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Do space and time exist? What is reality made of?
Scientist Carlo Rovelli has spent his whole life exploring these questions and pushing the boundaries of what we know. His Seven Brief Lessons on Physics outsold Fifty Shades of Grey in his native Italy.
In his latest book, Reality Is Not What It Seems, he shows how our understanding of reality has changed throughout centuries, from Democritus to today’s theory of loop quantum gravity. The theory of loop quantum gravity – Rovelli is a leading proponent – suggests a recurrent universe, or a “Big Bounce”.
Here we learn that time is not quite what we might think it is.
THAT THE NATURE of time is different from the common idea which we have of it was already clear over a century ago. Special and general relativity made this explicit. Today, the inadequacy of our common-sense view of time can be easily verified in a laboratory.
Let’s reconsider, for example, the first consequence of general relativity. Take two watches, ensure that they mark exactly the same time, place one on the floor and the other on a piece of furniture. Wait for about half an hour and then bring them back next to each other. Will they still tell the same time?
The answer is no. The watches which we usually wear on our wrists, or have on our mobile phones, are not sufficiently precise to allow us to verify this fact, but in physics laboratories all over the world there are timepieces precise enough to demonstrate the discrepancy which occurs: the watch left on the floor is slow when compared to the one which has been raised above it.
Why? Because time does not pass in the same way everywhere in the world. In some places, it flows more quickly; in others, more slowly. The closer you get to the Earth, where gravity is more intense, the slower time passes. Remember the twins in Chapter 3, who ended up with different ages as a result of having lived one at sea level and one in the mountains?
The effect is very slight: the time gained during a life spent by the sea, with respect to one passed in the mountains, consists of fractions of a second – but the smallness of the amount does not alter the fact that there is a real difference. Time does not work as we customarily imagine it does.
We must not think of time as if there were a great cosmic clock that marks the life of the universe. We have known for more than a century that we must think of time instead as a localised phenomenon: every object in the universe has its own time running, at a pace determined by the local gravitational field.
But even this notion of a localised time no longer works when we take the quantum nature of the gravitational field into account. Quantum events are no longer ordered by the passage of time at the Planck scale. Time, in a sense, ceases to exist.
What does it mean to say that time does not exist? First, the absence of the variable time from the fundamental equations does not imply that everything is immobile and that change does not happen. On the contrary, it means that change is ubiquitous. Only: elementary processes cannot be ordered along a common succession of instants.
At the extremely small scale of the quanta of space, the dance of nature does not develop to the rhythm kept by the baton of a single orchestral conductor: every process dances independently with its neighbours, following its own rhythm.
The passing of time is intrinsic to the world, it is born of the world itself, out of the relations between quantum events which are the world and which themselves generate their own time. In fact, the nonexistence of time does not mean anything particularly complicated.
Carlo Rovelli is a physicist and bestselling author. Reality Is Not What It Seems is published June 2017 by Penguin.
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Can these government fools do anythin right
Yahoo Right as far as I am concerned exempt for the next few years.
Fair do, glad to see someone actually got something out of the incompetence of this shower of idiots
Woopsi doo de ja vue
Why was this not brought up along with the other problems discussed at last weeks Government meeting with Revenue?
Wrong…This is not costing the Revenue anything.
It is you the taxpayer who are paying for this blunder.
Bumbling Idiots.
Probably because no one spotted it Andrew….!!
Why do e think that they wanted the money in november
“Great”
Weal give a tax exemption to NAMA’s “bankrupts” and other vested interest vultures, who are buying Evictees homes in their kid’s names for a pittance.
What about exemptions for the half a million homes in deep negative equity?
What about exemptions for the 200,000-300,000 (and counting) homes in mortgage distress?
“Great”
I can just hear the inbreeds scoffing.
