Black Holes, Custodians of time?

[Fallingstar1971]

Black Holes.......

They come in different sizes

The Galaxy has a very big one in its center...

And Time runs at different rates depending on your distance to the gravity source (GPS clocks run slower than ground based clocks for example, or is this strictly a "speed" thing?)

At what rate would time flow at the center of the galaxy?

What would the Universe be like without these cosmic killers?

If spacetime were naturally flat, and the black holes were demonstrated with troughs in this normally flat spacetime, would not a super massive galactic black hole act as an anchor for the rest of the galaxy? Is this why the stars all orbit a common center of mass.

But if you anchor space, would you not also anchor time? Is the super massive black hole the great cosmic "clock" that sets time throughout itself? With the stars and planets having a much smaller but still detectable warpage of not flat spacetime, but of a trough of spacetime centered on the galactic center? Like a master clock with a bunch of "mini" clocks (stars, planets) that modify the master clock on a local scale (like the warpage of the spacetime trough caused by the sun, or the earth for example)

If you were out in extra-galactic space, in between the galaxies, gravity would be weaker, would time run slower?

Star

 

[darkmatter4brains]

If you calculated it out I think you would find that time doesn't run at a substantially different rate somewhere in deep space than it does here on Earth. It would be a different rate, but just not a big difference. Even the GPS satellites aren't running at a huge difference. It's just that the small difference in rate that they do run at, propogates into BIG position errors over time. It's just like with Special Relativty. The Universe is a relativistic one, but you just don't notice it, because the effects only become substantial at close to c. Same with General Relativity - you need really big masses around and you need to get close to them for the effects to become strong.

I'd be a little wary about the master clock analogy. That sounds like it would be getting closer to a Newtonion view in that it would be like some sort of aboslute reference frame. The whole point of Einstein's theory is that there is no absolute reference frame (i.e. there are no master clocks).

 

[Fallingstar1971]

Hmmmm

OK master clock in a black hole......perhaps I can clean that up a bit.......

1. Consider all the gravitational sources in the Universe...... considering that this includes all matter and some exotic things like black holes and neutron stars.... This is a very big number. Now put that off to the side for a sec.

2. Consider that each source, no matter how big, no matter how small, is warping both space and time. Now that is a lot of warpage going on, IMO, you would be very hard pressed to find a spot that is straight (with no warpage at all)

3. Since it is not only space that is warped, but time, we have to now consider that time is warped just as much as space. No straight lines for time as well.

4. Now lets bring in our master clock. Our master reference frame. The Universe, more specifically, The Big Bang itself.

Here and now, we actually cannot measure a "fixed" rate of time because we are inside the event. Time is in flux.

I guess what I am trying to say is that the Big Bang is still happening. On the reference scale of the Universe only a small amount of time has passed. However, with all the warping of space and time due to all the gravity points in the Universe, that small amount of time has been stretched into Billions of years. Without gravity there would be nothing to stop expansion from instantly reaching light speed, and then we would have missed all of creation. It would have been over and done before we even opened our eyes. Gravity slows and warps time just enough so that we dont "miss" it.

Black holes are areas in space that can warp space and consiquently, time, back onto itself. In the example of a galaxy, the central black hole would be the dominating object "setting" local time due to its spacetime distortions. All stars, planets, moons, people, whatever would sublty warp time as well, but this time would ALREADY be warped by said central black hole. Since its the dominating force it will be a modification of the space already modified by the black hole. In this sense, the black hole "sets the tone" so to speak, or in my earlier words, sets the clock.

Star

 

[origin]

Hmmmm

OK master clock in a black hole......perhaps I can clean that up a bit.......

1. Consider all the gravitational sources in the Universe...... considering that this includes all matter and some exotic things like black holes and neutron stars.... This is a very big number. Now put that off to the side for a sec.

2. Consider that each source, no matter how big, no matter how small, is warping both space and time. Now that is a lot of warpage going on, IMO, you would be very hard pressed to find a spot that is straight (with no warpage at all)

3. Since it is not only space that is warped, but time, we have to now consider that time is warped just as much as space. No straight lines for time as well.

4. Now lets bring in our master clock. Our master reference frame. The Universe, more specifically, The Big Bang itself.

Here and now, we actually cannot measure a "fixed" rate of time because we are inside the event. Time is in flux.

I guess what I am trying to say is that the Big Bang is still happening. On the reference scale of the Universe only a small amount of time has passed. However, with all the warping of space and time due to all the gravity points in the Universe, that small amount of time has been stretched into Billions of years. Without gravity there would be nothing to stop expansion from instantly reaching light speed, and then we would have missed all of creation. It would have been over and done before we even opened our eyes. Gravity slows and warps time just enough so that we dont "miss" it.

Black holes are areas in space that can warp space and consiquently, time, back onto itself. In the example of a galaxy, the central black hole would be the dominating object "setting" local time due to its spacetime distortions. All stars, planets, moons, people, whatever would sublty warp time as well, but this time would ALREADY be warped by said central black hole. Since its the dominating force it will be a modification of the space already modified by the black hole. In this sense, the black hole "sets the tone" so to speak, or in my earlier words, sets the clock.

Star

The black hole in the center of our galaxy has essentially no affect what so ever on our local time. The moon has more affect on the local time than the black hole in the center of the galaxy or even the sun for that matter! The reason I say this is because the affect on time is proportional to the gravitational field. The moon causes tides that are larger than the tides caused by the sun or certainly the galaxy so the the gravitational affects of the moon are stronger hence the time dialation affect is stronger.

Now I might be wrong on this analysis - if someone wants to chime in and 'pop my ballon' or agree, please do so.