Are parallel universes and alternate time lines two separate and distinct things, or are they one and the same? What do you think?
Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate timelin
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Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
I think that they are two separate things. A parallel universe is, you know, another universe where stuff is different and is supposed to be different. An alternative timeline is where this universe has diverged or gone "wrong". Well, that's what I think, I'm sure my fellow geeks will be along in a moment to contradict me.
I think that they are two separate things. A parallel universe is, you know, another universe where stuff is different and is supposed to be different. An alternative timeline is where this universe has diverged or gone "wrong". Well, that's what I think, I'm sure my fellow geeks will be along in a moment to contradict me.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
yeah, an alternate timeline is where something changed in the past and it affects the present or future
a parallel universe is where something different happened in the past, but it doesn't affect the present or future in 'our' universe because it's parallel
yeah, an alternate timeline is where something changed in the past and it affects the present or future
a parallel universe is where something different happened in the past, but it doesn't affect the present or future in 'our' universe because it's parallel
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
I think that all alternate timelines are parallel universes, but not all parallel universes are alternate timelines.
I think that all alternate timelines are parallel universes, but not all parallel universes are alternate timelines.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
"Parallel universe" is a misnomer used when people mean "alternate timeline". An alternate timeline is a set of events that is divergent from the "original" and that follows its own course. Presumably it has the same laws of physics as it's basically a different edition of the same universe.
"Parallel universe" is a misnomer used when people mean "alternate timeline". An alternate timeline is a set of events that is divergent from the "original" and that follows its own course. Presumably it has the same laws of physics as it's basically a different edition of the same universe.
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Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
Alternate Reality/Universe = Mirror Universe
Alternate Timeline = Star Trek XI
Alternate Reality/Universe = Mirror Universe
Alternate Timeline = Star Trek XI
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
Ditto.
Ditto.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
But if two alternate time-lines exist at the same time, doesn't that make them alternate universes of one another? Each time-line duplicates persons, places and things, each time the time-line forks. Unless you are arguing that once a time-line is changed, then that means all other forks cease to exist?
BTW, I am not arguing either way for or against. Just seems both concepts are so similar they overlap and seeing if there is a good explanation as to why they are different and distinct.
But if two alternate time-lines exist at the same time, doesn't that make them alternate universes of one another? Each time-line duplicates persons, places and things, each time the time-line forks. Unless you are arguing that once a time-line is changed, then that means all other forks cease to exist?
BTW, I am not arguing either way for or against. Just seems both concepts are so similar they overlap and seeing if there is a good explanation as to why they are different and distinct.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
I view them as different. An alternate timeline is simply a different progression of historical events. A universe, OTOH, is a distinct physical location.
I mean, can you explain how a simple alternate timeline can cause a person to exhibit a different RNA signature, as "Parallels" showed?
ST XI, for example, I view as an alternate universe, not simply a different timeline. For at least two reasons: 1) The new 'Abramsverse' does not overwrite the old 'prime universe', and 2) Spock Prime and Nero reached the Abramsverse via the black hole, a wormhole into another universe.
I view them as different. An alternate timeline is simply a different progression of historical events. A universe, OTOH, is a distinct physical location.
I mean, can you explain how a simple alternate timeline can cause a person to exhibit a different RNA signature, as "Parallels" showed?
ST XI, for example, I view as an alternate universe, not simply a different timeline. For at least two reasons: 1) The new 'Abramsverse' does not overwrite the old 'prime universe', and 2) Spock Prime and Nero reached the Abramsverse via the black hole, a wormhole into another universe.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
Actually it was quantum flux located in his RNA. TNG: Parallels was the one treatment of alternate timelines/parallel universes that is the most well grounded in real-world theoretical science. See Many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.
Actually it was quantum flux located in his RNA. TNG: Parallels was the one treatment of alternate timelines/parallel universes that is the most well grounded in real-world theoretical science. See Many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
Y= Divergent timelines
ll= Parallel Universes
The point of divergence is when Spock and Nero arrive in 2233, prior to that its the same timeline/univerese as TOS.
With alternate timelines there is a point where the timelines diverged. In a parallel universe both have always existed and there is no point of divergence.
Y= Divergent timelines
ll= Parallel Universes
Divergent/alternate doesn't mean overwritten. ( unless the writers want it to)Mr. Laser Beam said:
The point of divergence is when Spock and Nero arrive in 2233, prior to that its the same timeline/univerese as TOS.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
They're interchangable terms for the same thing.
