Back to the Future Superfan and Physicist Is Trying to Build a Real-Life Time Machine
Today is Back to the Future Day, and while most of us dream of traveling back in time in a DeLorean, superfan and prominent physicist Ronald Mallett wants to make it a reality.
We know from Einstein's theory of relativity that time travel is possible while traveling at extremely high speeds; NASA astronauts age .0007 seconds slower every six months that they're in space as a result of effects explained by Einstein's time dilation theory. Mallett, a physicist at the University of Connecticut, believes that these theoretical principles can be applied to creating a time machine on Earth, if only we could work out the logistical and engineering difficulties.
Mallett was inspired to begin his life's work after a personal tragedy; his father passed away when he was very young, and his work is aimed towards seeing him once again:
"About a year after he died, when I was 11, I came across a Classics Illustrated edition of H.G. Wells' famous classic, The Time Machine. The quote at the very beginning of the story changed everything for me. It said, 'Scientific people know very well that time is just a kind of space and we can move forward and backward in time just as we can in space.' It was at that moment that I decided that I would have to figure out how to build a time machine so that I could see my father again and perhaps save his life."
And what is this superfan doing for Back to the Future day? He's going to marathon his favorite time travel movies, including the adaptation of H.G. Wells's The Time Machine and, of course, the full Back to the Future trilogy.
"Incidentally, the first movie in the series has a special meaning for me because Marty McFly goes back to 1955, which is the year my father died. By the way, it's also the year that Einstein died."
http://www.outerplaces.com/science/...t-is-trying-to-build-a-real-life-time-machine
Today is Back to the Future Day, and while most of us dream of traveling back in time in a DeLorean, superfan and prominent physicist Ronald Mallett wants to make it a reality.
We know from Einstein's theory of relativity that time travel is possible while traveling at extremely high speeds; NASA astronauts age .0007 seconds slower every six months that they're in space as a result of effects explained by Einstein's time dilation theory. Mallett, a physicist at the University of Connecticut, believes that these theoretical principles can be applied to creating a time machine on Earth, if only we could work out the logistical and engineering difficulties.
Mallett was inspired to begin his life's work after a personal tragedy; his father passed away when he was very young, and his work is aimed towards seeing him once again:
"About a year after he died, when I was 11, I came across a Classics Illustrated edition of H.G. Wells' famous classic, The Time Machine. The quote at the very beginning of the story changed everything for me. It said, 'Scientific people know very well that time is just a kind of space and we can move forward and backward in time just as we can in space.' It was at that moment that I decided that I would have to figure out how to build a time machine so that I could see my father again and perhaps save his life."
And what is this superfan doing for Back to the Future day? He's going to marathon his favorite time travel movies, including the adaptation of H.G. Wells's The Time Machine and, of course, the full Back to the Future trilogy.
"Incidentally, the first movie in the series has a special meaning for me because Marty McFly goes back to 1955, which is the year my father died. By the way, it's also the year that Einstein died."
http://www.outerplaces.com/science/...t-is-trying-to-build-a-real-life-time-machine
