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Is it possible to write about Time Travel without making paradoxes?

Ruby

Auror
Hi Ruby,

Unfortunately I gave up on Doctor Who after Tom Baker left. He is for me the quintessential doctor. But yes there are endless paradoxes in the show and they are never addressed properly - probably because they can't be.

And yes there are paradoxes in going to the future as well. So let's say your character does as you say and goes to the future to pick up a time machine from his grandson? Let's say he goes a hundred years into the future. Then he goes back and lives out his normal life in the present. At every stage of his life in the present he is changed because of his trip to the future. And that change must affect his behaviour and so in turn affects the world around him. So how does he live a life in the present that is exactly as it should have been had he not gone to the future?

The answers are of a course a philosophical grab bag. The first one is that he doesn't. He lives a different life, and that life is in fact the one that leads to the future where he can find a future in which his past self will arrive (have arrived? Tenses are problematic here.) But that leads us straight into destiny (not the predictions of greatness type.) It means that everything he does from the point at which he left until the point in the future at which he arrived is completely predestined. Not just him but everyone else as well. In short there is no such thing as either free will or chance.

The next choice is the parallel worlds options where, the world split at the point when he travelled to the future. Thus he went to "A" future but not necessarily "THE" future. So that future will not have to exist later. This runs into a different problem, one of energy. If every time I walk down a street and turn right instead of left a new possible universe is created, where did the energy forthat come from? It certainly didn't come from me turning in one direction. And we are talking about the creation of an entire universe here.

And the third option is the one touched on by Devor. The so-called B series of time. In the B series time does not change, but rather we move through it. It's rather like reading a book, where the present is the page your reading, but most importantly every other page in the book - those you've read (the past) and those still to read (the future) exist in exactly the same way that the present does. Now in this scenario time travel is paradox free. The reason is simply that if I take out my little red pen and start rewriting some of the pages from the past or the future, it makes no difference to the page I'm on. They are all already written.

However there are consequences too, and the biggest one is that cause and effect no longer applies to anything. For example if on one page I throw a ball and on the next it is flying, there is no actual reason for it to be flying save that someone wrote that it was. Because every page - every present - is completely indipendant of every other one. So if I change the previous page such that I no longer threw the ball, in the next page it still flies. Which simply means that the reason the ball flies has nothing to do with anything done on a previous page.

Cheers, Greg.

Hi psychotic, I gave up on Doctor Who when the Daleks learnt how to fly and climb stairs! I have a copy of the first Doctor Who book, ah, those were the days!

The book I'm writing (or not, more like procrastinating :D) mixes magic, time travel and science. The time traveller is a magician who turns up in the wrong year to bring the MC back to the future, but she is still living in her own time and hasn't time travelled yet. She hasn't met him before and thinks he's deranged. So while he's trying to fix the machine, he hooks up with his Great Grandfather, who's worked with him in the future. He also finds another prototype of the time machine there that someone else has stolen. So, how many paradoxes have I got so far? And the MC hasn't even time travelled yet! :eek: This is only part of the main plot.
Btw this is just the prequel to my other WIP where the MC is stuck in the future. It's also complicated by having to write everyone's ancestors and descendants and work out the maths of how old everyone is. Plus the historical research necessary for writing about the past. But the time travel paradoxes are the most complicated aspects of this plot.

So far I have about 100 characters for the two books, including a couple of rabbits and a poodle used in magic acts.

I don't know whether to abandon this and write some chick lit with maybe three characters and an unrequited love story.

Having said that, I do like what I've written so far, it's just needing to know what rules will work. I'm reading a couple of time travel stories now as research.
Thanks for your help! :)

((Btw Sorry I haven't thanked anyone for their interesting post today, but I seem to have run out of those at the moment! :) ))
 
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Ruby

Auror
I'm a huge fan of science fiction but I avoid writing anything with time travel for all the reasons mentioned above. That and quantum physics.

Hi Reaver, thank you for this inspiring post! Yes, well, even I haven't attempted putting quantum physics in the WIP. Although, come to think of it, I may have to as the MC is supposed to be doing scientific research into kinetics. :eek:
 

Ruby

Auror
My personal opinion on time travel is that time is stationary. We can move about in time and nothing will change, because time knew we were going to move about in time. Everything is fixed, to use a Doctor Who term. No moment is in flux.

Hi Noma, thanks. :confused: So I can just disregard all the above theories?
 

Noma Galway

Archmage
Well no...that wasn't what I meant. I just wanted to add my two cents. I thought that would be the way to write about it without paradoxes. Though my theory lends itself to predestination... :/
 

Ireth

Myth Weaver
Well no...that wasn't what I meant. I just wanted to add my two cents. I thought that would be the way to write about it without paradoxes. Though my theory lends itself to predestination... :/

But if every moment is fixed and nothing can change, then why bother with time travel at all? Sightseeing seems about the most you could do with it in that case.
 

