As if Quantum Teleportation Weren't Spooky Enough, Physicists Propose 'Time Teleportation'

Popular Science ^ | 1/18/11 | Clay Dillow

[Nachum]

As if the idea ideas of quantum entanglement and time travel weren’t difficult enough to wrap one’s head around separately, two physicists at the Universtiy of Queensland in Australia have further compounded the headache by merging the two ideas via a new kind of quantum entanglement that links particles not across space, but across time.

Quantum entanglement is that “spooky action” (Einstein’s words, not ours) that links two particles such that a measurement on one immediately influences the state of the other, even if the two particles are separated by miles, or even light years. Entanglement defies the intuitive way we understand the universe to work (as does most of quantum mechanics). The idea of “time teleportation,” as described by S. Jay Olson and Timothy Ralph, doesn’t add clarity but it does introduce some interesting questions about the fundamentals of the universe.

In a sense, everyone and everything is time traveling, moving forward in time at a given rate. What Olson and Ralph propose is that it’s possible to take a shortcut into the future without being present in the interim. How? Tech Review’s KFC explains:

The idea is that a detector acts on a qubit and then generates a classical message describing how this particle can be detected. Then, at some point in the future, another detector at the same position in space, receives this message and carries out the required measurement, thereby reconstructing the qubit.

[Savage Beast]

I think they're supposed to be blurry if the universe is fluctuating and the Planck unit is the smallest particle of time but that the Hubble telescope said they're not blurry and so that either the universe isn't fluctuating or the Plank unit is smaller than anybody thought or it's infinitely small or for some other reason they're not blurry or something--

--but what do I know? I thought that thing on Mars looked like a face.

[GOPJ]

Thanks - great explanation. I was going to guess something simple like a universe expanding would look blurry in parts unless we were at the exact center... which in not possible. That said, I thought the Mars thing looked like a face too...

[UCANSEE2]

Here’s a question.

Is the Universe less dense at the center, or more dense?

[Savage Beast]

Don't ask me. I thought the present was infinitely small and that thing on Mars was a face.

(I'm not the best.)

[domeika]

Even creepier, the passengers of the Titanic were treated to a silent version showing of "The Poseidon Adventure" at the very time the Titanic struck that iceberg in 1912. The movie was such a hit that the reel was rewound so that the film could be shown a second time. By the time the second showing was over, the ship was in its death throes and it was too late for most of the viewers to make the lifeboats.

For a second there I thought you were funnin me, then I looked it up. I had never heard of that, but have to wonder that if it is true, what sick bastid picked that movie to show?

[The Comedian]

Is the Universe less dense at the center, or more dense?

Yes ;-)

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[Billthedrill]

Doc: "Zo, Herr Drill, where in ze future do you vish to go?"
BtD: "Well, Doc, how about when the Mariners win the World Series?"
Doc: "I am zo zorry, Herr Drill, ze machine does not go beyond ze heat death of ze universe."

[UCANSEE2]

I thought the present was infinitely small and that thing on Mars was a face.

Well, you are right about one of them.

[UCANSEE2]

You are partly correct.

[The Comedian]

You are partly correct.

So the cat's OK?

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[MortMan]

Couldn’t this mean someone could go back to Hawaii on an interesting date, perhaps August nineteen sixty - what year did Obama claim to be born on the big island? - and...

[Paradox]

Doesn’t surprise me at all. There is much more to Space and Time than what we experience.

[GOPJ]

I’m going with ‘more’... adds to the mystery.

[UCANSEE2]

So the cat's OK?

Depends. Which Universe are you in ?

[UCANSEE2]

I’m going with ‘more’... adds to the mystery.

OK. Assuming that's true, then the densest part of the Universe must also be the center. Where is the densest part of the Universe?

[UCANSEE2]

Why aren’t they blurry?

Why can we even see them at all ?

[InternetTuffGuy]

Most discoveries or concepts start with an idea and many of such ideas eventually become reality.

I firmly believe that devices have been built which can transmit data using quantum entaglement (changing spins in digital sequences?) and that the very moment those devices came into existence, certain labs have been privy to communication from the future.

Depending on one's view of time/multiple timelines one has to assume that those in the future would purposely hold back on certain details in order to ensure that nothing communicated would endanger the future communicant's own eventual births.

[The Cajun]

Assuming that's true, then the densest part of the Universe must also be the center. Where is the densest part of the Universe?

Five miles down the road from my house in Chacahoula Swamp, lots of quantum fluctuations happen there at night ;^).

[Savage Beast]

No, not Planck units. Extremely distant galaxies and stars.

It's my understanding that if time is in very small--but not infinitely small--units (Planck units), we would see extremely distant galaxies and stars as blurry because as the universe fluxuates, assuming that it does--certainly over long distances of time/space it must--it would, at some time or another, reduce time to these units, and distant stars would appear blurry; however, if time were infinitely small, these galaxies and stars would be clear. The Hubble telescope sees them as clear.

Is that right, Comedian?

[Hot Tabasco]

The idea is that a detector acts on a qubit and then generates a classical message describing how this particle can be detected. Then, at some point in the future, another detector at the same position in space, receives this message and carries out the required measurement, thereby reconstructing the qubit.

Years ago I used to bring up this same argument with my softball teams in the bar after our games. All I was met with was ridicule...........So look who's chuckling now!