The Possibility of Time Travel

The Possibility of Time Travel

I just ran across this interesting article on time travel published by BBC News. The basic idea is that there are essentially two formulas: (a) time travel is not possible (ostensibly because we have never encountered its affects in the present) or (b) time travel is possible, but something is preventing it from changing the present. As the article points out, option (a) seems more intuitive, but option (b) is certainly plausible insofar as Einstein’s general theory of relativity points to a space-time curvature in which time loops back over itself (and, derivatively, that quantum physics does not distinguish between moving back and forward in time).

In attempting to articulate a more cohesive materialist formula for examining history, I thought this passage was particularly interesting, especially in regards to its Hegelian flavor:

It is as if, in some strange way, the present takes account of all the possible routes back into the past and, because your father is certainly alive, none of the routes back can possibly lead to his death.

I think it’s also worth pointing out, at least humorously, that the entire article is postulated around the murder of one’s father, which will no doubt elicit a smirk from psychoanalytically-informed readers.