No one takes this into account. TIME TRAVEL

[Mad Scientist]

Time travel. It's Science Fiction, right? Hm, well, I honestly believe it is a possible notion. Just because it seems impossible doesn't mean it can't be done.

Just like the Wright Brothers. They had a dream that they could fly, and they were ridiculed for it. Called crazy for it. I'd like to share with you fine ladies and gentlemen one of my favorite sayings. "The only difference between insanity and genius is a degree of success".

Now to the purpose of this discussion, which I fully expect to get ignored, is to the so-called "flights of fancy" that it is possible to create a time altering device.

I'd like to remind you fellow readers and dreamers that almost all science that we know isn't exactly proven. The Theory of Relativity; Theory of Gravity; Big Bang Theory. They are all just widely accepted theories a.k.a. hypotheses. Even black holes is just a theory, none have actually been found. It was just a theory to describe the bending of light in distant readings of space. I'm not saying that any one of these are false, just that it's our best guess at why things happen. Like a few hundred years ago the Greek Gods were responsible for everything.

And, the grandfather paradox is a miscalculation, in my opinion. (From this moment on, this will be my opinions. You are of course entitled to your own, as I've said earlier that nothing is set in stone.) I favor String theory. But, that isn't really what I'm trying to say here.

Even if you did build a machine that you step inside, and it creates a field around you and sends you back in time, no one has considered that the world revolves, and orbits, and that entire space is expanding. That means if you go back a few hours, you'll be in space. Because you aren't moving in location. It wont work to bolt the machine to the ground, because in order to travel through time, there must be a field of energy encircling the subject, and that within will not move in location. Everything else will move instead of the subject.

Well. Don't just stare at me, continue! Let free your opinions and rants, ideas and questions in a timely yet serious manner.

 

[Ochalla]

I came in to express my annoyance of time travel comically, but now I'm just frustrated. Theory is far beyond a hypothesis and the Greek Gods were worshiped by the majority of Greeks THOUSANDS of years ago and even then their scholars knew them better as allegories not fact.

 

[Hisoka]

I honestly hope time travel never becomes reality. I mean our every choice in life would become meaningless, and then where would we be. A vapid bunch of useless slugs who change the flow of time because we wanted a better score on our last session of the latest online game or what have you.

 

[WesteriaVale]

You say time travel has yet to be invented. But say it with me "Time Travel" if it will exist, it DOES exist. Why? Because if some smuck comes back to 2014 to laugh at us, Bam! it exists, but it hasn't been invented yet. Therefore Time Travel either is or isn't. Forever.

Yay.

 

[Fijoli]

Plenty of black holes have been found, and time travel has been taken into accounts ages before the older series of dr. Who.

Now, science is not just theory, sure a lot of it is, but we can't just ignore the facts; black holes are not a theory. What they do, how they exist, where they lead, those are the theories.

http://www.kidsastronomy.com/black_hole.htm

Time travel is a theory because it's not obviously there like black holes, the sun, and this pimple on my face. In fact the key to time travel might be the existence of black holes. Black holes might be the result of time travel gone wrong, that is just my fleeting idea on the matter.

I love the concept of time travel but something in my inner being tells me that only certain types of beings would ever be capable of it and human beings have a loooong way to go.

That's how Fijo thinks. :)

 

[SlamifiedBuddafied]

@Mad Scientist : If by your idea of location, saying that moving back in time but not changing position relative to the surface your on (namely the Earths crust) you could find yourself floating in space since you only effected that small area in which the time module is contained. If this were true, then only a select amount of points would be mathematically available to travel back (or forward) in time if your position had to be relative to where the Earth was at a given point. Of course, I've already lost track of what I'm thinking about.

Time travel just seems like such an overly complicated and convoluted theory that has undergone change from both the world of physics and media (literature, film, games, etc). Many of these ideas have been taken into account by a variety of people seems to be constantly evolving; more so now-a-days due to mass social networking unlike the days of H.G. Wells "The Time Machine" or the early physicists of the twentieth century. But I'm losing myself to rambling, my point is, its a theory that's been taken by the populace and molded into what it is now by seeping through media after being documented and hypothesized by "reputable" physicists.

