Link to Physics ArticleThe scientist in the linked article thinks there is a way to bend time with lasers, and that some kind of time travel can be invented after all, eventually.
This reminds me of a boyish thought experiment I had. Since Einstein's work seemed to prove that light is the top speed anything could ever travel, I wondered about relative speeds, such as whether two bullets, each traveling in opposite directions at more than 50% the speed of light, would therefore have greater relative speed than light to each other. Each ultra-fast bullet would supposedly observe the other bullet to pass by at more than the speed of light. The excess of the speed of light, c, would be manifest as a warp in time that would prevent any simple observed speed on either bullet -- the apparent speeds could never exceed c.
So I then envisioned a sphere in which one could sit, which also fits within two outer spheres, like layers of an onion, but the two outermost spheres would be made of "unobtainium" and rotate at 51% of c in opposite directions. (Presumably these shells would be magically lubricated, magnetically suspended or use "very special ball bearings" in such a way to avoid coming in direct contact -- probably not possible.)
I imagined that this would produce a time warp and impart time travel to the occupants of the innermost, non-rotating sphere, who might simply sit there and sip coffee or have a smoke during their subjective experience of time.
I think time travel would present less of a crack-pot ambiance if actual time travelers from the future were to appear here and now, or any time in the past. Yet time travel into the future already exists. The faster any object travels, the less subjective time it experiences. If something could go exactly c, then it would experience no time at all.
This reminds me of a boyish thought experiment I had. Since Einstein's work seemed to prove that light is the top speed anything could ever travel, I wondered about relative speeds, such as whether two bullets, each traveling in opposite directions at more than 50% the speed of light, would therefore have greater relative speed than light to each other. Each ultra-fast bullet would supposedly observe the other bullet to pass by at more than the speed of light. The excess of the speed of light, c, would be manifest as a warp in time that would prevent any simple observed speed on either bullet -- the apparent speeds could never exceed c.
So I then envisioned a sphere in which one could sit, which also fits within two outer spheres, like layers of an onion, but the two outermost spheres would be made of "unobtainium" and rotate at 51% of c in opposite directions. (Presumably these shells would be magically lubricated, magnetically suspended or use "very special ball bearings" in such a way to avoid coming in direct contact -- probably not possible.)
I imagined that this would produce a time warp and impart time travel to the occupants of the innermost, non-rotating sphere, who might simply sit there and sip coffee or have a smoke during their subjective experience of time.
I think time travel would present less of a crack-pot ambiance if actual time travelers from the future were to appear here and now, or any time in the past. Yet time travel into the future already exists. The faster any object travels, the less subjective time it experiences. If something could go exactly c, then it would experience no time at all.
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