Time Travel: 100% Possible, or the Fevered Dream of a Madman?

[JTG of the PRB]

Poll question: Time Travel: 100% Possible, or the Fevered Dream of a Madman?

What do you think, Loungers? Will man someday have the capacity to travel through time freely? Is time like a river, or is it a fixed line in the Universe? Is time travel possible with the right technology, or would the potential paradoxes of altered timelines be enough to tear the very fabric of existence asunder and reduce everything that ever is and shall be to nothingness?

Let me hear your thoughts!

[Richard Steele]

1. Time is an illusion, albeit a persistent one.

"Time" is a fiction created by the mind, to compensate
for its inability to understand everything all at once.

[Aristus]

2. Time is an illusion; lunchtime, doubly so.

B-)

[Dr. Strange]

3. It must be a Thursday...

I could never get the hang of Thursdays.

:thumbsup:

[Aristus]

10. I know...

Wretched, isn't it?

[trof]

67. Here's what I've learned.

If I always do Thursdays AFTER Wednesdays, but BEFORE Fridays, I can keep up.
Otherwise it's just a chaotic muddle.
Hope this works for you.
;-)

[JTG of the PRB]

4. An excellent answer, I must say. I applaud you!

However, were time not an illusion, would it be a straight line- rigid with fixed points - or would it be like a river - more fluid, flowing through Existence - and would travel to different points of the straight line/river be possible?

[Richard Steele]

13. It's a big wobbly ball made of timey-wimey stuff.

Personally, I believe that their are an INFINITE number of realities,
that every possibilty which is realized creates its own universe.

But they aren't separate and distict- they're all mixed up and interacting,
a vast ocean of "reality soup" that we are all SWIMMING in.

We, every one of us, cross the lines from one reality to the next a dozen times a day.

[JTG of the PRB]

14. Ahh... I agree with you 100%!

I am under the impression that anything that CAN happen DOES happen, in an alternate universe. As our personal choices define our existence and, to an extent, the existence of those around us, those actions ripple throughout reality and create windows and doorways to other realities that can spring to existence with the actions of others.

[Westegg]

70. I, too, agree...

...but I'm still not certain that it won't be possible to visit some of these INFINITE realities.

Just holding out hope for the insanely impossible, I guess. But then, that sorta sums up my life so far, in THIS reality.

[Kat45]

82. An artificial construct, here on earth.

[laconicsax]

5. Time travel is a reality on two different levels

You are in Colorado (unless your profile lies), I am in Oregon. If you called me right now, you'd be calling from an hour in the future. I could ask you questions about what happens at 8:15 PM and you could answer honestly, since you have already experienced 8:15 PM and I still have to wait about 15 minutes, whereas whatever you describe to me happened 45 minutes ago for you.

There's also some kind of time travel something in quantum theory that I won't even pretend to understand. Something about measuring particles and by definition, measuring the particles changed something about them when they were created--actively changing the past or something like that.

[JTG of the PRB]

8. I suppose I can count that.

Although, that sort of time travel only exists in one direction and because of the somewhat arbitrary existence of these so-called "time zones." All of existence is a time zone; it just matters on where the sun is in relation to your position on the planet.

As for me calling from the future, that could work... But suppose you called me at 7:15pm Oregon time to tell me what would happen at 7:15pm. As I would have already experienced the events of 7:15pm an hour earlier, my version of the events at 7:15pm would be different than your own.

Wow. My head is starting to hurt. This thread is working!

[laconicsax]

15. That's nothing

If you would acknowledge simple existing math proof that 4 harmonic corner days rotate simultaneously around squared equator and cubed Earth, proving 4 Days, Not 1Day,1Self,1Earth or 1God that exists only as anti-side. This page you see - cannot exist without its anti-side existence, as +0- antipodes. Add +0- as One = nothing.

http://www.timecube.com/

Gene Ray, making Lee Mercer Jr. look overly coherent for however many years it is in cubic time.

[JTG of the PRB]

16. Wow. I think my brain just exploded.

Those are some intense theoretical theories on the theory of time and existence.

[Greyskye]

26. "making Lee Mercer Jr. look overly coherent for however many years it is in cubic time."

:rofl:

[zingaro]

6. I think the problem is that "time" travel would really be

parallel universe travel, rendering the probability of re-entering an intact present virtually impossible due to the near certainty that any roody-kazoody in a past event in one linear universe would completely alter that universe's present, rendering it's actual presentness something else entirely.

