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When I used to hear the phrase "life after death", I always assumed people were talking about heaven or hell, or becoming a spirit that floated around in some new state of consciousness. Several months ago, reading Kant, he used the phrase, referring to life in general, continuing after an individual dies. That there indeed IS life after death. If someone were to ask me if I believed in life after death, I previosly would have said, "no, when you stop functioning, that includes your mind and senses, you are no longer alive. But in the second sense, I would have to answer "well of course there is." People have been being born, living, and dying for quite a long time, and always, since there were first people, there has been life after death. And I suppose even if all people were to die, there would still be some plants and fish and microbes somewhere. Both senses though, have a common feel, somehow. What is it, of what an individual is, that continues to exist, that continues to live...after death?

PeterJ, Ok. Much clearer. But I still don't know what your solution is. You seem to have hinted that the universe, or objective reality itself must have contradictions or they wouldn't keep showing up in our thoughts about it. Generally, I suppose this is so, in the sense that there is plus and minus, up and down, positive and negative, and all the other pairs we think in, that we have derived from the apparent attributes of gravity, charge, eminations and accretions and such that the universe seems to made up of. But that is just opposites, not necessarily contradictions. Both validate the other. Which hints more in the direction that the universe is composed in a symetrical fashion, of enities that both oppose and create each other. Still no contradiction, still true and not false. If the universe were only one thing...there would be nothing to say about it at all. So it must be engaged in a number of activities that each comprise an entity with characteristics, with sub entities, and with each belonging to a greater group of similar entities. All being composed of what happened to them before, and all about to do what they are going to do next. According to the complex interplay of the forces and amounts and distances involved. Plus of course, the emergence of life, and...conciousness. Where an entity can on purpose promote its own pattern, against the flow. Is this a contradiction? Perhaps, but if it is, then perhaps the solution is to recognize consciousness as already having knowledge of the truth. Having already "won". And making it possible for those of our kind to continue in this victorious state, is what we do. Metaphysically, we are sort of constrained to the truth. If it fits with reality, it is right. If it contradicts reality...we rethink. Regards, TAR2

PeterJ, I don't think you are an idiot. The topic we are discussing is the whether or not philosophy is crap. Central to determining this one way or the other, are two important considerations, which are: What do we mean when we say "philosophy"? And is this thing which we mean valuable or crap? You have determined in your own worldview, that the most important, common result of metaphysics is that positive metaphysical statements are falsafiable, and/or lead to a contradiction. And at that point the distinction between which statement is true and which statement is false is undecidable. You seem to be saying, in regards to this thread topic, that philosophy is metaphysical arguments, and they are basically worthless to us. With which one might surmise you believe philosophy to be crap...but you follow up by suggesting that you hold an unassailable metaphysical position? Which is only important and true to you, and has no basis in fact, but instead is an unavoidable path to truth that is followed by the complete and honest application of metaphysical principles that have been gleaned by humankind, down through the ages, from our common struggle to reach such truth, given our common, empirical existence as subjective minds, attempting to objectively validate our understanding. With which, one would surmise, that you believe philosophy is indeed the application of metaphysics to our human condition, and that it is ultimately not only useful, but essential. My schoolyard taunting, was in fun, but a challenge none-the-less, for you to come down, one way or the other. Is philosophy crap, or is it essential? Regards, TAR2 A Tripolation, Allow me to back up my statement about Kant's ideas being useful in modern day linguistics and cognitive sciences. Here is a brief snipit from Steven Pinker's "The Stuff of Thought (language as a window into human nature)" pg 158 in the edition on my lap, 8 pages into the chapter entitled "Cleaving the air".

PeterJ, Well here is the layout. You can tell me if you see it the same way or not. I exist in and of objective reality. I am in possesion of subjective representations of objective reality. If I see a pattern in this objective reality that no one else sees, and I cannot show them where to find it, or how to see it, then it is more likely to be without basis in objective reality, than those patterns I notice that are also noticed by other subjective beings who also have internalized representations of objective reality, and find the same pattern to exist as I did. The more the better. If 8 billion sighted humans have the moon in their model of objective reality, there is 100% chance that there is such a thing, that truly exists in objective reality. If however, you know a truth, that everybody else seems to have missed...you best rethink. Regards, TAR2 Or point the darn thing out. People, I have found, have no problem adjusting their model of the world to fit the facts, as they become evident. This is quite contrary to how people handle personal gods and personal truths, that they have found, within their own musings. These are stubbornly held and defended, regardless of the facts. Perhaps your infallible metaphysical argument goes something like this...I am rubber, you are glue, anything you say, bounces off me and sticks to you. Not at all like mine, which is best reflected in the speech I have prepared, in the event that human resources calls me to a private meeting. (Spoken loudly with hands covering my ears) La La La La La La La...I can't hear you...LA LA LA LA...

