∆-Paradox Jim Al-Khalili

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(waterstones link)(Waterstones link)

This is a excellent book because it is well written, and because it shows how most 'paradoxes' are in fact not paradoxes, but just problems that we have not fully analysed, or problems in which we have made one or more 'false assumptions' that we have not noticed, and have taken as scared.

With this in mind, I wrote to professor Al-Khalili expressing my opinion that perhaps in one or two paradoxes, there were still a few incorrect assumptions that he had not noticed.

These (possible) incorrect assumptions being the not insignificant possibilities that perhaps 'time',, 'the past', and 'the future' do not actually exist.

I have only just sent the professor my letter, and I would not publish any reply he might send me without his permission, but for now, by way of expressing my view of part of the book, here is the letter I sent...

To Professor Jim Al-Khalili,

From Mr Matthew Marsden,

Dear Professor

First may I say thank you for your clear an informative TV shows and books, and that this is not a request for an evaluation etc, but just some comments on your book ‘Paradoxes’ that I hope you will find worthwhile reading.

With respect, I sincerely believe I can show that a number of your paradox solutions are perhaps slightly overcomplicated and can be dis-solved in quite an astounding manner if one just thoroughly rechecks some widely held, but un verified, very basic assumptions.

To explain what I mean please allow me to go over your interpretation and possible solutions to the ‘Grandfather Paradox’ which I understand you believe may be explainable, or be the only real, or unsolvable paradox in your book.

If I understand correctly, loosely speaking, your view is that the ‘grandfather paradox’ may make sense if,

A- It is the case that history itself shows that any traveller into the past did not, and thus could not affect events in an impossible way. Or,

B – We exist in one of many ‘multi-verses’ such that any ‘time travel’ event can lead to any ‘new’ consequences without conflict or paradox as it ‘s consequences are played out in a ‘parallel’ universe. Or,

C- We exist in a block universe, where past present and future all exist at once , and thus in a sense time travel is similar to normal travel from A to B but in a way we may not be able to fully imagine.

However, I think I can demonstrate that all of these solutions, and even the initial problem itself is actually redundant, and that this and other time ‘problems’ can be seen very differently, thus...

The importance of scientific ‘control’s

First consider that in any sensible experiment we need our test, and a control. Otherwise we have not explored all possibilities and have only one set of results to interpret which can lead to vague and ambiguous conclusions. E.g. if we give 100 itchy and sneezing subjects a new Hay fever pill in the morning, and find virtually all of them are symptom free in the evening, is in fact useless unless we also have a control, and or placebo group as well. This is because, for example, it may have just happened that the pollen count fell to completely zero that afternoon – and anyone taking the new pills or not would have stopped sneezing.

Now we apply the above logic to ‘Time’ – and – most critically we do so from a position of asking not leading questions such as ‘what is time’ or does time exist’ – but just ‘what do we actually observe’.

You say, very rightly, that many ‘Paradoxes’ that can be resolved with “Careful consideration of their underlying assumptions”, so before we consider paradoxes about ‘Time’ it makes sense to first very carefully consider any and all underlying assumptions about ‘Time’. Beginning with the most basic assumption that Time exists. You say, in paradoxes...

“Newton described how objects move and behave under the influence of forces, and Since all movement and change require the notion of time to make sense, time has to be included as an integral part of his mathematical description of nature”.

If we imagine Newton testing the equations for a falling body, we can imagine him allowing a mass to fall from various heights, as he started and stopped a ‘second’ hand on some type of clock. (or used a water clock, or pendulum etc).

Thus he could have experimentally confirmed that a body falling 10 metres ‘took’ 1.4 seconds, falling 20 metres took 2.02 seconds and so on, and thus confirmed that his equations correlated with reality (neglecting air resistance etc).

In this way it seems that Newton confirmed ‘things take time to fall’, and they ‘take more time to fall greater distances etc’.

However, (bearing in mind the importance of carefully rechecking ‘assumptions), now consider what Newton actually observed and what he did not actually observe, but simply assumed. Newton would have observed that...

• objects can exist, and move...

• masses can fall, under the effect of gravity

• ‘clock hands’ can rotate, under the effect of a coiled spring etc,

• he can set and measure distances, and degrees of rotation of clock hands, and

• he can compare moving objects - falling bodies, rotating hands, and

• he can do sensible, useful, mathematics relating to these observations.

But, no matter how Newton describes, and calculates about, what he sees, as far as I am aware nothing has been written to prove that extra to things existing and moving, Newton ever ‘observed’ a thing called ‘Time’, or observed ‘Time passing’. In other words, it seems to me..