Maybe *shrug* What do I know, really?

[JTG of the PRB]

11. That is a distinct possibility.

The very presence of a person from the future appearing in past events could be enough to create an alternate timeline and, thus, an alternate version of reality. However, were a person to travel backwards in time to merely observe an event - the person remained unseen, did not interact with anyone or anything, did not touch anything, did not say anything, did not die, and returned to the future with the timeline unpolluted - it is possible for that person to return to an unaltered future.

If that person so much as brushed against somebody or drew attention to themselves in any manner, no matter what the outcome of that incident, the timeline would, at least in some small way, be altered, thus creating a new version of reality.

[zingaro]

17. Exactly. No "home" to return to without an intact past.

So, carry a Cloak of Invisibility, keep your mouth closed and it's all good. :)

How many humans could do that? WOULD do that? From a history geek perspective, it'd be cool but from a personal perspective? What a challenge.

[JTG of the PRB]

32. Agreed! It would be next to impossible.

It would be amazing to travel back and observe some of the major events of Earth's history - the construction of the Pyramids, the fall of Rome, the American Revolution... It would be amazing and historically valuable to observe such occurrences in order to understand our own history better, but the risks would be far too great.

[pokerfan]

61. Screw all that. I just want next week's lottery numbers

[zingaro]

7. oops...sorry. Apparently I posted the same thing in two universes.

:hide:

[Rogelio]

9. Time travel to the future is said to be easier

than travel to the past.

[JTG of the PRB]

12. I would certainly agree with that.

If one travels to the future, the timeline cannot be polluted. Who knows? Maybe that person was SUPPOSED to travel to the future. If they were to NOT travel to the future, then that could irrevocably alter the timeline.

My question for that, however, is how is travel to the future possible> If time has not yet reached the future, how can the future exist? The year 2010 is coming up, but as of right now, 2010 does not exist. 2009 does not exist. March 1, 2008, does not yet exist. How could it be possible to travel forward to a time that has not yet happened as of the date you left for the future?

[pokerfan]

62. One way for forward time travel

is to accelerate one's self to relativistic velocities where time slows per the Lorentz contraction (special relativity). What is a few months for you could amount to centuries, millenia or more on Earth.

There are also general relativistic methods involving strong gravitational fields.

[ZombieNixon]

18. Theoretically, if you could fold yourself through the fifth dimension,

it would be possible to go back in time (god knows what kind of technology this would require, though). However, in that paradigm, you could not go forward in time, because folding something only makes the shortest distance between its starting and ending points shorter. i.e. you can't do anything to a single piece rope that would extend its maximum length (short of unraveling it, of course, and doing that to time might be a bad idea :P)

[JTG of the PRB]

20. That certainly lends credit to the idea that only travel backwards is possible.

I like the analogy with the rope representing time. If there is no more rope to travel to, you cannot travel into the future - the rope representing the future does not exist. Like you said, however, folding time would require enormous leaps in technology and probably more than all the energy in the entire Universe to do successfully.

[deucemagnet]

19. Time travel into the past is probably impossible...

...considering that the earth is rotating and revolving around a sun that is itself hurtling through the universe, you'd have to travel quite a distance to reach the point where the past happened, let alone traveling through time itself. Since time slows down as you approach the speed of light, time travel into the future will be possible as soon as we can reach speeds approaching the speed of light.

[JTG of the PRB]

22. The old problem with traveling through space-time and not just time itself.

A very tricky problem to get around. That would require even more in-depth calculations and an even greater energy expenditure.

The slowing of time as you approach the speed of light is interesting. Technically it would create the passage of time, though for anyone in a vessel traveling near the speed of light time for them would slow down - in the rest of the Universe time would remain constant. So the supposed time travel would be more of an illusion of the passengers in the vessel, and not an actual travel through time from Time Point A to Time Point B. Very interesting though...

[Fox Mulder]

21. I think it's possible...

[suninvited]

23. Where is my OTHER vote????????

I NEED my other........vote....

[JTG of the PRB]

25. Time does not allow for the option of "Other.

If you wish to take your complaint up with the Universe, you will need to fill our the Blue form and wait in the "Complaints and Suggestions line."

:P

[suninvited]

31. I don't have a Blue form. All of my forms are pinkish

or Orangish.

And the lines I see are for

"Open" or " Closed"


What should I do now?

