Have We ALREADY Built a Time Machine??

<h4>

Have We Already Built a Time Machine?</H4>

Time travel has been a staple of science fiction for generations, but could it be more than just fantasy? 

This is Unveiled, and today we’re answering the extraordinary question; have we already built a time machine?

There’s just no stopping technology. Like it, love it, loathe it, or fear it, it’s an unstoppable fact of human existence that new technologies keep on coming. And, in the twentieth century, we saw just how quickly that can change the world. Revolutionary transport, terrifying weapons, the space age, the computer age, the radio, the TV, and the internet; all have served to shape today’s world. Right now, we’re seemingly on the cusp of any number of further tech developments, with our near-future set to be freshly guided by things like artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, and the end of aging. There are those who feel hopeful, and those who feel scared… but, ultimately, technology doesn’t really care that much, either way.

In amongst all the contemporary buzz, however, it might be argued that time travel is one speculative technology that apparently hasn’t enjoyed the spotlight, of late. Yes, it’s still an ever-present in books and films, and it still ranks as one of the most wished-for superpowers out there, but the needle doesn’t appear to have been moved all that much. At least, not in the mainstream. Nevertheless, and given all of the other one-time-fictional technologies that have now been realized in real life, isn’t it about time we saw this one, as well? Or, at least, some significant developments toward it? The relative hush over time travel tech in recent times could be easily explainable by the fact that it isn’t possible. But, for some, if the world has gone a little quiet on the subject, it’s only really because we already have all that we need.

What better place to start than at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider? As the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator, it has been a magnet for panicked predictions and wide-ranging conspiracy theories over the years. In the early days, between 2008 and 2010, most of the whispered talk and rumor centered on the seeming possibility that the LHC would one day generate a black hole on Earth, thereby killing us all in an instant. So far, that hasn’t happened. But, amongst all the doomsday prophecies, there has also been a constant murmuring of possible time travel.

The LHC may never be a "time machine" in the traditional sense, but there are theories to suggest that it might inadvertently become one. Buried deep beneath the Franco-Swiss border in Europe, it is, of course, famous for smashing subatomic particles together at near-light speeds. The conditions inside the LHC are simply unlike anything else on Earth. And the most famous discovery made via the LHC (so far) is that of the Higgs Boson, otherwise known as the God particle - an elementary particle responsible for imbuing everything else with mass. For time travel enthusiasts, though, the real Holy Grail is the Higgs Singlet. This is an until-now hypothetical particle that, if real, could enable its manipulators to send messages forward and backwards in time. It’s said that the Higgs Singlet should operate in such a way so that it can move in and out of the fabled fifth dimension, to allow time travel within itself. 

Importantly, even if the Singlet were to exist (and, indeed, were to be discovered) then most predictions are that it wouldn’t then enable a human being to move around in time. Instead, it might grant a human access to the past and future as though remotely… or it might in some way be able to present a human in the present with key information about the past and future. Right now, it’s all a little murky. But, for the rest of the world watching on, what’s significant is that the same might once have been said about the Higgs Boson. The naysayers may have asked; how could a particle achieve mass from nothing? But the LHC delivered proof that it can. For many, it’s only a matter of time before a similar breakthrough is made in relation to time travel.

It’s not as though the Large Hadron Collider is the be all and end all, though. In fact, in terms of the quest for time travel, particle accelerators in general are only a relatively recent avenue of research. There have been more proposals put forward, particularly in the second half of the twentieth century.

In 1974, the American physicist and cosmologist, Frank Tipler, proposed a working, mathematical solution for time travel within Einstein's general relativity framework. His idea involved an infinitely long cylinder spinning along its longitudinal axis which would theoretically warp spacetime around it due to its immense gravity.

Anyone orbiting this structure - known as a Tipler Cylinder - fast enough could then find themselves propelled along what’s known as a closed timelike curve. This is essentially a path through spacetime that loops back on itself, potentially allowing any object that moves along it to visit their own past or future, depending on direction. The one thing that lets it down… is it’s extremely (even impossibly) impractical. Building an infinite structure is simply beyond our capabilities, and could very well always be so. But, nevertheless, Tipler’s hypothetical creation is proof that time travel is at least theoretically possible.

Elsewhere, Ronald Mallett’s time machine is perhaps one of the most famous examples out there. Mallett is a professor, primarily based at the University of Connecticut since 1975, who has dedicated his career to developing what he believes could be a practical method for temporal displacement. It’s based on the possibility that rotating lasers might again create closed timelike curves - similar in concept to Tipler's core idea, but on a smaller scale.

Mallett’s vision differs in that he proposes using the circulating light beams of ring lasers to generate the conditions necessary for time travel. In theory, this should be a lot more doable than Tipler’s infinite cylinder. Once more, Mallett claims that his sums are grounded in the work of Albert Einstein, saying that as per Einstein’s equations, his setup should bend and drag time and space enough to enable information to be sent back and forth, from the past to the present to the future. As it is, Mallett’s approach has somewhat divided the field, especially as there’s precious little by way of reliable, experimental verification to show that any of it’s actually possible. On the other hand, his thoughts have generated excitement over the years, purely because they would lean toward a more workable and practical time machine… if they ever did deliver meaningful results.

Finally, though, and to another of the most promising time travel pitches so far in modern history; the Alcubierre Drive. Proposed by the Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre in 1994, it’s another theoretical concept. But supporters for it argue that it’s a) much more achievable than Tipler’s vision and b) much more fleshed out than Mallett’s. Alcubierre suggests that by manipulating space-time, it might be possible to create a warp bubble that allows faster-than-light travel - without breaking any of the laws of physics locally. 

The Alcubierre Drive works on the principle of contracting space ahead of an object while expanding space behind it. By doing so, the object inside the warp bubble formed as a result - which could, for example, be a spaceship - would effectively be riding a wave of distorted spacetime. Key concepts such as Einstein's theory of relativity remain in place, but the vehicle fitted with the drive should (in theory) be able to travel at lightspeed or faster-than-lightspeed, all the same. Just as with Tipler’s and Mallett’s, there’s some heady science involved. But, reports are that there have been prototypes made of the Alcubierre Drive, specifically. Perhaps it, then, really is the most promising of the three.

For now, the sad truth is that we clearly do not have a mainstream time machine on Earth; a model or method that’s available to everyone. There is nothing by way of a universally known process to move through the dimension of time. If there were, if time machines were widely used, then the world would surely be a very different place.

But, could it be that that’s exactly why time travel might never be revealed, even if it were possible? On the one hand, some theorists claim that this technology (more than any other in the history of humankind) would be kept under wraps by those who wield it. On the other hand, time travel by its nature should be almost impossible to contain. So, what’s your verdict? Does it exist? And if so, which out of the Tipler Cylinder, the Mallett Time Machine, and the Alcubierre Drive is the most likely to be making it happen? Or, actually, is the real heart of the matter to be found underground on the European continent, somewhere in the tunnels of the Large Hadron Collider?