Myuncle

So what? Are you kidding? Everything is going to change if you make clear that there is no slowing down of time and you dismiss time as a fourth dimension, it simply means that big part of what Einstein said has got to be thrown in the bin, and only small part of what he discoverd (like the bending of light) is going to survive.

The useful fourth coordinate that we call "time" is possible only thanks to atoms movement, and not vice versa.

Nobody has a problem with length being real because it happens in the only three dimension that we know so far, without the urge to add a new non-existent fourth dimension like time. Mine it's not a speculation, it's just the most simple evidence, it's just that Einstein speculation is accepted by the mainstream science. I appreciate your courage Swansont when you say "time does indeed slow down when you move faster", at least you admit it. Unfortunately it's science fiction still accepted by mainstream science. I can't do anything about it, I have to live with it, the only thing I can do is invite you to wake up, the world is much more simple than we think.

You can't compare a possible black hole with the existance of time, it's apples and oranges in my opinion. When I say time doesn't exist, I mean only as a dimension, I have no doubt that time exists as human idea, it's a very useful one, just like all math is based on the idea that something can be identical to something, but in reality we have never found two things identical to each other. Both the idea of time and math are very useful for us humans, by agreeing on these concepts we make our lives much more comfortable. Time exists only in our mind but not in reality. "Time" it's just another convenient practical idea and convenient agreement (exactly like the concept that in math every "unity" is identical to another unity), but this is just in our mind, not in reality. Time is a measurement of movement and chemical change, is nothing more than a tool created by men to keep track of movements/changes, to describe the passing of events. Time is essentially nothing. You cannot add, subtract, slow, or speed up time. That's why I see no substance in Relativity theory. Of course I have the maximum respect for Einstein, initially he made a brilliant discovery by proving the light bending effect during the eclipse. After this amazing discovery all the media hype for Einstein began, and the Relativity is a result of that media hype, we are still clapping our hands for a theory without substance. Regarding the clock on the satellite, the reason that happens is again not because of time but because gravity distorts the fabric of space. You would be right absolutely if you just mention gravity and keep the fabric of time away. If we see the stars in the sky 100 light years away from us, does it mean that time is running slower for these stars only because we can see only their 100 years old light? No. And, again, imatfaal, I am not putting the cart in front of the horse, I just want to be shown some substance from the theoretical physics.

Exactly, it's not that big of a deal. I don't want to seem too cocky of course, but the fact that time doesn't exist it's actually very important. And if certain things are difficult to explain or to understand that doesn't make them existant. No matter how math is good at descrbing theory if this theory doesn't exist in reality. You are still ignoring the fact that just because a clock on a satellite run faster than a clock on earth, that doesn't mean that time is slowing down for the satellite.

That's my worry after watching the BBC program last night called "Faster than the speed of light?". It was disgusting to watch, do they think viewers are so easy to brainwash? (yes unfortunately...). Media hype means money of course. Is there anything genuine left in theoretical Physics? The presenter made an awful program. I know there is a lot of money involved, but since these pretty strings and extra dimensions have never been proven, why even mention them?? I think making a tv program is just trying to sell more books with a nice cover (night sky with bright stars) and useless long equations trying to impress someone. The presenter quoted Einstein saying that "time is not a constant, instead it changes depending on how fast you are moving, the faster you travel the slower time passes"...I am tired of listening to this. Time doesn't exist, it's not a dimension at all, only movement exists in reality. We are so addicted to our clock that we end up believing that time really exists. But if every single atom and subatomic particle had to stop moving, would we have time? No. Time is just a human idea (very useful idea) to keep track of these atoms moving. Then the presenter gave credit to Einstein for the GPS system (do we still need to give Einstein credit for everything? Just because a clock on a satellite run faster than a clock on earth, that doesn't mean that time is slowing down for the satellite!). But the most pathetic moment was when he gave so much attention to String theory as a possible candidate to explain the neutrino experiment and become the theory of everything...

Whether this guy is awarded the Nobel or ends up in jail, I am glad I am following this saga on the web. What are the mainstream media doing? Are they sleeping, or are they just too busy to tell us about the next boyband reunion?

wat? You are intimidating me with that weapon.