“I bought a repo for 50K from a family of distressed evictees”
“and the government even gave me a tax exemption for 3 years”
“Chortle”
“Snort”
“Snort”
The most worrying thing about this is that the people who paid it were not aware that they were exempt. I doubt Reveune went too far out of their way to make people aware that these houses were exempt,
It can only be exempt if you are an owner occupier
The Revenue commissioners will not loose one red cent because they will find a way to fleece the rest of us who are not exempt and the Fine Gael /Labour clowns will find a way to blame us for the error.
We seem to be the only country that has a long line of idiots in control who are overpaid, underworked, look down on the ordinary people like overlords and are as useful as tits on a bull I mean really where do we find these donkeys in the likes of government and revenue all there good for is putting fear into people and then f**king up the jobs they are given to do!
Thanks for your totally unconstructive rant. Mistakes happen. The important thing is that lessons are learned, those responsible are sanctioned and problems resolved.
Did you ever make a mistake?
Thought so.
You are obviously a Revenue employee. If a Taxpayer made a ‘mistake’ on their Tax return the Revenue will quote the usual ‘ignorance is no defence’ line. Fines and penalties follow.
Total over paid Muppets.
Obviously a revenue official.
Well there’s your first mistake right there.
Hard to believe there’s so many stupid people in the world. Thank God for the comments section on the Journal. Helps us smart people feel better about ourselves.
@insider.ie. So you’re a ‘public servants incompetence’ apologist?…as well as a leftist pretend journalist!! Writing for the Sindo or some other rag?
No sanctions, jobs for life and big pensions no matter what cock ups they make
we voted the idiots in but not me i didn’t vote as i couldn’t be responsible for more idiots running this country into the stone age. The only thing that these rich idiots are good for is spending my money on themselves. But then are we the idiots who voted these brain surgeons in as they convinced us to vote for them so you should ask yourself who is the idiot them or us??????????????
@insider.ie is just looking for another part time writer job. But, sorry not on this block. This wing is for sincere citizens who are concerned about the running of the nation and seeking true nation building.
Incompetent, those who peer reviewed & those who signed off should get their P45′s.
This won’t “cost” the Revenue a cent, they should not have the money, so they are merely returning it.
It’s a shame that the rest of us have to hand over this money which we get nothing for and the total taken from every household in the country is a total figure that’s not going to ring in tills at Christmas in retail shops.
This is a disturbing aspect of a sham government who “claim” to be fixing the mess the previous government allowed to happen. So much for getting Ireland back to work. It’s all a trick that the people seem to persist in falling for.
This Fine Gael government is different to the last government in two exclusive ways – a) they are more dictatorial and b) they are ever so slightly more inept than Fianna Failure were.
As long as people persist with their failure to realise that the YoYo administration of Ireland by Fine Gael / Fianna Fail is detrimental to our society, economy and citizens, we will continue to be used and abused by those same self serving people.
We need change, and that does not mean further diluting the alternative vote by introducing yet another political party, the call for a new party is led by those who know well that it will just result in the FF/FG power grab being sustained and bolstered. What we need is voters to start thinking and realising the futility of voting for people for the wrong reasons.
Rant over :-)
They owe us all, the thieving bastards
It’s believed the property tax refund will cost the Revenue millions of euros. …. What a statement. It was NOT their money to begin with and I’m sure they will not pay interest for stealing the money in the first place.
But the people they will have to pay to find out who they have to give the money back to then all the paper and I’m sure there will be more cost that I’m not aware off, they are just a bunch off bumbling idiots who just keep taking and taking from us, and this will continue until we the people stop them.
It will cost the revenue ZERO CENT. It was the home owner money in the first instance, they are just repaying what they collected wrongfully.
not convinced that there were too many house purchasers in 2013 !!
Typical civil servants
What do you mean ‘typical civil servants’? It was the politicians who voted through the legislation, it was the civil servants who spotted the error and are prompting the return of the money.
But why let the truth get in the way of some public sector bashing?
Please do not lump all civil servants together. It’s about as ridiculous as saying “typical private sector workers”. There are many different grades and types of civil servant. Any ultimately, this is a cock-up by civil servants in either the Department of Finance or Revenue Commissioners.
