Can Time Travel Alter Our Perception of Reality?

In summary: does this mean that if someone traveled at the speed of light for an entire lifetime, they would be younger than their twin who stayed on earth?2....if someone traveled to the past and changed something, would the future still happen, even though they changed it?3....would someone who traveled to the past and changed something still exist in the past, or would they just be visiting?
  • #1
altairz
11
0
Hey

1. If a person drive a car in 100 kph, while another person walks in 5 kph, will then time go slower for the driver?
I saw a video on youtube about Einsteins theory of relativity. They said that the faster we travel, the slower time goes. So will then the person who walks be longer into the future then the person who drive?

2. If one day a person would be able to travel as fast as the speed of light, would then time stop for that person? And if he were able to go faster than the speed of light, would he then be able to go to the past?

3. If we one day could travel to the past, would we then be able to change the future, or will everything be the same?

Thanks for answers :)
 
Astronomy news on Phys.org
  • #2
1. The increase of life due to the increase in speed would be negligible, because it is the difference in speed relative to the speed of light. If someone traveled at almost C for most of their life, then they would be younger than their identical twin on earth.

2. For a human to travel at the speed of light would be impossible without science fiction because the force required to move something at the speed of light is massive, and a photon is only able to accomplish this because it has negligible mass. And as for traveling into the past, cosmologically, everything exists at the same time, because if we look at the big bang, the fact that we are getting light from a fraction of a time after the big bang means that if we were to trace the light back, we would be at that time, so to travel faster than the speed of light, well i don't know 'where' or 'when' you would be but past and present in terms of the universe are highly relative concepts, because the 'past' is i guess the position of light in a certain space at that 'time.' I don't know if I am completely right about the conjectural part, but i think that's the general idea of how the past works, in terms of light.

3. If we could travel in the past, we would change the future, because we would change the events that lead to a change in the events in the future. I'm not really sure how to explain this, but its true:)

Hope this helped :)
 
  • #3
altairz said:
Hey

1. If a person drive a car in 100 kph, while another person walks in 5 kph, will then time go slower for the driver?
I saw a video on youtube about Einsteins theory of relativity. They said that the faster we travel, the slower time goes. So will then the person who walks be longer into the future then the person who drive?

To give you an idea of the magnitude here, time is passing 1.000000000000004 times faster for the man walking. So, you'll have to keep this experiment up for several million years to measure even a one second difference in what their clocks will measure.
 
Last edited:
  • #4
BlueMind said:
1. The increase of life due to the increase in speed would be negligible, because it is the difference in speed relative to the speed of light. If someone traveled at almost C for most of their life, then they would be younger than their identical twin on earth.

2. For a human to travel at the speed of light would be impossible without science fiction because the force required to move something at the speed of light is massive, and a photon is only able to accomplish this because it has negligible mass. And as for traveling into the past, cosmologically, everything exists at the same time, because if we look at the big bang, the fact that we are getting light from a fraction of a time after the big bang means that if we were to trace the light back, we would be at that time, so to travel faster than the speed of light, well i don't know 'where' or 'when' you would be but past and present in terms of the universe are highly relative concepts, because the 'past' is i guess the position of light in a certain space at that 'time.' I don't know if I am completely right about the conjectural part, but i think that's the general idea of how the past works, in terms of light.

3. If we could travel in the past, we would change the future, because we would change the events that lead to a change in the events in the future. I'm not really sure how to explain this, but its true:)

Hope this helped :)

It sure helped, thanks for good answers! :D I just have some few questions about your answers :P

1. with "C", do you mean the speed of light, or something else? :P

2. So the past and the present exists today? So does Albert Einstein live today, but in a different position of light? (correct me if I'm wrong, I'm pretty new to this time traveling stuff :P )

3. I have also heard about this parallell universes. That if you could travel to the past, you would go to a parallell universe so that you would not harm the time in your own universe. (maybe I am wrong, but that's how I understood it)
So this is not how it works? We can only travel back in time, in our own universe?
 
  • #5
Nabeshin said:
To give you an idea of the magnitude here, time is passing 1.000000000000004 times faster for the man in the car. So, you'll have to keep this experiment up for several million years to measure even a one second difference in what their clocks will measure.

That was a very small differens :P So then it means that the faster we go, the slower time goes. But we have to travel very fast to be able to notice it.
Does time go faster for the man in the car? doesn't it go slower for him?
 
Last edited:
  • #6
Acceleration is key to determining who[m] is moving. The person walking perceives the one in the car streaking away. The person in the car perceives the pedestrian as streaking away. Only when the accelerated observer returns, is it apparent there is a discrepancy.
 

Related to Can Time Travel Alter Our Perception of Reality?

1. Can time travel actually happen?

There is currently no scientific evidence or technology that supports the possibility of time travel. The concept of time travel is largely theoretical and remains a topic of exploration and debate among physicists and philosophers.

2. What is the theory of relativity and how does it relate to time travel?

The theory of relativity, proposed by Albert Einstein, states that time is relative and can be affected by factors such as gravity and velocity. This theory suggests that time travel could be possible through manipulation of these factors, but it has not been proven or tested.

3. Are there any real-life examples of time travel?

No, there are no confirmed or scientifically-proven examples of time travel. Some people claim to have experienced time slips or déjà vu, but these are not considered to be evidence of actual time travel.

4. What are the potential consequences of time travel?

One of the main consequences of time travel, if it were possible, would be the potential for altering the course of history and creating paradoxes. The butterfly effect, a concept in chaos theory, suggests that even small changes in the past could have significant and unpredictable consequences in the future.

5. Can the grandfather paradox be solved?

The grandfather paradox is a thought experiment that poses the question of what would happen if a person were to go back in time and prevent their own birth. This paradox has not been solved and remains a topic of debate and speculation. Some theories suggest that alternate timelines or parallel universes could exist to avoid paradoxes, but there is no scientific evidence to support this.

Similar threads

  • Astronomy and Astrophysics
Replies
2
Views
945
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
9
Views
1K
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
19
Views
1K
  • Special and General Relativity
2
Replies
65
Views
5K
  • Astronomy and Astrophysics
Replies
6
Views
2K
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
21
Views
1K
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
23
Views
1K
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
2
Views
1K
  • Special and General Relativity
Replies
19
Views
2K
  • Other Physics Topics
Replies
8
Views
1K
Back
Top