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That's an excellent point Worm of Morgoth made a couple of posts ago. Traveling to the same place at a different time, and the same time in a different place could be analogous. Of course there is a small chance - I should say a very small chance - that the Delorean would end up in the right space, or at least on Earth.

I had a thought of my own, now that I think back on a book I read about time travel. The author of that book referenced the main character in H.G. Wells famous novel The Time Machine. The inventor of the time machine had a miniature version of his time machine. He explained to his scientific colleagues that they could see it's spatial dimensions, but overlooked another dimension - that of time. The mini time machine stretched across time from its creation to its destruction just as surely as it stretched across it's width, depth, or height. This basically added another dimension to its volume so to speak. I mention this because this issue here really breaks the issue of time travel into two very different schools of thought - both of which can treat time as being analogous to the spatial dimensions.

The first school of though is that of H.G. Wells inventor. Objects exist across time. This is also the thought of the author of the other book I read. He described an object as existing across time, and if ever this object was to cross itself somehow along it's time-dimension time travel could be said to have occurred. This is true regardless of whether the object over contacts itself in any of the other spatial dimensions.

The second school of thought, which I hold and I think Worm of Morgoth would be in based on his comment is that physical objects exist as points in relation to the fouth dimension of time. This is a dimension to be traveled through, not extended across. This means that we can never meet ourselves in another time - past or present - because we can only exist in one time at a time (if that makes sense). It is a mystery to me why time travel seems one directional, but I suppose it has to do with entropy. Also this helps me clarify my point from my first post. I don't think that "relative" time travel is possible even though we are all technically traveling through time (according to this second school of thought). My thinking is that the whole universe exists in the same instant of time and travels through time at the same rate. Relativity and time dilation do not violate this point because, as I said before, even though clocks slow down they still coexist with the rest of the universe. To "time travel" in my picture would be akin to leaving the universe all together - like a motorcycle dropping out of a pack on a long stretch of highway. That is just my opinion of course, which is not to dismiss anyone else's different opinion.

I thought not even light could escape a black hole?

No, Law of conservation of matter would still apply since it is still a dimension, or at least I would imagine, and from a Calculus point of veiw you'd still have to travel through every point in time between the two points being traveled between meaning there would be an infinite number of yourself by the time you get to the desired point in time in the past. Which makes no sense since that would be creating massive amounts of matter in a specific way with particular arrangements and....phew....Just so complex....But yeah...I know we can easily make you go forward in time, my solution is to just be Cryogenically frozen for the desired amount of time you want to travel forward. mrgreen But that isn't exactly what we're talking about.

Ooh, well it must of gone right over my head.

*reads posts...again*

I don't believe it proves "conventional" time travel for things and humans is impossible-- I think it proves that at this time, with what we know, we cannot do it.

If it is possible on a microscopic level, then there still may be a way to do it on the larger scale- we just haven't progressed far enough to figure it out.

Was that a fiction movie or something true? I saw something similar (supposedly true) that didn't involve time travel. It showed that people really could have "gut feelings". One person in a room was shown pictures and a person kept totally separate was tested for physiological reactions associated with having a gut feeling. Kind of a psychic thing. Interestingly the isolated person would have "gut feelings" most often when the other person was looking at pictures of food. rofl But back on topic. What your post suggests seems not to be a physical object traveling throught time, but more like a reversal in cause and effect - future causes with present effects. That could be possible by quantum mechanics I suppose.

here is the real answer no matter what other people say. light is the fastest speed in the universe because light does not travel through time! light only travels through space and since it needs no medium to travel accross it is super super fast. and doesnot require to travel through time because its the fastest thing in the universe. everything travels through both space and time besides light. biggrin

What it means is that you would be moving so fast that everything else around you would go faster and you would stay the same age a year later kind of like that.