The other day I posited that there were at least 2 dimensions to time. I’d like to explain myself a little more. Most people, including physicists, believe there is only one time dimension. In fact, current string theory, which physicists believe has the best chance of being a unifying Theory of Everything (TOE), can only work mathematically if there are 10 space dimensions and 1 time dimension. What I don’t know is if string theory will work with multiple time dimensions. I’m not well enough versed in the math to even think about figuring it out. However, I believe someone needs to see if it works or not because I’m convinced there are more than one time dimension.
There are several ways to think about a time stream. I’ve heard people talk about thinking of it as a river running past the banks of reality. I don’t know how helpful that will be here. I’ll use two analogies. The first is this. Try to imagine yourself on a really long ride at Disney World billions of years long. Thinking of being on It’s a Small World five times in a row should get you in the ballpark. In this analogy, you must go where the ride takes you. You have very limited ways to alter the ride any any way. Even if you appear to have a freedom of choice, you only have a choice in what you do sitting on the ride. In the end, you will end up where the ride takes you. You have no real freedom of choice. Your experience is fixed and controlled by the fine folks at Disney.
Another way people think of moving through time is by imagining they are in a universe sized movie. Each moment in time is another frame of the movie. In this case, you have absolutely no freedom of choice. You must do as the director and editor make you do. Frame after frame of predetermined destiny.
Both of these scenarios describe a single dimension of time……only one possible future. I think there’s a problem with that line of thinking. If the universe only had one time line, then everything is predestined and we have no choices to make. We might as well resign ourselves to enjoying the ride the Creator ( if there is no Creator than this conversation is even more meaningless) has laid out for us and not worry about anything. Our lives are going to go the way they go and that’s all there is. As previously discussed, the universe, either through design or anthropic principle, or just dumb luck, seems perfectly designed allow for the experience of things. In fact, you could say that it maximizes the ways in which things can be experienced. Why then, would this universe be limited by allowing only one history from it’s beginning to end to be experienced? Why would it not allow for multiple possibilities and interactivity with whatever life forms are in it by allowing them to make choices?
I look around me and I don’t feel like I’m living a predetermined script in a cosmic movie. I seem to have choices to make; those I must make to live and those I have an option of making. Wow, I even seem to have a choice on whether or not to even make choices! Remarkable. Life seems to me much more like a 3D shooter video game. No…..I’m not saying that I feel like I’m walking around shooting bad guys and zombies all the time. I do however, seem to have the freedom to choose to go where I want, talk to other people, OK…yeah…even shoot some other creatures or objects, all within the confines of the game. However, if we only have the illusion of free will, but not the reality, then there is no point in living. Since our lives are the only thing that we truly have as our own, I therefore have to reject utterly that there is only one possible time line.
Time’s not so much like a river on a map as the entire map. I can choose to go along the river using no physical or mental engery, or I can get out of the river and climb out of the valley the river is in. It may take more work to do so, but I may be happy I did it in the end, especially if there’s a waterfall up ahead. At each moment in time, we each have the choice to go directly in front of us to the next moment in time through a minimal expenditure of energy, or we can go in one of many different directions. Some of those directions require the expediture of more energy than others.
Now, while it’s clear there must be more than one time dimension, what’s not so clear is how many more there are. Is it possible there are only two time dimensions? I think so. Two time dimensions allows for infinite different possible directions for each point in time. So instead of picturing us moving through time along a line on a piece of paper with only one choice of path, it’s more like being on the sheet of paper being able to go in any direction (apparently except backwards in any way) you want.
How does this work exactly? Does reality split at each point in time annd create an infinite number of new time lines? How the heck would convervation of mass/energy work in that framework? Are there an infinite number of universes many of which look alike up to a point where a different path can be taken? Does it even matter if you take yourself out of time to look at it? I just don’t know the answers to those questions.
However, the point is that we do have choices. Those choices, in part, determine the life we lead. That is the crux of where this coversation is going. Notice that as of yet, I have not mentioned, except peripherally, the existence of a Creator or God. Ironically, that will be the topic of my next post.
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