Time Traveler: A Scientist's Personal Mission to Make Time Travel a Reality

by Ronald Mallett and Bruce Henderson

Book Overview

This is the dramatic and inspirational first-person story of theoretical physicist, Dr. Ronald Mallett, who recently discovered the basic equations for a working time machine that he believes can be used as a transport vehicle to the past. Combining elements of Rocket Boys and Elegant Universe, Time Traveler follows Mallett's discovery of Einstein's work on space-time, his study of Godel's work on a solution of Einstein's equation that might allow...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 156858363X
• ISBN13: 9781568583631
• Release Date: November 2007
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.47 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.0" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Very Great Reading

I bought your book, Dr. Mallett after hearing your interview on NPR. Your voice was so warm and inviting and your interest's were mine in so many ways. I have watched the same TV shows and seen the same movies, not necessaryly because my main interest was time travel but, just because I have been in love with the universe all my life. The book is as warm as your voice and just held my interest from cover to cover. Thank you Dr. Mallett for your very interesting and warm story. Even though I don't have a good command of mathmatical formulaes, I still found your book so easy to understand and would recommand it to anyone who loves looking up into the starry heavens and enjoys the beautiful pictures we receive from the Hubble Telescope.

Breaking the time barrier...

"The moving finger writes and having writ moves on, nor all your piety can lure it back nor your tears wash out a word of it." Jon Donne. If Prof. Ron Mallett has his way, the words of Jon Donne will be a quaint aphorism that people used to say. The reason Mallett says this is because he believes that the time barrier can be broken and that -- someday -- people will have the technology to travel into the past. Almost immediately on announcing his speculations, Mallett became the topic of intense media interest including a Learning Channel special and great media coverage. And this is rightly so because the back story of Mallett's motivation -- so ably told in this book -- is itself so compelling. In 1955, while still a child, Ron Mallett lost his father who died of heart failure at the age of 33. Loving his Dad as intensely as he did, Mallett began to dream of breaking the time barrier to rejoin his father just to tell him "I love you." Just as everyone can easily connect with Mallett's motivation, mostly everyone will find themselves somewhat befuddled by the science behind Mallett's speculations. This isn't because he doesn't do a good job of explaining himself, but rather simply because scientific explanations typically tend to tax comprehension. That being said, his theory is an ingenious one: that just as gravity can used to distort time, so can concentrated light. In this way, Mallett must now consider it the sweetest serendipity that he worked in the private sector with lasers for a formative part of his early career. In this way, he became immediately acquianted with the very device he intends to employ in his time travel device. The typical time travel scenerios that have been set out involve a radical twisting of space. If we were bugs living on a sheet of Christmas wrapping paper, our travel from one end of the sheet to the other would be greatly speeded if we could somehow get the paper from the ends to connect with each other. And indeed, this is what the tradition theories of time travel all propose: that somehow -- whether it's through cosmic strings as speculated by J Richard Gott or black holes as speculated by Kip Thorne -- a force so great is created that space is litterally forced to warp back on itself. Unfortunately, at the end of the day, Mallett's theories will probably face the same fate at those of Gott and Thorne respecting time travel by people into the past...failure. However, having opened by quoting Donne, it's perhaps best to close by quoting Theodore Roosevelt who said: "Pity not those who have failed but those who live in that grey twilight that knows neither success nor failure." By dint of genius, Mallett -- ultimately successful or not -- has irrevocably taken himself out of that "grey twilight" and us with him...if only in our hearts and imaginations.

But Not Everybody Agrees!

First, this is more of a biography than a book on time travel. Dr. Mallett is one ov the very few people, and even fewer African-Americans who are theoretical physicists. The story of his rising from the Bronx to being a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Connecticut shows what can still be done in the United States so far as education and opportunity are concerned. It's not easy. Theoretical physics is not the easiest subject to master. And the additional problems of race and poverty do not make it any easier. Regarding the aspects of time travel. The mathematics of Einsteinian theories do seem to provide for at least the theoretical possibility of time travel. Dr. Mallett has spent a lot of time working in this area of Einstein's work. While some of his work is quite fascinating it appears to be a long way from a working version. You might also keep in mind that some other physicists have published papers which contain conflicting points.

A Mindbending Trip

Time Traveler has all the elements of a good thriller. It is especially engrossing because it is a true story. It has all of the unexpected twists and turns of reality. Truth is stranger than fiction! I found myself reading it in all sorts of unlikely places. It took me away from the politics at work during my lunch break. It transported me into another realm while I was waiting for a friend. It inspired me to reach for seemingly unattainable goals. It was thought provoking and mentally challenging. I highly recommend it. A. Paul

Elegant Scientific Insights

Dr. Mallett must be an extraordinary teacher. While the other reviewers are correct that his personal history is deeply compelling, the scientific insights that he explains in chapters 11 and 12 are breathtaking in their elegance. Dr. Mallett's theory is the complement to the 1919 verification by Arthur Eddington of Eistein's prediction regarding the deflection of light rays by the curved space around the sun. Dr. Mallett's insight is that Einstein's theory shows that light, which does not have mass, has energy and that energy could also produce a gravitational field. If that gravitational field twists space, then time gets twisted. Eddington showed that strong gravity bends light, then Dr. Mallett theorizes that intense light should affect gravity. Beautiful symmnetry. With the recent advent of small, relatively inexpensive femto-second lasers with power outputs in terawatts, Dr Mallett's hypothesis should be testable very soon. Good luck Dr. Mallett, your father has truly reached across time.