Victor Grippi – The Atomic Writer

This weeks Fringe Finale illustrated some fundamental concepts in the many worlds concept that is prevalent in sci-fi today. J.J. Abrams has another hit show with Fringe that Fox has just renewed for a second season. This X-Files like show more successfully mixes the crime-of-the-week type of show with a long arc sci-fi conspiracy thriller.

Common in TV today are shows like Fringe or Lost, another J.J. Abrams creation, where the long arc story line pulls viewers into the story as an attempt to hold on to them. What can be more simple than the use of cliffhanger tactics, a technique common at the end of chapters in novels, to leverage the innate human behavior of curiosity. One has to think of the process writers of these shows go through when plotting these story lines. In many ways the craft of writing follows the advance of sci-fi in these fringe areas.

Techniques like time travel, teleportation, worm holes, parallel worlds, open up a myriad of possible plots and a never ending forgiveness when a writer realizes he has written himself into a corner. This is not a bad thing. Conversely, this is a tool writers, like myself, use to reach our audience. What better way than to bring someone back from this other world or time travel back on the same timeline in order to prevent the precarious death of your beloved character. We’ve already seen time travel introduced in Lost, and another world made readily available in Fringe. In the Fringe finale, we discover that Walter may have brought his son Peter back from this other world after his death in the original timeline.

With the introduction of Leonard Nimoy as William Bell, the long suspense to who Fox would cast in the roll, has finally ended. We also learn in the Finale that this other world still dons the twin towers. A suggestion that perhaps terrorists do not exist, or perhaps have come to their senses in this more friendly world? Has man conquered his technological adolescence in this other world to reach the pinnacle of societal evolution? Or will we learn that mankind has been rendered mute by a technologically advanced master, i.d., Massive Dynamics, that has removed all creative diversity and individual freedoms? Perhaps mankind needs a technological chaperon to adjust the knobs of the human experience. Perhaps new realities are hatched in incubators and then grown into viable worlds as a sort of proving ground for human experimentation. The worlds that fail are sadly flushed down the universal sewer of the cosmos to make room for a new one.

This post is dealing with two themes as I’m sure you’ve noticed, a discussion on the Fringe Finale, and one on the process of writing these shows. Remember, it’s the writer who faces a blank page and then creates the story premise, characters, and implements a plot to execute and reveal a message (theme) where there was none before. With sci-fi the options are far greater for complex story lines where people can return from the dead, hop into other worlds, or events can be altered by time travel. This also increases the depth and complexity of the message the show can expose. Gene Roddenberry was ahead of his time when he created Star Trek. Many social issues were explored in the episodes and were met with acceptance due to the fact that Star Trek took place in the future. This was removed enough from contemporary society so as not to be too on the nose.

Shows like Fringe allow curious minds to open up to new possibilities. They are speculate fiction where current scientific theories are extended into fiction to allow for unbridled imagination in a scenario where the impossible is rendered possible. If the human creative imagination is not allowed to flourish and thrive, then we as a society are locking ourselves into a room without a key. The world around us is continually changing and we must always be prepared to change with it. Sometimes this means adapting in ways never imagined before. To push the limits of our understanding of science and to think out of the box. If we don’t someone else will, and if history is any indicator of the future, we will perish along with the culture we have created. We must foster sci-fi techniques in the arts and not label them, and the people who create them, as fringe. The Show Fringe is an excellent example of speculative fiction set in a modern urban setting with a scenario every week that catches our attention and holds it with the quintessential “Pattern” to keep us coming back every week. The underlying message is there for those who seek it out.

I urge you, dedicated readers of this blog, to seek out these messages and embrace them. They are the keys to the kingdom we will need one day if we are to survive our technological adolescence.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking….what if.”

Victor Grippi
The AtomicWriter

This post is based a book due to be released in May 2009, Biocentrism: How Life and Consciousness Are the Keys to Understanding the True Nature of the Universe, by Robert Lanza and Bob Berman, and also an article that appeared in the MAy 2009 issue of Discover magazine.

A Biocentric view of the universe holds that what we perceive as real, the universe and everything in it, is based on our ability to cognitively make the observation in the first place. Are space and time physical objects that would exist even if life did not? This view reminds me of the old adage, if a tree falls in the woods, but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? I suppose one way to test this would be to leave an audio recording device next to the tree and then exit the woods. After the event one would only have to analyze the recording for the sound of the tree. Is the recording device alive? But more importantly is the act of making the observation the critical point?

