Day Dreaming is Fun.

ID:37614
 
Dec 26 2007, 7:49 pm (Edited on Dec 26 2007, 7:58 pm)
Keywords: crazy, nutter, timetravel
While spending some time doing a boring task, my mind wondered onto the idea of time travel. In the past, I've always subscribed to the "If it's possible, it probably just branches off". Today, however, I was day dreaming and thought this up. What is the only true time line follows time travel.

I'm not sure how to word that, but the basic idea is that when you travel back in time, instead of branching off the time you arrive, time itself loops, effectively ending the time ahead of you, and resetting the time to you arrive at. Let me make a little chart...




I doubt it is even close to possible that I am right about that, but it is interesting to think about.

That would, however, introduce a problem with bringing energy in from inside the loop to out, so you could just keep doing it over and over again, gaining power each time, thus pulling power from nothing. You could then say, to correct this, it takes all the power existing from the point you want to arive at to go back. Meaning no added energy could be brought back, problem is, you would be part of that energy(and also matter, because it matters too!), meaning that in order to time travel, you need at least one immeasurably small amount of energy/matter more than the universe contains.

Also, if my idea was true, would it not, then, be completely unethical to use time travel at all, considering it would end(not really kill) all lives before hand. It would also suggest that the end of the universe would be unlikely, because it would always get looped eventually(some race or another would invent time travel, and loop it back).

It boggles my mind thinking about it, possible or not.
Dec 26 2007, 7:57 pm
Just due to the fact that your idea allows for the creation of energy, it's flawed. Personally, I don't think that time travel is possible, because I don't believe there's any way to rectify the ontological paradox, but if it were possible, I believe the likely way would be by way of the self-consisteny principle.
Dec 26 2007, 8:02 pm
I edited this in: You could then say, to correct this, it takes all the power existing from the point you want to arive at to go back. Meaning no added energy could be brought back, problem is, you would be part of that energy(and also matter, because it matters too!), meaning that in order to time travel, you need at least one immeasurably small amount of energy/matter more than the universe contains.

So based on that, only matter/energy that doesn't belong in our universe in the first place could time travel(or at least an amount equal to the excess energy).

This would all make an interesting Sci-Fi something or another.
Dec 26 2007, 8:09 pm
I don't like any theory where it requires the universe to "correct" a problem somehow, especially when there's a simpler explanation.
Dec 26 2007, 8:15 pm
Yeah. My theory is mostly just interesting to thinking about. I wouldn't even call it a theory, really. Basically because of the free energy idea. Using my system, it's either free energy or possible in a way that doesn't effect the past, causing a never ending loop. The loop being that the time is reset(by using all the energy in the universe), but no matter/energy is let back, meaning that the exact same events will unfold, leading to time travel again.

Now to write a sci-fi novel based on an even character who wants to break the universe,
Dec 26 2007, 8:15 pm
So, what happens if you moved the whole universe one second into the future. Wouldn't the mass from one second before overlap the mass from one second after? How would that work?

In my opinion, time is very poorly understood, and since we don't really have any way to manipulate it in order to experiment, I don't think our understanding is libel to improve anytime soon.

If you want to talk about weird theories, you should ask me about pocket dimensions sometime.
Dec 26 2007, 8:18 pm
Oh, time travel forward already happens, that's natural. My system would be based on backwards only travel. Forward wouldn't involve traveling at any speed besides 1x.
Dec 26 2007, 8:21 pm
Also, by traveling forward at a leap, whatever it was traveling wouldn't exist between, so if you jumped the whole universe forward one second, it wouldn't change, because it would have spent that one second empty.
Dec 26 2007, 8:25 pm
Okay, so if you travel a few seconds forward in time, you cease to exist for a few seconds. The air then rushes in to fill the void, I assume. Now, when you reappear, you exist again. What happens to the air in the space you just filled?

Same problem happens when traveling backwards in time.
Dec 26 2007, 8:43 pm
He's referring to time dialation, I believe. I wouldn't call that time travel, as it's just different interpretations of the passage of time.
Dec 26 2007, 8:57 pm
If you are going to time travel it has already happened /deep
Dec 26 2007, 9:01 pm
Unless someone from 4952 travels to 2993.
Dec 26 2007, 9:59 pm
This is basically saying that time can only exist for the consciousness of the person/people that would be doing it.
Dec 27 2007, 4:09 am
Pretty much. You would be effectively destroying that time, because no information could be saved(not as in computer information, but as in physical information). You could also look at the timeline as a straight line, without the loop, but resetting at a certain point.

Interestingly enough, there could only be one time travel at a time, because even if two time travel ships tried to leave at the same time, one would be faster, and thus would end the other one.

You could, however have a loop connected inside another loop.

Foomer: As for the whole air thing: Air isn't the half of it, the Earth is moving man, and I mean really moving! Going back even a few hours would likely land you in a mountain or out in space. Or, if timed right, in the center of the Earth.

I have a lot of problems believing that useful time travel is possible. I guess, however, if you could even send radio waves forward or backwards in time it would result in some crazy things. Heck, imagine a through time radio that would allow you to send and receive radio messages sent through it. People 500 years in the future could send us info on new tech and really screw things up for themselves(perhaps this is where the branching theory comes in).
Dec 27 2007, 6:07 am
I like the alternative universe theory.
Dec 27 2007, 7:39 am
Contrary to the popular theory, I've never bought that Time was a tangible (and thus, able to be manipulated) substance/force/whatever...

To me, it's nothing more than a measurement of change...

And to travel "through" it, you need to do one of two things:

1) To go backwards, you need to "reset" every single bit of matter and energy in the entire universe to the exact state it was in at your target time... This includes yourself, though, rendering this an impossibility...

[Edit:] Meaning, I don't believe that Time is somehow "recorded"... There is no such thing as the Past or the Future, there is only the Present, and to visit the "Past", you need to alter everything in the Present to the state it was in... This makes it the new Present, and effectively erases everything in between...

2) Going forwards (faster than the natural speed) is somewhat easier, (though still likely to be very much impossible) as all you need to do is remove yourself from the natural flow of Time, allow it to move past you, and then reinsert yourself when your target time arrives... This is, of course, a one-way ticket...
Dec 27 2007, 10:13 am
I think time can be manipulated in the sense that you can increase or decrease the speed of time within a certain area - however, this is more like adjusting the physics of the area than actually changing time.

Its like the speed of light time dilation stuff - if you put a clock in a ship traveling at the speed of light, time will move more slowly for that one clock than for regular clocks. Its not than time slowed down in the ship, its just that the physics that make the clock run are altered at that speed.
Dec 27 2007, 12:02 pm
SuperSaiyanGokuX wrote:
Contrary to the popular theory, I've never bought that Time was a tangible (and thus, able to be manipulated) substance/force/whatever...

Then you're denying a pile of evidence larger than you cna possible imagine. Even GPS sattelites have to account for time dialation whenever they send signals back down to Earth.

If time is not a dimension, then the theory of relativity would not work, which it does. To deny all the evidence that time changes, include direct measurements, is to simple be naive.
Dec 27 2007, 12:02 pm
Foomer wrote:
than for regular clocks.

There are no regular clocks. It's all dependent on your frame of reference. :P
Dec 28 2007, 5:04 am
Foomer wrote:
I think time can be manipulated in the sense that you can increase or decrease the speed of time within a certain area - however, this is more like adjusting the physics of the area than actually changing time.

So if we just increase it by a negative number, we should be able to reverse time. See, it's just as simple as setting var/timeflow=-1

Problem solved.