Archived: Why is this impossible?

[threat]

So I just remembered something I thought of a while ago which I couldn't find an answer too. Let's say you have a rope 1 lightyear in length and it was tight. If someone pulled on the rope on one end wouldn't someone be able to feel it immediately on the other side?

[Xlite]

I would think the answer is yes.

The rope is kinda linked between two different timezones at the same time, so movement would show up in both places.

This is just a theory though, based on logic and my limited knowledge on the topic.

[Jack]

I don't see why not. Light-years are just distance of lightspeed travel in a year so I don't think it would affect the otherwise stationary and taut rope being pulled. I probably don't know of some odd property though.

[abusername]

Mind fuck.

[Rodrat]

well the whole rope will move at once. so i would assume it would be felt instantly

[Mantikore]

all materials show elastic properties, even things as rigid as diamond.

rope is generally a polymer, whether it be cellulose or nylon or whatever, and is pretty stretchy. not that it matters very much.

basically, it will stretch, and the other person wont feel it. think of the atoms and molecules of the rope joining together as being like little springs, if you pull on on end, you have to wait for the forces to equalize on all the springs, which takes time. You dont notice it on earth, since you dont usually deal with things that long.

tl:dr
it works only if the material is perfectly rigid, which is impossible.

[tariel]

Originally Posted by Mantikore

all materials show elastic properties, even things as rigid as diamond.

rope is generally a polymer, whether it be cellulose or nylon or whatever, and is pretty stretchy. not that it matters very much.

basically, it will stretch, and the other person wont feel it. think of the atoms and molecules of the rope joining together as being like little springs, if you pull on on end, you have to wait for the forces to equalize on all the springs, which takes time. You dont notice it on earth, since you dont usually deal with things that long.

tl:dr
it works only if the material is perfectly rigid, which is impossible.

Well, all practical aspects aside, this is more of a theoretical "thought experiment".

How about a really long tube filled with ping-pong balls? You push one end, the one the other end instantly moves? Ignoring compression of the ping pong balls of course.

[Unholy Batman]

you cant ignore the compression!

[mr.poopypants]

mantikore gots it^ i was gonna say it then i kept reading

[Kleenotse]

Would it be faster than the speed of sound, then?

edit: I know the speed of sound is variable, but let's just say the 'standard' 343 m/s

[DarkMage35]

Originally Posted by Mantikore

it works only if the material is perfectly rigid, which is impossible.

Originally Posted by tariel

How about a really long tube filled with ping-pong balls? You push one end, the one the other end instantly moves? Ignoring compression of the ping pong balls of course.

Ignoring compression/assuming perfectly rigid material doesnt change much. You cannot transmit information faster than light in currently known physics. If you bumped one end of a light-year long stick, it would take at least a year for the movement to show up at the other end, assuming the stick doesnt just break from the strain.

[r.bonesmith]

Originally Posted by Mantikore

tl:dr
it works only if the material is perfectly rigid, which is impossible.

You are a fucking idiot Mantikore. Shut the fuck up when talking about things you don't understand.

You are not aware of what a thought experiment is. Have you never read Einsteins theory of relativity? The damned thing is ONLY 100 pages long, and consists of only thought experiments in plain english. Ignorance about the basic fundamentals of the world pisses me off. How the fuck did you end up being a mod? Have you even taken high school physics? College physics? They cover relativity in both of those courses.

Normally I wouldn't jump on someones bones for a stupid opinion, but you fucking ignored the entire question!

LOOK UP WHAT A FUCKING THOUGHT QUESTION IS DUMBSHIT!

Now that I am done ranting about our mediocre moderators. . .

Time and Space are the same thing. This is what blew everyones mind when Einstein published his theory. This is why you always hear cheap B movies refering to the "Space Time Continuum." This is why the term light year is a little bit confusing. Things that are one light year away from us in space are also one year away from us in time.

So while the thought experiment you propose is a mindfuck if you don't consider time relative, it isn't if you do.

If you wish to be really mindfucked think about this,

If space and time are the same, then time could not have existed before the big bang.

