Theo Rhetoric
Temporal Novice
I have watched the recent debate on gun control. I swear I have a point, please give me a moment.
The reason the gun control debate is at, and shall remain at, an impasse, is that the most vocal members of the argument, on either side, are people none of us would have much of a problem with owning a firearm. Ted Nugent regularly preaches fire and brimstone about safe, responsible gun ownership. Similarly, if the survivors or family members of victims of one of these recent horrors were to, theoretically, decide to purchase a firearm, couldn't we safely expect that their experiences would make them above-average gun owners, from a responsibility standpoint?
I did say "safely expect", there, not "be guaranteed".
And that's the issue. Both sides have their fringe elements, but you will never hear from the people who really do want to take away all our civil liberties and you won't hear from the gun runners and violent or mentally unstable potential offenders in this argument. An argument being held by two parties that are both in the normal mainstream cannot resolve the issues on the fringes. In fact, they cannot resolve anything at all.
The same thing happens in the discussion of time travel and its possibility. You have your faithful, your skeptics, your merely curious - and every one of us share in common that we are already "time travelers", just of the forward-at-a-normal-rate variety. We seek to prove or demand proof, and the argument keeps circling back on itself.
Thanks for listening, now for the theory part of this. I suggest that, if time travel is possible, and no one has been able to provide incontrovertible evidence, that the problem is that the evidence is being systematically misinterpreted, through the lens of a bunch of well-meaning forward-normal-rate thinkers.
What if, instead of looking for the Great and Powerful Oz, we draw back the curtain? What I suggest is a discussion where we assume that time travel is not only possible, but has always been taking place. No machinery involved, for now, but going along the lines of a transfer of consciousness into another living creature, either in the past or an advanced future state.
The question isn't how we prove it to be true. The key point is, if that is true, and we are, somehow, not in control of the journey, or unable to fully retain our personalities as a result of the journey, existing as snippets, if you will, inside of other beings, then let's take a look at the world we now live in, and offer new interpretations of the "mundane" pieces of it from this point of view.
I'll toss out the first few things to ponder...
"Doctor, I hear voices telling me to do bad things."
" you know that train that crashed last week? I was supposed to be on it, but I heard a voice saying I shouldn't get on."
Different intentions between the two "voices"? Certainly. But different source?
And accelerated (non-normal-rate) forward time travel? You may choose to believe or not believe in reincarnation but, if reincarnation is real, isn't that, by definition, accelerated time travel into the future?
I know this will be difficult for some very important and brilliant people on this forum to accept - that time travel is happening, just not hop-in-the-machine style, or by any consciously controlled means.
But the way to disprove this hypothesis is to find something odd or fringe, that occurs in our lives, and that couldn't be explained in a world where this sort of time travel was taking place. The science of Psychology, and a good deal of our individual faith in a higher power, would be severely challenged by this theory. I thank you, quite soberly, for the suspension of personal beliefs that examining this theory will demand.
And I look forward to your inputs and exploration of the concept.
The reason the gun control debate is at, and shall remain at, an impasse, is that the most vocal members of the argument, on either side, are people none of us would have much of a problem with owning a firearm. Ted Nugent regularly preaches fire and brimstone about safe, responsible gun ownership. Similarly, if the survivors or family members of victims of one of these recent horrors were to, theoretically, decide to purchase a firearm, couldn't we safely expect that their experiences would make them above-average gun owners, from a responsibility standpoint?
I did say "safely expect", there, not "be guaranteed".
And that's the issue. Both sides have their fringe elements, but you will never hear from the people who really do want to take away all our civil liberties and you won't hear from the gun runners and violent or mentally unstable potential offenders in this argument. An argument being held by two parties that are both in the normal mainstream cannot resolve the issues on the fringes. In fact, they cannot resolve anything at all.
The same thing happens in the discussion of time travel and its possibility. You have your faithful, your skeptics, your merely curious - and every one of us share in common that we are already "time travelers", just of the forward-at-a-normal-rate variety. We seek to prove or demand proof, and the argument keeps circling back on itself.
Thanks for listening, now for the theory part of this. I suggest that, if time travel is possible, and no one has been able to provide incontrovertible evidence, that the problem is that the evidence is being systematically misinterpreted, through the lens of a bunch of well-meaning forward-normal-rate thinkers.
What if, instead of looking for the Great and Powerful Oz, we draw back the curtain? What I suggest is a discussion where we assume that time travel is not only possible, but has always been taking place. No machinery involved, for now, but going along the lines of a transfer of consciousness into another living creature, either in the past or an advanced future state.
The question isn't how we prove it to be true. The key point is, if that is true, and we are, somehow, not in control of the journey, or unable to fully retain our personalities as a result of the journey, existing as snippets, if you will, inside of other beings, then let's take a look at the world we now live in, and offer new interpretations of the "mundane" pieces of it from this point of view.
I'll toss out the first few things to ponder...
"Doctor, I hear voices telling me to do bad things."
" you know that train that crashed last week? I was supposed to be on it, but I heard a voice saying I shouldn't get on."
Different intentions between the two "voices"? Certainly. But different source?
And accelerated (non-normal-rate) forward time travel? You may choose to believe or not believe in reincarnation but, if reincarnation is real, isn't that, by definition, accelerated time travel into the future?
I know this will be difficult for some very important and brilliant people on this forum to accept - that time travel is happening, just not hop-in-the-machine style, or by any consciously controlled means.
But the way to disprove this hypothesis is to find something odd or fringe, that occurs in our lives, and that couldn't be explained in a world where this sort of time travel was taking place. The science of Psychology, and a good deal of our individual faith in a higher power, would be severely challenged by this theory. I thank you, quite soberly, for the suspension of personal beliefs that examining this theory will demand.
And I look forward to your inputs and exploration of the concept.