Will You build a time machine? Read to find out..

[RenUnconscious]

For anyone attempting to build a time machine, I say, Why bother building and testing and experimenting. You can prove almost instantly if you will ever create or have access to a time machine.

Step 1 : Get a Safe, with a combination memorized and known only to yourself.

Step 2 : Set a specific date/time when you will not be around the safe for a day or so.

Step 3 : Make up your mind that you will create/invent/steal/borrow a time machine at some point in the future.

Step 4 : Get the blueprints/diagrams/instructions for building the machine.

Step 5 : Travel back to the point in Step 2, put the instructions in the safe.

Step 6 : You have just set the specific time and wandered around for a day or so, go back to the safe, open it up.

Conclusion : If you find the instructions for the time machine then you have succeded. If the safe is still empty then you have failed and you will not build/create/steal/borrow a time machine in your lifetime.


ps : if you find the instructions for the time machine please email them to me along with the winning lotto numbers for the next ohhh 5 years or so. Thank you.

 

[Darby]

Ren,

Good experiment.

I'd add a step to make it really interesting if the experiment is successful:

Write a note to yourself in your own hand. Place it in a second safe. Resolve to attach that note to the blueprints.

If you open the blueprint safe and find both the blueprints and the note you should also find the note simultaneously in the other safe.

And another permutation:

Resolve to build not one, but two time machines. Add a third "safe" which is actually a large vault. Resolve to transport the second time machine back with you and assemble it in the vault.

If the experiment is successful and you find the second time machine your instruction is to destroy the blueprints and not build a time machine. Of course, you follow your instructions to the letter. It's not necessary because you already have a working time machine. It invents itself. /ttiforum/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[timetravelerbeliever]

Actually I am afraid this experiment might not work. Because when you come to the past you might end in another timeline that is not yours. Making it impossible for you to see the note...

 

[Razimus]

multiple timelines blah blah blah, I am from the year 2005.

 

[OllyB]

Raz,

Your site's looking better every time i click on it.

 

[RenUnconscious]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

Yes but Multiple timelines prove in and of themselves that all outcomes are possible. Meaning in one timeline there is no safe, in another there is, but through all of it if a hundred thousand me's come back in time to drop off the note no doubt 1 of us will suceed. proving that even with multiple timelines this experiment is still valid.

 

[Malcolm]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

I just made a deal with myself to come back in time and tell myself I did it, I built/got hold of a time machine. Unfortunately it would seem my future self is as unpredicatible as my present self. :-(
Its either that or my future self is/was too busy going forward in time instead and forgot I was supposed to come back and drop in for a cup of tea!
No offence intended...

 

[RenUnconscious]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

If your future self ever remembers to drop by for Tea you'll be sure to let us know. Also please have your future self provide us with the winning lotto numbers for the next 2 years. Thank you.

 

[Keven]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

What would you do with this timemachine anyways? i know i would gain unthinkable power/money, i think thats why my furutre self would never come back to give me anything

 

[newbie_0]

Resolve to build not one, but two time machines. Add a third "safe" which is actually a large vault. Resolve to transport the second time machine back with you and assemble it in the vault.

haha, that's awsome! you got me convinced many-world works on the macro level even more now Darby!

 

[Malcolm]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

Most certainly I would let you all know about this supposed visit if my future self ever gets round to visiting, I just bet my future self is having all the fun eh?

 

[Michael_Hawk]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

Is that not also like saying

Today I will set an alarm on my computer for in a few days which tells me to set an alarm for today.
If time travel is possible then wouldnt the alarm go off on my computer the second I set it?

This is provided that If someone was to travel through time to 2 days ago they would have to travel through all of time from where they left to where they were going, since they would travel through that point in time the alarm event would occur and trigger the alarm two days ago.

If this sounds confusing ill try and clear it up.

I set an alarm at 12:00 tuesday that will go off 12:00 thursday.
Thursday comes and my computer is still in tact, the alarm goes off at 12:00 and i set an alarm for two days ago at 12:00.
Now say two more days pass and i make a time machine on saturday to travel back to tuesday, I would have to travel through 4 days worth of time so all events would occur and the alarm would go off on tuesday at 12:00.

Although this could be canceled out by the multiple univearse theory, In one univearse i set the alarm and it goes off, in another my computer might explode the second i set the alarm and maybe in another i never set the alarm.

all very confusing to think about /ttiforum/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[RenUnconscious]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

very interesting, i like thought experiments like this, could you please provide more examples? you would still need a time machine for this experiment to work, whereas in my experiment you only need to make up your mind about getting access to a time machine.

 

[Michael_Hawk]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

Yes but wouldnt your method be determined on you not forgetting that you were going to build a time machine some time in the future?

How about this, you make it though someone delivers you a letter each year telling you the date that you decided to make a time machine and the safe you were going to put it in with the safe combination, then if you eventually do you can travel back in time and put the documents in the safe.

This also depends on you:

1, not dieing before you make it.
2, the post office not going bankrupt.
3, your safe not being stolen.
4, actually eventually working out how to make a time machine.

 

[RenUnconscious]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

I am sure you can find a few flaws like that in this Thought experiment. However. If 100 people were all to repeat this experiment it would be More likely of happening. 1000 people, even more. Meaning, this and only this, its possible.

 

[John]

This plan could never work. When you go to check for the plans and they are not there you will never build or look for plans for a time machine, because you assume you will never have these. In effect stopping you from building a time machine even if you would have normally. This experiment is time travel suicide and should not be performed.

 

[RenUnconscious]

Re: Will You build a time machine? Read to find o

This plan could never work. When you go to check for the plans and they are not there you will never build or look for plans for a time machine, because you assume you will never have these. In effect stopping you from building a time machine even if you would have normally. This experiment is time travel suicide and should not be performed.

I disagree and here is why.

If you ignore time for a second, and lets say you will create a time machine, and you will travel back into the past and put the documents in the safe. Then you will find them there at your current time. I suppose we can take the safe out of the equation if you'd like.

Step 1 I will set a time/date location. Feb 18th 2005 in Detroit Michigan at my house.
Step 2 I will build a time machine
Step 3 I will travel back to Feb 18th 2005 to my house in detroit michigan and give myself the time machine or the documentation on how to make it.

It will never happen the first time around because I have not built the machine yet. But thinking quantum-like, you realize that it will happen the second time around, which is the same as the first time around. Quantum Mechanics can be a *****.