Quantum Shocker: Physicists find time may flow forward and backward
Produced by: Manoj Kumar
Time Paradox
Physicists found that in open quantum systems, two arrows of time can emerge—one shooting into the future, the other equally into the past, challenging our one-way view of time.
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Symmetry Shattered
While classical physics shows no preference for time's direction, real-world phenomena like spilling milk break the symmetry, giving rise to the mysterious "arrow of time."
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Twin Entropy
In open quantum systems, entropy increases in both possible directions of time, meaning disorder grows whether time moves forward or backward, according to Dr. Andrea Rocco.
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Quantum Roads
Rocco compares time’s possibilities to a city's unseen traffic: we can see the roads—forward and backward—but not predict which way time will surge from any given moment.
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Pendulum Illusion
A swinging pendulum looks the same whether time moves forward or backward, highlighting how, at microscopic levels, time's direction isn't always obvious.
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Milk Test
Entropy’s irreversible nature is symbolized by spilled milk—it flows out but never back—demonstrating why real systems tend to show time's asymmetry in action.
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Twin Universes
The theory echoes cosmic speculations that two universes could have emerged at the Big Bang, traveling in opposite temporal directions—an idea now more mathematically plausible.
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Open Secrets
Unlike closed quantum systems, open systems interact with their environment, dissipating energy and making the passage of time—and its preferred direction—observable.
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New Framework
Though not about time travel, this research fundamentally reshapes how thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, and cosmology might think about time’s strange, fragile directionality.
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