Fumfer Physics 52: Time, Information, Black Holes, and IC Cosmology

Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner discuss time in the IC model as a sequence of informationally linked moments shaped by quantum probability, observer perspective, and incomplete histories. Rosner contrasts IC with ΛCDM, rejects backward time travel, and suggests advanced civilizations may eventually simulate or influence cosmic-scale temporal structures.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: I want to get into some of the aspects of time, as time, in some sense, becomes a plurally interpretable construct with subjectively processed and experienced time, objectively measured time via physical instruments as represented in perceptual systems such as ours once measured in this manner, and, perhaps, in some third sense with actual base reality of time as instantaneous and emergent simultaneously operative in larger reality inclusive of the former two. Describe time to me in an IC model. In an IC model, what are some ways an individual can manipulate the physics of time differently?

Rick Rosner: I consider time a series of moments drawn from a space of possible moments. There are problems with this view. There may not be a well-defined set of all possible moments, and it is difficult to define a “moment” for an entire universe. In relativity, there is no single universal present shared by all observers.

There are experiential moments: moments as experienced from a particular location and frame of reference. What we experience as “now” includes information from different distances and therefore different times. The farther away we look in space, the farther back we look in time. So a moment is not simply the same everywhere in the universe. It depends on the observer’s position, motion, and available information.

Even so, I think of time as a sequence of moments linked by physical continuity and quantum probability. Each moment is built from an incomplete history. We do not have perfect information about the past, and the future remains open because not all quantum outcomes have occurred. From each moment, there is a range of possible next moments, with some much more probable than others. The next moment we experience will usually be strongly related to the previous one and will likely fall among the most probable continuations.

There are unresolved issues in this view, and some parts need clarification, but that is how I see time.

These moments can be loosely compared to ticks of a clock, though that is only a simplification. In one second, an enormous number of microscopic physical and quantum events occur in the observable environment around us. One could think of these as many tiny updates in the state of the world, but what matters is the changing pattern of open and resolved physical possibilities.

I would not describe this as a literal, observable collapse. In some interpretations of quantum mechanics, collapse is treated as real; in others, it is not. In this model, a quantum question is either still open or has become resolved relative to the history being experienced. Some physical processes unfold continuously or through many intermediate states, rather than as single, instantaneous events.

Subsequent moments generally contain new information relative to previous moments, though systems can also lose, disperse, or hide information. In that sense, time can be understood as connected to the generation, transformation, and redistribution of information.

That, in compressed form, is time for me. The next question is: how can one mess with time?

Jacobsen: Yes, and I want to be very specific here. Based on those premises, my question is about manipulating time, or, more specifically, about the things that an IC framework allows one to do with time that are not possible in the standard Big Bang ΛCDM cosmological model.

Rosner: I do not know that IC allows you to do anything with time that you cannot do in the Big Bang model. There are, however, aspects of time that are different.

Jacobsen: Okay.

Rosner: The main difference is that, in an IC universe, the apparent age of the universe is not its true age. The universe is vastly older than it appears. Around black holes, it is also easier within the IC framework to conceive of information moving into and out of the region surrounding collapsed matter.

Jacobsen: I remember learning about black holes in high school physics, perhaps in Grade 9, although I would have to fact-check that. I always thought the fundamental premise was that black holes represent places where our standard descriptive models break down and are therefore only partial. It seemed possible that answers to more fundamental theories might emerge through the careful study of those objects.

Rosner: Right. If you build everything from information, you arrive at a different, more dynamic picture of a black hole. You also arrive at a different understanding of entropy, or at least a more comprehensive one. We are accustomed to thinking about entropy in closed systems, where it statistically tends to increase. Increasingly, however, physicists are studying open systems, where entropy need not always increase locally, even though the total entropy of an isolated system still follows the second law of thermodynamics.

Returning to your original question, I do not think backward time travel is possible. I do think it may become possible to simulate the past and the future with extraordinary fidelity. Advances in large-scale data processing, AI-driven computation, quantum computing, and other powerful technologies could allow us to construct increasingly accurate reconstructions of past states and increasingly sophisticated predictions of future ones.

As finite beings with limited informational requirements, we do not need infinite information to create useful representations of the world. In the future, we may be able to explore highly accurate simulations of the past or investigate probable futures based on the best available evidence. That would not directly alter the way time operates, although it might alter how we interact with the universe.

Within the IC framework, I think the amount of information in the universe generally increases over time. I also do not know whether intelligent agents, advanced civilizations, for example, might eventually become capable of influencing the large-scale evolution of the universe. They could conceivably become technologically sophisticated enough to utilize the supermassive black holes found at the centers of most galaxies or otherwise influence which regions of the universe remain active or collapse.

A civilization that has existed for millions of years might be able to harness large-scale cosmic structures for its own purposes, perhaps even avoiding regions destined for gravitational collapse. In that sense, sufficiently advanced civilizations could become part of the mechanics of the universe itself.

Even so, none of that necessarily changes the fundamental nature of time.

That is what I have.

Jacobsen: On a fundamental level, you began that response by saying that IC does not necessarily describe things one can do with time so much as it describes different things about time. I want to push back on that a little. I think the first premise, in some ways, leads to the second.

If one had a sufficiently deep understanding of time, what time is, what can be said about it in a fundamental sense, and how it can be understood from different angles, then a sufficiently advanced civilization, with enough scale and control over energy sources, might develop an engineering perspective on time. That knowledge could imply a practical understanding of what can be done, listed, measured, or recorded.

Rosner: Yes and no. If everything is a moment, if everything that exists does so within a particular moment, and if every moment is time-coded, that is, every moment has a particular temporal notation, then one is unlikely to experience time in any way other than linearly.

However, in the space of all possible moments, each moment may apply to multiple universes or possible histories. There is a set of likely past moments and a set of likely future moments. Even the present is incompletely defined. These moments can involve a lot of superposition. If one is thinking in terms of a quantum computer or a quantum universe, then open quantum questions remain unresolved across a number of possible situations. This can also be described as part of a multiverse.

One way to think about it is as a multiverse bundle moving linearly through time. No moment is completely specified. That lack of specification creates multiplicity. It is like a ring around a bundle moving forward. The ring is tightest at the present moment and spreads outward into likely past moments and likely future moments.

In practical terms, this does not disturb ordinary experience. We live the way we live in the world, or worlds, in which we live.

Can technology be used to alter the size of that ring? Possibly.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen is a blogger on Vocal with more than 200 publications on the platform. He is the Founder and Publisher of In-Sight Publishing (ISBN: 978–1–0692343; 978–1–0673505) and Editor-in-Chief of In-Sight: Interviews (ISSN: 2369–6885). He writes for International Policy Digest (ISSN: 2332–9416), The Humanist (Print: ISSN, 0018–7399; Online: ISSN, 2163–3576), Basic Income Earth Network (UK Registered Charity 1177066), Humanist Perspectives (ISSN: 1719–6337), A Further Inquiry (SubStack), Vocal, Medium, The Good Men Project, The New Enlightenment Project, The Washington Outsider, rabble.ca, and other media. His bibliography index can be found via the Jacobsen Bank at In-Sight Publishing, comprising more than 10,000 articles, interviews, and republications across more than 200 outlets. He has served in national and international leadership roles within humanist and media organizations, held several academic fellowships, and currently serves on several boards. He is a member in good standing in numerous media organizations, including the Canadian Association of Journalists, PEN Canada (CRA: 88916 2541 RR0001), Reporters Without Borders (SIREN: 343 684 221/SIRET: 343 684 221 00041/EIN: 20–0708028), and others.