The Unit of the Universe series has been examining matter and energy from the viewpoint of a different geometry, that of the licosas. I have argued that the understanding of reality is limited by the geometry upon which reasoning rests. Since the first set of intelligent eyes looked up to the heavens we have pondered the nature of things. We wonder, of what are we composed. Our modern sciences have demonstrated ever smaller units of matter. Matter has been shown to be an alternative expression of energy. Yet the ultimate answers elude us.

The Unit of the Universe, a physical and mathematical model, has been developed on this website to illustrate a system which I have called the licosas. It must be asked if it can be related to what is commonly called the real world. The following is an attempt to consolidate these ideas into a world view. In case you haven't been following along as this system was developed, this is my geometry, these are my ideas and not mainstream science. This essay may not make much sense unless you have read "Basic Unit of the Universe" and the others on this website. Even then I make no guarantees.

TIME

Time is an illusion. You do not see time, you see change. We have created devices which change in a regular manner and display that change. These are clocks. We comprehend intuitively that there must be an instant, which is the mid change state of all we can think of. Time is an idealization of the process we witness as though it had some universal value. It does not, change is subject to the forces acting upon it.

Time comes in two flavors, now and then. Now is a quite mysterious entity. You can never catch it. Any event that a human can perceive or record has already happened. It takes a discernable interval for a nerve signal to travel the short distance from eye to brain. (Who knows how it even gets to the mind, whatever that is.) So too with the input of the other senses. In that regard we all live in the immediate past. Let me coin an acronym for that, "TIP". So, TIP of now is a term to describe what we commonly regard as the current moment. That lets me reserve "NOW!" as a keyword to refer, in a zen-like manner, to that unattainable instant which rides before the peak of our wave of experience. The TIP of now marks the beginning of "then". Then is a path stretching into the past.

The past is the sequence of causes and effects which resulted from all of the forces upon all of the particles of what we perceive as the real world.

Consider playing a simple game of catch. Your friend throws you a ball. Your eye watches the ball approach. As the image of the ball is processed in your brain the ball has moved to some new position. You adjust your hand to catch it, but you are only making an educated guess as to where it will be. You are never operating on real time information. Good guesser that you are (Bene Guesserat to paraphrase "Dune" terms) the ball comes into your glove. The sense of it striking your hand travels through your brain and you send back a signal telling your hand to close around it. To late, that is old information. To catch it you have to anticipate and train your body to act on the guess, not the feel. That reflex action allows you to catch it. You learn this by trial and error. You perceive in the immediate past. To successfully negotiate your way through life you have learned to accept the TIP as NOW! and ignore the anticipation.

THE REALITY ENGINE

This allows us to examine reality from quite a different perspective. One of the great difficulties science faced in its growing years was an apparent confrontation with religion. It is still going on. Let's face it, a lot more people go to churches than to laboratories. And a lot more preachers rip into their minds than scientists do. The Big Bang theory offered the world of science a reconciliation. Scientists could say, "look, we are not in disagreement with your creation myth, we find much the same idea". So the debate became one of time lines and event sequences. Well, dial the inquisition hot line on this one. I propose a system where experiential reality is being created NOW! .

Creation in my scheme is an ongoing process. There is no beginning and no end because NOW! does not exist where those terms have meaning. It is because it cannot not be. In the state of NOW! pure potential for reality exists. Each of the smallest particles in the atoms that make up the molecules that make up your hand and the ball has its own reality engine. While that engine is operating on that particle, an entity which we accept as real exists. It is this engine of reality that is operated upon by forces. What mostly determines the way stuff turns out to be is the negative pressure of the past. It is sort of a reverse mold idea. The past is spewing out of NOW!, molded by the TIP. We are caught as on the crest of a wave between NOW! and TIP and call it the present. Apparent time is the continuing resolution of those actuators.

THE REALITY SPECTRUM

It has become common to refer to our world as existing in three dimensions of physical space plus a dimension of time. Several theories posit that there are other dimensions in the world around us that we cannot see. Most simply, there is the line, plane, solid viewpoint of dimension. That is what you learned in elementary geometry. That is conceptual dimension. It is a set of quantities applied to an idea. Conceptually you can consider a one dimensional line. Further you can imagine it a composed of points and of a way to measure from point A to point B.

This extends into the real world as a way of organizing our knowledge about an object. Dimension regards the number of measurements which must be taken of a physical object to describe it. To measure a box we need three such numbers. The box is then a three dimensional object. However the box can never be cut into a two dimensional plane. You can draw a line on a box to represent its length, but that line will never be perfectly straight or one dimensional. That is a mental exercise only.

Few would disagree that our modern view encompasses a world of matter and energy. Matter is composed of molecules which are in turn composed of atoms which are in turn composed of subatomic particles which again may be composed of smaller elementals yet, quarks, etc.. Matter and energy are interchangeable in a known relationship.

