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Far-Fetched Time Travel Concept Receives Private Funds
Posted by
Zonk
on Tue Jun 12, 2007 10:59 AM
from the if-you're-going-to-make-a-time-machine-do-it-with-some-style dept.
from the if-you're-going-to-make-a-time-machine-do-it-with-some-style dept.
WED Fan writes "A University of Washington researcher who couldn't find funds the old fashioned way has raised funds from private parties to continue with his studies of 'time travel'. He is studying the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox. Basically, using spooky action, he wants to be able to use entangled pairs to send messages, not only through space, but also in time. 'As the evidence for this has accumulated, several fairly contorted and unsatisfying efforts have been aimed at solving the puzzle. Cramer has proposed an explanation that doesn't violate the speed of light but does kind of mess with the traditional concept of time.' Despite the implausibility of the science here laypeople have been inspired by the researcher's idea, enough to donate almost $35,000 to his project."
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obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
I have a bridge that...
In soviet Russia Time Travel You.
Is this the Lt. Commander Data theory or the Spock theory of time travel?
if you do manage to do this, send me a copy of all the sports results for the next 100 years and history of the stocks, etc.
Seriously.. If this was possible, i can only start to imagine how the wrong people or even the right people could really mess up things with their first little test.
Re:obligatory (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:obligatory (Score:5, Interesting)
This won't allow you to send messages 'back' in time though.
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Re:obligatory (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
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Maybe they did... (Score:5, Funny)
How do you know they didn't?
Sure, it may seem like it's a foolish investment, but if it pays off... Oh, man... Invest a penny at the beginning at time, and before you know it, you'll be dining at Milliways.
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Two counterpoints (Score:5, Insightful)
(2) Not necessarily, if one needs to develop a special kind of "receiver" in order to receive the messages, then the first point in time at which such messages could be received would be when such receiver technology was invented (such point in time would be in the future still). If that point was in, say, 2015, then you could send messages from 2019 to 2015 but not from 2019 to 2007. You could *send* such messages, but nobody would have the technology to even realise that such messages were being sent. Like transmitting radio signals to cavemen.
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Dear God! (Score:5, Funny)
Now THAT would be annoying! Imagine turning the thing on for the first time ever, and immediately receiving Zetabytes of "Frist psot!" messages.
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Re:Two counterpoints (Score:5, Funny)
Cue pissed off insulted caveman Geico commercial.
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Re:Two counterpoints (Score:5, Funny)
I am writing to inform you that I have recieved a message from your future self. Included is the text from that message.
Here's my address..
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Re:obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:obligatory (Score:4, Informative)
i actually like the many-worlds theory. i find it easier to grasp.
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Re:ahahaha... (Score:5, Informative)
Heck, the site even says that time dilation doesn't occur and instead attributes it to clocks slowing down ("for whatever reason"). Now, experiments in time dilation have shown that cesium atomic clocks, devices accurate to within a billionth of a second every day, show results extremely close to that predicted in general reletivity. Unless this site wants to come up with an explaination of mechanical failure for devices with such accuracy, I'm going to stick with the evidence for time dilation.
Overall, I have to say that crackpot sites by people who as far I can tell have submitted no papers to peer reviewed journals or otherwise shown expertise in the field are probably not the best place to get information on physics.
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Its not that far fetched. (Score:5, Funny)
I invested some money in this guy next week and have been earning a decent return on my investment for the last 3 years.
I did however feel a little shiver as I considered shorting his stock and for some damned reason pictures of my family have started to fade.
Re:Its not that far fetched. (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Its not that far fetched. (Score:5, Funny)
2. ???
3. Invent Time Machine
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So? (Score:5, Funny)
he wants to be able to use entangled pairs to send messages, not only through space, but also in time.
Big deal, Slashdot has been bringing us news from the past for years!
Re:So? (Score:5, Funny)
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As The Doctor once said... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:As The Doctor once said... (Score:4, Funny)
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First Post from 1972 (Score:5, Funny)
Re:First Post from 1972 (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm all for the scientific method... (Score:3, Insightful)
But I also admire folks who can inspire others toward some dream...
Re:I'm all for the scientific method... (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't have to pick between dreaming and scientific rigor. The scientific method is how you turn your dreams into a reality -- if reality is ammenable to your dreams.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The question is whether $35k is enough to fund one experiment.
