Are there such things as 'potential' worldines? For example, the President is trying to figure out whether or not to decalre war on Iraq. He decides he's going to sleep on it, and assuming all future events have a seperate, and equal worldine; would it at all be possible that a time traveller could go back in time, and travel the worldine of the decision that was not made, to examine the probable outcome, and/or prevent a certain outcome?
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I was just curious
- Thread starter CIGDiv
- Start date
Cryomaniac
Chrono Cadet
As far as i'm aware no, the wordlines only diverge after the decision is made.
the wordlines only diverge after the decision is made
Which doesn't affect the original question at all. It implies two potential outcomes that co-exist. Otherwise, there's no divergence at all, i.e., no, they don't "diverge".
If divergence actually happens, then there are indeed two potential future timelines from a point just before the decision. Travelling into the future could potentially take either path. If it were not possible to take either path but only one path, then divergence does not in fact happen.
The problem with divergence --
In the next room over, while the President sleeps, a personal secretary is on the verge of a decision. An instant before the President awakens and decides, the decision is made by the secretary in the next room. Therefore, assuming divergence due to decision, two Presidents now making decisions result in four future potential timelines.
But down the hall, a Presidential aide has just recently chosen a tie from a rack of twenty ties. At least twenty potential futures came from that, so twenty personal secretaries gave rise to forty Presidents who created eighty potential timelines.
Given the number of decisions being made every instant among all sentient beings in the universe, time travel forward would be impossibly complex within less than a millisecond -- if divergence happened.
I'm pretty sure divergence is an irrelevant concept. (Hmmm... as I tried to decide what the right word was and then settled on "irrelevant", how many divergences happened?)
Every event in the universe creates parallels we see the outcome of an infinite number of cause and effect situations every time we look in the mirror. Some caused by events so distant that we dont even think of them as relevant.
As far as tracking down a specific off shoot of this universe it would be incredibly difficult with our technology because. "At a speed beyond our ability to comprehend parallels are created from every event taking place in the universes at any given moment". There would be a massive number of universes where a single decision was made or not made . Now say for example Bush did,nt invade anything. An infinite nubmer of probabilities spring from that event.
Everything from Bush taking a bullet from a pissed off person believing that an invasion should have taken place, to negotiations that that end up in a singular global government and world peace , To the U.S. getting annihlated by bio weaponry. Theres an infinite number of outcomes springing from a 50 50 decision. So even if you witnesed one possible outcome does not mean it would work in this universe. As your not simply looking at the outcome of a single decision. More a crescendo of events and offshoots of every event taken place after the inital probability was created. Every one of them different from the origin of the event which may or may not have even began in this universe.
So in effect your sitting in a potential universe allready whith an incredibly huge number of other of possible parallels just outside our comprehension. "Confusing is'nt it" /ttiforum/images/graemlins/yum.gif Still stumps me at times just thinking of the ramifications of my morning coffee. /ttiforum/images/graemlins/smile.gif
As far as tracking down a specific off shoot of this universe it would be incredibly difficult with our technology because. "At a speed beyond our ability to comprehend parallels are created from every event taking place in the universes at any given moment". There would be a massive number of universes where a single decision was made or not made . Now say for example Bush did,nt invade anything. An infinite nubmer of probabilities spring from that event.
Everything from Bush taking a bullet from a pissed off person believing that an invasion should have taken place, to negotiations that that end up in a singular global government and world peace , To the U.S. getting annihlated by bio weaponry. Theres an infinite number of outcomes springing from a 50 50 decision. So even if you witnesed one possible outcome does not mean it would work in this universe. As your not simply looking at the outcome of a single decision. More a crescendo of events and offshoots of every event taken place after the inital probability was created. Every one of them different from the origin of the event which may or may not have even began in this universe.
So in effect your sitting in a potential universe allready whith an incredibly huge number of other of possible parallels just outside our comprehension. "Confusing is'nt it" /ttiforum/images/graemlins/yum.gif Still stumps me at times just thinking of the ramifications of my morning coffee. /ttiforum/images/graemlins/smile.gif