Time travel...

[Abaddon]

I've been recently thinking a good bit on time travel for one reason or another, and I thought of some things I thought I would bounce of all of you.  A lot of people seem to think at some point time travel might be possible, and I'm not sure exactly where I stand on that.  I do however feel that, if it ever does happen, time travel will really be insanely destructive....this is kind of how I believe it might go.

Say if the government, or some very large well funded organization creates a time travel device, it seems like it would be impossible to go back in time by any other means as just a watcher...and invisible one at that.  Say just looking at it through a computer, or really feeling your presence there.  To me, it seems like anyone going back in time would just alter things to much.  If they hold some one up for just a split second and they die, or live where they should have died, it would change - to my eyes - the future forever.  To that end, I see from that point on, everyone being nervous about being watched and thus changing everyones lives for good.  Just think of the fact that Government agencies going back in time and seeing various crimes (in their eyes) and other things, and some how relaying that to that time period, or putting them on trail in that time period.  It all seems like there's really no way to have time travel really work, how ever depressing that thought is.

I'm sorry that that above is so disjointed and...almost confusing I guess.  I just kind of typed it stream of conscious.  Just thought it would be interesting to hear others ideas on the topic.

-Will

[Will]

There are varied schools of thought on the various paradox that could be created by traveling into the past. Generally, the idea is that while it's possible to travel to the past without changing major events, the risk is absolutely too great to risk. Generally.

Based on what little information is available, I find that it's likely that one cannot change the future, but rather can create a new future in addition to the future from which you came. Let's say you go back in time and kill your grandfather, creating a grandfather paradox. By my understanding, instead of you ceasing to exist, you'll simply prevent yourself from being born in the reality where your grandfather was killed. The reality where you come from, where your grandfather lives, will also exist. I believe it's called multiple-stream theory. Every time you create a change in the past, you create a new reality which branches off from the original. The real problem would be that once you've changed the future, you couldn't go back to the original future.

[jcm]

damn you willravel...i WAS about to hit paste and submit, but someone already said it.

yeah ditto.

[Will]

Muhahaha... I've foiled jcm again!  

[jcm]

i just kicked the crap out of my monitor...hope you felt that.  

[LARA]

I'm of the position that time travel is impossible in reality.  That's about it.

[joeactor]

Interesting.

I was just thinking about this very topic next week.

I'm sure I'll think about it again yesterday.

When are we again?

"Tomorrow is only as far as today was yesterday..."
  -- JoeActor

[Tom62]

I believe that we can move only forward in time, not back. Should we invent a spaceship that nearly reaches the speed of light than the time on board of the ship will run much slower than on Earth if we move away from it. So you might say that we travel through time. Should we ever be so stupid to jump into a black hole than there is a theory that time will stand still for us. Then there are some interesting time and space theories about wormholes. Anyway I find time traveller stories very fascinating. One of the most funny one's is the following classical story of Fredric Brown:

The End

Professor Jones had been working on time theory for many years.
"And I have found the key equation," he told his daughter one day. "Time is a field.  This machine I have made can manipulate, even reverse, that field."
Pushing a button as he spoke, he said, "This should make time run backward backward run time make should this," said he, spoke he as button a pushing.
"Field that, reverse even, manipulate can made have I machine this.  Field is a time." Day one daughter his told he, "Equation key the found have I and."
"Years many for theory time on working been had Jones Professor."

[Will]

Hahahahaha.... awesome.

[SteveS]

Sweet story, Tom62.

In anyone wants to travel in time, just set your device to 2.342 and oscillate at 11 hertz.  You can use me as your constant.

[Tom62]

In anyone wants to travel in time, just set your device to 2.342 and oscillate at 11 hertz.  You can use me as your constant.

You could also transfer a file under M$ Windows. Time slows down enormously when you reach the 80% completed mark.

[joeactor]

I believe that we can move only forward in time, not back.

Actually, we should be able to move in either direction (according to Einstein).
"The Arrow of Time" is only our perception of causality.

But, how would you know if you move backward in time?  Wouldn't you un-experience things?
Your neurons would revert to their prior state, so no "memory of the future" is possible.

In order to travel in time ala sci-fi, you first need to remove yourself from the normal time stream...

At least that's what uncle Al told me before he vanished,
JoeActor

[Tom62]

But, how would you know if you move backward in time?  Wouldn't you un-experience things?
Your neurons would revert to their prior state, so no "memory of the future" is possible.

That reminds me of the excellent SciFi book "Hyperion" by Dan Simmons, in which a woman in the book is aging backwards. She kept a diary to keep track of her future memories, but in the end the memories don't have any meaning for her. Highly recommended! Another brilliant SciFi tme traveller's book to read is Audrey Niffenegger's "The Timetraveller's wife" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Time_Traveler's_Wife) which is a highly romantic love story about a man who travels involuntarily through time, and a woman whose life takes a natural sequential course. Their passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap. The book is being filmed right now and will come out in November this year (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452694/)

[karadan]

I love time travel theories. I'm especially partial to world-line theory where instead of travelling through time, you just jump to a different universe practically identical to our own, but at a different stage in history. There was a great web hoax (you've probably all heard of it) by a dude called john Titor. I really enjoyed that story.

I once read a fantastic sci-fi story about a scientist who created a 'chronoscope'. It was a time viewing device. The scientist who created it, did so for the purposes of viewing ancient Egypt, Jesus and Rome etc. His machine was quickly taken away by the government and they tried to silence him. He eventually made another one and managed to get the bluprints distributed around the world. The final scene had an agent telling the scientist that he'd just doomed the planet. He desputed this by arguing that the world needed technology such as the chronoscope and that the government wanted to silence him because that is what they do. The one thing he hadn't thought of was the fact that the chronoscope could see ANY distance into the past, no matter how small. Having the ability to see milliseconds into the past meant that personal privacy and secrecy had now also become a thing of the past.

[rlrose328]

In anyone wants to travel in time, just set your device to 2.342 and oscillate at 11 hertz.  You can use me as your constant.

Will do, Steve... I'll be your constant as well.