Professor Predicts Human Time Travel This Century

PhysOrg.com ^ | 04 April 2006 | Lisa Zyga

[camle]

not to mention bringing stuff from the future to sell here.

[day10]

Come to think of it, you are right - in one of the scenarios.

I don't want to comment further - could ruin it for someone who hasn't seen it.

[GAB-1955]

Give it a break. Not everything is about illegal immigration and borders.

[MeanWestTexan]

Or just a stack of drug and other patents.

Imagine having the formula for Viagra, et al, 20 years ago.

[Dr. Bogus Pachysandra]

Didn't I mention something about "wheat from the Chaff?"

[Republican Party Reptile]

cool, do I get Frequent Flyer miles?

[camle]

go forward a few days to get the winning lottery numbers...

[azhenfud]

"What ya'll may not realize is that your machine speeds up as time goes on, so that when you're my age it's going about 2X."

A wise elder Cherokee told me as you age, your perception of time changes: when you're two, a year is half your lifespan - your perception is that a year is very lengthy, when you're 80, it's 1/80th so the perception is that a year is much shorter....

[saganite]

I don't understand your wheat reference. I need malted barley.

[azhenfud]

"go forward a few days to get the winning lottery numbers..."

With my luck, I'd have gotten them for the wrong day.

[MeanWestTexan]

Ah, but just going back and buying a ticket may be enough to change what number comes up.

A more sure approach would be to bring back intellectual property --- drug patents with research to back up, some tech stuff, software (video games and DOS, Windows, etc), probably old antique coins to finance (old bills being hard to acquire), maybe the exact location of big oil and gas finds to get cheap drilling leases . . . etc.

Some things wouldn't change.

[beezdotcom]

As soon as you arrive at the past, you’re making a choice and there’ll be a split. Our universe will not be affected by what you do in your visit to the past.

Of course, your ability to find your way back to THIS universe might be adversely affected...

[spetznaz]

To be honest I think that if Time Travel EVER happens, it will only be in one direction ....forward. I think we may be able to find ways of travelling forward, but going back is another thing all together. There are too many conundrums involved in that .....for instance is it possible to change something that has already occured?

Now, going forward has none of these problems, but travelling back would have a lot of interesting queries. For example could someone stop the Kennedy assassination? The fact that it happened means that IT DID happen! Or let's say you stop the Kennedy assassination .....that means he never died in the way that he did, and thus according to the new 'history' he finished out his term and all that, which means that in the future there is no need for you to go back in time to save him. Hence, you never go back, and thus you never stop the plot, and so he gets shot! A loop occurs ....by stopping his assassination it means that there it never happened, and thus since it did not happen there is no need for you to go back and save him, and because you do not go back to save him then you do not stop the plot, and because you do not stop the plot then he gets assassinated, and because he is assassinated you decide to go back in time, and because you go back in time you stop the plot, and because .......well, in a nutshell a loop occurs.

Going forward has none of these problems. In fact it will probably be possible to have perceived 'time travel' in the future decades .....perceived in that it will not be true time travel. Basically what would be needed would be a way to induce long-term 'hibernation' in humans, some sort of suspended animation where bodily functions are brought to a near-stop, and then 'waking' the person up say 20 yrs into the future. To the person it will seem as if he travelled forward through time .....shutting his eyes in 2060 and arriving in 2080 .....and it will seem like it happened in an instant. And with future technology hopefully cellular processes (and aging) will have been slowed (or stopped) during this period of suspended animation.

[Smokin' Joe]

So he goes back, saves his dad, loses his motive for inventing a time machine, and then what?

[Dimensio]

I still do not understand how Doctor Brown was successfull in rigging a remote control that not only supplanted the function of a car's accelerator, but also employed a mechanism to manipulate the clutch and change gears at the appropriate times.

[Tokra]

Watched a newly released DVD over the weekend..."A Sound of Thunder" based on the short story by Ray Bradbury about the morality of time travel and greed. The CGI was not George Lucas caliber but I thought the premise was interesting.....

That was one of my favorite science fiction stories growing up. I had no idea it had been made into a movie. Thanks for the tip!

[Chasaway]

"...Okay... so where are all the time travellers?..."

Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are probably two of 'em.

[NKByrum]

The DeLorean was an automatic?????

[Dimensio]

I apparently discovered a strange liquid that induces time travel, called "Skyy". After consuming a sufficient quantity, I found myself transported nearly twelve hours into the future, without explanation.

Unfortunately, this method of time travel is not without drawback. It appears to cause massive headaches lasting up to an entire day.

[going hot]

You are assuming that you and your life are sufficiently interesting for someonew from the future to contact in thier past? :-))