The Cautious Time Traveller

[rvm45]

Friends..

Awhile back, they made a movie called "The Butterfly Effect" and people have been misunderstanding this principle ever since.

As I understand it, the movie proposes that OCCASIONALLY stepping on a Butterfly or moving a single Grain of Sand, can have massive effects on the unfolding of history.

This is BULLSHIT!

If you could go back in time, you can't find a Butterfly or a Grain of Sand so obscure, that moving it one-tenth of an inch won't drastically alter the timeline.

This is related to Chaos Theory. Chaos Theory was largely discovered by a fellow trying to model weather systems. He set up a virtual North America and divided it into ONE MILLION data points.

He assigned each data point a temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, wind speed and wind direction—he used a super-computer and he set the system to evolve according to a set of well understood principles of weather.

He found that if you changed a single data point—raise the temperature at just one point by .1 Degrees or raise or lower humidity by .1%; in ten days, you will have completely different weather. In one system, you have sunny picnic weather and in another, you will have a thunderstorm.

There are any number of systems where the smallest change INEVITABLY causes big changes over time.

Now, just to help you visualize this…

In our timeline, Rastus and Eugenea have sex. Millions of sperm enter the genetic sweepstakes and end the end there can be only one.

If we can go back in time and get either Eugenea or Rastus to move just one one-hundredth of an inch—another sperm is almost certain to win the race.

If Rastus has to drive through a thunderstorm to get home, it is very far fetched to imagine that he will get back on PRECISELY the same world track that led to him siring Little Rastus Junior. Maybe he and the misses won't even have sex that night. If they do, maybe they won't conceive. If they conceive, odds are 50-50 that they will have a little Rastina instead of a Rastus Junior. Even if they have a boy—it will be an Alphonso and not a Rastus Junior.

Little Rastina or Alphonso will be random number generators that continually move the time line ever further away from the original timeline.

Now consider, every single child conceived from the point the weather changes appreciably, will be a different child than you had in the original timeline.

Consider, it is easy to transpose the exact date of a thunderstorm. It is MUCH HARDER to change the total yearly rainfall and EVEN HARDER to change the long-term climate.

So, if you go back 111-years and do something as innocuous as dropping a singe concrete block into the Marianas Trench or stopping in the middle of the Sahara Desert just long enough to take a good whiz, you may return to find that none of the people that you remember were ever born in the new timeline—but the broad history may be very similar—A Communist Takeover in Russia, WWI, WWII, ETCETERA—just no Lenin or Stalin, Hitler, Churchill or FDR—Just place-holders much like them.

So, the dude who said, "You cannot step on the same river twice," could have been talking about time travel.

IF you go to the past, don't plan on ever coming back to your world.

IF you go to the future, well and good. However, once you return to the present, every move that you make will introduce chaos into the original timeline and change it from what you remember. You MIGHT be able to go ahead 24-hours and get the Powerball Number without changing the future enough to invalidate your foreknowledge—but then again, maybe not.

Stock Market tips from 6-months in the future are almost certainly invalid.

Now, suppose that I get a Stepvan and turn it into a time machine. I load it up with generic white sugar, pepper and assorted spices and cheap but brightly colored "T" Shirts and Sweatshirts from the "Dollar General Store" and I go back to Ancient Greece or Rome and make lots of Gold and Silver.

EE…

We are remarkably free in the New Knighted States about "Identity Papers." I suspect that this is a bit of an anomaly in all of the possible timelines. You arrive back in 2020 to find that you've become a non-person. You have no identity papers and no way to get any. How are you going to sell your authentic Gold Drachmas and get papers? Also, due to multiple changes, your paper money is funny money in 2020 II. Who in Hell is George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Alexander Hamilton, et al…?

Now, I'm at the age that I require beaucoup medicines to survive, If I get separated from access to my meds, I'm screwed. I have a lifespan measured in months—progressively more miserable months. I cannot afford to get stuck in 1910, separated from my time machine and my meds.

The concept tends to make me paranoid as all Hell.

