Get "Your Ticket to The Future" Here!!

August 11, 2002 11:21 AM

Get "Your Ticket to The Future" Here!! From the site :"We establish a fund in current time. You make a small contribution to the fund, and in a few hundred years that small amount grows to a very large amount. From that fund, moneys will be taken and used to retrieve you, perhaps seconds after you join, perhaps even moments before your recorded death, perhaps some other point in your lifetime. Further, the fund may even pay to have you "rejuvenated" medically (assuming this is scientifically possible at that time,) and support you financially for a number of years. (Note: Retrieving you just before the moment of death is just one possible scenario, but one that would avoid any Star Trek(TM) type paradoxes. There are an unlimited number of other possibilities, and we do not know what they will do, we can only make reasonably informed guesses.)"

I wonder, Scam or Genius at work here?
posted by bhmwks (30 comments total)

you actually wonder?
posted by quonsar at 11:22 AM on August 11, 2002

Ok, so let's say that I contribute $10. Now, 10 years for now, I invent a transister that will lead to the invention of time travel 200 years from now. In 200 years, they will come back to now and retrieve me. However, since I was retrieved, I never could have invented the transister, and therefore, time travel could not be invented, which would create a rip in space and time thus destroying the entire universe.

For only $10, you too can destroy all of existance.
posted by benjh at 11:27 AM on August 11, 2002

in that case, here's a twenty. keep the change.
posted by quonsar at 11:37 AM on August 11, 2002

benjh, doesn't the multiverse model allow for such paradoxes?
posted by donkeyschlong at 11:41 AM on August 11, 2002

well ok, then, i want my change.
posted by quonsar at 12:01 PM on August 11, 2002

Scam or Genius

Not necessarily contradictory terms!

The concept is novel, but I highly doubt this is a serious endeavor. Who and how would this be actioned if a breech of contract occurs?
posted by effer27 at 12:19 PM on August 11, 2002

Who and how would this be actioned if a breech of contract occurs?
[sniff! sniff!] anybody else smell lawyer?
posted by quonsar at 12:35 PM on August 11, 2002

It's not going to work. In the future, governmental currency will undoubtedly deflate to the point where everyone switches to something with real value: alcohol.

If you ask me, these people should dump their money into a collection of fine Scotch, while they still can. Maybe that will have some value in a hundred years.
posted by Galvatron at 12:40 PM on August 11, 2002

will they take a check?
posted by billybob at 2:45 PM on August 11, 2002

Ok, so let's say that I contribute $10. Now, 10 years for now, I invent a transister that will lead to the invention of time travel 200 years from now. In 200 years, they will come back to now and retrieve me.

C'mon, benjh -- give them some credit. You think they would premptively retrieve one of the key founders of the technology they based their business model around? I presume they would wait until you'd petered out into the final stretch of mediocrity that defined your life's end.

Which suggests that the key to collecting on your investment is to lead a thoroughly unimportant life. If you have a significant effect on history up through the end of you natural life, you aren't getting taken out of time.
posted by cortex at 3:41 PM on August 11, 2002

First, I want to point out the resemblance this bears to how you pay your bill at The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe, by Douglas Adams.

Second, If population continues to increase over the years, what are the odds time travel will be used to pull average schmoes out of the past? Also, not knowing what kind of laws could be in place, you could be pulled into any number of horrific situations, since you "volunteered" for time travel.
posted by Miss Beth at 4:08 PM on August 11, 2002

But what about the inflation? Dear God, won't anyone think of the inflation!

I wonder, Scam or Genius at work here?

My money's on both.
posted by saintsguy at 4:29 PM on August 11, 2002

I actually sent $10 to them because it was such a great idea and felt they deserved $10. I have my certificate (snail mail) came in a rolled up poster tube, we had a good laugh and chat about it, it was worth at least $10 in entertainment value. Hopefully they get rich doing it and I travel to the future. Includes instructions for notification procedures in your will in case you wish to be "snatched" just before death and a diploma style certificate of cheapest possible 8x11 stock that says "this is to certify stbalbach is a member in good standing" -- there are members who are not in good standing. Id guess the material labour and shipping costs were around $3.
posted by stbalbach at 5:23 PM on August 11, 2002

As mentioned in today's Below the Belt in the Washington Post.
posted by alidarbac at 5:46 PM on August 11, 2002

stbalbach, I hope you've set up some system so we'll all be alerted when you're zapped off into the future.
posted by Zonker at 5:47 PM on August 11, 2002

If I pay my ten dollars and want to go right now, shouldn't I be getting a knock on my door say ...


NOW.

Nope. Dammit. Must be a scam.
posted by morningbit at 6:13 PM on August 11, 2002

stbalbach, I hope you've set up some system so we'll all be alerted when you're zapped off into the future.

