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Spacetime

Galileo's spacetime

Although it seems to be an "old fashioned" notion, we should take a look at Newton's hypothesis about motion.

"It is absolute; what we call duration is the truth and the real dimension of mathematics. We can use time in Physics the same way we use it in our daily life. This is the way we measure duration. Of course when we measure the duration of a day or a month is not objective, but it the only thing we can do as long as there is not an absolute to do it. Each movement can be accelerated or slowed down, but time passes by without being affected.".

As a result each transition is transmitted instantly. We now can say that Newton was wrong, but his words sound realistic in our every day life, don't they?

Minkowski's spacetime

SpacetimeHermann Miknowski, a Russian mathematician, developed the concept of the space-time continuum. He was born in Russia and attended and then taught at German universities. To the three dimensions of space, Minkowski added the concept of a fourth dimension, time. This concept developed from Albert Einstein's 1905 relativity theory, and became, in turn, the framework for Einstein's 1916 general theory of relativity.

The graphic shows the world line of a particle moving forward in time. The particle has to move inside the cones. The two cones are named light cones. The tangent vector then points inside the past and the future light cone and is said to be future-directed and timelike. What we can observe is phenomena inside the two cones. We exist and act inside the cones.

For Minkowski, the space outside the cones is something that we cannot affect and be affected from it, even more it something that we do not have idea of it.If we could manufacture a machine, which it would allow us to travel through time, we could change past and future. We all know that this is something impossible so far. For Minkowski there is nowhere the term "present". It is natural, because present means something that happens now and at the same time it is already past.

If we could create a machine, which it would allow us to travel through time, we could change past and future. We all know that this is something impossible so far. For Minkowski there is nowhere the term "present". It is normal, because present means something that happens now and at the same time it is already past.

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