COSMOLOGY

This 31st essay of "A Rational Cosmology" addresses how it might be possible to define the locations of departure and arrival for a given moving object as well as to determine which entities are moving when entities change their relative positions.

This 29th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explains that while units on a time scale can be chosen to be of any length, they must be directly proportional to units on every other time scale. It also discusses the arbitrary nature of selecting a "zero point" on a time scale.

This 28th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" refutes the claim made by some that time and time scales are necessarily dependent on the motion of some entities, be they clocks or celestial objects. While a time scale can correspond to physical events, it does not depend on them.

This 27th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" shows that, even were all the entities in the universe to enter a period of absolute stasis, they would continue to accumulate the quality, time, uniformly, and their relation via a time scale would remain inescapably necessary.

Motion is the change in the three spatial dimensions facilitated by change in the one temporal dimension. This 30th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" describes the necessity of defining an entity's motion solely in terms of that entity and not other entities.

This 26th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" shows that entities have always existed and will always exist -- though entities that exist at one time need not be the same entities existing at another time. This is because entities are required to originate other entities.

This 25th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" shows that it is impossible for time to have either a beginning or an end. This is because time is not an entity, but rather a ubiquitous quality of entities. Since there can never be no entities, time will always exist.

Aging and senescence are two distinct phenomena that happen to correlate in human beings, some of whose internal functions deteriorate over time. But the two are not one and the same, and this 24th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" dispels the frequent conflation between them.

Although Einstein's Theory of Relativity contains numerous valid observations and predictions, this 23rd essay of "A Rational Cosmology" argues that the conceptual core of this theory, the idea of "relative time," is flawed and unnecessary.

This 22nd essay of "A Rational Cosmology" shows that time is an absolute quality and refutes the notion of relative time. The degree to which an entity exhibits time, its age, does not vary in accordance with the quantitative fluctuations of any of its other qualities.

A time scale relates entities' magnitudes of temporal separation and can in this manner relate all entities that ever existed using one dimension. This 21st essay of "A Rational Cosmology" describes the necessary linearity and uniformity of time scales.

This 20th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" identifies time as a dimension of entities, though not a spatial dimension. Unlike the spatial dimensions, which can either increase or decrease in magnitude, time must always increase uniformly for all entities.

This 19th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" identifies time as a ubiquitous quality of entities, whose measurements for a particular entity must always increase and never decrease. Time is not a "thing," nor is it ever possible to undo past occurrences.

The three spatial dimensions suffice can describe entities that are, in their entirety, absolutely and eternally static; but we observe that many entities change. This 18th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explains what change is and why time is necessary to account for it.

The Euclidean plane allows study of an even vaster interplay of qualities than does the line. 3-dimensional constructs are capable of describing all of an entity's spatial qualities, though still not the whole entity. This 17th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explains.

The ubiquitous qualities of entities are possessed by every thing that exists. Matter, the constituent quality of entities, is simply, that, which entities are made of. This thirteenth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" describes the nature of matter.

This 14th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" considers qualities which are universal to all entities: volume, length, width, and height. It explains what these qualities are and why every entity that exists must exhibit these four, along with the quality of matter.

"Space-as-relationship" is synonymous with "distance" and "separation." It is not a thing; rather, it relies on the existence of two or more distinct entities, or a single entity capable of motion. This 12th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explores this concept.

There is no such thing as "space," because what is commonly referred to as "space" is not a thing; "it" is either an absence of things or a relationship between things. This eleventh essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explores what "space" actually means.

Lines, or one-dimensional constructs in the Euclidean model, are eminently useful for studying real entities. To measure an entity's dimensions in any other manner but linearly is absurd and standardless. This 16th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" discusses the uses of lines.

A coordinate system is a mental model which enables human beings to relate the positions of real entities to one another. This 15th essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explains the uses of such concepts as points but emphasizes that points are not things in themselves.

Man does not yet know of any homogeneous entity that really exists, but rational cosmology can inform us what qualifications must be met by an entity that could be termed homogeneous. This ninth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" gives such qualifications.

This eighth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" demonstrates the logical impossibility of the universe ever being destroyed as well as of all entities combining to form a homogeneous "singularity." This is a refutation of currently fashionable "Big Crunch" theory.

Recent empiricist-positivist speculations have concerned whether or not the universe has a particular geometric shape. This tenth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" shows that the question is absurd, as the universe is not an entity, and only entities can have shapes.

This seventh essay of "A Rational Cosmology" exposes critical logical flaws within the basic propositions of Big Bang theory. Mr. Stolyarov notes underlying errors in the very notion of a "singularity," as well as why such a singularity could never have created anything.

This sixth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explains why the universe could not have been created, either by a God or by a Big Bang. If the universe is "everything that exists," then anything that created the universe must be outside of existence and thus not exist.

The term "universe" does not denote a thing, quality, or relationship. Rather, it is the sum of all entities that exist. It is not a "whole" in the sense that a person is a "whole." This fifth essay of "A Rational Cosmology" explores what the universe is and is not.

This third essay of "A Rational Cosmology" makes the distinction between ontology and cosmology; it further argues for cosmology's place as a branch of philosophy rather than a branch of physics. The distinction between entities and qualities is also introduced.

An axiom is a self-verifying statement. It cannot be proved deductively, because it is, in itself, the foundation upon which all further proofs are built. This second essay in "A Rational Cosmology" explains the axioms of existence, identity, and consciousness.

Cosmology is not a branch of physics, as many believe, but rather a field of philosophy. In this fourth essay of his series, "A Rational Cosmology," Mr. Stolyarov presents the essential distinction between physics and cosmology.