Have you ever wanted to go back in time, and change the course of history, maybe for yourself or even the history written in your history books? Ever since I saw the movie Back to the Future when I was a little, I was fascinated by the concept of time travel.
Time travel is the concept of moving between different points in time, in a behavior corresponding to moving between different points in space. Time travel could deal with moving forward in a timeline or backward in a timeline.Jane Marshall, a leading physicist today said “Einstein's theory of relativity is a theory of space and time, and should be no surprise that black holes offer, in concept, a way to travel through space and time” (All Sands). Even some of the earliest literature works of time travel dates back to 700 BC with the story of Raviata in the Sanskrit writings of Mahabriata (Maha bree yata).
All in all scientists have been trying to uncover the myths and facts about time travel throughout the years.Stephen Hawking, one of the most well known scientists of our day has said “All you need is a wormhole, or a rocket that goes really, really fast (speed of light)” (Hawking). Today, I will be trying to give you a better understanding the two major theories relative to time travel with the immutable timeline theory and the alternate timeline theory. Before I go into these two major theories, we must get a grasp of some key concepts or terms used by scientists and the physical world.
The first would be time. Time is a hard element to grasp.It is more of a theoretical word we use to describe the measurement of change. We think of it as a constant rate, but rather this measurement especially in time travel is evaluated to show events ordered from the past to the present, the present to the future. Another key term I would like to discuss would be a paradox.
A paradox is something that contradicts or opposes itself. There are many (millions) paradoxes when talking according to time travel. The most common one people will here and best way to explain a paradox is through the grandfather paradox.The grandfather paradox is explained by saying you travel back in time and kill your grandfather before he conceives one of your parents.
As a result this prevents your own conception in which you couldn't go back in time and kill your grandfather. This creates an endless loop and creates something known as a paradox. These terms can better understand our ways to grasp time travel, and the two major theories I will be talking about. The two major theories that scientists have came up with conclude that we must avoid paradoxes at all costs.If a paradox occurs than the time travel theory remains false. So in saying that the first time travel theory is called an immutable timeline.
This is explained best by saying that no matter what we do going back in time, that we ourselves cannot change the future. That even if we go back in time to kill our grandfather, that it will remain avoided, and no matter what we will be conceived anyways. It explains that our past, present, and future is set in stone, and irony could set in. Perhaps, we were the cause of our own existence.
Perhaps, we go back in time to change an event unknowingly the event takes place because we caused it in the first place. Almost all paradoxes are avoided in doing this, and as a result is known as a plausible theory of time travel. The other major theory that scientists have come up with, gives us a time travel theory that is called an alternate timeline. This goes hand in hand with the multiverse theory.
Brian Greene, a leading physicist explains the multiverse by saying “If you shuffle that deck, there's just so many orderings that can happen," Greene says."If you shuffle that deck enough times, the orders will have to repeat. Similarly, with an infinite universe and only a finite number of complexions of matter, the way in which matter arranges itself has to repeat” (NPR). That in our life, there are an infinite number of universes, and in that infinite number of universes there are infinite number of consequences, causes, and effects. That if we go back in time and change the past, we change the course of history, but our future is changed in a new timeline, hence alternate timeline.
As a result, although, we cannot go back to our present because we have changed the timeline and it has destroyed the present and future that we know. This gets rid of all paradoxes but can result us not being able to go back in time to our “world that we know”. So now you know a little about the two major theories of time travel, the alternate timeline theory and the immutable timeline theory. Recently the immutable timeline theory has been somewhat disproved by Stephen Hawking. He held a party for time-travelers but no one showed up.
Giving us an indication that if time travel had ever been established in the future, surely someone would have shown up. This evidence shows that the alternate timeline theory has a higher reputable chance rather. That, as a result, we may be able to change the past, but not get back to our own present. Although if the immutable timeline theory was available, I would have used the chance to go to see my very own speech that I’m speaking right now, listen to it, and make changes accordingly. Thank you.