@Hisoka : Not to be asinine toward your opinion, but why so brooding and dark?

@WesteriaVale : Reminds me of the phrase "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

@Fijoli : Yeah, I think I kinda stretched that out with excessive rambling. Though I do believe as well humanity may achieve time travel to an extent; however, by all theories so far, it just feels that travelling back in time is essentially impossible unless one could reverse the flow of time. But of course, in that statement I could also argue the idea of the universe creating life to observe it in order to have motion or the perception of time. Hence one could claim that time is moving backward but we, as humans (or any other organic creature for that matter) does not or cannot observe time moving in the opposite direction. For all we know this is all going backwards and whatever fourth dimensional being floating around watching us is laughing at our futile attempts in understanding the flow of the universe.

 

[Fijoli]

If anything we may be able to see into the future without having to actually go there and with that, learn to use the here and now to its fullest extent.

This is also me being super hopeful XD

 

[Hatsune Candy]

My problem with time travel is not can it be done, because for one there are actually a ton of theories suggesting that it's possible and I strongly believe that it is. It's that should it be done? If the movies have taught me anything it's that time travel is a very powerful and very dangerous tool to use, and looking at the human race as a whole, we like to abuse power to meet our own selfish needs. I love the idea of being able to travel through time (minus the fact that we're technically already time travelers) just as much as the next guy, but from a logical standpoint I just don't think we deserve that power. Especially when we still don't fully understand what the implications of the ability to move through time are. This is evident by the fact that time travel works differently in every single story that currently exists on the subject.

Another thing to consider is the practicality of time travel. Ya know, besides the omgitstraveltime aspect. What use would we have for such technology? To visit the past? To see historical events in person? I mean, are we really sure that we would want to see such a thing? The past is not a pretty sight, a lot of bad stuff happened in human history. Going back there might tempt people to intervene, and then we run the risk of altering the course of humanity and our present. The butterfly effect is some serious crap, yo. Not to mention that our presence there itself would also change history a fair amount. So time travel to the past is out of the question.

Of course, this doesn't take into account the theory that you can't change time and if we do go back in time, then that has always been what was going to happen. In other words, you can't change what happened or what will happen. But not only does that get extremely confusing it also basically says that we don't have the free will to make our own choices, and we don't know if any of that's true. Do we have free will? Do we really want to take such a risk in answering that question? Do we even want the answer to that question, or are we just happy living in our own little delusion? Think about it.

Okay, so maybe we don't want to travel backwards through time, so what about forwards? Now that just raises a lot of ethnic concerns. Do we possess the right to see our future? Do we even want to know what happens in our future? I've always believed that nothing is set in stone, and by traveling to see our future we would basically be accepting that whatever we see there is what's gonna happen no matter what and that we no say in it whatsoever. If we found out that it's something horrible, like nuclear fallout or whatever, then we would have to accept that that is our future and there is nothing we can do to change it. Like in a lot of movies that I've seen, trying to prevent the future is usually what makes it happen to begin with. So in others words, it goes back to that one question again and whether or not we want it answered. Do we have free will? Time travel, without a doubt, would answer that question for us. So the real question would be, do we want that kind of knowledge? I already know my answer. No, I don't. And I'm sure a lot of people would agree with me.

 

[Mad Scientist]

I came in to express my annoyance of time travel comically, but now I'm just frustrated. Theory is far beyond a hypothesis and the Greek Gods were worshiped by the majority of Greeks THOUSANDS of years ago and even then their scholars knew them better as allegories not fact.

"Scientists can't directly observe black holes with telescopes that detect x-ray, light, or other forms of electromagnetic radiation. We can, however, infer the presence of black holes and study them by detecting their effect on other matter nearby." -Taken by NASA's official website. Which means, black holes are just their best theory on what is happening. There could be something completely different at work there that has the same affect.

And yes, theories are more than just hypothesis. Theories are backed by a certain amount of evidence. Like the theory of gravity. That mass determines the gravitational pull of an object or body.

Which, if true, would mean that if you were in space in a space suit, and had a marble there with you. The marble would be pulled toward you and stick to your body. Assuming you weren't within another greater object for the marble to go towards.

