Time Travelers' Convention

usermilk writes "Some folks at MIT are holding a time-travelers' convention. The idea is to make it so famous and so widely-known that even thousands of years in the future, people will still know exactly when and where this time-traveler convention went down, and will all come travel to it at some point in their illustrious time-traveling careers. For those interested in attending, it's on May 7, 2005, 10:00pm EDT (08 May 2005 02:00:00 UTC) in the East Campus Courtyard at MIT. 42:21:36.025N, 71:05:16.332W (42.360007,-071.087870 in decimal degrees)."

Comments

I tried to make it

[Anonymous Coward]

But I couldn't figure out where those coordinates posted. Would you mind pointing out where you are at the moment in your galactic and solar orbits relative to a few quasars, please?

Re:I tried to make it

[millennial]

Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha, of course.

Why did they set the date in the future?

[femto]

Why didn't they set the date for yesterday? That way we wouldn't have to wait to see if it was successful.

Hmmm....

[carterhawk001]

hmm...things to remember:
1. if a time travel came back in time and altered the past, no one would know but him/her.
2. it is impossible to prove that our recorded history now is the same as it was 1 second ago due to rule number 1.
3. You may be caught in a temporal causality loop, doomed forever to repeat the same period of time over and over.
4. If time is an expression of entropy, then the only way to travel through time is to prefectly reverse entropy, which is impossible because, iirc, entropy is chaotic.
5. If the universe is nonlinear, or rather, linear is an illusion, then there is no past or future to travel to, but only the present wich exists at any instant as a snapshot in the cascade towards greater entropy.
6. The universe is moving towards a state of pure heat, at which time entropy will cease, as all engery, which drives entropy, will have been used. if you intend to travel through time by altering the universe around you, then you can not go past this point, or ever return. if you time travel by using internal independent means, then you may travel past this point, but you would no longer have any external means of measuring the passage of time in the universe. To time travel through external means you must increase the general entropy of the universe such that all events happen faster outside your time machine. to travel through time internaly you must slow down your own entropy. in both instances you must phase away from the universe such that you do not exist in it, lest you collide with something going faster than you can percieve.
7 If time is a seperate dimension then you must find a way to travel in the direction that is forwards or backwards from where you are now. 4 dimensional travel occurs at a steady, measurable rate. As you approach the speed of light, this rate of passage decreases. Thus, it is logical to assume that by exceeding the speed of light in our universe of spacetime you would travel backwards in time.
8. You may be your own great great grandparent.
9. If you change your own past you can not go back to your own future to reap the benifits because the new future would have a new you to match it.
10. Journeyman Project is t3h roxors!!!!!

Re:Hmmm....

[DirtyDuck]

Nah, you've been watching too much startrek.

Assuming time travel is possible, it's impossible to alter the past.

Think of it this way, the way something happened, is the way it happened. If you travel back in time, then you're participating in events however, your paticipation would already have happened. Therefore, anything you've already done would already have happened.

Think of it this way. You couldn't go back in time and shoot Hilter before he got into power for the very simple reason that it didn't happen. Say you setup a sniper rifle on a building. You could try to fire but you'd either miss, the gun would jam, you'd get arrested, have a heart-attack etc. etc.

This isn't the universe trying to protect itself or any such mystical mumbo jumbo. It's just the simple fact that a thing didn't happen and your actions in trying to change the past are already part of history.

Probably didn't explain it very clearly. ;)

Re:Hmmm....

[ravind]

Well if you think that it is impossible to change the past, then you have to conclude that it is impossible to change the future too because your future is somebody else's past. Which means the way your life turns out has already been determined and cannot be changed. How do you fit free will into that?

Re:Hmmm....

[EvilTwinSkippy]

Actually Time Travel by itself is impossible.

But what you could do is slip into an alternate universe which is exactly like ours, only 60 years behind. Once there you could kill Hitler and alter History... but only in THAT copy of the Universe.

While useless to alter history, I do find the technique works well for obtaining quality building materials, and collectables for my Ebay super-store.

Re:Hmmm....

[rar]

You couldn't go back in time and shoot Hilter before he got into power for the very simple reason that it didn't happen.

No, no, no; you got it all wrong. It was just exactly because someone went back and shot that Hilter you speak of; that the much worse dictator Hitler we do remember could come to power. :)

Re:Hmmm....

[carterhawk001]

Dont forget the multiverse, aka, the great tree of possibilities. Consider this, going back in time may be likened to moving back down the tree, and when you change something, a new branch forms and you start moving along that, parallel to the old branch. now your stuck in the new branch. The implication here is that nothing you do to alter time will truly alter time, it will just launch you along a new limb of the tree. You arent changing the past, your creating a new future.

gets the imagination going

[Anonymous Coward]

youve gotta love those mit guys and their uncanny study avoidance manouevres

RSVP?

[Dachannien]

For those interested in attending, it's on May 7, 2005, 10:00pm EDT

Oh, I'm sure I'll get around to it one of these days.

so naturally

[Edmund Blackadder]

The place will be full of dozens of idiots dressed in spandex and insisting thet they come from the future.

Re:so naturally

[aarku]

Well, to prove you're from the mind boggling far off future, a retail box of Duke Nukem Forever will be required to be presented at the door.

Fuck

[erikharrison]

I'm a time traveller. Unfortunately, you can't tell, because I travel through time with the help of an angel and an invisible lech, and the process causing me to appear identical to someone in the time I'm travelling to.

Hold on, I have to go get this Erik kid married to his one true love.

Oh boy.

It could be a ruse...

[Anonymous Coward]

It could be a ruse... the organizers may be stranded time travellers trying to send a message to the future to get rescued now. It may not be a genuine convention, but rather a lifeboat technique for the Insiders.

Re:The Convention

[Mr. Bad Example]

> [...]it will have been a blast!

I believe you mean willan on-be a blast.

I went there next year.

[Unknown Poltroon]

Its gonna be boring. But the after party they're planning last year kicked ass.

zerg

[Lord Omlette]

Even if someone time travelled into the past for a few seconds, wouldn't they wind up in the icy cold of space while the planet speeds along on its normal course around the sun?

Re:Ahh...

[woah]

John Titor.

...a fun read.

Re:so theoretically

[johnjay]

"So if there is no one present from the future theoretically we never figure out how to transend time." Or the party on May 7th becomes famous throughout time as one of the most suck-ass parties in all history. So, time travelers decide to skip it.

Re:Why this ain't gonna fly

[Datamonstar]

Dude, it's not like you don't have time.

Easier way is, "Time is an illusion"

[cfalcon]

I think "Time is an illusion" is an easier way to say it. If you have a picture you and a friend are looking at, and he wonders if the right side can ever travel to the left side and modify things, you'd wonder what he was talking about. I would argue that time is like that: static if viewed from enough dimensions, available for observation (in theory) as one massive N dimensional statue.

I already went.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't go. It was boring so a bunch of us went to ancient Babylonia for the invention of beer.

Re:TT is possible

[LinuxRulz]

Watever everyone says, time travel is possible. The thing is you can only travel to the future and it is incredibly slow...

Asimov Worked That Out Before Niven Did

[kalamazoo904]

Read "The End of Eternity" by Asimov... he also alludes to the episode in other books.

One fear...

[aXis100]

Seeing the location depicted so accurately, I have only one fear...

Telefrags.