Hey, I just came up with this thought while watching tv. Imagine that far into the future, the human species actually evolves drastically on a very conscious level. People actually get past all of the emotional garbage that is so focused upon in todays society and begin doing things that are now considered not humanly possible.
One of these capabilities would be time traval. The people from tomorrow would be able to go back in different time eras and persuade major events in the past to occur in a more desirable way. In hopes to make people understand through all their primitive ways. These evolved people would have no trouble blending in with the natives which wouldn't ever believe in the concept of time travel, even if they told them.
But anyways, the moment that kept me in awe was... If you think about it, there could be people today, a whole mess of people even, living among us, or popping in from time to time putting in their thoughts in hopes for a greater good. Or perhaps traveling to learn, like anything else. Simply figuring out why people tick they way they do.
Yeah I've thought about that too!, a teacher at school once said; time travel will never be possible, since we haven't met any travelers from the future today or from in past. But I was thinking, by the time this would be possible people should be smart enough to not intervene in today's society to ensure the safety of the future, perhaps they are watching us now, and have cloaking devices! who knows ;)
Or time travelers would simply not be interested in us.
That's an interesting point, Vvid, but I don't understand how these people are differentiated from people who already naturally exist in this time period.
Oh yeah,, cloaking indeed. Actually, the whole concept of UFO's ... hello?! TIME MACHINES, heheh, who knows? I have actually heard rumors of apparent aliens looking just like humans...can only take that so far tho.
But yeah, Telos, I came across that thought later on... In total essence of everything, our actual existence in the physical could very well be the same concept but without physical bodies. Our soul would naturally want to go into different eras and experience different events.
Again, if you set spiritual evolution aside, you would get the natural physical progression leading to people with time machines. It may sound kinda hokey now, but just imagine this. If it is possible to astral project into different time periods, what makes the physical so impossible--after all, the physical is just a denser energy makeup. So all we would need is a vehicle that can take our dense matter and manipulate it in order to achieve time travel.
I'm sorry, Vivid, you seem to be making too many assumptions that I cannot follow (i.e. spinning cultural memes).
I don't understand why it has become so acceptable to connect aliens, spiritualism, and time travel... 3 completely theoretical concepts merged... for... what, the sake of convenience? It has the appearance to me of a "dolorous fashion."
Thank you for your revelation, though.
I suppose I did throw all that together rather sloppily. My mind usually moves too fast for my own good sometimes.
The whole alien thing came off the top of my head at the moment so I threw it in. Allow me to explain a bit more depth. Perhaps aliens was the wrong word. How about, Utopians. It really doesn't matter. What we think of UFOs or aliens could simply be traveleres from a distant time(at least some of them--I realize it's a vast universe) and actual UFO is a time ship or whatever you wanna call it. Just one possible explanation.
As far as the spiritual aspect, that was simply in response to your previous post. Did I misinterpret? What did you mean by your statement?
QuoteI don't understand why it has become so acceptable to connect aliens, spiritualism, and time travel... 3 completely theoretical concepts merged... for... what, the sake of convenience? It has the appearance to me of a "dolorous fashion."
What about Occam's Razor?
I don't believe UFOs are timetravelers really, and apparently neither do you, but that does not mean it's not possible. In fact, how would expect humans to evolve (considering you believe in evolution) given our increasingly technological lifestyles? If more jobs, etc. were increasingly geared towards computer work, you can conceive how, in a few hundred thousand years or so maybe, we could evolve into your typical "gray": thin frame; long, skinny fingers; big eyes; smaller nose and mouth; loss of hair. It would be like streamlining the human body for computer work, and away from physical labor, exposure to nature, and having to hunt for food. Just a thought, and maybe a good theoretical example of Occam's Razor. :S
UFOs have also been seen throughout history, as there have been reports of literally unidentified flying objects ever since recorded history began. So if time travel is possible, and anyone is traveling back in time, would not UFOs be a prime suspect? This being all hypothetical, obviously (er, to our ignorant selves anyway o.O..).
A personal question would be: why try to change events? I don't see how there would really be any point in it, on a large scale anyway, but that's just me. A simple difference of opinion could answer that. Then there's another question of: how do we know that events
haven't been influenced, or like Vvid's original question, how do we know they're not living amongst us right now? I don't suppose we can answer that one.
Seeing as how there's no solid evidence of it, though (or at least none that I know of personally), I fail to see why I should believe this is the case. It's an interesting idea, though.
Btw - why is this in OBE discussions?
Thank you, Vvid, I think I understand a bit better.
NLC, I'm not sure if you meant to say "Occam's Razor" or something else. The way you applied seems very contradictory. Basically, it means the simplest explanation is usually the best. Now, which is a simpler explanation... one that requires few assumptions, or one that requires many? I hope it is apparent that fewer assumptions make for a simpler explanation, and that you have made many.
I understand it might seem fruitless at first, but consider the assumptions you've made... in 300,000 years we will have abandoned our current trend of cybernetics and genetic manipulation and continue to interface with computers as we do now? In that vast amount of time we will have sheepishly evolved around computers and not engineered computers to evolve around us?
It is safer to assume that our biotech trends will continue and our relationship with computers will change (into what, that is another line of inquiry), because such things are already happening now. Why would we engineer ourselves to have small, weak bodies?
Your story appears more complex than the notion that by that time we'll have reconstructed ourselves using nanobots, because nanotechnology is already in use today. And that should we ever travel back in time we would do so using these miniscule machines, because the energy requirements would be lower and the device easier to construct (current theoretical possibilities of backwards time travel depend on wormholes of minute proportions).
There may indeed be time travellers here. And the reason we haven't met them is because they are so small, which is to their advantage, especially if they practice non-interference.
