Wank time-travel research

It is some testimony to the cultural prominence of that film series that never having seen a single installment, I nevertheless was able to figure out in about five seconds what was being referenced.
You've NEVER seen Back to the Future?!?
giphy.gif
 
Randomly? I completely agree.

Strategically? Even high level tactically? Very different matter. There is the classic "go WAY back and kill XXXXX" that creates a cascade effect that either A) Splits the T/L or B) Drastically alters the original T/L beyond recognition (the classic "butterfly effect" from A Sound of Thunder) but there is also the "go back in time five minutes" or "go back an hour/day".

A reasonable example of the second can be 9/11. Total event happened in the space of two hours and four minutes. Before the final aircraft went down it was obvious that it was some sort of an attack and all the aircraft had been identified. All that needs to be done is send someone back three hours and order a ground hold and have instructions to rescreen the passengers on those four flights. Yes, that will have enormous impact on the future, but not any future anyone knows. Even the individual(s) sent back only have a three hour change. Obviously this won't work for events that happened before the discovery of Time Travel because you will need to set up some sort of system to allow the stops (although if you are really bloody-minded all you have to do is send back a couple geese to interdict each aircraft on climb-out). There will be huge changes from the perspective of a viewer outside of the current T/L, but for those within the T/L? It's the future, haven't happened yet.
Maybe time travel is simply used to prevent the OTHER side from altering the timeline proving that time travel was pivotal to the events of our TL...or we just partake of the multiverse.
 
A reasonable example of the second can be 9/11. Total event happened in the space of two hours and four minutes. Before the final aircraft went down it was obvious that it was some sort of an attack and all the aircraft had been identified. All that needs to be done is send someone back three hours and order a ground hold and have instructions to rescreen the passengers on those four flights. Yes, that will have enormous impact on the future, but not any future anyone knows. Even the individual(s) sent back only have a three hour change. Obviously this won't work for events that happened before the discovery of Time Travel because you will need to set up some sort of system to allow the stops (although if you are really bloody-minded all you have to do is send back a couple geese to interdict each aircraft on climb-out). There will be huge changes from the perspective of a viewer outside of the current T/L, but for those within the T/L? It's the future, haven't happened yet.

But how do we get around the problem that it is only possible to go back and prevent the 9/11 terrorists from carrying out their attacks if you have knowledge of the attacks in the first place? Here's one easy way that the whole thing can go wrong:
  • Let's say that as of 11:00 a.m., the nature of the attacks becomes clear and Supervisor Jane Doe of our fictional Covert Temporal Intervention Department orders Agent Joe Schmoe to travel back in time to 6:00 a.m. to put ground holds on the four planes.
  • Agent Schmoe does so and the 19 terrorists are caught and arrested.
  • However, the original Agent Schmoe (let's call him Schmoe-A) is still on his way to work that day with no knowledge of the attacks, and Doe is also none the wiser. So Doe can't now order Schmoe-A back to the past at 11:00 a.m., because she does not have the knowledge that prompted her to do that in the first place.
  • Maybe Schmoe-B (the one who time-traveled) knows this and realizes that he has to contact Schmoe-A and Doe to make sure that the order is still given, which is plausible enough. (Obviously a phone call from our future selves warning us about something would seem like a preposterous prank to most of us, but we'll assume that Schmoe and Doe are used to this kind of weirdness.)
  • But there are already some butterflies here, because now rather than traveling back to prevent attacks that he himself witnessed, Schmoe is traveling back based on a warning from his future self. Is he capable of literally behaving in exactly the same way regardless? I'm not sure.
  • Or let's put that aside and imagine a more straightforward problem - when Schmoe-B places the call to Schmoe-A and Doe, they are crossing the street, get distracted by their cell phones ringing, and are run over by a bus, meaning Schmoe-A is dead and never makes the time jump in the first place.
We're now in classic paradox territory and, if Doc Brown was right, risking the destruction of the entire spacetime continuum. Schmoe-A dies before he can become Schmoe-B and place the call, which means that the call is never placed, which that means Schmoe-A survives and becomes Schmoe-B, which means that he does place the call, which means that Schmoe-A dies before he can become Schmoe-B and place the call, which means that the call is never placed, which means that Schmoe-A survives, and so on ad infinitum.
 
You've NEVER seen Back to the Future?!?
giphy.gif

Nope. But I know that's Christopher Lloyd in the GIF, and that he plays a mad scientist.

