Talk:Anisotropic synchrony convention/Archive1

Sense
That makes a whole lot of sense. After all, it's a well-established fact that things come down faster than they go up. --I&#39;m bored (talk) 21:33, 16 November 2010 (UTC)
 * can anyone explain if there are distance limits on this idea ? I mean what space is within the frame of referance that would not have light instantaneously travel ? Hamster (talk) 17:06, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I've updated the conclusion of this article to match the discussion of the ASC on the Lisle page.Gabriel Hanna (talk) 17:38, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not an expert in the field, but I do see a problem with the model. First, Doppler. It wouldn't explain red-shifting, which could only occur at the calculated level if the speed of light were conventionally accepted. If light appears to an observer to be infinite in speed, then it wouldn't show any shift. This occurs at non-cosmic scales too - it has to be compensated for whe communicating with deep-space probes. Second, a friend pointed out issues with supernova halos - the delayed illumination of the gas around a supernova due to the light-lag, which would not occur in the ASC model. The only way I can see this as working would be to have something (And we all know who that would be!) intelligently adjusting the observed speed of light - making it go at C when emitted and for the first few months so as to explain the redshift and halo, then giving the photons a kick in the rear with the divine boot to make them go infinitely fast once they enter interstellar space, and finally wave the speed limit sign in front of them just before they enter the solar system so we'll get the correct doppler observations at our end. Make the theory nonfalsifiable, in other words, which is really a no-no when it comes to science. Maybe the math works in simple situations with just an observer, source and mirror - but if it can't explain observations on doppler shifts and halos, it's worthless. 77.96.228.232 (talk) 21:52, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

All of your objections to alternative synchrony conventions have been raised over the last 70 years in the physics and philopsophy of science journals. So far, no one has managed to show that there are any physical consequences whatever to assuming that the speed of light is not the same for incoming and outgoing directions. So, you don't have to worry, you still get the same measurements for Doppler effects and whatnot--it is your assumptions of what happened when that might need readjusting, but the spectra you collect are going to come out just fine.

Arguing with asynchronous conventions is what Lisle WANTS you to do, as he knows far more about it than you. It is mainstream, though obscure physics (obscure even to physicists).Gabriel Hanna (talk) 03:50, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

science amateur question
Question: if you have a laser chamber set as wide apart as such an experiment would allow, and you shot a beam of light toward one end and measured it, then shot it back and measured it - does this not necessarily fix the "observer" problem, since you have two observers on both ends, seeing the same thing, and the light going back and forth, measured consistently showing that it takes .00001 seconds to get from A to B per observer 1, and .00001 to get from A to B per observer 2, then when shot back, B to A is STILL .00001 seconds, per both observers? how does this not make his entire thing a flop? I get when we are talking distances from the earth to the moon, but now we have technology to measure speeds with two observers. or is there some other quirk that light can both travel at the speed of light and at half the speed of light at the very same time?--En attendant Godot 18:40, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * You still have to communicate with each other. However you do that will require time and movement, likely of EM radiation.  Actually, the concept of "at the same time" doesn't really work in relativity.  Someone else should explain that, however!  steriletalk 20:48, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it's the communication. In order to know what time it left A, A needs to send that information, but that information needs to be synced with B to mean anything (and vice versa). This communication can't exceed the speed of light - your communication is subject to the problems in the experiment itself, so couldn't be used to correct for them. If you could find a way of magically communicating (no, quantum entanglement won't work) instantly you'd solve the problem as then your ability to syncronise and agree on time frames and references wouldn't be subject to the light-speed delay between your two points. ADK ...I'll mystify your dog house! 10:21, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

This one might be easy, but if the problem is the movement of clock B, can't you just start both in the center and move both out an equal distance?

Hypothetical experiment to test ASC?
I'm not sure if I've got the physics right here, so tell me if I'm off-base but I think it might be possible, in some far-flung space-faring future of ours to test the ASC. First, take two satellites and give them a clock and a high-mag telescope lens, capable of reading a dial off the side of a probe 3 light-days away. The satellites will also require precisely calibrated .99c thruster rockets pointing in both directions in order to control acceleration. Yay future woo! Now, launch them into high earth orbit and "synchronize" the calendars, let's say starting January 1st. Now, with the rocket thruster imparting a known acceleration curve to the probe, very gradually accelerate one probe away from the Earth, while temporarily altering the computer-calculated time of the other probe by the amount predicted by relativity in order to compensate for relativistic affects on the departing probe. Carefully expending the precise amount of power/reactants(I'm not sure if escaping from Earth's high earth orbit would have an effect on fuel use?) as the first rocket, the second rocket will attempt to bring the probe to what we could only fantasize may be a stationary position relative to earth. Whatever, point is, we have two satellites with calendars that are, for most people's purposes, showing the same "date", despite being separated by a huge distance of three light-days. The amount of time dilation not accounted for by computer models is likely to be extremely small, certainly not on the order of a day if the thrusters are fast enough. Now, if light is supposed to be traveling at infinite speed to an observer and 1/2c back, then each satellite would see the date on the other as being the same as its own. If, however, the isotropic convention is true, then they will still see the date as three days behind the other, without having to ever communicate to each other. The probe, its job completed, need only return to Earth at .99c and display the picture on Tumblr for all the world to see. Not that anyone will be surprised, but still.

Now, I know that this is probably still measuring the two-way speed of light in some way, but doesn't the immense margin of error kind of preclude any synchrony convention that doesn't limit the delta between travel times to be more than a few parts in a million. (Just an estimate.) Please comment and criticize, I'm still a young physicist, and I'd like to learn.
 * It probably falls down with the fact you're assuming you can perfectly model relativity. Recall that one of the major contenders to explain faster-than-light neutrinos is a missing relativistic correction analogous to that employed on GPS satellites - but overlooked because the detectors weren't in orbit. These effects are everywhere and the ability to predict and control them perfectly is probably beyond us. Clock synchronisation is a principle problem, you don't need vast distances and high speeds for it to become an effect (depending, of course, on your sensitivity, GPS clocks have microsecond delays, the OPERA neutrino experiment have nanoseconds because the effect was smaller) you can have a problem, in principle, synchronising two clocks that are just next to each other. Communication between two clocks is always retarded by the fact they can communicate only at the speed of light between each other, not instantaneously. Therefore your clocks are going to be out of whack from the very start and there is no way to ensure you've corrected for this - and without this first level of precision, no matter what you do you're going to have them unsynchronised. Now, your point is whether you can minimise this to the point where it's so far within experimental error that you can get a meaningful result. You're still relying on some kind of "convention" as to synchronise the clocks, though, and the true one-way speed has to be completely independent of this. Scarlet A.pngnarchist 12:23, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Does anyone get this?
If so, could you explain it in more layman's terms? steriletalk 17:42, 6 January 2012 (UTC)
 * From a quick skim, it seems that a lot of it rests on how you define "now" given that the speed of light is finite and nothing (information, at least) can move faster. Say, I click my fingers and shout "NOW", you'll hear this slightly later the more distant you are - the information travels at a finite speed - so in some respects "NOW" as in "this very moment in time" in fact expands out from you at the speed of light, anything on this boundary is the "NOW". This is really the root of the problem that requires us to use syncronisation conventions in the first place. Scarlet A.pngpathetic 17:51, 6 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't know about that. "Now" has a perilous meaning in relativity.  It's more what slice of space-time you are in. I more interested by what he means about the gravitational field being necessary. steriletalk 17:58, 6 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah, I think I get it. The point is that the convention works if you're just modeling light bouncing back and forward in a straight line - although "convention" doesn't imply "reality". BUT, Lisle has to say that it stems radially from the Earth. This is a different kettle of fish entirely. For example, in general relativity there is "in theory" no difference between gravity and acceleration. Stick someone in a box and accelerate it at 9.8 ms^-1 and they will think that they're on the Earth's surface - except that on the Earth's surface you'll feel the gravity pull you in different directions from one side of the room to the other (imagine the room is the entire width of Russia if you have trouble figuring that one), it's radial, while the acceleration will always be linear. So you can tell them apart, simply by walking from one side to the other and testing what direction it travels in - the radial force of gravity will change, the linear force of acceleration won't. Same with Lisle's convention, if it was in any way a reflection of reality it would be the case that we could detect it. The only way that this would work is that if there is some space-time curvature, making detecting Lisle's suggestion quite synonymous with detecting a gravitational field that would warp space and time like that. I've got a diagram in my head that might clear it up. Scarlet A.pngpathetic 18:05, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay having a quick read of it in a nutshell, what I think he is saying that Lisle's radial anisotropic synchrony convention can't be centred at the Earth alone (as Leslie has appeared to have done), it has to be centred at all points in space-time, kind of defeating what he hoped to achieve. The only way out of this for Lisle would be by introducing some sort of Earth-centric gravitational field. -  π    04:43, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

"planting fake isotopes"
On the one hand, Lisle is indeed a YEC. On the other, that's a crappy line. Peter mqzp 22:32, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Why Lisle’s ideas give us the same problems Barry Setterfield’s ideas gave us
I just posted this as a comment on the original blog refuting Lisle’s ideas, but will also post it here since I think it makes for a far simpler critique than saying “a gravitation field must be observed”.

It uses a simple thought experiment. To make this as simple as possible, I am going to keep it one-dimensional.

Let us suppose we have a one dimensional universe infinitely long [1]. In this universe, I can not think of a reliable way of determining that light travels instantly going left but 93,000 meters a second (c/2) going right—relativity and going that.

However, let us instead suppose there is a point e [2] in this universe where light travels instantly towards this point but 93,000 meters a second going away from this point.

Let’s have a single photon [3] to the right of e going left. It will be traveling instantly since it’s traveling towards e.

Once this photon hits the point e, its velocity changes and it is now traveling at the speed of c/2.

This is the fundamental problem with Lisle’s model. Since it has a point in the universe for which light travels one speed going towards said point, and another speed going away from that point, light will have to change speed in this universe.

Once light changes its relative speed, it will create observable phenomenon which we have not observed.