Solar sail turbines? I have never written about it. Why you say that the energy density is crap, how big and heavy do you think the space turbines can be? As big as you want! How powerful they can be? (I don't know). Weight, friction and mass is not a problem, the absence of gravity is energy itself. Our planet is spinning from millions of years, it's pretty heavy and doesn't give any problem. The energy required to kickstart the rotation can come from rockets at the end of the blades, not necessarily from the turbine. Well, I don't have any design specifications in mind so I can share with no problem...

I explained already in #25, it's all about friction, you just need to kick-start the rotation, the turbine will spin at incredible speed, before slowing down it will take ages, and with all the energy generated you just use a tiny amount of it to keep the blades up to speed...(just saying, I am not sure of it).

The ISS is kind of heavy, it's the size of a football field and it has been a success, if they didn't have any problem with assembling the components I don't see why assembling the turbines would be more difficult, actually it would be easier. There have been 135 launches to the space station since the launch of the first module (by the way the 90 kilowatts of power for the ISS is supplied by solar panels). You can simply send on space sections of gigantic blades ready to assemble and spin at incredible speed generating lots of power, this is not Star Trek. For the space station they spent more or less $100 billion, which is nothing if you compare it with all the money we spend in oil and energy bills.

Don't allow media to brainwash you. Big and heavy is a HUGE problem only for the oil companies. If all the money we waste in oil was invested in space economy it would be better for all of us. If all the nations want to do it they could collaborate easily, energy it's in the interest of the majority of the whole planet, but it's not in the interest of a small minority of rich entrepreneurs.

In theory on Earth to minimize friction you just need to make the blades heavier and bigger, but the problem is that the wind wouldn't be strong enough to spin them. In space all these problems would be gone.

If on space you can make the turbine as heavy and big as you want, why the friction would stop it?

If the asteroid impact explains their extintion, then why the dinosaurs didn't pop up again after this impact? If they were the strongest animals on the planet, evolution should have brought them back following the same genetic mutations that allowed them to appear before this impact.

Or maybe the T-rex killed every big dinosaur until there was no meat enough for them to survive so they turned to cannibalism until extintion...

I read on science news that their extinction wasn't probably caused by asteroid impact. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110919144042.htm If it was caused by any asteroid why anyway they didn't pop up back after that? Can we consider the croc as a small dinosaur survived only thanks to water? Is it possible that dinosaurs, being as clever as chickens, they have been wiped out by more clever predators?

Could they reach the planet through a long cable built above the South Pole? Is it feasible?

No wind required, you start rotating them and they will never stop, energy problem solved, is it?

By competition I mean both, fight for survival and fierce competition. If you imagine the period when they started making the first tools and the first weapons I suppose a real race started between humans to create better weapons, otherwise the risk of being litterally wiped out it was very likely to happen. I can imagine how many wars and how many deaths, the second world war it's just the tip of the iceberg.

Yes, there is no doubt that all mutations happen accidentally. Our sons can be born with six fingers or two heads, everything can happen. but at the same time exploiting those accidents is essential. Any animals can develop a bigger skull and a bigger brain, but since they don't have fingers (and they don't have a strong muscle in the thumb to manipulate tools like humans), they can't use and exploit this genetic mutation. It's all about building weapons to kill the enemy, that's the competition, you need intelligence to do that, and primates could afford to exploit this mutation thanks to their hands.

Thanks, very clever response. Basically if you are a predator or a prey, without hands, you don't need to be particularly clever, you just need to run as fast as you can, or be persistent like the wolves. But since these animals don't have fingers to make weapons to kill predators or preys, they don't need a bigger brain. All in all zebras and lions they can survive very well the way they are.

Ok, let's take all the carnivores, or all the animals that need to eat only nuts, they can easily sustain it metabolically. Sorry swansont but I don't buy that John Cuthber theory, and with all respect, I don't even buy the theory according which cooking food and smaller jaws favoured a bigger skull.

Ok, this happened even to other animals but when we consider the size of the brain we measure it in proportion to the rest of the body, in this case humans have the biggest brain. So why horses or cats didn't develop the same increase in brain size? It's not something that you want but something that happened to you. Why didn't happen to a zebra? If zebras had a bigger brain they would be as clever as humans and protect themselves better from predators.

Experts in evolution please answer me. I know that every change in evolution happened because of genetic mutations, therefore by accident. Chimps could develop bigger brains only thanks to a genetic mutation in the size of the skull. But I don't understand why this happened only to primates. Why this mutation didn't happen to a zebra or a lion?