Yes. Send me $10 and you will be alterted!
posted by stbalbach at 6:25 PM on August 11, 2002

Links about Time Travel:

Steve Preston's Time Travel Page, including "a simple and easy to understand explanation of time travel. Ideal for those with minimal knowledge of physics."

Some theoretical scientists think that time travel would only be possible using black holes, and wormholes in space. Here's a page that has Animated simulations of travel around and near black holes and neutron spheres.

More information about black holes and beyond.

The Theory of Elementary Waves -- wherein the author discusses a rational basis for quantum mechanics.

Build Your Own Time Travel Device! (Or at least just have an out-of-body experience). (While you're at it, be sure to check out the selection of other fine products at Future Horizons, including plans for a working hoverboard, a mini hydrogen reactor to convert water into energy, plans for a flying saucer ... not to mention stuff they label as "strange science.")
posted by crunchland at 6:34 PM on August 11, 2002

It allows for these kinds of paradoxes assuming quantum realities. (For every possible action, each possibility happens, in a seperate quantum universe). But even then, this is assuming that when time traveling, you will also travel within the same quantum universe that you departed from.

In the basis of temporal mechanics, the barriers between quantum realities can be broken by a temporal distortion that would be created by the inverse tachion required in order to achieve temporal travel. So you could travel back and pick me up, but you actually picked me up in an alternate quantum universe. So while I may not be pulled into the future with my $10, at least one of my quantum replicates will be the beneficiary of such a wonderful gift.

Of course, if your temporal distortion becomes unstable, you could create a breach within the the quantum universes, causing them to merge together. The result would cause the universe's matter flow to be adversely affected, requiring a collapse and reconditioning to correct itself, which of course, would destroy existance as we know it.
posted by benjh at 7:10 PM on August 11, 2002

what a pretty website. i like how the strange bright blueish purple makes me want to vomit. i'm sure it's much more asthetically pleasing in the future.
posted by folktrash at 8:38 PM on August 11, 2002

Well... I dunno about this, they'll need to be able to beat inflation, and they'll need to make sure that the world economic and information systems stay 'pure' untill time travel is invented. They also need to make sure what they are doing will be legal under future time travel laws. AND they'll need to figure out a way to snag people in a non-invasive manner.



So there's more to it then the simple human invention of time travel.
posted by delmoi at 8:55 PM on August 11, 2002

o_O
posted by JettSuperior at 9:10 PM on August 11, 2002

I want to build a plaque that will last a very long time; it says "Dear Time Traveller meet me here 1 October 2002 at midday. I wont tell anyone else that you visited. PS Can you have done some research into this year and have the results of a number of 2002/3 sporting events. Cheers."

And as long as no-one pulls it down, I meet a time traveller for sure.
posted by meech at 4:12 AM on August 12, 2002

Is it ok if I wait until other people start disappearing before I pay my ten bucks? Is anyone else struck by the parallel between this and the evangelical Christian doctrine of the Rapture? So if people do start mysteriously vanishing, we need to find out whether they were born again or just had a spare $10.

When you think about it, this scam(?) is pretty close to the popular understanding of Christian doctrine. It requires an act of faith on the believer's part and promises unprovable pie-in-the-sky. Pascal's wager is as applicable here as it is to any deistic religion.
posted by norm29 at 7:29 AM on August 12, 2002

I think the real problem is that (as morningbit noticed) you can find out pretty much instantly whether or not it's a scam, since either the time-traveller will arrive or he won't. If he doesn't, then it's a scam! (I'm guessing that's why they suggest being picked up immediately before death.)

Someone should sic the IRS on these guys... is this sort of thing legal?
posted by tweebiscuit at 7:39 AM on August 12, 2002

I should have added to my previous post: This seems like the sort of con that got played on poor farmers in the Depression. Sure, it looks like fun and games on the Internet, but what if they're duping innocent people who don't know any better?
posted by tweebiscuit at 7:40 AM on August 12, 2002

it actually works !

i gave them 10 dollars and they beamed me to

2273ad and now theyve beamed me back !

im a zillionare!

theres actually a rival firm in the future where if

you give them a zillion dollars theyll beam

you back into the past where your investment

deprecates to like five dollars.

its not very popular though.
posted by sgt.serenity at 8:00 AM on August 12, 2002

If this guy ever updates his site, we should find out whether or not it's actually possible.

Unless he's been kidnapped by Temporal Protectorate Elvis clones.
posted by toothgnip at 8:42 AM on August 12, 2002

toothgnip

I was just looking for that!
posted by elwoodwiles at 5:41 PM on August 12, 2002

check this old discussion
posted by elwoodwiles at 5:44 PM on August 12, 2002