Where Time Begins

Where time begins

By Nicholas Jones

Version: 1.81, March 18, 2024

ISBN: 9781370670178

Copyright 2020 Nicholas Jones.

Smashwords Edition

License Notes:

This eBook is licensed for your personal use only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favourite eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. Excerpts of up to 10 pages may be printed for personal use or in discussion groups and teaching classes, as long as it is provided without cost. Quotes may be reprinted for purposes of review and critique.

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Cover pictures: (public domain images from wpclipart.com)

• Inside stopwatch face: spiral galaxy M81 in ultraviolet from wpclipart.com.

• Background: Hubble Ultra-Deep Field image taken in full range of ultraviolet to near-infrared light. It contains some of the most distant galaxies. wpclipart.com.

More info at: wiki/Hubble_Ultra-Deep_Field.

The original image may have been sourced via NASA’s hubblesite.org or ESA/Hubble’s spacetelescope.org.

Tips:

The PDF version, currently only available at Smashwords, allows you to easily explore the many cross references and figures. However, the EPUB and MOBI readers have very flexible presentation formats to enhance readability, and are far superior on small screens. ‘Landscape’ layout also improves display of equations and figures on such screens.

Table of Contents

Cover photo

Preface

Part 1: Redshift duplicated in a finite universe

Abstract

1. Introduction

The #1-default model

2. Fundamental concepts

2.1 The critical geometry

2.1.1 Start-of-time approach …Figure 1a, Equation (2)

2.1.2 Start-of-gravity approach …Figure 1b

2.1.3 Gravitational force of the MGR curves …Figure 1c, Figure 1d

2.2 The software algorithm

2.3 The time base

2.4 The source code repository

2.5 The experimentally proven physics

2.5.1 Integrating Gravitational Force to Potential

2.5.2 Updating Age

2.5.3 Speed Updates

2.5.4 Redshift Updates

2.5.5 Has General relativity been fulfilled?

3. Results

3.1 The Maximum Gravitational Range (MGR) …Figure 2a, Figure 2b, Figure 2c, The #2-default model

3.2 The Gravity Profiles …Figure 3a, Figure 3b, Figure 4

3.3 The Speed Profiles …Figure 5a, Figure 5b, Figure 5c

3.4 The Redshift Profiles …Figure 6a, Figure 6b, Figure 6c, Figure 6d

3.5 The Density Profile …Figure 7a, Figure 7b, Figure 7c, Outer shell parameters, Matter migration

3.6 The Heating Profile …Figure 8

3.7 The Age Profiles …Figure 9

3.8 So where is the centre?

4. Discussion

4.1 Distances above redshift 0.1 …Figure 10, My really big problem, Figure 11a, Figure 11b, Figure 11c, The #3-default model, Sample galaxy lists, Figure 11d

4.2 A possible CMB cause …Axis of Evil

4.3 Redshift Distortions …Fingers of God Effect, Figure 11e, Peculiar velocities, Quasars

4.4 Galactic structure and distribution …Galaxy-windup-dilemma

5. Conclusions

6. Acknowledgements

7. Epilogue

7.1 The initial timeless state

7.2 What is proven?

7.3 Dark Energy evidence

Part 2: Dream time

8. The gravitational shockwave

9. The Bubble model

10. Galactic distribution

10.1 The shrinking shell …Figure 12, Figure 13, Figure 14

10.2 An expanding shell, 10.2.1 Gravitational potential flow

10.3 The final question

10.4 A cold winter’s day, 10.4.1 The time-stopped approach, 10.4.2 The Condensation approach

Part 3: What we understand and what we believe

11. Biblical consistency

11.1 A note to atheists

11.2 The key scriptures

11.3 A challenge to our understanding

11.4 Proof of God

11.5 The day thing

11.6 The image of God

11.7 To my critics

11.8 The meaning of life

Follow-up

Updates

Update 1: The outer shell in scripture (Part 3)

Update 2: Colliding galaxies (Part 1)

Update 3: Heating mechanisms (Part 1)

Update 4: Void Features (Part 1)

Update 5: Before the Big Bang

Update 6: CMBR satellite surveys (Proof of COI) …Figure 20, Figure 21, Figure 22

Personal acknowledgements

Foreword

Version history

References

…[01], [02], [03], [04], [05], [06], [07], [08], [09], [10],

[11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20],

[21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30],

[31], [32].

Technical follow-up: The COI Universe Model

The author’s website: GeckoFocus.com

Discover a simpler universe!

