Whatever Time

Most people are far less productive than they think they are because they are under- or over-estimating the time it takes to complete a task. Be diligent in the present while focusing on what you want to achieve in the future.


Time for some facts about time

Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects. The temporal position of events with respect to the transitory present is continually changing; events happen, then are located further and further in the past.

Time has been a major subject of religion, philosophy, and science, but defining it in a non-controversial manner applicable to all fields of study has consistently eluded the greatest scholars. A simple definition states that "time is what clocks measure".



Two contrasting viewpoints on time divide many prominent philosophers. One view is that time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe, a dimension in which events occur in sequence. Sir Isaac Newton subscribed to this realist view, and hence it is sometimes referred to as Newtonian time. Time travel, in this view, becomes a possibility as other "times" persist like frames of a film strip, spread out across the time line.

The opposing view is that time does not refer to any kind of "container" that events and objects "move through", nor to any entity that "flows", but that it is instead part of a fundamental intellectual structure (together with space and number) within which humans sequence and compare events. This second view, in the tradition of Gottfried Leibniz and Immanuel Kant, holds that time is neither an event nor a thing, and thus is not itself measurable nor can it be travelled.

Who is better known to be the Time Travel Lord but Doctor Who. I grew up watching his shows and reading his comics and magazines. He made me fascinated with the probability of time travelling.

Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior appears as a blue police box. Along with a succession of companions, he faces a variety of foes while working to save civilisations, help people, and right wrongs.

The programme is listed in Guinness World Records as the longest-running science fiction television show in the world, and as the "most successful" science fiction series of all time, in terms of its overall broadcast ratings, DVD and book sales, iTunes traffic, and "illegal downloads". It has been recognised for its imaginative stories, creative low-budget special effects during its original run, and pioneering use of electronic music (originally produced by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop).

Time has historically been closely related with space, the two together comprising spacetime in Einstein's special relativity and general relativity. According to these theories, the concept of time depends on the spatial reference frame of the observer, and the human perception as well as the measurement by instruments such as clocks are different for observers in relative motion. The past is the set of events that can send light signals to the observer; the future is the set of events to which the observer can send light signals.

Doctor Who does not only travel through time but also through space.

Other time travelling shows I remember where Voyagers, an American science fiction time travel-based television series that aired on NBC during the 1982–1983 season. The series stars Jon-Erik Hexum and Meeno Peluce.

Phineas Bogg (Jon-Erik Hexum) was one of a society of time travelers called Voyagers who, with the help of a young boy named Jeffrey Jones (played by Meeno Peluce) used a hand-held device called an Omni (which looked much like a large pocket watch) to travel in time and ensured that history unfolded as we know it.

Bogg and Jeffrey first met when Bogg's Omni malfunctioned and took him to 1982, landing him in the apartment of Jeffrey's aunt and uncle, who were caring for him after his parents' death. Jeffrey accidentally fell out of a window, and Bogg jumped out to rescue him by activating the Omni. Bogg's Guidebook, which contained a detailed description of how history should unfold, had been grabbed by Jeffrey's dog Ralph so Bogg had to rely on Jeffrey (whose father was a history professor) to help him.

There was also Quantum Leap, an American television series that was broadcast on NBC from March 26, 1989 to May 5, 1993, for a total of five seasons. The series was created by Donald Bellisario, and starred Scott Bakula as Dr. Sam Beckett, a physicist from the (then future) year of 1997, who becomes lost in time following a time travel experiment, temporarily taking the places of other people to "put right what once went wrong". Dean Stockwell co-starred as Al Calavicci, Sam's womanizing, cigar-smoking sidekick and best friend, who appeared as a hologram that only Sam, animals, and young children could see and hear.^[3] The series featured a mix of comedy, drama and melodrama, social commentary, nostalgia and science fiction, which won it a broad range of fans. One of its trademarks is that at the end of each episode, Sam "leaps" into the setting for the next episode, usually uttering a dismayed "Oh, boy!"

There were also several movies who jumped into the band-wagon of the time-travelling theme, which are actually too many to mention.

From millennium-skipping Victorians to phone booth-hopping teenagers, the term time travel often summons our most fantastic visions of what it means to move through the fourth dimension. But of course you don't need a time machine or a fancy wormhole to jaunt through the years.

As you've probably noticed, we're all constantly engaged in the act of time travel. At its most basic level, time is the rate of change in the universe -- and like it or not, we are constantly undergoing change. We age, the planets move around the sun, and things fall apart.

We measure the passage of time in seconds, minutes, hours and years, but this doesn't mean time flows at a constant rate. Just as the water in a river rushes or slows depending on the size of the channel, time flows at different rates in different places. In other words, time is relative.

But what causes this fluctuation along our one-way trek from the cradle to the grave? It all comes down to the relationship between time and space. Human beings frolic about in the three spatial dimensions of length, width and depth. Time joins the party as that most crucial fourth dimension. Time can't exist without space, and space can't exist without time. The two exist as one: the space-time continuum. Any event that occurs in the universe has to involve both space and time.

Time travel is no longer regarded as strictly science fiction. Einstein’s theories of general and special relativity can be used to actually prove that time travel is possible. Government research experiments have yielded experimental data that conclusively illustrate that fast moving aircraft have traveled into the future. This phenomenon is due to the principal of time dilation, which states that bodies moving at high velocities experience a time that ticks slower than the time measured at zero velocity.

Hawking's Theories

Famed astrophysicist Stephen Hawking believes humans are capable of time travel.

Claiming he is not as concerned about being labelled crazy as he once was, Hawking has publicly aired this second startling theory, after claiming it was "entirely reasonable" to assume aliens existed.

Hawking said he believed humans could travel millions of years into the future and repopulate their devastated planet.

Hawking said once spaceships were built that could fly faster than the speed of light, a day on board would be equivalent to a year on Earth.

That's because - according to Einstein - as objects accelerate through space, time slows down around them.

Which also means that Hawking's theory only applies to moving forwards through time.

Moving backwards is impossible, Hawking says, because it "violates a fundamental rule that cause comes before effect".

If moving backwards through time was possible, a person could shoot their former selves.

“I believe things cannot make themselves impossible,” Hawking said.

However, once spaceships approached the speed of light, their crew would start skipping through Earth years on a daily basis, giving the human race a chance to start again.

“It would take six years at full power just to reach these speeds," Hawking said.

"After the first two years, it would reach half light speed and be far outside the solar system.

"After another two years, it would be traveling at 90 per cent of the speed of light.

“After another two years of full thrust, the ship would reach full speed, 98 per cent of the speed of light, and each day on the ship would be a year on Earth.

"At such speeds, a trip to the edge of the galaxy would take just 80 years for those on board.”

Manchester University professor Brian Cox told The Times that Hawking's theory had already found some basis in experiments carried out by the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva.

"When we accelerate tiny particles to 99.99 per cent of the speed of light in the Large Hadron Collider at Cern in Geneva, the time they experience passes at one-seventhousandth of the rate it does for us," Prof Cox said.

Hawking admits he is obsessed with time travel - he told the Daily Mail if he could go backwards he'd visit Marilyn Monroe in her prime or drop in on Galileo - but said as he got older, he cared less about what people thought of his theories.

“Time travel was once considered scientific heresy, and I used to avoid talking about it for fear of being labelled a crank," he said in Stephen Hawking's Universe.

"These days I’m not so cautious.” says Stephen Hawking.