Quotes About Spacetime

It is theoretically possible to warp spacetime itself, so you're not actually moving faster than the speed of light, but it's actually space that's moving.

Black holes are enigmatic astronomical objects, areas where the gravity is so immense that it has warped spacetime so that not even light can escape.

There was a long history of speculation that in quantum gravity, unlike Einstein's classical theory, it might be possible for the topology of spacetime to change.

A bare black hole is pure empty spacetime—no atoms, light, strings, or particles of any kind, dark or bright. It's empty space—or, in physics slang, the vacuum.

Journey into Gravity and Spacetime (Wheeler, 1990).

Conscious realism makes a bold claim: consciousness, not spacetime and its objects, is fundamental reality and is properly described as a network of conscious agents.

Conscious realism makes a bold claim: consciousness, not spacetime and its objects, is fundamental reality and is properly described as a network of conscious agents.31 To earn its keep, conscious realism must do serious work ahead. It must ground a theory of quantum gravity, explain the emergence of our spacetime interface and its objects, explain the appearance of Darwinian evolution within that interface, and explain the evolutionary emergence of human psychology.

For principled reasons, Einstein's spacetime cannot be foundational in physics

spacetime model, we might now reasonably ask what is the momentum of the car through time. The answer, fairly obviously, is that

the whole block of spacetime from the start of the universe to the end of the universe exists as one unchanging block. This is called the block universe model.

the addition of a fifth dimension has the effect of introducing the electromagnetic field in four-dimensional spacetime.

everything travels through spacetime at the speed of light.

As we move about in space, we are also moving forward in time. This means we effectively navigate a path through spacetime called a world line.

Over the last three decades, theorists have proposed at least a dozen new approaches. Each approach is motivated by a compelling hypothesis, but none has so far succeeded. In the realm of particle physics, these include Technicolor, preon models, and supersymmetry. In the realm of spacetime, they include twistor theory, causal sets, supergravity, dynamical triangulations, and loop quantum gravity. Some of these ideas are as exotic as they sound.

Relativity asserts that all observers, whatever their velocities relative to one another, measure exactly the same number for the speed of light. The invariance of the speed of light allows two apparently unrelated quantities, the dimension of time and the three dimensions of space, to be united into one four-dimensional entity, spacetime.

Spacetime tells matter how to move; matter tells spacetime how to curve.

Never make a calculation until you know the answer. Make an estimate before every calculation, try a simple physical argument (symmetry! invariance! conservation!) before every derivation, guess the answer to every paradox and puzzle. Courage: No one else needs to know what the guess is. Therefore make it quickly, by instinct. A right guess reinforces this instinct. A wrong guess brings the refreshment of surprise. In either case life as a spacetime expert, however long, is more fun!

Spacetime grips mass, telling it how to move... Mass grips spacetime, telling it how to curve

We have one real candidate for changing the rules; this is string theory. In string theory the one-dimensional trajectory of a particle in spacetime is replaced by a two-dimensional orbit of a string. Such strings can be of any size, but under ordinary circumstances they are quite tiny, ... a value determined by comparing the predictions of the theory for Newton's constant and the fine structure constant to experimental values.

If we do get a quantum theory of spacetime, it should answer some of the deepest philosophical questions that we have, like what happened before the big bang?

On the other hand, we don't understand the theory too completely, and because of this fuzziness of spacetime, the very concept of spacetime and spacetime dimensions isn't precisely defined.

Minkowski spacetime.

Matter tells Spacetime how to curve, and Spacetime tells matter how to move.

Asking about a time before the beginning of our spherical spacetime is like asking what lies north of the North Pole. There is no such thing.