But, you're missing my point. You're picking my words to argue against my meaning. Like, say, if Einstein misspelled the word Relativity on his paper and it was discarded because he made a misspelling.

For hypothesis to become Theories they must have a lot of evidence supporting them. I understand that. But that still doesn't mean that they are Truths. They are just what makes the most sense at the time.

@Mad Scientist : If by your idea of location, saying that moving back in time but not changing position relative to the surface your on (namely the Earths crust) you could find yourself floating in space since you only effected that small area in which the time module is contained. If this were true, then only a select amount of points would be mathematically available to travel back (or forward) in time if your position had to be relative to where the Earth was at a given point. Of course, I've already lost track of what I'm thinking about.

Time travel just seems like such an overly complicated and convoluted theory that has undergone change from both the world of physics and media (literature, film, games, etc). Many of these ideas have been taken into account by a variety of people seems to be constantly evolving; more so now-a-days due to mass social networking unlike the days of H.G. Wells "The Time Machine" or the early physicists of the twentieth century. But I'm losing myself to rambling, my point is, its a theory that's been taken by the populace and molded into what it is now by seeping through media after being documented and hypothesized by "reputable" physicists.

You would be wrong, I'm afraid. No previous point in time would be safe, because it's not just the world that moves around the sun in a certain pattern. The entire galaxy is moving too. Space is expanding, so everything in it is moving too.

In my mind, there is only 1 idea:

1. Build a receiver first, then the time machine. The time machine would send the subject (be it a message, data, or person) back to that receiver. But, you could only go back in time so far as when the receiver was built. So, if in theory that was the only way to safely travel back in time, that would be the reason that no one from the future has visited us yet, we have yet to build the receiver.

 

[Mad Scientist]

My problem with time travel is not can it be done, because for one there are actually a ton of theories suggesting that it's possible and I strongly believe that it is. It's that should it be done? If the movies have taught me anything it's that time travel is a very powerful and very dangerous tool to use, and looking at the human race as a whole, we like to abuse power to meet our own selfish needs. I love the idea of being able to travel through time (minus the fact that we're technically already time travelers) just as much as the next guy, but from a logical standpoint I just don't think we deserve that power. Especially when we still don't fully understand what the implications of the ability to move through time are. This is evident by the fact that time travel works differently in every single story that currently exists on the subject.

Another thing to consider is the practicality of time travel. Ya know, besides the omgitstraveltime aspect. What use would we have for such technology? To visit the past? To see historical events in person? I mean, are we really sure that we would want to see such a thing? The past is not a pretty sight, a lot of bad stuff happened in human history. Going back there might tempt people to intervene, and then we run the risk of altering the course of humanity and our present. The butterfly effect is some serious crap, yo. Not to mention that our presence there itself would also change history a fair amount. So time travel to the past is out of the question.

Of course, this doesn't take into account the theory that you can't change time and if we do go back in time, then that has always been what was going to happen. In other words, you can't change what happened or what will happen. But not only does that get extremely confusing it also basically says that we don't have the free will to make our own choices, and we don't know if any of that's true. Do we have free will? Do we really want to take such a risk in answering that question? Do we even want the answer to that question, or are we just happy living in our own little delusion? Think about it.

Okay, so maybe we don't want to travel backwards through time, so what about forwards? Now that just raises a lot of ethnic concerns. Do we possess the right to see our future? Do we even want to know what happens in our future? I've always believed that nothing is set in stone, and by traveling to see our future we would basically be accepting that whatever we see there is what's gonna happen no matter what and that we no say in it whatsoever. If we found out that it's something horrible, like nuclear fallout or whatever, then we would have to accept that that is our future and there is nothing we can do to change it. Like in a lot of movies that I've seen, trying to prevent the future is usually what makes it happen to begin with. So in others words, it goes back to that one question again and whether or not we want it answered. Do we have free will? Time travel, without a doubt, would answer that question for us. So the real question would be, do we want that kind of knowledge? I already know my answer. No, I don't. And I'm sure a lot of people would agree with me.

There are all kinds of reasons that can justify time travel to be done.

