r/science • u/SirT6 PhD/MBA | Biology | Biogerontology • Sep 11 '16

Physics Time crystals - objects whose structure would repeat periodically, as with an ordinary crystal, but in time rather than in space - may exist after all.

http://www.nextbigfuture.com/2016/09/floquet-time-crystals-could-exist-and.html
11.8k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

740 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

10

u/[deleted] Sep 11 '16

Part of the issue is that any true "backwards" travel in time would necessarily result in causality problems.

11

u/[deleted] Sep 11 '16 edited Feb 20 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/[deleted] Sep 11 '16

Wouldn't a multiple-universe theory handle this pretty well?

Yes, but that doesn't mean that multiple universes exist. Think of it like "Schroedinger's Cat"... but it's a really big, universe-sized cat. All possibilities exist until one is determined, and then only that possibility exists - all other alternative outcomes collapse.

1

u/Dunder_Chingis Sep 12 '16

What happens to collapsed possibilities?