[negative_zero]

Nothing travels faster than light. NOTHING!!!

[harry_hardcore_hoedown]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

You are a fucking idiot Mantikore. Shut the fuck up when talking about things you don't understand.

You are not aware of what a thought experiment is. Have you never read Einsteins theory of relativity? The damned thing is ONLY 100 pages long, and consists of only thought experiments in plain english. Ignorance about the basic fundamentals of the world pisses me off. How the fuck did you end up being a mod? Have you even taken high school physics? College physics? They cover relativity in both of those courses.

Normally I wouldn't jump on someones bones for a stupid opinion, but you fucking ignored the entire question!

LOOK UP WHAT A FUCKING THOUGHT QUESTION IS DUMBSHIT!

Now that I am done ranting about our mediocre moderators. . .

Time and Space are the same thing. This is what blew everyones mind when Einstein published his theory. This is why you always hear cheap B movies refering to the "Space Time Continuum." This is why the term light year is a little bit confusing. Things that are one light year away from us in space are also one year away from us in time.

So while the thought experiment you propose is a mindfuck if you don't consider time relative, it isn't if you do.

If you wish to be really mindfucked think about this,

If space and time are the same, then time could not have existed before the big bang.

Mantikore answered the question. You went off on a retarded tangent that doesn't apply to the question. Of course the OP was assuming an inertial reference frame. He was asking if force travels instantaneously.

Oh, and you can do us a favour and shut the fuck up about things you don't understand. "Time and space are the same thing" is something you might say if you learned about relativity from a misinformed online summary with a religious agenda. Space consists of three dimensions; in relativity time is treated as a fourth. They are absolutely not the same thing.

On topic: They wouldn't feel the pull instantly. Like Mantikore said, materials all have elastic properties. This is why sound has a speed - the molecules that feel the force first (in this case at the start of the rope) are able to move slightly independently of the next ones and the force isn't transferred to the next ones until they move back. The speed the force will travel through the rope depends on the stiffness of the rope (how much it resists elastic behaviour) and its density. The higher the ratio of the two, the faster if will travel through the material. If the rope were infinitely stiff, then the ratio would be infinitely large and it would be transmitted instantly, but the rope would have to be cooled to absolute zero, requiring an infinite amount of energy.

[r.bonesmith]

Originally Posted by harry_hardcore_hoedown

Mantikore answered the question. You went off on a retarded tangent that doesn't apply to the question. Of course the OP was assuming an inertial reference frame. He was asking if force travels instantaneously.

Oh, and you can do us a favour and shut the fuck up about things you don't understand. "Time and space are the same thing" is something you might say if you learned about relativity from a misinformed online summary with a religious agenda. Space consists of three dimensions; in relativity time is treated as a fourth. They are absolutely not the same thing.

Why don't you get back to me when you're done sucking Mantikores cock and have read a fucking book.

I have made it through physics classes, the most advanced of which was non-linear dynamics (modeling systems really), I have read both the general and the special theory of relativity, and I'm here to say that. . .

TIME AND SPACE ARE THE SAME FUCKING THING.

The fact that they are the same thing is sorta the second biggest point of the entire theory of relativity, yah know? Right after the first biggest point which is "Everything is relative."

How the fuck did you learn about relativity? Wikipedia? Some other misinformed shit someone else said on Math & Science?

This isn't even news, we have known this (those of us that read books) for well over 100 years.

You, Harry Hardcore Hoedown, are a fucking high school nitwit. The question the OP asked is a thought experiment. I know you are an idiot and have never taken a physics class because you keep on saying, just like Manticore keeps on saying, "Of course objects compress, and speed has sound, and yada yada yada." Then you throw in some "Absolute zero and a ratio of infinity divide by zero, then you herp, then you derp, and tada, faster than light travel!" Then you start to suck your own dick congratulating yourself on how fucking smart you are.

NOTHING TRAVELS FASTER THAN THE SPEED OF LIGHT!

Please stop applying classical mechanics (elasticity, stiffness) to problems that require relativity. You are not even close to having the right answer dipshit.

