Time Travel – What could possibly go wrong?
A look at some of the problems and dangers of Time Travel.
by Richard Denning
Is Time Travel Possible? Well that is a subject of an article on its own but lets accept for the moment that it is possible and that one day people could travel through time. If they could do this what are the dangers?
Straight forward and very practical dangers
To me the most obvious problem with travelling through time is the sorts of places you would end up. Can you speak the language? Do you know the laws? We find travelling to strange countries at times confusing and it is very easy to get some custom wrong. This would be even more so in the past. So simply getting by on a day to day basis would be hard enough.
The Past is also a dangerous place with a large part of human existence occupied by conflict. There are other dangers of course. What if you appeared right in the middle of the Great Fire of London:
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At that moment, fire surged up the stairs towards the two Walkers. Septimus cried out, then stumbled and fell hard onto the wooden floor, pulling Tom with him. Weakened by the fire from below, the wooden landing collapsed and they both fell through the hole.
Tom managed to catch hold of a ceiling beam as he fell, leaving him dangling down into the room below. Septimus landed with a crash on top of the baker's table in the middle of the room on the ground floor. Despite the inferno all around it the table was as yet intact. It was, however, smouldering.
"Septimus!" Tom yelled, but his friend did not respond and appeared to be out cold on the table below. The flames advanced on them both from all sides. Tom tried to Walk, but could not concentrate enough to focus on the Flow of Time. With a growing sense of despair, he felt the heat rise. His hair crackled and his shoes started to smoulder. Below him, one leg of the baker's table caught fire. The table creaked then, with a snap, the leg gave way and the whole thing collapsed, throwing Septimus' limp form onto the floor.
There was another roar and from the ends of the room two huge waves of fire swept towards them; at any moment it would surround them. This was it, Tom thought. Who would have reckoned he would die in the Great Fire of London? He braced himself, the muscles in his arm screaming at him to let go of the beam.
From Tomorrow's Guardian
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Changing History
How fragile is time? How resistant to change is it. In Chaos theory there is a concept called the butterfly effect that suggests that even tiny things – like a butterfly flapping its wings can change events on a large scale. Take this example:
Other theories suggest that you CANT change anything and that history is the way it is and as it played out the way it did any attempts to change it will fail. Even if small changes are possible the big picture would remain the same. So William might get ill but recover and still get his victory or if he died his son would take over etc.
This is when it really gets weird – Paradoxes.
When you start messing about with time strange possibilities emerge. So for example lets look at the Grandfather Paradox. You invent a time machine and go back in time. You kill your grandad. If your granddad died YOU were never born. So who was it that just went back and killed their granddad?
One way out of this dilemma is to assume that the universe, laws of physics or whatever WONT allow this to happen. Your granddad will somehow survive. Say you sent a bomb to him in the past – the bomb does not go off.
Another way out of the problem is that when you change the past a new ALTERNATE future is created. This is the Multiple World Theory of Quantum Physics. So you travel back from Timeline A, change history and your granddad died and you live your life out in timeline B – a world in which you were never born.
Where did that spoon come from
This one is even stranger. Lets say when you were a child a man visited you and gave you a spoon. You loved that spoon and took it everywhere. When you were an old man you invent a time machine and decide to go back in time and see your parents. You naturally take the spoon with you. When you see your family you meet yourself as a child and GIVE yourself the spoon.
Question? Where did the spoon first come from?
Answers on a post card please…
So you can see that time travel raises fun and very weird possibilities. This is of course why it is the subject of so many books, movies and TV series.
This is a subject that has long fascinated me and all these paradoxes and dangers (as well as the opportunities of time travel) are explored in my time travel adventure story Tomorrow's Guardian.
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"Well, what's going on? Did you do this? I trusted you. Was this all a trick to get me away from here so your friends could do this?" Tom demanded.
The Welshman shook his head. "I promise I didn't do anything of the sort," he said, but Tom thought he had a guilty look on his face.
"Well who did? Who burnt the house down? Can you tell me anything, Septimus? Can you tell me if my parents are alright?"
Letting go of Tom, Septimus reached into his trouser pocket. He brought out a small device that looked a little like an iPod. There was the sound of beeping as he pressed a few buttons. He then held the item up at arm's length and swept it around in a half circle. After pressing his buttons again he looked up at Tom, but said nothing.
"Well? What's that?" Tom asked, knowing he sounded rude, but not caring.
"We call it a Time Sniffer. Probably got a more technical name but I don't know it. It can detect deviations from the time line."
"Eh?"
"If someone does something to alter history this tells me it has happened," the man explained.
"Alter history: you mean this might have happened in the past?" asked Tom, thinking it would explain why the house was cold as if the fire had happened long ago. He swallowed, tried and failed to keep the anxiety out of his voice, "Well, has anyone?"
Septimus nodded, "I'm sorry, but yes. I am confused though. This thing is giving me mixed messages. Something more complex has gone on than a simple change. This device detects two types of change. It feels the change in a location. Someone has changed history relating to this spot. But also it detects change relating to people." He suddenly stared down at the boy. "Of course, that's it! It feels it on you. Some change to do with you. It's a strong signal and I think …" He stopped speaking and dropped the device.
"Oh my God! It can't be, can it?" he said, staring at the device as it lay on the ground and then leaning over and picking it up again. He grimaced as he took in the symbols on the screen, then looking up he stared at Tom.
"What? Septimus, what is it?" Tom thought the Welshman seemed a little afraid of him and it scared him.
"Something very bad has happened here. This thing says the fire occurred twelve or so years ago and that your parents died in it. You are a paradox, my boy: you don't exist. You were never born!"
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Tomorrow's Guardian is published by Mercia Books and is available in paperback and e-book from:
http://www.merciabooks.co.uk/books.html
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0956483569
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0956483569
