Cosmology Folks: I am going to try an experiment tomorrow and need your help.
When you arrive in class, please arrange yourselves into small groups of from 2-3 students each. Then, with your colleagues, please discuss the following: Newton’s theory of Absolute Space and Absolute Time, implies the concept of a Universal Now. In Newton’s view, each Universal Now is like a page in a book, and ‘eternity’ is like the entire stack of pages that make up the book. The analogy is not perfect, because Newton believed time is continuous, but you get the idea.
Here is Mel Brooks’ take on it, from the movie Spaceballs.
Question: Does the future already exist, and does the past still exist? (This type of theory is called the Block Universe.) If the past and future all exist, not just ‘Now’, why do we only experience a single Now? Please discuss…
See you tomorrow (aka the next page in Newton’s book).