I wrote this piece years ago when I was much younger and I am deciding today to share it with my steemit community.
I am someone who months ago would've bet my whole future millions that time travel will never be possible. But after watching some episodes of The Flash and studying some explanations in physics and having my eyes open to Quantum mechanics, I'm beginning to doubt my resolve.
The other week I sat at the dining table with my younger brother and sister and enthusiastically explained what I had learned over lunch. And although I will be or may be wrong (because The Flash, come on, it's fiction) because my knowledge of physics and Quantum mechanics is limited, I just want to share what I think is possibly sensible.
Some Prerequisities to understand what the heck I'll be saying
Okay, having said all that. Let me outline prerequisites. You should know something about these to understand what I'm going to blab about very soon. But don't worry if you don't understand them, we're still going to have fun.
•3-dimension
•The fourth dimension
•Time (not just the clock stuff, but the essence of it; the substance of it)
•Space (no, not where astronauts go. The surrounding around us that can be occupied by matter. Understand that it is not only space that constitutes the Universe. If there is light, there is darkness. If there is heat, there is cold. If there is space, there is in comparison, 'not-space' or maybe something else.)
•The Universe
•Existence (not philosophical existence, but that quality of matter that makes it be.)
•Vibration (not an alert type on your phone but understand waves and what it means to vibrate.)
•Light and the speed of light (3.8 × 10ⁿ metres per sec. n = 8 which is like... faster than amazingly fast.)
•Sound and the speed of sound (In air, sounds travels at a speed between 330-340metres per sec.)
•Space-time continuum
•Flow. Fluid flow, any kind of flow. Just understand flow.
Let's get down to the gist
Now, we are well aware of the space around us. According to the Cartesian coordinates, if we go up or down, that is the y-axis0. If we go sideways, left or right, that is the x-axis which is perpendicular to the y-axis. This is the 2-dimension coordinates.
There is a third dimension, z-axis that is at 90° to both the x- and y-axis. If you draw two lines at 90° to each other, one vertical and the other horizontal, and make them meet a point, the line that can go through that point from outside the page and into the page is the z-axis. X, y and z constitute a 3-dimensional object which is basically everything around us. They all have height (y), breadth (x) and width or thickness (z).
Now for the crazy part
Some scientists have been talking about the 4th axis. Heard of it? It is time (t). So x-, y- and z-axis plus time all constitute the existence of matter; it's a state of being and continuity. Take a second to assimilate that...
I want you to picture this: A clean storm drain or gutter.
It is filled to the brim with clean and clear water and flowing in one direction. This water keeps flowing at a steady speed.
Let this speed be time and the water be known as space. Everything physical (you can see and touch and can occupy 'space') is in this water, flowing alongside it like debris in flood water.
Now you've grabbed the picture of space-time continuum. So, supposing you could jump out of this water, space and time, would you stop existing? Yes, I think so.
But! But, jumping out of time ain't that easy. You see, as x-, y- and z- axes are at 90° to each other, I posit that time is also at 90° to all of and each of them.
Wait, let it sink in...
Okay, if time is at 90° to the three axes that constitute space that means, according to me, time is perpendicular to space. That means the quantity that governs the rate at which the water flows exists at 90° to the surface of water.
So as you stand there looking at the storm drain, or gutter and someone asks you, "Where is time?"
You will, like one smart ass Socrates, pick up a ruler and hold it straight up on the surface of the flowing water and say, "Where this ruler is is where time exist, all through the length of this infinite span of water. At every tiny fraction or interval of the water, time exists this way."
Okay?
This brings us to the main purpose of this article: Time travel!
Time Travel
By now somebody thinks I'm crazy. I'm just utilizing my brain and I'm very likely to be wrong. Don't base your final year research topic on this, I didn't send you.
When somebody talks about time travel they are actually referring to the alteration of the speed or rate of flow of that water. If the rate could be modified that would mean somebody can make one second as long as 2 minutes and 3 hours as short as 5 seconds.
But how do you move from May 2016 to April 1912 to see the Titanic sink again, or worse to alter the space-time continuum by preventing it from hitting the iceberg? You will have to be able to find a way to 'vibrate' out of space and in the same plane as time flow in the realm that is not space backwards over the gutter till you find 1912 and jump into space and begin to exist in that period of time.
Okay, pause, breath and think...
Vibrating in the same plane as time will mean you pausing time (we haven't reached that level of technological advancement yet), and slipping out of space in that instant of time (I have no idea how you will do that) and then migrate and accurately spot the instant of time you want to go to and slip into space again.
Then, press play.
Tick tock tick tock, you're in 00:00:01, 4th of April, 1912. But you are too late, the Titanic has already kissed the iceberg... You didn't think of that.
Hopefully you must've thought about how you will go back. No? Hahaha, you're dead. You are a person existing in the wrong time.
Having said all that, it's necessary to point out the problems that stand between humanity and time travelling capabilities. As is the duty of every sci-fi writer, I'm going to do that now:
•Vibrating matter faster than an instant of time
•Vibrating matter out of the space continuum
•Finding a way to map time in 'not-space'
•Flowing or 'migrating' matter opposite to time in 'not-space'
•Finding your way back to your time from an era that has no technology for time travelling. I don't know why this particular one is funny to me. Imagine getting lost in the middle of Genghis Khan's invasion of China or landing in the middle of the nest of newly hatched T-Rex dinosaurs.
What's next?
Well, what kind of state does matter exist in when it is not in space? I am beginning to think this is impossible again.