A Holistic Story of Space and Time

By David Pearcey

Have you ever wondered how the space and time of our everyday lives works - and why? David Pearcey is here to help, with A Holistic Story of Space and Time, a thorough exploration through our world of space and time. Explaining how space and time works as a complete system, the book is helped by brief accounts of the contributions of some of the great scientists and philosophers who helped us understand its components.

Intended for the general reader who has no previous technical understanding, A Holistic Story of Space and Time delves into several areas - the types of geometries of space, the motion of matter in space, and how the force fields of matter pervade space, as well as how we perceive space and time by treating the brain as an information management system. It shows how the process of perception allows us to determine the true nature of the geometry of the space and time of the real world. Much more is also looked into in detail such as Einstein's special and general theories of relativity including his unified field theory, electromagnetism, and quantum physics, including charts and diagrams to explain some of the concepts involved.

The final part of the book investigates the relationship between us who perceive the real world and the space and time of the real world, using the ideas developed by the philosophers Kant and Schopenhauer. This all combines to give the reader a uniquely broad look into our world and explains how it works as a total entity, from the cosmic world of the curved geometry of general relativity to the mysterious quantum world and then the philosophical aspects of how we are part of it. Anyone with an interest in the way things work will be well-suited to this extraordinary book that answers the why as well as the what and how.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Jun 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9781805146209

David Pearcey

David Pearcey is a retired geologist who studied physics and geology at university. He gave up the ambition of being a physicist when he found that physics was about mathematics rather than principles describing how the universe worked. He spent his life as a geologist working in remote parts of Australia.

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Copyright © 2023 David Pearcey

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Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

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Contents

Acknowledgements

The story of space and time

ILLUSTRATIONS

Charts

Chart 1: The process of perception of space and time

Chart 2: The force fields of matter

Chart 3: The steps involved in our presentation of special relativity

Chart 4: The geometry of general relativity

Chart 5: The processes involved in the quantum world

Chart 6: The philosophy of perception

Diagrams

Diagram 1: Experimental apparatus exemplifying the Lorentz force equation

Diagram 2: Visualisation of non-Euclidean geometry in two dimensions

Diagram 3: Visualisation of non-Euclidean space near the Sun

Diagram 4: Moving bodies in the real world and the visual view

Diagram 5: Bending of light in non-Euclidean space near the Sun

Diagram 6: Differential flow associated with a vortex

Diagram 7: Motion of a body within a vortex

Diagram 8: Interacting vortices with like and opposing rotations

Diagram 9: Rotating charged disc and its toroidal magnetic field

Cameos

Galileo Galilei

Isaac Newton

Michael Faraday

Immanuel Kant

Hendrik Lorentz

James Clerk Maxwell

Albert Einstein

Hermann Minkowski

René Descartes

Arthur Schopenhauer

Acknowledgements

This book is the result of the efforts of a team of people. Sue Mathews edited the initial manuscript into the book that you are holding in your hands. Rebecca Crannaford and Emma Regeur helped her with formatting. Janet Pearce, an old work colleague, helped with the production of the charts and diagrams and Sally Pope the indexing. I also thank Frances, my sister, and Ian, for encouragement and for finding Sue, a good friend of theirs. Of course, I cannot forget Marion Le Crayon, who I met in the Fremantle Markets, for the wonderful caricatures of the people who this story is about.

This book is in memory of Douglas Adams. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, about the meaning of ‘life, the universe and everything’, introduced me to the idea of looking at science holistically and the realisation that the subject can be presented in a friendly style.

The story of space and time

Welcome to the world of space and time or, as some people call it, space-time, and yet others, dynamic space. This is, in part, a travelogue through the story of space and time, where we visit some of the great scientists and philosophers who built our understanding of it. However, their contribution only covers part of the story, as there is a blank area to this story that, to my knowledge, has not been visited by anyone before.

