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View Full Version : If time machines were feasible...


53v3N
2008-12-15, 05:00
Wouldn't we have been visited by future people by now - OR - if our time was really that boring, people in the past probably would have been visited by future people, in which they would have most likely written down accounts in history books?

Or do we have to die first, and then be visited by future people? But in that scenario, it would it not just seem like we are living like now?

Mantikore
2008-12-15, 09:51
whut?

53v3N
2008-12-15, 13:58
whut?

If time machines were possible, wouldn't we have already been visited at least once in history from some people in the future, or doesn't it work like that?

Mantikore
2008-12-15, 14:24
well, we could or we could not. but if something is impossible then whats the point in discussing it?

bobfish
2008-12-15, 20:55
If they cand bend time, they can probably bend space around themselves to avoid being seen. 1st rule: don't change the past.

twotimintim
2008-12-15, 20:57
Wouldn't we have been visited by future people by now


I am from the future :)

53v3N
2008-12-16, 03:05
well, we could or we could not. but if something is impossible then whats the point in discussing it?

Well that's what I'm saying, it most likely is impossible, or else we would have seen people from the future by now, or at least some documentation of such from the past.

53v3N
2008-12-16, 03:05
I am from the future :)

Okay Jimbo (Twelve Monkeys).

The Chip Shop Guy
2008-12-17, 00:41
Parallel universes and what not.

Also here's a wikipedia article on time travel: LINK (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_travel)

Midge
2008-12-17, 01:15
Okay Jimbo (Twelve Monkeys).

I only came here to comment on the fact how I enjoy someone making a Twelve Monkeys reference.

xenosss
2008-12-17, 01:25
And this is the same question raised in the 1950s against aliens existing (Fermi paradox). The problem (situation? thing?) is, if the science is conceivably possible, then someone somewhere will always be trying for it.

CaptainCanada
2008-12-17, 04:49
Split timelines solve all problems concerning time travel. Except for the fact that it isn't possible.

L'Explorateur
2008-12-17, 06:54
The scientists who believe time travel is possible normally think that time travel to the future is theoretically possible (traveling at the speed of light), but time travel to the past is not.

Agent 008
2008-12-20, 19:06
How about you try to commit quantum suicide - if it works and you find yourself not being able to die, you may prove a very important theory.

Or you may die. In which case you will remain undead (not alive and not dead) until someone discovers you.

Or not, in case both theories are wrong.

killallthewhiteman
2008-12-22, 07:59
time travel is impossible because time is cyclical.

simple.

Can Dardin
2008-12-23, 01:22
if you were to go into the past then you'd create a paradox and not have been able to have gone into the past in the first place. Going into the future, your knowledge about the future, upon coming back will have changed the future, so the future you know won't exist.

Then again, there's the way of thinking where if you go into the past, then you're already feeling the repercussions of what you did in the past. That, though is a very roundabout way of thinking and i quite like the paradox idea better because then people would have all sorts of weird memories about the things that would have happened because of your going into the past. That would also change the future and therefore the present.

So really all im trying to say is that time travel makes no sense.

L'Explorateur
2008-12-23, 02:25
So really all im trying to say is that time travel makes no sense.

It makes more sense if you can fathom the idea of each person's reality being only a thread in the forum of everything. What is said in one thread does not necessarily affect another.

Agent 008
2008-12-23, 09:58
It makes more sense if you can fathom the idea of each person's reality being only a thread in the forum of everything. What is said in one thread does not necessarily affect another.

Unless you break one of the rules and get banned for what you said in one thread, and therefore can't contribute to the other threads.

L'Explorateur
2008-12-23, 15:55
Unless you break one of the rules and get banned for what you said in one thread, and therefore can't contribute to the other threads.

Well in that case it would seem logical to make another username :)

Lucid Dreamer
2008-12-24, 07:21
Most scientists have agreed that time traveling through the past would be impossible because of this time paradox. Albert einstein however believed that time travel into the future was probable if one could manage to travel faster than the speed of light, only problem is thats impossble :-p

Jazzy_Ways
2008-12-24, 10:46
They would only be able to go back as far as the time machine was created.