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Preface

…What you need to ask

Take a spherical universe, with same density as ours, and a radius of about 13 billion light years. Wrap a dense outer shell around it and watch the gravitational field of that shell as it penetrates the universe at the speed of light. The central galaxies will experience a gravitational surge that accelerates these galaxies outwards at a speed proportional to their distance from the centre of the universe. This gives a linearly increasing Doppler redshift. Outside this region, the speed drops off but then there is an increasing gravitational potential between the centre and the outer galaxies. This yields an increasing gravitational redshift. If you get the density and width of the shell just right, then after about 15 to 16 billion years, the redshift of this universe, viewed from the centre, will look just like ours. Further, gravitational collapse of the outer shell will replicate the CMB radiation and temperature. Also, the outward acceleration of galaxies will reduce the density of the central region, exactly as observed in the KBC Void [21]. That’s not all that this model predicts and explains, buts it’s all I could fit in one paragraph. Your question is, can you afford to ignore this and stay with models that require hypothetical (unseen, undetected, imaginary) dark matter and dark energy, and still don’t explain many peculiar redshift observations?

…Another shot at capturing your interest

Are you a PhD Physicist? If so, you probably don’t need to read this preface that gradually introduces a new way to look at the universe, and quietly challenges long held assumptions of other models. I suggest that you jump to Chapter 2 and read the discussion about Equation (2). One relatively simple equation predicts a linearly increasing recession speed of galaxies at near ranges, with an exponentially growing gravitational redshift at far ranges. That is exactly what real redshift observations show in Figure 11a. Look at Update 6 where the drift speed of the Milky Way, derived from CMBR redshift surveys, demands Doppler based redshift — not expanding space!

But wait, there is more… See precise explanations of the KBC void [21] and deviations from Hubble’s Law normally written off as peculiar velocities. Or what about a prediction based on time dilation for the increasing Super Nova Type Ia (SNIa) light curve widths in Figure 10. Hard questions like the galaxy-windup-dilemma and the fingers-of-god-effect are also resolved. Does that whet your appetite? The rest of us mere mortals can simply read on.

…Some imagination to kick-start this model

Do you recall the star-field pictures at the start of a Star Trek episode? Like so many other fans, I used it as my screen-saver. The stars seem to appear in the centre of the screen as if they had just come into view and then streak past. After seeing the end of ‘Men in Black’, with the screen zooming outwards to the edge of the universe and beyond, I contemplated reversing that zoom, and speeding from the edge of the universe to its centre; Star Trek style. But what would happen at the start if those stars appearing in the centre front, were not just coming into view but actually materialising as we zoomed inwards at the speed of light? It means that all the matter of the universe was effectively behind me. That means that all the intergalactic gravity would be outwards and that would accelerate all stars (galaxies) outwards. Instantly we have redshift across the entire universe with no magic dark stuff required.

OK, so that is where it started. It turns out that there are several ways to initiate a gravitational surge from the outside to the centre. However the critical question was, could I calculate the exact profile of this redshift? Would it match Hubble’s observations? This bugged me for several years until fate gave me the spare time to develop the algebra and the simulator.

…Let’s start with real physics

Part 1 is not a story. It is a physics only, self-contained description of how gravity evolved across the universe from the start of time. The Big Bang Model (BBM) also has start of time and start of gravity events that are compatible with this model, so it should not be a surprise, but wow, it sure is a surprise when you read section 2.1.2. Chapter 7 continues the surprises with a discussion of a fairly new metric that seems to explain how time might re-start from the outside-in after a rapid expansion phase.

The changes in gravity are integrated to show the speeds at which galaxies would move, and to determine the gravitational potential between galaxies. However, two novel assumptions are made. First, a spherical universe is assumed. That’s not too radical. In fact, it’s exactly what you expect from a universe that explodes, inflates and/or expands from a singularity. The second assumption is that time itself started (or restarted) at the outside of the universe. Now, that’s radical, but to my own genuine surprise; the physical mechanisms discussed in section 2.1.2 and Chapter 7 can account for this outside-in start-up, or something mathematically similar. Having observed that Part 1, using only experimentally proven physics, clearly and numerically predicts what we observe today, these novel assumptions would seem to be vindicated.

There are still further questions to answer. How did the initial mass distribution form? How did this mass distribution take the shape of stars, gathered into galaxies, gathered into clusters and super clusters with great voids in between? These questions are addressed in Part 2, but the answers there are just speculative; even pure imagination. No experimental physics can test or go back before the start of time but there are hints. I also suggest some of these hints in Part 1.

I really want to get you to the exciting bits. So, if you are already familiar with redshift and its causes, you can probably skip this history lesson that shows how we got into the current confused state. Why not jump to Part 1 now, and come back to this later.