[JTG of the PRB]

33. I would suggest you contact the Department of Universial Claims.

They can instruct you where to pick up the blue form. However, their offices are currently closed until further notice. If you would like to take a seat in the waiting area, we will accommodate your request as soon as humanly possible.

[suninvited]

36. I did contact the department of Universal Claims.

They informed me that they were currently out of blue forms. They advised me that I could sit in the waiting area, but did not inform me that their offices were closed. I arrived at that conclusion of my own free will.

NOT Free Willy.

Do not confuse this with FREE WILLY.

[JTG of the PRB]

39. Ah, I understand completely now.

If you would like to attend the 7:00pm screening of "Free Willy" On March 9th you will need to fill our the green form.

[suninvited]

41. And what is this F'ing PURPLE form good for?

Huh?

[JTG of the PRB]

42. The purple form?

I think that's actually an application to work at the Gap.

If you want to apply to work at the Gap, you'll have to get in the Gap line. It's down the hall though the third door on the right.

You'll need a completed blue form to hand in with your Gap application, as the blue form has some important information the Gap will need to consider during the hiring process.

[suninvited]

44. I tried to apply for the Gap, and they wouldn't take the purple form

they claimed they needed a yellow form, and a portfolio.

I had a yellow piece of paper, but I didn't have any pictures.

Besides, I blame the GAP for the anorexic behavoiur of our daughters. Along with OLD NAVY.

THOSE BASTARDS.

[JTG of the PRB]

46. I'm sorry, but if you want to rail against the Gap AND Old Navy...

...I'm afraid you'll need the Chartreuse form labeled EZ23ZXI completed in triplicate.

[suninvited]

48. I have them in QUADRUPULATE

In the Chartueuse form.

I expect my refund promptly
!

[JTG of the PRB]

49. Oh, dear... I'm afraid you're at the wrong window.

If you want a refund, you'll have to get in the Refunds and Open Hostility line.

[suninvited]

53. I waited in that line for two hours

they said that the "unsatisfied" line or the hyperbole 'LINE COULD HELP ME'

The open hostility line was clearly hostile, and they told me to move to the refunds line or the unsatisfied line, which I was unsatisfied with.

What can I do ?

[JTG of the PRB]

55. Well, there is one way...

If you fill out the blue form, we can get this all cleared up in no time.

[suninvited]

56. Don't tease me

with that blue form stuff.

I am way beyond that !

[Critters2]

30. You mean the one about Robb being a time-traveling dingbat?

:shrug:

[FloridaJudy]

24. "The crowds at the crucifixion

Were unreal! And then some lunatic stole the body..."

I'd actually considered writing a science fiction story that started that way, but I believe Micheal Moorcock (Behold the Man) beat me to it. As a life-long SF fan, time travel stories are my favorites.

[JTG of the PRB]

29. They're some of my favorites as well...

...but my brain just won't let go if the paradoxes created in some episodes. If somebody travels backwards in time to change something to make the future better and they succeed, the future has been changed. But if the future has been changed, the need to go back in time to change the past will never have existed, and thus the person traveling back in time from the future will never have the need to go back in time. The journey to the past will never have occurred, the past will not be changed, and the timeline will revert to its original existence, wherein something in the past needs to be corrected, prompting somebody to travel back to change the past to alter the future, and the paradox starts all over again.

It makes my head spin, I tell ya!

[FloridaJudy]

52. Try Alfred Bester's "The Men Who Murdered Mohammed"

For an interesting take on the paradox.

[Inchworm]

27. Mere discussion of time travel affects the Rapture Index

I've always wanted to use "Rapture Index" in a sentence.

:hi:

[TreasonousBastard]

28. If time travel will ever happen, where are all the tourists...

from the future?

[Fox Mulder]

34. Good point...

or maybe they are here and we don't know they're tourists...

[JTG of the PRB]

37. They've probably taken gone to great lengths to blend in with the crowds.

If time travel is possible in the future and there are "time tourists" visiting us, we would probably never know it because they've likely all been screened - both physically and psychologically - as well as given a series of lectures and training sessions on how to "stay out of history's way" (to quote a favorite movie of mine). I'm sure there would be severe punishments awaiting those time tourists who interrupted the events of the pas tin any way, shape or form - that is, if their future hadn't been too drastically altered!

[laconicsax]

51. They're in GD:P, stirring up shit

[Richard Steele]

68. They're EVERYWHERE.

Trust me.