L'Explorateur
2008-12-24, 18:29
Most scientists have agreed that time traveling through the past would be impossible because of this time paradox. Albert einstein however believed that time travel into the future was probable if one could manage to travel faster than the speed of light, only problem is thats impossble :-p

First of all, he says you have to be going AT the speed of light, not faster.

But have you ever heard of a tachyon? (only theoretical, but relevant)

willancs
2008-12-24, 22:08
Or do we have to die first, and then be visited by future people? But in that scenario, it would it not just seem like we are living like now?

You lost me at this point.

twotimintim
2008-12-25, 10:04
Split timelines solve all problems concerning time travel. Except for the fact that it isn't possible.


Yeah doesn't E8 predict this or something?

Jihad
2008-12-25, 17:44
What about alien abductees and people that have seen UFOs? Couldn't they just be humans from the future and not aliens at all?

Also I just watched Timecop with jean claude van damme and it didn't make any sense.

Lb13
2008-12-29, 09:30
john titor.

well in the show "lost" season four, a character named desmond travels from 2004 back to 1996 back and forth in flashes. his body remains in 2004 but he looks like he is stuck like if he was on drugs. with his eyes open and standing without moving but his mind/spirit/soul/conscience or whatever travels back to his 1996 body. when it goes back to 2004 his 1996 body stays still frozen like.

besides if anyone did travel back in time to us would you believe him? why would he tell us? well what if jesus was a time traveler? or like the other guy said, what if aliens are actually human species that are millions of years evolved past us? which would explain their small bodies. if they are technologically more advanced then they wouldn't have the need for big strong bodies just big massive heads because they are far more knowledgeable than what we are capable of. what if they are time travelers.

Sentinel
2008-12-29, 17:03
Or...what if time travel has no bearing on the future or past of the world? I.e. you could invent a time machine, go back in time, kill your grandfather, then travel back to the present day and visit him in the nursing home. Time travel, if it were possible, does not necessitate traveling backwards in our OWN existence; merely experiencing and seeing a mirror of what it was like. Sure, we could interact with it, but it would have no bearing on the current world line of the universe.

Agent 008
2008-12-29, 22:39
Or...what if time travel has no bearing on the future or past of the world? I.e. you could invent a time machine, go back in time, kill your grandfather, then travel back to the present day and visit him in the nursing home. Time travel, if it were possible, does not necessitate traveling backwards in our OWN existence; merely experiencing and seeing a mirror of what it was like. Sure, we could interact with it, but it would have no bearing on the current world line of the universe.

What if you never went back?

That means, a time machine would essentially mean that we'll be able to make "checkpoints".

I.e., I have an important decision to make. Instead of making a decision, I go one hour back in time, and make the decision in that alternate reality. If it turns out that that decision leads to something bad happening, I go "back" to the future (which is the past now), then go back an hour again, and try a different decision.

You can have several checkpoints this way, as long as you remember where you travelled in what reality.

Lb13
2008-12-30, 11:04
Or...what if time travel has no bearing on the future or past of the world? I.e. you could invent a time machine, go back in time, kill your grandfather, then travel back to the present day and visit him in the nursing home. Time travel, if it were possible, does not necessitate traveling backwards in our OWN existence; merely experiencing and seeing a mirror of what it was like. Sure, we could interact with it, but it would have no bearing on the current world line of the universe.

that reminds me of the star trek simulation room. that would be very cool.

Sentinel
2008-12-31, 07:29
What if you never went back?

That means, a time machine would essentially mean that we'll be able to make "checkpoints".

I.e., I have an important decision to make. Instead of making a decision, I go one hour back in time, and make the decision in that alternate reality. If it turns out that that decision leads to something bad happening, I go "back" to the future (which is the past now), then go back an hour again, and try a different decision.

You can have several checkpoints this way, as long as you remember where you travelled in what reality.

That would be fucking sweet. I always wanted to have a ctrl-Z in real life! You could fuck a hot girl, find out she has AIDS, then ZOOM! back to the night before!