Take calculus, it doesn't even have to be multivariable, single variable will be fine.
Then take a CALC based physics class.
Then read Einsteins fucking book.

[harry_hardcore_hoedown]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

Why don't you get back to me when you're done sucking Mantikores cock and have read a fucking book.

I have made it through physics classes, the most advanced of which was non-linear dynamics (modeling systems really), I have read both the general and the special theory of relativity, and I'm here to say that. . .

TIME AND SPACE ARE THE SAME FUCKING THING.

The fact that they are the same thing is sorta the second biggest point of the entire theory of relativity, yah know? Right after the first biggest point which is "Everything is relative."

How the fuck did you learn about relativity? Wikipedia? Some other misinformed shit someone else said on Math & Science?

This isn't even news, we have known this (those of us that read books) for well over 100 years.

You, Harry Hardcore Hoedown, are a fucking high school nitwit. The question the OP asked is a thought experiment. I know you are an idiot and have never taken a physics class because you keep on saying, just like Manticore keeps on saying, "Of course objects compress, and speed has sound, and yada yada yada." Then you throw in some "Absolute zero and a ratio of infinity divide by zero, then you herp, then you derp, and tada, faster than light travel!" Then you start to suck your own dick congratulating yourself on how fucking smart you are.

NOTHING TRAVELS FASTER THAN THE SPEED OF LIGHT!

Please stop applying classical mechanics (elasticity, stiffness) to problems that require relativity. You are not even close to having the right answer dipshit.

Take calculus, it doesn't even have to be multivariable, single variable will be fine.
Then take a CALC based physics class.
Then read Einsteins fucking book.

I've taken physics and calc, and I'm here to say that... you're bullshitting. At most you could call time a component of space in the same way as length, width and height, and strictly speaking that's not accurate either. Also what you said about "nothing travels faster than light" is bullshit. Only objects with rest mass are bounded by the speed of light. Energy can travel as fast as it wants, and in that case would. I didn't say anything about moving the rope itself faster than the speed of light. Surely if you understand physics as well as you claim to you can understand this: if the rope were completely stiff - which requires that there be no intermolecular motion (hence cooling to absolute zero) - then the energy would be propagated instantly.

[Joe Camel]

People, stop fighting.

[Joe Camel]

Jk go at it, i'm learning.

[Xlite]

To all those saying nothing is faster than the speed of light

If your "thought" was based on quantum entanglement action at a distance it might indeed be faster than the speed of light.

Also, look up the Hartman effect, and expansion of space which eventually will be faster than the speed of light.

[Bilbo]

Whats funny to me is that while r. bonesmith has taken the time to flame, he has not provided any semblance of an answer.

[Fractals]

Originally Posted by Mantikore

tl:dr
it works only if the material is perfectly rigid, which is impossible.

'impossible' probably isn't the best word to use here. there's nothing theoretical, AFAIK, stopping you from having a material that can transfer force 1 light year. If you can manufacture a 1 light year long rope/cable/column, it's not so far-fetched that you can find a material that is rigid enough to transfer the energy. If you find a nice cool part of space, the ambient temperature should help it stay rigid.

[threat]

I came across a pretty satisfying answer last night. All matter interacts by the electromagnetic force, in terms of objects bumping into each other and bouncing away. That force and all others take time to get from 1 point to another, and that time cannot be faster than the speed of light but could be pretty close.

[Reality Apologist]

There's a whole lot of bad foundations of physics going on in this thread. Let me try to clear up a few points.

As others have said, this could only be an issue if we had a perfectly rigid material. There is, as far as we know, no such thing. As a result of this, everything else I'm going to say is moot. But suppose we had a perfectly rigid material. What then? As a few other people have pointed out, thought experiments can be interesting to pursue. Let's think about this.

