Is time travel possible?

By Vicky Stein , Ailsa Harvey published December 18, 2021

Science says time travel is possible, but probably not in the way you're thinking.

Time travel: wormhole

Is time travel possible? Scientists and science fiction writers alike continue to imagine the possibilities.
(Image credit: Getty)

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Special relativity

General relativity and GPS

Wormhole travel

Alternate theories

Time travel in science fiction

Books

Movies

Television

Games

Is time travel possible? Short answer: Yes, and you're doing it right now — hurtling into the future at the
impressive rate of one second per second. You're pretty much always moving through time at the same
speed, whether you're watching paint dry or wishing you had more hours to visit with a friend from out
of town.

But this isn't the kind of time travel that's captivated countless science fiction writers, or spurred a genre
so extensive that Wikipedia lists over 400 titles in the category "Movies about Time Travel." In franchises
like "Doctor Who," "Star Trek," and "Back to the Future" characters climb into some wild vehicle to blast
into the past or spin into the future. Once the characters have traveled through time, they grapple with
what happens if you change the past or present based on information from the future (which is where
time travel stories intersect with the idea of parallel universes or alternate timelines).

Related: The best sci-fi time machines ever

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Although many people are fascinated by the idea of changing the past or seeing the future before it's
due, no person has ever demonstrated the kind of back-and-forth time travel seen in science fiction, or
proposed a method of sending a person through significant periods of time that wouldn't destroy them
on the way. And, as physicist Stephen Hawking pointed out in his book "Black Holes and Baby Universes"
(Bantam, 1994), "The best evidence we have that time travel is not possible, and never will be, is that we
have not been invaded by hordes of tourists from the future."