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posted by martyb on Friday April 28 2017, @07:07AM   Printer-friendly
from the just-take-a-long-nap dept.

After some serious number crunching, a University of British Columbia (Okanagan Campus) researcher has come up with a mathematical model for a viable time machine.

Ben Tippett, a mathematics and physics instructor at University of British Columbia's Okanagan campus, recently published a study about the feasibility of time travel. Tippett, whose field of expertise is Einstein's theory of general relativity, studies black holes and science fiction when he's not teaching. Using math and physics, he has created a formula that describes a method for time travel.

"People think of time travel as something as fiction," says Tippett. "And we tend to think it's not possible because we don't actually do it. But, mathematically, it is possible."

"The time direction of the space-time surface also shows curvature. There is evidence showing the closer to a black hole we get, time moves slower," says Tippett. "My model of a time machine uses the curved space-time -- to bend time into a circle for the passengers, not in a straight line. That circle takes us back in time."

The division of space into three dimensions, with time in a separate dimension by itself, is incorrect, says Tippett. The four dimensions should be imagined simultaneously, where different directions are connected, as a space-time continuum. Using Einstein's theory, Tippett says that the curvature of space-time accounts for the curved orbits of the planets.

[...] "While is it mathematically feasible, it is not yet possible to build a space-time machine because we need materials--which we call exotic matter--to bend space-time in these impossible ways, but they have yet to be discovered."

[...] For his research, Tippett created a mathematical model of a Traversable Acausal Retrograde Domain in Space-time (TARDIS). He describes it as a bubble of space-time geometry which carries its contents backward and forwards through space and time as it tours a large circular path. The bubble moves through space-time at speeds greater than the speed of light at times, allowing it to move backward in time.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/04/170427091717.htm

[Abstract] Traversable acausal retrograde domains in spacetime

What do you think ?


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by kaszz on Friday April 28 2017, @09:54AM (3 children)

    by kaszz (4211) on Friday April 28 2017, @09:54AM (#501092) Journal

    The gravity generated time relativism that a black hole generates is only say 2 times real time or so at maximum. Traveling at high speeds enables really big time relativity to occur. So forget black holes as an efficient means for this phenomena.

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  • (Score: 1) by dvader on Friday April 28 2017, @12:32PM (2 children)

    by dvader (1936) on Friday April 28 2017, @12:32PM (#501132)

    No, the time dilation goes to infinity as you approach the event horizon. See
    https://astronomy.stackexchange.com/questions/2524/would-time-go-by-infinitely-fast-when-crossing-the-event-horizon-of-a-black-hole [stackexchange.com]

    Basically, to an outside observer, you never pass the event horizon but according to you, all the time in the outside universe passes before you cross. All this happens in a very short instance of your own time of course. However, the redshift also goes to infinity so an outside observer won't actually see anything at all after a while.

    Still, if you could cruise down close to the event horizon and then back again, you could skip to arbitrarily far into the future. I would not recommend it though...

    • (Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday April 28 2017, @04:46PM

      by mcgrew (701) <publish@mcgrewbooks.com> on Friday April 28 2017, @04:46PM (#501217) Homepage Journal

      A World Out of Time. [wikipedia.org] I still have the half-century old dog-eared paperback I bough when it was first out. In the story, the protagonist uses a black hole to go fantastic distances into the future.

      --
      mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday April 28 2017, @08:58PM

      by kaszz (4211) on Friday April 28 2017, @08:58PM (#501304) Journal

      Before you reach the event horizon that increases the time relativity more than two times you may also be unable to leave. So while a black hole may provide the means. They come with a big catch.