What are the implications of time travel in popular culture?

[russ_watters]

Did you mean this as an opinion?

Well - there are some QM implications on time travel, but in my opinion (there it is), that's not relevant to the question since humans don't live in a quantum-scale world.

Russ, great post. I'm a Star Trek Next Generation Fan, and also was a fan of the original show (yes, I watched it when it was originally on). What I wouldn't give for a replicator! or a holodeck! A friend of mine likes to point out all of the serious flaws with the "physics", he ruined it for me.

Evo, no doubt you have noticed that I'm a real stickler for scientific accuracy - I hated "Armageddon" and refuse to see "The Core," but I'm still a Star Trek fan. What gets me is when people get their science from the media and don't realize it isn't science.

Also, maybe, there can be a distinciton between "science fiction" and "science fantasy." Like with James Bond - the things he does aren't possible, but that's ok: He's James Bond. "Armageddon" and "The Core" both had science advisors and both claimed to be true to science in their characterizations of it.

 

[Evo]

What gets me is when people get their science from the media and don't realize it isn't science.

Actually it's kind of scary how many people's knowledge of science is primarily based on the media.

"Armageddon" and "The Core" both had science advisors and both claimed to be true to science in their characterizations of it.

Oh come on Russ, you don't believe in the scientific accuracy of those two fine movies? (I haven't seen either one)

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Well - there are some QM implications on time travel, but in my opinion (there it is), that's not relevant to the question since humans don't live in a quantum-scale world.

The possiblities are not limited to quantum sized objects. From what I have read in sources like The Future of Spacetime, the more likely limitation is energy. There is also one solution to the grandfather paradox that seems to resolve the paradox but still allows for time travel.

 

[Evo]

Ivan, are you familiar with Ronald Mallett? I saw a documentary about his research into time travel on a special that TLC did back in December. It was very interesting. For the first time I started thinking this could be a form of "time travel" that might work, but it is not the type of time travel that we are familiar with from books and films. Power is the main drawback people see to this working.

Basically here is the gist of what he's thinking, this from an article I will also post a link to.

Why you haven't met someone from the future

However, putting Ronald's theory into practice presents plenty of problems. For example, the temperature of the ring would have to be close to absolute zero (-273°C), so humans would find it difficult to use. It would also be impossible to travel back to a time before the machine was switched on. This explains why people from the future haven't visited us - we are yet to build a time machine for them to exit from.

Ronald hopes that travellers from the future may be able to overcome these difficulties and use the rings of light that we construct today as portals to our time.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/slab/wormholes/default.htm

This is an excerpt from a "layman's explanation" of Mallet's paper.

Nearly 50 years later, Mallett may be on the verge of building the world's first operative "time machine," though it will bear little relation to that of Wells, or to the DeLorean sports car of the movie Back to the Future, or the Tardis of Dr. Who or any of the other hundreds of time traveling mechanisms that have been imagined since Wells first took a crack at it.

Mallett's machine, as laid out in his May 2000 paper in Physics Letters entitled "Weak gravitational field of the electromagnetic radiation in a ring laser," is based on Einstein's formulation that light and matter are both forms of energy.

We know that matter can bend space-time and according to Einstein's theory, matter and light are both forms of energy. So why can't light bend space-time?

This fall, with UConn colleague Dr. Chandra Raychoudri, Mallett will begin work on building a "ring laser"--basically, a device that will create a circulating light beam, perhaps within a photonic crystal that will bend the light's trajectory and slow it down.

Then, a neutron particle will be sent into the space in the center of the beam. In short, the beam--perhaps two beams in one model, with the light traveling in opposite directions--is expected to twist the space-time inside the circle into a loop.

Think of a spoon stirring thick gravy in a pot and creating a vortex, only the vortex in this case is the fabric of space-time twisting, with past, present and future, circling one another so that the future precedes the past.
Then--and while this might not seem very exciting--a neutron, a small particle of matter--will be sent into the center of the beam. If its spin is affected, then it is being affected by warped space-time.

In a further experiment that Mallett has considered, two identical samples of a radioactive substance could be put into the center of the ring, one going in the direction of the beam. The other in the opposite direction. Since radioactivity decays at a measurable rate, it would be possible to measure, in effect, the time that both particles had experienced within the beam. If the time proves to be different, then time will have been measurably altered.

Eventually, says Mallett, "what would be neat is if you saw another neutron in there that you hadn't introduced yet." In essence, the same neutron "visiting itself from the future."

