Does your time machine have the annoying habit of overshooting its target by several centuries?

How do you get to the past or the future? Ask a science fiction fan. (Or a theoretical physicist.)

Here are the answers.

1. What did Marty McFly use to get back to the future? A DeLorean. Obviously, this car had unique properties.
2. What extra quality does the Doctor's TARDIS have that makes space/time travel so convenient? It's bigger on the inside. Now why didn't the rest of them think of that? Haul all the luggage you want.
3. What makes time travel possible in Star Trek's 'City on the Edge of Forever'? A time portal. Dangerous things, time portals.
4. What's the name of Dr Peabody's time machine? WABAC. His boy Sherman uses it, too.
5. This theoretical (but real-life) time machine might cause the Grandfather Paradox. A Tipler cylinder. Fortunately, there's the Novikov self-consistency principle. See? Real people think about these things, not just us nuts.
6. What time travel device does DC Comics use? The cosmic treadmill. Somehow fitting.
7. What device does Quentin Collins build in his basement (of course) in Dark Shadows? A time staircase. Well, they were pretty steampunk on Dark Shadows, and it was 1840.
8. In Irwin Allen's legendary TV series, how did his travellers move through time? In the Time Tunnel, of course.
9. What imaginative name did HG Wells give to his time-travel device? The Time Machine. (Duh.)
10. In the 1970 illustrated novel Time and Again, how did author Jack Finney's protagonist move through time? He used his mind. Oh, and a classy old hotel.

Now, all you need is a DIY instruction kit, and you can build your own time machine. See you yesterday!

Dmitri Gheorgheni

22.02.16 Front Page

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