Study Suggests Time Can Flow Both Forward And Backwards In The Quantum Realm

Scientists at the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom studied how time behaves in a quantum system. They used a set of equations and found something very interesting the existence of opposing arrows of time. These arrows are like proofs that time doesn’t always flow in one direction at the quantum level.

Andrea Rocco, one of the researchers said “Our findings suggest that while our common experience tells us that time only moves one way, we’re just unaware that the opposite direction would have been equally possible.”

To understand why time flows in one direction, the study authors made two important assumptions. First, they assumed that the environment around a quantum system is huge and very complex. Because of this they decided to ignore the details of the environment and just focus on the system itself.

Their second assumption was about how energy and information behave. They assumed that just like in the everyday world once energy or information leaves the system, it never comes back.

As they worked with their equations, they noticed another interesting thing. Most physical equations show smooth continuous changes, but their models had something different a time discontinuous factor. This meant that time was represented with sudden shifts or breaks, as if was glitching rather than moving smoothly.

Rocco explained this idea by saying, “There are processes, such as the motion of a pendulum, that look just as believable in reverse. The problem is that, at the most basic level, the laws of physics don’t explain why some processes can’t go backward. This shows that, while time seems to move forward in our daily lives, something strange happens at the quantum level.