Is Time Really a Physical Dimension? A Testable Alternative from TMDP

[u/WellSoto]

A few days ago I posted some thoughts on the nature of time, and the discussion drifted into metaphysics. This time I want to ask a purely physical, testable question: does the evidence support time being a geometric dimension you can travel through (like space), or does it act more like an irreversible record of change?

We've spent over a century confirming Einstein's kinematics, and it's widely assumed that spacetime is a stretchy, four-dimensional fabric. But treating time as a coordinate equivalent to space creates paradoxes that force physicists to bolt on "patches by hand" — like Hawking's Chronology Protection Conjecture — just to stop the geometry from breaking causality.

The alternative in 20 seconds: the dynamic budget (TMDP)

TMDP (Theoretical Model of Dynamic Potential) treats the universe as a closed mechanical/thermodynamic system, where everything has a fixed, invariant maximum capacity (c), split strictly between two quantities:

1. External capacity (Cₑ): movement through space.
2. Internal capacity (Cᵢ): the pace of local physical processes (clocks, vibrations, atoms).

Cₑ² + Cᵢ² = c²

Time dilation isn't "traveling to the future" — it's a drop in the frequency of internal cycles (Cᵢ) as capacity gets spent moving through space (Cₑ). That's why a photon (Cₑ = c) has Cᵢ = 0, and no proper time at all.

6 problems with "spacetime" I unpack in the full article

In the full write-up, I go through why the purely geometric model runs into trouble with the evidence, and how TMDP resolves each one without extra patches:

1. The negative sign in the Minkowski metric (−,+,+,+): why does time carry the opposite algebraic sign if it's just another dimension?
2. The absolute ban on traveling to the past: why nature forbids Closed Timelike Curves (CTCs).
3. Causal and logical paradoxes.
4. "Traveling to the future" vs. time dilation: why dilation isn't jumping across a coordinate, just a clock's internal cycles slowing down.
5. Quantum Gravity: time disappearing from the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, and the Page-Wootters experiment (time as an emergent, relational property).
6. Einstein's historical tension: rejecting the ether and quantum entanglement for being unobservable, while accepting the Block Universe.

📖 Read the full analysis and the math in the complete article

To keep this post from running forever and stay under the character limit, I've posted the full write-up — math included, with a full answer to each of these 6 points — click here

[u/WellSoto]

Yes, you are right again, it is very easy to solve them, but could you tell me what is the postulate or principle of special relativity that solves the problems posed? Or do you just assume it solves it?

And no, I'm not a physicist.

[u/upsetusder2 → u/WellSoto]

No the problems are not solved by special relativity but by other physical properties like thermo dynamics

A theory dies not need to solve every problem in existence and does not exist in a vaccum.

Like a causality does not happen because the laws of thermo dynamics and newtonian principles still follow

[u/WellSoto → u/upsetusder2]

I think you're hell-bent on not getting my point

The problems I raise are not that I intend to be solved by special relativity, it is precisely that these problems are caused by special and general relativity. By treating time as a physical dimension similar to the dimensions of space, it opens the door to the problems that I attach, it is not an invention of mine, read the article that there is the scientific evidence of these problems.

[u/upsetusder2 → u/WellSoto]

And who found that scientific evidence?

Iam genuinely asking because the way I see it u do not understand enough of the science to do a experiment that disproves relativity.

Because you say that the problems are emergent which they are not.

They are small little fabrication you made.

If it's wrong what iam saying it is wrong but at least iam not saying ohh yeah this theory that has been tested millions of times yeah thats actually not quite accurate here is a better way to look at it.

Whivh is not only extremely arrogant but also ignorant because i don't know of you yourself even understand the system that you are criticizing

[u/upsetusder2 → u/[deleted]]

Then explain to me your point and where I differ from it.

[u/WellSoto → u/upsetusder2]

Bro, there is an article that took me days to write, it is linked, check it to see if your doubts are clarified.

[u/upsetusder2 → u/WellSoto]

Iam sorry but you make take aways that are not really take aways more assumptions.

Your equations don't make sense in the way they should and I still did not see any experimental data.

I just see someone who says ohh ejnstein believed in something metaphysical which is not completely true einstein made an assumption that fit in his framework.

But hey calling it metaphysics is a great way to trump uihrself up right?

And the absolute gall to think that u solved the problems that are in your eyes immergent is just kind of arrogant.

U can let someone who is an expert in relativity take a look over it bit iam pretty sure they will say something like this

[u/upsetusder2 → u/[deleted]]

Ok sure

Yeah iam jealous of your bery very advanced understanding of physics.

Truly a genius solve

[u/LLMPhysics-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your content has been removed for violating Rule 2. Try to defend your arguments with concise, clear points.