Could the past and future be happening right now?

[Sean Hollyman]

I mean, are the past and future happening as we speak?

Imagine this: You go back a hundred years, and see a man riding a bike. Now when you go back to your own time, will that man still be riding his bike, but in his own time?

Same can be said of the future. You go into the future, and see a bird flying. When you go back to your present time, will that bird still be flying in it's own time? Or will it just cease?

Also, if you were to go to a diffirent point of time, what would happen to your current self? Would you just dissapear while you're gone, then come back? Would anyone notice your asbesnce?

 

[HighXavier]

What I think you're asking is what happens to the original time line when you time travel. If you beleive in the idea that there is only one time line then going back in time will not change anything as any changes you make will be already done from your original prespective( the man riding the bike will continue to ride the bike in the past).

If you beleive in an infinite number of time lines then nothing happens to your original self also. You are traveling time lines by going to the past or future (the man riding the bike will be in a different time line and will continue to ride the bike).

 

[Bacaruda]

Since time travel to the past is ludicrous; I find this topic quite amusing.

 

[Indeterminacy]

Imagine this: You go back a hundred years, and see a man riding a bike. Now when you go back to your own time, will that man still be riding his bike, but in his own time?

Same can be said of the future. You go into the future, and see a bird flying. When you go back to your present time, will that bird still be flying in it's own time? Or will it just cease?

Also, if you were to go to a diffirent point of time, what would happen to your current self? Would you just dissapear while you're gone, then come back? Would anyone notice your asbesnce?

I think the essence of your concern here is best addressed by the late, great, Douglas Adams:

One of the major problems encountered in time travel not that of becoming your own mother or father. There is no problem involved in becoming your own mother or father that a broad-minded and well-adjusted family can?t cope with. There is no problem about changing the course of history- the course of history does not change because it all fits together like a jigsaw. All the important changes have happened before the things they were supposed to change and it all sorts itself out in the end.

The major problem is quite simply one of grammar, and the main work to consult in this matter is Dr Dan Streetmentioner's Time Traveller's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you for instance how to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward two days in order to avoid it. The event will be described differently according to whether you are talking about it from the standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the further future, or a time in the further past and is further complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations whilst you are actually travelling from one time to another with the intention of becoming your own father or mother.

Most readers get as far as the Future Semi-Conditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up: and in fact in later editions of the book all the pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs.

The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy skips lightly over this tangle of academic abstraction, pausing only to note that the term "Future Perfect" has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be.

Basically, you're using grammatical tenses that assume you're in the present such as "still be riding" , but postulate their application across time frames. That's a category error.

 

[CrystalShadow]

That is really a question that's very difficult to answer. Since physics essentially says time doesn't really exist as we understand it (it's an artifact of how the mind works), there's a high chance it all exists at once.

Though, there's still quite a few different possibilities, and no-one really knows what is really going on.

However, consider this:

If the past, present and future all exist at once, that implies free will doesn't exist. Because everything you've ever done, or ever will do already exists and is completely immutable.

You might think parallel universes would help this, but it won't. It just means everything you could ever possibly do or have done exists as well.
You still can't change anything, but now you also can't know which of the many possible futures is the your future, and which is the future of an alternate version of yourself.

 

[shootandshiver]

I have a theory that chrontons are just forward and back instructors to matter. That time as it is does not exist aside from local anomolies putting things in fastforwards and backwards.

 

[Indeterminacy]

That is really a question that's very difficult to answer. Since physics essentially says time doesn't really exist as we understand it (it's an artifact of how the mind works), there's a high chance it all exists at once.

Again, "At once" necessitates the existence of criteria for two events occurring "at the same time". It's crazy to think that everything that happened 10 seconds ago, now and 10 seconds in the future happen "at the same time", since the very conditions by which events are observed to occur "now, as opposed to 10 seconds ago" are what determine that they do not in fact happen "at once".

 

[shootandshiver]

i got this theory when a buddy of mine and i were talking about anti matter out in who-knows-where that might be going backwards...

And since time exists provably if your smarter than me, it also explains why the universe hasnt divided by 0.0 by a since electron passing three seconds in the past and creating a chronological impossibility, or better yet, why Philip J Fry can be his own grandfather

 

[Innegativeion]

Since time travel to the past is ludicrous; I find this topic quite amusing.

Yeah, musing about the scientific implications of backwards time travel is rather pointless considering it's scientifically impossible.

Best to just stick with the rules set forth by whatever TV show/movie/book/video game you're using at the moment.

 

[x EvilErmine x]

No and yes because as relativity states time relative to the individual. So for the man riding the bike in the past then he will still be riding the bike but only from his point of view. From yours he ain't going to be riding anything as he will be long dead.

Also time travel to the past is not possible because of thermodynamics. To travel to the past would require you to somehow reverse the entropy of the universe.

Although I've always wondered what would happen to you if you could over come thermodynamics and go to the past. What would happen to the matter that i am made of? How would it exists in two places at the same time? Because if i go back before i was born then the atoms that make me up would have been somewhere else. So how could i be there but the atoms that make me be somewhere else too.

 

[theheroofaction]

Um... no.

It's just a convenient plot device made by sci-fi writers to make it so time-travel guys can't be prepared for everything.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Since time travel to the past is ludicrous; I find this topic quite amusing.