Take another popular example, the two slit photon test. Here a beam of light (photons) is directed towards two slits made on one side of a box. If you observe the subatomic particle, the photon appears to pass through one slit or the other, by the reflection it makes on the inside of the opposite side of the box. However, if no one observes the particle, it exhibits the behavior of a wave that can inhabit all possibilities, including passing through both slits simultaneously.

Quantum mechanics is the physicist’s best model for describing the subatomic world. It also makes some of the best arguments that conscious perception is integral to the workings of the universe. Quantum theory tells us that a unobserved particle, like an electron or a photon, exists in a blurry unpredictable state with no well defined location or frequency until the moment it is observed. This is the famous Heisenberg uncertainty principal. Physicists describe the unobserved condition as a wave function. Wave functions are mathematical equations that attempt to predict the location and/or motion (frequency) of the particle at a precise moment in time. When an observation is made, by hitting it with a photon in order to see it, it is said to have collapsed the wave function. The act of making the observation has caused the particle to change. We can only know its location or its frequency, but never both at the same time. Experimenters suggest that mere knowledge in the experimenter’s mind is sufficient to collapse the wave function and convert possibility to reality.

Another theory in quantum mechanics deals quantum entanglement. Einstein called this behavior, “spooky action at a distance”, and told Roger Penrose he thought it was only a mere calculation error. Entanglement deals with two particles that share the same wave function. If we measure one particle and thus collapse its wave function, the other one collapses simultaneously. If one photon is observed to have vertical polarization, its waves all moving in one plane, the act of observation causes the other photon to instantly collapse into a horizontal polarity. This has been tested using one way mirrors where the particles were split and separated by many miles. Nicolas Gisin tested this at the University of Geneva in 1997.

Before these experiments most scientists believed in an independent universe where physical states exist in some absolute sense before they are measured. This has now been proven to not be the case.

What is time? The passage of time can be thought of like frames in a motion picture. The change from one frame to the next can be cognitively resolved to the passage of time. But is time object that exists in a past, present and future form? The past exists in the electrical stimuli of our brain cells. The future has not been reduced to the collapse of the multitudes of wave functions that make up our perceivable world. We are left with only the present. Time exists in the snapshots of wave functions we choose to collapse that make up the reality of the present in which we live. What else could it be? We observe time as a delta from one moment to the next regardless of what another person experiences on the other side of the world. Time is as personal as the way we brush our teeth. When we learn of another persons sequence of events that occurred during a span known as time, we splice their experience into our own. Time is then rendered to no more than the total summation of the internal reel running inside our minds.

What is space? Is it an object that is constantly expanding from the origin point known as the big bang? Most of us still think like Issac Newton, that space is an object or container that can be picked up and taken to the laboratory. But isn’t space really just our way of interpreting how an object should look once we collapse its wave function?

Our notions of space are false.

1. Distances between objects mutate depending on conditions like gravity and velocity, as described by Einstein’s theory of relativity. Translation: There is no absolute distance between anything and anything else.

2. Empty space, as described by quantum mechanics, is in fact not empty and but full of potential particles and fields.

3. Quantum theory also doubts that distance objects are actually separated by great distances. Entanglement has been proven to show that particles can act in unison rendering great distances mute.

Science tries to explain the physical universe, by making an investigated assumption based on the wrong initial starting point. By inclination and training these scientists are obsessed with mathematical descriptions of the world. Biocentrism should help unlock the mysteries of the universe be providing another investigated tool. By allowing the observer into the equation new avenues of insight can be realized. New thinking machines can be developed that experience the world as we do, and will certainly provide solutions that are more organic to the reality we see playing on the projector inside our minds. Perhaps a unified field theory, Einsteins dream, may finally be realized by merging physical observation with consciousness as science continues to collapse our reality into theories that are discarded just as fast. Take string theory as an example.

To answer my original question: Is the audio recorder to be considered alive in order to meet the criteria for collapsing the wave function of the fell tree? The answer is of course no. However, if no one listens to the recording of the tree that fell in the woods, would the recording make a sound. However, if I make a recording of the recording of the fallen tree… And on, and on, and on.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking…what if.

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer

Hello Readers,

It’s been awhile since my last post here on the AtomicWriter, but I assure you I’m alive and well. I’ve been busy writing my third novel, as well as my first screenplay. So writing on the blog was put on the back burner. More on these great projects in a later post.