Simply put, Lisle’s ideas give us the same problems Barry Setterfield’s ideas from over 30 years ago gave us, and should be discredited for the same reasons.

Samiam (talk) 20:57, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

[1] Using Cantor’s set equivalences and Hilbert curves, this imaginary universe could be equivalent to a 2-dimensional or, indeed, n-dimensional universe, but let’s not go there.

[2] e as in “earth”; nothing to do with Euler’s constant.

[3] To keep things simple, even though in our universe a photon is both a wave and a particle, we will treat it as a simple particle in this imaginary universe.


 * Lisle does some vague hand-waving to try and get out of this problem: “Yes, ASC works exactly the same on Earth as in space. So lasers aimed toward an observer are instantaneous, and those pointed away are ½ c, by ASC measurement.” ( http://www.jasonlisle.com/2012/08/03/arbitrariness-and-inconsistency-the-opposites-of-rationality/ ) This is a bold claim — while modern quantum mechanics concludes that light is both a particle and a wave, photons are also particles and, as such have a given direction and velocity. For two observers with the same rest velocity, a given light particle will have a given velocity and direction.  It will not be travelling at infinite speed towards observer A and away from observer B, while at the same time travelling at infinite speed from observer A to observer B.  There’s no observable or testable scientific theory to claim otherwise.  Samiam (talk) 05:17, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thinking about it more, his theory is fundamentally flawed and is not as far as I know supported by anything Einstein proposed. His idea comes down to this: Let us have two points in a line: A and B, which we put 10 meters apart for the purposes of the exercise.  Now, let’s suppose in this universe photons travel infinite speed towards any observer, but only one meter a second away from a given observer.  So, we have a photon go from A to B.  One second later, from the point of view of A, the photon is only one meter away from him.  The very same photon, however, from the point of view of B, already arrived at B’s location.  We now have a photon at two locations at the same time.  This is a contradiction.


 * I do not believe this is the thought experiment Einstein had in mind. Timothy V Reeves agrees with me; Sure, you can have an absolute planar vector where light travels one speed going in the direction of the vector, and another speed going opposite said vector, and no one would be able to prove this vector doesn’t exist.  But, it breaks down if this vector is relative and not absolute.  The classic “when does Io go behind Jupiter” problem can have the same answer if, when Jupiter is on our side of the sun, the light comes to us instantly, but, when Jupiter is on the other side of the sun, it comes to us at the speed of c/2.  If the light from Jupiter comes to us instantly at both times, we would observe Io’s eclipse by Jupiter differently than we do in the real world.


 * Lisle seems to agree; while he initially bragged that Reeves’ issue about a gravitational wave being created if all light travels to the Earth instantly “is very easy to refute” (September 11 2012 blog comment), he has not done so in the nine subsequent months, even thought Reeves asked for the refutation again this last January (January 19 2013 blog comment). (See http://www.jasonlisle.com/2012/08/03/arbitrariness-and-inconsistency-the-opposites-of-rationality/ for both comments)


 * I understand that there are some really bizarre and unintuitive things going on in quantum physics. Quantum particles are both particles and waves.  The Heisenberg uncertainty principle does not make common sense and was very hard for many physicists to accept (“God does not play dice” and all that).  Both theorems were not accepted by the physics community without extensive testing and experimentation confirming that’s how things are.


 * For a particle to be in two places at the same time, and have such a theory be accepted by scientific consensus, requires that the theory be testable and confirmed by experiments. Extraordinary claims, after all, require extraordinary evidence.  Lisle’s theory fails here.  Yes, real science is sometimes really bizarre and unintuitive.  So are false crank theories.  What separates a crank theory, such as this notion from Lisle, from an accepted theory is whether it can be tested—whether it is falsifiable (Lisle tries very hard to make it something that’s not falsifiable).


 * Unfortunately for Lisle, even if the math from having a photon in two places at once (actually an infinite number of places since there are an infinite number of potential observation points for every photon) works out (and he doesn’t even deal with the issue of how the photons will get the energy to have infinite velocity), his notion does not match the universe we observe. I mentioned Io’s orbit above.  He has another falsifiable observation: Since light is coming to us instantly, far-away objects should have their light coming to us instantly, and far-away galaxies should be more or less like our galaxy.


 * However, the farther away the galaxies we observe, the lower the number of heavy elements we see in those galaxies—which indicates the light has taken a long time to come here since those far-away galaxies are consistent with the galaxies we should have in a younger universe. Which means that the light from those far away galaxies isn’t magically arriving here instantly (or, perhaps, instead of pulling a Barry Setterfield, Lisle is trying to pull a slightly more sophisticated Omphalos)


 * It gets worse. No respected physicist would write and no respected journal would publish a paper with nonsense like “The clear biblical teaching therefore is that everything in the universe is a few thousand years old”, the way Lisle’s “paper” does.  That’s just something that has no place in any scientific paper.


 * Let me close with a link: http://sensuouscurmudgeon.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/jason-lisles-instant-starlight%E2%80%9D-paper/ Samiam (talk) 14:43, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

I’m confused
Martin, I have looked extensively at what Lisle is proposing, and it looks like garbage to me. I do not understand your revert but am willing to have any errors I am making corrected.

The conventional Isotropic and Anisotropic models

Here, we will have three points in space where we are making observations, and two clocks we are observing. The points in space will be called “P1”, “P2”, and “P3”; I will put one clock at “P1” and another at “P3”.

In the Standard Isotropic model, time dilation does not affect what times our clocks show (we will assume the clocks were moved slowly enough to not have their time changed in the standard model, where time dilation is only affected by one’s relative velocity compared to the velocity of light).

Standard/Isotropic (P1 is one light second from P2, P2 is one light second from P3, and vice versa) model.

Actual time :51 P1     (*:51, :49) P2     (:50, :50) P3     (:49, *:51)

Here, at P1, we see that we’re 51 seconds past the minute on our own clock (the first element in the two-element tuple, marked with a star because it’s showing the accurate absolute time), and the clock two light seconds away shows a time of 49 seconds pass the minute (since we’re, from point 1, seeing how P3’s clock looked two seconds ago)

At P2, we see that we’re 50 seconds past the minute on both clocks which are one light second away, even though it’s really 51 seconds past the minute.

At P3, our own clock (the second element in the tuple) is showing the correct time (51 seconds) and the other clock two light seconds away is showing a time two seconds in the past.

Let’s now change the model to a One-Way/Anisotropic model, where the speed of light going “down” (from P1 to P2 and from P2 to P3) is infinite, and it takes two seconds for light to go from P3 to P2, and from P2 to P1. To go from P3 to P1 takes four light seconds.

For this model to work (so that the observed universe is identical), we have to change the rules of time dilation. Now, time dilates differently: When moving a clock from P2 to P1, the clock slows down while being moved, and loses one second of time when travelling one light second “upstream”. The slowdown happens regardless of how fast or slow we move the clock “upstream”; in an Anisotropic universe which looks the same as our universe, time dilation is not just velocity based, but also space movement based.

Likewise, moving a clock downstream causes time to speed up (unlike an Isotropic universe, where time dilation only causes time to “slow down” with a moving object’s clock compared to a stationary clock, time can also speed up). Moving a clock one light second “downstream” causes the clock to gain one second of time.

Actual :51 P1     (*:50, :48)        (*:51, :49) at :52 P2     (:50, :50)    -or- (:50, :50) at  :51 P3     (:50, *:52)        (:49, *:51) at :50

Clock #1 loses one second going from P2 to P1 via time dilation

Clock #2 gains one second going from P2 to P3 via time dilation

While the actual time is different, we observe the same times on the clocks even though light is travelling infinitely fast one direction but only at a velocity of c/2 going the other direction. It is our modification to time dilation which allow us to have light travel infinitely in one direction while going c/2 in the other direction, while having the same observed universe.

(Since it’s the theory of relativity, that “actual time” I’ve been talking about doesn’t actually exist, or, equivalently it can not be observed so may as well not exist. Everything is, well, relative)

This is what Einstein proposed. I have shown how we can change the rules of time dilation such that, even though C is infinite going one direction, the observed universe is the same.

This is a rather obscure corner of special relativity and it’s amazing how many times people have tried to come up with an experiment to prove we’re in a Isotropic instead of an Anisotropic universe, only to subsequently be shown that the experiment doesn’t work.

(Actually, if the universe has been created all at once as a special act of creation, we could test to see if it’s Isotropic or Anisotropic. How to do so is left as an exercise for the reader).

Is a one-way bidirectional anisotropic universe possible?

Now, is one-way bidirectional anisotropic universe that appears to be an isotropic universe possible?

TL;DR No, it isn’t (but read more if you disagree)

Let's look at the geocentric model of asymmetric time, which Reeves thought Lisle was proposing:

Here, P2 is the center of the universe. Light always travels infinitely fast towards P2 and half the speed of light away from P2.

(P2->P1 2 seconds, P1->P2 instant, P2->P3 2 seconds, P3->P2 instant)

Actual :50 P1    (*:50, :48)        (:51, :49) at  :51 P2    (:50, :50)    -or- (:50, :50) at  :50 P3    (:48, *:50)        (:49, *:51) at :51

Note: When moving the clocks away from P2, no time dilation happened with the clocks—the clocks were not altered. For our three point model, the universe is the same observable universe as an Isotropic universe. Again, no clocks were altered to give us what looks, at first glance, to be the same observed universe.

But...let’s add some more clocks. Here, it’s P3 that is the center of our geocentric Anisotropic universe. We’ll have five clocks in this universe and observe

Clock P1  P2   P3   P4   P5 as observed at the given point P1 (:50, :48, :46, :46, :46) P2 (:50, :50, :48, :48, :48) P3 (:50, :50, :50, :50, :50) P4 (:48, :48, :48, :50, :50) P5 (:46, :46, :46, :48, :50)

Now, let’s compare that to an Isotropic universe:

Clock P1  P2   P3   P4   P5 as observed at the given point P1 (:50, :49, :48, :47, :46) P2 (:49, :50, :49, :48, :47) P3 (:48, :49, :50, :51, :52) P4 (:47, :48, :49, :50, :51) P5 (:46, :47, :48, :49, :50)

Oh dear. The model doesn’t work—or, should I say, the geocentric Anisotropic universe is observationally different than an Isotropic universe. Perhaps if we reset the clocks with some magic time dilation, we can fix this problem:

Clock P1  P2   P3   P4   P5 as observed at the given point P1 (:48, :47, :46, :47, :48) P2 (:48, :49, :48, :49, :50) P3 (:48, :49, :50, :51, :52) P4 (:46, :47, :48, :51, :52) P5 (:44, :45, :46, :49, :52)

Nope, the model still breaks down.

