Time travel, removing the paradoxes.

Hi,
I touched on this breifly in another thread and it was suggested it may deserve to be discussed seperately.
Time travel is often dismissed on the basis that it would create a paradox, for example one of which is the well known case of travelling back in time and killing your parents or meeting yourself.
My argument is that we can avoid these paradoxical enigmas by viewing things in a slightly different way. In this version of time travel, the subject himself remains in a fixed point in space and time, whilst it is reality around them that travels back or forward in time.
I believe that this is entirely possible and have been involved in experimental theory regarding this on a quantum level.
Thoughts please.

I believe that once someone initiates the act of "time travel" they effectively leave the arena of space/time. this takes them and their machine out of space (and of course time), into a sort if 'interdimension', perhaps a wormhole? because of the nature of time, there is no single timeline that every being that ever existed lived on, there are infinite amounts of parallel earths experiencing different timelines. What if hitler was never born? there's a timeline for that. what if i time traveled back in time to kill my grandfather? theres a timeline for that. since you enter a different timeline/parallel earth than the first earth/timeline you came from, there are no paradoxes.

I first learned of this possibility from a very interesting interview with a fella named Dan Burisch on Project Camelot. Dan Burisch goes into pretty good detail about the Montauk Experiments (accidental time travel in PA) and explains how it works. He also gives up some real juicy stuff when he starts talking about who the real visitors at Roswell are. (time travelers)

One thing that is pointed out in Dan's interview: once you leave your first timeline(the timeline you were born on) you can't go back to the exact same one. Since you left, and there are INFINITE timelines available, it's nearly impossible to pinpoint one timeline in particular...so you are forced to re-enter a timeline that seems MOST similar to your original one.

highly recommend the interview, he's a smart guy but the subject usurps any mortal really.

reply to post by Moonbeast1111


I'm not sure how that theory would remove paradoxes, specifically the grandfather paradox. I subscribe to the alternate timeline theory where you can indeed bounce around in time, but any changes you make will not reflect in your own timeline, rather, they would create separate time lines. If you go a step further and suggest that time is actually static, and that all possible events have already played out in alternate universes, you wouldn't even be creating new universes or timelines, you'd merely get to experience them.

I think quantum physics talks about this to an extent.

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters
reply to post by Moonbeast1111

 

I'm not sure how that theory would remove paradoxes, specifically the grandfather paradox. I subscribe to the alternate timeline theory where you can indeed bounce around in time, but any changes you make will not reflect in your own timeline, rather, they would create separate time lines. If you go a step furthein r and suggest that time is actually static, and that all possible events have already played out in alternate universes, you wouldn't even be creating new universes or timelines, you'd merely get to experience them.

I think quantum physics talks about this to an extent.

actually you just said the same thing i did. once you leave, you create a new timeline that describes the new event (you time traveling). the changes made dont reflect your original timeline because you aren't in your original timeline. if you leave your timeline to kill your grandfather you've only created a new timeline where you are never born, that doesn't mean your original timeline is adjusted at all. I don't believe anything is static so i'm not going to go there. it sounds like your theory is the same as mine but with a different angle.

yes there is a little literature related to this in the context of quantum mechanics but not really enough evidence to go anywhere with it yet. (not enough PUBLIC evidence)

The ONLY plausible way to move in time is if you CANT
act in time.
IE: Travel back in time would be plausible if there would be some
kind of flux (temporal displacement), were YES you are "in" time.
But not fysicaly. And the surounding have no knowlage of you...

I think your theory would only work by detaching yourself from the current reality to create a new dimension (another reality), copying the current timeline in the process. This new timeline would be separate from the old one, and there would be two of you. Now, in this timeline, you could go back in time to kill your (hes) grandparents. That would erase the other you and hes father, but not you. You could now go insane and ravage the timeline all you want without it impacting you...

Or so I thought at first atleast, hah. Too tired to think through the logic atm, but I believe this would create a paradox or two, too. Well, some food for thought anyway...

reply to post by metalshredmetal


Maybe static isn't the appropriate term. We perceive time as something like the flow of a river, we have little control over it, but we assume the future is new, and the past is behind us. Time and space, as Einstein suggested could be connected in a way we don't understand.