PeterJ, Winning or losing a philosophical argument, is not really why I discuss things with people. Noticing the common truth is more important to me. If I thought I was totally right about everything, but nobody agreed, that would be useless. Not a victory of any kind at all. I am neither the first nor the last, nor the smartest nor the dumbest, to consider the nature of their relationship with objective reality. Where the victories are achieved is when the thing is clear and evident to all. When something is true, it simply is. No argument is required. Regards, TAR2

PeteJ, I am reading Kant. I don't take what and why he says things in the same manner you do. I am not an authority on the matter, certainly, but there is a difference between you saying that Kant says this or that, and me thinking that Kant is saying this or that. And there are important implications between using words like indefensible, undecidable, and unfalsifiable, as Immortal points out. To screw this around and state it the way you do, is somehow wrong in my mind. You keep saying it is so simple to show that it is not worth arguing about...when in fact, finding simple truths from which one can deduce much, is crucial to the whole operation of thought. I don't think you have a positive outlook on the thing. Perhaps we cannot know the thing in its self, but there is much we can say about it. That we are only working with a representation of the thing, does not mean the thing itself is not real. Regards, TAR2

Owl, You never answered my challenge. What is the shape of the edge of the shadow(penumbra) cast by the Earth? Straight or curved? Regards, TAR2

A Tripolation, Kant's metaphysics and "categories" and determinations built on the foundations of an a priori intuition of space, and of time, finds some close analogs in modern day linquistics and cognitive sciences. Regards, TAR2

PeterJ, You keep saying that philosophers can not make a positive assertion. And you seem rather positive that this is the case. If you are right, then you are contradicting yourself. If you are wrong, which I think you are, then that leaves me free to both philosophize and assert positive things about objective reality, as they become evident to me. Regards, TAR And of what use would philosophy be, if it did not teach us what it is we can say about the world, in truth?

Mooey, I think when you take anything to the extreme it becomes absurd. Laughable when done in ernest. Hurtful when done mockingly. Let the evangelical preachers make their own silly statements. But don't put words in their mouth. Make your points with counter examples. There are many believers in God that are not evangelical preachers. And the God they believe in may have more similarities to the objective reality you believe in than you think. Where the differences are, are the areas up for discussion, but that leaves a lot of meat on both plates. And it comes back to the title of this thread. The same idea, when you hold it, is put in a good light. When somebody else holds it, it is put in a questionable light. And when a third party holds it, it is downright absurd. Regards, TAR2 Even cosmologists that predict what the universe will "look like" in 25 billion years, are revealing their belief in a consciousness that is greater and longer lasting than their own. That objective reality IS a being that exists. Whose particular attributes include at least the ability to "look".

A Tripolation, A very scholarly philosopher friend and teacher of mine, often will warn me to "be careful" when I state a premise with questionable basis, and provide a counter example for me to muse upon. Very useful. Regards, TAR2 The search for the solid premises, from which much else will follow is the nature of any intellectual pursuit. Be they scientific or philosophical, or religious ones. Philosophy's work in this area is a great contribution to human advancement. PeterJ, As for "schools of thought". These might be a problem. After all people are not prone to accept lines of thought that negate the premises upon which their work is based. Regards, TAR2 I suppose that is why we have universities. To coordinate the schools, and iron out the problems. And settle the thing on the Basketball Court? Better at least, than settling it on the battlefield.