Whether all the alternate timelines co-exist equally in an infinite multiverse, or if a single timeline is repeatedly overwritten, is open to debate. Trek writers have tried to have it both ways over the years, but they're incompatible. If Nero and Spock went back in time and created a new parallel branch of the timeline without erasing TOS/TNG/etc, then every other alternate future ever glimpsed in Star Trek ("All Good Things", "Endgame", "Shockwave", "Azati Prime" etc.) should be persistant, too. Rather than changing or erasing anything, we just move tracks and change our multiverse P.O.V. It's messy, but it just about fits.
The Stargate Atlantis (wrong franchise, I know) episode "Before I Sleep" brilliantly summed it all up in about 20 seconds.
They're interchangable terms for the same thing.
Whether all the alternate timelines co-exist equally in an infinite multiverse, or if a single timeline is repeatedly overwritten, is open to debate. Trek writers have tried to have it both ways over the years, but they're incompatible. If Nero and Spock went back in time and created a new parallel branch of the timeline without erasing TOS/TNG/etc, then every other alternate future ever glimpsed in Star Trek ("All Good Things", "Endgame", "Shockwave", "Azati Prime" etc.) should be persistant, too. Rather than changing or erasing anything, we just move tracks and change our multiverse P.O.V. It's messy, but it just about fits.
The Stargate Atlantis (wrong franchise, I know) episode "Before I Sleep" brilliantly summed it all up in about 20 seconds.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
That's how I understand them, too. Though one could make a case for parallel universes only seeming to be parallel because they diverged so far back in pre-history.
Oh, that's right, this is fiction. The author would tell us.
That's how I understand them, too. Though one could make a case for parallel universes only seeming to be parallel because they diverged so far back in pre-history.
Oh, that's right, this is fiction. The author would tell us.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
I've always considered a parallel universe being one that has a different set of basic laws of physics, etc., that render it sufficiently different from our own. It could be something as 'simple' as the gravitational constant being 4.5 vs 9.8 m/s^2, etc.
A divergent timeline would be a universe where, for instance, Buzz Aldrin was the first man on the moon vs. Neil Armstrong, and thus history diverges from that point onwards.
Granted, you could make the argument that the two parallel universes in paragraph 1 diverged at the point of creation, but (IMO) that's kind of stretching it a bit.
Cheers & YMMV,
-CM-
I've always considered a parallel universe being one that has a different set of basic laws of physics, etc., that render it sufficiently different from our own. It could be something as 'simple' as the gravitational constant being 4.5 vs 9.8 m/s^2, etc.
A divergent timeline would be a universe where, for instance, Buzz Aldrin was the first man on the moon vs. Neil Armstrong, and thus history diverges from that point onwards.
Granted, you could make the argument that the two parallel universes in paragraph 1 diverged at the point of creation, but (IMO) that's kind of stretching it a bit.
Cheers & YMMV,
-CM-
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
HORRAY! My favorite topic of all time!
Yes, this is even better than bashing the Star Wars PT.
There is NO difference between a parallel universe and an alternate timeline - or at least, no difference that you can be sure you are seeing.
Envision the multiverse as a series of parallel bands stretching to the right and to the left into infinity. (I like to envision them as separate colors for simplicity.)
Each band is a universe with its own timeline that stretches in front of you and behind you into infinity. Because there is an infinite number of bands, every possible thing that could happen, does happen in at least one band. Most things happen in more than one band. It's reasonable for bands to be very very similar to vast numbers of other bands, so that a person bopping from one to another might not realize they'd changed universes at all. (Feel free to fuck with your minds by imagining that universe-bopping happens naturally to all of us, all the time, without us being aware of it.)
Time travel cannot occur within one band (let's say the red band) into the past because of the grandfather paradox. It can happen into the future of a single band, and also at any point in any other band. A thousand years back in the blue band or a billion years back in the green band is no problemo at all for red band grandchildren. If red, blue and green differ from each other only by one or two flaps of a butterfly's wings on Proxima Centauri in the year 1,000,292,383,201,392 BC, then your average time traveller might be fooled into thinking that no inter-dimensional travel had occurred at all.
The key thing to remember is: there is no way to check out every butterfly on every world at every time in the existence of every universe when you are casually time travelling around. You can never know whether you are travelling in time, across dimensions, or both. The only thing you can be sure ever happened, and constitues "proof" of where you are, is the past of your own timeline - the one place you are prohibited from ever visiting.
HORRAY! My favorite topic of all time!
Yes, this is even better than bashing the Star Wars PT.There is NO difference between a parallel universe and an alternate timeline - or at least, no difference that you can be sure you are seeing.
Envision the multiverse as a series of parallel bands stretching to the right and to the left into infinity. (I like to envision them as separate colors for simplicity.)