1. Say, we build my Receiver now. Then, 50 years from now they build the time machine. Then, they discover a cure for cancer. They send that knowledge back and save countless lives. This can be applied to anything that takes a long time to discover.

2. Natural disasters. Say another tsunami hits killing thousands. They go back and evacuate and save countless lives.

3. Time-Saving. The world really dies because the sun dies out. Say 500 years from now for pure arguments sake. We spend 500 years searching space for a suitable planet, sector by sector. Impossible to search all space in that time. But, search one direction for 500 years, then go back in time saying, "there's nothing in that section", then 500 years looking in the next one. This idea can be applied to anything time-sensitive.

4. Violence/Accidents. Stop terrorists, school shootings, car crashes, you name it. Save countless lives.

5. My Reason: To see if it can be done. I want to know if we can do it, just to see if we can.

Like I said before, I believe in string theory personally. Paradoxes cannot exist in reality, but many realities can exist at the same time.

 

[Hatsune Candy]

There are all kinds of reasons that can justify time travel to be done.

1. Say, we build my Receiver now. Then, 50 years from now they build the time machine. Then, they discover a cure for cancer. They send that knowledge back and save countless lives. This can be applied to anything that takes a long time to discover.

2. Natural disasters. Say another tsunami hits killing thousands. They go back and evacuate and save countless lives.

3. Time-Saving. The world really dies because the sun dies out. Say 500 years from now for pure arguments sake. We spend 500 years searching space for a suitable planet, sector by sector. Impossible to search all space in that time. But, search one direction for 500 years, then go back in time saying, "there's nothing in that section", then 500 years looking in the next one. This idea can be applied to anything time-sensitive.

4. Violence/Accidents. Stop terrorists, school shootings, car crashes, you name it. Save countless lives.

5. My Reason: To see if it can be done. I want to know if we can do it, just to see if we can.

Like I said before, I believe in string theory personally. Paradoxes cannot exist in reality, but many realities can exist at the same time.

If you're okay accepting that we don't have free will and that everything is predetermined, then I don't see much wrong with those things, except with anything that deals with traveling backwards in time. It is a terrible idea and I can not stress it enough. The butterfly effect is a serious thing. Even if you have good intentions, changing the past can backfire drastically on you by affecting events you would have never considered. All in all, a really bad idea.

There's also still the possibility of power abuse to consider. I know I only touched on it for a little bit, but it's a serious issue we'd have to think about. There are, without a doubt a lot of people out there who would use that technology for their own selfish needs and it probably wouldn't end well for the rest of humanity. So even if most of us want to use it to make the world a better place, not everyone is that kind hearted. In all likelyhood, any time travel would be under strict government regulation to prevent such a thing from happening and it probably wouldn't get used for much as a result, if I know politics any and I'm hoping I do.

 

[Ochalla]

Considering at least in the United States we have a problem with laypeople thinking certain theories are "just" a theory, there's a good reason to argue that a theory is not a hypothesis since it devalues all the work that has been done. Anyone that knows science knows that uncovering the truth, not sticking to previous held beliefs is the goal, but on the flip side you can not throw everything out just to suite your own agenda.

 

[Mad Scientist]

Just for the record, I believe in Black holes and relativity. I'm just saying that I'm open to the possibility that these could be wrong, despite all of the evidence in their favor. I just want people to think outside of the box here.

And as to free will, I believe in that too. If free will didn't exist, you wouldn't be able to alter the past by telling someone to go a different path. In the original timeline, which would be this timeline, you are free to do whatever you want. And if a time traveler went back to alter the course you would be going on, free will is still there. One would argue if you didn't have free will, then you wouldn't be able to alter your path to prevent a certain even?

And another thing. The Butterfly Effect is here, whether you go back in time or not. What causes accidents? Events that line up in a particular way to cause a chair reaction. Hell, weather is in itself a prime example.

And one MORE thing, as to my thoughts about location and the need for a receiver, I have thought of a name for this: Locality Conjecture.

