Paradox lost...

J

JamesAnthony

Temporal Navigator
Just an interesting thought...

For those that believe in ultimate free will, do you think that you travelled back in time purely as an observer, to view a past choice you made, would your past self make the same choice?

If there is no fate, then your past self might or might not make the same choice you remember making. What are your opinions?

This is the principle I believe eradicates the grandfather paradox. I believe that our actions are set, and therefore our proposed journeys into the past are also set. Nothing we do in the past can affect the future as we know it. Our 'free will' in the past will be hampered in some unforeseen way.

James
 
How often have you said "had I only known"? If I went back to see myself it would only be with the intent to explain to myself the unforseen repurcussion of a decision that I could not foresee. Having information of this type (foresight) would change the decisions we make. People who say that we have no freewill because we do what we think we need to do according to our priorities, and that our priorities at any given moment is dictated by our environment say little about a person's ability to focus or a person's resolve. I know for myself that my focus is stronger at times, ignoring distractions, than at other times, and sometimes it has merely to do with how much coffee I've drank. Going back in time I could have distracted myself from drinking too much coffee and had a profound effect on the rest of my day!
 
Beer affects free will too.... /ttiforum/images/graemlins/frown.gif


Anyway...
If I went back to see myself it would only be with the intent to explain to myself the unforseen repurcussion of a decision that I could not foresee
Click to expand...

Therein lies the problem of the grandfather paradox. Unless of course you remind your earlier self to go back in time and tell their earlier self too...and so on!

James
 
Theoritically, if I could go back into time and tell myself about some event that would turn out negatively (there have been more than one of these events, believe you me,) I wouldn't change a thing. It's through these experiences, bad or good, that shape who we are and allow us to learn from our mistakes. Let's say, theoritically, that I say something behind a friend's back. Then that friend finds out and a huge arguement ensues. The next week, I have the opportunity to go back in time and tell myself not to gossip, and I take it. Then I haven't learned first hand not to talk behind a friend's back because it hurts their feelings. Does that make sense?

That brings up another point; if I go back in time to avoid a situation, will a similair situation happen anyway? Basically, are all events in life set in stone - maybe they can be avoided or delayed, but not stopped. Just like death, in the end, no one can completely avoid death, only maybe delay it.

- jewstinian
 
Theoritically, if I could go back into time and tell myself about some event that would turn out negatively (there have been more than one of these events, believe you me,) I wouldn't change a thing. It's through these experiences, bad or good, that shape who we are and allow us to learn from our mistakes. Let's say, theoritically, that I say something behind a friend's back. Then that friend finds out and a huge arguement ensues. The next week, I have the opportunity to go back in time and tell myself not to gossip, and I take it. Then I haven't learned first hand not to talk behind a friend's back because it hurts their feelings. Does that make sense?
Click to expand...

That's my belief too. I think that we should be free to make our own mistakes, without the presense of self appointed guardians of our future. Time travel, when not used as an observational tool, can really only be used as an ethically dubious method of shaping the future. By stopping World War 2, would someone be preventing the deaths of millions? or the births of billions?
 
I believe I am capable of understanding how someone would be affected by my actions if it were explained to me first. I don't believe I need their emotional reaction to learn, or the corresponding actions of their spite and revenge. A lot of problems happen when we are not considerate enough, that is, we do not consider how a certain someone will be affected. If our attention could have been pointed at how our action would affect someone that we didn't consider, or that they would react much differently that we had supposed, we would, more often than not, change our decisions (at least I believe I would).
 
We all sometimes want to go back in time change certain things that have happened in the past but it simply is not a good idea. Apart from what someone said about learning experiences which I guess you make a fairly good point. But the real reason is that time is not set in stone. This is because the universe is constantly duplicating itself every time an atom has a choice of going one way or the other. So by now there would be millions most likely alot more but anyway alot of different universes. This proves that things are not set in stone. And another reason why we should not travel back in time is yet another paradox to be solved. Say ,for example, that you go back in time and stop JFK from being assasinated. Now I like the sixties prez as much as the next guy but what if something about his assasination caused your parents to meet. Now without the assasination your not alive. Or at the very least living an extremely different life because your parents may have somehow still met and your life went a different direction. This is a simple reason why we should not travel back in time. Now forward is a different story. I believe that even if you drop a nuculear bomb in the future there will still be a way to change it by doing something else when you return to the present.
 
Back
Top