Planetfurry BBS

ScottyDM · Posted: Sun Jun 11, 2006 9:07 pm Post subject:

One theory is that there is only one past, but infinite futures.

You may safely travel into the future and come back home. Of course if you do it again, the second time the future you visit it will be different. And when you get there naturally, it will be different still.

If you travel into the past, you can never return to your to your exact time and reality. If you only go a few days into the past then return, the chance of having a problem is slight, but it still exists. What if in the second future you were killed the day before in an auto accident? If you go dozens or hundreds of years into the past, the possibility of returning to a timeline similar to your own would be vanishingly small.

Another theory is that there is only one timeline and it is self-healing.

Go into the past and you can monkey with events all you want. Reality will rearrange itself so the purpose of fate is fufilled. Now if you go three days into the past and kill someone, then in the present that person will be dead, but soon someone else will arise to fulfill your victim's purpose and your plans for changing the future will fail.

The most popular theory in fiction seems to be to mix and match bits of the infinite futures and self-healing theories.

The author does whatever the heck he or she wants and hopes the readers aren't too smart or discriminating. After all, it's fiction, right? Typically, large events have infinite possibilities while small events are self-healing. This is a popular technique with shows like Star Trek. Although I remember one episode of ST Voyager which seemed to be based on infinite futures.

There are many other theories too.

For example, time travel is not possible. There is evidence of this. If time travel were possible then a few people, at many points in the past, would have met time travelers. It seems unlikely that they have all kept quiet. Of course maybe the authors who have written fiction about time travel did meet these brave souls from our future and rather than write a factual account, fictionalized it and sold the book. H. G. Wells comes to mind.

<looks over at the Foxx> Well?

Scotty

ChrisFoxx · Posted: Mon Jun 12, 2006 10:48 pm Post subject:

Asalis · Posted: Tue Jun 13, 2006 3:28 pm Post subject:

This is jsut a personal observation of mine but i've noticed that with everythign tht everyone says is impossible and against teh lws of physics. Man kind has created a technology that redifines ourperceptions of physics and show that the impossible is quite possible. For example once it was said that mankind could nto fly. then we invent the airplane. it was said the soud barrior coudl not be reached so we invent the jet. it was allso thought impossible to communicate across two point instantaniously untill the telephone was invented and integrated years later in society.

now on a side note and more twords the topic of discussion, it is my belief that in holding with the infinite diversity amoung infinite possiilities we cant just create a macine that can transcend time but dimension as well. for is theres an infinite amount of alternate versions of the presant then wouldnt that be true for the past as well? In order to return home you would have to know the exact point of which you are before you leave. otherwise you could end up in a completly different dimension simmilar to the one you leaft or completly different and alien to you. The same can be true for traveling in the future. You may not always return to the exact same point you leaft.

Elfen_Furry · Moderator Joined: 18 Jun 2002 Posts: 2601 Location: NYC NY

Just remember- once you launch and crash an action, you cant reboot the universe...

AmigaDragon · Posted: Wed Jun 14, 2006 12:04 am Post subject:

Asalis · Posted: Wed Jun 14, 2006 2:06 pm Post subject:

Superlagg · Posted: Thu Jun 15, 2006 7:41 am Post subject:

Lets just hope that the universe doesnt get too badly wanged-up. I'm pretty sure breaking God's Alienware with time-smacking wouldnt make him too peachy.

TGIF007 · Posted: Fri Jun 30, 2006 5:28 am Post subject:

The most likely alternatives:

You can't change time - My least favorite alternative for very obvious reasons.
Branching time lines - Tabitha creates a new and happier timeline (and hopefully that is the one documented in SOTS) while somewhere else the original timeline continues unchanged.
Stream of consciousness (a.k.a.: "follow the arrow") - The fact that the time traveler has traveled in time gives them a certain immunity to the changes that they wrought, such that the fact that they traveled back in time and made changes remains, even though their change may have in fact removed their motivation to have done such. In many ways, this is the happiest, since there is just one time line and we are able to have Sabrina saved (and remain saved).

Oh - and one more alternative:
You leave clues to yourself to go back and fix things - knowing that her motivation to go back in time and warn Sabrina will disappear, part of the tampering is to warn herself of the need to go back and warn Sabrina. This type of story raises the question (as in Heinlein's "By his bootstraps") as to where the initial loop started, but the need to examine how multiple iterations work, once the message has been left to the untraumatized Tabitha of the need to go back, doesn't need to be examined.

Now if I only had a time machine to move forward to see the finished stories...

TGIF

AmigaDragon · Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2006 12:35 am Post subject:

If you find one of those, bring me back a copy too Wink

ChrisFoxx · Posted: Sat Aug 05, 2006 9:00 pm Post subject:

AmigaDragon · Posted: Sun Aug 06, 2006 1:26 am Post subject:

51? Did I miss 50 or did I just forget reading it? *goes back to read or re-read 50*

ChrisFoxx · Posted: Sun Aug 06, 2006 10:23 am Post subject:

D.F. Thompson · Posted: Sun Aug 06, 2006 3:48 pm Post subject:

Went back and reread the whole series. I had forgotten the crowbar. I think it's safe to say chris that you have ensured that joke will be around for along time.