A simple explanation of a wormhole might help. Take a piece of paper and draw 2 dots on their end of the page, the shortest path is a straight line between them, until you fold the paper together, then the dots are essentially occupying the same point in space/time.

A similar example for time comes (I think) from the show 'Quantum Leap'. We see time as something that progresses from point A to point B, yesterday leads into today which turns into tomorrow. Yesterday is one end of a piece of string, tomorrow is the other end.

BUT, if we instead create a loop out of that string, time has no beginning or end, it just is. Instead of past events influencing the future, we have everything that every was or could be already done. This isn't to say your life is already written for you. No, it's to say that all of your possible futures ARE. Ever change that could have been has been.

With that in mind, if you attempt to travel through time, you are merely going to slip into one of the other timelines that allows for your timetravelling without causing a paradox, sure, in Timeline C you went back and killed your grandfather. But since you came from Timeline A, you can't affect that timeline, so no paradox.

Yup, we're on the same page I think.

Originally posted by Kryom
I think your theory would only work by detaching yourself from the current reality to create a new dimension (another reality), copying the current timeline in the process. This new timeline would be separate from the old one, and there would be two of you. Now, in this timeline, you could go back in time to kill your (hes) grandparents. That would erase the other you and hes father, but not you. You could now go insane and ravage the timeline all you want without it impacting you...

Or so I thought at first atleast, hah. Too tired to think through the logic atm, but I believe this would create a paradox or two, too. Well, some food for thought anyway...

once again, you do agree with me. as i said, once you leave your original timeline to partake in 'time travel' you LEAVE YOU FIRST TIMELINE, enter a INTERDIMENSION OUTSIDE OF SPACETIME , and REENTER in a NEW TIMELINE.

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters
reply to post by metalshredmetal

 

Yup, we're on the same page I think.

What if time travel is only possible within your own timeline? What if it only reverses or speeds up time for you? This would prevent any paradoxes from occurring.

They say time runs slower in space. Wouldn't this eventually cause multiple copies of satellites and astronauts in earth's orbit? If my theory is correct then that would explain this. Unless I am incorrect in my understanding of this which is very possible.

I was once told by a time traveler that only a single timeline exists. It can be thought of as the tape inside of a VHS cassette. If you were to go back in time, and not be the catalyst for future changing events, then you are like the normal operation of the read heads in the tape (i.e you are not damaging the tape as you travel along it) and so, when the tape plays out again, it plays out exactly the same, based on causality... we'll imagine that if you went back in time and had little contact with anyone in the world, then the tape (time) would continue to play on normally as if you had never been there.

However, if you rewind the tape and the read-heads start to modify the tape as it plays, then by the end of the tape, it is entirely different than what it would have been if no agents had worked to modify the tape time-line. By going back in time, you effectively erase the future as a static future, and it once again became writable.

This is similar to how our future is writable now, but the only difference is that when you go back in time, you already knew what was going to happen, and so have a plan to counteract it. If you knew the future right now - or at least, as in this case had memories of what the future might be, then you could pretty easily change the future.

hmm i'll have to ponder upon these things as i am unable to contribute at the moment, ill come back later

heres why I think you cant travel back in time.

we are made of atoms and energy. time is this energy or atoms doing its thing as it evolves cells multiply and divide,and eventually dies. wether youre a tree or a human.once your energy or atoms die thats it.or mabe it dosent die it evolves into something else,still it changes state You cant put them back together,or reverse the process that state or *time* is gone or at least changed .

,its all changing,once it changes its a new thing, so time is the measure of the changing different states of being or chemical makeup.it changes it cannot unchange,you can not goto 1952,1952 means nothing to the universe, Were all in methapysiclly speaking in one big chemical soup bubbling and churning and changing,Time. you cant seperate youself from the soup cause its part of you..
thats my vauge understanding of it anyway.

Originally posted by Hantrid
What if time travel is only possible within your own timeline? What if it only reverses or speeds up time for you? This would prevent any paradoxes from occurring.

