Re: Why John Titor\'s trip was unlikely
That's short sighted don't you think? Good thing JT didn't travel back to 1692.
Methinks you are not reading my statement with a full understanding of its technical accuracy. Let me try it another way to help you understand:
"But if his answer to the question defies scientific inquiry, then it cannot be true or correct."
JT's answer cannot be falsified, today, tomorrow, or 300 years ago. You are making the error of thinking scientific inquiry is subject to technology of any given time. It is not. Any statement that cannot be falsified is incomplete, and therefore incorrect.
If he did, he would have violated his main characters primary rule that he isn't going to help people get rich.
Awfully convenient excuse to shadow the truth, don't you think? The last I recall, verified scientific theories trump any made-up rule.
JT's tactic was to use Tippler's old time travel theory. Invent something as elaborate as JT's time machine. I challenge you. (Half kidding, it's waste of time, but you never know, you'd have better chance than I would at making something cool)
Here we go again. In your zeal to try to prove that JT's story could be possible (which you cannot), you want to somehow turn this back to me as my problem. The challenge is not mine, it is yours. You have the burden of proof, not I. And so far you are doing a lousy job, speaking strictly scientifically.
My believability rating as a percent score would vary day to day from 0 to 100. Depending on how much mental anguish the story is putting on me, my rating approaches 100. Mostly hovers around 50 though. The author didn't trip on his words, or give up and admit the hoax. He carried through with it to the end.
Your very words belie your dilemma. Notice that none of your stated criteria for getting to even a level "hovering around 50" are not at all scientific. Again speaking from a scientific vantage point, the following is true:
1) Just because a liar is persistent and does not give up his lies does not change the fact that he is lying.
2) Just because a liar can be smooth with his prose, and not "trip up" does not change the fact that he is lying.
3) Just because a liar never admits that he is/was lying does not change the fact that he is lying.
I think you might get less grief from family, girlfriends, employers and perhaps even other members of this forum if you applied primarily scientific methods to your thoughts about Titor. People with much more knowledge of physics than myself (and perhaps yourself) have summarily debunked the Titor story. Yet folks like you seem to wish to keep it alive with non-scientific logic. Is there some reason in your being that urges you to keep it alive? Why do you persist? Will you continue this train of thought even after 2005 passes without Civil War in the USA?
My pixel example is not really decoupling these concepts.
Nor can it ever, which is my point. You were using this analogy (and do recall it is an analogy, not fact) to try to give an example where something could move without actually moving in space.
Just as there are forces at works in JT's story. Altering gravitational forces has an effect on matter contained within the field, so the story goes.
Any/all of this MAY be true, but what I can tell you is NOT true is that none of this could occur without MOTION. Any effect on matter within any kind of force field will induce motion of one form or another. It's the way the universe works. /ttiforum/images/graemlins/smile.gif
The OP insisted there is no other way to move through the universe than the SINGLE method we have discovered after existing for a only a few years compared to the age of the universe. I'm just saying we don't know for sure yet.
No he didn't. He merely exposed you to what millions upon millions of experimental results have told us about how Mass, Space, and Time interact with one another to form the laws of physics.
I'm not trying to convince you, I'm just saying I don't refute the possibility that matter can "appear" out of nowhere. If a single particle can pop into existence because of changing forces, then it sounds possible we can figure a way how to control all particles.
I asked for an example not because I needed convincing, but rather to apply one of the rules of logic to show you why motion is always required. Let me try it another way. The rule of logic goes roughly like this:
* Any ONE specific result that negates a general statement of truth is enough to completely negate the statement in question. IOW: A specific truth always overrules a general truth.
If you can find one, JUST ONE, case of a body of matter in our universe that does not move, then you will have trumped my statement of general truth about Matter and Motion. But I don't think you can. And logic then says that since you cannot disprove this fact, then you must account for it in any theory of time travel (which is what 1122's post was all about).
You cannot use non-scientific prose to bolster Titor's story, for it is fundamentally flawed with respect to science on at least this one level, if not more!
RMT
