Interesting site

[-F7]

It's most likely all B.S., but an interestingly haunting read nonetheless. If you like Sci-Fi, you'll love this.

http://www.johntitor.com

[Salyavin]

Of course it's BS. The "man from the future" is essentially the same as the "speaking to the dead" schtick: say a bunch of vague stuff and the gullible will remember what you got right and conveniently forget what you got wrong. This guy even built in an excuse for all his "misses": they're "divergences in the worldlines" between his future and ours. Any lucky hits are because he's from the future, of course. :rolleyes: However, talking a lot about minor advances in physics but not mentioning 9/11/01 is a pretty big miss to explain away with "divergent worldlines."

The disappearance to "go back to the future" is the real telling point. It avoids the major pitfall of any con job: stick around long enough and you'll start contradicting yourself, enough that even the easiest mark will eventually pick up on it.

Cheers,
Salyavin

[Orion]

It was still kind of cool. Sal's right though. complete BS. Like any good SciFi plot, you gotta suspend conventional logic to enjoy it.

[radio667]

So , your sayin .he's not really from the future :smirk: DAMN !!!!!!!!!

[Inkswitch]

THE TIME TRAVEL TALE OF JOHN TITOR


"The observation of time travelers "appearing" suddenly in a worldline does not happen very often. There are two cases and two points of view to consider.

In the first case, the time machine does not move as it goes from one worldline to another and then returns. The people watching on the original worldline would wave good-bye and watch as the machine is turned on. There would be a static discharge and the air would appear to "ripple" as if it were getting denser. Then, it would stop and the machine will have appeared to have disappeared. If the machine doesn't move its position from worldline to worldline, the observer would not see it disappear at all.

In the second case, if the machine were moved, it would disappear from the viewpoint of the observer and return in a different location based on where it was moved and turned on from the destination worldline. In that case, the rippling seems to dissolve the machine and it disappears. If that happens while you are watching it leave and you expect it to return, you know it was moved or had a serious malfunction.

It is actually quite dangerous to get too close to a distortion unit as it enters or leaves a worldline. It vents radiation and has a very strong localized gravity field. Personally, I worry about that a great deal.

It can be adjusted to some degree (the gravitational fields). The CG (center of gravity) is adjustable within about 4 feet and the unit is effective about 10 to 12 feet in either direction from there. The vertical distance is quite a bit shorter and is determined by sensors in the unit.

Depending on whether or not you are going forward or backward, the footprint of the unit is different. I wouldn't quite say it "scoops" up the ground cleanly. It sort of vibrates it loose and takes it along for the ride. It looks like someone raked the ground an inch or so deep with a small hand hoe or shovel. The negative ergosphere "scoops" up the front and back areas of the field. The positive ergosphere leaves a longer area near the center of mass. It's about a cubic foot of dirt spread out over six square feet or so."


He made the classic mistake right there. Stating that the "time machine" does not move or travel physically blows his whole scam. A time machine MUST also be able to travel physical distances. Our solar system moves apprx 1 million miles a day in the outer spiral arm of our galaxy. Any time travel machine that didn't physically travel in real space would appear in vacuum. Our planet would be nearly 120,450,000,000 miles out of position in relation to the "time machine" in the "worldline" he describes. That is if he is traveling 33 years.

One a side note.... This guy seems really bitter. I think he is an environmentalist by some of the stuff he writes. They are all pretty bitter.

Also, his quote "Everything that can happen has probably already happened in another wordline" or whatever it was has been written in more than one sci-fi novels. "The Labryinth of Dreams" by Jack Chalker is where this guy is getting most of his stuff and you will find his direct quote "a saying we have in the future" in these books. They are a decent read, btw. Not real deep, but fun.

:ink:

[Squirrelinabox]

A time machine in the "classic" sense (such as in the move/book The Time Machine) actually doesn't need to move itself, as it merely speeds up/slows down time while it remains stationary. IN that sense, the machine itself can move along with the rotation/shift of the Earth but not actually have to move itself. Just as I can sit on the ground for a day, I personally haven't moved anywhere by my own actions... but being grounded on a moving object has caused me to move in relation to the universe. So, basically, a time machine doesn't need to move, as long as it deals with the "speeding up" or "slowing down" time theories it can basically sit in one spot on earth and be carried along to the right position just as welll all do every day... just with a time machine it would be much faster/slower.