Mooey, I think the video is a strawman argument. Not likely the thinking of a theist. Instead the thinking of an Atheist trying to put himself in the shoes of a Theist. (and build a silly argument) Fact is, when somebody talks of God, they are not thinking about a God you know does not exist. They are thinking about objective reality. Objective reality that trumps everything you know. You, as a scientist may be convinced that the universe is explainable by a handful of laws that matter and energy abide by...and that all that there is is random combinations of these laws...that in these laws there is no hint of consciousness and intent. Yet here you sit. A willfull, conscious collection of accidental chemicals. And if you are part of the universe, part of objective reality, part of an unthinking universe...where did the "thinking" come into the picture? Not unlikely in my way of thinking, that I am just as smart and just as dumb as the rest of the universe. Any attributes I may have, came in some way, from objective reality. That means objective reality CAN and DID create me. On its own, without any outside help. And an acorn lies on the floor of a virgin forest somewhere, in all its intricate beauty and promise of treeness, without any human's equation, prediction, or assistance. The universe, objective reality, did that, all on it's own. The doer of the Oak tree is the God theists know. It need not be the grey bearded gentleman you know does not live in the clouds. It is objective reality itself, that we are part of, that we know intimately. Regards, TAR2

Owl, You know I know the shape of the moon. It is a different shape than it appears to be with the naked eye, from my car, when it is full. My point was that many measurements, at different times, taken from different perspectives, and from different sources are added up in my mind, and your mind, to determine what shape it always has. And from any one perspective, at any one time, it is still only a disc. You do not have any one "real" vantage point from which you can determine its sphereness. You have to hold an "ideal" that fulfills ALL the separate observations. You may think I am a dolt. But I am trying to point out to you, that you trust the measurements and observations of many, over spans of time, to fill out your understanding of the shape of the moon...then you stop trusting others, and figure you are holding the correct understanding and know the "real" shape of the moon...regardless of the continued observations, and idealizations that describe what that shape must be like. Yes it has a shape, regardless of who and when and from where it is observed. But your ideal of its real shape is your ideal, it is not the real shape. It is the understanding that you have of what its real shape must be, if all the information about it is added together. That is, from the best "god's eye" view you can manage. Together, people can manage a better "god's eye" view, than when acting alone. That is what science is about. Arriving at a better understanding of the shape of things. Don't know why you think that you can get there, without going along for the ride. And don't know why you think that scientists don't already know what they are looking at. Regards, TAR Underlying point being, that philosophy is relevant to science, but not "better than". You can form an ideal with philosophy. But it is not as good as testing it out, and seeing if it fits with reality. Like science does.

Owl, Lurking about, with full intention of weaning myself off this forum, and getting back to my reading list, I see that my inability to make sense of Ross COULD be because he wasn't making any. And my inability to follow his reasoning was not because I couldn't think as deeply as he, but because he was looking at it wrong. In that light, I would like to add, as a (maybe) parting shot, a thought I had last night looking at the full moon on my drive home. I thought of you and your "real" sphere, and considered it odd that you would think such about the moon, being that it looked to me rather like a circle, with no third dimension at all. And being that the moon always has its same face to us, I was wondering why you would think it even had another side, much less a spherical shape. Where do you get such "ideas"? Maybe a cresent moon will remind me. But if light from the Sun reflects off the moon and gives the same pattern as light from a light bulb reflecting off a globe sitting on my sideboard, and I know the globe to be a sphere, I guess the moon might be as well. My thought is now, that if you are creating the idea of what shape a thing is, you have to model it, turn the model around in your hand or mind, and see if some similar characteristics and behaviors exist in the thing which is outside your reach, as those exhibited in the thing you have more information about. I don't think you can do this, but "over time". That is, put all the observations together, to get an idea of what the "thing" is, that you are describing or observing. In this "light", I would ask you to reconsider the "distance" between things, and consider the shadow of the Earth that the high speed traveler would pass through should she travel in such a way as the Earth would for a moment block the Sun. Is this shadow a "real" thing? What is its shape? Would she measure the shape of the Earth as a circle at any moment during its passage across the face of the Sun? I don't know the answer to this, but I think the question is useful, in considering the real "shape" of the Earth's shadow. I know there is an umbra and a penumbra because the Sun is not a point source, but if you were to project this shadow, in your "real" image of the solar system, would the shadow be straight or curved? You cannot exactly use experience of "straight" shadows you might note in a room. The solar system is quite huge and it takes light some time to cover the distance. And take the whole milky way. Which part of it is currently in the Earth's shadow? Tough to nail down in the "realist" camp. Don't you think? It would be sort of a spiral shape. Regards, TAR2

