Affecting Yesterday, Changing Tomorrow

[Grom 0]

Would you change something about the past even if you knew it would drastically affect tomorrow?

 

 This is a tough question that even Star Trek hasn't fully given us an answer to.  The other day I watched the movie "Frequency" for the first time and my intrigue about time travel was once again sparked.  Although I believe it is impossible and will always be impossible it is still worthwhile to wrestle with nonetheless.  

 

 What would you do? The Sci-Fi genre has tried to answer this question, but I don't think the answer is necessarily very simple, although I have only given you "yes" or "no" options.  When you consider that one modification to the past could change the entire look of the world in the now, the question itself becomes quite burdensome.  Is there anyone out there that would give a resounding yes? If so, what would you change? Could you live with the results...even if it means the nullification of your own or someone you love's existence? (I suppose if you never existed, you would have no problem living with your decision  :;): )  

 

What are your thoughts?

 

Please stay on topic. :)

[Dumbass 0]

For something like this it would really depend on the situation - what successs would mean, the chances of it happening, and the costs if it didn't happen as predicted.  If I knew that I would work as an accountant for a living I would probably have stuck with accounting as my first major rather than switch to economics.  I would have finished college sooner, been in the work force longer, and have a more lucrative career now.  Or, I could have ended up causing the Enron / Andersen scandal.

 

Or maybe that cute girl I dated for a while wouldn't have gone back to her old boyfriend and married him if I had asked her out a few years earlier when we had a class together.  Then again she might have said no if I did and I wouldn't have dated her at all.

 

It really depends on the situation.

 

There was a "New" Twilight Zone episode recently where a woman from the future went back in time for the purpose of killing Adolph Hitler when he was a baby (a la Terminator).  It didn't work out as expected and Hitler's nanny simply kidnapped a baby off the street and told the family that was their baby.  I think changing the past, if possible, would happen like this.  Things happen slightly differently but the main results would be the same.

[STSF StarDust 0]

I will say that mine would be yes.

 

Although I will refrain from stating what I would change and those I know would be affected. Course, saying that, I really don't know. But things certainly would have been different.

[ens_tino 0]

I voted yes,but it would be good to change the past and to fix all the mistakes you have made in your life. But as they say you shouldnt tamper with time because it will find a way to get back at you.

[Vex Xiang 0]

I wouldnt. Anything that I change might make me dead. Example: if I went back and put money in America Online stock, I may have bought a Ferrari...and gotten in a wreck, and died because those cars are made of plastic.

 

And once I'm dead I can't go back and change it again! Heck, I could change something like what restaurant I ate one night 10 years ago...which in turn would change how I got home, what time, when I got up the next morning, my mood, what I did that day...and my entire life would be completely different. And eventually I might walk across a street I may never have before and WHAM be hit by a speeding car.

 

No no...its not worth it. One slip up or unknown and SPLAT.

[Vex Xiang 0]

But....

 

What if I want to change my life because I'm poor. So I go back and make myself rich. But when I get older I'm already rich so I dont think of changing my life to make me rich, so I don't. Which means I couldnt have gone back to change my life. So then it would have never happened and I'd be poor again.

 

What a waste of time that would be   ;)

[Dumbass 0]

I think Vex is destined to live a life of poverty and auto accidents.    ;)

[Images 0]

I think Vex is destined to live a life of poverty and auto accidents.    ;)

aren't we all? except for that damn gates!

[willingham 0]

I said yes, but do to circumstances beyond my control ::fire burns in eyes:: I cannot state how I would change the past and affect the future. MWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!  

 

Wait, did I just laugh? OMG! I just gave it away!  AWWWWWWWWW ****!!!!

[Nemesis 0]

Well there are many factors if the non-linear time theory is correct then of course it wouldn't because every single time is going on at the exact same tim.... moment is the spacal grid which would mean if you changed to another time it would only affect their time line and not your own but also would you ever be able to return to your own  time line correctly. If we are disscussing linear time then I think it would because time is far too sensitive image if I appeared in the past and there was a footprint that wasn't there before and it killed a bug and that bug was to bite your grandfather and it ultimately ended up in you not being born and other factor is going to the future for if you went to the future to see how things turned out wouldn't you have not existed from your present until arriving in the future so when you return to the present the future would change because you would then have had a presence that was never there before. ;) I think Star Trek makes temporal mechanics too simple but they do make for good stories :)

[willingham 0]

???

