Thursday, March 26, 2015

Wizardry
Time is modeled as a line. A line is formed of ∞ points. Points are zero-dimensional; i.e., they do not have volume, area, length, or any other higher-dimensional analogue. Is the line, used to represent time, so different from time itself? Or may the line represent time more accurately than you are presently aware? Only time will tell. Welcome to the Mysterium Tremendum. Please excuse the self-possessed numinosity and have a wonderful new day, my Shpongled friends!

ImprovisedSurvival
Not so sure. Even a period on a paper has a third dimension. From a far enough distance, the Earth will appear as a single point/ zero dimensional, as do the stars in space, or the cells in your body, or the galaxy above, or the grain of sand below, or the atom inside, or the solar system outside, the nucleus, the electron, the photon... universe.  

All is perspective

Wizardry
The period on a paper though, is not the same as a point as defined by Euclidean geometry:  "The description of a point, 'that which has no part,' indicates that Euclid will be treating a point as having no width, length, or breadth, but as an indivisible location."

That being said, I think you may have been making reference to the fractal nature of the universe (As above, so below) in which case I partially agree with your sentiment.

ImprovisedSurvival
Euclid is dead, the only thing that has no width, length and breadth is the space in between the lights

enleuk
A line is not made of points if a line has length but a point does not. Instead it becomes a line as soon as it is something more than a mere point, as soon as it has a length, however minuscule, i.e. even an infinitesimal line is a line and not a point as long as it retains any length at all. In other words, a line is not a row of non-dimensional dots, but a distance between two non-dimensional positions. In reality, there are neither straight lines nor points.

Time is motion, motion is a change in any direction, we can call this direction length. It's not a straight line though. If we assume that the Big Bang was the start of time, at least the start of motion in our universe, our bubble, regardless if other bubbles exist, then obviously time and motion is rather chaotic, spreading outwards from the centre and also clumping together and moving in fairly unpredictable directions at any given local point.

Wizardry
Theoretical science seems to have a way with creating something from nothing for no reason.  Lines arise from nothings in big fancy bangs and bring forth talking monkeys after aeons of "chaos."  I guess that's not as far fetched as an omnipotent creator designing a world intentionally...or is it?  I guess the big explosion at the start with all the chaos makes it more edgy and entertaining for the youth.

enleuk
Excuse me for explaining the errors of your description of Euclidian geometry, I'll never do it again.

deathtokoalas
euclidean geometry is either incomplete or inconsistent. i think that hilbert's approach of undefined terms is preferable. what is a point? what is a line? we can't express these things in language, but we know them when we see them.

that said, it's not really all that bad to think of an infinite number of points in a line segment. any continuous subset of the real line is uncountable.

time is often modeled as a line, but you're oversimplifying it. if you'd like to understand how time and space are connected, i would suggest investing some time into the theory of relativity. which, fwiw, requires very non-euclidean geometry.