Agemoz's Physics Blog

I have postulated that existence as we know it is confined to a 3D slice, a hypersurface isotropic in time, of 4D spacetime I call the activation layer. I’ve discussed in previous posts that this activation layer is why observers only are aware of one instance of time at any given point in time, and that interactions are confined to the activation layer. I’ve previously posted that this shows why we don’t get visits from the future and will not be able to observe or interact with our past selves–the activation layer is the only one of an infinite number of hypersurfaces in spacetime where observation and interactions occur. There is no existence in non-activated hypersurfaces, even if you use a wormhole to travel to them.

In previous posts (https://agemozphysics.com/2023/02/08/space-time-activation-layer/ and https://agemozphysics.com/2023/02/14/gravity-and-the-activation-layer/), I show how the timewise motion of the activation layer concept leads to why we experience the acceleration factor g of gravity. An object in the activation layer literally moves forward in spacetime, so if the spacetime region is curved, it experiences a force identical to the straight-line path of an orbiting planet in a curved spacetime. Einstein’s equivalence principle where inertial behavior cannot be distinguished from object motion in a gravitational field, therefore becomes an identity, and gravitational force becomes an illusion.

However, hypotheses such as the activation layer can sound good but fail as a representation of truth if something is found that leads to contradictions. In the last month or so I’ve been looking for both contradictions or ways to prove the hypothesis.

I always thought Neil Bohr’s “not even wrong” quote meant that he thought an idea was stupid because of a lack of knowledge or a faulty conclusion, but recently I learned that this is not the case. He meant that the idea was such that it could not be proved (or disproved) and thus was worthless to the progress of science. What I’m trying to do with with these posts is to address whether there is truth here and whether there are consequences (not “not even wrong”).

One really big elephant in the room for the activation layer hypothesis–cliche for an obvious objection–is that even in flat spacetime, clocks can progress at different rates for different observers (with different frame of reference velocities)–the obvious example being the twins paradox. Historically, the documented reason Einstein worked on general relativity was to extend the laws of special relativity to the curved spacetime of gravitational fields. The activation layer concept depends on the use of a time-wise isotropic hypersurface that always moves forward in time. How do we get different clock observations if time progresses identically everywhere in the activation layer?

Here is why I don’t think that is a showstopper: the activation layer forward time motion is the engine that powers the motion of every clock everywhere in the layer, but the rate of aging–the speed at which a clock ticks or the age of an observer–can vary depending on the observer’s frame of reference and the curvature of the activation layer in his local neighborhood. In other words, the word time is used to represent two different things. Declaring that time cannot be identical for every observer in the universe is ignoring the difference between the forward progress of hypersurfaces in 4D spacetime and the property of aging (clock ticking rate) for a given observer or entity within a hypersurface.

Here is an example of how to distinguish the two meanings of time. Mathematically, g is an acceleration factor dependent on the speed of the activation layer surface in time (the isotropic hypersurface time) and the curvature of the surface. You have to multiply it by a local observer’s time^2 (the observer’s aging rate, dependent on the locally applied laws of special relativity) to get the total effect of gravity on that observer’s awareness of time passing.

I will continue my deep dive into the activation layer with more posts to come. Next will be a discussion about why the activation layer hypothesis leads to one of the two postulates of special relativity, the speed limit set as the speed of light.

Agemoz

Tags: general relativity, general-relativity, physics, relativity, special relativity, special-relativity

This entry was posted on February 21, 2023 at 4:14 pm and is filed under Physics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.