[philosophie_en_rose]

35. Could be mad, in a coma, or back in time. Hard to tell.

[Greyskye]

38. Time travel into the past is absolutely possible:

Just not into your past. The act of time travel itself would create a branching universe - and there is no going back to your "original" universe/timeline. If your technology allowed you to then travel 'back' forward in time :silly: you would be able to stay in your (current) universe of origin. The multi-verse won't let itself be destroyed, there are safety valves.

Oh, and if we ever did manage to do it, we'd need a new vocabulary. :rofl:

[JTG of the PRB]

40. I think our vocabulary is big enough...

It's our BRAINS that are a little too small for all this! :rofl:

[Muttocracy]

43. a repetitive life and the occasional deja vu work for me... nt

[harmonicon]

45. I can travel into the future

hold on....







wait...






yep, here we are! THE FUTURE!!!!!!!!! OMG!!! DU still exists!! So does my couch!! The future rules, dude - the food in my fridge didn't even rot... wow!!

[JTG of the PRB]

47. BLASPHEMER!!!

Time-traveling, space-walking, Universe-altering villain! FIE ON YOU!!!

[harmonicon]

50. You're nothing but a chronomist!!!

ALERT!! ALERT!!

[Solon]

54. Its possible the Universe may correct or prevent paradoxes...

Take the Grandfather paradox, you go back in time to kill your own grandfather before they conceive one of your parents. Let's say, instead of being able to achieve this goal, you are guaranteed to fail, you try to shoot him, and the gun jams, you try to stab him, but you end up tripping and falling, and facing the consequences thereof. Perhaps some "random" events, such as these, aren't as random as we believe.

Another possibility is the correction of paradoxes from the simple fact that the events were supposed to happen in the first place. Call this the "Fry hypothesis" from Futurama, Fry went back into the past, accidentally, and ended up killing his own grandfather accidentally as well. Yet, instead of him ending his own existence, or tearing the Universe apart, he conceives his own father, becoming his own grandfather. The fact is that for his entire life he was his own grandfather, even before he went in time, so when he was thrust into the past to conceive his father, that was supposed to happen and couldn't be prevented. Of course, what this means is that our own past, while considered immutable, was still meddled with by time travelers, its just that, from both our perspective and theirs, no change occurs.

In both instances, time travel to the past is possible, however, in one, you can be an impassive observer, and any attempt to change the past would be met with failure. In the second scenario, you can go in the past, and any actions you take in the past that would have "changed" history were supposed to happen the "first time around", of course, this raises questions of free will, so may be unresolvable.

My brainfarts for the night, after drinking and being tired, now I'm going to bed.

[JTG of the PRB]

57. Ah, an excellent reference to one of my favorite shows!

The paradox encountered by Fry in Futurama is what they call a predestination paradox. The events that happened when he traveled back in time happened exactly as they were supposed to happen, and had anything else happened from what DID happen, the future would have been changed.

The examples you spoke of are from one of the two trains of thoughts regarding time travel. Those possibilities exist in a Universe that will automatically cancel out or negate any changes in the timeline. The predestination paradox is one of those - one traveling back in time will create and change history so that the historical outcomes are exactly what they were supposed to be and nothing else. Another idea along those lines says that there is a slippage created by the Universe that may allow you to go back to the time you intended, but either in a situation or a location that will entirely prevent you from accomplishing your mission.

The article on Wikipedia talks about this time slippage, giving the example that if you were to travel back in time with the intent of killing Hitler, your trip through time may very well be successful, but you would find yourself on a Montana farm in late April, 1945 - in the right time but too far away to accomplish your intended goal of killing Hitler.

I've been poking around this Wikipedia article all night. My brain is starting to hurt, so I think it's time for me to go to bed too. For anybody interested in learning more than you ever needed to know about time travel theories and paradoxes, here is the link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_travel

[laconicsax]

60. "Oh, a lesson in not changing history from Mr. I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"

:rofl:

[FloridaJudy]

64. Do read Heinlein's "All You Zombies"

If you want a mind-bending - and hysterically funny - take on the "I'm my own Grandpapa" time travel paradox.

[Iggo]

66. His "Time Enough For Love" also covers it. (n/t)

[Dr. Strange]

69. A nice story.

David Gerrold's book "The Man Who Folded Himself" is a rather similar story.
Narcissism to the nth degree!

