Time Travel

Time may well be the most complex phenomenon known to mankind. Scientists know many things about it yet at the same time know very little. One conclusion, however, is pretty straight forward. Time travel Ð'- at least the kind that would be of any use to us Ð'- is just not possible.

Firstly we will focus on a few ideas and questions about time travel. One major question asked by people is: if time travel exists where are all the time travelers? This does seem to be an exceptional question. If time travel does exist then wouldn't we see time travelers popping up here and there in different time periods? One theory is that all the UFO's, ghosts and other strange phenomenon we experience are caused by time travelers. (Faige) There is of course no proof whatsoever in these statements but it is interesting to think about. The grandfather clause is another very interesting aspect of time travel. It's an extremely good example of why time travel does not make sense. Say for example you were to travel back in time and kill your grandfather before he produced a son. This would mean your father would never have been conceived and in turn lead to you never being born. But if you were never born then you could not have killed your grandfather and therefore your grandfather had a child which, in turn, leads to your birth. (Richmond 299-300) To put it in a more straightforward context if you went back in time and killed yourself as a child you would never have grown up and would never have been able to travel back in time to kill yourself. This obviously does not make sense and completely contradicts itself. Richmond, however, brings up an interesting defense of the theory. He states that time can not be tampered with. For example you go back in time to kill your grandfather. You try to stab him but at that moment he gets into a taxi cab. You try to shoot him but your gun jams. No matter how you try to kill him, you simply can not do so. You run into an impossible amount of coincidences that prevents you from killing your grandfather and changing time. (300-301) This isn't a bad attempt at defending time travel but this theory is ridiculous and does not hold ground in the slightest. There are two reasons for this. The first is that in our world there are no such things as infinite coincidences. We know it to be true therefore if these recurring coincidences are impossible then it's safe to say time travel is also impossible. (Dowe 575-577) The second reason ties in with the chaos theory; that one small change can adversely have huge impacts felt all around the globe. If you are unable to kill your grandfather this means you can not tamper with the time line. But if you were to go back in time at all would you not have already tampered with the time line the moment you stepped foot into the past? For example let us say after traveling into the past you exit your time machine and step on a bug. This bug, however, had come into contact with a certain chemical that mutated it enough so that when it was eaten by a bird it made this bird develop a gene that later was found to cure cancer. Would the mysterious force somehow stop you from stepping on the bug? In traveling into the past a time traveler would inadvertently be changing the future no matter what they were to do or how minute the changes were to be. Even bending one blade of grass would be changing the future would it not? This doesn't eliminate Richmond's mysterious coincidences view completely but we can conclude that in order to preserve the future this unexplained phenomenon (if such a thing exists) would simply disallow time travel altogether.

It seems there is a pretty strong case rejecting time travel but there is one more point to look at. This concept is pretty straight forward but once again it does not hold face when it comes down to the basics. This theory is that of casual loops. That event A causes event B, which in turn leads back to event A. Say, for example, your future self comes up to you one day and gives you instructions on how to build a time machine. After many years of hard work you finally perfect the machine. You set it to go back into the past and upon arrival you find your earlier self and give him instructions on how to build a time machine. You can only build a time machine because you received instructions from the future but you were only able to receive the instructions because you were able to travel back through time! (Riggs 58-64) With a little thought one can see how absolutely absurd this idea is. It makes no sense whatsoever. In our world event A is caused by event B which causes event C. You can not have loops because it simply does not add up. There has to be a start of events but in the casual loop theory there is no direct start. This leads us to believe that casual loops are not possible and furthers our conclusion that time travel is impossible. In discussing these common situations we can get significant insight into time travel and get a general understanding of the problems it presents. Once this is achieved we can focus on the more technical views and develop theories out of evidence at hand such as those which Albert Einstein developed.

Einstein came up with ingenious theories about the universe that