• Newton did not observe that there was an invisible ‘place’ or ‘thing’ called ‘the Future’.

• He did not observe that there was an invisible ‘place’ or ‘thing’ called ‘the Past’.

• He did not observe that there was an invisible thing called ‘Time’ that passed between these ‘places’.

• And he did not observe that this thing called ‘Time’ was ‘needed’ to exist and pass, for gravity, or energy to be able to move things.

In my opinion all of the above, unless proven must scientifically remain at the status of ‘untested hypothesis’. However, many people seem to assume the existence in some way of the past, the future and time are too obvious to need proving. And with respect from reading paradoxes, and some of ‘Black Holes, Wormholes and Time Machines’, I believe this is your current view.

Thus, in performing and checking his experiments, all Newton observed is that things may fall, and ‘hands’ on machines may rotate, and we may compare such different types of motion if we choose.

Any other belief Newton (or anyone else) has that ‘he feels time exists and is passing’ is meaningless and completely scientifically irrelevant, especially if he (or you) apparently gets this ‘feeling’ having be told by other that ’time exists’ , and one can ‘feel it passing’ – This is true just as a child being told that ‘mind reading’ is possible, and being shown a good ‘mind reading’ act – may then ‘feel’ he is ‘watching mind reading happen’.

On this point, when you say in paradoxes,

“all motion and change must by definition be judged against time... [e.g.] the number of heartbeats per minute”

This too can be queried, if you compare heartbeats to a motorised hand rotating on a numbered dial, then that is what you are comparing them to – I.e. an oscillating effect, to an example of steady rotation. You can call this rotation ‘degrees’ , or ‘radians’ , or centimetres of tip movement, and describe your comparison as ‘100 beats per 360 degrees’ etc – but just ‘calling’ these 360 degrees ‘seconds of time’ does not prove that there is ‘a past’ , or ‘a future’, or a thing called time that passes between these places, or just passes, as hearts beat, or motorised hands rotate.

Thus, (IMO) all motion can be compared to other examples of motion. And in fact comparing motion to motion is all we ever do, if we say, as with respect you do in paradoxes, “all motion and change must by definition be judged against time” then we are in one swoop forcing ourselves to agree that ‘time’ ‘must’ exist (with its future, past and other mysteries) but our only reason or proof for this amazing claim is, because ‘things move’.

While the word, language, and or ideas of time can be used as a common ‘currency’ when talking about motion – but using this ‘idea’, this abstract ‘conversion rate’ that 15 degrees of Earth’s rotation ‘is’ one ‘hour’ of ‘time’ etc – and then claiming this ‘time’ thing, proves the existence of , and connects ‘unimaginable and intangible’ ‘places’ (the ‘past’ and the ‘future’) existing in a 4^th ‘dimension’, that may be visited or changed in theory or in practice - is not logically congruent or scientific.

Testing hypothesises,

So, now we reconsider the importance of controls or placebos in science as described above, and apply it to the argument for and against time.

If we consider the question...

If ‘Time’ exists, and things move and change and interact ‘over time’ would this explain why there seems to be an approaching though invisible future, a receding and accumulating past, and ever changing present, and that we can measure and work with ‘seconds’ of time etc?

Then I would agree that the answer to this question seems to be YES – if time exists in some or any way, then that would seem to adequately explain ‘the future’, ‘the past’ etc.

The problem here is that the answer to this question is YES! This is a problem, because like the lack of sneezing in our hay fever test subjects, it stops us checking for other possibilities because we seem to have found a valid solution worth keeping and developing ... even though this may not be the case.

What the positive answer to the above question stops is the asking of what I call the control question which is as follows...

If ‘Time’ does not exist, and things in the universe JUST move and change and interact, would this alone explain why there seems to be an approaching though invisible future, a receding and accumulating past, and ever changing present, and that we can measure and work with units we call ‘seconds’ etc?

In other words, by things in the universe ‘JUST’ moving and changing and interacting, what I mean is that as things move, under the force of gravity or energy, they JUST move and change and interact, and do not create any kind of a ‘record’ or their movement and change in any way, any where at all, other than in their physical surroundings.

I.e. as things move and change, they do not create, or add to an invisible record of all events that might be called the ‘temporal’ past. And as things move and change they do not create or affect any invisible, intangible thing that might be called the ‘temporal’ future.

