My thoughts on time travel

Originally posted by bodebliss
I would disagree on one point namely "We are all here" that is subjective.

I know people who would argue till they are out of breath that there is no way you can prove anything or anyone is here or that there is a here.

Relativity. Have them extrapolate what will happen when they drop a ball. Then drop a ball. Have them not extrapolate what will happen when they drop a ball. Then drop a ball. Ask them if there was a difference in the basic physics between the two events. Did the ball go up, instead of down? Did it go sideways instead of down? Did it float away? Did it vanish and reappear? Did it cease existing altogether? Did it become something other than a ball?



[edit on 26-3-2006 by undo]

I read this somewhere:

All life is an one second (instant) symphony. Time is what allows us to view it in consecutve increments.

I thought that was an interesting way of looking at it. In other words, the present is all there is. It's relative to your position. If you are in the past, you are still in the present, because the present is relative to you.

Originally posted by Zeta_101
If time travel exists and history does change, how do we notice?

The only possible person that would know is the time traveler.

We would have no memory of the unchanged futurewhich would be our past.

If there is any tiny shred of truth to the studies conducted by the Army's "Stargate" program, then consciousness may have some ability to transcend time in some unknown fashion by creating a massless, non-local observer point. Of course, there will be still problems with a massless point interacting with the environment at the target time and place. You wouldn't be able actually DO anything but observe.

But, then again, maybe there's a non-physical way to connect consciousnesses such that information can be transmitted. Several studies have indicated that cognition requires a synaptic interaction on a quantum virtual level, so maybe there's a way to "reach into" the consciousness of a contemporaneous observer, and interact with the environment that way.

Maybe the voices in some crazy people's heads are actually time travelers (although they wouldn't actually be "traveling") trying to make a non-physical connection with somebody in this time and place. And maybe the voices in some genius's heads are also feeding them advanced knowledge from the future. Could Jacques Vallee's "Invisible College" be the activity of future experimenters projecting images back through time.

If you ever got a telescope out into space, a thousand light years away from earth, and had it pointed at earth, youd be seeng a thousand years ago, on earth!

thats the closest thing to time travel I think we'll ever experience

What is the smallest thing you could do to change the world? I'm thinking that if time travel would be possible the only possible movement would be forward.. yet some might argue how can this be done if it hasn't happened yet?

Going backwards would be simply too risky.. even talking to someone down the street may result in catastrophes in later life.. I don't think any Government would risk going back and jeapordising their own success.

Oh and does anyone have any ideas on how time travel could be accomplished? travelling at lightspeed and slowing time etc etc? I really have a small monkey like mind so keep it simple!!

Quantum teleportation and entanglement. The device works by making a clone of the original object, at the other end of the transmission. Eventually, they'll be able to make the original object appear at the other end of the transmission.

if time travel were to be possible, who knows what possiblities may come out of that. Like STOPPING TIME. How can you master time travel without being able to STOP time? They sorta go together right?

Originally posted by undo
Quantum teleportation and entanglement.

The device works by making a clone of the original object, at the other end of the transmission. Eventually, they'll be able to make the original object appear at the other end of the transmission.

That's not how quantum entanglement works. What they do is entangle pairs of quantum particles and when seperated they still after a fashion maintain the entanglement. Only the pairs actually are moving opposite each other if what you have is spin-up the other pair which could be on the other side of the universe(possibly) would be spin-down.

Originally posted by bodebliss

Originally posted by undo
Quantum teleportation and entanglement.

The device works by making a clone of the original object, at the other end of the transmission. Eventually, they'll be able to make the original object appear at the other end of the transmission.

That's not how quantum entanglement works. What they do is entangle pairs of quantum particles and when seperated they still after a fashion maintain the entanglement. Only the pairs actually are moving opposite each other if what you have is spin-up the other pair which could be on the other side of the universe(possibly) would be spin-down.

Oh. I just had read an article on it and listened to an interview. From the sounds of it, the teleportation works by creating a clone of the original quantum particle, via quantum entanglement, at the opposite end of the transmitting device.

Another way it was described was: 2 particles are entangled and one is sent to the moon. the one that is sent to the moon, will retain all the original features of the other, which is still on the earth. Another way they described it was: The signature of one atom can be sent to another atom, over vast distances of space, instantly (faster than light travel), essentially reconstructing the "signature" of the atom, on an atom at the other end. The second example was an early description of it. The first example was after they learned more about entanglement. Of course, this is only what I recall (brain is rusty).

