Speed of light? Time?

[shaffaaf27]

Take this example: A man shoots himself. You see this, and call an ambulance.

If you were travelling faster than light, you would actually see this occur BEFORE it happens. Meaning, you could see him shoot himself before he actually shot himself. You'd call the ambulance before the event actually ocurred. The paramedics would be standing around very confused. As a result, the man just might not shoot himself. Which means you can't have seen it, which means the paramedics wouldn't have come, etc.

but if you were traveling faster then light, then the light would not reech you eyes, and you would nto see the thing even happeneing. aslo if you were to se it, you have to be either stationary or moving extrmemly slowly relative to the speed of light. beuase even if you were traveling at the speed of light, everything would be a blur to you.

 

[Tomobobo]

We know time travel is impossible... because no one has dropped in on us

end of dicussion

-not sure who originally said this

Who's to say you can only travel forward in time, and not back? That would kill your theory right there. That, and the fact that I'm sure if backwards time travel was possible, it'd be highly trivial to travel back to our present time just to say that it's been done.

Besides those things, anyone who did travel back in time would have to go so largely unnoticed by every thing and every person in order to keep the events that led up to the future in tact. It'd be an incredibly dangerous mission to go back in time, you threaten your own existence.

 

[Bowser128]

We know time travel is impossible... because no one has dropped in on us

end of dicussion

-not sure who originally said this

'Impossible' is not a word that should factor in scientific conversations, so let's not go throwing it around.

I have never understood that phrase though, aside from all the other issues with the possibility of time travel at a macroscopic level, the potential universe ending implications and even the interpretive powers of our brains, why would a time traveller want to visit us in this era and say "Hello I'm a time traveller, this is the apparatus I used"? It just wouldn't be a good idea, because their intervention would mean that time travel would be 'discovered' at a different point, destroying the future timeline (consequently the universe

). Even if someone did say/has said that, nobody would listen, they would just put the traveller in an asylum and have done with it.

 

[- Wrath of God -]

Take this example: A man shoots himself. You see this, and call an ambulance.

If you were travelling faster than light, you would actually see this occur BEFORE it happens. Meaning, you could see him shoot himself before he actually shot himself. You'd call the ambulance before the event actually ocurred. The paramedics would be standing around very confused. As a result, the man just might not shoot himself. Which means you can't have seen it, which means the paramedics wouldn't have come, etc.




but if you were traveling faster then light, then the light would not reech you eyes, and you would nto see the thing even happeneing. aslo if you were to se it, you have to be either stationary or moving extrmemly slowly relative to the speed of light. beuase even if you were traveling at the speed of light, everything would be a blur to you.

Well actually, that's not quite right... You see, there would still be light particles hitting your eyes if you were traveling faster than the speed of light. So what you would see would actually be very distorted, but it wouldn't be black like you (or someone else said earlier).

 

[shaffaaf27]

^^

ok but just to tell you light, is not made up of particles, but waves. it is an electro magnetic wave.

 

[skullstatue]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?

 

[Veho]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place.

Indeed. And for that exact reason, we should do all in our power to ban time travel now

 

[Jiggah]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?

There are different theories around this. One requires that you only have one real timeline, which cannot be changed at all (Grandfather paradox). The other is a multi-verse, which when the time traveler goes back he is missing from his timeline and his timeline doesn't not change at all. The moment that time traveler enters the past, he creates a new timeline that coexists with old timeline.

______________he's missing in this one, history cannot be altered.
\________he appears in this one, but the history would seem like it's altered to him.

 

[Bowser128]

ok but just to tell you light, is not made up of particles, but waves. it is an electro magnetic wave.

Photons? I don't suppose you've ever heard of 'wave-particle duality'

 

[AeroScap]

^lol schooled!

 

[skullstatue]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?


There are different theories around this. One requires that you only have one real timeline, which cannot be changed at all (Grandfather paradox). The other is a multi-verse, which when the time traveler goes back he is missing from his timeline and his timeline doesn't not change at all. The moment that time traveler enters the past, he creates a new timeline that coexists with old timeline.

______________he's missing in this one, history cannot be altered.
\________he appears in this one, but the history would seem like it's altered to him.

lol, I've heard of that too. Didn't some guy who predicted an IBM computer say he went back in time, but it wasn't the same time line anymore, so some of his predictions wouldn't come true. I can't remember his name though, pretty funny stuff.

 

[skullstatue]

Ah yes, John Titor was his name. Sorry for the double post

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

 

[- Wrath of God -]

ok but just to tell you light, is not made up of particles, but waves. it is an electro magnetic wave.


Photons? I don't suppose you've ever heard of 'wave-particle duality'

Thank you.

 

[iza]

Yes, in theory, if you traveled faster than light, you'd go back in time. But that's only one of the theories. The prevailing one says that it's very much impossible for a corporeal object to achieve the speed of light, much less go over it. And that's why they are looking into teleportation.