Owl, The article was a bit over my head. I will have to plead stupidy. And bow out, if your discussion is on that level. I apologize for thinking I could add anything to the discussion. In my general inquiry into the meaning behind language, I forgot an important fact. I have no way to know what it means to be more intelligent than I am. If I knew, I would be more intelligent. I'll have to abandon my current strategy of participating in these threads, and go back to reading the works of the great minds that are sitting on the shelf next to me. I'll be back, if and when I think I know something. It has been fun. Regards, TAR2

Appolinaria and Inow, I am wondering if the disagreement here has to do with the meaning of afterlife. After one's life, is there life? And to what extent is that pertinent to one's life. I do not think it is wrong to believe that life will continue to exist after one's death. Even Mr. Krauss believes that something will exist in 100 billion years. The question that seems to be at hand is whether or not the universe was born, will live, and die and there will still be something. Is there an afteruniverse that the universe needs to be concerned with? Regards, TAR2

Ben Bowen, I was merely proposing that if nothing is the opposite of something, then the absence of everything that there is, would be nothing. And that we are unlikely to find such on "this side" of the big bang. That is, that if space and time and reality are on this side, then no space, no time and no real thing is on the other. If that means nothing to you, then it is an appropriate description. Regards, TAR2

Thank you IGGY. I appreciate the time you take to explain things to me. You seem to have a grasp of where I am in reference to where I am attempting to get, understandingwise, in terms of the physics and relativity. As a general observation, in terms of this thread, there are both teachers and students here. I think that philosopjy is very relevant to science, but has already been solidly incorporated into said field of inquiry. And Owl does philosophy a disservice in rejecting the science that has been done in complete accord with solid philosophical thinking. Free thinking is fine for "turning the thing around and looking at it from all sides." But this is what scientists insist on anyway. It is important to note that people have been doing this for a long time. And where we find the same thing, everytime we turn the thing around and look at it, we will probably find a scientist has recorded the fact. Owl, Along this line. About the rotation of the Earth. If you are to say something about it, you have to say it in reference to something. Notice, in terms of relativity that an "observer" is always referenced. The thing that the observer sees is real. It exists with or without the observer. And if two observers look at the same real thing, and see it differently, this establishes the real thing as "other than" the observers or their "ideals". Often you (Owl) have been questioned on why this general establishment of real things is accepted by you, on most counts, but not when it comes to length contraction or time dilation. After Iggy's post, I had a thought. Can you accept that things, real things, are separated from each other? This "distance" between things is C. Always. Really. And time and length are components of the distance between things. And moving things cover a distance, which changes their distance from the things they are moving toward and the things they are moving away from. Can you sort this out, in a "real" way, better than the equations of relativity? Regards, TAR2

Iggy, Yes I have tried. Probably not hard enough. I suppose my problem is finding something to hold constant. I try the measured at C thing and it makes sense, and "works out", until I try and comprehend the consequences. I for instance want to flip back and forth between the frames and see the thing that is constant. I have understood the grids and the math, and to a certain extent, the "spacetime" that is referred to. But I have Owl's problem, in wanting to match up the numbers with real stuff. So that I can understand the consequences. If there is "something" on which the real world is based, I would like to understand it. I do not seek however to prove length contraction and time dilation incorrect, as Owl seems to be insisting. I on the other hand, have the same "realist" intuition, but am completely open to learning what is "meant" by the terms. That is what is convention, what is analogy and metaphor, and what are the "real" referents we are referring to. For instance, if there is not "something" for the stay at home to remain in, and everything is completely relative. Then to the traveling twin, who never changed reference frames either, it was indeed the Earth that sped away, and came back to her. The kind of thing I am suggesting is a matrix of gravitational and magnetic fields that one can actually be moving through, or staying stationary to. Certain of it moves along with you, and certain of it, you are moving through. The matrix itself is not "fixed" in position, except by reference to all of it, from any one here and now. Since the fields generated by Alpha Centuri and the Sun express themselves at C, and have been doing so, for much longer than 4.3 years, the Alpha Centuri-Earth part of the matrix is already here. In fact a whole bunch of local stars are locked together already, in a swirl around the center of the Milky Way. It makes a difference, in my imagination, whose fields you are moving in reference to. And whose fields you are moving along with. Complicated to figure, and maybe this is what the equations of relativity are meant to address. But it seems required that the traveler is moving through "something" that the Earth is moving along with, for there to be a difference in the ages of the twins upon the return of the traveller. Regards, TAR2 even dark matter and energy should have some behavioral characteristics neutrinos should be standing still or swirling about, or coming in, or going out from or to or in or out or around "something" shouldn't they? PeterJ, Yeah, I should probably do a bit less wondering and a lot more reading. Regards, TAR2 I wonder why I don't

