time travel [possibilities and impossibilities]

[*puffy* japanisthebest]

possibilities:

if you were going to travel to the past and visit yourself in lets say new year's 2005. you would see yourself before you even travel back in time because in the future you time traveled back to yourself so for the traveler you see yourself when you were younger and to the person who has not traveled[ which is still you] would see you as an older self.

 

 

Impossibilities:

if you wanted to pass away deliberately [A.K.A suicidal person] a different way than usual lets say you travel back in time 10 minutes then you drown your past self that would not be possible because you died 10 minutes earlier so you would not have a chance to go back in time[ even if it was possible your future self is still alive]. Unless you still travel back in time but decide not to drown yourself.

[Airbrush]

If it was possible for you to travel back in time, it would only be possible by entering a parallel universe (like in the series "Fringe"). In that universe there would now be 2 of you, and none of you in the first universe. If you (heaven forbid) murdered your younger self, your older self would not cease to exist, since there would be 2 of you, one from each universe, and only your older duplicate survived.

Edited November 23, 2011 by Airbrush

[Moontanman]

If it was possible for you to travel back in time, it would only be possible by entering a parallel universe (like in the series "Fringe"). In that universe there would now be 2 of you, and none of you in the first universe. If you (heaven forbid) murdered your younger self, your older self would not cease to exist, since there would be 2 of you, one from each universe, and only your older duplicate survived.

 

 

I agree that this is probably the most likely of all the other extremely unlikely speculations on time travel, personally I'll be amazed if time is possible, logically it's impossible to deal with unless you postulate something else that's outside our reality like extra dimensions. I once read another possible way to look at it, if i remember correctly it's like this, first of all time travel is limited to the era that the time machine exists, from the time it is turned on to the time it ceases to exist you can communicate back and forth through time (actual time travel is precluded because you would have to pass through a singularity or a place very close to it and no physical thing can pass this barrier, ok, I have to admit there was a good reason for that but I can't remember it, but anyway say an asteroid hits the Earth after the time machine is turned on, the future can warn the present to evacuate the area, millions of lives could be saved, the asteroid might still hit the earth but the heads up saved the people who would have been killed. So in the future these people would be saved but the machine would allow the "saved" future to give the warning so the people could be saved, the asteroid strikes no matter what we do. I think the communication is one way as well, and it's why we aren't run over by time traveling tourists... it's been a long time since I read it sorry....

[Airbrush]

Interesting comment Moontanman. I've heard something like traveling between dimensions, or universes, or time travel, would require the use of a worm hole. And jumping into a wom hole is like jumping into a black hole. Or you would be converted into energy. Not survivable.

[Latex]

Orbiting a black hole at a safe speed for 10 years would mean that the time on earth would have passed a considerable amount more.

[Locke]

If you time traveled, you would not be able to see yourself. Since time goes slower with less gravity, if you went into space traveling at the speed of light for a few years, and returned it would be 50 (or so) years later, and all of your relatives would be 50 years older while you were only a few years later. I don't know if it's possible to time travel into the past, but it very well could be and then I would agree with the parallel universe ideas.

[*puffy* japanisthebest]

If it was possible for you to travel back in time, it would only be possible by entering a parallel universe (like in the series "Fringe"). In that universe there would now be 2 of you, and none of you in the first universe. If you (heaven forbid) murdered your younger self, your older self would not cease to exist, since there would be 2 of you, one from each universe, and only your older duplicate survived.

thats pretty believable thx

[cowman602]

if you travel very fast, lets say 97% the speed of light, time will begin to slow down for you although you wouldn't notice. I've always wondered about that. right now we could be jumping/skipping in time but because we are all in it no one would notice. but if you looked from the out side in we would be going fast then slow spontaneously. I don't know of any way to test that theory. idk was just thinking lol

[shawnhcorey]

Although speculating on time travel is always fun, it does not seem likely. First, no-one has ever sent anything back in time, not even the small bit. Second, all the equations of physics are symmetrical; they are the same regardless of if you run the forward or backward. Since physics cannot distinguish between the future and the past, the time parameter in all its equations is nothing but a mathematical convenience. Time has no dimension. You can't go back into the past because there's no there to go to.

 

There also seems to be some confusion between general and special relativity. General relativity says that clocks deep in a gravitational well will run faster than those far away. Special relativity says that clocks travelling at high speed will run slower than those moving slower or not at all.