A Time Travel Dialogue

by John W. Carroll

Is time travel just a confusing plot device deployed by science fiction authors and Hollywood filmmakers to amaze and amuse? Or might empirical data prompt a scientific hypothesis of time travel? Structured on a fascinating dialogue involving a distinguished physicist, Dr. Rufus, a physics graduate student and a computer scientist this book probes an experimentally supported hypothesis of backwards time travel – and in so doing addresses key metaphysical issues, such as causation, identity over time and free will. The setting is the Jefferson National Laboratory during a period of five days in 2010. Dr. Rufus’s experimental search for the psi-lepton and the resulting intractable data spurs the discussion on time travel. She and her two colleagues are pushed by their observations to address the grandfather paradox and other puzzles about backwards causation, with attention also given to causal loops, multi-dimensional time, and the prospect that only the present exists.

94 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 2014

Reviews

[Sara G · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting discussion on what time, time travel, and its paradoxes would be. I think this would be useful for fiction writers, *or* for someone interested in following along with the thought experiment of it all and figuring out their own hypothetical theory of time travel.