Each band is a universe with its own timeline that stretches in front of you and behind you into infinity. Because there is an infinite number of bands, every possible thing that could happen, does happen in at least one band. Most things happen in more than one band. It's reasonable for bands to be very very similar to vast numbers of other bands, so that a person bopping from one to another might not realize they'd changed universes at all. (Feel free to fuck with your minds by imagining that universe-bopping happens naturally to all of us, all the time, without us being aware of it.)
Time travel cannot occur within one band (let's say the red band) into the past because of the grandfather paradox. It can happen into the future of a single band, and also at any point in any other band. A thousand years back in the blue band or a billion years back in the green band is no problemo at all for red band grandchildren. If red, blue and green differ from each other only by one or two flaps of a butterfly's wings on Proxima Centauri in the year 1,000,292,383,201,392 BC, then your average time traveller might be fooled into thinking that no inter-dimensional travel had occurred at all.
The key thing to remember is: there is no way to check out every butterfly on every world at every time in the existence of every universe when you are casually time travelling around. You can never know whether you are travelling in time, across dimensions, or both. The only thing you can be sure ever happened, and constitues "proof" of where you are, is the past of your own timeline - the one place you are prohibited from ever visiting.
If you assume that the "original" number of universes was one, and at some point, time travellers started mucking things up. But if the "original" number of universes was infinity at the time of the Big Bang, then there is no need, and in fact no room for more universes to be created. It all just becomes a game of Wack-a-Mole, with time travellers appearing in various places but never, ever in the past of their own original timeline. With an infinity of playgrounds to choose from, they'd hardly feel constrained. If they ever had a way of knowing what was really going on - and that's the thing they can never be sure of.
They're the same thing: Prime, Mirror and Abrams 'verses are three of an infinity of pre-existing universes, each with their own independent timeline. And they are very similar to each other, even with the Terran Empire stuff. There are universes so alien that they'd drive HP Lovecraft mad!
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Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
Separate things. Think of a parallel universe as another river, and an alternate timeline as an estuary of a river.
Separate things. Think of a parallel universe as another river, and an alternate timeline as an estuary of a river.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
They're just fictional notions vaguely based in theoretical science. Neither actually refers to an observed phenomenon, and whether there's any difference or not is entirely up to the person using the terms.
They're just fictional notions vaguely based in theoretical science. Neither actually refers to an observed phenomenon, and whether there's any difference or not is entirely up to the person using the terms.
Re: Is there a diference between a parallel universe and alternate tim
I agree with this.
HORRAY! My favorite topic of all time!
There is NO difference between a parallel universe and an alternate timeline - or at least, no difference that you can be sure you are seeing.
Envision the multiverse as a series of parallel bands stretching to the right and to the left into infinity. (I like to envision them as separate colors for simplicity.)
Each band is a universe with its own timeline that stretches in front of you and behind you into infinity. Because there is an infinite number of bands, every possible thing that could happen, does happen in at least one band. Most things happen in more than one band. It's reasonable for bands to be very very similar to vast numbers of other bands, so that a person bopping from one to another might not realize they'd changed universes at all. (Feel free to fuck with your minds by imagining that universe-bopping happens naturally to all of us, all the time, without us being aware of it.)
Time travel cannot occur within one band (let's say the red band) into the past because of the grandfather paradox. It can happen into the future of a single band, and also at any point in any other band. A thousand years back in the blue band or a billion years back in the green band is no problemo at all for red band grandchildren. If red, blue and green differ from each other only by one or two flaps of a butterfly's wings on Proxima Centauri in the year 1,000,292,383,201,392 BC, then your average time traveller might be fooled into thinking that no inter-dimensional travel had occurred at all.
The key thing to remember is: there is no way to check out every butterfly on every world at every time in the existence of every universe when you are casually time travelling around. You can never know whether you are travelling in time, across dimensions, or both. The only thing you can be sure ever happened, and constitues "proof" of where you are, is the past of your own timeline - the one place you are prohibited from ever visiting.
If you assume that the "original" number of universes was one, and at some point, time travellers started mucking things up. But if the "original" number of universes was infinity at the time of the Big Bang, then there is no need, and in fact no room for more universes to be created. It all just becomes a game of Wack-a-Mole, with time travellers appearing in various places but never, ever in the past of their own original timeline. With an infinity of playgrounds to choose from, they'd hardly feel constrained. If they ever had a way of knowing what was really going on - and that's the thing they can never be sure of.
They're the same thing: Prime, Mirror and Abrams 'verses are three of an infinity of pre-existing universes, each with their own independent timeline. And they are very similar to each other, even with the Terran Empire stuff. There are universes so alien that they'd drive HP Lovecraft mad!
I agree with this.
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