Time Travel

[skunkushybrid]

Anyone believe that this is possible, as in having the ability to travel back and forth?

I know it isn't possible, I tried to write a short story on the subject once and I could never complete it. The complications involved are simply insurmountable.

On a different note, I've also read Stephen Hawking's theory on worm holes. He surmises that it may be possible to access different universes, galaxies etc... by travelling through a worm hole and coming out at various points. He also theorised that it might be possible for us to create our own worm hole, although we would need an energy resource very similar in size and strength to our own life-giving sun.

 

[TroyRider]

My new favorite TV show is Heros on NBC....watch it buzzed, its awesome! .....Time travel...flyin guy.....chick that can't be killed.....drug addict who sees and paints the future!

 

[Doobie006]

Time traveling forward is not impossible, in fact it is a law of nature. All you have to do is travel faster relative to something else. This is all covered in Einstein's Special Relativity.

So let's say You would be sitting on a bench while I would be riding a motorcycle really fast through the streets of London for a couple of hours. When I would comeback. You would be a fraction of a nano-second older than I. Because I was traveling faster than you were, Time moved more slowly for me.

The greater the difference in velocity between us, the more time dilation would occur.

So If I could fly in a space ship travelling close to the speed of light for 1 year, I would come back to an earth that has aged millions of years.

Traveling backwards in time is more difficult. If you could go faster than the speed of light than you would be traveling backwards in time, but nothing that has mass can travel at or faster than the speed of light. So Einstein said it would be impossible.

But, as you mentioned, Wormholes might be the answer.
If we could warp space-time enough, we could form a bridge between any 2 points in Space and time. Then we could go back and forth.

 

[skunkushybrid]

If you think about it logically were it that the science was there to enable travelling back in time the actual ability to travel back to the past would be impossible. Even if you went backwards you would still be going forwards, only backwards.

What is done is done, you cannot travel to the past. If you could then even by you taking a simple breath you could drastically alter the course of the future. I understand that you could travel forwards, but backwards would be impossible not only from a scientific standpoint but from a theoretical one too.

 

[wanna smoke that ak47]

watch donnie darko it explaines it all preety trippey movie when yur high to

 

[Doobie006]

Even if you went backwards you would still be going forwards, only backwards..

You're right, since time is relative, your perception of time is always moving forward.

What is done is done, you cannot travel to the past. If you could then even by you taking a simple breath you could drastically alter the course of the future. I understand that you could travel forwards, but backwards would be impossible not only from a scientific standpoint but from a theoretical one too.

That is only if time is linear.
There are a few theories in Quantum Mechanics, that suggest that there may be an infinite number of universes, and therefore an infinite number of paths to take. I look at it like an infinite maze of possibilities. If you go back in time to some point, you simply follow this new "quantum" path, you don't alter anything. So no more paradox.

 

[skunkushybrid]

I think I see... but this fails because Time would still need to be linear for the alteration (in the past) to reach back to a present time where the alteration has had no effect. Which suggests that there would be no change, which also suggests that backward time travel is impossible, as logically; to change something in the past it would have drastic consequences for the future.

To follow the new path would be a change in our present, we wouldn't realise it so therefore nothing would have changed... but it would have...

Quantum Physics is the study of the very small, the universe within the universe. Our body's are a universe to billions of microbes... I've never read anything on the time travel aspect of quantum physics... I just belive it to be logically impossible to travel backwards... I doubt even quantum mechanics could make a viable explanation that could compete with steadfast logic.

 

[AllMeatNoPotato]

skunk, you brought up a very good point of time travel being impossible due to the fact that time is linear. say if we took that line and bent it like a string, it would still be linear but not on an x axis. now lets say that line touched in two spots forming a bridge between the two points on the line. there is a possibility of time travel if we could bend the time continium to bridge in one moment in time. as far as the infinite universes, there is a good possibility of this being true. it makes it easier to understand ghosts this way!

 

[skunkushybrid]

So you're talking about bending time and then building a bridge... and how would we go about doing this exactly?

I've already stated that I believe it possible to travel forwards. My argument is that it is impossible to go back to a time that has already happened. You can never travel backwards. The dinosaurs are extinct, if backward time travel were possible you could go back to a time where they are still alive, and that's an absurd notion.

There's no need to explain ghosts because they are figments of people's imagination.