Forgive me if I’m wrong but I’d imagine it was civil servants who drafted the legislation
Yes. Of course the legislation is voted upon by the politicians, but ultimately the mistake lies with a civil servant in Dept of Finance or the Revenue Commissioners.
@Vocal…who wrote it???? No more side-stepping for you CS fxxkers!
Fired for gross incompetency is how this should end!
Zero accountability is the poison that flows in depts of Finance, Environment, Education, Health, Justice and the Gardai! Cover up after cover up. It’s pathetic. That’s why, no matter which dept a decision comes from, always, always challenge it, be it income tax demands/estimates, welfare cut decisions, VAT estimates etc. Always challenge them.
Senior civil servents are what you mean. The girl on the counter of the motor tax office confirmed she didn’t draft this.
Dont rub your hands just yet. The real acid test of their record keeping is about to begin. Will they know who should get money back? *grabs popcorn.
Next:- Refund to all Rural Home Owners.
LPT fails to provide these services to Rural Home Owners
1. No mains water
2. No public sewage system
3. No street lighting
4. No footpaths
5. No cycle lanes
6. No public parks
7. No buses
8. No DART
9. No LUAS
10. No subsidised theaters
———————————–
No EU Government or Troika has a mandate to tax Family Homes.
You forgot no decent roads !
The Revenue are as bad as the government and HSE and other public sector areas where their right hand doesn’t know what their left hand is doing and squandering millions of tax payers hard earned cash in the process!!!!!
lol……aaaaaaaaaahahhaha……..thinks do go wrong when you are raping an pillaging !!!
I still don’t understand what the ‘property tax’ is, have never received any letters concerning this so called tax even though I own my own home. Are people actually paying this tax and to whom? I think it maybe just some scam.
Steve it’s up to you to register your home for lpt. At the end of the day if you sell your house or leave it to someone the lpt is going to be deducted off it and moreover the household charge of 100 euro is now gone up to 200 for anyone liable that didn’t pay it by end July. Revenue are also collecting it by adding it on to lpt.
Best stay under the radar then. Fair play for avoiding this scam.
Still waiting for bill ourselves,partner is PAYE. When they have the manners to send a bill we will pay it but not running round doing their job because their to lazy or to stupid to do it.
Please read freehold property law , it states no entity shall have a hold on such a property and goverment need not be informed of sale or transfer.
No problem just raise the taxes elsewhere
What about people who bought a family in the boom years who are now in massive negative equity!! But of course as Noonan says we’re the negative equity generation and always forgotten!
Civil servants. What a contradiction!!!!!
Just love the way they say this will ‘cost revenue’ loads. It’s money revenue wouldn’t have except for this robbing govt.
Now we have to pay for these Incompetent fools,
Feehily should stand down ,we have heard enough of her big mouth for the last 2 years!!
Whatever about appoportioning blame where it is due for this monumental cock-up, the key point now is to sort out the mess so that the property tax for 2013 is levied in a fair way. (I’m sure the legislation for 2014 will be amended in time to correct the error).
It would be absolutely scandalous if owner-occupiers of second-hand properties are not required to pay the property tax for 2013, while owner-occupiers of new properties are required to pay it. While a case can be made for helping out first-time buyers, there is absolutely no justification for taxing second-time or subsequent purchasers of new properties and not taxing similar purchasers of second-hand properties. If there is no way to make the legislation retroactive then the only equitable solution is to refund property-tax payments to ALL who paid for the half-year iin 2013. A nice Christmas bonus for us all.
No buyer of any house old or new is liable for the tax if they complete sale before end 2013. It was meant to only be first time buyers but ended up being all buyers.
That’s not what the article says:
“The result is that a person who purchases a second hand house and occupies it as a sole or main residence is entitled to the exemption regardless of the fact that they are not a first time buyer,” they stated.
Having reviewed the legislation, Revenue concluded that, “notwithstanding the fact that the intention was clear, the legislation did not impose a liability to LPT on a non-first time buyer of a second–hand house,” they said”
It’s not what RTE is reporting either.