Lets not forget wormholes. That's the most exciting prospect for travelling to other galaxies. Bend a huge amount of space over on itself to bring it close to you and then create a bridge between the two points.

There are a lot of exciting things going on at the moment. They've managed to teleport light particles (but not solid matter).

Right now deep underground in Switzerland (cern), scientists are working on a machine to rip a hole in the fabric of space to create mini black holes. They say it'll help them discover parallel universes.

Sounds safe!

oh yea.. real safe... "news flash: Europe eaten by black hole... asia's desert."

 

[Azimuth]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?


There are different theories around this. One requires that you only have one real timeline, which cannot be changed at all (Grandfather paradox). The other is a multi-verse, which when the time traveler goes back he is missing from his timeline and his timeline doesn't not change at all. The moment that time traveler enters the past, he creates a new timeline that coexists with old timeline.

______________he's missing in this one, history cannot be altered.
\________he appears in this one, but the history would seem like it's altered to him.

I wonder if you have ever read the book timeline, they prove the alternate universe theory by using the double slit experiment, definitely a must read for anyone who is interested in quantum physics.

But the truth is that there are infinitely many factors stopping you from killing someone in the past, it is very hard to alter the present, now imagine applying that same principle to the past.

So I go to kill a czar, his guards stop me or I can't pull the trigger or any other complication we may encounter in our everyday lives. Just because its the past doesn't mean you control all the variables.

 

[- Wrath of God -]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?


There are different theories around this. One requires that you only have one real timeline, which cannot be changed at all (Grandfather paradox). The other is a multi-verse, which when the time traveler goes back he is missing from his timeline and his timeline doesn't not change at all. The moment that time traveler enters the past, he creates a new timeline that coexists with old timeline.

______________he's missing in this one, history cannot be altered.
\________he appears in this one, but the history would seem like it's altered to him.

I wonder if you have ever read the book timeline, they prove the alternate universe theory by using the double slit experiment, definitely a must read for anyone who is interested in quantum physics.

But the truth is that there are infinitely many factors stopping you from killing someone in the past, it is very hard to alter the present, now imagine applying that same principle to the past.

So I go to kill a czar, his guards stop me or I can't pull the trigger or any other complication we may encounter in our everyday lives. Just because its the past doesn't mean you control all the variables.

But the difference is that it would be documented somewhere that a man dressed in strange clothing tried to shoot the czar. If the theory of alternate universes were true then there would be a possibility of you succeeding (since there wouldn't be anything stopping you). And if the theory of only one universe were true, then there would either be documentation of you going back in time or it would work out just so there is none.

 

[Squiffy]

A proposed resolution of these paradoxes is Hawking's "chronology protection conjecture". In this he says that events which cause a paradox to occur are not allowed in the universe.
For example imagine this situation: a billiard ball may enter a wormhole, travel backwards in time and hit itself causing it not to enter the wormhole at all.
The conjecture suggests that the billiard ball may not do this, but may travel backwards in time so that it hits itself in such a way that it still goes into the wormhole, thus resolving the paradox.

To be honest, there are so many causal theories that I think it's too early to "believe" in one or the other. Until we get more experimental evidence, at least.

 

[Caoimhin]

Yeah, but.. Erm.. How are we supposed to experiment with time travelling? Setting the clock two hours backwards?

 

[- Wrath of God -]

1. Invent an experiment to test time travel.
2. Schedule the experiment time.
3. Keep a lookout for the object appearing before you actually conduct the experiment.
4. Conduct the experiment at the scheduled time (or don't if you want to destroy the universe).

 

[skullstatue]

If you go back in time to kill a czar or something. And you succeeded, you wouldn't have a reason to go back in time in the first place. I don't get another thing, if time is relevant to you, wouldn't you hit a "zero point" before time actually started reversing?


There are different theories around this. One requires that you only have one real timeline, which cannot be changed at all (Grandfather paradox). The other is a multi-verse, which when the time traveler goes back he is missing from his timeline and his timeline doesn't not change at all. The moment that time traveler enters the past, he creates a new timeline that coexists with old timeline.

______________he's missing in this one, history cannot be altered.
\________he appears in this one, but the history would seem like it's altered to him.

I wonder if you have ever read the book timeline, they prove the alternate universe theory by using the double slit experiment, definitely a must read for anyone who is interested in quantum physics.

But the truth is that there are infinitely many factors stopping you from killing someone in the past, it is very hard to alter the present, now imagine applying that same principle to the past.

So I go to kill a czar, his guards stop me or I can't pull the trigger or any other complication we may encounter in our everyday lives. Just because its the past doesn't mean you control all the variables.

Just merely being in the past would alter it, unless you were already destined to be in the past, and if you never went back in time then your time line wouldn't exist. So, you see the paradox.