I presume that some day in the future, they will be able to reverse many of the effects of aging. I also suspect that this will start as experimental, quickly progress to something for the very rich and shortly afterward become tightly controlled by Government.

If I were a time traveller, my goal would be to go far enough into the past to raise a roll and then settle in for the long haul.

A rich man in 1800 could have contracted to have a large mansion built, complete with secret rooms big enough for a Stepvan time machine—or two. You could import your laborers from out of State and pay them large bribes to stay silent. Yeah, they have no idea what the wiring that you insist on installing to specs is FOR, but a good craftsman can do it.

100 years later, who would believe some odd rumors about secret rooms in "T-Travler's Mansion"? Sounds like Bullshit urban legends to me…

Now this is important: You need some sort of garage where someone can leave stuff for you, but not be able to enter the house proper.

Hire a Live-In groundskeeper caretaker. Subscribe to several period periodicals and have your caretaker leave them in your shed.

You pop forward six-months at a time, just to see how your investments are doing and to keep an eye on "SOCIETY."

Every so often you take a day off to hire a new groundskeeper or an investment manager.

Every so often, a "SON" from far away inherits the estate.

When Birth Certificates become a dire necessity, bribe an obstetrician to register a few births—that you can use for an identity in 20-years…

When REAL ID becomes a thing, get some.

Ride the timeline forward 6-months at a time—usually spending no more than a few hours scanning periodicals and then fast-forward another 6-months until you finally get to a future that has the secret to perpetual youth.

Once you're rejuvenated, you have far more freedom to travel.

EE…How big can you make a Time Machine? Well, since their isn't such a thing, that is like asking "How high is up!?!"

Watching "Doctor Who" with my sister—the Doctor's TARDIS is bigger than some medium-sized cities inside. {I read about a long ago episode, where there is actually a small town inside the TARDIS—though the writers seem to have forgotten that bit of lore…}

EE…

Why can't our cautious time traveller eventually turn his whole Victorian Mansion into a time machine—that largely sits outside of normal space and is invisible?

Why?

So he can have an ungodly BIG LIBRARY. Once he alters the timeline, all those brilliant authors and the great literature that they WOULD HAVE WRITTEN will be gone forever.

Even Encyclopedias and history books from erased timelines might have some value.

EE…

But is our Cautious Time Traveller traveling in 4-dimensional time, or is he drifting into uncounted alternate timelines lying side by side with his original timeline in 5-dimensions?

Maybe this is a deep question that even our protagonist ponders.


…..RVM45

[willc453]

Re-read what you wrote. Let's go with someone making a time machine. On Youtube, there's a movie about a kid who finds notes and films on some classified project his grandfather was working on. Yeah, dealing with and creating a time machine. Haven't watched all of it, so don't remember/know the entire story line other than he goes back in time. I think if you go back in time and change things, like the Titanic NOT sinking, you will change history. Remember all the rich and famous that died when it sank, along with all the immigrants coming to America? And let's not forget that S.O.S. became the standard for declaring an emergency, world wide.

And remember what happened to Marty when he bought that Sports Almanac and it got into Biff's hands? Like Doc Brown explained, time was one line, but with what Biff had done, time had split off into an entirely different tangent and why Marty's dad was killed and his mom had married Biff. To change things back the way they were, you have to go back in time, while also avoiding meeting your earlier self.

There's a story where a guy found himself traveling back in time, but to places he lived at and always in the body he had at that time. Like being found by his Mom with a butchers knife in the kitchen that he was going to use to do something with. She thought he was bug shit crazy and going to kill someone, so hello mental ward from time to time.

And how about Groundhog Day with Bill Murray who keeps repeating the same day over and over. Ramos was asked how long Bill was in this time loop and he figured 10 years. Someone else figured something like 100?