Bonesmith et al. are correct that we'd run into relativistic effects here. The issue, though, is not really with something traveling faster than the speed of light (what's traveling, in a perfectly rigid material? Movement? That doesn't make any sense). The issue, rather, is with picking out a preferred frame of reference on which the motion at both ends is simultaneous. Relativity forbids that. Bonesmith is almost right, but not quite. It isn't quite right to say that space and time are exactly the same thing; there's a reason that we pick out some dimensions as "space-like" and one as "time-like." There are mathematical differences between the space-like dimensions of the universe and the time-like dimension. The right way to express the idea is to say that space and time are dimensions on the same four-dimensional manifold (more precisely, a Minkowskian manifold for special relativity, and a Lorentzian manifold for general relativity); it's not that space and time are the same thing, but rather that the three spatial dimensions and one temporal dimensions compose a single four-dimensional space-time.

Why is this distinction important? Well, it makes it clear that the issues at play here are geometric ones: relativity is, first and foremost, a theory about the geometry of space-time--a theory about how points along the manifold relate to one another. The gloss of special relativity is usually "nothing can travel faster than light," but that's not the best way to think about this. Rather, think about it in terms of paths through the four-dimensional space-time: light always takes the shortest available path between one space-time point and another. "Nothing can go faster than light" is true in just the same sense that the shortest distance between two points on a sheet of paper is a straight line connecting those points: you can't get from A to B without covering at least the distance of the straight line connecting them. Light takes the analog of the straight line through four-space. You can't "outrun" light in the same sense that you can't "outrun" a straight line on a piece of paper.

This explains why the speed of light is invariant--why all observers will measure light as going just as fast, no matter how the observers are moving. Remember, speed is a function of distance and time: velocities are expressed as changes in spatial position in a given time period ("how much space did we cover in x amount of time?"). If we think about light (or anything else) as moving through a four-dimensional space-time, though, talk about this kind of intuitive velocity falls away: "how much space-time did we cover in x amount of time" just doesn't make any sense if movement through the time-like dimension is already being taken into account. The right way to think about it, rather, is just as the length of the path through all four dimensions, and no matter how you're moving, the shortest path between two points doesn't change. That's what it means to say that the speed of light is the same for all observers--that the speed of light is Lorentz invariant.

One consequence of this is that questions of simultaneity--questions about whether x happened before y, after y, or at the same time as y--break down if events are far enough apart in space. How far apart things need to be for this to take effect depends on a few factors, but one light-year is (far) more than enough to make this kind of experiment break down. Call my tugging on one end of the rope "x," and your perception that the rope moves "y." x and y are space-like separated by one light-year. Do x and y happen at the same time? The answer is both 'yes' and 'no:' there are perfectly legitimate ways to carve up space-time such that x and y are simultaneous. That is, there's a perfectly legitimate reference frame wherein this absolutely does work; relative to some observers, x and y will happen at the same time. However there are also perfectly good reference frames where x happens well before y, AND perfectly good reference frames where y happens before x. These are all correct in their own frames, but none is correct globally: one of the consequences of the invariant speed of light is that there's no global reference frame that provides an absolute standard of simultaneity. This seems odd, but only because we're not used to dealing with objects moving very, very quickly or very, very far apart from one another.

We run into the same problems with quantum mechanical entanglement. If two entangled particles A and B are far enough apart, it's no more correct to say that the measurement of one of A immediately causes B's state to change than it is to say that the B's state changes first, or that they change at precisely the same time. That's the sense in which QM and special relativity are in tension.

[Xlite]

Originally Posted by Reality Apologist

There's a whole lot of bad foundations of physics going on in this thread. Let me try to clear up a few points.

As others have said, this could only be an issue if we had a perfectly rigid material. There is, as far as we know, no such thing. As a result of this, everything else I'm going to say is moot. But suppose we had a perfectly rigid material. What then? As a few other people have pointed out, thought experiments can be interesting to pursue. Let's think about this.

Bonesmith et al. are correct that we'd run into relativistic effects here. The issue, though, is not really with something traveling faster than the speed of light (what's traveling, in a perfectly rigid material? Movement? That doesn't make any sense). The issue, rather, is with picking out a preferred frame of reference on which the motion at both ends is simultaneous. Relativity forbids that. Bonesmith is almost right, but not quite. It isn't quite right to say that space and time are exactly the same thing; there's a reason that we pick out some dimensions as "space-like" and one as "time-like." There are mathematical differences between the space-like dimensions of the universe and the time-like dimension. The right way to express the idea is to say that space and time are dimensions on the same four-dimensional manifold (more precisely, a Minkowskian manifold for special relativity, and a Lorentzian manifold for general relativity); it's not that space and time are the same thing, but rather that the three spatial dimensions and one temporal dimensions compose a single four-dimensional space-time.