….and who wrote the legislation??????? Guess there will be no hands up from anyone!!!!
It just gets better and better….
If you want to abolish this tax join the National Association for the Abolition of Property Tax (NAAPT). You CAN do something about this or, you could continue to whine on the Journal and do nothing. http://www.naapt.weebly.com
You can be sure whomever wrote the legislation had to pass it to superiors for approval.
I will even venture someone pointed out the error and was ignored by someone higher up in a hurry.
Or, worse, people saw it and shut up because they were afraid of being that person.
Best case scenario, someone saw it and shut up on purpose, knowing eventually some average people would get a nice tax break.
“It’s believed the property tax refund will cost the Revenue millions of euros.”
It wasn’t their money to begin with, you mean some people are being refunded. Full Stop.
I’m confused. Based on reports so far I should qualify for this exemption because I bought a second hand house and it’s my principle private residence. But I bought it in 2008, so what’s the story ? Am I exempt ??
I agree – the article is a bit rambling …
I wish all the peoples pay the tax because its to help the country. The goverment fair because don’t want to upset the peoples but need the money for to run service.
Money’s not going to help the country as claimed Lorna. It the tax was meant to provide local services and now it has been diverted to Irish water. It is not going towards local services…..
Incorrect. We where told the money was going to go to local services. But it has been since revealed that the powers that be have decided against that. And that Central Government will spend it. I suppose to recapitalise the Banks or for the Private water company.
or featherbed their own obscene pensions and outrageous salaries and unvouched expenses, then there’s all the the ‘retired’ parasites pensions to pay for. The money has to come from somewhere folks so guess where the new revenue stream is, they will tap that to ensure there’s money in the bank for their ‘entitlements’ before they blow it elsewhere.
I wasn’t the only one what is wrong with our grovement
I would be interested to know how many government officials have purchased houses in 2013 for something like this to slip thru the fingers. Don’t reckon anyone is that stupid. Wag the dog my friends.
Abolish property tax full stop its immoral to tax a person home !! Stop borrowing 638 million every yr to give to corrupt charities in foreign countries . We don’t have it also it’s double the property tax .. This makes no sense what so ever
Ding Dong the wicket witch is in the revenue but also in FG/L
DOWN WITH THIS ILLEGAL HOME TAX.
IF ITS ILLEGAL,,,THEN WHY DID SO MANY FOOLS PAY IT AND BREAK THE LAW !!
They were bullied and intimidated into paying but most of all in great fear of what would happen to them if they didn’t. It has to be remembered that this country is run by a Mafia type gang.
They should repay every cent to every homeowner. It’s an illegal unjust tax and it’s not too late for anyone you to join http://www.attackthetax.com/ and refuse to pay in 2014. Now you know it’s not going into local services, maintenance and communities. Stand up!
this seems fair – non first time buyers would have paid stamp duty.
An awful lot of very learned people on here. Why don’t a few of you go an run the country.
OK, so who gets the bullet, in the private sector a monumental screw up would in no doubt get you the chop, so lets see a head. With no budget constraints regarding legal, PR, and anything else you can shake a stick at, and still be capable of still screwing up, – it’s not beyond reason to assume some action might be taken on behalf of the ultimate employer (ie) THE TAXPAYER
I sold my house this year with a financial loss of €250, 000 ( lucky I got rid of it I suppose ).. I managed to pay off the mortgage ..but was FORCED to pay the property tax or the sale wouldn’t go through I was told by my legal team.so its impossible NOT to pay it eventually. Im still paying off the gas bill from that house I dont own anymore. .. another scam CALOR GAS …my life savings went into that house on the insistance of my stupid accountant who told me I was CRAZY when I suggested a recession was coming 8 yrs ago. As a woman he thought I knew nothing. ( sorry but he treated me like an idiot) ..look at me now ? iv lost all my future security.iv allot of health problems and wonder will I be thrown on the scrap heap at 65… im now only 53… this country is just run by money hungry bumbling idiots who probably still use their fingers to count.
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