On this page of Ingersoll Lockwood's website there is at the bottom a animation that begins at a building and scrolls out in one continuous stream, basically out to the end of the universe. Most likely this is a cool generated graphic, but at this point, who knows. It was a very well done graphic, with changes in albedo you would expect based on distance and position with respect to the sun etc., so it used a physics engine at the least.
Regardless, I took a few screenshots as it was scrolling out and found it on Google Earth. The building it starts at is Energie-Wende-Garching; what appears to be geothermal energy plant. The building itself can be seen from the front (as opposed to the top on google earth) in the first picture.
It doesn't really look like the image from Ingersoll Lockwood, though it is the same size, and that may have been done at a time prior to the addition of the solar roof (which makes it look pyramidal from the top).
What I found interesting is that right next door is the Max Planck institute of Quantum Optics, as well as other various places of interest like an observatory, Max Planck Institute of Extraterrestrial Physics, etc.
Just thought I would share something interesting. No connection to anything really, except of course that IF a system that can see possible futures exists it could very well have been developed at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics.
There are many theories of time. Some are as you say, events all happen simultaneously, and what we call a sequence of events is how we perceive things, having nothing to do with reality.
Certain interpretations of quantum mechanics suggest that time is completely indeterminate, or more specifically, the outcome of any event is truly random in the most fundamental sense. Both allow for perception of the future.
In the first case, a perception of the future will always be 100% accurate. No matter how far into the future or past you look it will be exactly what will happen, no matter what choices we make.
In the second case a perception of the future would be less and less accurate as you look forward in time. Because QM is a microscopic effect, on the macroscopic level the universe is pretty deterministic. Quantum effects really only come into play on the scale of the very (very) large/long or very small/short. Everywhere in between is pretty much predictable. However, because all those quantum uncertainties add up over time, as you look further and further into the future the certainty of events becomes less and less.
Looking back into the past should still be exact, though I would have to think about that one. That thought might be specific to the many worlds theorem of QM and not QM in general.
There are other possible theories on time as well. I've looked into many, and done the math on some, but its been a while. I even did a paper on wormhole physics (GR) for my senior project that delved into time a little bit, including the solutions to the metric that allowed for closed timelike loops. In such a case the past and present are intimately linked, with "the approved" solutions insisting that the past cannot be changed, but will always play out exactly as it has, no matter what choice you make. That's more insistence on what "logically must be true" than strictly the only possible solution though.
Travelling into the future is trivially simple. We are doing it right now. We can do it much faster than the rest of the universe if we so choose, and indeed those that are up in the IST are doing exactly that, albeit not that much faster. I think its on the order of a fraction of a second per year but I'd have to do some math to be sure.
We do though almost have the technology that we could go into the future at a fair bit faster rate than we are. So an astronaut could take off, go anywhere really fast, come back and the world will have progressed a thousand years into the future, while he is only a year older (for example).
We don't call that time travel because there is no way back, except perhaps using certain solutions that allow for wormholes.
Making a measurement changes the system because the system is fragile. In the case of determining a specific state of say a moving electron, the photon interaction required to make that measurement changes the state being measured because that is what a photon-electron interaction does. For example, a photon that can make a precise measurement is so strong relative to the mass of the electron that it alters the velocity of the electron, thus a new state equation describes the motion after measurement.
So yes, but for an understandable reason. The philosophical problem only arises in the equation that described the motion before the measurement, which was indeterministic. So its not so much that the outcome was changed by observation, but that one set of probabilities existed, then, upon measurement all those probabilities except one went to zero i.e. the outcome was determined (not changed), and a new set of probabilities exists to describe the motion (or whatever is being measured).
This only speaks to the idea of determinism. It is also only one interpretation of events and is a philosophy.
The idea that an observation determines the pre-existing state of an event is only an interpretation of what the math of quantum mechanics says.
It is important to note that it is not the only interpretation and may very well not be true at all. There are many other interpretations of the math and measurements of QM that do not adopt such a philosophy.
The real truth about physics is that we have no idea how the universe works (not counting potentially hidden knowledge). There are more questions in physics than answers. The mathematical models of reality that we call "physics" are nothing more than that: models. We use these models because they have predictive power. With a specific set of conditions as input we can predict the outcome precisely, within the scope of the model. In the case of QM the "precisely" is of variable precision depending on the experimental setup of the system and input.
We take measurements to find evidence that our models work, or don't work. Where they don't work we try to come up with new models. When we create a new model we look into its math to determine if this new model says anything new about what reality is, and how we may have gotten it wrong in our other models, and where we can look to take novel measurements that elucidate a new understanding or proof of the validity of the model.
Physics is nothing more than the iterative creation of new models of reality, and measurements of reality, in an attempt to understand reality. It is never a statement of reality itself. It is never "truth". (No branch of science ever produces statements of truth.)
Things like the interpretation of QM that state that the observers decisions are a fundamental part of the reality of the system being measured are philosophical attempts to rectify the math of our models with how we think things should be, nothing more. Such ideas are not physics (models of reality), nor are they reality itself (the truth), they are just an exercise in humans making sense of "what is" based on our limited understanding and observations of it.
Personally I think this thinking is a "cop out" philosophy. It is so non-sensical and circular in its logic that it encourages people to stop thinking on the subject. "Shut up and calculate" is the mantra that arises from this interpretation and is what is taught in every QM physics class the world over. I do not adopt this philosophy of QM and think it is likely wrong, though as of now, that is an unknown and only a personal opinion. I could justify that opinion with facts, but it would still remain opinion, thus why it has persisted as long as it has.
Please don't misunderstand this reply as being trite, but have you read Slaughterhouse Five?
You've got a magnificent brain; wondering how you come down on some of the "softer" sciences. The ones that, perhaps, express the inexpressible in a different way.
I have not read Slaughterhouse Five. If I find the time perhaps I will. It is of the same genre of many other books I have read.
I'm not sure what you mean by softer sciences. There is science, that is the iterative approach of making measurements and creating better and better models that fit all the measurements we have taken. And there is philosophy, where we create models without measurements but based strictly on axioms.
Physics does both (all sciences do both, but its easy to see in physics). It creates models based on measurements that uses strictly the language of math, and overlays other models based on clearly stated axioms in an attempt to describe what the math says using logic. Usually it does both the endeavors simultaneously, one driving the other.
Some of the "sciences" like psychology or political science, etc. attempt to do the same thing, but really are based on so many unprovable, obscure and/or even conflicting axioms that they are more akin to people in a dark room trying to find the door for just the chance at a single photon to bring them hope of a larger world.
In other words, it is the misuse of axioms that drives too many endeavors in these attempts at elucidation that obfuscates the entire model creation process, and creates useless models. If one can not, or does not, completely describe their axioms one can not understand their own model. This is what is most frustrating about things like "climate science" which is a complete oxymoron imo (as practiced).
Their models are all mathy, and look sciency, but really there are so many "obvious" axioms injected (usually without even realizing it) that have nothing to do with reality that all models must produce flawed results, which is why they ubiquitously have so little predictive power.
Climate science is the lie of hidden axioms. Most soft sciences are. That doesn't mean they have to be, that is just how they are often practiced (and taught). Sometimes someone exceptional comes along and does it correctly. I have read some treatise that really shine as examples of how to approach such complicated systems by clearly stating their axioms, and attempting to justify them. It helps define the system, which limits its use, but makes it an honest approach with potentially usable models.
If only it was taught that way.
Slyver, you help me grow, in wonderful ways. THANKS! GBY & your loved ones!