Why is this distinction important? Well, it makes it clear that the issues at play here are geometric ones: relativity is, first and foremost, a theory about the geometry of space-time--a theory about how points along the manifold relate to one another. The gloss of special relativity is usually "nothing can travel faster than light," but that's not the best way to think about this. Rather, think about it in terms of paths through the four-dimensional space-time: light always takes the shortest available path between one space-time point and another. "Nothing can go faster than light" is true in just the same sense that the shortest distance between two points on a sheet of paper is a straight line connecting those points: you can't get from A to B without covering at least the distance of the straight line connecting them. Light takes the analog of the straight line through four-space. You can't "outrun" light in the same sense that you can't "outrun" a straight line on a piece of paper.

This explains why the speed of light is invariant--why all observers will measure light as going just as fast, no matter how the observers are moving. Remember, speed is a function of distance and time: velocities are expressed as changes in spatial position in a given time period ("how much space did we cover in x amount of time?"). If we think about light (or anything else) as moving through a four-dimensional space-time, though, talk about this kind of intuitive velocity falls away: "how much space-time did we cover in x amount of time" just doesn't make any sense if movement through the time-like dimension is already being taken into account. The right way to think about it, rather, is just as the length of the path through all four dimensions, and no matter how you're moving, the shortest path between two points doesn't change. That's what it means to say that the speed of light is the same for all observers--that the speed of light is Lorentz invariant.

One consequence of this is that questions of simultaneity--questions about whether x happened before y, after y, or at the same time as y--break down if events are far enough apart in space. How far apart things need to be for this to take effect depends on a few factors, but one light-year is (far) more than enough to make this kind of experiment break down. Call my tugging on one end of the rope "x," and your perception that the rope moves "y." x and y are space-like separated by one light-year. Do x and y happen at the same time? The answer is both 'yes' and 'no:' there are perfectly legitimate ways to carve up space-time such that x and y are simultaneous. That is, there's a perfectly legitimate reference frame wherein this absolutely does work; relative to some observers, x and y will happen at the same time. However there are also perfectly good reference frames where x happens well before y, AND perfectly good reference frames where y happens before x. These are all correct in their own frames, but none is correct globally: one of the consequences of the invariant speed of light is that there's no global reference frame that provides an absolute standard of simultaneity. This seems odd, but only because we're not used to dealing with objects moving very, very quickly or very, very far apart from one another.

We run into the same problems with quantum mechanical entanglement. If two entangled particles A and B are far enough apart, it's no more correct to say that the measurement of one of A immediately causes B's state to change than it is to say that the B's state changes first, or that they change at precisely the same time. That's the sense in which QM and special relativity are in tension.

What the fuck?

[007GoldenShower]

r.bonesmith... What a cocksucker.

[Mantikore]

Originally Posted by Xlite

What the fuck?

Yeah, RA's posts have always been a bit abstract, yet fairly understandable. From what i gather, multiple events occur, but the results will depend on the frame of reference. Different observers would experience it differently.

Although yeah, getting your head around can be daunting. Quantum science isnt my forte either. Try reading it a few times

[Former_Member]

Originally Posted by tariel

Well, all practical aspects aside, this is more of a theoretical "thought experiment".

How about a really long tube filled with ping-pong balls? You push one end, the one the other end instantly moves? Ignoring compression of the ping pong balls of course.

Well yeah, perhaps it would be then; but it wouldn't be particularly extraordinary.

If you've got that many ping pong balls, it's going to be an astronomical amount. You're going to need to apply some incredible force to move them, out of the realms of physical possibility.

Also, it's not moving a lightyear, the whole ping-pong ball chain (as a whole, or constituent parts) are moving the distance of one ping pong ball.

