Spoilers STAR TREK BEYOND
- Thread starter Khan 2.0
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Phantom: The problem with that is first, I don't think too many credible astro-physicists spout nonsense. Second, if our future for hundreds if not thousands of years is unfolding in front of us, and at some point, some civilization out there finds out one can go back in time and change things, you don't think they would've done it to their advantage by now? It would make the fear of nuclear war in the 1950s through the 1970s seem like fear of a bee sting (if you're not allergic).
Finally, I find it incredible, even in the science fiction where it's been done, that my time (and hence, me) has blinked in and out of existence few times (or even once) as people go around "setting right" the mistakes or malicious intents of others. (Unless it happens during those times when one is driving down the highway and all of a sudden can't remember having driven the last twenty miles. You all know the feeling.)
BillJ: Yes, very concise observation. Roddenberry did plenty of retconning, himself.
Well, as long as your doctor can't say the same thing.
Shall we talk more about wigs?
That was the concept of the "Time War" in Doctor Who. The Timelords and the Daleks kept jumping back into one another's past, each trying to negate the other's existence by striking at the things that helped create them in the first place. Timelords try to intercept Dalek time travelers, Daleks go back and attack the birthplaces of the Timelords who try to intercept them, Timelords intercept the baby general assassination squads, Daleks jump back and attack the interceptors, timelords attack the Dalek interceptor-attackers before they launch, Daleks lay an ambush for the interceptor-attacker-attackers, etc etc. Infinite regress to the point of insanity, which -- inevitably -- drove both combatants insane.
The company and scientist that Scotty and McCoy traded with were the ones who did invent the substance. An earlier draft of the script, which was used as the basis for the novelization, makes that clear.
As for Gillian, once she was brought forward, she could not be allowed to return (and indeed IV shows that she did not return). You can argue removing her in the first place was a risk (and it was), but it apparently did no appreciable damage to the timeline by doing so. Time is "strict", in Trek, but not that strict (nowhere near as strict as Bradbury, for example).
A much more serious issue would be Checkov's phaser, communicator and Starfleet ID.
So you have ONE instance where the writers got lazy and did a poor job. That doesn't change all the other instances where they did a good job of consistency on the issue.
They were never consistent on the issue, because even the smallest change would have wide ranging effects on the timeline. You just can't pull a person out of time and expect there to be no ramifications.
Based on the angle of the photo and the way his arms appear at least somewhat at his side, it looks like he's holding a phone just out of view angled up at the mirror.
Is a multi-dimensional rupture, not a temporal incursion, which is sealed when Worf returns to the correct Enterprise, which is identfied by matching quantum signitures.
Again, not a temporal incursion, but a dimensional transposition. (The same alledged justification for JJ Trek).
Future's End. And yes they did. They stopped Braxton from entering the rift, thus short-circuiting the timeline changes.
They told him what they did to keep him motivated to make the warp flight, which was the critical event that HAD to take place to restore the timeline.
And they repaired that knowledge by integrating him into the timeline at a point before he gained that knoweldge, which in concert with the Enterprise being in temporal displacement resulted in him being "reset" without the knowledge.
A similar effect happened in "Yesterday's Enterprise" when the E-C re-entered the temporal rift the timeline "reset" and the only one who even suspected something had happened was Guinan (whose species has the ability to perceive time differently).
Which was a repair of the timeline, allowing events to proceed as they must. The only significant anomaly is that Bell's picture is that of Sisko.
Not a temporal violation, as it did nothing to change the timeline. (Plus tribbles still exist in some form in the 24th century, per "When the Bough Breaks", "Generations", "A Man Alone" and "The Nagus".)
Yes, in the strictest sense it was a violation, and he almost got in trouble for it. DTI could have docked him for it but Lucksley let him off (to Dulmer's dismay).
They never try to fix it because they don't even know it occurred. Neither Kirk, Spock, nor McCoy saw it happen.
Fortunately the death of the one bum had no apparent impact on the timeline.
