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Question: Logic question to test your intellect!?
Now, this is slightly complicated, but I'll try as hard as I can to help you understand the scenario!.

Lets just say you happened to have a time machine, You have a test at school today and you didn't study!. So you get in your time machine and go in the past 2 days ago to tell yourself to study for the test and then get back in the time machine and go back to the present a split second after your past self went to the past so you would not fuse atoms!. You suddenly have a large understanding about what the test will be about and will surely get an A!.

Think deeply about this scenario!. Is this possible!?(Ignore the fact there is a time machine or where it came from) I made this myself and in order to answer this correctly you need to understand how time works!. In one day I will add a detail to the question explaining why or why not this is possible!.Www@QuestionHome@Com


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:
Assuming time travel is actually possible, which it is generally thought not to be, this scenario is still implausible!.

In all likelihood, I would have encountered my future self already in the past, who already told me to study, and then the same confluence of events that prohibited me from studying would occur!. To be consistent, I would still go back in time and try to talk myself into studying, but to no avail, as I had already not studied!.

As for your idea of fusing atoms, what is to say that I do not have enough matter in common to be disruptive to my past self as well as to my present self!. also, there is the possibility that if I were to come back a second after I left, there would still be two versions of myself: the present, and the past!. So, then what!? I from two days ago don't just fade into the self that went back in time and came back!.

In short: the one of me that went back to warn myself to study for the test would come back not having studied for the test and have to take it!. It would essentially necessitate a version of myself that had studied in the past to arrive at the present with that knowledge!. The future self came from a past where it had not studied, and always would!. And the past self--if it studied--would differ from the future self that instigated the crisis by not studying, making them effectually different beings!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

I suppose it is, or could be possible in some way!. Of course, one must avoid encountering their own self through time as it could mess up the flow of time, one little action could end up changing the future forever!. also, people would go mad if they saw themselves face to face, which is a good idea that my past self would have already went to the past when I returned to the present!. It would be best to not disrupt the time flow as much as possible, time is fragile!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

Lets say you do go back in time and study (altering the circumstances, events around you by going back in time to study) so you are back in present and you now may overslept for your exam, become ill, etc!. Www@QuestionHome@Com

No, not at all!. I've given this some thought, and if you go back and tell yourself to study, and your past self studies and prepares for the test, then you would have never had the need to travel back in time in the first place!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

No, it is logically impossible!.

To travel back in time is to be "at a certain time, at an earlier time" -- an incoherent statement that does not square with our perception of time!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

Anonymou!.!. has it right if you went back in time and studied you would not need the time machine when you got back!. Therefore not using it to go back in time!. Www@QuestionHome@Com