Physics, the way we’ve thought about it for the last few hundred years, requires us to make assumptions about time.

In our old way of thinking, just as we must assume three axes of space – scales along which we can measure what’s where – so we must assume an axis of time – a scale along which we can measure what happens when.

It doesn’t matter whether, like Newton, we assume an absolute scale along which we can measure what happens when according to a giant clock in the sky, or whether, like Einstein, we assume a relative scale along which we can measure what happens when according to a tiny clock in each and every reference frame.

Either way, we must assume an axis of time.

Wolfram Physics, on the other hand, doesn’t require us to make any assumptions about time.

We need only posit the application of rules to the nodes and edges of the hypergraph, and time emerges.

The evolution of the hypergraph is time...

...which gives us a profound clue, not just to the nature of time, but to the nature of the universe.

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References

• The canonical mass of a neutron star is 1.4 solar masses
• The mass of the Sun is 1.988416 × 10³⁰ kg
• The mass of a neutron is 1.67492750056(85) × 10^-27 kg
• So the number of neutrons in a neutron star, assuming neutron stars are made entirely of neutrons (which they’re not), is 1.4 × 1.988416 × 10³⁰ kg / 1.67492750056(85) × 10^-27 kg ~ 10⁵⁷

Credits

• Pulsar animation by Michael Kramer licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
• Retina image by د.مصطفى الجزار licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

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The Last Theory is hosted by Mark Jeffery founder of Open Web Mind