An interesting take on (the lack of) time travel ;)

Join the discussion
Registration is free. Start your own thread to ask a follow-up.
5 replies · 2K views
Mentor
Messages
29,213
Reaction score
4,643
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1312.7128v1.pdf

Time travel has captured the public imagination for much of the past century, but little has been done to actually search for time travelers. Here, three implementations of Internet searches for time travelers are described, all seeking a prescient mention of information not previously available. The first search covered prescient content placed on the Internet, highlighted by a comprehensive search for specific terms in tweets on Twitter. The second search examined prescient inquiries submitted to a search engine, highlighted by a comprehensive search for specific search terms submitted to a popular astronomy web site. The third search involved a request for a direct Internet communication, either by email or tweet, pre-dating to the time of the inquiry. Given practical verifiability concerns, only time travelers from the future were investigated. No time travelers were discovered. Although these negative results do not disprove time travel, given the great reach of the Internet, this search is perhaps the most comprehensive to date
 
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: 1 person
Physics news on Phys.org
:smile:

But now, time travelers have read that paper, so they know how to cover their tracks! D'OH!
 
Worse - they read the paper before it was written and already have covered their tracks!
 
Vanadium 50 said:
Worse - they read the paper before it was written and already have covered their tracks!

Double D'OH!
 
Retract it!

Haha it actually looks like someone invested quite a bit of time in that paper.
 
Given practical verifiability concerns, only time travelers from the future were investigated.
So what's the diff biff?
Time traveller from the future returns to the past to invest in the stock market on emerging high tech since he already knows which ones will make him rich.
Time traveller from the past comes to the future to see which stocks will make him rich, and returns to the past to do so.
Neither would be verifiable.