 

[Mad Scientist]

There's also still the possibility of power abuse to consider. I know I only touched on it for a little bit, but it's a serious issue we'd have to think about. There are, without a doubt a lot of people out there who would use that technology for their own selfish needs and it probably wouldn't end well for the rest of humanity. So even if most of us want to use it to make the world a better place, not everyone is that kind hearted. In all likelyhood, any time travel would be under strict government regulation to prevent such a thing from happening and it probably wouldn't get used for much as a result, if I know politics any and I'm hoping I do.

Sorry, I forgot to throw my feelings on this part too. Here it is:

Of course abuse will be a major problem, since any time machine would be in the government's hands. But, you must consider this people: There are entire divisions in most of the main World Powers with scores of scientists devoted to proving time travel is possible. Russia, America, Sweden, Norway, China, Japan, England. They are all trying to unravel this. So, it's not really "should we or should we not?", it's "can we before they can".

Think of the Nukes. Such a powerful weapon as the nuclear bomb can only really be countered by having the same threat. Russia won't launch a nuke at us, because we can launch one right back. This is the same concept. This is an arms race for time-travel. If we choose not to at least have one when one of the others do, no one has a chance against them.

And by time travel, I mean sending data and information through time. That is more likely in realistic means than sending living matter.

You guys may take this conversation as being light-hearted, or perhaps comical. In all actuality, if they do figure out how to do it - and they are trying - whoever develops it first will have the world at it's fingertips.

 

[Hatsune Candy]

And as to free will, I believe in that too. If free will didn't exist, you wouldn't be able to alter the past by telling someone to go a different path. In the original timeline, which would be this timeline, you are free to do whatever you want. And if a time traveler went back to alter the course you would be going on, free will is still there. One would argue if you didn't have free will, then you wouldn't be able to alter your path to prevent a certain even?

And another thing. The Butterfly Effect is here, whether you go back in time or not. What causes accidents? Events that line up in a particular way to cause a chair reaction. Hell, weather is in itself a prime example.

You kinda forgot the point that I was trying to making in the first place. I believe in free will too, but I also believe in paranormal activity, that doesn't mean either one exists. One theory is that any time travel that will be done, has been done. So if someone travels back in time and alters the future, that has always been what was going to happen and they actually wouldn't be changing anything at all. The question still remains in whether or not we want to prove that theory. Some might want to, but others would be more than happy to live a delusion thinking that they have the freedom to make there own decisions, like the way we do currently. I'll have to admit, this theory makes the most sense, our present could just be someone else's past and vice verse. Whose to say that our present is the present that the universe is solely focused on. It's just like when humanity used to think that the Earth was the center of the universe, a highly unlikely and self centered theory. And the only way we are to know the truth is to see it for ourselves, but unlike with the Earth, we have to consider whether or not we even want to know the truth. It's a lot more to take in and most people might not be able to accept it.

Then there's also the possibility that that theory is wrong and we can change the past. I realize the butterfly effect is a real thing that happens everyday, that only proceeds to help me make my point better. It's just that with time travel, the butterfly effect is a lot more disastrous than the everyday butterfly effect. Would we really want swap out a relatively small disaster for a catastrophic event that could potentially destroy human life as we know it? I'm under the belief that (most) things happens for a reason and if we could go back in time and stop something that was meant to occur, all hell would break loose. Say we go back in time and stop 9/11 from ever happening (I'm sorry, but it was the only example I could think of on such short notice). Okay, so the twin towers are fine now, whose to say the terrorists won't just try again? But on something else, like say... The White House. The government gets destroyed, country falls in turmoil, society starts to fall apart, the terrorists win, you get the idea. And if we go back in time and try to stop that from happening, it would only further disrupt the future of humanity. It's a bit of an extreme example, but it gets the point across. Even something as simple as our presence in the past could change the future in big ways and would essentially be unfixable because any attempt to go back and fix it would alter the future even more. And if you're sticking with the theory of multiple timelines and whatnot, it doesn't matter, because you'd be stuck down that path you created along with the billions of other people in that alternate timeline.

So yeah, like I said before, traveling to the past is a very bad idea. And I'm not even touching on whether or not we have the right to change the past in the first place, because that's an entirely different thing altogether and I'm getting tired of talking.