Re:I'm all for the scientific method... (Score:5, Insightful)
The wealthier you are the more other people take you seriously.
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Re:I'm all for the scientific method... (Score:5, Informative)
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ROI (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:ROI (Score:5, Interesting)
This process takes no time (obviously), so any discovery of time travel is immediately undone. Actually, this happens all the, er, time.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It is extraordinarily sad to me that the "geeks" of this forum are considering this a financial investment rather than a scientific investment. I am a scientist, and I know that the logic of grants and funding agencies is a game that can be far removed from science, supportive of the status quo and the tenured. For $2-10K, if I had it lying around, I'd happily play "funding reviewer" in the hope of fun
Re:ROI (Score:4, Insightful)
If you've got more money than you know what to do with, why not take a couple long-shot bets?
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Re:ROI (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:ROI (Score:4, Interesting)
So in testing the machine, you receive the message, and then in 20 seconds send it. It works! Great, but...
On the second test, you start to wonder, "What would happen if I was going to send the message, but then change my mind when I receive it?"
So you receive the message, then decide not to send it. Interesting paradox, huh?
Either that, or the machine will always predict with 100% accuracy whether or not you'll push the button to send the message. So if you intend to not push it once you get the message, you'll never get the message. So there will be no way to "trick" the message into coming in.
It's a bizarre concept. Thinking about it brings up interesting thoughts like whether or not we really have free will.
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Come on... (Score:4, Funny)
for chists sake (Score:5, Informative)
you'd think these people wouldve already known that.
Re:for chists sake (Score:5, Funny)
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I am already Half way there. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I am already Half way there. (Score:5, Funny)
>:-*-D
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Re:I am already Half way there. (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:I am already Half way there. (Score:5, Funny)
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List of investors? (Score:4, Insightful)
I can prove that it won't work (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course, the past impoverished researcher would have to build a receiver first, requiring funds up front. Maybe that's what he's doing now. Keep an eye on how this guy's "luck" goes in the, um, future.
Push it to the limit (Score:3, Funny)
Good idea (Score:5, Interesting)
I care not if I think the researcher is not all there, it's not my money.
For instance Robert Bussard is trying to raise funds to continue his fusion research. Now I don't think he spent money wisely in the past, I don't think he was too smart in his dealings with the DoD, I do not think he has solved all the problem. But I do think he is the closest to cheap fusion. Should I fund him?
My only stipulation is that everything must be published, not only the research but also the money trail. I want to see where the dork spent $10k on software.
Remember, folks... (Score:3, Insightful)
These People aren't Investors (Score:5, Insightful)
These people are not investors. They did not get "scammed". Those of us who read the article know that this scientist did not even approach them for cash. Rather, news of his plight got out and people wanted to donate. He is a respected particle physicist with a theory that is a little odd. He wants to perform a relatively cheap experiment which should show whether his theory has enough going for it to be worth further examination. If these experiments fail, oh well, back to the drawing board.
This is the way science is SUPPOSED to work. There's nothing wrong with being skeptical, but acting like this guy is a scam artist is ridiculous. This guy runs a super collider, yet everyone here is so damn sure they understand quantum phenomenon better than he does.
I am an investor. (Score:5, Funny)
I have yet to hear of any results, although I did have a strange experience the other day. I was about to try my first sip of Milo's Famous Sweet Tea when a 500 lb man appeared from thin air and knocked the glass from my hand before disappearing again.
Not a crackpot. (Score:4, Informative)
It's based on hard science, and makes testable predictions. TFS grabbed the most sensational lines from TFA.
Re:Causality anyone? (Score:5, Interesting)
Intra-universe causality, at least. If parallel universes exist (and mathematically it makes a lot more sense if they do), then causality is a moot point. When something travels back in time, it only appears in a parallel universe with the same history up to the point in the past at which it arrives, after which it is fundamentally different. This doesn't necessarily even require a violation of the laws of physics, because there is always some finite (but infinitesimal) probability of virtual particles assembling themselves into an object from a possible future or the past. If there are parallel universes, then there are almost certainly an infinite number of them, one for every possibility, and therefore some universes exist in which time travel happens as essentially an accident of random physics, but to the observers within the universe it looks just like time travel but without causality violations.
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