Why time travel is less implausible than initially thought

Decanato - Facoltà di scienze informatiche

Data: 20 Dicembre 2018 / 12:30 - 13:30

USI Lugano Campus, room A-33, Red building (Via G. Buffi 13)

Speaker:

Ämin Baumeler

 

Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information, Austria

Date:

Thursday, December 20, 2018

Place:

USI Lugano Campus, room A-33, Red building (Via G. Buffi 13)

Time:

12:30-13:30

 

 

Abstract:

The development of the theory of general relativity sparked extensive research on time travel. The reason for this is that closed time-like curves (trajectories particles can take to time travel) arise as solutions to Einstein’s equations of general relativity. Intuitively, time travel is impossible due to logical problems. This motivated a series of researchers to model time travel quantum mechanically where logical problems are avoided. From a computer-science perspective, however, these models are highly speculative, since their computational power is extravagant: They allow for efficient computation of NP-hard problems. Our contribution to these studies is two-fold:

i) We show that we do not need to invoke quantum theory to render time travel logically consistent;

ii) The resulting model is computationally tame. Thus, time travel cannot any-longer be ruled out based on the current arguments.
 

 

 

Biography:

Ämin Baumeler obtained his masters degree in computer science at ETH Zurich with a thesis on quantum cryptography. The results of the thesis were obtained during a stay at the Institute for Quantum Computing (Waterloo, Canada). Soon after he started his PhD studies in the research group of Prof. Stefan Wolf and obtained his PhD early 2017 with a work on non-causal correlations and non-causal computation. The thesis was awarded the best thesis prize from the German, Swiss, and Austrian societies of computer science. Since one year he works as a Postdoc in Prof. Caslav Brukner’s group at the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information (Vienna, Austria).
 

 

 

Host:

Prof. Stefan Wolf