So you've moved a neutron. So what?

What Mallett will have shown--if it works--is that the fabric of time itself can be altered by light, and a thing can be moved into the past. If it works for a neutron, in theory, it would work for you and me.

http://www.walterzeichner.com/thezfiles/timetravel.html

Mallett's paper "Weak gravitational field of the electromagnetic radiation in a ring laser"

http://temporology.bio.msu.ru/EREPORTS/mallett.pdf

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Over the years I have read about perhaps a dozen designs or concepts that might in principle at least be capable of causing time travel [as we think of it]. I am pretty sure that I have seen this one before.

There is an interesting proof that potentially resolves at least one variation of the grandfather paradox. I don't know how the mathematical proof is done - I don't even know if I could understand it - but it can apparently be shown that by using billiard balls to recreate the paradox, nature does force a real and non-paradoxical solution. First a few simple steps are needed. The entrance to a time machine is place in the corner pocket with the exit from the machine at the side pocket. Keeping in mind the core problem with the grandfather paradox, a billiard ball is placed at the corner most distant from the time machine's entrance. The ball is hit in a straight line so that it enters the time machine, passes through, and emerges from the side pocket a few moments ealier; just in time to hit itself thus preventing its entry into the machine - i.e. into the corner pocket. Since if the ball never went into the corner it can't emerge from the side pocket to deflect its own path, the essence of the grandfather paradox is duplicated. It turns out that the ball can be made to interfere with itself but not sufficiently so as to cause the ball to miss the corner pocket. In other words, the path can be deflected but not enough to create a paradox. Something within this thought experiment implicitly prevents a genuine paradox from ever occurring.

 

[Evo]

Over the years I have read about perhaps a dozen designs or concepts that might in principle at least be capable of causing time travel [as we think of it]. I am pretty sure that I have seen this one before.

This one is different. It's not time travel as we think of it. It's opening a portal now that in the future someone could send something back to us, even if it is only a neutron. Time travel for humans may never be possible, but this concept of opening a portal is intriguing. We ourselves could not use it.

 

[Math Is Hard]

Since if the ball never went into the corner it can't emerge from the side pocket to deflect its own path, the essence of the grandfather paradox is duplicated. It turns out that the ball can be made to interfere with itself but not sufficiently so as to cause the ball to miss the corner pocket. In other words, the path can be deflected but not enough to create a paradox. Something within this thought experiment implicitly prevents a genuine paradox from ever occurring.

So does this prove that God does not play pool with the universe, either?

 

[THE[>U<]DUDE]

Since time is relative ... it remains relative to we human beings.

Time is a construct of the human psyche. The universe itself keeps no time. The transition of energy signals via Static Photon Vibration Theory across regions of 'flat' space-time (that account for 99% of the universe) is instantaneous. No time passes for something traveling at light speed.

Time is our own phenomenon. God is probably laughing Himself silly watching us play around with this bizarre concept!

Static Photon Vibration ... www.photonoceab.tk[/URL]

Makes sense.

 

[Zantra]

I haven't forgotten about this guy, so I just wanted to remind all of you.

It is interesting how world events are unfolding isn't it? Bush is completely screwing up our reputation around the world, skirting the geneva convention, and basically going off the deep end. Al Gore is the 2nd person this week to call bush a "bungling idiot" and I wholeheartedly agree. But I digress. I'm not on my political soapbox, but I feel that things are eerily ringing with truth to some of the things Titor said.

He said that right around the time of election time 2004 the chaos would begin. He said that it will be a civil conflict where our personal rights would be taken from us under the guise of protection. And he asked us "how many civil liberties would you be willing to sacrifice in the name of safety?".

Bush already presented that bill giving police and government agencies more freedom to search and sieze without as much probable cause. And people who were 9-11 suspects were held for months without due process. But I can see the public feeding from the innate fears that the government is breeeding. The color coded alert system, homeland security. Now Abu Gharabi prisoners being mistreated. Titor referenced the Waco incident, and inferred that the government covered up something.

Now while I'm not building a bunker in South America just yet, the vision Titor presented-which when I first read it sounded impossible, is starting to seem a lot more plausible with the direction Bush has been taking. Would you give up your right to due process in the name of ferretting out potential terrorists? Would you allow yourself to be questioned, your house to be ransacked, if only by mistake, so that potential terrorist cells could be found and prevented? I for one, would not. The day that happens... Well all I can say is "Ohhhh Cananda...".