Let's look at it differently. The "Unit of the Universe" has illustrated a system of geometry to describe reality. Within it, energy is viewed as a two dimensional phenomenon and an argument has been given to show its relationship to three dimensional matter. Regrettably that has been loosely defined. So let's get down to it. Dimension is a glissando. That is a term I have borrowed from music. It describes a continuous upward or downward slide between two notes. A trombone plays in such a manner, capable of smoothly sliding between notes. So can a violin.

Here we do not attempt to compartmentalize reality into neat divisions. Forget thinking that the universe has neat boundaries around dimensions. Instead, view it as a glissando across a spectrum. That reality spectrum has harmonic points which we witness. In our day to day lives, we run into hard stuff and move things about. We live in a world in which matter and energy form our experiences. These occupy a place on the reality spectrum. But like the spectrum of light, we do not "see" it in its entirety.

The first harmonics we will examine are veil and nexus. This is very much what was described in the article on the "Atom". By invoking the density difference ratio, see "Density", we demonstrated how the veil increases density to the point of forming an infinitely dense point center, the nexus. The increase in density was called "soupiness" as we progressed along the glissando between the two.

In the article, "Force", we examine how force operates on two dimensional veils. We have proposed a universe filled with veils. We permit each veil to concentrate to a nexus. Each of these centers of concentration interacts with every other by means of a rail. Rails are formed by the common linear components of two veil-nexus pairs. They are one dimensional harmonics in the system. Their capacity to transmit energy between two veil-nexus pairs also has a soupiness function.

The Reality Spectrum now has harmonic points at nexus, veil and rail. They are interconnected by a glissando of intermediate states. What manner of space will permit this to be?

THE SINGULARITY

So what then is there, really? The singularity. Here, singularity is used to refer to a homogeneous state of existence for everything that is. There is that which is and nothing. Of that which is, there are no different parts.

In the absence of time, the universe resolves to a singularity surrounded by its opposite, nothing. That is the meaning of the cryptic equation which began this article, 1 = 0. All that exists is the singularity, beyond it is nothing. They are in equilibrium and so are equal, for one does not disturb the balance of the other.

The reciprocal of the singularity is the universe. Ah, but am I now saying the singularity can have parts? The universe has parts, doesn't it? It is a point of view. There is the perspective of us little old folks looking up at the great big everything and trying to build our ideas up to comprehend it. Then there is the perspective of the singularity.

From the perspective of singularity, there is no reference point beyond itself. Change has no meaning and thus time cannot command it. The singularity is a nondimensional and nontemporal space. This is the heart of NOW!. If there is only one and nothing, then to what is one equal? Nothing.

In the article in this series "The Atom", we allow the veil to compress to nexus. Nexus becomes the three dimensional expression of the two dimensional veil. Each holds the potential of the other within itself. The singularity holds the potential of the extant universe. A question to be answered is, "What does the singularity look like in our kind of space?" Simple, our kind of space.

If there is only the singularity and nothing, where does all the stuff come from? Since we are not allowing the "Deus ex Machina", I can't simply say that it has multiplied itself. As a singularity, it cannot divide as it has no parts. But with only a singularity and no reference, who can say if it is moving or not moving. All that there is, is within itself. As such, there is no measure to be applied to it to say how big or small it is.

If you are a singularity in nondimensional space, then you are nowhere, surrounded by nothing. But in our world you are everywhere and everything.

RAIL, VEIL AND NEXUS

To the veil, a nexus is a point sized hole that it surrounds. In veil terms, a part appears to have transcended its form of existence into something else which is persistently associated. That something is a nexus.

To a nexus, a veil is a field expression that it has attracted. In previous essays I have implied that the veil develops a nexus. This is not necessarily so as the converse is an equally valid viewpoint.

A rail partakes of two entities. Every entity is connected to every other via some rail. All of existence is interconnected. Each nexus is being pulled and pushed by a countless net of rails. I believe it is this property that permits quantum entanglement. Two photons with identical reality spectra are linked throughout space by the common rail. Remember that the rail is not a thing. It is the link of the common linear component of two veils and is an ever changing pair of radii.

The concentration of the soupiness around the nexus creates a sort of lens through which the singularity projects.

What we envision as hard matter, the "solidness" of subatomic particles, is a reflection of our point of view. There really isn't anything there besides the interplay of rails, veils and nexii.

Each (veil and nexus) is an expression of the reality spectrum of a unit entity . Every unit that is, quark, photon, etc., has its own reality spectrum. That spectrum can change due to the action of other entities, i.e. it can express more as veil at one time than another and conversely.