Let me explain. There are two sides to space and time: there is our understanding of it in the context of our perception of it, and there is the space and time of the real world from which we get our perceptions. It is this latter side of the story that appears not to have been told.

We start our journey into the nature of the space and time of the universe by reviewing our basic physics. We cover such topics as the geometry of space, the nature of time, the motion of matter through space and how force fields associated with matter pervade space, all in the context of our perception of the real world.

We also investigate the nature of force fields such as gravity and electromagnetism, presented via principles rather than inaccessible mathematical equations. Then, if we wish to understand the nature of space and time with respect to the real world, we must investigate the processes of perception and understand how these influence the way we perceive space and time. From this we can define the basic physics of space and time in the context of the real world, devoid of the influences that the processes of perception have on our view of it.

We then investigate the multidimensional nature of space, the nature of the non-Euclidean and dynamic geometry of space and how these geometries relate to force fields that pervade space.

We then delve into the physics of space and time, which is Albert Einstein’s theories of relativity, including his special theory about the motion of matter and his general theory concerning gravity.

We firstly explain each of his theories in the context of our perception of the space and time geometry, as he presented them, and then redevelop them in the context of the real-world geometry. This is all done based on physical principles rather than mathematics, so no technical knowledge of mathematics is needed.

We then define the force fields other than gravity with respect to the geometry of space in the real world. Albert Einstein, after completing his geometric gravitational theory, tried to do this for electromagnetic force fields through his unified field theory. We touch on quantum theory, the motion of elementary particles in space and the wave nature of matter. We also note that the quantum world is where the building blocks of matter are at work.

Finally, we get philosophical and investigate the relationship that exists between you, the perceiver, and the real world, not only from the scientist’s point of view but also from the philosopher’s perspective. This is an interesting part of the book – the world we live in is rather strange, but you will have to read the book to understand why.

In this book we are taking a holistic approach to our understanding of space and time. This means we will look at it from a big picture perspective and see how space and time work as a complete system, rather than using the academic approach of treating different fields of knowledge as separate subjects in their own right. We also tackle some subjects in a different way; this is because we wish to see them in context as a whole, rather than in the way they were developed mathematically – this book is a mathematics-free zone.

Charts are employed at the end of some chapters where we venture into new territory in our travels through the story of space and time. The charts are used to help clarify the relationship between real-world space and time and our perception of it.

The main characters in this book have their names personalised to project a feeling of friendliness about them; they are people just like us. For example, Albert Einstein has been personalised to Uncle Albert.

Also, there is a glossary at the back of the book. I mention it now in case you read the book before discovering it.

Chapter 1

A review of our holistic story

Introduction

It is possible that the ancestors of intelligent life on Earth gained an awareness of space early in the evolution of life when animals were required to move about to obtain food. However, an awareness of time may have first been appreciated when, through evolution, intelligent life gained the ability to remember the past and then plan for the future. This process is particularly important if there are dangerous life forms trying to eat you. This ability to retain a memory of the past gave rise to the concept of the ‘arrow of time’, that is, the past trailing after the present and the idea that there is a future. This means that life which had the ability to be aware of its past must have had the ability to perceive and learn about the world it is in and take actions to improve its survival chances.

We will start our journey through the world of space and time by applying the assumption that what we think of as the real world is our perception of it; of course, we assume that there is a real world out there from which we gain our perceptions.

To determine the nature of the space and time of the real world, as opposed to our perception of it, we need to understand how the processes of perception alter the true nature of real-world space and time to give us our perception of it. As all physics dealing with space and time has been undertaken in the context of our perception, rather than that of the real world, we will be entering a new world of understanding when we start to investigate the nature of space and time in this new context. That is, in our journey through the topic of space and time, our travels will take us through the concepts developed by many great people, but we will also venture into some unexplored territory when we deal directly with the space and time geometry of the real world.