But Lisle isn’t proposing that!

OK, in an obscure blog comment I dug up, that isn’t what Lisle is apparently proposing. Lisle claims that “lasers aimed toward an observer are instantaneous, and those pointed away are ½ c, by ASC measurement” in a comment posted to Arbitrariness and Inconsistency – the Opposites of Rationality; look for his September 11 2012 blog comment.

Can I come up with a sensitive model of asymmetric time based on what Lisle is apparently proposing? Does he even propose a model internally consistent enough that we can model it? I was able to model an Isotropic universe, an Anisotropic universe (which looks identical to our universe), and a “Geocentric Anisotropic” universe which ends up being observationally different.

So, how do we model this notion of his. Perhaps, by going back to the three-point model and making P2->P1 instant from P1's point of view, 2 seconds from P2's point of view; P1->P2 instant from P2's point of view, 2 seconds from P1's point of view; Wait a minute, this does not work

I can not model this because an observer can not observe how fast photons are going away from them. Relativity and all that. In effect, Lisle is proposing that each and every photon will be at an infinite number of points in space at the same time. OK, I know. Quantum mechanics allows things like that in certain circumstances (not when said particle also has an infinite number of possible velocities at the same time the way Lisle proposes, but still).

But...let me look. Nope, Lisle did not once say the word “Quantum” in his original paper. So, I will assume that he thinks this idea of his can somehow be shoehorned in to conventional special relativity. Unfortunately, while a classic Anisotropic universe can be simply modeled (and looks just like our universe; while light travels infinitely in one direction, we can modify time dilation to make light appear to have the same finite velocity in all directions) Geocentric Anisotropic universe can be simply modeled (and shown to result in a different universe, as both Reeves and myself have demonstrated, each of us using different thought experiments to reach the same conclusion), this “A photon has an infinite number of locations and velocities at the same time” model can’t be.

However, this idea can be modeled once we realize that the only photons that mattered are photons which can be observed. The only observable photons are the ones which hit an observer. If we, to make the model as simple as possible, make the observer a point on a one-dimensional universe, the only photon that the observer will see is one directly approaching him.

Adapting what appears to be Lisle’s model to this model makes it so that light is always travelling infinitely fast. I hope it is trivial to for a reader to see why this model is not the observed universe we are currently in.

Those “half of speed of light” photons Lisle imagines do not exist (or, should I say, are never observed, which means the same thing in contemporary physics) Which means we would not get Ole Roemer’s observed variant times for the eclipses of Jupiter's moon Io.

Please explain exactly what’s wrong with this model before reverting my edits again. Thank you. Samiam (talk) 23:42, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * We had an edit conflict (actually, more than one) on the talk page; I posted about this but your latest talk posts kept beating me. I don't understand the P1/P2/P3 blocks you posted above, but it looks like you have three clocks in three places that are synchronized. How did you do that? In an isotropic universe, moving the clocks apart makes them lose synchronization because they have relative velocity. You can't prove that you've moved them "slowly enough" unless you bring them back together and they show identical time: but that can't be differentiated from an anisotropic universe in which bringing them back together in space gets them back in sync with one another. You haven't proven that they stayed synchronized over the whole out-and-back slow journey - at best, you've shown that they were synchronized at the start and at the finish. If you want to try to show synchronization over the whole loop, you have to transmit a signal from one clock to another. In an isotropic universe, you see a flash from the distant clock and you set your clock back by however many seconds you assume the light has spent in travel, or you look at the distant clock face and say "that was the time there X seconds ago". In an anisotropic universe, you set your clock to the moment you see the flash, and you look at the distant clock face and say "that is the time there now". So the business of synchronizing clocks already depends upon your convention.


 * Lisle's model is not geocentric, so I don't know why you bother to prove that the universe isn't like that. How do you propose to measure the delta-V of photons that never interact with you? If they interact with you, they don't change v; by anisotropic definition it's always infinite for photons moving directly toward you. You can't observe photons moving away from you in the isotropic universe either, so there's no conflict there.


 * "(P2->P1 instant from P1's point of view, 2 seconds from P2's point of view; P1->P2 instant from P2's point of view, 2 seconds from P1's point of view; this does not work)" Actually it works just fine. When P1 gets P2's flash and immediately sends one back, P2 sees the return flash at 2 seconds, just when she expected it. She flashes instantly and P1 sees the response 2 seconds after his own flash, just when he expected it. Both observers see the responses as having been sent the moment the outgoing signal reached the target. Their definition of 'simultaneity' differs from ours, but it's an internally consistent definition.


 * Nobody can observe how fast photons are approaching them without assuming something about whether they travel at the same speed in all directions. They can measure a round trip and divide by two, or they can measure a round trip and apply an anisotropic conversion factor. Either one works. Maxwell's equations work with either convention. Relativity works with either convention.


 * Ole Romer's variant times for the eclipses of Io are explained, anisotropically, by Jupiter local time lagging as Jupiter gets farther and farther from earth, and then catching up to Earth time as it gets closer and closer. It's not any stranger than the isotropic relativity concept of time slowing on a relativistic rocketship, or clocks slowing in gravitational fields. This effect doesn't depend on high relative velocity between Earth and Jupiter, just greater or lesser distance.


 * Even in a 1-D Lisle universe, light does not always travel at infinite speed. Light moving toward you moves at infinite speed; light moving away travels at c/2. Yes, for the guy down the universe from you, the light that you say is moving away from you at c/2 is the same light that he says is coming toward him at infinite speed. That is the crux of the convention, but it can't be proven or disproven, only chosen or rejected, because no test that can be thought of within the universe can prove that one convention is right and the other is wrong. They are equally capable of explaining all observations. Both you and the guy downuniverse from you can bounce light beams back and forth till eternity and the round trip average time will always be c.--Martin Arrowsmith (talk) 03:17, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the explanation. I made the model probably too complicated...so let me try to make it simpler.  In Lisle’s anisotropic universe, instead of having a distant object having the same time as us (as it is in a simpler isotropic universe) and having the appearance of delay (such as with the Io moon) caused by light travelling slowly, the distant object has experienced time dilation and is, if you will, in the past relative to us.


 * This means that, when Lisle’s Garden of Eden was created 6,000 years ago, the observed stars were instantly created with negative time dilation in them. Which means God created objects with the appearance of age.


 * This creation of the stars in an isotropic universe means that God created stars as well as the stars’ light in transit. In Lisle’s anisotropic universe, God created in one instant stars with a huge time dilation factor in them.  The light can be seen as travelling to us instantly, but the time dilation thing means doesn’t get around the fact that God created celestial objects with an artificial age in them.


 * All the anisotropic convention gives Lisle and other young earth creationists is a different way of saying “God created the distant celestial objects and the light in transit”. Now it’s “God created the distant celestial objects and a non-scientific (non-testable) convoluted way of looking at the speed of light along with artificial age in the celestial objects”.  In Lisle’s universe, all he has done is replace the artificial light in transit with artificially aged time dilation.


 * It’s the Omphalos problem all over again. It’s Omphalos if it’s artificial light in transit.  It’s Omphalos if it’s an artificially aged time dilation.  Said time dilation looks to an observer may as well be light in transit (and, indeed, still is light in transit because there’s no observed change to the universe once we apply Occam’s Razor and look at the universe as an isotropic universe again).  Changing the convention doesn’t solve the underlying problem for young earth creationists.  Samiam (talk) 05:36, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

The ASC, if applies, makes a 4000-year-old Earth suddenly billions of years old when the stars are created.
I have rewritten parts of the article to point out that the ASC only reframes the “light in transit” problem in to an equivalent “artificial time dilation” problem.

Now, Martin may correct me (there appear to be subtle errors in my reasoning above since I sometimes teleport clocks around in my simplified 1-dimensional universe, but I now understand that in an ASC universe, time dilation works differently and that’s how the universe looks the same observationally), but, if the universe was created 6,000 years ago in Lisle’s ASC universe, when God created the stars in the sky, instead of creating young stars that appear old as well as their light in transit, he created stars that were billions of years old and with very heavy time dilation from Earth’s point of view.

Indeed, from the point of view of the stars, billions of years passed. And, since Lisle says that the light from Earth instantly goes to these distant stars, from the point of view of any aliens around distant stars, our Earth appears to be billions of years old, and, indeed, for the universe to be consistent, God would, when making the stars in the sky, have to have billions of year pass on the earth (otherwise we get the problematic geocentric ASC model which Martin, Reeves and myself agree is unworkable), since observers on the distant stars now will observe billions of years pass on Earth.

So, when God did his miraculous creation on day 4 of the Genesis 7-day cycle, at the moment those “lights in the sky” were made, billions of years of time passed in Lisle’s ASC universe—both on the distant stars (perhaps via time dilation) and on the Earth (since, from the distant stars, the Earth also experienced time dilation and now appears billions of years old).

Samiam (talk) 08:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Actually, what the ASC may allow is to have the observed universe from the point of Earth be only 6,000 years old. But, from the point of view of any of the “lights in the sky”, time started 6,000 + distance from Earth years ago.  For example, Alpha Centauri was created, from its own relativistic time frame 6,004 years ago since it’s only 4 light years from earth.  Another example: The Andromeda Galaxy was created, from its frame of reference, 2,506,500 years ago, since it’s some 2.5 million light years from Earth.


 * As I understand it, if someone who was on the Andromeda in Lisle’s ASC universe looked at the Milky Way and Earth a million years ago, they would either see the Sun and Earth—which would make the Earth older than 6,000 years old, or they would see a big black spot there until about 120,000 years ago (the Milky Way is 120,000 light years in diameter) when the Milky Way would start appearing until finally the Solar system would be the last location to appear.


