What is a time warp? Is this real or a product of science fiction? Something you’d see on Star Trek? This is a question that nagged me in the middle of the night. Well, actually, in the middle of the night I’ve been nagged by a barking beagle, but this in no way diminishes my need to discover the meaning of a time warp, believe you me. People use the phrase “time warp” all the time now. It’s usually a term of derision, like, “Wow, that guy’s living in a time warp. He still watches television.” That whole diatribe could have been summed up in two words: “He’s old.”

A lot of science fiction is extracted from real science. But what about the time warp? A time warp has come to mean the exhibition of characteristics of an earlier era. Like you’re stuck in a certain period of time and cannot move forward. This seems to happen to older people. They keep talking about their younger days. And they wear clothes that are out of style by about 25 years. They also tend to eat with food on their lips, but this is something else altogether.

I was so puzzled by the time warp idea that I called my friend, Winston Lightmeter, PhD, Columbia (not the school, but the country). He explained this to me:
A time warp occurs when the space-time continuum, regardless of a vacuum or black hole, compresses and folds until the linear aspect of the progression of time ceases to exist and gives way to a parallel existence of reality. Thus, we could theoretically go back in time, or forward in time, depending on the particular point of the fold in which we find ourselves.

I was less impressed by what the professor said than by his ability to use two words with two “u”s side-by-side within the same sentence. I think this may be a first. Do professors learn how to speak this way, or do they do so naturally? I wish I could be so pedantic and fluent in such itinerant bullshit. Oh well.

If I understand Dr. Lightmeter correctly, time is not what we think it is. Next Monday could easily be last Tuesday, and if you are age 27, you could be walking down the street minding your own business, step into a Macy’s for a pair of underwear and emerge four years later wearing a Japanese bathrobe and claiming that somebody stole your virginity. In fact, this happened to my own mother once during a white elephant sale. Not the virginity part, but she did buy a silk kimono just because it was marked down.

Now, let’s say we wanted to travel back in time to visit Fidel Castro in 1951. Why would we want to do this? The obvious reason is to steal a crate or two of his cigars. In 1951, a Cuban cigar went for about two cents a piece. Now they are worth about $270 for two boxes, but you can’t get ahold of these cigars very easily directly from Cuba because of the embargo. Hence, the price has soared, and your 1951 cigar could make you a pretty penny with the help of a buckle in the space-time continuum. See how valuable the time warp can be?

Another example. You read Saturday’s paper, discover the winning lottery number, go back in through the time warp a few days, get a lottery ticket bearing that number, and presto, in a few days you will be rolling in the dough. The time warp can be a very good thing. Think of how wonderful it would be to go to your 30th college reunion predicting everybody’s future. They’ll think you’re a genie. Or if you want to preserve your youthful appearance, you just step inside a time warp every other year. In eight years you’d be sixteen years younger, and in 16 years you’d be 32 even if you were 64. Get the math? Me neither.

What else do we know about time? We know time is of the essence, but is this true when you have access to a time warp? No. The essence would be dependent on the time, so the phrase would have to be changed to “Time is not of the essence.” We also say, “Take your time.” Now this would be come a literal statement.

If I knew about the time warp when I was 11 and in math class, I could have gotten this problem right: If a train was leaving Philadelphia at 4 pm and going 120 mph on its way to Lincoln, Nebraska, when would it arrive? My answer would be: Yesterday. And I would be right, according to Sigmund Lefkowitz, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr Lefkowitz had lots to say in my interview with him last Thursday (which may also be a week from whenever you read this):

Dr. Lefkowitz: If you were going to the dentist and needed a filling for your tooth, you wouldn’t need to pay the dentist for 4 years.
Me: Why is that?
Dr. Lefkowitz: Because you could step into a time warp and cancel your appointment after your dental work. When the bill came, you could inform the office manager that she must be mistaken because if she checked her appointment book, she could see that you haven’t even come in yet.
Me: But why four years?
Dr. Lefkowitz: I use four years as a general figure to represent how long you could ethically keep this charade going without paying. It’s a fun experiment. Reminds me of the time I stuck a balloon over a gas stove and blew up my mother’s kitchen. Those were the days.

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