curium96

The theory of everything is not a scientific theory. It is a theory of ideas, and it goes as follows: An idea represents that which it represents, in contraposition to the fact of the idea as it is. This IS fact, it will not be disputed, and the implications of this fact are what we call science. The implications of science are not what we call fact. Fact is what exists beyond perception, to be inferred through perception but not wholly perceived given the limits of perception. As Plato put it: "The starry heaven which we behold is wrought upon a visible ground, and therefore, although the fairest and most perfect of visible things, must necessarily be deemed inferior far to the true motions of absolute swiftness and absolute slowness, which are relative to each other, and carry with them that which is contained in them, in the true number and in every true figure. Now, these are to be apprehended by reason and intelligence, but not by sight." Where oh where is the man of reason? He who calls himself "scientist", he is not it. And this, again, shall be known as fact, in consequence of evidence, to which the man of "science", so-called, is patently oblivious. How many times must the folly of man be made manifest in this way? Every era of mankind sees a NEW enlightenment, so profound, so all-knowing as to be beyond reproach. Yet the essence of truth lies right before us, asking simply to be beheld. The enlightened man, now as always before, simply turns away.

God shall be defined as all-encompassing. In other words, eternal. All that exists is God, and God is all that exists. There is no other acceptable definition, and any definition contradicting this is paradoxical. A paradox is an idea which represents incompleteness, e.g. a failure in understanding. If it appears that ideas which are otherwise acceptable exist in contradiction to each other, it shall be assumed that these ideas are incomplete, incoherent, or just plain incorrect. This will not be disputed because it is fact. There is no debating fact where fact is indisputable, and this point, while widely accepted, implies an endemic shortfall of perspective which can be described as a natural consequence or limit of existence. Scientists call this "the event horizon". They don't accept the implications, rejecting the implications as unknowable, rather than accepting the unknowability of the implications as A fact. See what I'm getting at? Turns out this whole "alphabetical language" wasn't a complete waste of time, if you know what I mean... Am I right? Human beings had an inkling. Then we had ideas. We strung those ideas into a sequence, in relation to each other, in relation to ourselves. We draw upon reality, the objective, the totality of existence, to formulate these ideas. The limits of these ideas in relation to each other distinguishes what is real and what is not. The totality of what is real is God: the Objective Frame of Reference.

We as human beings seem to share a connection in the form of our observed reality. This is evidenced by the indisputable fact that our spacetime heritage can be traced back, irrespective of the individual perspective, to a common origin. If the nature of the common origin is infinite, there would be no upwards or downwards limit to the frequency of light, and the observable universe would be defined in terms of the visible spectrum of light shared by the group (the parameters of shared experience). Time dilation as a consequence of perspective in relation to mass and motion would lead automatically to an accelerating expansion of spacetime, in other words, this visible effect should have been predicted given a sufficient understanding of observation, and this is evident in the fact that the effect is observed. The sum of human efforts in observation is directly tethered to the mass and motion of the Earth in relation to the Solar System, the Solar System in relation to the Milky Way, the Milky Way in relation to the Local Cluster, and so on and so forth. You are telling me that you know for a fact that the effects of time dilation on an infinite variety of scales is insufficient to explain or predict the phenomenon in question? I know there is much I do not know. I hope that you will understand when I state plainly that I remain skeptical and unconvinced. Again, and I thought I said this, but I know words are trickier than they seem: I am not trying to explain expansion. I explicitly said, as a basic premise, that this discussion will be based in the idea of observation as a fact (e.g. empirical science), therefore we will take expansion for granted as a prerequisite of the conversation as such. The question I raised, to clarify, is whether or not it is a matter of basic logic that the universe should expand at a static or accelerating rate given the nature of observed space and time. Obviously, given massive areas in spacetime which are relatively void of matter and energy relative to other areas which are relatively dense in terms of matter and energy, we would observe expansion which can be predicted in terms of this discrepancy. In other words, try assuming space that appears void of matter and energy is still massive, and think about what that means. "Problem solved. Or, am I missing something?" LVW

I appreciate all the info! As you can tell, I'm not a scientist, just a curious bystander. I respect your offering your time to me. It was not my intention to explain or even raise the question of what causes universal expansion (which seems to me a natural consequence of observation in an infinite universe, but I don't want to get sidetracked on that point). I specifically used the phrase "given the initiation of expansion..." in my initial comment. In other words, taking the causal mechanism of expansion for granted, can expansion then be explained in terms of time dilation? It is my understanding that expansion is something that occurs in the spaces between matter and energy as opposed to within them, or am I misunderstanding? My question, to clarify, is whether the absence of matter and energy in the Cosmic voids could cause a time dilation effect which would naturally lead to an accelerating expansion of the universe, as opposed to a steady expansion. It seems like you are telling me that time dilation is already factored into the models, but on that point you have me confused. Isn't the whole mystery of Dark Energy the fact that the Universe appears to be expanding at an accelerating rate, which was not predicted by theory but rather discovered through observation? Couldn't that reasonably be explained by differences in the relative passage of time in empty space as opposed to spaces occupied by mass?

Can the expansion of the universe be explained in terms of time dilation? If we accept observational evidence at face value, it appears that all the matter and energy in the universe was originally confined to an extremely small space. Would the extremely high density of the early observable universe not lead logically to a universe that, given the initiation of expansion, expands at an accelerating (but also uneven) rate in accordance with the distribution of matter and energy in space? Where there is less gravity, time moves faster, right? So wouldn't it make sense that the cosmic voids would expand at a faster and faster rate relative to the galactic centers of mass?