I wanted to share my thoughts on two excellent shows I watched this weekend. The first, on Friday, was the series finale for Battlestar Gallactica and then the movie Knowing staring Nicolas Cage. Both these shows revealed a premise or controlling idea that resonates with the premise in both my novels, The Ninth Cube and The Butterfly Virus. The premise that humanity has restarted time and time again and how humans are not the product of pure randomness.

Let’s explore this concept in detail. In Battlestar, we learn in the finale that Cara 1 (Starbuck) held the secret to the location of the real Earth. After finding herself crashed and dead on the first Earth, we find out she holds the coordinates used in the FTL to jump to Earth. These coordinates were contained in a musical piece she played with her father as a child. Now the importance of this is in the idea of determinism versus randomness, the theme of both the TV show and the movie. Cara 1 (Starbuck) was sent back (as an angel) to the fleet to lead them to Earth by a predetermined intelligence that watches over us and protects us without direct intervention. Some my call this entity God, big G or little g, and some may call it an alien intelligence. I’ll leave this up to your own personal views.

We also learn in Battlestar how pivotal Gaius Baltar was to humanities salvation. He gave up the defense access codes on Caprica, that lead to its destruction by the Cylons, but this allowed the fresh start for humanity to be realized. What seemed like an act of treason actually lead to the restart on Earth. We see model Six and Gaius as angels who have witnessed this cycle time and time again. Humanity gains intelligence, develops technology that eventually leads to destruction on a global scale. The model Six Cylon appeared to him like an angel who helped guide him through this process. Whenever humanity reaches the brink of extinction, this intelligence sends beings (angels) to intervene.

The show then uses the young female hybrid as the michronial “Eve”, who became our common ancestor here on Earth. The theme of a restart for humanity based on an ever improving design makes me think how we may all be experiments in a grand test operated by the intelligence that created us.

In the movie Knowing the controlling idea is that we are not the product of randomness. We see that determinism is rejected by the Nicolas Cage character who after his wife’s death, backstory, believes we are the product of randomness, and that science can explain everything. When the paper with the predictions shows up, he changes and believes in a grand order or scheme of things. The fact that someone could predict exactly the dates of disasters, leads him to believe again in determination. An intelligence that can see the future and intervene when humanity reaches the brink of destruction.

I absolutely recommend this movie and when you see the aliens rise up to enter their ship, you will see the resemblance to angels. The metaphor here is the same as in Battlestar. Ascended beings sent down to help humanity survive. When his son and the girl are dropped off on a pristine earth, we see the tree of knowledge in the background. A direct reference to the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve. A restart for humanity.

The Atomic Writer, has written about the same themes. In The Ninth Cube, we have a similar restart for humanity and a direct reference to Adam and Eve in the garden. I don’t want to give away the ending of the book, but if you read it, you’ll understand.

In The Butterfly Virus: A Thriller, again the controlling idea of a restart for humanity takes a different form but the message is the same. Again I do not intend to spoil the book, but would strongly advise reading it, especially if you’ve read this post this far. You must be fascinated with this topic.

In closing, the theme or controlling idea we see in media today is a direct outcropping of the warning writers are trying to convey to their readers. As technology becomes more and more integrated in our lives, will we someday create an artificial intelligence capable of turning on us like a rabid pit bull? Will we be at the mercy of technology to the degree that we can’t live without it? But what happens if technology is suddenly rendered mute? Could humanity survive in a primitive state once again, or will we perish like dust in the wind.

One solution is to never loose sight of our roots. To always be able to be self sustaining and self sufficient, live off the land, feed ourselves, clothe ourselves, and fully take care of ourselves without technology. We belong to the last generation, on this planet, who grew up with little or no high technology. Some of us still remember how to live without a GPS map speaking to us on the road, or a constant electronic communication device tweeting our every move to our social media list of drones. Can you remember how to look up a phone number in the yellow pages? When was the last time you picked up a newspaper? Don’t like ink on your fingers, you say?

I realize I’m writing this on my notebook computer with a browser tab opened to Facebook, and that my books are available electronically on the Amazon kindle, and I have a twitter account. I’ve spent many years writing computer software for a living. I’m very integrated with technology. But if all of this just went away one day, I could survive. I would keep moving forward and not dwell on the fact that these “conveniences” are no longer available. In time, we as ever inquisitive humans would develop technology and in time we would be right back in the same place.