[Zertz 0]

Somethings, both good and bad, happen for a reason and cannot be changed. Someone said something about a woman unsuccessfully killing Hitler. Assume this is one of the things that is fated to happen, you try to kill him when hes out for a walk, hidden somewhere, you take aim and your gun jams, you go back in time and end up captures because you came in at the wrong time, the odds are against you, and mabye the fates too. So I would say no, it's not really worth trying. Unless you have nothing left to lose a la Armada.

[Nemesis 0]

another thing if you went back and killed hitler the odds are you would never be born because you  changed a radical part of history and then Hitler would have never been shot because you were never born which would lead to a time loop ;)

[Zertz 0]

And then theirs the multiverse theory, which I don't believe in.

[Nemesis 0]

I believe in the Multiverse theory it makes sense   ;)

[willingham 0]

So do I.

 

And now here comes...nothing!

[Seiben 0]

Yeah Nem.. and I guess I do to.. seems like it makes sense anyways.. And I too voted "YES", like everyone else here, I've made a mistake or two in my life that I'd like to take back.    :)  

Edit: Well, at least I can take back some mistakes, I've made. lol.  ;)

[Nemesis 0]

if you corrected your mistakes in the past would you have ever learned from them and then again making them further down the road with even worse endings to the situation ;)

[Seiben 0]

How profound, monkey man.. How profound.   ;)

[Images 0]

well in my opinion time travel may one day be possible. But it really only works if you stop thinking about time as a sequence of events "this happened, which meant this happened then this" instead, view each moment as simply an arrangement of particles, you mess with that just a litttle and all the time following is messed up. In sequential or i guess linear time this would result in you being eliminated. But remember, why do we think that the world has some kind of logic in itself? how can it? I think it really doesn't. You'd be breaking one of the most fundamental laws of physics by creating matter but these rules are rules we've set. But who am i to talk, i can't even remember how i got home last night!

[willingham 0]

Unfortunately, we cannot change it at all.  You know the Prime Directive. "We cannot interfere with the natural evolution of civilizations."  That includes humans.

[Zertz 0]

I believe its worded differently because from that it means we can't change our own Federation civilization, going back in time to fix that breaks the Temporal Prime Directive.

[Nemesis 0]

Well if you could travel through time without actually going through time but having a view of the past ;) without being there so you can learn but not destroy the temporal continum

[willingham 0]

Very true, Nemesis, very true.

[Sovak 0]

A most emphatic NO on this one.  I have a wonderful example that is very personal, and very true.  I've thought of this example many times in my life, and am amazed to think of the ripple effect that the change would have made in my life.

 

The year: 1976.  A young man, just out of High School, sits in a Personnel Manager's office, interviewing for a job.  The factory job he has applied for is the most lucrative of his short employment history, and will put plenty of money in his bank account to tide him over during his upcoming college sojourn.  College is expensive!  He really needs the money.  The Personnel Manager, after giving him a tour of the facility, showing him his duties, and introducing him to his prospective supervisors, tells him he can start tomorrow.  He explains that there will be a three week training period, longer than most because this particular job is rather difficult to master, and they want someone who will be steady, hardworking, and who will stay there for a while.

 

Therein lies the moral dilemma.  Does the young man take the job, pocket the rewards, and, come the fall and college time, ditch it?  Or does he do the morally right thing and tell the PM his plans and that this is only a Summer job for him?

 

I chose the latter.  The Personnel Manager respected my honesty, but told me I could not be placed in that position...  however...  there is a position in the secondary department that might work for you.  It doesn't pay as much, but you can start tomorrow.  It's in a completely different part of the factory called the "back" building.

 

The next day, while sitting there, mindlessy putting together spark plug wires, I got to know several of the other workers.  We chatted for hours as we sat there.  One cute young girl who worked accross the bench from me, I really began to like, and I finally got the nerve up to ask her out.

 

Twenty-seven years later, we have three wonderful kids, and three adorable grandchildren.  I cannot imagine how my life would have changed, had I told that one little white lie to accept the first job.

 

Change one little thing about the past?  Not on your life!  You have no idea what unpredictable changes it would make!