…The history lesson

What I am going to propose in this book is quite reasonable and consistent with the known laws of physics, but it’s going to be the exact opposite of everything you have come to expect. Let’s have a quick look at aspects of the prevailing Expanding Universe model or Big Bang model (BBM). A good place to start is Hubble’s Law which is an observation that the redshift of distant galaxies increases in proportion to their distance from the earth. Redshift means that the light from the distant galaxy is decreased in frequency. This causes colours in the visible spectrum to become redder. The effect is well documented and could be caused by the distant galaxy travelling away from the earth at some speed. Since redshift increases with distance then this recessional speed must also be increasing. This is known as the Doppler Effect and is called Doppler redshift. The only problem is that some of the most distant galaxies would have to be receding at up to or over the speed of light. It also seemed totally improbable that our galaxy was at the centre of 200 billion odd galaxies in the universe. But now, new evidence from CMBR surveys, demands this understanding. See Figure 21 in Update 6. Unfortunately the scientists of the day, discounted speed induced redshift, presumably because they did not grasp how the COI model predicts gravitational redshift to supplement Doppler redshift at greater ranges.

Redshift, caused by a gravitational field, is known as gravitational redshift. The way I like to remember gravitational redshift is to say that as you move against gravity (to a higher gravitational potential) time runs faster under General Relativity. And if time runs faster at the observer, then the frequency of a distant light source appears to be lower. In General Relativity this effect is referred to as Time Dilation. Can gravitational redshift account for the redshift predicted by Hubble’s Law? Well, if the universe looks the same in all directions we might assume we are close to the centre. However, in a steady state universe, the light coming from the outside to the centre would be traveling in the same direction as the prevailing gravity and would appear blue-shifted; the opposite of redshift. So, it seems that gravitational redshift was discounted. (Of course, who said that our universe has to be in steady state?)

With nowhere else to go, in 1927 Georges Lemaitre, proposed the expansion of the universe based on Einstein’s General Relativity. This didn’t have experimental confirmation but seemed to work in principle. The proposal is that if space–time was expanding then it would expand the wavelength of light, causing the frequency of the light to reduce and voila - redshift. Sadly, over the last 90 odd years, more and more problems have surfaced with this expansion theory. You will hear about them if you choose to read on, but as the only redshift explanation not discounted, it has persisted, and been modified.

Since I am going to propose a new model of the universe, it is important to note that my universe model is also derived or built on principles of Einstein’s General Relativity. Deviating from the Expanding Universe model is not breaking the laws of physics. It is changing the underlying assumptions that all models have tucked away somewhere. And, it seems that no one has considered a model of the universe which tracks the changes in gravitational field strength as the universe evolves from the start-of-gravity to present day...

…Let’s build our first universe – the biggest void

Suppose you could make a universe suddenly pop into existence that is 14 billion light years (14 Gly) in radius. It would take 14 billion years (14 Gyr) for the gravity of the outer galaxies to reach the centre and another 14 billion years for the whole universe to be in gravitational contact, nominally steady-state. A lot of changes can happen in 14 billion years!

Now, let’s add a little twist. Imagine that there is a dense outer shell around the universe. The only reason this seems to be a surprise is that we have assumed the universe is infinite and homogeneous. And don’t forget that we have already found this funny thing/stuff out there called the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). OK, so there is something detectable out there. I’ll call it an outer shell but I’ll label it as an assumption for now.

Now let me tell you about voids. Voids are roughly spherical structures that seem to honeycomb the universe. They have a below average density (concentration) of galaxies at their centre and higher density of galaxies around the edge. So, this twist is really just picturing the universe itself as a super-sized void — lower density interior and higher density outer shell. No one (including me) seems to have anything more than highly speculative idea of how voids form. But isn’t it comforting for now, to speculate that these hollow shells are the consequence of some local expansion; just as the universe itself is presumed to have expanded.

…While I am introducing voids and this void-like shell around the universe, it also seems pertinent to note that the COI model predicts the position, size and density of the largest void in the universe, namely the KBC void.

Let’s get back to the impact of that dense outer shell. Its gravitational field dominates the universe’s gravitational field, but it takes 14 billion odd years to propagate to the centre at the speed of light. Given the initial assumption that this universe just popped into existence, no one would complain about this inward propagation of the gravity. Well, rather than the universe popping into existence, suppose the universe started out small and expanded (inflated) faster than the speed of light. Then when the inflation stopped, the gravity of the dense outer shell would start to propagate inwards at the speed of light. Surprisingly this does not sound too much different to Big Bang Model (BBM) assumptions except that we have this dense outer shell present. (Note: the BBM uses a faster-than-light inflation that spreads out even the atoms of the universe, but then this inflation changes to an expansion mode that only moves galaxies apart.)

But wait, just one more little twist… Suppose that time itself starts at the outside and like any causal system, it spreads inwards at the speed of light. This seems like a rather radical supposition, but is it that radical? Expansion is radical and faster than light inflation is radical. Starting, stopping and changing the rate of expansion simultaneously across the entire universe is radical. Creating an infinite universe in a finite time from a singularity is also pushing the envelope. But if this little twist is a bit much for you, then I’ll just mention that the inwards propagation of the gravitational field of a dense outer shell behaves much like the start of time. So this start of time twist is just a mathematical convenience to some extent.