 * Indeed, if the Earth was created by a divine intervention 6,000 years ago, we would have a big black spot around the earth until the light from the stars hits the Earth (which contradicts the observed universe) in an Isotropic universe,; in Lisle’s Anisotropic universe, we would instead have, from the point of view of distant stars, a big black spot where the Milky Way should be until God created the Milky way then the Earth.


 * This makes sense to me and I’m pretty sure it works with the maths—but I would like to get confirmation from Marvin or someone else who understands the maths better before putting this different train of thought in the article space. Samiam (talk) 08:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * OK, I was bold and added this train of thought. If it doesn’t add up, another editor will undoubtedly correct or remove the section if it’s, for some reason, nonsense.  Samiam (talk) 09:02, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Removed: While an enjoyable and fascination train of speculation, it’s not the only possible consequence of ASC + Young earth. If God created isotropic two-way light in transit instead 6,000 years ago, the consequences will be different (we will then have a universe that will be observationally identical to a conventional old universe; the ASC universe will, as I mention above, suddenly change the age of the entire universe, including the Earth, at the point 6,000 years ago; God’s act of creating “Lights in the sky” ‘merely’ creates the deception of light in transit from non-existent stars in the isotropic frame, but alters history — remember there’s no light in transit since we have infinite one-way light speed towards observers — in Lisle’s ASC frame).  Samiam (talk) 09:57, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Added again, but with the "time is altered" conclusion instead. Remember, our universe is observationally about 14 billion years old.  If it’s actually 6,000 years old, the isotropic universe is one where the light in transit is an artificial construct, but, in Lisle’s ASC universe, there is no light in transit approaching an observer so we are forced to instead retroactively change history. Samiam (talk) 11:11, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * One ASC solution to have the Earth (but not universe) be 6,000 years old — but most of the Universe will end up being much older (the farther from the Earth one is, the older ones existence is — remember, the light has to lumber at c/2 in the frame of reference of everything else going towards Earth and has to be visible on Earth 6,000 years ago). However, so that all the aliens out can see the Earth, God will still have to create deceptive one-way light in transit going away from Earth (since it has to lumber along at c/2 from Earth’s frame of reference before the aliens will see it)...or, equivalently, just go retcon and make the Earth 4,000,000,000 years old so it matches the observed universe.  Samiam (talk) 12:17, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't know if I agree with what you're adding. I guess I agree with what Martin is saying above: you can't verify or disprove a convention; you can either choose to use it or not. I would think you might be able to make a statement about the time-scale of the nuclear processes of stars, but making statements about what someone in another part of the universe observes doesn't make sense. talk 13:36, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I’m not disagreeing with the convention. But, I’m saying “changing the convention doesn’t allow one to create 6,000 years ago what is observationally our universe without also creating deceptive light in transit”.   It seems like Lisle really wants a 6,000 year old universe without deceptive light in transit being created, but he can’t get that with this somewhat bizarre ASC convention he cooked up.  He either gets an observationally different universe, or God still has to make the light in transit (albeit only going one direction).  Samiam (talk) 17:23, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Your wording is very odd and maybe I'm just not following you, but it seems like you are attempting to provide absolute time measurements for one directional measurements when that has no meaning. You can't do a one-way measurement. The only way to get a measurement is to send a message back, which would then give the same time from both observers' points of view. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 18:51, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * ADD: If anything, the concept of everything "created all at once at a distance" is the problem, because "simultaneous" doesn't really work in relativity. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk
 * Indeed. I’m no expert in theoretical physics, but I do know that special relativity doesn’t allow for one day the heavens to be empty without stars, then, on the next day have a sky full of distant stars.  Not without some form of non-scientific cheating.   Since Lisle proposes this miracle in his paper, it violates special relativity.  Samiam (talk) 22:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Lisle is comfortable with God creating a star yesterday which looks like an old star (From his paper: “Just as Adam was created mature, needing no time or process to reach adulthood, so was the universe”) but, for whatever reason, he doesn’t like one particular aspect of a mature universe created yesterday, namely the artificial light in transit (Again, from his paper: “I suggest that it is reasonable (and in fact necessary) to suppose that distant starlight did in fact originate from the star, and was not created in transit”). Samiam (talk) 19:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Actually, see wp:Olbers' paradox. The sky should be full of light. talk 00:28, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Olber's paradox only applies to an infinite universe with an infinite number of stars (it also assumes infinite age, but that bit can be ignored if the speed of light is infinite). If the universe is finite in extent or contains a finite number of stars, or contains an certain arrangement of stars, the night sky can still be dark even if the speed of light is infinite.--Martin Arrowsmith (talk) 01:37, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Lisle doesn't actually solve the light in transit problem
In an isotropic universe, creating all of the far-away stars at once via divine mandate 6,000 years ago and having them observable from Earth requires deceptive "light in transit" to make it observationally identical to an old universe.

Lisle's ASC universe fails to solve this problem; it still needs deceptive light in transit (one way away from Earth), or results in a universe different from the one we observe. To wit:


 * From the point of view of far away stars, the light from the star goes to Earth at a lumbering c/2. Since there is no deceptive light in transit in Lisle's model, the stars are required to have existed in their own frame of reference for much longer than Earth has; the farther away a star observed from Earth is, the longer it must have existed to be observed is Lisle's ASC model.  Most of the universe, in fact, is old, just like it is in the universe observed and accepted by mainstream science.
 * Also, in Lisle's model, if one looks towards the Milky Way and Earth a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, since there is no deceptive light in transit, one will initially observe nothing there. Since the Milky way is over 100,000 light years in size, a few hundred thousand years before the Earth's creation, this observer (Luke) will start to observe the Milky Way being miraculously formed (this is how God's miracle of all the stars formed at once from Earth's point of view looks elsewhere in the ASC convention).  If Luke has a strong enough telescope, and lives long enough, he will finally observe, 6,000 years ago in our frame of reference, the Sun and Earth being formed last after all of the other stars in the Milky Way are formed.
 * This results in a universe with different observable phenomena than the universe accepted by mainstream science. The miracle of God's instant creation of the stars from Earth's point of view in the ASC convention causes the universe to be observably different than a universe without that miracle happening.  His model needs to be modified to allow deceptive light in transit, or not have the Earth created by a miracle 6,000 years ago.  Otherwise, it will not create the same universe we observe today.

(I’m moving this mini-essay that I wrote from the article space until when and if we get some consensus this actually contributes to the article) Samiam (talk) 20:05, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Why I want to archive the old discussion
There’s a lot of pointless and incorrect speculation (some of which is my incorrect speculation) on this talk page. The Anisotropic synchrony convention (ASC) is a perfectly acceptable, albeit obscure, sub-branch of special relativity, so questions like “What about the Maxwell’s equations that use the speed of light?” miss the point.

In addition, there has been a misconception that Lisle has proposed a geocentric Anisotropic synchrony convention (light travels infinitely fast towards Earth, at other speeds elsewhere). This is not what Lisle proposed; he proposes that, for anyone anywhere in the universe, light travels infinitely fast towards them and at the speed of c/2 away from them. It seems bizarre, but special relativity allows it.

The problem with Lisle’s paper is not the ASC. The ASC is, if you will, the distraction while Lisle pulls his slight of hand elsewhere. The slight of hand is this: Lisle is proposing that the entire universe was created about 6,000 years ago (“everything in the universe was made in the span of six days [...] this creation happened a few thousand (roughly 6,000) years ago [...] God tells us that the stars were created on the fourth day to give light upon the earth” Lisle 2010) with the artificial appearance of age (“Just as Adam was created mature, needing no time or process to reach adulthood, so was the universe” Lisle, 2010).

The only artifact of an universe created 6,000 years ago with the appearance of artificial age that Lisle objects to in his paper is light in transit (“I suggest that it is reasonable (and in fact necessary) to suppose that distant starlight did in fact originate from the star, and was not created in transit.”, again from Lisle 2010).

Hence, this bizarre ASC which Lisle uses to try and make a young universe look like an old universe has its own set of problems. One being this: In our Isotropic (Yeah, yeah, I know. It might be any of the infinite possible Anisotropic universes, since they all appear identical) universe, if there were a giant mirror 5,000 light years from Earth, and we looked in that mirror, we would see the Earth as it looked 10,000 years ago. Lisle’s ASC universe is observably different: In Lisle’s ASC universe, that mirror will not show us anything (or, should I say, it will show us whatever Lisle interprets as being “formless and empty”) for the next 4,000 years.

Another issue with Lisle’s ASC universe is that it is geocentric: Observers elsewhere in the universe will see a circle of darkness (or whatever passes as “formless and empty”) where the Milky Way and The Earth should be; this circle of darkness will contract and the final visible star for them will be our sun. The reason for this Geocentric POV is not because of Lisle’s alternate way of looking at special relativity, but because the miracle of all of the stars appearing at once (as per Lisle’s paper) is one that Lisle alleges God has done for the benefit of Earthlings and in Earth’s frame of reference.

Samiam (talk) 07:02, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Let me back up some of my refutation with solid math
I always preferred geometry to algebra. I mentioned a contracting sphere of darkness visible in a mirror in Lisle’s model of the universe.

Let me back that up with some solid math, using Lisle's own numbers.

Lisle himself points out that the apparent speed of light will be 1/(1-COS(A)), “where A is the angle of the light beam with A=0 indicating the direction directly toward the observer” (source).

So, let’s create a 2 dimensional universe with Lisle’s own ASC. I will put a huge mirror on the right hand side of this universe, and two stars in the universe. It looks like this:

|                  |   Earth           | |                  |                   |                   |   Other star      | |               Mirror

The earth (OK, Sun, but I’m calling it Earth) and the “other star” are the same distance from the mirror. The earth and the other star are both 5000 light years from the mirror. The earth and the other star are 10,000 light years from each other.

