Renowned Physicist Says Time Travel Is Not Only Possible, But Likely
Yesterday we told you about the mad scientists mixing humans and cows together…today, not so creepy, but just as fantastic.
Time travel? Teleportation? No problem, says renowned physicist Michio Kaku.
Kaku, a professor at the City University of New York, is creating quite a stir in Britain with the release of his new book, “The Physics of the Impossible.”
On this side of the pond, outlandish claims in books are recognized as, well, a good way to sell books.
But in Blighty, Kaku’s being treated as if he’s Doctor Who informing dim-witted humans about the wonders of the Universe, with front-page treatment Wednesday in both the Daily Telegraph and the Guardian. Even the normally staid Economist is chiming in.
Kaku, one of the earliest proponents of string theory, still a contentious issue among physicists, divides the most common science-fiction tropes, or “impossibilities,” into three categories — possible soon, possible in the far future and really, truly impossible.
Category 1, as he dubs it, includes things that may become true within the next century, if not the next few decades: teleportation (already possible, but only among subatomic particles); telepathy (thanks to brain implants); invisibility (already being researched using light-bending ‘metamaterials’); laser guns (existing, but hugely power-hungry); force fields; and the discovery of extraterrestrial life.
Category 2 includes things that are theoretically possible but would be realized only with thousands more years of technological progress: time travel (possibly through “wormholes” in space); traveling faster than light; and the discovery of parallel universes.
Category 3 consists of things that really are impossible because they violate the laws of physics. Only two concepts qualify: knowing the future and perpetual motion.
“The Physics of the Impossible,” released March 11 in the U.S., is currently No. 123 on the Amazon bestseller lists. It comes out Thursday in Britain, though without the “Doctor Who”-themed cover of the U.S. version.
(Fox)
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Time travel?
Shit, that’s easy!
Get on board Saudi Arabian Airlines and by the time you’ve landed in Riyadh, you have to set your watch back 600 years.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:02 pmThere once was a fellow named White
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:08 pmWhose speed was much faster than light
He took off one day
In a Relative way
And returned on the previous night!
Bill;
My memory goes (from the book “1,2,3, Infinity”, George Gamow):
There was a young lady named Bright
Who could travel much faster than light!
She took off one day
In a relative way,
And came back on the previous night!
Actually, future time travellers have been messing around with history all along. You don’t notice because your memories are revised each time they make a change.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:13 pmSooo….with time travel…unless your time travel device is portable and comes with you, wouldn’t that be a one way ticket to the past? (Where the time travel device doesn’t exist yet). Or is gonna be like that tv show Sliders where it’s like a remote control…no, wait…that’s alternate realities…I’m so confused!
I’ll tell you one thing…if I could travel back in time…I’d go back and kill muhammed in the crib. That would be worth a one way ticket.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:26 pmOnly one big problem….the time paradox.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:48 pmIf time travel was possible, then we should have seen or experienced time travellers from our future who have gone back into their past. But because there mere presence in our time, would have corrupted the timeline.
“time”…is a figment of human imagination. ‘Time’ exists nowhere else in the universe, but in the mind of man. ‘Time’ is a construct mankind created to assuage fear; an attempt to create order out of what our limited intellect perceives as chaos. ‘Time’ does not “stand still” at the speed of light and we cannot “travel” through ‘time’…except in our imaginations.
Beyond this…
I agree with KevinM. This cult, known as islam would have us all travel back in time…to a place ruled by barbaric impulse.
April 2nd, 2008 at 2:51 pmTime is natures way of insuring that everything doesn’t happen all at once…
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:46 pmReminds me of the “Time Portal” episode in Star Trek. So where’s the “acravicon” again? I bet Mr Atos knows. LOL
April 2nd, 2008 at 4:04 pmAt least we’ll be ready when SkyNet becomes “self-aware”.
April 2nd, 2008 at 6:55 pmTake me back to the Battle of Bunker Hill.
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:08 pmTime travel is irrelevant. Judgment day is inevitable…
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:24 pmAMEN Brother.
But for the sake of discussion, time is only the measurement of the earth rotating on its axis and revolving around the sun. thats it, its just a measurement of a physical reality, there is no past, just memories and current existence. nothing more, nothing less. the future is just as impossible to reach because there is no seperate existence, just this one, how can you go someplace that doesnt exist? Besides, when Christ returns, everything as we know it will change forever.
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:08 pmsomebody stole my FLUX CAPASITOR
April 3rd, 2008 at 6:38 amdon’t think it could work that way, the only sensible theory of time travel like in Heinlein books and some other follow this is that time is a uniform continuum so anything that will happen in the future as far as time travel has already been reflected in our historical development. So no one ever will go back in time and kill Mohammad in the crib, because no one has already…lol.
anyway i kind of like Douglas Adams take on it “time is an illusion, lunch time doubly so…”
doesn’t the establishment clause require the separation of sci-fi and the church, all this talk of revelation is a real bummer, forget about Satan, or skynet, i worried about the dalek’s earth invasion 2100.
April 3rd, 2008 at 7:54 amif you are traveling down a 2 lane road and you step on the gas you just encounter the oncoming cars sooner that you would have if you traveled at the slower speed. you did not go into the future. same thing with traveling at the speed of light. it is your “relative” position in space.
Charles is right about the time issue.
April 3rd, 2008 at 9:49 amArleigh;
April 4th, 2008 at 8:24 amActually, everything DID happen all at once. We just haven’t noticed yet. :roll::eek: