ON TIME TRAVEL

Tuesday, June 17, 2014 12:07:07 PM

So every now and then I have to listen to some blowhard explain in detail why their time travel theory is the correct one and why even though they have alternate timelines or whatnot there's no paradoxes.

The theories are usually not very scientific. So I am going to be the blowhard today and regale you with why I am right. I've held my tongue for too long.

I support the only theory that not only doesn't have paradoxes, but which we can infer from how time works in the universe and which has mathematical proofs and theoretical evidence.

The way we perceive time is an illusion imposed by our cognitive process. We can only see time flowing in one direction. Time has directionality, and because of that events are not disjointed and have cause and effect. Reverse time also has directionality, and so events should be recognizable when they are played forwards or backwards. Forwards time should see cause go towards effect, backwards time should see effect go towards cause. The cup falls off the table and shatters, the cup regenerates and rises to rest on the table. The events can not change once they were already set in motion - once they are recorded/observed, if you will.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_of_time

We can even demonstrate this with quantum principles. Current quantum measurements can affect and therefore predict the normally random future states of a quantum system and more importantly, VICE VERSA. Essentially, the future effects can resonate through time to leave an imprint upon the current measurements.

http://discovermagazine.com/2010/apr/01-back-from-the-future

Now, let's be fair. Fatalism is obnoxiously anthropocentric - the universe cares not for the arrogance of humans. I am annoyed by those scientists who claim that because more primitive parts of the brain spark before the higher functions in decision making, we aren't really making decisions and therefore don't really have free-will. Poppy cock, as though all of those impulses aren't integral parts of the decision making process. Humans are much more complicated than quanta. But there are certain ramifications of this in regards to cause and effect and the very small scale workings of the universe and time itself. The electrons firing in our brains can be influenced by their future state as much as they can be by their present and past states. Deja vu and Jamais vu.

Of course the only way we could ever see time go backwards, and thus travel "back in time," is either to use video editing, reverse the expansion of the universe, or fall into a black hole (itself a collapsing universe). And if we did time travel, it would already have been an integral part of the events that happened - tracing the pre-existing paths as it were, and that's if it's not just walking backwards from an outsider perspective.

But because black holes are potentially somewhat accessible (or for now they can be simulated), and because we have mathematics, this means we can actually test and prove exactly what I'm saying.

Source: Stephen freakin' Hawking, Albert Einstein, and Science yo!