As a layperson, time travel seems impossible to me. Prove me wrong!

Now, I'm just a layperson, not a scientist. If you are a physicist, please prove me wrong (because I really don't know, I'm just guessing) . So, here's what makes sense to me:

There is no time. Time is an illusion created by memory and imagination. Time exists only in the mind. Reality is just eternal now and even that is impossible to pinpoint. The past exists as memory, the future exists as imagination. If you say 'go back in time', wherever you would go, if you could go, it will still be 'now'. So, if you could travel back in time, it would be to a parallel universe identical to this one (whose future could be affected by your deeds in that universe, which would not affect the universe you just left to get there), but that idea presumes that every moment has a parallel universe. However, for that to be true it presumes there is such a thing as an absolute moment, which is impossible given the 'absolute moment' does not exist because an attempt at capturing it changes it and thus the absolute moment does not exist. If it does not exist then the idea of 'parallel universes' is science fiction.

Now, it is talked about (or so I've heard about) time travel in Einstein's relativity but that isn't the kind of time travel we typically think of as portrayed in the book by H.G. Wells "The Time Machine". Einstein's Relativistic time travel is a one way affair and requires speed of light rocket. Now, one could go slower but you'd travel less into the future as you went slower,

https://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/einstein/time/time-machines

Five years on a ship traveling at 99 percent the speed of light (2.5 years out and 2.5 years back) corresponds to roughly 36 years on Earth. When the spaceship returned to Earth, the people onboard would come back 31 years in their future--but they would be only five years older than when they left.

Why anyone would want to do that is beyond me. Traveling in a rocket for 5 years, a lot of crap can go wrong in that time aboard a space craft. Hydroponic space veggies doesn't sound too appealing.

 

It is known as time dilation, and has been proven. That is because time is subjective, and while to them they may have traveled for five years, they are inside the dilation effect so would not directly observe the difference.

This has been well known for well over 50 years. And there is a ton of evidence and research into this subject. But I have no interest in "proving you wrong", you just need to take at least a little time and do your own research.

The very fact that you are calling it "time travel" and not "time dilation "shows you do not understand any of this. And stop with the constant whine that you are just a layperson and do not know or understand any of this. Most of us are laypeople in things like this, but those of us interested in such fields do our own research in order to understand these concepts.

Hell, it was well explained way back in 1980, and by many others before and since.

 

I normally do not use videos, but in this case I do believe there is an exception that seeing is easier than explaining.

 

Your patronizing tone aside,

I didn't ask to be proven wrong on 'time dilation', I asked to be proven wrong on the concept of the HG Wells notion of time travel as portrayed in HG Well's 'time machine". That concept of time travel not the same thing as 'time dilation'.

 

When the subject of time travel is often brought up in conversation, what is usually meant is the idea of getting into a machine and going back in time or in the future, as portrayed in HG Well's "Time Machine".

I have no issue with 'time dilation', which is why a provided the quote.

I brought up the subject of time dilation to distinguish between that and the concept of time travel as portrayed in Well's "Time Machine".

They are not the same thing.

Time dilation is real.

Time travel as portrayed by HG Well's 'Time Machine", I contend is science fiction.

 

That is fantasy and not reality. Nobody really expects time machines, the various forms of faster than light travel, transporters, space craft traversing from one galaxy to another, laser swords, or anything else. It is fiction, a plot device for telling a story and not expected to follow science.

 

I see that you haven't heard that there is a time-reversed parallel universe that was created by the big bang. From our point of view, that universe is in the past, before the big bang. But, from their point of view, we are in their past. Just to inform you, from each point of view time is running forward normally. We just appear in each other's past.

This was in the news recently:
NASA scientists detect evidence of parallel universe where time runs backward

https://nypost.com/2020/05/19/nasa-...medium=site buttons&utm_campaign=site buttons

I don't know if this source is behind a paywall or not but I was able to view it. If you can't read it, then do a search for "time reversed universe" on your preferred search engine.

 

That was my point.

I brought it up for discussion because the astrophysicist Ron Mallet believed it was possible. Because of that, I believed that, well, if he believes it's possible, are there other physicists, scientists, etc., that believe it is possible? Because of that, I explained, in lay terms, why I thought it was not possible and if there were any scientists on this forum who believed otherwise, I ask them to prove me wrong, and to exclude the time dilation phenomenon, because that isn't what is being addressed in my argument.

Please exclude other things in my comment not addressed, thank you.

 

“Not everyone was comfortable with the hypothesis,” -- Peter Gorham

I will accept the hypothesis as something real when it advances past the hypothesis stage.