They say time runs slower in space. Wouldn't this eventually cause multiple copies of satellites and astronauts in earth's orbit? If my theory is correct then that would explain this. Unless I am incorrect in my understanding of this which is very possible.

I was actually thinking about the theory that time runs slower in space as I gave my above theory.
I guess in space our chemical makeup atoms,energy decompose and burn out slower then someone on earth,your not traveling in time really your energy or state of chemical makeup and everything around you is burning out slower than yor buddy on earth,. time is about the changin state of our atoms.and some other methapyhsical crap im sure, But the states are still changing,slower but they are,theres no going back. cause theres nothing to go back too

Originally posted by RestingInPieces
I was once told by a time traveler that only a single timeline exists. It can be thought of as the tape inside of a VHS cassette. If you were to go back in time, and not be the catalyst for future changing events, then you are like the normal operation of the read heads in the tape (i.e you are not damaging the tape as you travel along it) and so, when the tape plays out again, it plays out exactly the same, based on causality... we'll imagine that if you went back in time and had little contact with anyone in the world, then the tape (time) would continue to play on normally as if you had never been there.
'
However, if you rewind the tape and the read-heads start to modify the tape as it plays, then by the end of the tape, it is entirely different than what it would have been if no agents had worked to modify the tape time-line. By going back in time, you effectively erase the future as a static future, and it once again became writable.

This is similar to how our future is writable now, but the only difference is that when you go back in time, you already knew what was going to happen, and so have a plan to counteract it. If you knew the future right now - or at least, as in this case had memories of what the future might be, then you could pretty easily change the future.

if i read that right then i think you're saying that if you go back in time and change a specific scenario, then you change the future. I also agree with this, but i would say that when you go back in time in the first place, you've already exited your original timeline. (because i'm no black-op scientist) I must be resorted to assumption, but there's lots of evidence to say that in order to time travel you must exit your physical space/time, and thus your timeline. once you exit space/time you enter an "inter-dimensional" realm of some sort. usually this place is depicted as a "wormhole" in movies and such. once you're done time traveling (you're reached your destination in time, i.e. 1942) you've effectively entered a new brand new timeline, one that was created the instant you entered it. It was created the instant you entered it because the very fact of you being there has never happened, you entered 1942, but your old original timeline never had a "you" in 1942, so a new timeline must be created to accommodate your existence. once you're there in this "new" 1942, you can change events that didn't happen in your original timeline, but because they are two different timelines then only the timeline that was altered is changed. Your original timeline that you were born on stays like nothing abnormal happened in it's year of 1942. ... something like that..

Another approach is the one taken in films: we see flashbacks, but the film goes on. Same with time: time travel is flashback, but reality goes on.

Originally posted by Angrybadger
heres why I think you cant travel back in time.

we are made of atoms and energy. time is this energy or atoms doing its thing as it evolves cells multiply and divide,and eventually dies. wether youre a tree or a human.once your energy or atoms die thats it.or mabe it dosent die it evolves into something else,still it changes state You cant put them back together,or reverse the process that state or *time* is gone or at least changed .

,its all changing,once it changes its a new thing, so time is the measure of the changing different states of being or chemical makeup.it changes it cannot unchange,you can not goto 1952,1952 means nothing to the universe, Were all in methapysiclly speaking in one big chemical soup bubbling and churning and changing,Time. you cant seperate youself from the soup cause its part of you..
thats my vauge understanding of it anyway.

I actually reeeally like this perspective. but i have one bone about it...you're going about the whole idea in a very physical-world oriented way. And if you think of the universe as nothing but physical matter, I'd have the same viewpoint as you. I believe the physical world and events in it (like chemical reactions) are only a fraction of the universe. even though we are seemingly flesh and bone, we are much more than that. I've always been damn fond of the idea of time being the changing of states of being. But in your case it seems like you've gone from the microscopic perspective of physical matter and chemical reactions in relation to time, to the macroscopic perspective of what the Universal Mind might think of the "idea" of "time travel." I think there's a big gap of possibilities between those two.