In my opinion, while the answer to the question ‘if things move and change over a thing called time would this seem to make sense ?’ seems to be YES, the answer to the question ‘if things JUST move and change would this seem to explain all that we attribute to the existence of a thing called time?’ – is also YES.

To clarify this before I lose your confidence, consider fossils, sedimentary rock layers, tree growth rings, and your own internal memories.

All of these things separately or together seem to suggest the existence of time, and ‘the past’. But, logically and scientifically it can be said that ‘if things in the universe JUST move and interact, without also creating another record of all events in a place called ‘the past’, then particles in water can fall to create ordered layers, bones can settle and be slowly replaced by rock, and a human can walk around the world having the contents of his or her mind changed by what they see’.

So while the external and internal evidence around us seems to show that ‘things move and change and interact over a thing called time’ in fact – all of that evidence – only actually shows that things move and interact. – The most important thing being to realise that the contents of our own minds, the physical areas we call ‘memories’ also in fact only prove that matter can exist and interact, and change, and our ‘memories’ do not also prove that there is also ‘another’ record of events created and stored in an invisible and mysterious ‘place’ or ‘thing’ called the past. And thus even the changing, and accumulating, contents of our minds do not prove that the past, ‘time’ and thus the future exist.

Back to Newton.

To take this back to your book, the importance of carefully checking assumptions, and your comments on Newton,

Newton described how objects move and behave under the influence of forces, and Since all movement and change require the notion of time to make sense, time has to be included as an integral part of his mathematical description of nature

I would say that very strictly speaking “all movement and change do not require the notion of time to make sense”.

Logically, either things in the universe JUST move and change, OR as they move and change a thing called ‘time’ also exists, and ‘passes’ from an invisible ‘place’ called ‘the future’ into an invisible place called ‘the past’.

I suggest that all you and I ever directly observe is that things just ‘move and change’, and that we never have a reason, or proof to assume extra to this a thing called ‘time’ also exists.

And that while we see things move and change in orderly or chaotic ways, and appear from ‘outside’ of our physical point of view, we never see things ‘appear out of a temporal future’.

Likewise we may see the contents of our minds change, and in a sense accumulate images and information, but we never see anything ‘recede into a temporal past’.

Thus when Newton declares a rock will ‘take’ 15 seconds to fall N metres, he is really saying ‘As this rock falls N metres, this motorised hand rotates 90 degrees, because of the way it is manufactured. And, In my opinion Newton, (like Galileo before him etc) does not prove that as the rock falls ‘quantity’ of a thing called ’time’ passes or flows ‘through’ the present.

The miniscule – but massive oversight.

While clearly something is “included as an integral part of (our) mathematical description of nature” I would argue that just because we can put mathematical numbers to how much the earth, or a ‘clock’ hand modelling the earth has rotated, this is not any kind of a reason to also conclude that an ‘extra’ invisible and mysterious, paradoxical, and intangible ‘other’ thing called time also exists.

And I cannot stress too strongly how it is, in my opinion, that right at this very small detail of ‘calling’ amounts of movement or rotation ‘minutes’ etc – without being fully conscious of what we are doing and why – we mistakenly ‘make’ an entirely abstract, mental ‘tool’ into an apparently ‘real’ and mysterious ‘thing’. Thus we ‘create’ an entire shelf of books, and millions of web pages, about a ‘thing’, and ‘problem’ that was not, and cannot be shown to actually exist.

Einstein's Grandfather... paradox.

Concerning Newton Vs relativity (IMO) we are offered a forced choice ‘Is Time universal and fixed, or is time merged with space and dilatable?) – whatever you choose you chose that time exists, and of course any intelligent scientist jumps to say Einstein is right.

But consider, Einstein, like Newton, and Galileo, never proved the existence of time, he/they, seem to have only assumed that time existed, and more importantly none of them, or anyone else I have read, seems to have even seen, let alone asked the control question –‘what if things JUST move and change’.

Electrodynamics,

In paradoxes, you suggest,

‘our current best theory of time is provided by Einstein's General Relativity’

GR, is built on SR so If we first look at ‘Electrodynamics’ 1905, we see Einstein's working definition of ‘Time’ is absolutely no such thing, and is phenomenally inadequate particularly considering how virtually every serious book I have read on ‘Time’ builds on it in the way you suggest.

In the 1905 paper (p1 Kinematics) Einstein says...

We must bear carefully in mind that a mathematical description of this kind has no physical meaning unless we are quite clear as to what we understand by “time.” ...