And apart from the fact that the guy's name is Marty McFly, and De Loreans have some role in the story, and Zemeckis was the director, I think everything I know about the film is from watching the Sneak Previews review when it first came out. But it's one of those films that you kind of just think you "know", on a level that goes beyond whether or not you've actually seen it. Sort of like Gone With The Wind.
 
What's the point of using a weapon that destroys everything, including yourself?
I'm sure many nuclear warfare theorists would have an answer for that question.
if you want a pod to slow down technological development governments+companies deciding to pour tons of money into ratholes like ftl/time travel would work
Why? First you need the knowledge to do the experiments, which means physics is getting a lot more investment. Then you need equipment to do the experiments--which would logically include particle accelerators, high-energy lasers, and the entire industry supporting them. Even if you don't have a single person sent back in time or to Alpha Centauri or wherever, you come out of this with a huge amount of valuable equipment, data, etc. which is relevant to a wide variety of fields, even if the government is suppressing research telling why time travel/FTL is impossible and their pet theories are wrong.
 
I'm sure many nuclear warfare theorists would have an answer for that question.

Yeah, I thoought of that parallel myself.

Thing is though, with MAD, you don't neccessarily destroy yourself, you destroy the other guy, on the gamble that he'll be too much of a gutless liberal to destroy you even after he knows your bombs are coming his way. But if you bet incorrectly, yeah, than you get destroyed as well.

And even then, the whole idea of MAD is not to actually destroy anyone, but to make them think that you'd be willing to do so.

But with time travel, one side acting on its own, with no retaliation from the other, could very well destroy everything. So basically, the only way you can convince your opponent that you'd be willing to use it is if you make him think that you are DIRECTLY SUICIDAL, ie. you'd be willing to press one "button" that guarantees everything disappears.

IOW, you're the leader of probably a major country, with all the perks and rewards that come with that job, but you want your enemy to think that you act according to the same calculations as a suicide bomber.
 

CalBear

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But how do we get around the problem that it is only possible to go back and prevent the 9/11 terrorists from carrying out their attacks if you have knowledge of the attacks in the first place? Here's one easy way that the whole thing can go wrong:
  • Let's say that as of 11:00 a.m., the nature of the attacks becomes clear and Supervisor Jane Doe of our fictional Covert Temporal Intervention Department orders Agent Joe Schmoe to travel back in time to 6:00 a.m. to put ground holds on the four planes.
  • Agent Schmoe does so and the 19 terrorists are caught and arrested.
  • However, the original Agent Schmoe (let's call him Schmoe-A) is still on his way to work that day with no knowledge of the attacks, and Doe is also none the wiser. So Doe can't now order Schmoe-A back to the past at 11:00 a.m., because she does not have the knowledge that prompted her to do that in the first place.
  • Maybe Schmoe-B (the one who time-traveled) knows this and realizes that he has to contact Schmoe-A and Doe to make sure that the order is still given, which is plausible enough. (Obviously a phone call from our future selves warning us about something would seem like a preposterous prank to most of us, but we'll assume that Schmoe and Doe are used to this kind of weirdness.)
  • But there are already some butterflies here, because now rather than traveling back to prevent attacks that he himself witnessed, Schmoe is traveling back based on a warning from his future self. Is he capable of literally behaving in exactly the same way regardless? I'm not sure.
  • Or let's put that aside and imagine a more straightforward problem - when Schmoe-B places the call to Schmoe-A and Doe, they are crossing the street, get distracted by their cell phones ringing, and are run over by a bus, meaning Schmoe-A is dead and never makes the time jump in the first place.
We're now in classic paradox territory and, if Doc Brown was right, risking the destruction of the entire spacetime continuum. Schmoe-A dies before he can become Schmoe-B and place the call, which means that the call is never placed, which that means Schmoe-A survives and becomes Schmoe-B, which means that he does place the call, which means that Schmoe-A dies before he can become Schmoe-B and place the call, which means that the call is never placed, which means that Schmoe-A survives, and so on ad infinitum.

I'm far from in agreement, especially in the case of any observer, that the "Groundhog Day loop would be eternal, but I lack the math to really debate it.

A second, perhaps even more strategically useful use for at least the observation of the "past" is that, well, it isn't really the past, in any practical manner of the term. If you look back in time a nano-second, is it really distinguishable from the present? It would allow the most effective spying resource ever created (it would also make privacy an obsolete concept). The first side to get it winds up with an advantage that makes the breaking of Enigma and JN-25 combined seem insignificant.
 
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