Posted on 04/28/2017 1:16:00 PM PDT by Red Badger
UBC math and physics instructor, Ben Tippett. Credit: UBC Okanagan
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After some serious number crunching, a UBC researcher has come up with a mathematical model for a viable time machine.
Ben Tippett, a mathematics and physics instructor at UBC's Okanagan campus, recently published a study about the feasibility of time travel. Tippett, whose field of expertise is Einstein's theory of general relativity, studies black holes and science fiction when he's not teaching. Using math and physics, he has created a formula that describes a method for time travel.
"People think of time travel as something as fiction," says Tippett. "And we tend to think it's not possible because we don't actually do it. But, mathematically, it is possible."
Ever since HG Wells published his book Time Machine in 1885, people have been curious about time travel—and scientists have worked to solve or disprove the theory, he says. In 1915 Albert Einstein announced his theory of general relativity, stating that gravitational fields are caused by distortions in the fabric of space and time. More than 100 years later, the LIGO Scientific Collaboration—an international team of physics institutes and research groups—announced the detection of gravitational waves generated by colliding black holes billions of lightyears away, confirming Einstein's theory.
The division of space into three dimensions, with time in a separate dimension by itself, is incorrect, says Tippett. The four dimensions should be imagined simultaneously, where different directions are connected, as a space-time continuum. Using Einstein's theory, Tippett says that the curvature of space-time accounts for the curved orbits of the planets.
In "flat"—or uncurved—space-time, planets and stars would move in straight lines. In the vicinity of a massive star, space-time geometry becomes curved and the straight trajectories of nearby planets will follow the curvature and bend around star.
"The time direction of the space-time surface also shows curvature. There is evidence showing the closer to a black hole we get, time moves slower," says Tippett. "My model of a time machine uses the curved space-time—to bend time into a circle for the passengers, not in a straight line. That circle takes us back in time."
While it is possible to describe this type of time travel using a mathematical equation, Tippett doubts that anyone will ever build a machine to make it work.
"HG Wells popularized the term 'time machine' and he left people with the thought that an explorer would need a 'machine or special box' to actually accomplish time travel," Tippett says. "While is it mathematically feasible, it is not yet possible to build a space-time machine because we need materials—which we call exotic matter—to bend space-time in these impossible ways, but they have yet to be discovered."
For his research, Tippett created a mathematical model of a Traversable Acausal Retrograde Domain in Space-time (TARDIS). He describes it as a bubble of space-time geometry which carries its contents backward and forwards through space and time as it tours a large circular path. The bubble moves through space-time at speeds greater than the speed of light at times, allowing it to move backward in time.
"Studying space-time is both fascinating and problematic. And it's also a fun way to use math and physics," says Tippett. "Experts in my field have been exploring the possibility of mathematical time machines since 1949. And my research presents a new method for doing it."
Tippett's research was recently published in the IOPscience journal Classical and Quantum Gravity.
Explore further: How Einstein could help unlock the mysteries of space travel
More information: Benjamin K Tippett et al. Traversable acausal retrograde domains in spacetime, Classical and Quantum Gravity (2017). DOI: 10.1088/1361-6382/aa6549
Are you always this sensitive when somebody points out that Star Trek is FICTION - and probably should not be used as a basis upon which to formulate a functional world view?
Of course it is/was fiction!!! I never claimed otherwise DU idiot!!! It was never used to formulate anything. It was a meaningless transcript post as a gag, one that has been explained to your arrogant young self on other posts here. Reading comp. not your thing I guess. Good Lord......
Of course.
>> It was never used to formulate anything.
Your inability to demonstrate a 2nd grade grasp of the relative (both Special and General) material indicates otherwise.
Understand it now snob DU troll? Only a damn idiot would have thought that part of a Star Trek transcript from 50 years ago, put up as an FR gag post, was anything other than that. A spoof. Get it yet sonny?
Buzz of junior. You have shown your conceited DU noob self to be nothing but an arrogant punk. Snobs always are.
>>Get it yet sonny?
I get what your inability to demonstrate a 2nd grade grasp of the relative (both Special and General) material indicates.
Meanwhile, every one of your fruitless DelUsional posts today was directed at me.
Clearly the “damn idiot” isn’t me.
Damn if you are not dumber than a box of rocks DU noob troll. A real Z. for sure. An arrogant one, but pure Z. Order up! Back to work sonny.
Any DU noob trolls that think that a 50 year old Star Trek transcript represents something other than just TV entertainment, as you evidently do, or claim others might, are damn idiots. You were not even born when Star Trek was first televised. Get lost.
>>You were not even born when Star Trek was first televised.
Another “fact” you gagged out of the southern end of your digestive tract.
Fail again.
Get lost clown. Take your arrogant conceited noobie self back to the DU. They like snobs like you over there I hear.
That all you got?
All I need for a noob DU conceited no count jerk like you.
FAIL!
Again.
They did.
Stalin took over the whole of Europe, Asia and Africa.
German scientist under his control came up with both rockets and the A-bomb which he used to smash North America to smithereens.
Atomic winter set in and everyone except for a few people in South America died.
They built a time machine and sent someone back to kill the person who killed Hitler.
Buzz of you arrogant noob DU clown troll.
lol
>>Buzz of you
Off has two Fs.
Up late tonight spelling Nazi snob? Remember that paper route tomorrow morning DU noob troll. Have to be on the ball. How did things go at the drive up window today? To bad you still have to work.
Fail again.
And Off still has two Fs.
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