If, for instance, I say, “That train arrives here at 7 o'clock,” I mean something like this: “The pointing of the small hand of my watch to 7 and the arrival of the train are simultaneous events.”3

Critically, what Einstein is ‘observing’ or describing here is that ...

• ‘pointed’, motorised hands can rotate on numbered dials, and

• ‘Trains’ can move along and stop on tracks. And,

• The motion and position of things like these can be noted and compared if we choose

But, in my opinion, Einstein does not observe, describe, or prove any of the following

• Einstein does not prove there is a thing called 'time'

• He does not prove that a 'rotating hand' relates to, or shows the existence of 'time'

• He does not prove that there is a ‘past'

• He does not prove there is ‘a future’

• He does not prove ‘time’ passes between these places – and is ‘needed’ for things to be able to move.

• He does not prove ‘time’ has an arrow, I.e. it passes 'in one direction'

• And he does not prove that there is a ‘now’ - in which 'simultaneous' events may occur,

• And he does not prove, that there are in any sense ‘other times’ – such that the idea of 'non-simultaneous events' can make sense.

It seems to me that all of the above are just assumed to be true by Einstein, and that most readers of his work assume, that what he assumes must be correct – and thus that anything he says from then on builds on – and thus firms up or adds to – a proof that time exists... and can be merged with space etc.

Note also, that Einstein does not seem to even see, consider, and then legitimately disprove or not, the most basic possibility, which is that the world is just as we see it, and that things in it JUST exist and interact – without needing or creating ‘Time’ – a past a future and so on.

In essence what I am saying in cold logic is,

IF ‘time’ exists THEN it is true that relativity describes fascinating facts about it.

BUT – despite very common assumptions - relativity does NOT prove that time exists.

Also

IF ‘Time’ does not exist, THEN Relativity ‘just’ describes fascinating facts about the unexpected way, and ‘rates’ at which objects move and change under extreme conditions (‘now’).

So, it seems to me that precisely speaking the statement ‘our current best theory of time is provided by Einstein's General Relativity’ – is not true, because Einstein's only ‘assumed’ that time exists (in SR), and wrote SR and GR in the ‘language of time’, as ‘if’ time exists. But as far as I am aware at no point does he prove the existence, or ‘function’ of ‘time’, or of any of its suggested components (past, future, flow, direction etc)..

However, (if you are still with me) – If time does not exist, how can Einstein's Relativity still make sense, in countless real, and useful ways, as experimentally proven, which of course in essence it does.

Timeless Special Relativity.

In simple terms, unless Einstein or someone else proves the existence of time, and the past and the future – or any combination, then ‘all’ Relativity is describing is the unusual physical transformations (length contraction, mass increase etc) – and unusual ‘rates of change’ – that the effects motion and gravity create.

Thus, in examples like the twins paradox (as proven by astronauts and GPS transmitters etc) – the accelerating/ travelling twin does indeed ‘Change more slowly’! – BUT- critically – such an experiment does not prove any of the following...

• It does not prove that extra to movement and change ‘time’ exists

• Does not prove that ‘the future’ exists

• Does not prove that ‘the past’ exists

• Does not prove that a thing called ‘time’ passes from ‘future’ to ‘past’

• Does not prove that motion or gravity ‘slows the passage of Time’ from the future to the past.

• Does not prove that things change more slowly because ‘time’ exists and ‘passes’ more slowly

It is only that if one ‘makes up’ and super imposes the ‘idea’ that a thing called time exists, that one forces this idea onto the theoretical and experimental results observed.

If one just assumes (and imposes the idea that) things JUST exist and move and interact and change – possibly at unexpected rates (but always just ‘now’ so to speak) – then this, much simpler, view also will seem to make sense.

The difference being that the view of ‘time’ insists on numerous intangible inconceivable invisible and undetectable ‘things’ such as ‘a past and ‘a future’ to ‘exist’ and leads to countless apparent ‘paradoxes’ – requiring ‘block’ time , parallel universes, multi-verses, and ‘universal causality problem preventing mechanisms’ to exist– while the idea that things just exist and move depends only on what you directly constantly, simply observe to be true.

(Occam’s razor applied, case 2 seems worth serious consideration)

Timeless General Relativity.

Thus, to the Grandfather paradox. In my opinion, the problem is at the very start, with the idea or suggestion that one goes into ‘THE’ past.

It seems to me, neither Galileo, Newton, Einstein, Hawking and so on...