However you picture the start-up of the universe, it seems like something is breaking the laws of physics. But guess what – Einstein’s equations actually allow time to stop under special conditions, and a rapidly expanding universe with a dense outer shell is one of them. (More details in Chapter 7). My simulation starts nominally when time starts, after the inflation stops. By the way, I cannot explain why inflation would stop – no one can! It’s a fundamental change in the physics of the universe that unfolds without propagation delay, yet it is accepted whole heartedly. Oh well, I had to start somewhere and the start of time seemed like a good place.

It’s pretty clear that for the first 14 billion odd years of this model, the overall gravitational pull of my proposed universe would be outwards. This outward gravity would accelerate all galaxies outwards establishing a Doppler redshift. Light travelling from the outside to the centre of such a universe would be continuously travelling against gravity, to a higher potential, meaning that there would be a monotonically increasing gravitational redshift. Time would literally be accelerating rather than the universe expanding. But ultimately this universe would begin to collapse as steady state was reached. That is why this model is called the COI universe, Collapsed from the Outside In. Have you got that twist clear? The universe will ultimately collapse inwards, but at the start, the gravitational pull is initially outwards.

…Comparing models

The COI universe is the antithesis of an Expanding universe. The COI model pictures a finite closed universe shrinking under its own gravity, which is currently evolving as gravitational forces establish steady state. By contrast, the Expanding universe is in some manner infinite, growing in mass-energy every day and generally gives little attention to factors like the rate at which gravity might achieve steady state. Which model should you select? That will become more apparent as you read on. I don’t want to tackle everything in this preface. But since the expanding universe model seems to sit unopposed as the only explanation, I think it is fair to complain a little more, so that if you want to defend that model, you know what you are approving…

It has become an art form in the way we try and sweep these problems under the carpet. The inconsistencies between predictions and observations are labelled as dark or peculiar or dilemmas. If you have been working in this field for a long time you may have become desensitised to these problems. This book is not a complete answer to life, the universe and everything, but it is a major step to unveiling a new model, or at least thinking outside the box. This solution is much simpler. It is not brilliant. It does not involve any new physical laws or matter. It just involves this new assumption about time or gravity starting from the outside. I don’t think that anyone can prove or disprove this assumption, just as no one can observe the start of time. Yet this strange assumption is supportable.

There is no magic or sleight of hand involved. I want you to meticulously apply the experimentally proven laws of physics to the initial state and see that it predicts the observed redshift. I don’t want you to be happy with all manner of inconsistencies, but there are still many things to be resolved. These are discussed in Chapters 8 to 10. Instead, get excited that these fundamental issues are now closer; perhaps even within our reach. And what have we done? We have not got smarter. We just needed to refine our assumptions, that is, the framework on which our universe is founded. Will this new framework turn out to be just a stepping stone to something even better; or will it prove to be a rock solid foundation — only time will tell! I hope it will be sooner rather than later because there is a lot of research, by really clever people, looking for dark stuff that simply does not exist under the COI model.

Finally, let me restate what is proven and what is conjecture. I claim that Part 1, the COI process, as virtually proven. That is, starting from its assumed initial state, the redshift profile of this universe will result from the action of the known laws of physics. There is some evidence in Chapter 7 for how the initial state came into being, but that involves some conjecture. Just how the initial state formed is referred to as the ‘pre-history’ since several options require this to happen before the start of time. Some hints are offered but no proof is claimed. Indeed, the pre-history cannot be proven because we cannot repeat the experiment. However it is hoped that the success of the COI Model will prompt or channel investigations into mechanisms that create the initial state.

By contrast, Part 2 is not proof of anything. It is there only as a thought-provoking explanation of the questions left unanswered in Part 1. It’s more of a brainstorm session. None-the-less, I found it exciting to picture new ways that galactic structures and distribution could be explained. It is fully expected that other solutions will be proposed. But, if you disagree with issues in Part 1, then show the fault or conduct the experiment to disprove it. The status quo, an infinite expanding universe predicts nothing. Originally it did explain an observed linear relationship between distance and redshift but that relationship is now seen to break down at near ranges and far ranges. By contrast the COI model actually predicts this behaviour and a variety of other observations that are otherwise unexplained.

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Part 1: Redshift duplicated in a finite universe

(Chapters 1 to 7)

Part 1 is very close to a manuscript as originally submitted to two science journals. These publications demanded the format used in chapters 1 to 5. I was pretty naive of the standards required by such editors so it was not surprising that it was immediately dismissed without technical review. I also refer to lots of internet references, but it seems that professionals frown on that, because