Yeah, musing about the scientific implications of backwards time travel is rather pointless considering it's scientifically impossible.

Well, people do think of the sound of one hand clapping. Or imaginary numbers.

 

[Indeterminacy]

Also time travel to the past is not possible because of thermodynamics. To travel to the past would require you to somehow reverse the entropy of the universe.

That's if you're considering "the Universe at a time t" a closed system. One could suppose that the existence of time travel would explicitly open the system at time t up to the flow of heat to other time slices of the universe.

 

[Innegativeion]

Although I've always wondered what would happen to you if you could over come thermodynamics and go to the past. What would happen to the matter that i am made of? How would it exists in two places at the same time? Because if i go back before i was born then the atoms that make me up would have been somewhere else. So how could i be there but the atoms that make me be somewhere else too.

God couldn't come up for a good solution to that one, so he just decided to scrap the time travel mechanic.

Well, people do think of the sound of one hand clapping. Or imaginary numbers.

Oh I love sci-fi and fantasy, but since there is no reverse time travel, there are no "rules" to it. Reverse time travel's "rules" change based on the fictional universe it's based it. OP seems to be trying figure how it would work within the real world.

Also, like my man Lewis Caroll, I hate imaginary numbers with a passion.

 

[Indeterminacy]

Also, like my man Lewis Caroll, I hate imaginary numbers with a passion.

Pah. PAH, I say. The complex field is entirely well defined. Why are imaginary numbers any more problematic than real or rational numbers?

 

[XDravond]

Hmm time travel an interesting thing to discuss. Time, is "now" really the present or has it already happened? If I travel backwards whack my ancestor and then travel back would I exist?... Takes a lot great minds to form proper hypothesis about what could be...

But Really time travel I'm skeptical to, but possibility of seeing what has happen is probably possible (you "just" have to beat the speed of light and your home...)

For the question: No. If you travel back in time you can only see things that already happened. History is fuzzy but for some reason I believe it's not changeable or "happening" as we speak... (we are not talking about humans perception of history, because "history is written by the winner...", but the actual movement in time/space...
And time travel (if it is at all possible) is not what you'd call safe because we don't really know the moving speed of some rather important things like the universe (you would have a larger chance of getting "materialized" in a sun on the other edge of the universe than on Earth... (and even less on a specific spot...)

So "Scotty beam me up..." I take my chances with teleportation before I try time travel...

 

[x EvilErmine x]

Although I've always wondered what would happen to you if you could over come thermodynamics and go to the past. What would happen to the matter that i am made of? How would it exists in two places at the same time? Because if i go back before i was born then the atoms that make me up would have been somewhere else. So how could i be there but the atoms that make me be somewhere else too.

God couldn't come up for a good solution to that one, so he just decided to scrap the time travel mechanic.

That made me laugh far too loudly...now the cat is giving me evil looks coz i woke him up. Barvo good sir xD

Also time travel to the past is not possible because of thermodynamics. To travel to the past would require you to somehow reverse the entropy of the universe.

That's if you're considering "the Universe at a time t" a closed system. One could suppose that the existence of time travel would explicitly open the system at time t up to the flow of heat to other time slices of the universe.

Yeah i see where you are coming from on that one but i just cant see how the universe can be anything but a closed system , all be it a frikin ginormous one. For it not to be a closed system would that not imply that there is something outside the universe?

 

[vrbtny]

Imagine this: You go back a hundred years, and see a man riding a bike. Now when you go back to your own time, will that man still be riding his bike, but in his own time?

Same can be said of the future. You go into the future, and see a bird flying. When you go back to your present time, will that bird still be flying in it's own time? Or will it just cease?

Also, if you were to go to a diffirent point of time, what would happen to your current self? Would you just dissapear while you're gone, then come back? Would anyone notice your asbesnce?

I think the essence of your concern here is best addressed by the late, great, Douglas Adams:

One of the major problems encountered in time travel not that of becoming your own mother or father. There is no problem involved in becoming your own mother or father that a broad-minded and well-adjusted family can?t cope with. There is no problem about changing the course of history- the course of history does not change because it all fits together like a jigsaw. All the important changes have happened before the things they were supposed to change and it all sorts itself out in the end.

The major problem is quite simply one of grammar, and the main work to consult in this matter is Dr Dan Streetmentioner's Time Traveller's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you for instance how to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward two days in order to avoid it. The event will be described differently according to whether you are talking about it from the standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the further future, or a time in the further past and is further complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations whilst you are actually travelling from one time to another with the intention of becoming your own father or mother.

Most readers get as far as the Future Semi-Conditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up: and in fact in later editions of the book all the pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs.

The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy skips lightly over this tangle of academic abstraction, pausing only to note that the term "Future Perfect" has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be.

Basically, you're using grammatical tenses that assume you're in the present such as "still be riding" , but postulate their application across time frames. That's a category error.

Yeah, whatever this guy said/quoted.

No idea what the hell it means, but this is your answer.

 

[XDravond]

Also, like my man Lewis Caroll, I hate imaginary numbers with a passion.

Pah. PAH, I say. The complex field is entirely well defined. Why are imaginary numbers any more problematic than real or rational numbers?

Because there are so many rules you have to remember for something that does not exist in any other way than human minds...(or whatever super intelligent alien might got that far in mathematics...)