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Is Traveling Back In Time Possible?

st-t-toat

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one of godel's solutions to GR admits closed timelike curves, which allow the possibility of backwards travel in time?

however, closed timelike curves of causally-connected events appear to preclude any physical means of determining
whether a given event, in the series of events defined by the curve, happened earlier or later than any other -
perhaps rendering the question of past present & future, and travel between them, semantically moot?

godel's universes are deemed ... "exotic";
 

Fluffywolf

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Interesting lecture. It made me think of something unrelated though quite peculiar.

Thoguht: The event horizon of a black hole is made up of an extreme amount of invisible light.

Reasoning: the exact moment anything capable of relfecting light that passes the event horizon, the event horizon (beyond the point of no return where even the speed of light can no longer escape from) captures that relfected light indefinately on the event horizon, as it is the moment where the speed of light is not sucked into the black hole nor able to escape the black hole. So the event horizon of a black hole would be extremely bright, but only visible when you are exactly on the event horizon.

As for time travel, I like the type two time travel far more than the type one. And on that I also had an idea.

So they couldn't reproduce the grandfather paradox because the photon always deviated from its final destination of destroying itself, whatever that meant, but you could still theoretically send a message back this way through measuring how many photons you send back and/or how much time inbetween. Or whatever code you apply to it. And then act upon that sent information and still cause a grandfather paradox. So how would that work?

Of course they'd fist need to be able to send photons back more than a billionth of a nanosecond to do that but you see the issue.

Even if the photons themselves can not change through time travel and need to be in the same state, an array of photons can still relay a message.
 

st-t-toat

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Interesting lecture. It made me think of something unrelated though quite peculiar.

Thoguht: The event horizon of a black hole is made up of an extreme amount of invisible light.

Reasoning: the exact moment anything capable of relfecting light that passes the event horizon, the event horizon (beyond the point of no return where even the speed of light can no longer escape from) captures that relfected light indefinately on the event horizon, as it is the moment where the speed of light is not sucked into the black hole nor able to escape the black hole. So the event horizon of a black hole would be extremely bright, but only visible when you are exactly on the event horizon.

neat! i think that may be called a photon sphere?

Photon sphere - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

there may be a thread covering black holes, elsewhere?

As for time travel, I like the type two time travel far more than the type one. And on that I also had an idea.

So they couldn't reproduce the grandfather paradox because the photon always deviated from its final destination of destroying itself, whatever that meant, but you could still theoretically send a message back this way through measuring how many photons you send back and/or how much time inbetween. Or whatever code you apply to it. And then act upon that sent information and still cause a grandfather paradox. So how would that work?

Of course they'd fist need to be able to send photons back more than a billionth of a nanosecond to do that but you see the issue.

Even if the photons themselves can not change through time travel and need to be in the same state, an array of photons can still relay a message.

i suspect i'm a Type 1 sort-a guy, given the mutiverse and all that?

i have to pass on your second idea, though, sorry;
 

Fluffywolf

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neat! i think that may be called a photon sphere?

Photon sphere - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

there may be a thread covering black holes, elsewhere?



i suspect i'm a Type 1 sort-a guy, given the mutiverse and all that?

i have to pass on your second idea, though, sorry;

Type one is pretty boring though. Because it can only affect your future, but never your past. Type two, if possible to crack the paradox, would essentially mean that you can simply receive information that can save the world and make you rich at the time in your life of your choosing, and once you received that information, there isn't even a need to bother sending it again in the future! It's perfect.

So I wonder why you'd pass on my second idea. It would be the most effecient method of time travel out there.

Of course it's going to be impossible if they can only send photons back in time in a closed loop a billionth of a second, but hey if you can send a particle back in time a billionth of a second, then why wouldnt it be theoretically possible to send multiple particles back say, a day into the past in the form of an encoded message. The sheer potential power is mind boggling!

Or even better. Send photons back in time in computing so you can make the biggest calculations and get the answer before you even need to input the calculation. You could make a time-quantum computer super AI!

The only downside is that it is way more scary than type 1 time travel, because we'd never be influenced by type 1 travel as it can not change our world by definition. But type 2. Very scary.
 

Mole

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Frankly I think is travelling back in time possible begs the question of what is time?
 

Mole

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I think the question assumes time is a constant when it is a variable.
 

ilikeitlikethat

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I think the Holy Bible and other ancient texts and gods/ancient aliens; could be proof of time travel.
 

ilikeitlikethat

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According to entropy, if you were able to travel back, you'd arrive in a parallel timeline; so feel free to murder your grandfather as a child and stay rest assured that you won't compromise your own existence in doing so.
 

ilikeitlikethat

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I guess it all comes down to Schrödinger's cat and in the past the future of your grandfather is and isn't always dead and you are from the one that had your parent and had you. Entropy dictates the odds are going to be in your favour on the young grandparent homicide front considering 'now' is made up of a sequence of events that may or may not have happened; Entropy thinks that 'now' is a result as spontaneous as lightening.
 

Forever

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According to entropy, if you were able to travel back, you'd arrive in a parallel timeline; so feel free to murder your grandfather as a child and stay rest assured that you won't compromise your own existence in doing so.

Entropy is simply more disorder in matter is preferred. How does that translate going to a parallel timeline?

such reasoning is suspect as even if it were to murder another individual
 

ilikeitlikethat

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Entropy is simply more disorder in matter is preferred. How does that translate going to a parallel timeline?

such reasoning is suspect as even if it were to murder another individual

Because in order for your timeline to be yours, everything must happen as it did; But what are the chances of that happening again if you were to travel to past?
It'll be the past, where things are happening but not as they did in your timeline.
So one version a girl wears a pink hat, another, she wears no hat.
 

Mole

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Good science fiction is based on scientific facts. And travelling back in time is not based on scientific fact, but on fantasy. On the other hand, travelling forward in time is based on the scientific fact of relativity, and can be good science fiction.
 

Little_Sticks

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In theory, if time went backwards, we'd still think it was going forwards, because that's how we see it.
 

Doctor Cringelord

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Forgive if someone already made this point.

I was having a vent discussion about time travel with another member (can't remember which) and we agreed that to travel through time would be deadly without being able to account for and adjust for the movement of the cosmos. One could easily end up floating in outer space, or in the center of a star or asteroid.
 

Doctor Cringelord

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Because in order for your timeline to be yours, everything must happen as it did; But what are the chances of that happening again if you were to travel to past?
It'll be the past, where things are happening but not as they did in your timeline.
So one version a girl wears a pink hat, another, she wears no hat.

I read a short story about corporate raiders using time travel to expolit the past. It never had an effect on their own present because everytime they changed the past, a new alternate timeline split off from the point of interference..

What if traveling back was possible but it proved nearly impossible to travel back to the correct future timeline?
 
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