Time is an illusion. We can become caught up in this magical property and how it can not be reversed.
We must remember what we are really talking about is a reversal of states of existence. For example If I had a machine which could reverse the states of all matter and energy and thus existence or reality within a sphere or bubble of influence, then within this area, it would appear that I am travelling back in time. Suppose this took 10mins to achieve a reversal of state to the previous 100 years. Time has not altered, time has continued and is 10 mins further into the future, yet to all intents and purposes I have time-travelled back 100 years.

Originally posted by Moonbeast1111
Time is an illusion. We can become caught up in this magical property and how it can not be reversed.
We must remember what we are really talking about is a reversal of states of existence. For example If I had a machine which could reverse the states of all matter and energy and thus existence or reality within a sphere or bubble of influence, then within this area, it would appear that I am travelling back in time. Suppose this took 10mins to achieve a reversal of state to the previous 100 years. Time has not altered, time has continued and is 10 mins further into the future, yet to all intents and purposes I have time-travelled back 100 years.

I do agree that time is an illusion, an illusion meant only for the physical world of matter. what i would add to your scenario is that once you start "reversing the states of all matter" you say it would happen inside a sphere of influence. I posit that the sphere of influence (i.e. a "UFO") that you are inside stays the same (that is, your physical body and thus consciousness stays on the same timeline) and it is what is outside the sphere of influence that is changed. in this case the sphere of influence must be you and your time traveling device, since you are the thing being influenced, and you can't be influenced without your machine so it comes with you. Also I don't think i would subscribe to the idea of traveling into the past causing "reversing the states of matter". In order to go in "reverse", it would take sequential time. and furthermore this would not be possible if you are inside a sphere of influence being shielded from the outside space/time that is actually changing.

Originally posted by metalshredmetal

Originally posted by Angrybadger
heres why I think you cant travel back in time.

thanks for the reply.
we are made of atoms and energy. time is energy or atoms doing its thing as it evolves cells multiply and divide,and eventually dies. wether youre a tree or a human.once your energy or atoms die thats it.or mabe it dosent die it evolves into something else,still it changes state You cant put them back together,or reverse the process that state or *time* is gone or at least changed .

,its all changing,once it changes its a new thing, so time is the measure of the changing different states of being or chemical makeup.it changes it cannot unchange,you can not goto 1952,1952 means nothing to the universe, Were all in methapysiclly speaking in one big chemical soup bubbling and churning and changing,Time. you cant seperate youself from the soup cause its part of you..
thats my vauge understanding of it anyway.

I actually reeeally like this perspective. but i have one bone about it...you're going about the whole idea in a very physical-world oriented way. And if you think of the universe as nothing but physical matter, I'd have the same viewpoint as you. I believe the physical world and events in it (like chemical reactions) are only a fraction of the universe. even though we are seemingly flesh and bone, we are much more than that. I've always been damn fond of the idea of time being the changing of states of being. But in your case it seems like you've gone from the microscopic perspective of physical matter and chemical reactions in relation to time, to the macroscopic perspective of what the Universal Mind might think of the "idea" of "time travel." I think there's a big gap of possibilities between those two.

edit on 1/31/11 by metalshredmetal because: sentence

well we live in a physical world and It decays,Our bodies will crumble to dust,your car will rust and rot,all chemical reactions,so you cant return to a pysical world of say even yesterday,it has chemically changed on an atomic level.but I see your point about the world being more than physical/

But didnt you see the line about us all being a part of the same soup? I got quite methaphysical in that post.though I admit Im just thinking aloud, wasnt that methapysical enough for ya.we could die and be transformed to a different state,different properties like oil (us after death) and water unable to mix totally with the physical world,but thats getting all spiritual and possibly religious which Im not opposed too,just sticking to time travel.

so you cant time travel and bring back rusted metal , but I mentioned the whole world world being a soup that we are part of.

Maybe there is a spritiual realm,who knows.we are concious and obviously different than a a piece of metal or a tree which will decay..So say we evolve spiritualy when our bodies die,our energy ,or even our dying concious..gives birth to a new us,our our child? into the spirtual realm change is still happening.You cant go back. thats my point.

i agree there is more to it than the physical dimension.But that decays.so its only forward all the way baby.
Of all the magical stuff god did in the bible I dont think he ever time traveled for a redo.He destroyed # and started again.