 

[Mad Scientist]

But some things change with my Locality Conjecture. In my theory, time travel cannot be achieved without having built a receiver for the data/persons traveling. Once the receiver is built, it will then close the time-loop allowing time travel to be possible. That would explain, as I've said before, why time traveling hasn't be done yet. It would then only allow travel to the date the receiver was built or after.

I agree with you on whether this is the alpha time-line. For all we know, it could be a parallel universe. And altering things in the past would be dangerous. I'm aware of how dangerous that is. I still want to try it, though. Heck, all this stuff is the reason I'm in college right now. :D

 

[Kitty]

I'm in agreement with Ocha about one thing. Don't diss scientific findings yo, don't just throw shit out the window. Even when scientists find that they are wrong, there is still some truth to their findings in most cases. Obviously people try to stay away from uneducated guesses in the scientific field.

Also time-travel is a boring thought to me personally. I live in the present, I focus on myself now. Past is past, I'll learn from it but I don't need to know all the details. I just thought I'd give some food for thought here

I might mention lastly that time isn't necessarily a 'flow'. As someone highly into astronomy I see where you are getting your thoughts based on black holes, but you must also realize that our "study" of black holes is so weak and flimsy because we can't even get remotely near one that it's mainly all observation on light from a really long distance. Basically my point in this is it's a pathetic study and maybe you should focus on humans to get your time ideas. Currently black hole theories are getting ripped to shreds, especially after Stephen Hawking finally said his fire-wall theory had been proved wrong.

But, anyway, The reason I say this is because humans made up time, so think about this, have you ever been in danger before? I've been face-to-face with death twice. Time slows because our brains take in more to keep away from threat. I have been in an instance where time has been slow to me. As you age, scientists have discovered time can speed up for the very old. You begin to forget what day it is, month, year. Truthfully it doesn't matter.

Although I am no scientist, and nothing more than someone who has a hobby, I figured I had some ideas of what to give back to you who may be interested in time travel. You may also be interested to know if you accept the theory of linear time then you are time traveling forward along that line as we speak, so congrats. But to those who may want to reconsider time and look at other theories on it, there are some great youtube messages and I think "Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman" may have done something on it before.

Anyway yeah that's it from me, just thought I'd give you guys something to talk about.

 

[Mad Scientist]

Speaking of Stephen Hawking, here's some interesting news, even though it's a few years old.

There are massive machines called Particle Accelerators, which launch subatomic particles at high velocities. Not only are they attempting to break the Faster than light Barrier, but attempting to crash two particles together to recreate a miniature universe (recreating the Big Bang) and Black Holes.

Concerning this; the fact that they will eventually try reproducing a black hole in studies to see if superstring theory is accurate, public safety concerns have been voiced.

Top scientists, namely Stephen Hawking being one claim that if black holes are produced, it is theoretically predicted that such small black holes should evaporate extremely quickly based on Hawking's research, but which is as yet experimentally unconfirmed. Thus if stable micro black holes should be produced, they must grow far too slowly to cause any noticeable macroscopic effects within the natural lifetime of the solar system.

Using black holes, with their signature gravitational and emissions coupled with a strong magnetic field has been a reoccurring hypothesis in time travel. That and wormholes.

Just food for thought that they're trying some dangerous shit already.

Here's an aerial view of one of the Particle Accelerators:

 

[Hatsune Candy]

Yeah, particle accelerators are kinda awesome. They were originally made to better understand particle physics, but now they're being used to discover all sorts of things. Like how time flows slower for an object the faster it's moving, because particles traveling at high speeds would have a longer half life then stationary particles. And as I recall the whole concern about them was that there was the possibility that they could make miniature black holes and destroy the entire world and whatnot. Which is kind of a silly thought nowadays, I mean, that black hole thing stopped being a real concern several years ago. Through apparently with the higher energy accelerators being made in the future it's starting to become a concern again.

Also, the thing about wormholes is they're extremely unstable and microscopically small. The only form of energy that would be powerful enough to make them travel safe and big enough to fit through is antimatter. And we don't even know if antimatter exists, let alone how to make some. Heck we're not even sure if wormholes exist. I like to believe that they do, but there's not much evidence to back up that belief.