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By Julian Sterling, Senior Anthropological Correspondent
January 17, 2026

In a move that has sent shockwaves through both the scientific community and the fanbases of mid-century science fiction, the European Commission has officially drafted a proposal to ban the development, sale, and operation of “Chronological Displacement Devices”—or, in the vulgar tongue, Time Machines. While the rest of the world remains preoccupied with the mundane integration of AI, Europe has decided to preemptively regulate the laws of physics before someone accidentally deletes the Renaissance. 

The factual catalyst for this unprecedented legislation is the EU AI Act, which reached a critical enforcement milestone on February 2, 2025, by prohibiting “unacceptable risk” technologies. In 2026, Brussels has expanded this “Precautionary Principle” to include theoretical physics. The European Commission’s rationale is characteristically dry: time travel poses a “material distortion to human behavior” and presents a unique “security risk” that cannot be mitigated by standard data-governance protocols. It is the ultimate satirical peak of European bureaucracy: attempting to put a “No Entry” sign on the past to protect the stability of the future. 

Critics argue that the ban is a “Governance Gap” gone rogue. While there is no factual evidence that a functional time machine currently exists outside of a CERN whiteboard, the EU is taking no chances. The proposed directive would categorize “Temporal Manipulation” as a prohibited practice alongside social scoring and manipulative AI. In a world of Global Volatility, the EU’s message is clear: if you want to change the past, you’ll have to do it through the traditional method of rewriting history textbooks, not by tinkering with the fabric of spacetime.