A – proved the existence of ‘the past’ , or

B – disproved “that if things in the universe JUST moved and interacted this would be enough to change the world around us, and the contents of our minds, in such a way to ‘fool’ us into thinking a thing called ‘time’, and specifically ‘the past’ exist”.

Thus there is no ‘Grandfather paradox’ and no causality problem to examine or resolve, because the question ‘what if one went into the past’ is as invalid and unfounded as ‘what if one captured a ghost’.

Our actions do not cause effects in ‘the future’ – we affect what we push against and in the direction we push against it.

Likewise our actions do not create a ‘temporal past’, or trails or records in the ‘temporal past’ – in simple terms we ‘simply leave physical changes in the matter we interact with physically – in the physical location ‘behind’ us as we move. – i.e. we do not create anything more sophisticated than ‘footprints in the mud’ that automatically is ‘behind us’ and ‘in our (physical) past’ as we move. And thus there is no such thing as temporal past that we could ‘visit’ or ‘change’ – so as to cause problems in a ‘future’.

We do not change ‘a past’, we change what we change physically around us – any ‘forensic’ police investigator never ‘goes into the past’ or proves the existence of the past – they can work out what ‘happened’ in a sense, but ‘that things happen’ does not prove that as things ‘happen’ ‘a thing called time passes’ or that ‘a temporal past record of all happenings’ is ‘some’ how created, and stored some ‘where’.

Logically, and scientifically it must be the case that..

• Either – as things happen a ‘record’ is created in ‘the past’ and the past in some way “exists”. Or,

• No ‘temporal’ record is created – and ‘the past’ does NOT exist at all, in any way, any 'where'.

And we cannot have it both ways, we cannot claim that ‘time’ and ‘the past’ are just useful notions or terms, but ‘the past’ does not exist... but it kind of does exist, and we could visit it... but not really – so it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t exist or not – so we may as well say it does, and wander what would happen if we went ‘back’ and changed it... but it doesn’t really exist.... etc ad nausea.

If we wish to claim that ‘the past’ exists, then we must consider that to think something exists, logically we need and initial reason to suspect it does, and then some experimental proof to confirm our suspicion. - And I would suggest that when it comes to ’Time’ – specifically, ‘the past’,

• (*) we have ‘no initial reason’ to even suspect that the past exists – and

• we have no experimental proof to confirm that ‘the past exists’

(* -NOTE, critically ‘the contents of your mind’ do not count – they do prove that things exist, move change and interact, creating ‘record’s or trails in the matter around them in the most intricate – even intelligent – ways but the patterns in the physical matter in your brain do NOT prove that there is ALSO ‘another’ record of events created, stored and added to in a place called ‘the past’ held somewhere in a ‘fourth dimension’)

Thus, with no initial reason to suspect time exist and no proof it does, and no need for ‘time’ to explain our observations

– plus the fact that the ‘idea’ of time has not thoroughly been tested against the idea that things ‘just exist and interact’ and – the fact that the idea of time leads to endless ‘paradoxes’ that require fantastic ‘parallel universes etc to resolve – it seems to me there is no case to suggest time exists.

Therefore, making up the (useful) system of time, then talking about ‘the idea of past’, then asking what if we ‘went into the idea we just made up’ and changed something there? – makes about as much sense as seeing how useful the ‘idea’ or system of ‘long division’ is, and then asking how much does ‘long division’ weigh, or whether we could store some ‘long division’ in a jar.

The reversible Quantum ‘Time’ vs. irreversible Classical ‘Time’ problem.

In my opinion, the above reasoning applies to and resolves all the ‘problems’ with ‘time’ that I have researched (and I have researched thoroughly before ‘publishing’ my eBook and Talks etc), for example, although the very little I know of quantum mechanics comes mainly from reading your own ‘QUANTUM a guide for the perplexed’, however, as I understand it there is said to be a problem resolving the apparently reversible Quantum ‘Time’ with irreversible Classical ‘Time’.

IMO this problem can be shown to be unfounded, thus...

It is observed that matter exists, moves changes etc – but not observed that as it does so ‘a past’ or a future’ exist or that a thing called time flows between these places in a ‘fixed’ or otherwise direction.

Large scale,

Therefore, on a large scale, we may ‘drop vases’ – observe that the universe is on average constantly and only expanding, and that we seem to organise the contents of our minds so as to apparently ‘accumulate’ ordered (matter) in-formation. But these entropy, cosmological, and physiological ‘arrows’ do not prove the ‘existence’ and one way flow of a thing called time.

