Iranian time travel machine not all it seems

The Iranian government has dismissed a claim that one of its citizens has invented a time machine. Sadly the gadget itself was at best overhyped, despite the best efforts of the ‘inventor.’

The device, the “Aryayek Time Traveling Machine” is the work of Ali Razeghi (which can also be written as Razeqi), who appears to work at a government-run facility, the Centre for Strategic Inventions.

According to a news agency also run by the government, Razeghi said he had formally registered the invention. It wasn’t the traditional time travel concept by which the user was literally transported to another era. Instead it was a slightly dramatic way of describing a device that predicted future events.

The device, which could apparently fit into a personal computer case (it’s not clear if this is a literal computer casing or something like a laptop bag) could supposedly predict the events of an individual’s life over the next five to eight years with 98 percent accuracy. According to Razeghi that meant the machine could bring the future to you, hence the time travel terminology.

Not short on hype, Razeghi also claimed the device could predict events on a national scale such as currency and oil price fluctuations and the likelihood of military conflict.

Sadly he was unable to go into any specifics other than citing the use of “algorithms” because he feared that China would steal and mass produce the idea. That’s also the reason he’s giving for the lack of a prototype.

Since attracting international attention, the story seems to have fallen apart. The news agency has deleted the original story and is now quoting Iran’s science, research and technology minister as saying the device has not been officially registered. Mohammad Mehdinejad Nouri noted that there are legal requirements of scientific proof and evidence before you can make such a registration with the relevant official body, the State Organization for Registration of Deeds and Properties.

It appears that Razeghi actually registered the invention at his own workplace. The value of that registration is somewhat undermined by reports that Razeghi has previously registered another 179 inventions in the same way.

More cynical folk are speculating that Razeghi has been set up as the fall guy after the Iranian government itself floated the story to try to worry other countries about its technological advances, only to quickly realize nobody was buying the claims.