<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div style="display: block;"><span style="font-family: -webkit-standard; font-size: medium;">The lack of time travellers visiting us may be seen as evidence that time travel is not possible. In this article, I argue an alternative explanation is that we are not economically important enough to our descendants to justify the costs of time travel. Using a cost-benefit analysis, I elaborate on this argument. I suggest that the major cost of time travel is likely to be the energy cost, whilst the largest benefit of time travel is knowledge which the present possesses, but the future has lost. Focusing on this benefit, I argue it is extremely unlikely that we possess a piece of knowledge which is sufficiently important to a future civilisation (system critical), but also has been lost by said civilisation. This is to say, we may not have been visited by time travellers because we are not important enough. </span><span style="font-family: -webkit-standard; font-size: medium;">Stuart Mills</span></div><div style="display: block;"><div style="-webkit-user-select: all; -webkit-user-drag: element; display: inline-block;" class="apple-rich-link" draggable="true" role="link" data-url="https://www.theseedsofscience.pub/p/the-economics-of-time-travel"><a style="border-radius:10px;font-family:-apple-system, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;display:block;-webkit-user-select:none;width:300px;user-select:none;-webkit-user-modify:read-only;user-modify:read-only;overflow:hidden;text-decoration:none;" class="lp-rich-link" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.theseedsofscience.pub/p/the-economics-of-time-travel" dir="ltr" role="button" draggable="false" width="300"><table style="table-layout:fixed;border-collapse:collapse;width:300px;background-color:#E4E4E4;font-family:-apple-system, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;" class="lp-rich-link-emailBaseTable" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" width="300"><tbody><tr><td vertical-align="center" align="center"><img style="width:300px;filter:brightness(0.97);height:204px;" width="300" height="204" draggable="false" class="lp-rich-link-mediaImage" alt="cf487df9-8334-47fb-a372-9559dd00bd18_732x498.jpeg" src="cid:ACCA3147-A314-479B-86D0-80E6295ED200"></td></tr><tr><td vertical-align="center"><table bgcolor="#E4E4E4" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="300" style="table-layout:fixed;font-family:-apple-system, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;background-color:rgba(228, 228, 228, 1);-apple-color-filter:initial;" class="lp-rich-link-captionBar"><tbody><tr><td style="padding:8px 0px 8px 0px;" class="lp-rich-link-captionBar-textStackItem"><div style="max-width:100%;margin:0px 16px 0px 16px;overflow:hidden;" class="lp-rich-link-captionBar-textStack"><div style="word-wrap:break-word;font-weight:500;font-size:12px;overflow:hidden;text-overflow:ellipsis;text-align:left;" class="lp-rich-link-captionBar-textStack-topCaption-leading"><a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.theseedsofscience.pub/p/the-economics-of-time-travel" style="text-decoration: none" draggable="false"><font color="#272727" style="color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.847059);">The Economics of Time Travel</font></a></div><div style="word-wrap:break-word;font-weight:400;font-size:11px;overflow:hidden;text-overflow:ellipsis;text-align:left;" class="lp-rich-link-captionBar-textStack-bottomCaption-leading"><a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.theseedsofscience.pub/p/the-economics-of-time-travel" style="text-decoration: none" draggable="false"><font color="#808080" style="color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.498039);">theseedsofscience.pub</font></a></div></div></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></a></div></div><div><br></div></body></html>