SCEPCOP Forum

"Hong Kong physicists say they have proved that a single photon obeys Einstein's theory that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light -- demonstrating that outside science fiction, time travel is impossible."
http://news.yahoo.com/hong-kong-scienti ... 26913.html

Now, if time travel is impossible, would that not pretty much put an end to the discussion of how UFOs could possibly get here since that's usually the leading explanation?

I hate the word impossible. Why not stick to highly improbable?

The best we can ever do is go with: As far as we know, and "highly improbable". We don't know what we don't know. We don't know what may be possible. There's just no point in going to "impossible".

Here's a question: I'll say it's impossible for me to take a flying leap and land in Australia. Now, is that impossible or highly improbable? Technically, it would be highly improbable, but at what point, statistically speaking, does an action become so highly improbable that it should be considered impossible for all intents and purposes?

Impossible? I'm with Arouet, "impossible" is a mighty strong word.

Think of all of the things that were considered impossible 2,000 years ago, 300 years ago or even 100 years ago when I was born.

The big problem with saying that its impossible is that we don't know what we might learn in the future that would change our assessment of the situation. I agree that based on what we currently know, it may be impossible. You've heard me argue the distance problem is one of the biggest reasons to doubt aliens have visied this planet. But we don't know what physics may be discovered in the future that changes the whole picture. Maybe a hypedrive is possible. Or bending space time. Or something else. We just don't know.

We're just plain better off staying away from impossible: what is the benefit in using that term?