Noma Galway

Archmage
Well, see, time would be prepared for the change. The travelers wouldn't know it. Like someone who went back to stop Hitler from coming to power would be the cause of his coming to power. I think that analogy was mentioned earlier.
 

Ruby

Auror
Hi, the main problem with my time travel plot, as I see it, is keeping track of who knows what in each scene, whether they have met before and avoiding obvious paradoxes. Apart from that, easy peasy! :eek:
 

Steerpike

Felis amatus
Moderator
Well, see, time would be prepared for the change. The travelers wouldn't know it. Like someone who went back to stop Hitler from coming to power would be the cause of his coming to power. I think that analogy was mentioned earlier.
Is there still going to be a paradox, though, that if someone goes back in time and announces they did so (or even proves it), but they weren't there the first time around, then things have changed. Otherwise, if there is any time travel at any point, then there would always be time travel (which also seems paradoxical). And you've still got issues with conservation of mass and energy, right?
 

Devor

Fiery Keeper of the Hat
Moderator
And the third option is the one touched on by Devor. The so-called B series of time. In the B series time does not change, but rather we move through it. It's rather like reading a book, where the present is the page your reading, but most importantly every other page in the book - those you've read (the past) and those still to read (the future) exist in exactly the same way that the present does. Now in this scenario time travel is paradox free. The reason is simply that if I take out my little red pen and start rewriting some of the pages from the past or the future, it makes no difference to the page I'm on. They are all already written.

However there are consequences too, and the biggest one is that cause and effect no longer applies to anything. For example if on one page I throw a ball and on the next it is flying, there is no actual reason for it to be flying save that someone wrote that it was. Because every page - every present - is completely indipendant of every other one. So if I change the previous page such that I no longer threw the ball, in the next page it still flies. Which simply means that the reason the ball flies has nothing to do with anything done on a previous page.

That doesn't sound like what I was talking about.

What I'm talking about is a way to minimize the butterfly effect. In normal time, A leads to Z. But you go back in time and change A into @. Instead of changing everything, the future creates a friction that resists to minimize the change. Somehow @ still leads to Z. Maybe B has to become $ and C becomes &, but somewhere along the way the letters manage to come back, depending on how big the change was.

It's kind of like the original time travel story where he goes back to save his girl, but finds that she still dies, just a different way. The future resists your effort to change. The Tenth Doctor tries to save everybody's life in a fixed point, but the future resists, the woman kills herself, and he manages to change exactly one line in the document. The future already exists and resists your efforts to change it.

You can take this principle as far or as little as you want. Maybe saving a person is tough, but killing might have a bigger change. Maybe I can't change the distant past, but I can go back to yesterday to fix something big, and I can get away with it because the future already knew I was doing it.

Or maybe "the universe adjusts" is just enough to explain away the butterfly effect, and I can change whatever else I can manage.
 

Ruby

Auror
Hi,

I keep thinking that everything's sorted in the plot and then another paradox turns up! Such as, how much the other time travellers know about the MC in the future when they meet her in the past before she goes to the future.

How do I know where the story even begins? :confused:

Ps Can anyone recommend a good time travel book to read as research?
 

Queshire

Auror
A person's subjective time remains linear even as they weave in and out of the objective timeline. Five minutes ago for you is five minutes ago even if five minutes ago you where in 2121. Basically they would know as much about your MC as they learned from when they met the future version of your MC. Now, how much that would actually be is something that you have to decide for yourself. It's one of the main challenges of a time travel story. You need to keep the composition of the entire piece in mind from the beginning. You can't seat of your pants it, just going from cause to effect like a series of dominoes, as with time travel, a later effect can go back to be an earlier cause.
 

Ruby

Auror
A person's subjective time remains linear even as they weave in and out of the objective timeline. Five minutes ago for you is five minutes ago even if five minutes ago you where in 2121. Basically they would know as much about your MC as they learned from when they met the future version of your MC. Now, how much that would actually be is something that you have to decide for yourself. It's one of the main challenges of a time travel story. You need to keep the composition of the entire piece in mind from the beginning. You can't seat of your pants it, just going from cause to effect like a series of dominoes, as with time travel, a later effect can go back to be an earlier cause.
Hi Queshire,

Yes, I agree with you.

There was another problem re my plot which I discussed on another thread: does a character age if they're taken to the future, live there for 60 years and then return to around the time they left? I still haven't resolved that one. Of course, if she doesn't age that would affect the second book and if she does, it would change the first. So it's either going to be a happy ending or horror!

:eek:
 

Queshire

Auror
Author's choice. I've read one book that has time travelers' only age when they're in their native time frame, in Narnia though they live to grow up in Narnia when they come back to Earth they turn back into kids, I don't think it's spelled out, but I'm pretty sure that in Doctor Who you keep aging like normal regardless of when you are so yes, they would be an old lady if they returned after spending 60 years in the future, or, hey, maybe with the way time travel works the moment you time travel you become unstuck in time, immortal and unchanging forever. That could be interesting.
 

