James Woodward on Back From The Future Hologram Universe

On Sep 30, 2010, at 2:58 PM, james f woodward wrote:

Folks,

A few clarificatory comments are perhaps in order. First, ["therofax" ] has
alluded to "Jim's theory". Flattering as this is, it isn't really right.
I have no "theory" in the usual sense of that word. I am convinced that
Einstein's general relativity theory (GRT) -- without any added on ZPE or
ZPF baggage -- is correct. I am also convinced that GRT fully accounts
for the origin of inertial reaction forces as the gravitational action of
the chiefly distant "matter" [everything, including dark matter and
energy] that gravitates.

Exactly my point! "Distant stars" too small a fraction of the total stuff.

That is, Mach's principle is correct. It has
been known for 40 years or more that Mach's principle is a "boundary"
condition on GRT --

Exactly, but I am saying the important boundary is our future event horizon!

namely, if "critical cosmic matter density" obtains
and spacetime is flat at the cosmic scale, then inertial reaction forces
are purely gravitational in origin. Cosmic spatiotemporal flatness has
been known to be the the fact of reality since the WMAP results were
reported some years ago. The correctness of Mach's principle, as Hoyle
and Narlikar figured out in the '60s requires that Wheeler-Feynman
"absorber" theory apply to gravity (and presumably electrodynamics).
That fixes the future, and in the post t'Hooft era leads to the talk
about holograms. I suppose you could say that Mach's principle being
correct enables the hologram interpretation. The reverse, however, is
not necessarily true.

So we agree on this fundamental issue.

Such work as I have done that sometimes gets mistaken for "theory"
consists of some calculations using the theoretical notions of others
(notably relativity theory) to show that there may well be a way to
ultimately make absurdly benign wormholes -- that is, stargates (a term
familiar to several on this list). Whether those calculations are right
will eventually be sorted out in the laboratory; but in the interrim they
make fodder for interesting speculation.

I might also add that John Cramer's retrocausal signaling experiment
should shed light (so to speak) on whether the future is fixed or not.
Oddly enough, the creator of the transactional interpretation of QM --
which seems to fix the future -- does not himself think that the future
is fully fixed. Just a little bit in advance of the present, freezing
out like ice crystals forming on a pane of glass in winter. . . .

Is that Popper falsifiable?

There is also Aharonov's idea of "post-selection" on our future event horizon.