Let me call the earth “E”, the other star “Q”, and the mirror “M” in the next diagram

So, now some paths of light:

EM E --> M    +       M     \      M  QEM' \    M         \  M           \M /M QEM /  M       /    M     /      M     Q        M

In this diagram, we have four rays of light to look at and determine how long they take to travel to Earth:


 * EM, the ray of light going from the earth to the mirror
 * EM', the same ray of light bouncing back from the mirror to earth again

And, the ray of light that first goes from the star Q to the mirror M, then from the mirror back to Earth


 * QEM, a ray of light going from the Q-star to the mirror
 * QEM', the same ray of light going from the mirror to the Earth

Some other numbers of interest:


 * Distance from Earth to Mirror: 5,000 light mirrors
 * Distance from Earth to Q-star: 10,000 light years
 * Distance from Q-star to the point on the mirror where the particle will bounce to earth: 5000 * sqrt(2) light years (about 7071 light years)
 * Distance from point on the mirror where Q-star’s light gets reflected before it arrives on the Earth: About 7071 light years.
 * Angle of any light beam going directly to Earth: 0 degrees
 * Angle of light beam going from Q-star to the mirror (before coming to Earth), in relation to the Earth: 45 degrees
 * Angle of light beam going from earth to the mirror: 180 degrees.

Now, since any ray of light going directly towards the earth has infinite velocity in Lisle’s ASC universe, the amount of time for the rays EM' and QEM' to arrive from the mirror to Earth is trivial to calculate: They arrive instantly. Likewise, any light going from Q to Earth gets there right away.

However, the rays of light EM and QEM take longer to travel. To wit:


 * The ray EM is travelling 180 degrees directly away from Earth. It has a velocity of C/2, so takes 10,000 years to travel from Earth to the mirror.
 * The ray QEM is travelling 45 degrees away from a direct angle to the Earth. Using Lisle’s equation, which seems solid to me (as much as a lot of people here will hate me for saying this, he is a smart scientist)  The length of travel is just over 7000 light years long (7071 and change).  The speed of light for a ray travelling this angle is c * 3.41.  7071 / 3.41 gives us a 2071-year trip for the QEM ray.

What is the consequence of this math?

The reflection of a distant star in this mirror appears on Earth *before* Earth’s own reflection appears in the mirror!

Think about it for a minute. In Lisle’s ASC universe, the time it takes for us to see our own reflection is longer than to see a reflection of something 10,000 light years away from us. Now, yes, an ASC universe is observationally identical and I’m sure if we did the math to account for all of the time dilation effects and the always relativity of time in the special relativity model and everything else we would finally end up with the same numbers that an Isotropic universe gives us.

But, we don’t have to do any of that really hard math. We can keep it a simple back of the envelope calculation because Lisle asserts that, 6,000 years ago, God created everything at once. Yeah, it violates special relativity, but, I’m not complaining. Keeps the math easy. :)

See, in Lisle’s universe, we can look at it with this “God’s eye” view. And, on that day 6,000 years ago, in Lisle’s universe, we are able to see this “Q” star immediately, even though it’s 10,000 light years away. But, we can’t see it in the mirror until 2071 years later. And, more to the point, we can’t see our own reflection for 10,000 years, even though the round trip distance for the light is shorter.

If we lived in Lisle’s ASC universe with a huge mirror 5,000 light years away, we would already see the other star but not see our own Sun in that mirror.

This is what I meant when I put in the article “Observers elsewhere in the universe (or, equivalently, observers on Earth looking at a giant mirror thousands of light years away) will see a sphere of darkness (or whatever passes as "formless and empty") centered where the Earth should be; this sphere of darkness would contract at the speed of light (become smaller and smaller) and the final visible star for other observers will be our sun”...and the math backs it up for a simple two star and one mirror Lisle-style ASC universe created via a divine miracle.

Samiam (talk) 11:35, 4 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Dr. Lisle agrees with the general gist of this math, but points out an error: In his ASC universe, the speed of light of the beam going from the star to the mirror slows down because its angle relative to the Earth changes during its path. While it takes longer than 2,071 years for the light to reach Earth, he and I both agree it takes under 10,000 years. Samiam (talk) 21:39, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Can I get this published somewhere?
Is there any place I can make this a formal paper and get it published? If creationist claptrap sites can get their nonsense published, there must be peer-reviewed pro-skeptic journals where people refute this kind of nonsense with solid math and science. Samiam (talk) 11:35, 4 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Creationists tend to publish their material in their own journals. So why not start your own wingnut physics journal? Генгис silverbrain.png 22:33, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Geocentric Universe
Lisle's math does cause a geocentric universe, but not in the way indicated on the main page. The key point is that with an anisotropic speed of light, an observer two lightyears away and your own view of a mirror one lightyear away wouldn't be the same. While the mirror math holds up, look at it this way:

EM       EM"  E --> M>V    +       M        +     \      M      /  QEM' \    M    /QEM" \ M  / \M/ /M QEM /  M       /    M     /      M     Q        M

In this figure, V is the "virtual earth" equivalent to our reflection. But, with an anisotropic speed of light, the time it takes QEM and QEM" to reach V, as well as the time it takes EM and EM" to reach V, is zero, while the time it takes QEM and QEM' to reach Earth, as seen from Earth, is nonzero.


 * Sorry to interject here, but, you are, of course, right. But V has a different time frame of reference than E in the ASC (from Earth's point of view, V is how the Earth looked 10,000 years ago, both in a conventional universe and an observationally identical ASC universe) Samiam (talk) 22:02, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

The actual reasons ASC leads to geocentrism are threefold:

1. If we accept that light moves toward us instantaneously, the fact that we can't see anything more than 13.8 billion lightyears away (corresponding to the recombination epoch in fact-based cosmology) would indicate that there's nothing there. In other words, the universe is spherical and centered on Earth.

2. Related to Olbers' paradox: if the universe is infinite in all directions and light reaches us (from our frame of reference) instantly, the night sky should be a solid wall of light, as every possible vector from earth would terminate in a star. If the universe is finite but not centered on Earth, the amount of starlight should vary wildly depending on the direction in which the observer is facing. Neither of these match reality, so once again we are left with the conclusion that either ASC is wrong or the universe is geocentric.

3. Even taking "distance causes time dilation" to its absolute extreme and assuming that everything we see is exactly as it was 6,000 years ago (when Lisle claims the universe was created), that doesn't explain why galaxies billions of lightyears away look billions of years younger than the milky way, in direct proportion to their distance from us. DataSnake (talk) 19:24, 3 April 2014 (UTC)


 * The ASC does just that; it takes distance causing time dilation to its absolute extreme. Instead of giving light a one-way finite speed, the ASC causing time to dilate by the mere act of moving away from something else. (Grant: I am probably completely screwing up what the ASC does.  Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong; I still haven't fully grasped what the ASC does, and spent about a week a year ago trying to figure it out)


 * The thing to keep in mind is that our universe could be (but probably isn't) an ASC universe. The ASC merely changes how (to simplify a concept I still haven't fully grasped) the relativity between time and distance are measured.  It's nothing more than a different way of measuring things, and doesn't change observations one iota.  It violates Occam's razor big time: It converts calculations which only require high school geometry to calculate in to monstrosities which require college-level calculus to solve.


 * The sleight of hand is saying, OK, assuming this really bizarre, complicated, and unintuitive way of viewing time/distance, let's make a universe that was all created at once 6,000 years ago (yes, "at once" violates special relativity, but let's humor Dr. Lisle). Well, I don't like converting calculations which only require high-school level math in to calculations which require college-level math, so what is that universe like if we drop the ASC and observe things using the normal balanced speed of light convention?


 * Lisle, by our normal convention, is proposing a universe that was created over 13 billion years ago. The stars, quasars, and what not we see that are 13 billion light years away?  Those were created 13 billions years ago.  The Andromeda Galaxy?  That was created about 2.5 million years ago.  SN1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud?  That star was created all at once 174,000 years ago, then exploded 168,000 years ago.  It is only our Earth in Lisle's universe that was created 6,000 years ago.


 * In a way of thinking, 174,000 years ago for an object 174,000 light years away can, in fact, be right now, since there is no such thing as absolute time in special relativity. In the ASC, the Earth of right now is the Earth of 2.5 million years in the future for observers in the Andromeda Galaxy. (Again, Grant, if I am getting any of this wrong, feel free to correct me.  I will not take it personally, because I know that I don't really have an intuitive grasp of special relativity strong enough to fully understand how the ASC screws it up)


 * "6,000 years ago" in an ASC universe is a very different thing than what the average guy on the street thinks of when we say "6,000 years ago". Samiam (talk) 21:05, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * So that's not quite what ASC is, though I can understand why it's confusing. The problem is that ASC is exactly what the acronym says it is: an anisotropic synchrony convention for the speed of light. Keep in mind that the one-way speed of light is not objectively measurable independent of chosen convention (we can only measure the two-way speed). This is because choosing a convention also fixes how we consider simultaneity. It's not that ASC changes time dilation; the underlying physics doesn't change. It's just that it makes a different set of assumptions and builds a different ruleset for understanding relativity. If you wanted to, you could re-define relativity to fit ASC, and while it would get ugly, you would still see the same physics fall out.
 * In general, ASC is not strictly wrong. It's not a pleasant way to understand things, and it somehow manages to make special relativity even less intuitive than it already is. Because ASC posits that the asynchronicity occurs for anywhere an observer is in space, moving reference frames becomes far less trivial to imagine (as though it's even trivial as it is). It's where ASC is used to justify things like YEC or geocentrism that it utterly fails. - Grant (talk) 22:33, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Indeed. The ASC creates the same observed universe.  Where Dr. Lisle violates special relativity is by claiming that everything was created "at once" 6,000 years ago from the relative time frame of the Earth, which makes the Earth's time frame of reference an absolute frame of reference. Samiam (talk) 22:47, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, it ends up being a significant contradiction. There are a billion and one problems with Lisle's ideas, not least of which is that he believes the universe to be 6000 years old. ;) - Grant (talk) 22:50, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Lisle is proposing a version of the Omphalos hypothesis, since, in his world-view, God created, 6,000 years ago, galaxies that, the farther away they are from earth, the younger they look, in a manner that is consistent with an old universe.  To quote one web page, "When we look at the spectra (remember those Fraunhofer lines?) of the very farthest galaxies we can see (and remember that we are looking back in TIME since it takes time for the light to reach us) only hydrogen and helium lines." source Samiam (talk) 23:03, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Very much so. Lisle accepts that everything except light in transit could be created with the appearance of age. This sort of trivially hand-waves away a lot of the problems with using ASC to justify YEC beliefs, but then again, the Omphalos hypothesis is capable of hand-waving all problems away. I'm not sure why he felt the need to tack a bit of scientific veneer on it. It kind of seems silly. - Grant (talk) 23:54, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * The more you obfuscate, the more people you can fool :( As an aside, his support for his belief when I corresponded with him is that since we have not observed new stars being created, they must be a special creation.  But, you know, we have observed stars being formed: Star formation in Phonenix cluster Samiam (talk) 03:39, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

ASC and SN1987A
I was having a discussion about SN1987A with John Hartnett on Facebook.

