Time viewing (into the past)

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ryansavage

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I've seen reference to this for different reasons, but I've never seen it explained as simply as what follows. There's always some strange equation and verbosity that makes the writer feel better about themselves.

So, here is how we can view what happened in the past:
Basically, it's as "simple" as going faster than light. If you can go as fast as light, and face in the direction of what you want to see, the light will never catch you, nor will you go faster than the light that brings the images to show you what happened. i.e. everything you're looking at would appear to have frozen. If you go faster than light, and turn the other way (away from whatever you're viewing), you're going to start crashing into the light that brings the images of what has happened. Picture you driving the same speed as a car behind you. It will never gain, nor will you pull away from it. Now imagine that you are driving faster than the cars in front of you. You will catch up to them and whatever they're carrying.

So, were you to travel faster than the speed of light, and face the direction the light that carries the images (since what we see is light, not the actual object) i.e. with your back to the object that is reflecting the light, you would begin to run into previously sent light waves, thusly seeing what happened earlier and earlier in the history of whatever reflected the light.

The only question is whether you can see images of what light is carrying from the back and not just from the front. Soon as we figure out how to travel faster than light, I'll move this from the science fiction forum. haha.
 
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StarRider1701

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So, the first FTL ship needs to mount a camera in the nose. Our eyes (cameras are merely imitations of the human eye) are activated by light entering them. Would that include catching up with light and receiving it essencially backwards?

My first concern would be distortion of the image in the light caused by the receptor (camera or eye) moving faster than light. It seems to me that the camera lens pressing against the light beam would force it to move faster than light even as it enters the body of the camera.

Interesting concept. But if you can go FTL, why not just travel to a specific distance then just stop, turn and let the light from X years ago catch you normally? To my mind, that would work far easier and clearer than what you proposed.
 
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yevaud

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One would not "see" photons in any event. You are entirely out of their frame of reference. What you would see is problematic, if anything.
 
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