Sunday, February 05, 2006

Time bandits

Sometimes science worries me.

Tachyons are theoretical particles that travel faster than light, and therefore travel backwards in time. Nobody has ever seen one - which isn't all that surprising since the ones we might be able to see haven't yet been formed, and when they are they'll instantly disappear into the past. Our only chance is to catch one from the future in the instant it crosses our time line, before it passes into the past.

It's possible that a tachyon formed now will shoot backwards, interact with something in the past and change history. It's possible this has already happened.

Consider a stockbroker in Leeds who wakes up one morning to find he's a goat farmer in Orkney. Is he going to be surprised? Well, no.

If a tachyon changed his past, then it changed all of it. He never was a stockbroker in Leeds. He was a goat farmer, all his life. He won't notice the change. Neither will anyone else.

If a tachyon formed in the future comes back and stops me writing this, you won't notice it vanish because in your memory, it was never there.

What worries me about this is that scientists are actively looking for tachyons. What if they find them?

What if they work out how to aim them?

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