Was Titor ever fully discredited? I don't believe so. Like I said, I'm not looking for 5 people within a 100 miles of me who I can trust with my life- but I will rest a lot easier when bush is out of office and there aren't quite so many similarities between the titor predictions and reality.

 

[Evo]

Titor said that Bush is re-elected in 2004, or perhaps I assumed it was Bush. Perhaps Kerry is the one that Titor says causes the war?

"Your enemy was in the cities. Was the President in 2005 also on the enemy side? How did you feel personally about the President then?
The President or "leader" in 2005 I believe tried desperately to be the next Lincoln and hold the country together but many of their policies drove a larger wedge into the Bill of Rights."

Also, the stuff Titor was spewing has all been said before by all too many. It's nothing new, so I wouldn't worry about it.

Here is a mistake Titor made that has already been disproved.

"13. We don't know what's on Mars yet."

I guess he didn't know about the Mars rovers that were due to land on Mars in 2004.

 

[THE[>U<]DUDE]

From reading into a great deal of what this alledged time traveller had to say, I got the gist he just about covered all the bases, as well as being pretty vague on details at the same time.

This is an old trick spawned by the earliest 'so-called' spiritual mediums.

Anyone with a slice of home-cooked intelligence could banter on about events that are going to happen henceforth without committing themselves to precise details.

For example, if I were to say that in the year 2007 there is going to be a bad earthquake on the Pacific Rim ... then there is a pretty safe bet that my prediction will be borne out. This is not because I have traveled back from the future to share my historical wisdoms, it is simply because I already know the Pacific Rim area (which covers 1000s of miles) is prone to volcanism and quake activity, and the likelihood of there being an event is something like 1 in every so many years.

This hypothesis, coupled with the fact that no one will refute, dispute or challenge it if it doesn't occur in 2007, all leads to me looking pretty clued up on the predictions market.

www.photonocean.tk[/URL]

 

[nix]

he was probably just a man who had nothing better to do with his time...(i didnt read all of what he said..but if he was on some big sanctioned time travel mission why did he stay for 4 months to socialize?)
..he made predictions just specific enough so that in the near future we could fit events in for the purpose of convincing ourselves that truth actually lied behind what he said...all the same ill be happier when this year is over and nothing like a civil war is starting up...and right now I am just happy I am Canadian

 

[gravenewworld]

I don't understand why people believe the BS. Come on seriously, a guy travels from the future to spend his time posting on an internet forum, that is really believable. Couldn't he do something more productive? Also his claim that Russia will nuke China and the US is extremely hard to believe. I find it hard to believe that Russia and its citizens are willing to commit suicide. Russia funding a war? LOL That country's economy has been in the toilet for years, what will they arm their soldiers with sticks? Terrorism is a much more serious threat to the US and other nations than Russia. Yes his posts are entertaining but seriously people have been watching too many movies.

 

[numberPI]

i think time traveling will never be possible... why? because knowing the human sense of stupidity, someone would've already screw things up "returning" to the past and altering it.. or any sort of error.

 

[d28_2012]

John Titor Group

Hey If your interested in John Titor you might want to join my yahoo group: -
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/John_Titor_UK/
theres loads of links and pictures for you to check out and a message board.

 

[Zantra]

bumping this because.. well it's good for site traffic

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Hey there stranger.

 

[Oyéah]

Most of us don't know what is on Mars yet. We have been shown what the cameras see, once they have been screened. In the first images, I saw plenty of things in the sky, then that stopped. I have seen before and after depressions in the ground that look like, oh foot prints, shall we say? I don't think that people are walking around on Mars, I think they are in the American Southwest, at least one of the rovers, looks to be near the Henry Mountains.

In the last two weeks, the government currently in power has stated that they might postpone the election if there are terrorist acts at the time of the conventions. President Bush is warning that there are going to be anarchists at the Republican convention. I think that the current government is going to have a hard time letting go, in fact, I don't think they will let go, even if they are voted out of office. I think this scenario is setting up exactly as described.

 

[Evo]

Most of us don't know what is on Mars yet. We have been shown what the cameras see, once they have been screened. In the first images, I saw plenty of things in the sky, then that stopped. I have seen before and after depressions in the ground that look like, oh foot prints, shall we say? I don't think that people are walking around on Mars, I think they are in the American Southwest, at least one of the rovers, looks to be near the Henry Mountains.

In the last two weeks, the government currently in power has stated that they might postpone the election if there are terrorist acts at the time of the conventions. President Bush is warning that there are going to be anarchists at the Republican convention. I think that the current government is going to have a hard time letting go, in fact, I don't think they will let go, even if they are voted out of office. I think this scenario is setting up exactly as described.