[Reality Apologist]

Originally Posted by Mantikore

Yeah, RA's posts have always been a bit abstract, yet fairly understandable. From what i gather, multiple events occur, but the results will depend on the frame of reference. Different observers would experience it differently.

Although yeah, getting your head around can be daunting. Quantum science isnt my forte either. Try reading it a few times

Well, it's not just a matter of experience. Things actually are different in different measure frames: this isn't just an illusion. The barn and pole example came up in the last thread about this topic, and I think it's useful here, too. See http://everything2.com/title/The+Bar...tivity+Paradox

If you have a specific question, Xlite, post and I'll try to clarify. As Mantikore said, this is abstract (and complicated!) stuff.

[Xlite]

Originally Posted by Reality Apologist

If you have a specific question, Xlite, post and I'll try to clarify. As Mantikore said, this is abstract (and complicated!) stuff.

Thanks, but i think Mantikore nailed it.

That paradox is quite fascinating i must say
Also lol, about your post...
I don't consider myself a newb on quantum mechanics, i do know some things.
But your post made absolutely no sense. Could just be my english.
Kudos for knowledge though.

[Reality Apologist]

Originally Posted by Xlite

Thanks, but i think Mantikore nailed it.

That paradox is quite fascinating i must say
Also lol, about your post...
I don't consider myself a newb on quantum mechanics, i do know some things.
But your post made absolutely no sense. Could just be my english.
Kudos for knowledge though.

I didn't even talk about QM until the last paragraph: that was all just about relativity

Like I said, I'm happy to clarify anything that was particularly opaque.

[Yurpen]

if we turn to roap we can travel to future?

[Yurpen]

remember in space, time is measured by distance, not earthly time.

[rabbitweed]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

You are a fucking idiot Mantikore. Shut the fuck up when talking about things you don't understand.

You are not aware of what a thought experiment is. Have you never read Einsteins theory of relativity? The damned thing is ONLY 100 pages long, and consists of only thought experiments in plain english. Ignorance about the basic fundamentals of the world pisses me off. How the fuck did you end up being a mod? Have you even taken high school physics? College physics? They cover relativity in both of those courses.

Normally I wouldn't jump on someones bones for a stupid opinion, but you fucking ignored the entire question!

LOOK UP WHAT A FUCKING THOUGHT QUESTION IS DUMBSHIT!

Now that I am done ranting about our mediocre moderators. . .

Time and Space are the same thing. This is what blew everyones mind when Einstein published his theory. This is why you always hear cheap B movies refering to the "Space Time Continuum." This is why the term light year is a little bit confusing. Things that are one light year away from us in space are also one year away from us in time.

So while the thought experiment you propose is a mindfuck if you don't consider time relative, it isn't if you do.

If you wish to be really mindfucked think about this,

If space and time are the same, then time could not have existed before the big bang.

He approached it from an engineering viewpoint, as I believe that's what he's studying. Don't get your panties in a twist because he didn't approach it from an idealised physics standpoint, since the OP didn't specify.

[r.bonesmith]

I was, and am, under the impression that we choose "time like" and "distance like" dimensions because we find it hard to wrap our minds around space time being the same thing, which it is.

Light propogates in all directions at the same speed, including time, which is just another direction. If we keep on treating time as something special people will keep on answering OP's question with the kind of "Absolute zero, infinite ratio, yada yada" answers that we see every day. While they are different, it is more a difference that we made up because of our perspective.

While it is easy to say "3 spatial dimensions plus 1 temporal dimension", it is probably better to say "We built a 4 dimensional model, but only because it was easy for us to do so, and it probably has very little to do with what actually goes on in the universe, but it does help us make make predictions to limited cases, which is pretty cool, because now we can communicate with cellular phones and such."

Giving time its own "time like" designation is like calling length and width separate things and not realizing you can turn the fucking thing sideways.

Quantum Mechanics does not work over large distances so I'm not sure why people keep bringing it up??? On that note, QM is sorta boring. It sounds great and then you read about it, and it is really sorta lame.