He tried to scupper the contention that SN1987A is at least 170,000 years old, by using the ASC to claim the light arrived instantaneously. I pointed out at the time that the ASC simply conventionalises the DISCREPANCY between timeframes, and that if he claimed that the light arrived HERE instantly, then light from earth could not yet have arrived at SN1987A, OR that if he thinks it has arrived, then the universe has to be at least 170,000 years old. I could not think up a thought experiment to show this at the time, but I think the one below does it. However, I'd like some advice on whether it works.

If it does, it might be an interesting addition to the page, as it ties together two issues, and if it works, there would be no known YEC response to the existence of 1987A.

---

We know that SN1987A is 170,000 light years away (actually about 168,000), as we currently measure it. This is a useful tool, as it is a lot older than the 6,000 years or 10,000 years claimed by YECs, and, even by the ASC, they agree it is 170,000 light years distant.

Let us imagine the following thought experiment:

Earth sends a message to SN1987A to synchronise clocks, on the assumption that the speed of light is constant. SN1987A receives that message, and sends the message back. That message would take 170,000 years each way, that’s 340,000 years round trip.

CONVENTIONAL Interpretation:

Earth and SN1987A Viewpoint: SN1987A is 170,000 light years distant. The assumption is that the message gets there after 170,000 years, and takes another 170,000 years to get back. When the clocks are synchronised, SN1987A‘s clock is set to the a time 170,000 years AFTER the original timestamp on the message. When they send the message back, a further 170,000 years have elapsed, making 340,000 years in total. This means that Earth and SN1987A have synchronised their clocks to what they claim is the “same” time, but the discrepancy between message timestamp and message arriveal time is because messages take 170,000 years either way.

ASC Interpretation:

Earth Viewpoint

The message gets to SN1987A after 340,000 years, as it is travelling at c/2. Earth thinks that SN1987A is mistakenly instructed to set its clock to 170,000s years IN THE PAST. SN1987A sends the message back, which Earth receives instantaneously. This means there is now a discrepancy of 170,000 years between Earth timeframe and the timeframe of SN1987A, and as far as Earth is concerned, when SN1987A’s clock set their clock to show the current time, they are actually setting it to a point 170,000 years in Earth’s past.

SN1987A Viewpoint

SN1987A considers it has received the message at exactly the same the time that it was sent, as the speed of light is infinite. Their view is that they are mistakenly instructed to set their clocks to a point 170,000 years in the future. They then send the message back to earth, and the message takes 340,000 years, travelling at c/2. As far as SN1987A is concerned, the time on their clock is showing a point 170,000 year in Earth’s future.

Discussion:

In both Earth and SN1987A’s viewpoints under ASC, there is a difference in timeframes. Earth claims that SN1987A is showing a time 170,000 years in its PAST, and SN1987A claims it is showing a time 170,000 year in Earth’s FUTURE. Neither of these viewpoints can be reconciled, because both are equally valid reasonings under ASC.

However, from neither point of view, is it possible that the universe is 6000 years old. From both points of view, there is a discrepancy in the timeframe of 170,000 years, which cannot be reconciled under ASC. Even if you claim that there is not enough time for the experiment to have been carried out in the universe since the creation, that does not alter the fact that there is a notional 170,000 year time-discrepancy between the timeframes of Earth and SN1987A, depending upon your point of view. As the experiment was described, from Earth’s point of view, SN1987A has its clocks set to 170,000 years in the past. However, it would have been possible to reverse the details, in which case SN1987A would then claim that Earth’s clock was set to 170,000 years in ITS past. All this means an event like creation, will have a discrepancy of 170,000 years attached to it, depending upon whether it is viewed from Earth or SN1987A. If creation occurred only 6000 years ago, the maximum possible discrepancy between two viewpoints would be 6000 years.

This means that either

(1) ASC is incorrect, and the world does not work like this, OR

(2) The Universe is at least 170,000 years old.

---

Does this work?