Titor said that there would be a major Waco, TX like event every month in 2004 before the November elections. Let's see, this is the 7th month and so far, Titor has struck out 7 times in a row. The Titor thing was a hoax, and a very poor one at that.

 

[selfAdjoint]

Titor said that there would be a major Waco, TX like event every month in 2004 before the November elections. Let's see, this is the 7th month and so far, Titor has struck out 7 times in a row. The Titor thing was a hoax, and a very poor one at that.

Well, unless you count the goings-on in Iraq. How many civilians died at Waco? And how many Iraqi civilians have died each month so far in 2004?

 

[Evo]

Well, unless you count the goings-on in Iraq. How many civilians died at Waco? And how many Iraqi civilians have died each month so far in 2004?

It had to be domestic, so he's at zero.

 

[Oyéah]

Be sure, I would love to run across blatant magic. But, really the world, just as it is, is pure magic. I have a healthy respect for the progress of time and time's magnificent evolution. The thing about Titor's sad prophecies, is that there are so many better daydreams, about the fate of our world.

 

[phoenixthoth]

time travel experiment

a message to "time travelers" or parallel universe travelers:

it's 10:00PM PST (GMT-7) now on July 17th,2004.

at 10:15PM, meet me at the corner of choctaw ct. and camanche rd. in camanche villiage (or ione according to the post office). be discreet. edit: oh yeah, that is in california. duh!

you'll know me because i'll (1) be the only guy around and (2) i'll be wearing a blue shirt and i'll answer to the name phoenix.

as for the rest of you, i'll let you know if anything happens if I'm still in this time zone. :surprise:

cheers

 

[Zantra]

a message to "time travelers" or parallel universe travelers:

it's 10:00PM PST (GMT-7) now on July 17th,2004.

at 10:15PM, meet me at the corner of choctaw ct. and camanche rd. in camanche villiage (or ione according to the post office). be discreet. edit: oh yeah, that is in california. duh!

you'll know me because i'll (1) be the only guy around and (2) i'll be wearing a blue shirt and i'll answer to the name phoenix.

as for the rest of you, i'll let you know if anything happens if I'm still in this time zone. :surprise:

cheers

well?

Oh hey Ivan.. long time no talk.

 

[phoenixthoth]

i wasn't going to post anything at first because i might just come off as crazy.

first of all, there were no flying spaceships or people materializing out of thin air.

the assumption of that method is that the place where I'm recording my little time-capsule for later discovery by travelers will stand the test of time until time travel or parallel universe travel is invented. either that or that there are those who are already keeping tabs. and of course the underlying assumption for it to work is that travel is possible at all. oh yeah, and that they'd waste all that energy just to visit lil ol me.

what happened at 10:15pm was all in my head and very well could have been self-induced. it also could have been induced by another being (ie a traveler); there's simply no way for me to be sure.

there was some light outside from neighbors' houses, enough to see if there were people walking around. i stared at the reflector from a telephone poll and everything went dim/out at 10:15. it wasn't, as far as i know, the lights going dim, it was my vision winking out.

accompanying this vision disturbance was a significant altered state of consciousness without any drugs. it felt like LSD and could very well have been just a flashback. a flashback at exactly 10:15.

i sometimes do auto-writing, writing without my consious self being involved. i went inside at about 10:20 and wrote down something to the effect of "you are not ready."

At this time we will tell you that you are not ready to see “tiem [sic]travelers.”

and whoever wrote that, probably just my true self or deeper self or subconscious, is prolly right; if i did see a giant klingon spaceship de-cloak after just having been around the sun at warp 10+, i would have been scared. :surprise:

 

[Ivan Seeking]

One's imagination is a powerful thing.

