(Pac, this one's for you!)

Physicist Says Time Travel Is Not Only Possible, but Likely

Thursday, April     03, 2008

 NASA

A spaceship enters a wormhole in a NASA artist's illustration.

Time travel? Teleportation? No problem, says renowned physicist Michio Kaku.

Kaku,a professor at the City University of New York, is creating quite astir in Britain with the release of his new book, "The Physics of theImpossible."

On this side of the pond, outlandish claims in books are recognized as, well, a good way to sell books.

Butin Blighty, Kaku's being treated as if he's Doctor Who informingdim-witted humans about the wonders of the Universe, with front-pagetreatment Wednesday in both the Daily Telegraph and the Guardian. Eventhe normally staid Economist is chiming in.

Kaku,one of the earliest proponents of string theory, still a contentiousissue among physicists, divides the most common science-fiction tropes,or "impossibilities," into three categories — possible soon, possiblein the far future and really, truly impossible.

Category1, as he dubs it, includes things that may become true within the nextcentury, if not the next few decades: teleportation (already possible,but only among subatomic particles); telepathy (thanks to brainimplants); invisibility (already being researched using light-bending'metamaterials'); laser guns (existing, but hugely power-hungry); forcefields; and the discovery of extraterrestrial life.

Category2 includes things that are theoretically possible but would be realizedonly with thousands more years of technological progress: time travel(possibly through "wormholes" in space); traveling faster than light;and the discovery of parallel universes.

Category3 consists of things that really are impossible because they violatethe laws of physics. Only two concepts qualify: knowing the future andperpetual motion.

"The Physics of theImpossible," released March 11 in the U.S., is currently No. 123 on theAmazon bestseller lists. It comes out Thursday in Britain, thoughwithout the "Doctor Who"-themed cover of the U.S. version.

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