Could someday be invented an artifact that captures images of the past?

Question

Will it be possible someday to invent an artifact that can obtain images and sounds of past events? I wish I had it!

Answer 1

There is a device that captures images of the past - it is called a TELESCOPE!

When you look through a telescope at a galaxy 100 light years away, you are seeing that galaxy as it was 100 years ago!

Answer 2

The answer is no (except, of course, for trick answers, like looking into the sky and seeing light that left distant stars eons ago).

Here's why! And I think this answer to be quite elegant:

The past no longer exists. You cannot go back to something that no longer exists.

Think of the analogy of going back to a place that you once knew in your own past. Looked at superficially, you might think that you're sort of going back to the past. But you're actually not. The place where you're going is that place as it exists today. The buildings, if they were there many years ago, are aging and worn. The people, if they're still living, are much older and not at all like the days of their, or your, youth. The trees, the animals, the microscopic life are all changed.

You could not return to the same place exactly as it was years ago, because "years-ago" no longer exists. And it will never again exist. Only the present exists.

Answer 3

It would have been stories. The base of what you want photos to be used for is culture. "See, this is..." That was done with story telling for years. There are many cultures that still, to some extent basically, tell the whole story of their culture. I'm not exaggerating when I say the one person would speak for weeks at a time. I personally think that's how we got some of the funnier things in history. "Icarus flew too close to the sun and burned; Icarus tried to be too cool and lost everything, so don't you do that!" There is a vast, stimulating world to be explored around story telling and basically, what you think photos do. (Adjusts soap box) I think younger people find it too easy to flip through life in pictures and "the gist of it" never having anything tangible to mold and hold on to and work with. Since the dawn of time as far as we know people have been sharing information, building culture in many ways. And all of those still exist today. Someone once said "I would trade every painting of Christ for a single photograph." What they miss in that statement is that the photo, painting, story, etc are all equal. We THINK the photo is more real when in actuality it isn't. It CAN BE more direct but all ways initiate the humanity in people. The photo, story, painting; all initiate you. Your granny doesn't exist or not exist any less just because you have or lost her wedding ring.

Answer 4

There is quite a bit of discussion among theoretical physicists concerning time. There are several workable modles of a non-linear time structure. (Workable, but thus far untestable.)
Our experience of time is linear. We see Brett Farve throw a touch down pass, THEN we see the people in the room with us rejoice. One event leads to the next.
In non linear time everything has already happened, is currently happening and has yet to happen. Everyone has heard the old thought experiment that says, if you could see forever, you would see the back of your head do to the curvature of space. Non linear time theories are built around ideas that time curves under an as yet undetermined way. So I guess that would mean that if you lived forever you would, what? witness your own birth or something.

If you're seriously interested in this sort of thing, I would suggest you find a few books on string theory and on quantum mechanics.

Answer 5

Technically we already have it, the moment you take a picture of something, it's already "in the past". Take a picture of a clock, f.ex., by the time you pressed the shutter, the time has already moved on. A telescope can show you things in the universe that long have 'died', like stars etc.

If you are thinking of a 'Time Machine", I say - why not....???

Just look at history, Leonardo da Vinci and his work. Back then people probably thought he was way out there, flying machines and such... Now look at us today..:)

I believe that if you can dream it, you can do it.. Well, maybe not you, but someone...

Answer 6

A camera does exactly that.
When you look in any direction you are looking into the past.
When you take a picture the light that reaches the lens originated in the past.
A person fractions of a second a star,years!

Answer 7

Not for me, the reason is its because we can't go back to time and we can't send a camera back to time. The camera wasn't even invented during the beginning of life. If you go back there then something in the past will be changed and will affect the present.

Answer 8

TELESCOPE!!!! , actually If U look up in the sky at night , what u see is the light from the stars billions and billion of years ago, some of the stars U see today dont even exist anymore. so essentially ur looking at the past

Answer 9

Oh defenitly.The only thing required is very very power-ful amplifiers.To make those amplifiers we need high voltage of electricity.The only lacking to make artifact is lack of energy resource.I hope some day we'll find such energy resoruce and we can make that artifact.

Any doubts contact newton_maxplanck @yahoo.com

Answer 10

Yes, its called a telescope. It captures images of stars and galaxies that happened thousands or millions of years ago.