 

[Overdose]

i wasn't going to post anything at first because i might just come off as crazy.

first of all, there were no flying spaceships or people materializing out of thin air.

the assumption of that method is that the place where I'm recording my little time-capsule for later discovery by travelers will stand the test of time until time travel or parallel universe travel is invented. either that or that there are those who are already keeping tabs. and of course the underlying assumption for it to work is that travel is possible at all. oh yeah, and that they'd waste all that energy just to visit lil ol me.

what happened at 10:15pm was all in my head and very well could have been self-induced. it also could have been induced by another being (ie a traveler); there's simply no way for me to be sure.

there was some light outside from neighbors' houses, enough to see if there were people walking around. i stared at the reflector from a telephone poll and everything went dim/out at 10:15. it wasn't, as far as i know, the lights going dim, it was my vision winking out.

accompanying this vision disturbance was a significant altered state of consciousness without any drugs. it felt like LSD and could very well have been just a flashback. a flashback at exactly 10:15.

i sometimes do auto-writing, writing without my consious self being involved. i went inside at about 10:20 and wrote down something to the effect of "you are not ready."



and whoever wrote that, probably just my true self or deeper self or subconscious, is prolly right; if i did see a giant klingon spaceship de-cloak after just having been around the sun at warp 10+, i would have been scared. :surprise:

I remember reading something someone posted here a while ago with a link to a webpage about extra-dimensional beings who were all ready here, had ships in orbit etc but most wouldn't see; as we arnt ready to see them.
Sounds very similar.

 

[megashawn]

Oyeah, your not trying to start another "Humans have not left earth, they are not on mars" conspiracy are you?

 

[Atrayo]

Hi All,

I've just spent the last couple of hours reading all 10 pages of this thread. (had time to kill) Also, a couple of months ago i was introduced to this John Titor accounts which have been very thought provoking to say the least. Myself I'm on the fence on whether this is a: prankster, delusional, or the real mccoy. However his commentry on society and the human psyche have made him an Internet urban legend to say the least. At least for these 3 years leading up to the end of 2004 into 2005.

The entrance to a time machine is place in the corner pocket with the exit from the machine at the side pocket. Keeping in mind the core problem with the grandfather paradox, a billiard ball is placed at the corner most distant from the time machine's entrance. The ball is hit in a straight line so that it enters the time machine, passes through, and emerges from the side pocket a few moments ealier; just in time to hit itself thus preventing its entry into the machine - i.e. into the corner pocket. Since if the ball never went into the corner it can't emerge from the side pocket to deflect its own path, the essence of the grandfather paradox is duplicated. It turns out that the ball can be made to interfere with itself but not sufficiently so as to cause the ball to miss the corner pocket. In other words, the path can be deflected but not enough to create a paradox. Something within this thought experiment implicitly prevents a genuine paradox from ever occurring. ---Ivan Seeking.

That billard table experiement was rigged, since it was based on a rentangular right angled billard table. Where in mother nature have you seen right angles at work? (lest for humanity) Perhaps try the same experiment on a billard table that is round, which those do exist.

Here is a mistake Titor made that has already been disproved.

"13. We don't know what's on Mars yet."

I guess he didn't know about the Mars rovers that were due to land on Mars in 2004. ---Evo.

Well John Titor does mention that a lot of the technology (information) of his day was lost post the nuclear strike. Reminds me of the anime program "Trigun" with all that pre-cursor technology strewn about and not knowing how to use it fully.

Also his claim that Russia will nuke China and the US is extremely hard to believe. I find it hard to believe that Russia and its citizens are willing to commit suicide. Russia funding a war? LOL That country's economy has been in the toilet for years, what will they arm their soldiers with sticks? Terrorism is a much more serious threat to the US and other nations than Russia. ---Graveneworld.

Well during the cold war there have been many tales of being on the brink of a nuclear war. More recently i heard of this one either via the history channel or discovery science channel. That in 1995 then President (Primer) Yelstin of Russia was on the verge of launching a first strike at the USA.

The reason being was they detected a lone missile that they suspected was targeted at Moscow. Yelstin had his version of the "football" (launch codes etc..) in hand. The culprit was some Noreweign scientists had fired a missile with an experiemental payload of atmospheric gear. Which Yelstin was at his 2 minute window to make the decision to strike us, which by his "raw nerve" he watched all this unfold and watch the missile splash into the ocean.

So basically there may be countless tales like this during the cold war, but we just don't know about it. Also, the black market has possibly so many rogue nukes from Russia that it's plausible. Much like that movie with Ben Affleck and Morgan Freeman with a rogue nuke being set off in the US. Thinking it was the Russians launching a first strike at the president visit in a sporting arena.

Who's to say that a old communist guard of disgruntled Russian military that went rogue, doesn't launch something at the USA. Yes, it's all very far-fetched and hopefully non-sense, but the chess pieces are on the board. It just takes a chain of events to put them into motion.

 

[MadIce]

Below you'll find some reconstructions of the original threads in which John Titor/TimeTravel_0 appeared.

Time Travel Paradoxes!
Parallel Universe
Topics Limited to 11 Pages?
I am from 2036