It's simplicity was not in the number of assumptions, but that it would explain two things at once. The idea would take out both the origin of UFOs and whether or not we've been visited by time travelers at the same time if it were true, as opposed to trying to explain each thing separately with its own line of assumptions. If we criticize assumptions themselves, then we should drop the whole conversation immediately because none of what either of us are saying has much going for it besides creative thinking. I didn't say I believed any of this, either, and thus the last part of my post (besides the wrong forum bit).
QuoteI understand it might seem fruitless at first, but consider the assumptions you've made... in 300,000 years we will have abandoned our current trend of cybernetics and genetic manipulation and continue to interface with computers as we do now? In that vast amount of time we will have sheepishly evolved around computers and not engineered computers to evolve around us?
It is safer to assume that our biotech trends will continue and our relationship with computers will change (into what, that is another line of inquiry), because such things are already happening now. Why would we engineer ourselves to have small, weak bodies?
I was basing my idea off of assumptions of..
1) hair becoming obsolete from not needing protection from the cold,
2) the sense of smell becoming obsolete, or at least much less useful,
3) eyes having to adjust to more strain (unless of course we compensate this ourselves artificially),
4) less use for manual labor,
etc... which would, as I see it, constitute less hair, a weaker/smaller nose, smaller frames, etc.
Weaker doesn't necessarily mean better or worse here, but just adapted for different purposes, just as we're physically weaker than Neanderthals, and yet we're the ones that survived. If we continue with modern trends, how much hunting do you expect will be necessary in the future? How much do you think we'll rely on our sense of smell? How much do you think we'll need hair to maintain our body heat, if we continue living in artificially heated homes? I expect more labor will become automated, as well, with fewer exceptions than today even. The most demanding activities would likely be sports, if they even continue to still exist. That's how I see it, anyway,
if nothing will happen in the mean time to send us back to sticks and stones and we continue our current trends.
QuoteYour story appears more complex than the notion that by that time we'll have reconstructed ourselves using nanobots, because nanotechnology is already in use today.
Reconstructed ourselves into what exactly? More ancient forms of ourselves, simply to retain/regain our physical strength? Why? I can see how such technology would be used to fight disease or aging, but there are more practical reasons behind those sorts of things.
QuoteAnd that should we ever travel back in time we would do so using these miniscule machines, because the energy requirements would be lower and the device easier to construct (current theoretical possibilities of backwards time travel depend on wormholes of minute proportions).
There may indeed be time travellers here. And the reason we haven't met them is because they are so small, which is to their advantage, especially if they practice non-interference.
No reason for me to object to this, but theoretical science does have a tendency to change over time. Maybe this is exactly what will happen in the future, or maybe by the time we can actually do these kinds of things (if ever), we will haven taken a completely different approach. I don't see how there is not an assumption in the proposition that our current theoretical sciences will not have changed by then.
Or maybe we'll lose hair by pulling it out after we talk to one another.
QuoteIt's simplicity was not in the number of assumptions, but that it would explain two things at once.
Which is an
assumption of a connection, seemingless baseless. You see you are adding complexity by doing this. What you mistake for simplicity is simple-mindedness.
I hope you do not take that as a personal attack, for my meaning is limited to the ideas and thoughts at hand.
I think we may just think in totally different ways here, Telos. I'm apparently severely right-brained anyway so it probably shouldn't be very surprising that I would have trouble comprehending certain perspectives.
You know if you travel at the speed of light then time ceases to exist. But what is light? it is similar to energy. but what is energy? the short answer is everything as i gather. so there is no time, only now...but that is funny because as humans it takes us something like 0.3 seconds for our senses/brain to process "reality". so are we always in the past? i guess it doesn't really matter anyways because everything is relative. if i had a twin brother and he flew a jet for a living he would be younger than me....so says Einstein. our universe...our reality is so strange! go figure
i have a major problem with time travel theories that involve anything more than past/future observation. Things that have already happened have already happened, case closed. You may be able to re-watch it happening, or you may be able to see what will happen next...but i doubt you can change the past/future. However, I'm much much more willing to accept changing the future as opposed to the past, but even that has its complications.
for example, if you can travel to and alter the past, you must be able to do so in your own past. If this is true, you can, theoretically change your own past. But there is a major problem with this as you will soon see. Lets say when you were growing up, you wanted to change something about your past. Lets say that you wanted to ask out this girl, but never did. So, you go into the past, ask her out, etc. If you actually were able to change the past, it would thus change the present. This means that you would have asked her out years ago, and thus, you would have never gone into the past to ask her out (because you already did). That's the first reason why its impossible. The second reason would be the instantaneous consequence of the first impossibility. If you never go from the present to the past to ask her out (because you succeeded in doing so in the past) then you never would have succeed in asking her out using time travel. In essence, if you succeed in changing your past, you intrinsically fail in changing your past.
Its like this:
1.) If you travel to the past and change it, in the future, you wouldn't travel to the past to change anything (because its already the way you want it)
BUT
2.) If you do #1, then you would instantaneously fail at changing the past, and thus, would prompt you to change to the past, in the future.
All we can conclude is that either A.) altering the past is impossible or B.) You get stuck in a loop of [If 1 then 2] [If 2 then 1].
If the answer is B, then one of three things could happen. One, you would be stuck in the infinite loop forever. Two, you would be stuck in the infinite loop until you die of old age, which in effect, would cause you to die of old age the instant you travel into the past. Or three, you get stuck in the loop and age, much like two, but you realize that something is wrong and stop time-traveling when you notice you have significantly aged before you had even traveled into the past (as far as you know).
either way, you fail to change the past and sever consequences result.