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Asked by Mads to Anais, katy, Lauren, Richard, Stuart on 14 Mar 2016.
Question: Is time travel possible?
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Anais Kahve answered on 14 Mar 2016:
Unfortunately not, but I’m sure it will be possible at some point the future. Anything is possible!
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Richard Friend answered on 14 Mar 2016:
Nope, sorry, although it makes for some great films! Cause and effect are so tightly bound that we can’t mix the two up. If we did go back in time we’d probably create a whole bunch of paradoxes, (like going back and killing your grandfather) and some people have said that if this would happen the universe would fix itself in the easiest way possible, which would be to make it so no one went back in time in the first place. Boring or what?
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Stuart Atkinson answered on 15 Mar 2016:
Yes, absolutely, time travel is possible. But I will also back up Anais and Richard and say ‘in one direction only!’
Think about it – you are travelling through time all the time. Yesterday it was yesterday, and today you are rapidly moving into tomorrow!
The speed at which we perceive time is also determined by consciousness eg for a rock with no perception of its surroundings, a year could pass in an instant. Yet if you are bored in a lesson then sometimes the clock feels like it’s going backwards. Conversely, when you’re enjoying yourself it can seem to go really quickly.
Having said all that, Einstein’s Theory of Special Relativity predicted that fast moving objects would experience time dilation, and this has been shown to be true. Scientists took a pair of highly-accurate clocks and flew one at high speed whilst keeping the other on the ground. When they were compared it was found that the one that had been moving was a little behind ie time had actually slowed down for it! Effects of relativity like this have to be taken into account with the satellites that provide our GPS system.
An extreme example of this effect is a though experiment called the ‘Twins Paradox’. One twin goes off into space at close to the speed of light, and his brother remains on Earth. When the first twin returns, although he himself has only aged a year, his brother is now an old man. This sounds ridiculous but has been shown to be true – the only difficult thing is getting close to the speed of light!
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Lauren Laing answered on 15 Mar 2016:
I’m with Stuart, I think one day this could be possible!!! There are a few theories to explain how! But they all seem to come with their problems so far!!!
One theory is: If we could travel at the speed of light (OR faster!!!)
This theory says, if we could travel at a constant speed of 186,000 miles per second, when travelling this fast your clock runs slow relative to people who are still! Brian Cox thinks that “As you approach the speed of light, your clock runs so slow you could come back 10,000 years in the future.”One of the major problems with this theory is that according to the laws of physics, nothing can travel as fast as the speed of light – let alone a spaceship. This would also require a huge amount of energy!!!! Also, the human body would not be able to withstand time travel at all, as travelling at nearly the speed of light would kill you. So there are quite a few issues with THIS theory!!!
Another theory is using the super massive black hole! Professor Hawking described black holes as being so dense that they have a dramatic impact on time, slowing it down more than anything else in the universe. If a spaceship were to orbit a black hole, those on board would only experience eight minutes of time for every 16-minute orbit.
That would mean, if they circled the black hole for five years, 10 years would pass elsewhere. When they get home, everyone on Earth will have aged five years more than they have.The problem is this is very dangerous, and it doesn’t really take us that far into the future!!!
So I think time travel will be possible! One day! But I think we need to do a lot more research yet!
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