22 August 2011

Time travel is possible!

I was reading some science jokes just a while ago because my brother told me one yesterday. There was one particular joke that got my attention (because I have no effin idea what it was trying to say. And of course, I have no idea what's funny about it. It's about tachyons. Here's the joke:

To get to the other side. Why did the tachyon cross the road?

For you science nerds out there, you probably are laughing at me and/or the joke already. Pasensya na! Hehehe. When I checked what tachyons are, here's what I found out from Wikipedia:

A tachyon (/ˈtæki.ɒn/; Greek: ταχύς, takhus, "swift" + English: -on "elementary particle") is a hypothetical subatomic particle that moves faster than light. In the language of special relativity, a tachyon would be a particle with space-like four-momentum and imaginary proper time. A tachyon would be constrained to the space-like portion of the energy-momentum graph. Therefore, it cannot slow down to subluminal speeds.

So... there's a hypothetical "thing" faster than the light. I am actually excited! I mean, the article did mention that "despite the theoretical arguments against the existence of tachyon particles, experimental searches have been conducted to test the assumption against their existence; however, no experimental evidence for the existence of tachyon particles has been found." But hey, almost if not all scientific breakthroughs started with a hypothetical assumption, right? Philosophically and logically speaking, dismissing something because you cannot prove it is a fallacy of ignorance, right?

If there's anything science (or scientists) should have realized by now, things change, theories are proven wrong, and "facts" are disputed from time to time. And this is not science's weakness, but more of a strength. Just like band saw blades which need to be sharpen or replaced from time to time, science has to undergo these "corrections" for its own good.

Well, if this tachyon can be proven true in the future, then, hello time travel!

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