The better solution is to learn how to live with technology, and how to live with each other to the benefit of all of humanity. There would be no reason to restart humanity, no reason for angels to intervene and save us, if we don’t need saving in the first place. A sort of preventive determinism we control. After all, god, or the alien intelligence watching over us, had to have its start. Perhaps we are the ancients, the beings who will leave our small speck of an island and venture into the vastness of the universe to seed new worlds and watch over our children. Perhaps we on this Earth, on this evolutionary line, will be the ones rescuing our descendants millennium from now in our spaceships as we pluck out the next Adam and Eve, planting them on the next Earth.

“So say we all!” — Admiral Adama – Battlestar Gallactica

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking….what if.”

Victor Grippi
The AtomicWriter

Hello Readers,

I am proud to announce The Butterfly Virus: A Thriller.

For those who have waited patiently, it’s now available on the Kindle and will soon be in print.

Book Review:
A fast paced techno thriller, The Butterfly Virus takes you on an action packed thrill ride into the unthinkable. Dr. Daniel Lamb a renowned genetic engineer works on a revolutionary breakthrough in human cloning technology. When an unknown virus breaks out in the southwest, Daniel and his chief scientist, Tanya, are called into action. The team gains an ally in John Featherstone, an archeologist whose work on ancient Native American cultures provides a critical key to the unfolding global events.

Why is the military activating Operation Cave Eagle?

Why are some people immune?

Will Daniel and his team be able to survive a global outbreak and save mankind?

Hello Readers,

Amazon is pairing Carl Sagan’s book, Contact, with The Ninth Cube for the month of December. Readers will have the opportunity to purchase both books at a cost savings and can do so with a single click!

Click here to receive a discount on both books.

I am very excited about the opportunity for readers who may not have heard about The Ninth Cube to be exposed to it through this partnership. It’s hard to get the word out in today’s crowded and heavily saturated book market, and Amazon is helping new authors, like myself, to gain exposure through this partnership.

For those who ask questions such as; is time travel possible, where did we come from, where are we going, how are we going to get there, what will be there when we get there? The answers to these and many more questions can be found in the writing of Carl Sagan and The Atomic Writer. And in the month of December, you can experience both these great writers at discount.

Personal note:
Carl Sagan exposed the science of the Cosmos to an entire generation of inquisitive minds including the atomic writer. He continues to this day to inspire and motivate us wherever he is in the Cosmos. The Ninth Cube is an extraordinary book on many levels. One aspect is a tribute to a man who opened my eyes to the endless possibilities of what lies just out of reach. My only hope is that somehow, somewhere, Carl is reading my book and smiling.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking, what if…

Until next time…

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer

Hello Readers,

Many thanks to those who are reading my book. Thank you.

Please come back and leave a review. I would appreciate it very much.

Best Regards,
Victor Grippi

Hello Readers,

Just a reminder that The Ninth Cube is being paired with Stephen Hawking’s A Briefer History of Time on Amazon during the month of November. You can buy both books at a discount.

Check it out!

Have you ever read Plato’s Allegory of the Cave?

Here is my version of the story:

Suppose a group of people are chained to a large rock inside a deep cave. The rock faces the end of the cave, and the people chained to this rock can only see the back wall of the cave. They have been chained there since childhood. Given these circumstances, reality for these people are the shadows and sounds they experience that are reflected off the cave wall.

Suppose one day a member of the chained group is set free and allowed to walk behind the large rock. Once on the other side this person realizes that the shadows come from a large fire burning in a fire pit, and from people that walk between the fire and the rock. The sounds are from these free people that walk in and out of the cave. Wouldn’t this person be unable to describe or identify the fire and the other people? To him, reality is the shadows and sounds from the cave wall. These new entities would seem alien, mystical, magical, or even demonic in origin.

Further suppose that this freed person is then taken outside the cave where he experiences the shining sun and trees and everything that exists outside the cave. Would he not be able to accept these things? Could he categorize and rationalize these new objects after spending his life tied to a rock inside the cave?

