Can You Travel to the Roman Empire Using a Wormhole?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the theoretical possibility of traveling to the Roman Empire using a wormhole, exploring the implications of time travel through wormholes and black holes. Participants examine the conditions necessary for such travel and the associated challenges, including the nature of time and physical constraints involved.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Technical explanation
  • Debate/contested

Main Points Raised

  • One participant proposes that if a wormhole could be created, it might allow for time travel, questioning whether travel could extend beyond the inception of the wormhole.
  • Another participant references a paper by Morris, Thorne, and Yurtsever, asserting that a wormhole used as a time machine could not allow travel to any time before the wormhole was established.
  • A participant expresses curiosity about using a black hole as a bridge to a white hole, inquiring whether time would stop for the traveler after crossing the event horizon.
  • Responses indicate that while time for the traveler would continue normally, the relationship between the traveler's time and the outside universe could become complex, with concerns about tidal gravity and survivability during the journey.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants generally agree on the limitations of using wormholes for time travel, particularly regarding the inability to travel back to times before the wormhole's creation. However, there remains uncertainty about the effects of crossing event horizons and the feasibility of surviving such journeys.

Contextual Notes

Discussions include assumptions about the creation and stability of wormholes and black holes, as well as the dependence on theoretical physics that may not be practically realizable. The implications of tidal forces and the nature of time in different frames of reference are also noted but not fully resolved.

JordanSC5
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Assuming (Big assumption I know) you could create a wormhole, and using either of the relativities created the time effect needed to travel in the past, is there any way where the traveler could go beyond the inception of the wormhole. So if we made the time machine today, how could I get to the Roman Empire?

Is the only way through a natural blachole/wormhole and hope I land back on Earth in the past?
 
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As far as I know, the definitive paper on using wormholes as time machines is still this one by Morris, Thorne, and Yurtsever:

http://authors.library.caltech.edu/9262/1/MORprl88.pdf

There's a lot there for a short paper, but the key point for your question is that, even if you were able to make a wormhole into a time machine, you couldn't use it to go back in time to any event to the past of when the wormhole first became a time machine. So if you made the time machine today, you couldn't use it to travel back to the Roman Empire.

(Thorne also has a layman's discussion of this in his book Black Holes and Time Warps.)
 
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From all my readings that seems to be the consensus. So my next question is that if I want to into the black hole and use it as a bridge to another white hole, will time stop for me (the travelers) once I'm past the event horizon?

Time would continue normally for me the traveler correct? The real problem is not being ripped apart.
 
JordanSC5 said:
Time would continue normally for me the traveler correct?

Yes. But the relationship between your time and time in the outside universe can get pretty weird.

JordanSC5 said:
The real problem is not being ripped apart.

Yes, tidal gravity is still going to be there, and it will be much too large for any material we're currently familiar with to survive the trip unless the wormhole is extremely large (and the larger the wormhole, the more difficult it is to make it and hold it open in the first place).
 

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