First, we will complete a quick review of the basic physics of space and time in the context of our perception of it. We will look at the concept of space using coordinate systems and examine time in the context of the arrow of time, as well as seeing it as a dimension used to help define the motion of matter in space. We will also investigate the dynamics of matter under Newton’s laws of motion and, finally, look at how force fields influence the motion of matter through space. We will then briefly outline how gravitational and electromagnetic forces work by explaining them conceptually rather than mathematically.

Perception

We will investigate the process of perception in the context of how we understand the nature of real-world space and time using the assumption that our perception of the real world is generated by the brain as an information model that replicates it as a view in our head. The information model the brain uses is not unlike what we use in computing, and so we will look at computer information modelling to help understand the process of information management that goes on in the brain. We will then examine how the brain builds its information model of the real world, using an information management system that manages the information about the real world that it gains from our body sensors. We will also investigate the development of the information management system and the information model of the brain from early evolution, when the brain’s information management system was operated by genetically encoded hardwiring – that is, instinct – to what we have now.

We will show that time, when perceived as the arrow of time, is linked to the ability of intelligent life to retain a memory of the past. This ability, and subsequently its use to help learn from past experiences, is unique to intelligent life. In fact, the concept of the arrow of time is not upheld in the real world; this will be explained later in this book. We note that the reason why we perceive space as a three-dimensional geometric continuum is that our immediate world is governed by electromagnetic forces, and electromagnetic fields require three dimensions of space to function. We also note that the world we live in is almost totally Euclidean, so we have, through evolution, ended up perceiving it as being Euclidean.

The geometry of space in the real world

We examine the nature of real-world space and time and conclude that our perception of time is very much defined by the way we perceive the real world. That is, our concept of time is an evolutionary response to the way intelligent life responds to the dynamic nature of space in the real world. Space is a more complex issue; its dimensionality is not limited to three dimensions, and its geometric character is not limited to just being Euclidean stationary space, which is the geometry of space that we are familiar with. We identify that the geometry of space is not only multidimensional but can also be non-Euclidean and dynamic within itself. These types of geometries will be discussed in detail with examples from our everyday experience.

We then undertake a brief review of the nature of the coordinate systems that we use to define the geometry of space and classify them into Euclidean, non-Euclidean and dynamic space geometries. We spend a bit of time describing the non-Euclidean geometry of space, because some well-held preconceived notions of non-Euclidean space are not entirely true. We outline the true nature of non-Euclidean geometry and of examples of it from our everyday experience.

Dynamic geometry is something of a new subject in physics but has been known to philosophers since the time of René Descartes (Monsieur René) and may have been unwittingly investigated by Albert Einstein (Uncle Albert) in an abstract mathematical way, using a four-dimensional geometry to define it.

We review the subject of dynamic geometry in detail by examining it with respect to each of the dimensions that support it. In one dimension, it is represented by the stretching or contracting of space between any two points along a line. In a two-dimensional geometry, acting in a plane, the motion of a coordinate system would be a circular vortex flow, not unlike a disc of dust rotating around a planet or star. In three dimensions, the two-dimensional form of a vortex is associated with a toroidal dynamic geometry in three dimensions, where the toroidal flow is orthogonal, or at right angles, to the two-dimensional vortex flow. It is a bit like a bar magnet where the magnetic force lines correspond to the flow lines of the toroidal dynamic geometry. In four dimensions, the dynamic geometry would be as for three dimensions, but the dynamic geometry of the four-dimensional component would lie orthogonal to the three-dimensional flow. However, as we cannot perceive in four dimensions, we may perceive the fourth dimension of dynamic geometry as a particle, where the geometric properties of the particle represent the dynamic geometry in the fourth dimension.

Non-Euclidean and dynamic geometries are not part of our perceived notion of space, as we cannot see or feel space in the way we feel air on a windy day; we only realise that both forms of geometry, non-Euclidean geometry and dynamic geometry, exist in the real world when we see that the motion of bodies appears to deviate from their normal state of motion as they pass through it. We explain this deviation not as the effects of non-Euclidean or