As you well know, time goes forward. We cannot go backwards in time — only forward. But supposedly the laws of physics also work in reverse. (I don’t remember that from school, but perhaps I was drawing monster trucks that day.) So why doesn’t the universe ever run backwards? Physicists have often wondered why time seems to only go forward. They call this “the arrow-of-time” mystery. Lorenzo Maccone, an MIT physicist, has spent time contemplating why it doesn’t happen. (You’re going to enjoy this one, if your brain doesn’t crash.)
If the universe were to run backwards, a cold cup of coffee might spontaneously heat up, or a broken piece of glass might un-break. (Hold on to your logic, because we’re only getting started!) These events are governed by the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states that the entropy (degree of disorder) of a closed system never decreases. Regardless of the fancy scientific terms, things work the way they’re supposed to — in forward motion.
However, Maccone’s “solution” is that “entropy-decreasing events occur all the time”, so there’s really no mystery about the arrow-of-time. So why don’t we witness these things? After all, wouldn’t you notice if certain events started running backwards? I think everyone would. So how does Maccone explain this? He says that according to quantum mechanics, if you ever do witness an “entropy-decreasing event”, those memories of the event “will have been erased by necessity”.
Just to clarify, Maccone says you actually have the memories, but then they are subsequently erased. He says this happens because of “quantum entanglement“. Basically, you and “the system” have become entangled and cannot properly be described separately. Obviously, you can’t have this entanglement, so there’s a disentangling process. Maccone says, “the disentangling operation will erase this entanglement, namely the observer’s memory”. (Why isn’t the actual event ever erased, where we remember something backwards that once happened but then never happened?) Anyway, Maccone published a paper that explained his conclusion mathematically. (I was unable to reach the same conclusion mathematically, unless I multiplied by the page number a few times.)
In layman’s terms, Maccone thinks that because of symmetry, if there are transformations that increase entropy (and there are), then there must be transformations that decrease entropy. (Is that like saying because a star blows up, then it should eventually unexplode?)
Unfortunately for Maccone, there is no proof of these backward events, because he cannot remember them. 🙂
Not everyone in this field of study agree with Maccone (which is not surprising). Huw Price, head of the Centre for Time at the University of Sydney, thinks Maccone is simply trading one mystery for another: “The proposal to explain the thermodynamic arrow in terms of the [quantum] effects of observers has an obvious flaw. It doesn’t explain why all observers have the same orientation in time. … Why don’t some observers remember what we call the future, and accumulate information towards what we call the past?” See, I can explain that, and even with common sense! The past has already happened, but the future hasn’t happened yet. Is it really that simple?
In the last sentence of the article about this, the writer said, “Whether or not Maccone has solved the mystery of the arrow of time is unclear.” I can answer that one, too, without even drawing upon the vast reserves of knowledge accumulated from collegiate study. The answer, in one word, is NO.
Buffet o' Blog 
Thomas Wayne
I can remember time going backwards sometimes. I’ve told you all about it before. But your memory of it was erased because your quantums were tangled.
Thomas Wayne
If entropy is disorder, and increasing entropy leads to the future, then my college test scores were good, because they were in a state of disarray. By that logic, bad grades are better than good grades!
Mr. Destructo
In my research, I discovered how to neutralize the effects of quantum entanglement, by applying the Copenhagen interpretation of retrocausality to the Schrödinger equation. In this new-found realm of consciousness, I saw how physics can actually operate backwards. A humorous example is that the Important Evil Genius can learn something yet become even more stupid. That seems to violate the normal boundaries of reason, but it fits within Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.
I would explain it further, but there’s a lot of math involved, and I must return to developing my plans for world domination.
Alien Overlords
Ha, puny humans still believe in time. No wonder we conquered your insignificant planet so easily.
Crappo the Clown
Time running backward gives me gas…
Although, actually, if it were to happen, you could rip a loud fart, and THEN you’d get gas. But no one would remember it, because your quantums would be tangled up, and that makes you forget stuff. And that would be sad…
Thomas Wayne
This gives me a strange sense of deju-vu…
Crappo the Clown
Don’t you mean deju-moo? That is, the feeling you’ve heard this bullcrap before?
Beppo
About quantum mechanics, Bohr once said “If you think you understand it, you don’t understand it.”
That might explain how they come up with such crazy theories!
Thomas Wayne
If there is entropy / disorder / chaos in the universe, then does that mean it is not subject to the laws of physics? Or do people just label it entropy because we don’t understand it? If there is chaos, then how can there by laws of physics?
Or does this not make sense because of entangled quantums?
Beppo
If this is happening, why hasn’t someone captured it with a video recorder? Or does “the system” erase its memory, too?
MangoMan
I blame it all on the ‘dark matter’ that scientists made up cuase they can’t figure other stuff out.
Crappo the Clown
I made some of that “dark matter” one time… 🙂
Thomas Wayne
I was reading some comments on that article, and someone said:
“It’s not randomness in an unpredictable way but randomness in an orderless way.”
Uhh… If it’s orderless, wouldn’t it also be unpredictable?
Thomas Wayne
To test this theory of backwards physics, we need an infinite number of monkeys testing the temperature on an infinite number of cups of coffee. As anything is possible with an infinite number of monkeys, one of them will remember the coffee warming back up.
If this doesn’t work, the monkeys can fling poo at Lorenzo Maccone for wasting everyone’s time. 🙂
Thomas Wayne
If quantums can erase your memory, perhaps a dose of hydrogen can boost your self-esteem. Doesn’t it kinda fit within the same realm of fuzzy logic?
Obviously I’m no doctor or physicist, but this is teh internets, where you can be anyone and make up whatever you want. (I still wonder how that guy works at MIT if he publishes stuff like that… I need to find someone to pay me for my crackpot theories!)