But yes, the guy's theory sounds like he means the time machine doesn't move in real space, so it traveling to different "wordlines" would leave it in a vacuum instead of in the right spot.

And yes, the guy has issues :)

[Creeper]

It's all economics, really. *IF* mankind EVERY develops the ability to time-travel both forwards and backwards, (forward time-travel is quite easy, but you can't return backwards afterwards) we'd already know about it. The first person to figure it out would go back in time, buy manhatten, LA, Chicago, and Microsoft stock, for example. Anyway, the further back they can go with modern knowledge, the richer they become. So they then re-invest their riches in the past, and quickly wind up owning the world. That's not the case, so it never happens in the future either.

The second best idea after amassing the entire world's wealth, is improving technology. Go back in time a bit, invent stuff long before its' supposed to be, and by the time you get back to 'your present' .. everyone lives forever. Again, as that's not currently the case, it never will be.

:moon:

[Squirrelinabox]

Heh... that is kind of similar to my thoughts on Time Travel Creep...

Basically... if time travel is possible... it would have already been used at some point in the infinite future. And with that infinite future, comes infinite ways for people to come back to our time (and before) and destroy everything... intentional or not. There are so many paradoxes, so many little things that would have already been done to destroy the universe if time travel was possible.

Sure, all those movies about it make it look like rules can govern it all and it would be possible, though dangerous. If you think about how infinite time is, and how all it would take is 1 person in an infinite mass of future people to destroy everything, then it would have already been done. It is that simple.

However... traveling to the future still remains a possibility :)

[-F7]

A time machine in the "classic" sense (such as in the move/book The Time Machine) actually doesn't need to move itself, as it merely speeds up/slows down time while it remains stationary. IN that sense, the machine itself can move along with the rotation/shift of the Earth but not actually have to move itself. Just as I can sit on the ground for a day, I personally haven't moved anywhere by my own actions... but being grounded on a moving object has caused me to move in relation to the universe. So, basically, a time machine doesn't need to move, as long as it deals with the "speeding up" or "slowing down" time theories it can basically sit in one spot on earth and be carried along to the right position just as welll all do every day... just with a time machine it would be much faster/slower.

Actually, that wouldn't work. There might be a mountain or a lake where you're sitting 50 years prior. Moving back to that time and stopping would be...a bit of a problem. :p

Supposedly, this guy Titor said that one of the aspects of his time machine did something to overcome that.

[Salyavin]

Actually, that wouldn't work. There might be a mountain or a lake where you're sitting 50 years prior. Moving back to that time and stopping would be...a bit of a problem. :pA mountain or a lake in the future where/when you arrive is a risk of this kind of time travel (all hypothesis of course). Vernor Vinge's book Marooned in Realtime solved it by using computers to make microsecond stops every 50 years or so to check the outside world and make adjustments. Local time was completely stopped while "bobbled" so whatever created the mountain or lake couldn't affect you until the bobble popped. Great read BTW, like all of Vinge's books.

Supposedly, this guy Titor said that one of the aspects of his time machine did something to overcome that.Titor seems to have had a similar idea. His "time machine" stopped occasionally and "sampled" the local gravity. To high or too low and it would adjust the destination time. Treknobabble it might be, it still doesn't solve the problem of navigation: i.e. how do you know what the gravity should be at your target destination. It's not like we have gravity records for places and times on Earth from 1998 to 2001. :)

Basically... if time travel is possible... it would have already been used at some point in the infinite future. And with that infinite future, comes infinite ways for people to come back to our time (and before) and destroy everything... intentional or not. There are so many paradoxes, so many little things that would have already been done to destroy the universe if time travel was possible.The classic example is the grandfather paradox: go back in time and kill your grandfather before your father was conceived. There's no way around that one, except by handwaving "divergent worldlines" or parallel universes to explain away the discrepancies of causality (changes in the past affecting your future) and, of course, mispredictions.

I agree that if time travel to the past was possible it will already have happened (consult Dr. Streetmentioner's guide for proper time travel grammar :)), but how about the possibility of looking into the past but not being able to go there? There's a good Asimov story around that idea but the title escapes me at the moment.

