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Physicist Speculates Dragon Ball's Room of Spirit and Time Could Exist

One of the more interesting narrative elements introduced in the Dragon Ball franchise is the Room of Spirit and Time. After debuting in the Android Arc, the Room has appeared when the characters need to train for a long period in a short time span. This is only possible because one day spent in the Room is equivalent to one year. While it's a fantastical concept, in a recent interview published in Shueisha's V Jump magazine, Dr. Nobuyoshi Ohta, a specialist in elementary particles and gravity, posited a place like the Room could actually exist.

Initially posted on the Dragon Ball website in July 2023, the interview with Dr. Ohta resurfaced in the August 2024 issue of V Jump. While it's a condensed version of the interview, Dr. Ohta spoke about how one could create a Room of Spirit and Time, or at the very least create the conditions for one.

To put it simply, creating the Room would require two places of differing gravitational forces. The physicist explained, “…Time flows slower where there is stronger gravity.” He then explained it in relation to a person standing on Earth and another person orbiting the planet in a space station. In other words, time dilation.

So, using the principles of time dilation in relation to gravity, how would one recreate the Room? Well, Dr. Ohta suggested a few possibilities. The first of which is, “…Throw your enemies inside an existing place with stronger gravity, and, while your enemy is there, keep training in a place without strong gravity.” Of the places Dr. Ohta recommended, he brought up Jupiter and the Sun.

Yet, when pressed on creating the one day to one year time gap, the physicist postulated the edge of a black hole's event horizon. His exact words were, “Time slows down as you get closer and closer to an event horizon. You don't want a black hole that's too small either, though. This is because for smaller black holes, even if you got close to the event horizon, the strength of the gravity would increase.”

In the longer interview on the Dragon Ball website, Dr. Ohta also went into detail about how the Room of Spirits and Time could have a gravity 10 times stronger than Earth. It's an interesting question because in the series, protagonist Son Goku notes the Room is as large as Earth. Since there is no discussion regarding the density of the Room, Dr. Ohta postulated two possibilities. The first is the characters are warped to a planet that has a stronger gravitational force than Earth. The second is the Room is constantly accelerating.

For his reasoning with warping, Dr. Ohta spoke on the principles of folding space. However, he does mention, “In order for this to work, you'd need to be able to access the world above the third dimension… The only difficulty here is that no research has found any proof of a world with more than three dimensions.” So, while plausible, the research is inconclusive. For the constant acceleration, though, he explained how we experience gravity when we accelerate. Hence, his hypothesis the Room is constantly accelerating.

If Dr. Nobuyoshi Ohta's postulations are correct, we could have a real-life Room of Spirit and Time. Of course, it would have to be in a place of lower gravity than our opponents and potentially constantly accelerating. So, maybe the opposite of Bulma's gravity training room.

Sources: V Jump August 2024 issue, Dragon Ball's website