Just wondering. When the flyby guy is traveling at 99 percent the speed of light. Whose measurements are we using to determine this speed? Whose second are we using? Whose meter are we using? If the seconds and meters can vary but C can not, what is it exactly that is invariant? C is the distance that light travels in a certain period of time. Whose distance? Whose time? Just wondering. And the traveling twin. Why does she return younger? The stay at home was the one that was traveling at near light speed, relative to her. The stay at home should have been younger than her upon her return. ? Just wondering. If the equations work in the one direction, they should work in the other. Calling each frame a rest frame in turn. Why don't all the effects cancel out, and she should return exactly the same age as her twin? Just wondering.

Inow, Mr. Krauss has taken what we know at the moment and carried the equations forward for 100 billion years to "visualize" a universe, this universe, in the state it will then be in. We can not even "visualize" the state the universe is currently in, except for how it looks from here and now. With Mr. Krauss' knowledge that empty space is boiling with virtual particles that pop in an out of existence, and with our recent finding that we can only "see" less than one percent of the matter and energy in even the local universe, there seems to be much that can "happen" in the universe, without our knowledge of it happening. So on what basis does he rule out matter and energy changing characteristics, a little at a time, to form "new" arrangements. Or that the "knowledge" we have gained about the universe in the last 100 years, and our ability to "see" and understand more what the universe is about...given 100 billion years of exploration, will not allow us to "see" further than we can know? If flights of fancy are disallowed for religion and philosophy, then they should be at least recognized as such, when engaged in by a scientist. Regards, TAR2

Inow, Well, back to nothing. Mr. Krauss' belittling of religions bothered me, not because I don't agree that many religious (god made me do it) types of reasoning are baseless in my imagination, but because he doesn't offer anything better to satisfy my need for "life after death". I put this in the "nothing" discussion, because as far as I know, I knew nothing before I was born, and I will know nothing, after I die. However, it doesn't "seem" that way to me. I feel a belonging to my past, my family, my nation, my race, life on Earth, and our Solar System. And I feel a responsibility to leave my family and society and the Earth, in at least as good a condition as it was in during my life. I have a sense or knowledge, that it will continue after my death, and while TAR2 will know nothing after his death, there will be memories of me, that will continue after I die. In the works I leave behind, in the thoughts of those who I have touched, in the continuance of those established things, that I helped to maintain. There will still be something. Something that I care about, even though I will not be around to know about it. I am not in a position to claim that I would know or feel these things if there was not religion. I said my prayers when I was young, I went to Sunday School. I learned "a way" that people, together, dealt with the enormity and power of the universe, and learned "a way" to hold oneself responsible for "life after death". It might not be important that it will not be me that is living after I die. But that there is still going to be life...and I, while I am alive, am responsible for behaving in a manner that will honor and protect that life. On whose authority? Mr. Krauss does not answer this. Its all an accident according to him. The whole universe will disperse and there will be nothing but lonely peices of rock or lonely stars around...with "nothing" to look at, "nothing" to know. I don't personally agree with him. He does not "know" what will or will not be the case in 100billion years. The universe is not finished doing what it is doing, and it has not done yet what it is going to do, next. And if this particular clump of "accidental" chemical arrangements called "TAR2" can know and care about "something"...then the universe is capable of such...if it was ONLY me, that knew and cared about anything. However, I know it to be the case that there is not only me, but MUCH else that exists. And at least some of this much else, is similar to me in its ability to know and care about "something". If the universe has "accidentally" created consciousness in a mere 13.72 billion years...who is Mr. Krauss to even take a wild guess at what could develope in another 100billion years...much less declare that he KNOWS how it will be. I would be willing to bet big money that he has no clue. 'Course I can not lose or win such a bet, because neither Mr. Krauss nor I will be here to collect. But it is rather arrogant for him to claim such knowledge, and belittle the universe, and increase his own value in such a manner, as to claim knowledge of it in such a way. On whose authority does he imagine that such a pronouncement would mean anything to anybody, much less be correct? Could be that as Owl suggests, the universe will "chrunch" again to a singularity and emerge out the "other side" in a "different" way, with elements of what it has "learned" in this cycle, carried through to "form" the reality of the next stage. Who is to say that "this" universe was not created by a "former" one on the other side, that had "evolved", and intelligent beings, who "knew" what was occurring left "messages" for the next cycle to find. In anycase...there is not nothing. Reality is here to stay. Even if I won't be around to know about it. Someone, or something will. Seems to be a guarantee. How in the world could it be otherwise? Even if a tree falls in the woods, and there is no one around...there is still woods. Regards, TAR2