Now suppose this person is brought back to the cave and the rock where his friends have been tied to all their lives. Once there he tries to explain the origin of the shadows and the sounds and tries to convince them that the cave wall is not real but in fact an illusion. How do you think the other people will respond. Wouldn’t they think he was crazy, delusional, possessed; that his eyes have somehow been corrupted? Remember, all their lives the only reality they have known existed in the images and sounds reflected off the back of the cave. They would think he has been taken somewhere unknown and corrupted.

When he attempts to free another bound person, wouldn’t they try to kill him?

The moral of this story is that we are only able to comprehend and categorize that which falls within the boundaries of our limited viewpoint on the world. What we believe is real is limited by the degree to which we can perceive it.

The only way to expand our perception of reality is by experiencing new things, by reading stories of new possible realities that exist right on the other side of the rock of our lives. An entire universe of people, places, and things may exist right in front of our noses but we remain unable to perceive it because we refuse to accept the possibility that it exists at all.

Reading is one of the best ways to expand your mind and experience the countless possibilities in our world. To be more specific, books classified as speculative fiction take reality as we know it today, and expand upon it. This genre takes technology and makes one more step into the unknown. These books ask the big what if questions: what if we create an artificial black hole, what if it is actually a wormhole, what if we can time travel through it, what if it leads to another dimension.

Books like Stephen Hawking’s A Briefer History of Time, and Victor Grippi’s The Ninth Cube ask these questions and more. Hawking’s book is non-fiction and presents the current state of technology and physics theory, while The Ninth Cube takes these as premise and speculates on what the future may be when these theories become reality.

Fiction writers are like puppet masters who create shadows on the wall. All too often these do become reality.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking, what if…

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer

Hello Readers,

Amazon is pairing Stephen Hawking’s book, A Briefer History of Time, with The Ninth Cube for the month of November. Readers will have the opportunity to purchase both books at a cost savings and can do so with a single click.

Available with The Ninth Cube on Amazon

I am very excited about the opportunity for readers who may not have heard about The Ninth Cube and the Timeline Trilogy to be exposed to it through this partnership. It’s hard to get the word out in today’s crowded and heavily saturated book market, and Amazon is helping new authors, like myself, to gain exposure through this partnership.

For those who ask questions such as; is time travel possible, where did we come from, where are we going, how are we going to get there, what will be there when we get there? The answers to these and many more questions can be found in the writing of Stephen Hawking and The Atomic Writer. And in the month of November, you can experience both these writers at discount.

To quote Stephen Hawking, “The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired.”

We find in The Ninth Cube the main character, Dr. Daniel Lamb, who studied under Dr. Hawking. In Daniel’s thoughts and actions the story unfolds and realizes the dreams of a great physicist. In many ways this is the story Stephen Hawking would write, if he wrote fiction.

Don’t believe me? Read the story and post a comment.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking, what if…

Until next time…

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer

We all seek the elusive secret of life. In our view of the world and all the elements in it, we as humans strive to make sense out of a world that seems random and chaotic at times. We can’t help but to apply a cause and effect pattern on everything we see, touch, hear and smell. It starts during childhood and based on environmental stimuli – we begin to categorize and sort items into nice comfortable buckets that help us cope with everyday life. Many people who are provincial in their thinking stop this process at an early age and are not open to new ideas and theories. They are held prisoner by a narrow minded world view that renders the world only in terms they know. Any deviation from this single view, and cries of injustice, prejudice and blasphemy are heard.

Others, however, are constantly learning new theories and forming their own ideas about an ever changing and dynamic world. These are people open to new ideas who are not threatened by learning new things. It is this latter group who derive the most enjoyment from my writing; either on this blog, or in my short stories or from my books.

Some of you may ask, who am I to write about such lofty subjects? I am a writer who above all else is an observer. All good writers are good observers. I am no smarter than the average person, just an acute observer. We analyze and categorize all that we experience, and try not to form narrow patterns. I have done this my entire life. At a certain point this information ripens and a silent call to action is heard. I heard this call several years ago when I began honing my writing skills and starting the information dump that continues to this day. I have always been open to new ideas and consider myself a free thinker. More importantly, I have taken this input and formed it into my own view of the world and the underlying reason things exist the way they do.

I found fiction to be the best vehicle to relay my thoughts and unique viewpoint of the world. Through the characters I invent and their stories, I am able to convey what I believe may be one possible explanation for the meaning of life. You may not agree with me, and that is totally acceptable. For those who do read what I write, and can then make intelligent comments, I am forever grateful.