[DarkTirade]

58. Too easy to screw things up.

Even if it's possible I wouldn't wanna mess with it, other than to perheps peek into the future and change things before they happen.

But not too much... bad things can have a good effect in the long run. You never know.

Just for little things, like looking at tomorrow's winning lottery numbers. :evilgrin:

[Jamastiene]

59. I'm time traveling right now.

It was 12:50. Now I'd 12:51 I'm a full minute into the future.

[JTG of the PRB]

63. Kick for the morning crew.

Warning: You may not want to read into this thread too deeply unless you've had several gallons of coffee.

[Iggo]

65. We're all time travelers.

We all travel forward in time at a rate of approximately one second per second.

Pretty impressive, eh?:eyes:

[LSK]

71. I am posting from February 27, 2008

Its the shit over here yesterday!

:hi:

[tekisui]

72. If reverse time travel were possible, I think we'd have seen some

time travelers from the future.

I've never seen anyone from the future before.

[Iggo]

73. Exactly. It never will be possible...

...otherwise future dudes would be everywhere right now.

[JTG of the PRB]

75. Either that, or they've all been diligently screened to make sure they won't change history.

If there were time travelers from the future among us, we would probably never know. They wouldn't want to stick out like a sore thumb - they'd try to blend in, to be the most unassuming people you'll ever see. They would know their very presence could alter the flow of history, so they would take painstaking efforts to hide their presence and where/when they actually come from.

[pokerfan]

79. They are seen all the time!

UFO's are time travelers from our future! The Grays are what Homo Sapiens evolve into. They are fighting a time war with the Shadow People (SP) who are attempting to destroy them by destroying their past which just happens to be our present.

The Grays from their epoch (about 45ky in our future) are too powerful having dominated most of this galaxy so the SP launched the time war. The SP have visited every era of human history and have chosen this one as the most suitable for the destruction of our species. They've been active for about the last 80 years or so and are responsible for the world wars.

Doesn't anyone listen to Art Bell?

[bikebloke]

74. There's an excellent documentary series

All about time travel. It's called Time Tunnel. Tony and Doug prove it's possible. They love brawling with everyone in different time periods.

[Initech]

76. We need a flux capacitor stat!!

Come on, a time travel thread and not one reference to Back To The Future? Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with the lounge today? :evilgrin:

[yawnmaster]

77. Travel to the future is already possible...

To travel FASTER to the future you only need to accelerate to a higher speed relative to the point in space whose future you want to travel.
For instance, if I synchronize two watches and send one up with astronauts in space (since they tend to be the ones that travel at the highest velocities), run them out at a high speed (say to the moon) and back, then compare their watches. You will see that the astronauts watch has lost some time. From the astronauts point of view they traveled to a point in their future (compared to if they had stayed on Earth). The faster they go, the faster into the future they will travel (actually the closer to the speed of light). Since we can only accelerate to a very small fraction of the speed of light, at this time, we can only move a very small distance into the future.

Of course, there is no way back, as we can't travel into the past. On the other hand, you can always view the past! (As long as someone was recording it).

[Deep13]

78. Um, we are in fact travelling into the future, very slowly.

So I guess I have to wonder about that first option.

Time is a basic property of the universe, not merely an illusion created by human perception.

[baldguy]

80. Time travel is magic.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

[Lethe]

81. 100% possible

Our mammalian brains are hardwired to perceive time passing in a positive fashion. That is why a concept of negative time or going back in time is so confusing to us. It is entirely possible, you guys just played too much Super Mario Bros.

There is an infinite cascade of universes, with every sentient being's free will actions for each moment multiplied together against one another. It's like a cartesian product of sentient decisions. (and not only humans are sentient, we are the *most* sentient, be it is a matter of degree....other animals are sentient too)

Going back in time is not that big a deal, it only seems like a big deal because we are biased towards the universe that we inhabit. We think we live in the "one true universe", which is silly. If somehow you went back in time and started altering events, it wouldn't matter, because there already existed an infinite amount of universes, and you would just be living in one of them. If you killed your Grandfather or whatever, you wouldn't die on the spot or anything, because you already existed outside of that universe, and your actions become the future of that universe which you now inhabit. (only one of an infinite amount)

But what do I know? :) :shrug:

[The Inquisitive]

83. I'm doing it right now!

At a rate of 1 second per second that i!!! ... :( ... Damn, my time machine sucks, back to the drawing board...