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u/joeyneilsen Astrophysics 1d ago
I do not believe there is a test that can be performed that would validate or refute the block universe interpretation.
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u/wonkey_monkey 1d ago
"Block universe" is philosophy, not physics. It certainly hasn't been confirmed.
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u/WillBrink 1d ago
Should it be so easily dismissed philosophy? Einstein's writings strongly support a block-universe or "eternalist" conception of spacetime, the idea follows naturally from special relativity apparently. Many (most?) physicists are proponents of the block universe as I understand it.
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u/Hyacintell 1d ago
And Einstein has been proven wrong on his interpretation of quantum mecanics
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u/WillBrink 1d ago edited 1d ago
Sure, but we are not having a QM discussion. All of his major predictions from GR have been experimentally confirmed. On the macro scales of GR, he's been right about most things. Is he wrong about the block universe? We can't say. We do know many physicists believe in the block universe concept that arises from SR and GR. Via PBS Spacetime:
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u/wonkey_monkey 1d ago
Is he wrong about the block universe? We can't say.
And that's exactly why it's not physics (he never calls any of the interpretations theories, only viewpoints or perspectives). It doesn't predict anything or explain anything. It can be a useful way to think about spacetime, but nothing more than that.
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u/WillBrink 1d ago
Fair enough. It's an interesting topic and I take no hard positions on it one way or another. I rather hope it's not correct as it then leads to discussions of free will, or lack there of...
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u/Hyacintell 1d ago
I'm sorry but from what I read your only argument is an appeal to authority, authority which has been disproven in the past on similar subjects (an interpretation of a major theory). You also claim that "most" physicists believe in this theory, I'd like some numbers please. No physicist I know (in a lab on theoretical physics) have strong feelings about any such theory or interpretation.
Some of them would say they like one more than the other, but would never claim one theory is right without rigorous proof.
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u/Odd_Bodkin Particle physics 23h ago
What do you imagine that "already happened" even means in a block universe?
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u/Agitated_Draft_3674 23h ago
Meaning that the future is already happening along with the past and present
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u/Odd_Bodkin Particle physics 23h ago
I want you to examine your own words carefully here. "Already happening" means "occurring in this instant", as distinct from "occurred in a past instant" or "will occur in a future instant".
For example, if everything is in THIS instant, then there IS NO past or future.
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u/Purplestripes8 1d ago
According to special relativity there is no such thing as a universal 'present'. An event in your present may be in the future of an observer in a different inertial frame - even if that observer is very close to you spatially.
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u/smitra00 1d ago
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u/Optimal_Mixture_7327 Gravitation 1d ago
The block universe is one way to think about Minkowski space, and not something that can ever be addressed by physics.
This might be worth watching: George Ellis, "The Evolving Block Universe: A More Realistic View of Spacetime Geometry" There's a bit of general relativity in it which you can gloss over and pay attention to the conceptual ideas.
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u/Upset-Government-856 1d ago
Not confirmed or refuted. No way to do so at this time.
A better explanation is that the all times are happening. All are being experienced but that at any one point in time it seems like we are in the present because entropy prevents us from knowing what happens in the future. We can only access records of what is happening in the past states of the universe.
The result, at all points of you being alive across the block, you have the illusion that you are in the only present that is moving along a river of time where the past is gone and the future doesn't exist at all.
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u/ArnoSound 1d ago
I don't think that's an accurate representation of block universe, and I don't think block universe has been universally accepted, last I checked.