A rail is a function of veil. It begins at the edge of the nexus-hole, progresses along veil until it reaches another nexus-hole. Previously I stated that it is the nexus that moves not the veil. Put that in veil terms, it is the hole that moves as force is transmitted along the rail. The function of a rail is provide a pathway for the equalization of the energy states between two such centers. Remember also that a rail can only transmit energy to the degree that another veil-center can accept it. Excess energy results in motion as the pair resolves itself by adjusting its separation.

I am not saying a part of the singularity moves. This nexus hole exists in a reality of points. Although we like to think of points as sitting next to each other, that is no more true than radii sitting next to each other in a circle. You can always squeeze another one in. These are the expressions of the singularity as a point field. I have not said that the singularity is only as large as a point. The hole moves across a continual field of points, each of which fills it as it passes. Think of moving a lens across a field of view. No matter where you move it, there is always something to fill the lens.

That is where the reality we will eventually witness is being created NOW!

Here it has been posited that all which we accept as existence is within the singularity. As such it cannot have parts. The singularity can however vibrate. Consider a single guitar string. The string will vibrate at a particular frequency depending upon where you fret it with your finger. Vibration may be quite complex. Our earth vibrates with a grand symphony played by winds, waves, earthquakes, volcanoes and a host of other instruments. So does the sun vibrate as well. Everything does.

This allows me to now envision the veil as a distinct, persistent harmonic within the singularity. To say it is a two dimensional phenomenon is a statement from the perspective of our geometric. It is to the singularity as the ringing of a bell. That takes the forms as we have shown them. Those forms transition through stages from the lower energy spiral to the higher energy ruff phase. The transitions are determined by the actions of force exchanging through rails as described in "Force".

The singularity is the root of all reality spectra.

THE PRESSURE OF THE PAST

The second flavor of time is "then". How does the pressure of the past function? What is the commonality, the link between NOW! and the TIP. The immediate past is where we record the signatures of the reality which happened NOW!. We seek a consistent path from one to the other. Rail, veil and nexus exist in NOW!.

The nexus is the source of the physical manifestation which appears to be passing through time. The nexus is operated upon by the pressure of the past to determine what it will do next. These limitless concentration centers around point sized, holes are dashing about, growing and diminishing in energy as the whole system seeks equilibrium.

The pressure of the past is a function of the system of rails between everything. These are the two way vectors which rule energy exchange between veil-nexus pairs. The pressure of the past is the pull of that system of exchange NOW! .

Throughout this essay I have used time in its conventional sense. But I have avoided the question of how the past comes to be. I hate to use the word karma because it carries a lot of baggage meanings. But in its sense of cause and effect it is accurate. A moving nexus is an effect of a cause. It's manifestation intrudes out of NOW! because that is where the negative pressure of the past calls for it or intrudes it on a continuing basis.

Where a rail of force has operated upon a nexus, a path of least resistance resides. Between any two licosae, the exchanges are ongoing. Each nexus is connected to every other nexus throughout the rest of the universe. Each responds to the sum total of all forces acting upon it. From the common viewpoint, forces are the effects of causes from the prior TIP as it was just before the current TIP emerged.

TIP leads a constant stream of observation we have come to call time. We who are observing reality are composed of that which is being observed. We are of the same kind of stuff. When we say something is hard that is a relative statement. It is only hard in relation to our understanding of that term. As we currently view things, matter is composed of unfathomably small entities that can be considered condensed energy, which we observe with bodies made of the same unfathomably small stuff. When you add the delay between TIP and Now! we may as well be ghosts.

If there is such a thing as substantive time, it is the rate at which the past appears to emerge.

Assume that a quark is the smallest detectable real entity. Is the nexus a quark? No, the nexus is the reality engine that generates the quark. When the nexus disappears, the quark loses its reality engine. When we speak of creation being an ongoing process, this is the level at which it transpires. From this perch, time is the rate of change that the pressure of the past exerts upon reality as it is intruded into the past from NOW!.

THE NATURE OF REALITY

Reality is transitory. It must be so. Else the past would be materially with us. When you leave home and go to work or school, you are always only in one place as one entity. There are traces of you left behind, your wake in the sea of time. But you never turn around and bump into yourself. That is because all you are is wound up space. NOW! is that wound up space. It permits change by its own rules. That only catches up with our minds later. By some miracle we are able to remember what we witnessed. The lungs will bear witness to a lifetime of smoking, the liver to a lifetime of drinking. You may be fortunate to remember your youth as the mantle of age slips over you.

If you mark a tree with an axe, the mark remains. All of the engines of the reality of the cut in the tree persist until other forces cause them to alter. The pressure of the past is the inertia of the system of NOW!. All of the unresolved forces at any instant leave a sort of one dimensional footprint. It is of course in constant flux. Like a vector sea which is everywhere, stormy somewhere, calm somewhere else.

All images and text copyright 2005 J.M. Mongan, Oak Park, MI