Ruby

Auror
Author's choice. I've read one book that has time travelers' only age when they're in their native time frame, in Narnia though they live to grow up in Narnia when they come back to Earth they turn back into kids, I don't think it's spelled out, but I'm pretty sure that in Doctor Who you keep aging like normal regardless of when you are so yes, they would be an old lady if they returned after spending 60 years in the future, or, hey, maybe with the way time travel works the moment you time travel you become unstuck in time, immortal and unchanging forever. That could be interesting.

Hi Queshire,
Yes, I think the Narnia one doesn't really work. How can they grow up, live as adult monarchs in Narnia for many years, and then suddenly revert to being children going to school on a train? They wouldn't be children any more, would they? I mean, mentally.

My MC does age in the future. I think she will have to still be old when she travels back. :eek:

Doctor Who has a clever plot device in that he changes physically every time a new actor plays the role. So he can appear older or younger.

I must admit I rarely watch Doctor Who these days. Not since David Tennant left. I prefer all the very old series. I think the modern special effects spoil it. I didn't like the Christmas special either. I think it's been " dumbed down".
 

Jabrosky

Banned
When I was a kid, I loved time travel stories. Especially when the destination was the Mesozoic, and most of all Late Cretaceous North America. As I like to say, everything is better with dinosaurs.

That said, I seldom bother with time travel in my own writing. Even if you could somehow have-wave the paradoxes away, the neat thing about fantasy world-building is that there's nothing preventing you from juxtaposing human characters with dinosaurs or other prehistoric wildlife in the same time period.
 

Queshire

Auror
Hi Queshire,
Yes, I think the Narnia one doesn't really work. How can they grow up, live as adult monarchs in Narnia for many years, and then suddenly revert to being children going to school on a train? They wouldn't be children any more, would they? I mean, mentally.

My MC does age in the future. I think she will have to still be old when she travels back. :eek:

Doctor Who has a clever plot device in that he changes physically every time a new actor plays the role. So he can appear older or younger.

I must admit I rarely watch Doctor Who these days. Not since David Tennant left. I prefer all the very old series. I think the modern special effects spoil it. I didn't like the Christmas special either. I think it's been " dumbed down".

When you say it doesn't really work that means that it breaks your willing suspension of disbelief. Willing suspension of disbelief means that the reader makes it a point to ignore the impossible things in a story in order to enjoy the story. Take magic for example, it doesn't exist in real life, but we don't mind because it helps the story. However willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far and if you exceed how much a reader is willing to tolerate these impossible things then you're going to have a bad time as a writer.

One thing that writers can do to make sure that they don't break a reader's willing suspension of disbelief is to make their work follow some sort of internal rules or logic even if they aren't the real world's rules or logic. For example, Narnia has talking lions and being able to travel to a different world through a wardrobe. In that context having the kids aged down without anything weird happen to them as a result of those years doesn't seem as strange.

So it doesn't matter how you do time travel or magic or whatever so long as it makes internal sense. (sort of. There's still a limit to all things and if you go too far not even being internally consistent can save you.)
 

Ruby

Auror
When you say it doesn't really work that means that it breaks your willing suspension of disbelief. Willing suspension of disbelief means that the reader makes it a point to ignore the impossible things in a story in order to enjoy the story. Take magic for example, it doesn't exist in real life, but we don't mind because it helps the story. However willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far and if you exceed how much a reader is willing to tolerate these impossible things then you're going to have a bad time as a writer.

One thing that writers can do to make sure that they don't break a reader's willing suspension of disbelief is to make their work follow some sort of internal rules or logic even if they aren't the real world's rules or logic. For example, Narnia has talking lions and being able to travel to a different world through a wardrobe. In that context having the kids aged down without anything weird happen to them as a result of those years doesn't seem as strange.

So it doesn't matter how you do time travel or magic or whatever so long as it makes internal sense. (sort of. There's still a limit to all things and if you go too far not even being internally consistent can save you.)

Hi Queshire,

Oh, I totally agree with you. When I read the Narnia books as a child, I suspended disbelief and it seemed right that the children reverted to being children again. As a child, I was upset that they became adults in Narnia. However, when I reread the books as an adult, I found this a peculiar aspect of the plot.

On the other hand, C S Lewis is consistent in that he allows time spent in Narnia to be no time in our world. But then he's telling a story of magic, not time travel. He also invented the wood between the worlds in The Magician's Nephew, so they could travel to other worlds using magic rings, and there are many biblical references in the book, too. Again, children would not notice the allegories in the book or the parallels with Adam and Eve and the fact that evil enters Narnia with the witch as soon as the new world is created.

You are right in that you need to establish the rules for your own unique book.
 
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Ruby

Auror
Hi,

Today the MC's little dog was murdered. I wanted her to be resurrected but realised if time travel was used to save her then all of the events of that scene would be nullified. This would have meant discarding the newly evolved relationships between three of the main characters, not to mention the would-be assassin who's stalking the MC.

So the time traveller had to use magic, science and a little steam punk instead.

It seems that the best way to write a time travel story is to keep the actual time travel to a minimum.
 
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