Einstein and the time
philosopher agree...
Are Time
Machines Possible? No
Time travel is totally impossible because "the past" exists only in the memory of the observer. Certainly if one's auto is wrecked, its shattered surfaces are a record of what took place. But the wrecked auto itself continues to exist in eternity after being changed (wrecked) by the motion of matter and energy thorough space (the collision with the other auto, wall, tree, etc.)
The auto's pre-wrecked version no longer exists, except as a record (in your memory, in a photo you took of it, etc.) The future also exists only in the mind of the observer who is aware that matter and energy move continually to cause events to occur in eternity. The wrecked version of the auto doesn't exist until the collision occurs.
If the auto's pre-wrecked version were to exist, we would have to imagine there is a vast cosmic recording device that detects everything that happens and drags it into "the past." Infinite matter and energy would be required to create all of these pasts. There would be worlds and universes repeated like images in a hall of mirrors receding endlessly backward. To me, the idea of such a thing is absurd, but many physicists and cosmologists seem to believe something like this is possible.
If "time" really existed as an actual quantity, and if I could elucidate a physics for this, I would become world famous and get a trip to Stockholm for my Nobel. But no one will ever be able to quantify time because no such thing exists. (Therefore, my new analysis of time must be a philosophical analysis.)
Time then, is not even a "fourth dimension" which actually exists in the cosmos. My idea of geometry is a universe of curved lines and spherical fields and spaces. Here on earth, on our human scale, we experience three dimensions, up, down and across, but even our "level playing fields" really aren't level but are sections of the curved skin of our globe. Our concept of straight lines is something of an illusion, as is our concept of time flowing some place out there in the universe outside of our minds.
Okay, you don't have to take my word for this. Here's what Einstein said about time flow, and apparently these comments have been ignored by many of today's time travel enthusiasts: "past, present and future are only illusions, however persistent." Here we have Einstein saying essentially what I'm saying about time flow. After all, illusions are the result of mental processes such as comparing and experiencing. When we measure time, we measure one motion through space against another so we can compare these and experience time flow.
So, according Einstein and this writer, any time travel you wish to take will have to be taken inside your head.
(The above quote is from "Time's Arrow," an article by Paul Davies from New Scientist Magazine, November, 1997, as it appeared on the New Scientist web site.)
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aretime.htm, posted 7-31-00