cannot evolve and therefore there is not motion". Of course the conclusion is misleading, but at least you are right.
ThatFatMoogles: "First they tell you you're wrong and they can prove it; then they tell you you're right but it isn't important; then they tell you it's important but they knew it all along." Charles Kettering, former head of General Motors
ThatFatMoogles: steps 1 and 2 have been made [here] so far :P
RabbitMunch: well there is no motion in the sense that a space-time path is fixed. For example the path of Mercury could be mapped out considering all other objects it will interact with. And once mapped out, that path would not change. But so what?
eadon-com: oh, its just an argument between moogles and me
ThatFatMoogles: how can you map a path to change directions when there is no direction
PerrinAybara: "I am told God lives in me -- and yet the reality of darkness and coldness and emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul." - Mother Theresa
ThatFatMoogles: i'm talking about going back in time :P
RabbitMunch: ok backwards time travel would be out given what I said.
ThatFatMoogles: the planet mercury is being mapped going through time -- how will you map it going back in time, in a 'closed vector loop' without changing 'directions' when there is no direction in the first place
RabbitMunch: but again, this guy seems to be arguing against much more than backwards time travel.
ThatFatMoogles: yeah, he is. I feel he's on the right track. I'm majoring in physics so hopefully I'll be able to compute this a little more later on :P
ThatFatMoogles: [Quotes from "nasty" site] "Time travel is a symptom of a deeper malady. It is part of a chronic malformation of our collective scientific understanding of the fundamental underpinnings of nature. It is the end result of an incestuous intellectual orgy that has been going on for over a century. It is also the culmination of a scienti
ThatFatMoogles: "that took place in the early part of the twentieth century. A group of revolutionaries, fresh from the resounding empirical victories of Einstein's theory of relativity, established themselves as the sole interpreters and oracles of the new science."
ThatFatMoogles: ack
RabbitMunch: woah. Why does this guy get listed under 'crackpots' anyway? Is the site just doing the same thing my boss does?
eadon-com: he's claiming the relativists are crackpots, guys like hawking and wheeler
RabbitMunch: oh i see. Why not put einstein at teh top of the list?
eadon-com: lol
RabbitMunch: or newton maybe??
ThatFatMoogles: he's not arguing against the predictive correctness of the general and special theories of relativity
RabbitMunch: einstein and newton could arm wrestle for it.
ThatFatMoogles: rabbitmunch, are those spacetime mathematical constructs REAL physical processes?
RabbitMunch:
ThatFatMoogles: he's not arguing against the predictive correctness of the general and special theories of relativity
ThatFatMoogles: Before I continue, less I be immediately branded as an anti-relativity crank, let me make it perfectly clear that I agree with the mathematical and predictive correctness of both the Special and the General Theory of Relativity.
ThatFatMoogles: he says that at the top of his site :P
RabbitMunch: Ok, after this comment, I have to repeat that your arguments are philosophical. Physical theories predict the behavior of observable quantities. c who's your boss? :P
RabbitMunch: If your problems are not with the consistancy of the theories to experiment, you are talking philosophy. Not one of those guys, although I have met most of them.
eadon-com: rabbit, that site explicitly claims that physicists believe that things can move in 4D spacetime. This accusation is the core of his page, even the "nasty secret" title, and the accusation is false. It is a straw man argument. Philosophy is a minor issue.
RabbitMunch: Yes it is straw-man in that sense. But I am more talking about TFM's take on the site.
ThatFatMoogles: he's arguing against people who tell him that motion through spacetime is possible. He eventually just put that page up I think to argue against everyone at once :P