"A coin be either heads or tails, but not both!" This is QM in my opinion, except you a flip million coins a million times, put a cat in a box with some cyanide, and hope 4 chan doesn't find out about it.

[Fractals]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

I was, and am, under the impression that we choose "time like" and "distance like" dimensions because we find it hard to wrap our minds around space time being the same thing, which it is.

Light propogates in all directions at the same speed, including time, which is just another direction. If we keep on treating time as something special people will keep on answering OP's question with the kind of "Absolute zero, infinite ratio, yada yada" answers that we see every day. While they are different, it is more a difference that we made up because of our perspective.

While it is easy to say "3 spatial dimensions plus 1 temporal dimension", it is probably better to say "We built a 4 dimensional model, but only because it was easy for us to do so, and it probably has very little to do with what actually goes on in the universe, but it does help us make make predictions to limited cases, which is pretty cool, because now we can communicate with cellular phones and such."

Giving time its own "time like" designation is like calling length and width separate things and not realizing you can turn the fucking thing sideways.

Quantum Mechanics does not work over large distances so I'm not sure why people keep bringing it up??? On that note, QM is sorta boring. It sounds great and then you read about it, and it is really sorta lame.

"A coin be either heads or tails, but not both!" This is QM in my opinion, except you a flip million coins a million times, put a cat in a box with some cyanide, and hope 4 chan doesn't find out about it.

Here's 1 difference between time and the other 3 dimensions: I can freely move through the 3 dimensions, in any direction or speed physically possible (potentially any, at least below the speed of light), but I'm stuck moving forward in time.

[L33tz]

same thing as a long lever. it must be perfectly rigid to work. (impossible)

[r.bonesmith]

Originally Posted by Fractals

Here's 1 difference between time and the other 3 dimensions: I can freely move through the 3 dimensions, in any direction or speed physically possible (potentially any, at least below the speed of light), but I'm stuck moving forward in time.

Not really, the faster you move, the more your travel through time is distorted. This is called time dilation, and it is observable. I think in the 60's or something somebody flew a jet really fast which had a clock on it.

While some people may say "you can't move backwards in time. . ." Well of course not, not anymore than you can have "-5 rocks" or "-100 apples" or be "-5 feet" tall.

Your velocity through time can change. Indeed, it does, every time you move, just in very small amounts.

Edit: Oh, and no you can't move freely through the three dimensions. It takes alot of energy to go higher, or even move in a straight line, just like it takes alot of energy to travel at a different rate through time.

[Fractals]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

Not really, the faster you move, the more your travel through time is distorted. This is called time dilation, and it is observable. I think in the 60's or something somebody flew a jet really fast which had a clock on it.

While some people may say "you can't move backwards in time. . ." Well of course not, not anymore than you can have "-5 rocks" or "-100 apples" or be "-5 feet" tall.

Yea, but I can still move forwards and backwards in all the other dimensions.

[r.bonesmith]

No, you can't. You're just going forward in the opposite direction. This may seem like a smarmy answer, but it isn't supposed to be. Things can travel through time at opposite directions from each other as well, and end up 2 or 3 years away from each other as well as 2 or 3 lightyears away from each other.

When you leave and come back is everything the same as when you left it? No, so how can you say you have moved backwards to the same spot? The spot has changed, you have changed. Certainly two objects can travel apart at a speed almost light speed, and then come back together again, but during that journey the geometry of space has changed. Nothing will ever be same as it was, or as it is now. This illusion of linear time exists because we live on such a small scale. We think we can move freely about the "3d" space, but we can only move on a very small scale. On a cosmic level, why even call it movement at all?

[Fractals]

Originally Posted by r.bonesmith

No, you can't. You're just going forward in the opposite direction. This may seem like a smarmy answer, but it isn't supposed to be. Things can travel through time at opposite directions from each other as well, and end up 2 or 3 years away from each other as well as 2 or 3 lightyears away from each other.

Now you're just changing the rules of geometry/physics. These are the 3 planes I'm talking about, and you can move in a positive and negative direction on each plane.