However, I do accept the premise that strange particles that physics cannot explain have been detected, that much appears to be true, as established in a related article:

https://www.newscientist.com/articl...in-antarctica-cannot-be-explained-by-physics/

 

It largely does not matter, because most people do not take the New York Post seriously. It is little more than a slightly more reputable version of the National Enquirer.



Also, I read nothing in the article that really talks about "NASA". The only individual named is Peter Gorham, and he does not work for NASA but the University of Chicago.

Good rule of thumb, if it is in the New York Post, it is not even really good for wrapping fish in.

 

It was a story run in a lot more sources than just the New York Post. This was just the first article I came across today when I was looking for the story I remember. And it wasn't made up by a tabloid. It happened under NASA no less.

 

Ok, you can be a skeptic if you want to.
(By the way, your news source is behind a paywall, but I remember this news item from several years ago. So, I know it's real.)

Anyway, if time-reversed particles do exist, we just need to figure out how to enter that time stream, then one could time travel by traveling back and forth through time like sitting still on a conveyor belt. It takes you towards a destination.

 

If you want another argument for time travel, then I also did a thread topic about the future affecting the past, many years ago.

Quantum time the future affects the past

 

Our model of physics is that we live in space-time.

That is, time is as much a part of the universe as is distance in any direction. We live in 4 dimensions.

That model has been unassailable for more than 100 years of constant testing by physicists.

The reason for that constant testing is that there ARE known problems with our models of physics, as rationalizing quantum mechanics and Einstein's relativity has not been accomplished.

I mention this primarily as demonstrating a SERIOUS reason for the constant, focused, elaborate work that both experimentalists and theoreticians apply to this issue.

And, throughout that 100 years of constant assault, Einstein's model has proven ROCK solid.

 

Good comments!

Frankly, I'd say we are a LONG way from figuring out how to allow humans to survive in a tin can for 5 years!

There have been attempts to have significantly confined spaces in which a few humans could to try to live here on Earth as experiments for what would be required for space stations, or whatever. Those have not been very successful.

We DO seem to want humans living in such conditions on the Moon and/or Mars. This is one of the real issues, I think.

 

But does it work for the idea proffered in many a science fiction, in terms of a 'time machine' ( other than a rocket ) ?

 

If time travel was possible it would have already happened in the future.A time traveler would have been here already.

 

I'm an advocate of physics. In physics, there are complexities related to relativistic speed/frame of reference as mentioned above, but one can't go back in time. One can only find ways for time to pass at different rates.

For example, time passes at a different rate for Earth's surface than for GPS satellites, and that must be accounted for on your cell phone, or your position would be incorrectly calculated. The altitude of the satellite (which changes due to slightly elliptical orbits) has to be accounted for, too, because proximity to Earth's mass has an effect on time passage.

Theoretical physicists watch for possibilities of going back in time or ways to travel huge distances in short time, or to jump far ahead in time, but it's still scifi so far.

 

It is definitely theoretically possible.

From a practical, pragmatic, and engineering standpoint, however, it is another matter.

 

Even if we (for the sake of argument) accept that as true, there is still no reason that would mean that time travel would be less likely or not possible.

You seem to be using feeling, rather than logic.

 

If you follow that philosophy literally, there would be no reason to do anything, or plan for future causation and act accordingly.

So something tells me that logic fails here.

Um, no.

Just like your future is not 'now', so too your going back in time would not be 'now' either.

 

Um, no.
It seems you are bringing up the paradox issue.

We already do have an answer to this question, if we look on tiny scales in quantum physics. Paradoxes don't happen. They are forbidden. This can lead to some bizarre phenomena that we normally don't see on a macroscopic scale.

 

According to one theory, anti-matter is actually like ordinary matter that is going backward in time.
No one knows if that is true or not.

One way to try to verify that would be to see whether anti-matter experiences the opposite force from gravity - something that has never actually been measured. If it does experience the opposite force, it would be an indication that this theory may be true, at least if the time dilation explanation for gravity theory is the correct one.

If anti-matter is just like regular matter but with a different vector in time, how it behaves would give some indication of the bizarre behavior of time travel on a macroscopic scale. Since cause and effect would not work how people normally expect them to work. Things are correlated with "fate" and seemingly bizarre coincidences.

 

I think one has to be careful about what one might consider "theoretically possible".

As far as I know, there isn't any theory that has a significant following and includes that time travel is possible.

So, I'd love a cite to correct me on that, if you have one.

 

Imagine de-acceleration vs acceleration .


Moi

Proof Atavism Happens​