And remember the original 1960's Time Machine movie? The inventor is trying to explain how his miniature time machine was still in his parlor, but in a different time and space. The doctor says time is time and space is space, at which point the inventor says time changes space. That the room they were in right now could be under the ocean or in some cavern a thousand years from now. This is why Ben (Tale of Two Brothers) is damn careful when traveling thru time as he KNOWS he and Doc have already altered time/history when they took on those terrorists and the nukes they had planted on several airliners. This was also one of the reasons he became a doctor not only of what's called "modern medicine", but what people used in previous times. Like when he removed the boys appendix in Colorado in the 1800's....it had already been done, but not widely known. He could get away with using thread inside the boy which was "chock full of vitamins and other things" because it would never been seen or discovered, along with being absorbed by the body. Outside stiches? Silk thread. As it is, his kite flying demo almost bit him on the ass.

There's another Youtube movie where a guy discovers a trap door in a motel room he's rented for the night. Out of curiosity, he goes down into it, but when he comes out, find he's one day in the past. And it's always just that one day he keeps returning to. And Ben's mentioned two places on other worlds which are nothing more than giant shopping malls. Now if you can manipulate the time/space, it would be no problem to have a large set for example actually being much larger inside than it is outside. And remember the Winchester House with its many doors? Instead of opening a door and seeing a wall, why not a view of some tropical isle or jungle?

There's a book I got which once again, can't remember the title of. The guy's working as a DJ at some small radio station in Florida, with him and his wife ready to go their separate ways when he thinks he's having a heart attack and his last thought/sight of was seeing the time of his "death". Instead, he finds himself back in college in the prime of his youth. Thing is, when he gets to the date & time of his "heart attack", he finds himself somewhere else he'd spent his time as a youth, but further along in time. Since he's a sport buff, he KNOWS who's going to win the world series, horse races, etc. Life is good until he hits that date & time again. Then he watches a movie which he doesn't remember seeing when it came out when he was younger. So bit, it outdid the original Star Wars movie.

It would be an interesting Affected story if someone had the ability to travel back in time, even for a little bit, along with being able to be some where he'd been before. Like robbing a bank in NYC and running like hell with a bag full of money. Cops are chasing him, so he runs down an alley, then time jumps by a few hours so he's in California for example as he's been there before.

Anyway, some of my thoughts.

[papaof2]

"The Butterfly Effect" - There was a time travel story (not sure which of the many TV sci-fi series) where a company offered the opportunity to go back in time and kill a dinosaur. You had to stay one the suspended runways above the surface so you made no changes, not even footprints, and you were taken to a place where a dinosaur would have died from some other cause within minutes of the shooting.
One person gets off the walkway for some reason and when the hunting party returns to their time - let's call it "home year" - they find they are living under a different and very much Nazi-regimented government. The leader of the hunting party tells the guy who got off the walkway to check his boots. There's a butterfly on the bottom of one of them.

[willc453]

The time traveler panicked and lost his footing when the T-Rex came running at the time travel party. The T-Rex was suppose to fall into a swampy pit and never getting out, so killing it wouldn't affect the future. Others might like The Technicolor Time Machine by Harry Harrison which shows what can happen when messing around with history/evolution and how a uncle got filthy rich. Remember The Time Machine movie? A book came out titled The Time Machine II by George Pal and Joe Morhaim. In the movie, George (the time traveler) goes back to the future to be with Weena. The book takes up what happens afterwards, with him and Weena (who is pregnant) attempting to return back to his time. I checked and book's available on Amazon.

[admin]

Nov 4, 2020 2:14:40 GMT -6 papaof2 said:

"The Butterfly Effect" - There was a time travel story (not sure which of the many TV sci-fi series) where a company offered the opportunity to go back in time and kill a dinosaur. You had to stay one the suspended runways above the surface so you made no changes, not even footprints, and you were taken to a place where a dinosaur would have died from some other cause within minutes of the shooting.
One person gets off the walkway for some reason and when the hunting party returns to their time - let's call it "home year" - they find they are living under a different and very much Nazi-regimented government. The leader of the hunting party tells the guy who got off the walkway to check his boots. There's a butterfly on the bottom of one of them.

The Sound of Thunder by Ray Bradbury - also made into a movie (and changed drastically)

[papaof2]

Unfortunately. the movies can't leave some of Bradbury's best work alone - they must "improve" it.

I cut my Sc-Fi teeth on "The Martian Chronicles" and I've read almost everything he wrote - can't say everything as my memory's not perfect ;-)