If you continually learn new things you are always changing. The world is always changing, nothing ever stays the same. The earth, sun and the moon are always changing. Plants and animals are always evolving and adapting to the ever changing environment. Whether by intelligent design or random origins, our world is in constant motion. The well known phrase: The only constant in life is change. is very important. Once you stop changing, you begin to die. It’s as simple as that. Many people, at an early age, close themselves off to new ideas and begin to die.

My goal as a writer is to expand the minds of my readers. To open them up to new possibilities and ideas they may not of experienced before. In this way they may some day take this input and combine it to form their own personal world view. If I can achieve this with one person then I have succeeded as a writer.

If I have to dilute the message in my writing in order to sell more books, then I may never be a best selling author. Too many writers fall into this trap and change their writing in order to appeal to a mass audience. They have sold out to the system. Their message is contrived and artificial. Their words are targeted to sell books and make money for their publishers. Their books are nothing more than a commodity. If you want a cheap book, you will get a cheap message.

If you have read this post, this far, than I congratulate you. You are a positive thinker open to ideas and new experiences. You may also enjoy reading more. Some of my recommended books are on the right side in my Amazon ferris wheel.

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking, what if…

Until next time…

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer

Many of you ask The Atomic Writer if time travel is possible. It used to be a subject of science fiction that was not taken seriously. People would look sideways at you in a conversation about the physics involved and the possibility of altering space and time. Many scientists feared being seen as “fringe” scientists who are discounted as lunatics or quacks; the scourge of the profession.

Speaking of Fringe; how about the new Fox series by the same name? The Atomic Writer would like to know your comments on this new science based, X-Files like, new tv show. Any comments?

Michio Kaku gave the below interview to Scientific American on just this subject. The interview references the book and later movie, Timeline, by my fellow author Michael Crichton.

Now, let’s go back to Kaku, who says that it’s possible now to speak publicly about time travel without putting a career at risk, a thing unbelievable ten years ago.

Originally, the burden of proof was on physicists to prove that time travel was possible. Now the burden of proof is on physicists to prove there must be a law forbidding time travel. He goes back to the past to tell us when scientists started to think about time travel in a rigorous way, from Einstein to logician Kurt Gödel or mathematician Roy Kerr.

Here are selected excerpts:

SA: The idea in Timeline is that you can “fax” particles into the past. What is the kernel of truth there?
MK: In the last ten years, there has been enormous progress in something called quantum teleportation. This is not science fiction anymore. Now, to be real, we’re not talking about sending Captain Kirk across space and time. But we are talking about sending individual photons across space. In a few decades, maybe we will teleport the first virus, if the virus consists of a few thousand molecules. But at the present time, that’s the limit of what we can do. And we can only teleport things in space, not time. But the concept of faxing matter is not totally out of the question. And that was also raised in my book. So, there is a little bit of truth there.

SA: How practical would it be to build one of these time machines?
MK: In fact the energies we are talking about are the energies of stars. It would take a civilization far more advanced than ours, unbelievably advanced, to begin to manipulate negative energy to create gateways to the past. But if you could obtain large quantities of negative energy — and that’s a big “if” — then you could create a time machine that apparently obeys Einstein’s equation, and perhaps the laws of quantum theory. You need string theory to ultimately control all the divergences [i.e., to make sure a hail of gravitons doesn't fry you when you open or close the time machine]. Some cynics say quantum effects may still make the machine blow up. But at this point the burden of proof has shifted: people who are skeptical of time travel have to prove it’s impossible. And so far they have failed.

Kaku also speaks in detail about the paradoxes implied by time travel. and he discusses string theory or the influence of science fiction on physics. Scientific American also asked him what was his favorite time travel movie.

MK: Oh, that’s a hard one. There is a problem being a physicist, and that is when you see these movies, you say, “Well, that’s not right.” And it really ruins it. But I like the Back to the Future series. Here was a movie where you actually saw the scientist building and doing things; he was an essential character in the entire series. Doc Brown was this crazy man, but at least they showed him. He was there. He was making the series work.

Source: JR Minkel, for Scientific American, November 24, 2003
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So is time travel possible? Every day science advances into the future. Most of the time it is with baby steps, but sometimes we do make a quantum leap.

Having a scientist as a protagonist is a great idea, just ask Dr. Daniel Lamb…

Remember, never stop looking up at the night sky and asking, what if…

Until next time…

Victor Grippi
The Atomic Writer