Poll of the Day > Would making the secret to time travel public domain be dangerous?

(+) Yeah! (+)

(topic)

---

Yes. Vegans would go back and wipe out humans.

only if time can be altered
---

PKMNsony posted...

Yes. Vegans would go back and wipe out humans.

not if we design the time machines to be powered by ground up hamsters

---

I think if you went back in time you just went to or create a new reality so even if you go back and then go forward again, the time you come back to will be different and thus a new reality, so basically if you go back in time say goodbye to the universe you came from forever. Unless they do the whole avengers thing where they locked onto their universe or something.

so idk, dangerous for the person who goes?

---

Depends on the method of time travel, and how the universe works.

If we live in a universe where time travel can only be used to observe, or the universe itself prevents changes from being made via stable time loops and ridiculous coincidences? Then it would be mostly fine (though it might become like a higher level of doxxing, where you could go back in time and see what people were doing years ago, potentially film blackmail material, or otherwise find ways to see and learn shit you really shouldn't be).

On the other hand, if time travel CAN alter the past, and doesn't involve multiple parallel timelines and infinite possibility shenanigans, then time travel would be the most dangerous thing ever, even if it wasn't public. The moment anyone (theoretically) can time travel, even aside from the various "I'm going to back and fix the past!" factions starting time wars, you'd have people like me going back to try and find a way to keep humans from evolving in the first place. Or deliberately creating Grandfather Paradoxes in an attempt to self-destruct the entire universe.
---

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Depends on the method of time travel, and how the universe works.

If we live in a universe where time travel can only be used to observe, or the universe itself prevents changes from being made via stable time loops and ridiculous coincidences? Then it would be mostly fine (though it might become like a higher level of doxxing, where you could go back in time and see what people were doing years ago, potentially film blackmail material, or otherwise find ways to see and learn shit you really shouldn't be).

On the other hand, if time travel CAN alter the past, and doesn't involve multiple parallel timelines and infinite possibility shenanigans, then time travel would be the most dangerous thing ever, even if it wasn't public. The moment anyone (theoretically) can time travel, even aside from the various "I'm going to back and fix the past!" factions starting time wars, you'd have people like me going back to try and find a way to keep humans from evolving in the first place. Or deliberately creating Grandfather Paradoxes in an attempt to self-destruct the entire universe.

Asking the important questions here.

Mead posted...

not if we design the time machines to be powered by ground up hamsters

Depends on what Vegans. "Wipe out humans" sound like the super villain type, not the real life type.

---

Probably, although it depends on the nature of the method and the.... oh, PO already covered a lot of it.

At any rate, just because it's possible doesn't mean it's feasible for every Tom, Dick, and Sally to do it. The device could require unobtanium as a power source, there could be special conditions attached limiting where and how it could be performed, or there might be a material limit restricting passage to things smaller than a human child.

And there would always be some crazy hitherto unknown effects, like forgetting future knowledge while in the past and things adjusting so it seems like you were always a part of that timeline.

---

If time traveling worked like that, or like an elevator where you can select the time to return to, half of the trolls on here would be the dingus who button mashes 2020 when others try to use it.

Krazy_Kirby posted...

only if time can be altered

This. It basically depends on which theory about time travel is correct. Can you alter it, or has everything that happened already always happen? Or do you go to a different timeline altogether?
---

it's already happened 19,241 times, the results are obvious.

---