CatWatcher (talk) 11:03, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
 * It doesn't really make sense to say "Earth and SN1987A have synchronised their clocks to what they claim is the 'same' time." In relativity, and I think you are making the assumption that time is constant, which it is not in relativity, no matter what the convention (or I think at least). I'm also not sure that you have somehow attempted to measure the one-way speed of light, which you cannot do. You are right that what happens (i.e., reality) must be convention independent. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 13:36, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
 * That's correct about the clock synchronization problem. This is actually what makes measuring the one-way speed of light directly quite difficult (instead, we reflect it off of something and measure the two-way speed). Under any synchronization convention you choose, two clocks at different locations can't actually be synchronized. This is an unfortunate result of relativity. - Grant (talk) 13:47, 22 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks for this. Can I just clarify. When I say "synchronised clocks", what I mean is that the clocks on Earth and SN1987A have been aligned so that Earth THINKS they are aligned under the assumption of ASC. This is certainly possible. You then repeat the exercise, so that in a different pair of clocks, SN1987A thinks that it too has aligned the clocks to its time frame. Both of these can be made to work to Earth's satisfaction AND to SN1987A's satisfaction using different pairs of clocks. In one of the locations, it is even possible for that locations' 'earth time' & 'SN1987A time' to say the same thing. However, the discrepancy (340,000 years) now shows up in the clocks at the other location. There is no way to avoid this. The consequence is that the time frames of Earth & SN1987A are out of kilter by 340,000 years 'under the assumption of ASC'.CatWatcher (talk) 09:37, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Perhaps I'm confused about your delivery, but I still think the point you're trying to make is problematic. Synchronizing any two clocks anywhere requires adopting a synchronization convention. Prior to adopting some such convention, the one-way speed of light is undefined, since the notion of the "same" time at two distinct locations is also undefined in special relativity. What is common to all of these conventions, however, is that the average speed of light across two-way travel remains unchanged. Thus, the example you pose doesn't actually show a contradiction.
 * What you're missing is that the ASC convention is not geocentric. The signal travelling from Earth to SN1987A takes 340 000 years from the perspective of Earth, while it appears to be instant from the perspective of SN1987A. On the other hand, the return message appears to take 340 000 years for SN1987A, while it appears to be instant for Earth. The net result is that the round trip takes a grand total of 340 000 years from the perspective of both observers, and there is no discrepancy in the timeline because the clocks were synchronized to account for this in the first place. What you're proposing is sort of akin to changing synchronization on the fly. This is not valid. Once you pick a synchronization convention, all existing clocks must be synchronized to that convention. - Grant (talk) 14:46, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Let me make it totally clear. I am using a very simple ASC scheme to establish the 'clock alignment'. The scheme simply assumes that outgoing messages travel at c/2, and incoming messages take zero, wherever you happen to be. Imagine it thus as a message between Earth & Mars when the planets are 5 light-minutes apart (as WE would currently measure it) Earth records a video with the time in BLUE 00.00, sends that video to Mars, with instruction to set THEIR time in BLUE on their videolink to to 00.10 on receipt of the message, and relay this back to Earth. This they do. Now Earth thinks (under ASC) that the two clocks Mars/Earth show exactly the same time, because when they see the videolink from Mars, it is showing 00.10, which is the time on Earth clock, because under ASC it takes 10 minutes (double 5) OUT, and zero back; total 10 minutes.  Earth therefore thinks that this blue clock shows Earth time consistently.However, Mars is not happy with this scheme, because under ASC, their videolink of Earth shows 00.00 and they were asked to set their clock to 00.10. To rectify this, at 01:00 on the Blue clock, they set up a SECOND clock, to read 01:00 in RED, send a video of the two clocks to earth, with the instructions to Earth that they too are to set up an additional clock tome on their videos in RED, to read 01.10 when they get this message. Earth does this on the live Mars link. Mars sees this link, 10 minutes after sending the message, and by that time, both Mars clocks read 01.10. Mars is confident that the RED clock shows Mars time consistently. ON Mars, the two clocks show the same time, blue aligned to Earth's time frame, Red aligned to Mars time frame. On Earth though the clocks are discrepant by 10 minutes. This is equal to the round trip time. The purpose of this is to expose how under ASC we can show that even though we cannot align time frames, we can though determine the extent to which time frames in distinct spatial locations are discrepant from one another, namely 2d/c where d = the distance between locations. I want to establish this because the discrepancy in the case of SN1987A can be shown to be 340,000 years.  The point about this is that it in conjunction with the YEC assumption that the earth is 6,000 years old, then from our point of view, this FORCES the SN1987A we see to be 346,000 years old in order to allow for the discrepancy. Furthermore, this forces us to consider that all objects we can see in the sky are not as they appeared in our past, but as they appear in our future, so for example, what we see as Andromeda is how Andromeda looks 5 million years (2 x 2.5Mya) after creation, and objects on the far reaches of our telescopes show what the universe is like 28 Billion years (2x 14Gya) after creation. ASC + YEC forces us to see the universe as turned 'inside out' object firther away are further forward in time, not further back in time.  CatWatcher (talk) 22:44, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Our article makes clear that Lisle is not opposed to the Omphalos hypothesis, and if you add the consideration that Earth is somehow "special" (pretty much a guarantee for any creationist), then this stops being a problem, as the discrepancy doesn't matter.
 * Also, the problem is more complicated than you think. Even with YEC assumptions, the ASC can't invert causality. We can't see into the future. I'm not sure where in your thought experiment you're getting that from, but that's just not the case at all. Keep in mind that switching reference frames at different spatial coordinates is more complex than just moving time zones. - Grant (talk) 22:59, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Seeing into the future isn't a problem, because from our position under ASC we cannot materially affect it. Since the outgoing speed of light is c/2, and provided that is our maximum speed outwards, then by the time we get there, the time will be AFTER the future we see. Causality is not broken. And I am not moving time zones. Under ASC you can't say which way the discrepancy is, just that there is one and I still maintain that even though you can't specify its direction, you can say by how much the time frames are misaligned.  The point then is if you maintain that ONE location (Earth) is as near to t=0 as dammit, then the other location must account for ALL of the discrepancy AND therefore be in the future, because it CANT be in the past. Look at it this way. We are used to looking up at the night sky and assuming that what we see occurred in the past, because we think that light has taken time to get here; under ASC when we send a message to SN1987A, Now for us, we say it takes 340,000 years; however THEY get it immediately, that means that their "now" is 340,000 years into our future. If they send a video back to us of them getting the message, we only receive this video in 340,000 years time - at which point WE receive it instantaneously. CatWatcher (talk) 23:36, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Have you read, for example, WP's article on simultaneity and one-way speed of light? Considering "now" in two locations is always problematic in relativity based on what we think of as "now" everyday-wise. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 03:02, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * What Sterile said; you're completely off-base here, and I'm not sure how much farther I can go in explaining that. I recommend reading a few textbooks on special relativity to help understand why this is a problem. Also, you're very far from incorrect when you say that seeing the future isn't a problem because we can't affect it. Observing an event is affecting it, as the act of making an observation (even the act of the light hitting anything) is still an event. Your understanding of what constitutes a cause-effect relationship does not square with the definition used in special relativity. If you observed light from the future, the effect of your observation would precede its cause, which would violate causality. So far, we have no reason to believe that anything violates causality. - Grant (talk) 03:30, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I will add that this isn't arguing over minutiae like definitions, though it may seem like it is. Rather, the very basis of what you're proposing in your thought experiment is entirely incorrect. Your base mistake is assuming that one can switch reference frames from Earth to SN1987A, then back to Earth while some constant concept of "time" keeps ticking in the background. This is not how relativity actually works. I'm afraid there's absolutely no way to correct your thought experiment in order to have it make the point you want it to make; the only way to do so would be to wilfully violate special relativity. - Grant (talk) 04:44, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * OK, I know I am right here, so PLEASE PLEASE bear with me, and please do not give up thinking this is pointless or stupid. We are clearly talking at cross purposes. Firstly, I am NOT discussing anything except the situation where frames are at rest with one another. I know that once you take special and general relativity into account, the situation will change, but that is not what is happening here. Secondly this situation pertains to ANY two frames at rest, even between London & NY or me and my Broadband router in the next room. OK, the reason for all this is there is a very special condition in the ASC as used by YECs, namely that light incoming to an observer is considered by that observer to have arrived instantaneously from the source. That means according to the observer, they are observing what happens at the source at the moment the observer receives it; i.e. if it is a video from the source, it is is deemed by them as what is happening "now", since it has taken zero time to get here, and the video is considered to be a live feed happening in real time. And yes, I am perfectly clear that this is an illusion, but this is the viewpoint of the observer, receiving the message, if they believe that ASC is correct. I am not trying to define some sort of synchronous time which aligns the two time frames, I know that is impossible. I am asserting that using this POV it is possible for an observer in ONE of the locations, e.g. Earth, to arrange with Mars that the time stamp that they see on an incoming video from Mars agrees with the time on an Earth-bound clock. I really do not see how you can deny such a thing is possible. However, I cannot go further until you agree this is possible, since everything else rests on this and follows from it.CatWatcher (talk) 07:14, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * NB Just to demonstrate that the time stamp on the video is consistent (according to an Earth observer POV), imagine that Earth asked Mars to insert the 'live' feed that Mars is receiving from Earth as a P in P in the corner of the screen. When Earth sees the 'live feed' from Mars, the P in P shows the Broadcast made from Earth 10 minutes earlier. This time difference is the amount of time that earth considers that its message has taken to reach Mars from Earth. All this confirms to an Earth Observer, using ASC that what they are seeing is a 'live broadcast' from Mars, arriving instantaneously, but their broadcast feed TO Mars travels at c/2, and takes 10 minutes to get there.CatWatcher (talk) 07:29, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * There are actually three frames of referenece here: the time on Mars, the time on Earth, and time on the clock (i.e., the clock isn't light). You are assuming that the clock is always in the timeframe of Earth if it leaves Earth, and of Mars if it leaves Mars, which I don't think works. It's also problematic to say "live feed" since the only way to check to see if your feed is live is to send back the feed to get the two way speed of light. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 11:01, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * There might be physical clocks in each location, but no times are set on them at the start of the experiment. As I have described it above, in the last post (not the original one) there is only ONE POV, that of Earth, and hence one time frame, that of Earth. I am simply trying to 'impose' MY time frame on the Martian Astronauts so that it agrees with my Earth time frame. I don't care at this stage if Mars agrees with it or not (In fact they don't and this is what I am getting to...) Mars do not have any kind of say; they are just doing what I tell them. From my Earth POV under ASC, everything is consistent. I can see the time by looking at a clock here OR a clock on what I consider to be a "live" Mars link, and they both say the same time. The PinP that I see from the "live" feed is my message that I sent 10 minutes ago, which they are only receiving "now" because it has taken them 10 minutes to get the message.    NOTE ONCE AGAIN. Under ASC I CAN claim that the video is a "live feed" because 'under MY ASC interpretation', it takes ZERO time to get from Mars to here, so I consider it has taken no time to get here, so I think it is happening THERE exactly as I see it on the video, in my NOW.  I really do not see why this is difficult to understand. You simply have to adjust your thinking to what ASC claims. It seems bizarre, but it is totally consistentCatWatcher (talk) 11:50, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * The fact that this somehow leads to the conclusion that you can see events happening in the future tells me already that this is incorrect. Frankly, it doesn't even matter why. You did not address the point I made that observing a video "from the future" does indeed violate causality, which is something that is impossible under any synchronization convention. Secondly, you can't dismiss relativity just because both reference frames are stationary. I'm sorry, but even following a light-like trajectory on a light cone (as you would be doing if your information were transferred via light alone) still subjects you to special relativity. If synchronizing these clocks requires sending any kind of information from one location to the next, then it will be subject to these same issues. Also, even if this weren't the case, there is significant relative motion between the Earth and SN1987A (or Mars, in your example). We're sitting on a rock hurtling through space at something ridiculous like 70 km/s. These reference frames are not even stationary! Even worse, we're accelerating (all circular motion involves acceleration), so now we need to start considering general relativity too.
 * Really, you say you "know you're right", but you're really not. If saying "you're wrong and here's why" is arguing at cross purposes with you, then yes, I guess that's exactly what I'm doing (and will continue to do). - Grant (talk) 14:21, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree with Grant, I think. Some further points:
 * Not only is "now" problematic in relativity, so are "past" and "future", and further, they are not necessarily in the same reference frame (or, really, slice of space-time). (See the figure for example.)
 * In reality, the only measurement that you have that is reliable is the time it takes for the message to get from Earth to point B and back. Position in space matters (again, the figure, for regular relativity). You also don't know for sure how long it takes to get to Mars. You've told me, and therefore you've set the convention. This is, essentially, setting the one-way speed of light as a convention, not measuring it.
 * You also can't really "prove" or "disprove" a convention (which actually is a weakness in Lisle's explanation as well; it's not a hypothesis). You can call carbon-12 as 12 amu or 14841 other arbitrary units, it still describes the mass of a carbon-12 atom.
 * I don't think I'm missing anything. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 01:02, 25 April 2014 (UTC)



I really do not think that either of you are understanding what I am saying here.

It must be possible, because it IS possible, and we do it all the time, to set up a two-way videolink between two distant locations, e.g. You and say, the International Space Station, and put timestamps on the videos both ways. Currently the convention for the timestamps is that we assume that light travels at a constant speed and takes the same time for it to travel between locations. What we see claims to be a "live" broadcast, but which we deem is d/c in our past. For example, messages bounced off satellites are subject to a time-delay, because the message will take time to get bounced off the satellite & then to the other location. In our convention, we "share" the time-delay of the round trip at the speed of light between the two locations (2d/c), and interpret that we are seeing a video from d/c in the past in both locations. Both parties agree on this, sign up to this convention and everyone is happy. What I am saying is that under ASC you simply can't do this. You can set up the video link, that's fine, but as soon as you try to timestamp it, observers in the two different locations will want to timestamp the video in completely different ways, to make sense of the situation from their point of view, assuming ASC. There will ALWAYS be a discrepancy between the two timestamps, no matter how they are configured, and that discrepancy is always 2d/c. I suggest that you think this through, because it is a FACT, and a consequence of adopting ASC as a convention.

The second point, is that you claim there is no overarching sense of "now" across the system. Agreed. However, from the POV of the observers, under the version of ASC, as demanded by Lisle there is. Under Lisle's version of ASC, from the point of view of A, light travels direct from A to B at SOL=c/2, but light comes from B to at at SOL=0, instantaneously. It is this latter which causes the issue. Because each observer claims that light has taken zero time to reach him from the distant location, each observer's POV is that HE is seeing events from the other person live, as they happen, because ASC tells him that no time has occurred between a video being transmitted to him, and him receiving it; they occur simultaneously. Therefore to him, the time on the video should match his time exactly. This is the source of the discrepancy between the two time frames, because the person in the other time frame demands exactly the same thing, and they are incompatible. If they ever have a discussion, each will say to the other "No, I am seeing YOU are live, and MY message to YOU takes 2d/c." The situation is irreconcileable, but is a fact, and it is derived from Lisle's version of ASC. If you deny that this is correct, then you clearly have not even looked at the problem, and just are assuming that I am wrong.