Cheers,
Salyavin

[Paladin]

If anyone needs me, I'll be in my Police Box laughing hysterically.

[SK TastesLike KFC]

Who Moved My Blog?







SKTLKFC:moon:

[MadMikey]

Heh... that is kind of similar to my thoughts on Time Travel Creep...

Basically... if time travel is possible... it would have already been used at some point in the infinite future. And with that infinite future, comes infinite ways for people to come back to our time (and before) and destroy everything... intentional or not. There are so many paradoxes, so many little things that would have already been done to destroy the universe if time travel was possible.

Sure, all those movies about it make it look like rules can govern it all and it would be possible, though dangerous. If you think about how infinite time is, and how all it would take is 1 person in an infinite mass of future people to destroy everything, then it would have already been done. It is that simple.

However... traveling to the future still remains a possibility :)I think the Temporal Prime Directive (http://scorpion.startrek-rebellion.com/starfleet/temporal.htm)* pretty much takes care of all of this.


:D Sorry, Squirrel, had to. I like Trek, and I like discussions on Time Travel. All in all, this thread and the aforementioned website has been a pretty good read.










* Some people have entirely too much time on their hands :D

[Play]

...

* Some people have entirely too much time on their hands :D

That's exactly what I was about to say! Now can somebody tell me what this has to do with the timer on my microwave? :confused:

[ProphetSix]

"I appreciate the position you are in but you must realize that I am not affected in the least if you believe me or not."

Convenient statement, isn't it? =) Also, I was wondering where the slang and language from "his time" would show itself in the posts. I can only imagine that, especially since the world is more community and family oriented in the future, the English language has once again changed. He could make a conscious effort to use nothing but the current age's speech, but sooner or later (especially after 4 months of posts) you would slip up.

Granted, I didn't read through the entire thing, so he may have gone over that.......but still, I wonder how people will be talking in 2036. Perhaps "your mom" will finally be recognized in the Oxford dictionary? :naughty:

Nah, on a more serious note, perhaps time travel isn't travelling in time after all, but warping yourself to alternate planes of existence that look exactly like your world right now? After all, we can only see so far into space and we have not yet found the end to galaxies, worlds, stars, etc......the universe is huge, why can't there be a few billion of earths for each person, with "timelines" for quite a few possible outcomes for your actions?

So, more or less, you don't travel back in "time", but you travel 100 giga-light years away to another planet that looks, spins, smells, feels exactly like earth, in the same shape as it is in this moment in time; there it is "1969" while here it is "2003". You're watching the TV and see the US try to put the first men on the moon....but a storm comes through and delays the flight. Later on, while rechecking the engine, it's realized that there is a flaw in the ship's design and the flight won't be able to blast off for another year while they work it out. Meanwhile, Russia gets off a shuttle without any problems 2 months down the road, and land on the moon first. You're wondering if this affects your future, and you travel back to your origin; only to find the history books and what-not state that the US landed first, there was no storm or delay, etc.

In essence, you traveled to another world, not another time; kinda like an "instance" of your life, that's far far away; only there are a few billion of them.

*shrugs* Food for thought.

[SoBeiT]

Wasn't there a tv program with the 4 people who did travel to multiple earths..Sliders?

[ProphetSix]

Wasn't there a tv program with the 4 people who did travel to multiple earths..Sliders?

Ah, really? =D I don't watch sci-fi often, so I'm not sure..but it's a possibility; but I like to keep thinking that I have original ideas. :D

[SoBeiT]

....... but I like to keep thinking that I have original ideas. :D


Ok, you can keep on doing just that P6, I'll play along :p

multi earth travel sounds cool, good idea :)

[Salyavin]

Ah, really? =D I don't watch sci-fi often, so I'm not sure..but it's a possibility; but I like to keep thinking that I have original ideas. :DSliders was parallel universes. P6's idea is parallel Earths in this universe which is a lot more interesting. It's a more original idea too, but not truly original as Star Trek (original series) did it a few times... mostly because the sets and costumes were cheap. :)

If anyone needs me, I'll be in my Police Box laughing hysterically.Piffle. You can have your old Type 40 with the broken chameleon circuit. I'll take my well-furnished Cambridge professor's flat any day. :)

Cheers,
Salyavin

[Orion]

Dr. Who? I don't know that guy