Question:
What do you think about mankind inventing the time machine for time travel to past or future?
caltam84
2007-07-17 14:40:21 UTC
I think the future invention is great because I can change the unwanted events I have in the past.

However, that level of technology will not occur in a human lifetime.
Fifteen answers:
?
2007-07-24 20:55:09 UTC
Always an interesting question. If we define time travel to mean departure from a certain place and time followed (from the traveller's point of view) by arrival at the same place at an earlier (from the sedentary observer's point of view) time. Time travel paradoxes arise from the fact that departure occurs after arrival according to one observer and before arrival according to another. In the terminology of special relativity time travel implies that the timelike ordering of events is not invariant. This violates our intuitive notions of causality. However, intuition is not an infallible guide, so we must be careful. Is time travel really impossible, or is it merely another phenomenon where "impossible" means "nature is weirder than we think?"



It is sometimes argued that time travel violates conservation laws. For example, sending mass back in time increases the amount of energy that exists at that time. Doesn't this violate conservation of energy? This argument uses the concept of a global conservation law, whereas relativistically invariant formulations of the equations of physics only imply local conservation. A local conservation law tells us that the amount of stuff inside a small volume changes only when stuff flows in or out through the surface. A global conservation law is derived from this by integrating over all space and assuming that there is no flow in or out at infinity. If this integral cannot be performed, then global conservation does not follow. So, sending mass back in time might be all right, but it implies that something strange is happening. (Why shouldn't we be able to do the integral?)



The possibility of time travel in GR has been known at least since 1949 (by Kurt Godel). The GR spacetime found by Godel has what are now called "closed timelike curves" (CTCs). A CTC is a worldline that a particle or a person can follow which ends at the same spacetime point (the same position and time) as it started. A solution to GR which contains CTCs cannot have a spacelike embedding - space must have "holes" (as in donut holes, not holes punched in a sheet of paper). A would-be time traveller must go around or through the holes in a clever way.



The Godel solution is a curiosity, not useful for constructing a time machine. Two recent proposals, one by Morris, et al. [2] and one by Gott [3], have the possibility of actually leading to practical devices (if you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you). As with Godel, in these schemes nothing is locally strange; time travel results from the unusual topology of spacetime. The first uses a wormhole (the inner part of a black hole) which is held open and manipulated by electromagnetic forces. The second uses the conical geometry generated by an infinitely long string of mass. If two strings pass by each other, a clever person can go into the past by travelling a figure-eight path around the strings. In this scenario, if the string has non-zero diameter and finite mass density, there is a CTC without any unusual topology.



The possible existence of time machines remains an open question. None of the papers criticizing the two proposals are willing to categorically rule out the possibility. Nevertheless, the notion of time machines seems to carry with it a serious set of problems...
dimajaguar
2007-07-22 13:23:34 UTC
the time machine would be a remarkable invention, but traveling in time could be very dangerous, because you cannot know or predict the effects of the things you do in the past. One action leads to another, thus creating a chain reaction with immediate effects to the present. On the other hand, traveling in the future would be a good thing, only to avoid great accidents or disasters, but not for small things. If so, life would not have so many surprises!
╡_¥ôò.Hóö_╟
2007-07-25 12:51:17 UTC
Let's for the sake of argument assume such a machine exists. And so you go back to some time in the past. I foresee three possibilities.



1) You find yourself in the past but are unable to interact with anything or anyone in that past. You're only an observer, so you won't be able to affect anything and therefore not able to change the course of history.



2) You find yourself in the past and are able to interact with people and events. However, try as you may, whatever you do, you cannot change the course of history. For example, let's say you want to kill your grandfather so that you will not be born. What will happen is that you don't succeed. No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try,... you just fail again and again and again.



3) You find yourself in the past and are able to interact with people and events. In this possibility, you ARE ABLE to affect events and the course of history. But this will all be in a different universe -- not the universe that you originally are from. Notice that I said "affect" events and the course of history, not "change." Because in that universe, your history is already different. And fixed. You are there only to make it happen, but not change it. In that universe, a person (you) came from another universe and that person (you) affected events.





We have to remember one thing. No matter how clever we are and what machines we come up with -- even time machines -- we still have to obey the laws of the universe. Even the workings of the time machine is dependent on the laws of the universe. The time machine has to obey even the most fundamental of laws: the law of cause and effect. So how can we expect to use a machine that obeys the law of cause and effect to change history (which is actually a chain of causes and effects)? You want to use the law of natural progression to defy the law of natural progression. This universe will not allow it.
It_is_I_Leclerc
2007-07-17 14:47:58 UTC
I don't think we will ever be able to travel through time in that way.



If mankind was going to invent a time machine we would have known about it, someone from the future would have come back in time already. I don't think everyone coming from the future would have been responsible or doing so 'legally'. That would have been a recipe for trouble and by now would have come to light.
angelita
2016-05-21 02:04:23 UTC
Time travel has yet to be understood. At the point in time we are at this moment physicisists have theories but not the glue to connect... not yet. In the future I suspect they may but might find that interference in past or future events will be futile. For us now, we were as a shadow, will be as a dream and all substance, physical mental spiritual exists only in this moment that we live, so maybe they would "travel for fun" for amusement or for lessons to be learned or maybe they do not travel at all because to do so would be so depressing because there would be no way to help or stop the inevitable, so why then bother to identify yourself after awhile you would be seen only as messengers of doom and not welcomed at all.
EL8
2007-07-17 15:22:52 UTC
Actually, science does allow for one-directional time travel, into the future. If you were to leave Earth and travel at high enough speed for several years, you would come back to an time that is well in the future of where you are, based on the time that passed for you. Of course, this is only one-way travel.



Traveling back in time is possible, if you could travel at speeds faster than the speed of light. Unfortunately, this would require an infinite amount of energy, so its not very practical...
threelegmarmot
2007-07-22 15:19:17 UTC
I already have a time machine in my basement. I go down stairs at about 4 PM, surf the internet for what feels like 20 minutes and when I come upstairs it's 10 PM. This kind of sucks because every time I do it I lose 5 hours of my life (16.7 % of surfing is worthwhile).
Bart J
2007-07-17 14:45:07 UTC
Two possibilities:

1. Man will never invent time travel because it violates the laws of physics.

2. Man will invent time travel in the future, but they manage to hide it from us when they visit us from the future (I don't believe this).
anonymous
2007-07-25 11:38:57 UTC
MAN (is going to invent it and has already traveled in time.

There is a perception that the so called "Flying Saucers"

might be the time machines invented by our succeeder and they have travelled back to our age.So don't think Time machines are myth.
aviral17
2007-07-17 15:05:23 UTC
It cud happen in 20 yrs or so.The man just has to understand the basic principle.According to me,we hav to accelerate ourslvs faster than time and that shud help in travelling time
anonymous
2007-07-17 15:04:27 UTC
It is not going to happen. Ever. It is a great plot for science fiction stories but it can't happen. Time always goes forwards.
johnandeileen2000
2007-07-23 14:14:08 UTC
You have answered your own question, it can't happen now or in the future.
anonymous
2007-07-22 02:30:59 UTC
Not likely.
Captain Mozar
2007-07-25 07:56:19 UTC
Remember that TODAY is only yesterday's tomorrow...
anonymous
2007-07-17 14:47:40 UTC
That it will never happen.


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