 

[Doobie006]

I meant that if you were to travel back in time to some point, you would continue on from that point on a new path independent of your old timeline.
You would not change anything in the present of your old timeline. The old timeline would exist in another universe of which you would no longer be part of.

 

[skunkushybrid]

Therefore your future would be changed. Into what? Could be something far worse...

Of course, there is little point arguing about the mechanics as we both know to travel backwards in time is impossible. No matter how hard we tried we would still be moving forwards.

We make choices and once those choices are made there is no going back, what is done is done. The way forward is reality, I really do not believe that there are billions of other universes running alongside ours and we are all active in each living with the different choices we have made along the way... what would be the point? Please don't tell me there are many things we don't understand...

 

[Doobie006]

The laws of quantum physics are different than those of our macro-universe.
Quantum particles don't obey our physical laws (as we understand them).
Subatomic particles behave in very strange ways, they defy our notions of time and space. They've even observed one particle existing in two places at the same time.

 

[Doobie006]

I don't know how well that theory (Bubble universe) holds up. But that is one of many that tries to explain the strange things that has been observed in the quantum world.

 

[Doobie006]

We make choices and once those choices are made there is no going back, what is done is done. The way forward is reality, I really do not believe that there are billions of other universes running alongside ours and we are all active in each living with the different choices we have made along the way... what would be the point? Please don't tell me there are many things we don't understand...

There doesn't have to be any point to it. We simply may be beings that are only aware of one 4 dimensional universe.

 

[skunkushybrid]

Even if we could somehow enter the micro universe with the intention of going somewhere else we would be simply broken up and become a part of that universe as there is nowhere else to go. Maybe we could open doors so that we could matter-transfer to different worlds for example, but as for going back to a time that has already happened... I can't see quantum physics backing such a theory if it is to keep the funding it needs...

 

[Doobie006]

I'm sure there was more to this theory than what I've stated. I know for a fact that it was taken seriously by Physicists, I don't know if it is still today.
I'm sure they have new theories that explain the quantum world more accurately.

 

[AllMeatNoPotato]

skunk you need to look more at newton's 3rd law of motion. it states that
'For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.'
to go foward in time means that there is the possibility of going back in time also. like I said possibility!!!!!!!!! probable not, possible yes.

oh yeah, a bridge is a link between two points ie. if we were to bend the time continium, a bridge would form where the two points touched. as for quantum physics, dude i am lost in the sauce over that one. peace!

 

[skunkushybrid]

You've got that Newton quote wrong, I'm sure you've missed a word or two out, if not Newton was talking a load of bollocks. For every action there is an EQUAL and opposite reaction... It just doesn't read right to me, are you sure you've quoted correctly?

Also i'm not sure how the quote ties in, it is an obvious untruth. I can think of many actions where to do them doesn't cause an equal yet opposite reaction. Also with many actions it is very difficult to assertain what the opposite of said action would be. For example; to eat well, the opposite of this would be to eat badly. Just because you eat well one day does not mean you are going to eat badly the next...

 

[AllMeatNoPotato]

what you said was a little off the subject of physics. the qoute; Newton's Third Law
it ties in perfectly to what is being discussed here. how can you go foward in time and not go back in time. Oh I get it now. I forgot the skunk rule of physics. 'For what I say is true, and if it does not make sense to me, it must not be true!' sounds like a winner to me also. lol.

 

[Doobie006]

While your quote is correct Allmeat, it does not apply to what were talking about here (Time Travel). Newton's third law only applies to forces being exerted on objects.

But you made a good point when you said:
"like I said possibility!!!!!!!!! probable not, possible yes."

The one thing that was made clear by Quantum physics, was that nothing is impossible. Virtually all physical laws can be broken. In the quantum world this can be observed, however in the macro-universe, it becomes highly improbable (But never impossible).

Like skunk said, Time traveling backwards defies logic, and seems impossible, Yet in the quantum world this has been observed (A photon was emitted by an electron before the electron ever absorbed that photon). This is what makes scientists scratch their heads. In order to explain this phenomenon, they had to come up with some theories that allow this "Phenomenon" to occur without running into the usual paradox. One of those theories was the "Bubble universe" theory. As I said in my previous post, this theory has an interesting explanation, but I don't know how well it actually holds up to reality.