What I am attempting, clearly somewhat cack-handedly is to derive some consequences from this fact. The result is certainly true for events near to earth, travelling at non-relativistic speeds. I am assuming (possibly wrongly - and here I will bow to superior knowledge), that as we move outwards from earth, the discrepancy in times I note above is sufficiently large to outweigh any special or general relativistic effects due to motion or gravity. Intrinsically there is no paradox here, no one claims to be looking into the future, and no one is trying to assert that people are living in the same timeframes, with any such thing as a common "now". We can live on earth and simply assume that we are seeing every single star in the universe, 'live' as it happens under Lisle's version of ASC, and they can be doing the same thing,becuse we cannot tell whether they or us are correct, or even if the notion of being 'correct' makes any sense. The reductio ad absurdum comes when you try to apply the discrepancy between objects like SN1987A and Earth, which will have a discrepancy between their subjective time frames of 340,000 years. [Note, this 'discrepancy' currently exists - the image we see of them is interpreted as being 170K years in our past; the image they see of us is interpreted by them as being 170k years in their past, total = 340,000 years, but as we both adopt the same convention, no one is unhappy]. Lisle's ASC shows there is a 340,000 year discrepancy between timeframes. If we could communicate with them, they would disagree with us about when the universe began; they would claim it was 340,000 years earlier than us - or possibly later. So what? It's irreconcileable, we can never find out who is correct, and even the notion of being 'correct' does not make sense.

However, that is the point. Lisle claims to know. Lisle claims that the Universe began 6000 years ago. That alters the situation, and what WAS a convention, now HAS to become a reality. If the starlight problem is solved by ASC, it must be that ASC is the correct way to look at the universe, that light travels at c/2 from an observer and 0 towards an observer. And what WE see when we look at the night sky, is what is happenning on those stars RIGHT NOW. The consequence is inescapable. And it is further inescapable, that if there is a 340,000 year disagreement between Earth and SN1987A about when the Universe began, and we claim that we are absolutely correct, and only 6,000 years has passed since creation, then the consequence of that must be that according to SN1987A, in its timeframe, 340,000 years after creation have passed.

The person who wrote the following passage in the Article on the Main Page, has clearly thought this through as well (my emboldenments): "If we accept ASC, the only logical conclusion is that the universe is a sphere centered on Earth. Furthermore, objects farther away appear older. While accepting that time slows down with distance would at first glance appear to solve this problem, if we also accept Lisle's statement that the universe is only 6,000 years old, one is left wondering why objects millions and billions of lightyears away were millions and billions of years younger than closer objects a mere 6,000 years ago. The alternative explanation is that only the earth was created 6,000 years ago, with objects farther away created sooner. "

I know you will continue to disagree with all this, and so further discussion is pointless. However the lunacy is caused NOT by the ASC convention, but by Lisle using ASC to try to argue that the universe is 6000 years old. While it 'appears' to solve the starlight problem, it forces some completely unwanted and totally bizarre consequences. If you stand back from the problem, you can see this. ASC is simply a convention, and it does not impose any sense of what is or is not a universal timeframe, indeed it say you cannot do that. However, Lisle is attempting, by using ASC to do just that- to impose a universal timeframe. Lisle is saying that the universe began 6000 years ago FOR EVERYONE. That means you are going to end up with incompatibility somewhere, and stupidity probably everywhere.

Anyway, I've had enough of this. I've tried my best, but clearly that's not good enough. CatWatcher (talk) 07:55, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Actually, I do understand that paragraph, and I don't disagree with it. I just think your other explanations are difficult to follow and unnecessarily complicated. Sorry, no offense, I just do. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 10:52, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree with Sterile. You continue to argue around the points we're making. For example, I note that you have yet to respond to my point that observing light from the future violates causality. Again, there are many problems with YEC, and there are many problems with using ASC to justify it. I don't know about Sterile, but special relativity is sort of a big part of what I do. Quantum electrodynamics doesn't work so well without it. Since the rest of your argument is confusing, I have to focus on the things that are definitely incorrect (like the light from the future stuff), and I have to assume that if you don't grasp why that's incorrect, I can't make the assumption that the rest of your argument holds water. As with Sterile, I mean no offence here, and I understand that you're trying, but when you say that observing light from the future doesn't violate causality, it leads me to question the rest of your arguments.
 * One thing I will add: show me the math, and if it checks out, then fine. Ignore general relativity and then just mathematically work out the events as they happen in each location. The good news about special relativity is that it's not all that confusing in terms of the math. - Grant (talk) 14:00, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * All I'm saying is that, for example, events A, B, and C in the gif have an order that depends on the speed. I'm not meaning to deny anything about causality. Certainly a beam of light that leaves earth will come back in the future according to that particular frame of reference. Otherwise, I recommend basing your evaluation of arguments on the arguments, not the person. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 15:08, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Sorry, my point wasn't directed at you. My choice of words was possibly too vague, but by "as with Sterile", I meant something akin to, "like what Sterile said". Somewhere above in the discussion, CatWatcher made the point that his thought experiment allowed one to see light coming from the future, and that this didn't violate causality. This is the point I'm taking an issue with. It was never addressed, and given that I'm having a lot of difficulty parsing his other arguments (as you say, they're confusing), this is what I'm sticking on. Apologies if I came off sounding like I meant something different. - Grant (talk) 15:12, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * To clarify a bit further, if his basic premise allows the violation of causality, which he implies it does, then there's a problem with his premise. I realize that what I said above implies that I was attacking him; that was a poor choice of words on my part and not what I meant. If he can't justify this violation of causality, however, then there's something in his argument that's incorrect. - Grant (talk) 15:19, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * To summarize my thoughts on this, I of course believe that ASC cannot be used to justify YEC. However, I believe the arguments used to prove this in the thought experiment are overly complex, very difficult to follow, and not necessarily sound. I still believe there's significant difficulty here in reconciling various frames of reference, and given that Lisle has left open the idea that the Omphalos hypothesis may be acceptable (with the exception of light currently in transit), I'm not even sure it goes far enough to prove the point being made. I apologize if I'm not getting my ideas across well either; I've been quite ill over the past couple days and my thoughts have been a bit muddled. - Grant (talk) 15:42, 25 April 2014 (UTC)


 * They are NOT events in the future, that's the reductio ad absurdum if you attempt to combine ASC with a 6,000 year old universe. There are some 'simple' observations here: according to us on Earth, it is impossible that any one further distant than 3,000 light years away can see us. If they can't then Earth is special & the universe is Geocentric. If they can see us, then as far as we are concerned, we are forced to conclude from ASC that they must be older than us, and the further out they are, the older they have to be - from our vantage point. Now you might want to say this is 'age' rather than being 'in the future', but it's simply a matter of semantics. It's "time since the creation', as measured by us; if they appear to be 1 million years old, well, we don't have a million years, we only have 6,000, so the only way to account for that is the nonsensical conclusion that they must be in the future. Whether or not they are in the future - under ASC & YEC assumption I suppose is a moot point, but whatever they are we can no more affect them than we can now - after all they are the same observations. However, I will point out one major issue here, which seems to be ignored in Lisle's thinking and everyone elses. 'Light cones' are not actually cones under ASC. The 'forward' light cone is a cone, yes, albeit somewhat more acute, but the 'backward' light cone is actually flattened out into a plane around the origin. The diagram is asymmetric. The whole diagram has what used to be the t=0 plane twisted upwards into a cone. If you now somehow try to superimpose on top of that the idea that events at some t'=0 in the past everything in the Universe was created at the same time, then you are superimposing on this diagram a new co-ordinate system at t'=0, from which time is universally measured. Under that new measurement system, events on what used to be your old line t=0, which you previously regarded as 'simultaneous' now occur at different times with respect to the new co-ordinate system, and the further away they are, the further they appear to be in the future. The whole thing is a mess and clearly makes no sense.


 * I have said quite enough; it's all complete and utter nonsense anyway, and as is said in the article, the whole point of Lisle is to get people to waste time discussing the minutiae of this, rather than address the real lunacy which is why you would want to do this in the first place when there is absolutely no evidence for it whatsoever.CatWatcher (talk) 16:26, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Okay, then I apologize. I misunderstood the point you were trying to make. When you came back and said that observing future light did not violate causality, I assumed you were backing up your original point. The big problem I see is that in all likelihood, the guy you're talking to is going to turn around and point to something like "Goddidit" (e.g. the Omphalos hypothesis) anyways.
 * As for ASC, I agree that it's messy and nasty. I'm not sure why anyone would want to use it in general. That said, ASC in and of itself still works, albeit somewhat clumsily. The light cone becomes asymmetric, yes, but it doesn't change anything, and if you really wanted to you could rewrite special relativity with those rules in mind. That's why I think your thought experiment probably isn't the best way to counter these sorts of arguments. The problems in Lisle's reasoning are many, and I just feel that your thought experiment is too clunky and confusing to be of much real use when debating a determined creationist. Of course, one could argue that no arguments are of much use when debating a determined creationist...
 * Also, I do sincerely wish to apologize if my tone came across as hostile. I'm very passionate about all things physics, and sometimes in the heat of a good discussion I come across as hostile. I can tell you that wasn't my intention at all. Once I'm knee-deep in a discussion I just tend to forget things like pleasantries sometimes. I'm working on that... - Grant (talk) 16:39, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Looking at this thread (I didn't read the entire thread, sorry), I think the reason why Cat Watcher is thinking there is an absolute time frame, even though special relativity has no such thing, is because that is exactly what Dr. Lisle proposes. Dr. Lisle proposes a universe that, after altering the speed of light to have an infinite towards-observer speed, is created all at once 6,000 years ago. In violation of special relativity, his paper indirectly proposes that time as observed in the frame of reference on Earth is an absolute time reference for the entire universe. It's a nasty bit of sleight of hand combining relative time with absolute time. Threw me off too. Samiam (talk) 21:31, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * I sort of agree with you, but I don't think relativity is really violated, rather he adds the assumption that there is a certain distribution of creation events in space-time, such that their light all appears at once on Earth, which is odd and certainly ad hoc. [[File:Sterilesig.svg]]talk 15:03, 29 April 2014 (UTC)