Originally posted by Enkidu

Maybe the voices in some crazy people's heads are actually time travelers (although they wouldn't actually be "traveling") trying to make a non-physical connection with somebody in this time and place. And maybe the voices in some genius's heads are also feeding them advanced knowledge from the future. Could Jacques Vallee's "Invisible College" be the activity of future experimenters projecting images back through time.

I don't think it would (if possible) be liken that. I think it would be like if you were let's say a grandparent of the first president of Earth and for histories sake they want to find out about you . So your about to enter your bedroom one day and you hear some muffled noise on the otherside of the door, but when you open the door no one is there. You say to yourself,'What the heck?".

You've been visited by time travelers!

i read somewhere.. (here we go again) that some astral travellers claim to be able to go to future and past times... makes sense in a way, considering they leave their physical body at home.

I think time travel could be a reality, but what seems more likely to me is inter-dimensional travel, to a time that exists in parallel with our time. I think the Khufu pyramid was what the machine might look light. If the pyramid were covered with a reflective surface, like polished limestone, then when the sun was directly over it (equinox) the pyramid would reflect all light away from it, creating a anti-matter chamber inside. Just a theory though.

Just dropped in for a quick thought of mine, could we leap between our life time? Let's say a moment when we were 12, 15 or 16 ... and live that moment again, change things if you want, you would be in a 15 year old body ... but you would have all conciousness and know everything that you know now ... kind of like the Quantum Leap tv show, except in your own body. How about that? That would be pretty cool.

I will post now a theory that shows it is possible to time travel in a single worldline without creating a paradox.

Suppose that the universe is a state machine. At each moment in time, the state machine goes to a different state. Each state is recorded in the universe recorder box (that's hypothetical, but we can safely assume it for the sake of the discussion).

We represent the recorder with R. Each state S is added to the recorder. R is the total state of the universe:


R = S0 + S1 + ... + Sn


where 'n' is the count of all states.

If we are to time travel, we need to move from state S to state S'. Each state contains a certain configuration of all particles of the universe:


S = P1 + P2 + P3 + ... + Pm


where 'm' is the count of all particles.

Now in order to time travel, we need to move the time traveller H from state S to state S'. The time traveller H is composed of a subset of particles of state S:


H = HP1 + HP2 + HP3 + ... + HPhm


where 'hm' is the count of all particles of the human time traveller H (HP is 'human particle'.

So in order to time travel, we need to the following operations:


S = S - H
S' = S' + H


In other words, we take the time traveller H from state S and place him in state S'.

Now let's examine the consequences for forward or backward time travel. Suppose T is the universal index of a state S and T' is the universal index of state S'.

If T' < T, then we go back in time. If T > T', then we go forward in time.

Let's study the first case (T' < T). If we go back in time from T to T', then T must already have happened for T'; otherwise, it would not be possible, would it? therefore, we observe that T' can not happen after T. But T' can not happen before T either. So we conclude that T' and T have been created at the same time.

Now let's study the second case (T > T'). If we go forward in time from T to T', then T' must already exist. In other words, the future shall be there. It is imperative that T' can not exist after T. Therefore we reach the same conclusion as in the previous case: T' and T have been created at the same time.

So we observe that in both cases, T and T', no matter what their relation is, have been created at the exact same time.

Now that has tremendous consequences for our freedom: we can go back or forward in time, but we can not change the future or the past, because their outcome has already been decided.

Our time travel is part of the universe's design!!!

Therefore, when one goes back, if he manages to kill his grandfather before his father was born or kills his father before he was born, it means that his grandfather or father was not the real one!

By the way, this theory does not violate the law of energy conservation: the total amount of energy in the universe stays the same, but energy can flow from one state of the universe to the others.

T' and T have been created at the same time

In other words: Time is an instant symphony, which we view in sequential increments we call "life". I've always thought when Jehovah introduced Himself as "I am that I am," that it was a direct reference to His omnipresence in all Timelines - et.al, that time is always present or relative to the viewer and He was always "present". So even the past, would be the present to the viewer and therefore not the past, which doesn't create a paradox at all, it simply explains the position of the viewer whereever or whenever that might be.