Instead they only prove that, A - on a large scale ‘vases’ dropped from height are virtually guaranteed to smash for obvious reasons, but the odds of fragments jumping up to form a vase are extremely slim. B- the matter in the universe is constantly heading off in all directions, and C – that a human brain (like a digital cameras electronics) can be made to reorganise its contents in a highly structured way. None of these is the same as proving that ‘there is a thing called time, that flows between a ‘places’ or ‘things’ called the ‘unseeable future’ and ‘invisible, unchangeable past’, and has a one way direction or arrow. It is only if one ‘assumes’ that all these invisible and intangible ‘things’ exist and have these properties, and then imposes this idea onto observations, that they ‘seem’ not to ‘disprove’ our ‘assumptions’. None of which is the same as finding evidence or showing a proof that ‘time’ etc exists.

Small scale,

On a small scale, it is observed or concluded that a particle of type A can transform into particle types B and C plus X amount of energy. A and that particles C and B can be merged using X amount of energy to form type A and so on. – BUT none of this proves that there is a thing or place called the ‘past’ or a ‘future’ exist or that a thing called time flows between these places in either a ‘fixed’ or reversible direction.

In both cases (classical and Quantum) it is the imposition of the (unfounded and unproven) ‘idea’ of time – and the insistence that ‘time’ be explained or made to fit, that is the problem.

Thus (imo) there is not shown to be a thing called ‘time’ that exists, and it is not shown that this thing has a clear direction on one physical scale and is ‘reversible’ on a small scale. It is only observed that large aggregates of matter (falling, smashing vases etc) act in a certain way, while their subatomic components can flip between numerous states. –

I.e. unless someone PROVES the existence, function, and components of ‘time’ there is no problem to be resolved other than to see we are suggesting the existence of some mysterious ‘thing’ (time) with no good reason, and the more we try to force it onto reality the less it works – which should be triggering alarm belts to indicate we are on the wrong track – but instead we blindly insist on coming up with more and more incredible fudges – which are believable only because of the overwhelmingness of their ‘bluff’ – e.g. time still makes ‘sense’, as long as ‘infinite numbers of entire random duplicate universes can be instantaneously created, and can exist ‘some where’ ‘parallel’ to our own’ universe.

Conclusion

Finally, may I say thank you for sticking with me this far if you have done so professor, and I hope you don’t mind my comments of your books – and that you take them scientifically.

May I also say , I am very serious about what I have written here to you, and I understand of course that it may be completely wrong – but until that is shown clearly to me I choose to publicise and pursue my point.

Also, my apologies for any typos and rambling – I`m sure you get too much unsolicited stuff to read, but at least by writing to you and other scientific authors I have logged that I have come up with this work ‘first’ J and – if you have any questions I would be delighted to converse with you,

Concerning questions, I have written an Amazon Kindle eBook ‘A Brief History of Timelessness’ describing in great (if poorly edited) detail why I think I can show the idea of ‘time’ is unfounded and unproven, in all of the cases I could consider from simple human opinions, down to Relativity and QM etc.

Also, there is a searchable web site – www.TIMELESSNESS.co.uk

And numerous videos of talks I have given on the subject if you are interested.

e.g. www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHu_h-QNfNw (given at the Royal Greenwich Observatory)

I am as I say very serious about this subject, I’m giving talks on TIMELESSNESS in Kentish town London in early August – and then at the Edinburgh festival – and I am keen to do talks in more scientific establishments – so if you would ever like me to give a talk at Surrey University, or if you can recommend any one I can contact there or elsewhere I would appreciate that.

Re the points I tried to cover in ‘paradoxes’ ‘concisely’ in this letter,

I have described a ‘real world’ example of the ‘twins’ discussion more fully here,

https://sites.google.com/site/abriefhistoryoftimelessness/special-relativity/young-looking-cosmonauts

my main points re my issues with ‘On the Electro-dynamics of Moving Bodies’ here,

https://sites.google.com/site/abriefhistoryoftimelessness/special-relativity/the-electrodynamics-of-moving-bodies

And I have reworked Hawking’s version of the Grandfather paradox ‘timelessly’ here,

https://sites.google.com/site/abriefhistoryoftimelessness/advanced-timelessness/prof-hawking-s-mad-scientist-paradox

Yours sincerely,

Matthew Marsden

My apologies for cramming such a large post via your contacts page, I hope this didn’t cause problems – I have also snail mailed this to you in case it registered as spam (which hopefully it is not). Either way, thanks for your ‘time’.

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