Just an observation. I do not think I am alone in desiring to understand the universe "correctly". It's a rather large and extensive thing, in terms of size and scale in both time and distance. In fact it is everything there ever was and ever will be, everywhere and every time that there is. More than anyone can grasp. Even Mr. Krauss. If one feels they have a handle on it...they most likely are deluding themselves, in some sense or another. As each of us has our ways to handle it, and as handling it together is less lonely, I am cautious about anytime that someone feels they hold the only key. All in all Mr. Krauss is in rather the same spot as someone cirling the stone in Mecca, or reaching Nirvana on a hilltop. It is little help to me to be "outside" the reachers conception of the universe. I am rather certain that I am in the same universe, as well, and have equal rights and responsibilities to it. In a hundred billion years it will be this or that way? Come on. What are we having for dinner? Regards, TAR

Inow, Listened to the talk by Mr. Krauss. Don't know about this wheighing the universe thing. And can't get my head around the clumping of the Cosmic Backgound Radiation. I am not convinced that assumptions are not required to be made, before you can do a calculation. I feel that "empty space" is manipulated as a "thing" (much to Owl's and my dismay). Something that "gets larger". I have a feeling that some things are getting out of hand, in terms of the conflicting consequences. If this and that is observed, then all matter and energy we know about is only less than 1 percent of the mass and energy the universe is made of? Such a result would indicate to me that somebody is making an incorrect assumption and it is taking them on a wild goose chase. And it is disturbing to be that Mr. Krauss finds such a need to rank on religion. Does not seem humble at all. Sounds to me like someone who is already comfortable with their own personal God, and feels superior to non-believers. I was looking up at the stars the other night from a hot tub in a hollow in rural West Virgina. The universe is unimaginably large. What we see of it is contingent upon us being here and now. I do not think there is a better way to imagine it. Unlikely that an idealistic view of it, from "outside", considering it one thing, is going to be correct. There are going to be some incorrect assumptions made. Primarily because you can not "see" it, without holding to light speed as the max. I am guessing that "distance" is not properly handled all the time, in every cosmological argument. I don't know how one would "get outside" the universe, to see it expanding. And what exactly one is using as a baseline "time". As in what the universe is doing "now". Right now, here, it is doing exactly what we see it doing. Any "standard candle" is NOT standard in the sense that the farther away it is, the younger and smaller the universe was when it burned. There seems to be a jump from now what we see, to then as now, to there as later, in ways that seem inappropriate to me. For instance Mr. Krauss was talking about civilizations existing on planets in the distant galaxies. Does he mean then (which is the now we see) when the galaxy was so much younger, that enough heavy elements were not yet present due to the repeated star creation and death required for life as we know it to exist? Or does he mean in the Godlike now that we imagine that galaxy to be in, in the billions of years it has had to evolve as its light traveled to us? And what is our distance from that galaxy? What it was when the light that we are seeing now left it? What it appears to be as the light arrives? What it is figured to be, given some guess at apparent distance plus the increase in distance due to expansion in the last billions of years? And in any case, the universe is just unimaginably huge. I do not understand how anyone could pretend to contain it, and "get outside" it, to comprehend it as "one thing". One thing, whose absence would be nothing. Regards, TAR2

Owl, OK fine. But you are giving two answers for one rotation. This is no different from what relativity is saying about an Earth near C flyby. Earth has one real shape that must be measured differently according to the relative velocity of the measurer. As surely as the single rotation will be viewed as clockwise from above the South Pole, counterclockwise from above the North pole, left to right if viewed from the equator with your head up (like the North Pole) and right to left if you are above the equator, but upside down (head up like the South Pole). To say this is to not expect that the universe flips every time you stand on your head. Neither do the equations of space time expect anything to actually change their one shape. Regards, TAR2