Time Travel: The Grandfather Paradox Explained

Time travel has been a real mind-boggling matter not just for Scientists, but also for the people interested in such a thing. Therefore, here in this blog post, I’m going to explain as much as I could how time travel and its paradoxes work along with the possibility of it being achieved in reality.

The possibility of time travel

Albert Einstein in about 100 years ago manifested an idea of time and space that now is really a great theory helping scientists understand time travel more. The theory which he called,the relativity theory made it somehow clear to understand how time works. This great theory is all about how time and space are linked. 

In addition, he also said that the universe has a speed limit that no one can travel beyond it. So, in order for us to time travel we should travel as fast as we can just to slow time as it is believed that the faster you travel, the slower time gets. 

Time travel is absolutely a real thing; however, it is not that easy to happen like in movies. It also has many paradoxes, theoretical ones like the one we will discuss today, the grandfather paradox.

What is the grandfather paradox?

The grandfather paradox is a logical problem related to time travel. Therefore, it is all about the hustle that backing in time would make if it is possible. So, if it is possible to time travel and someone managed to travel back in time and met his grandfather then he killed him, it actually leaves a big question which is how this guy traveled in the first place. 

That said; managing to travel back in time and killing your grandfather before having kids must logically erase your own existence. So, how come someone would travel in time-if possible- and meet his grandfather then kill him without even being born in the same timeline. Mind-boggling, isn’t it? It really is, but what if this hustle had a solution? Would you dare go back in time and do so? We’ll figure it out just in the next paragraph, so stay focused time travelers!!! We are going to dive in this paradox more. 

The solution to this logical time paradox 

Before we dive into the solution of this mind-boggling paradox, we should actually begin with the concept of time. Time has tons of perceptions, one of those perceptions is that it is a straight line where past present and future are all in one direction, thus we might actually call that the standard timeline perception.

However, Scientists and many philosophers have another more reliable perception of how the timeline should actually be. For instance, they propose that time has multiple timelines and there is actually multiverse… Hooraaay!!! It might be a gullible idea for a moment, but seekers of paranormal theories all be like, Why not? Actually it might all be true as we never reached full-knowledge of the universe that we are living in and as the most famous quote from Game of Thrones say “You know nothing, John Snow” we might actually know little about the universe. 

As for the solution to the paradox there were two models scientists were reasoning to, the Deutch’s model and Seth Lloyd’s model.

1) Deutch’s Model

The model implies that there are two timelines existing simultaneously. That said, whoever tries to back in time and kills his / her grandfather will not be killing the grandfather that exists in his/her timeline, but there will be two timelines existing which will be the traveler’s timeline along with the other timeline where the grandfather is dead and no trace for the time traveler. 

2) Lloyd’s Model

Well, this model is a little different from the Deutch’s model which was all about a second timeline too different from the traveler’s one. Given that time and space are linked, that creates for sure a CTC or a “closed timelike curve” which makes it possible to go back in time theoretically. That said, Lloyd’s CTC propose that the traveler’s correlations will be preserved as he or she selects the CTC before going back, so he/ she will eventually end up returning to their main timeline. 

Which one is right?

Actually the two of them might be wrong, who knows!! However, till now scientists believe that they will someday come up with a real life changing discovery about time travel and actually we hope they do. Imagine being able to time travel to whenever you want!! Exciting, isn’t it? Of course there will be rules like not changing any major event as we cannot bear any consequences that might pop up for doing such a thing. 

Marvel, DC, and back to the future fans are undoubtedly thrilled to the idea of time travelling, of course me included. So, I hope we see it soooooon and most importantly use it for the greater good, no harm in a little self-enjoyment moment, but yeah for the greater good of Humanity!!

References:

spaceplace

space

scientificamerican

wikipedia