Clemens invited himself along to the future, and they note that he should not be there. By the end of things, Clemens is actually working with them to stop the Devidians, and therefore they can't just wipe his memories (as they did with Sarjenka in "Pen Pals"). Presumably they have a "gentlemen's agreement" that he will not speak of what he has learned. It's a calculated risk, true, but the only means they have to get the needed information to the crew stranded in San Fran.
As you can see, I pay very close attention.
Already discussed elsewhere.
Wrong again. Sisko and Bashir discuss it under the name "temporal displacement policy" in "Past Tense Part I"
Some filmed SF has been as well. BttF is actually a hybrid of a comedy and a time travel movie. The time travel material in retrospect is actually fairly grim, given the rather strict consequences of Marty's actions.
He doesn't because he CAN'T.
Kirk knows that Christopher can't go home. To protect the timeline, Christopher must stay.
Later they have this exchange with Christopher:
So Kirk is still committed to keeping Christopher with them, as he must do to preserve the timeline.
Until:
Now they're in a dillema. They have to send him back, but the risk is enormous, so they go to plan B:
Not much, but the best they can do.
Ultimately:
Ok, it's a shaky theory in terms of temporal physics. The point is they DID take their responsibility to preserving history seriously.
Some of my local friends who I've successfully brought into the Trek fold were initially very hesitant to try to the franchise because they associated it with this sort of thing and this sort of thing only. The stigma is real. "Oh, that Jeff. He likes that nerd show." I had to ease them in, get them to see things for how they really are. What amuses me is that nowadays they often initiate these kinds of back-and-forths with me after watching an episode, and I'm just like, "ack, no, just enjoy it... n3rdz!"
Not so different from sports fans endlessly debating player statistics and rattling off scores and whatever else they do. Or people who are into cars talking about performance and specs and mechanical details and whatever. Any fan's fascinations seem like a pointless waste of time to those outside the fandom.
Haha, of course, of course. We love what we love.
Actually, those things are very different in that what those fans are talking about is, in the main, quantifiable. Facts. Statistics. Once you move away from ratings and box office, there are no facts of consequence to discuss where Trek is concerned.
Having a degree doesn't mean you're asking the right questions or giving the right answers.
And Trek handles this with agencies like the DTI, and the authority under which the "timeships" like Relativity operate, and the agencies fighting the TCW. Preventing alterations to the timeline, and fixing those that occur.
Since the change in timeline happens in zero time itself you, operating within the changed timeline cannot perceive the moment of transition. For you nothing happened. Watch the opening of "Yesterday's Enterprise". That's basically how it works.
It depends on how sensitive the timestream is.
In the classical model (a la "The Sound of Thunder"), a single butterfly can radically effect the world 100+ million years later. This is analogous to the pure form of "chaos theory" where a butterfly in Japan can cause a hurricane in the US.
What that older model neglects is the concepts of inertia and entropy. When the butterfly flaps its wings, it moves air molecules adjacent to it, imparting energy to them. The amount of energy input by the wings transfers to the molecules, and some is lost to entropy after overcoming inertia. Now the molecules around those molecules have inertia as well, and the first set of molecules pushes against the second set, losing more energy to overcome their inertia.
Rinse, repeat. After several iterations, not enough energy is left to move any further air molecules, and therefore the butterfly wings have no effect on them.
Modern theories of temporal physics hold that basic concepts like inertia have temporal counterparts. So to change an entire timeline, you need either massive mounts of temporal disruption (the equivalent of dropping a nuclear-scale time bomb) or you need the exact right "fulcrum point" to amplify what energy you do have (Edith Keeler would be such a "fulcrum".)
That's how the bum can be disintegrated in CotEoF and not change the timeline. He is not a key figure in history, and not enough force was applied in his vanishing to affect large-scale change.
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**They were never consistent on any [scientific] issue.
Yes, exactly. The argument against JJ Trek is that it overwrites the Prime continuity, like taping over a VHS tape or a CD-RW. It isn't a temporal incursion but a dimensional one, meaning that both exist simultaneously.
Also, they may take their commitment to history seriously but the consequences are not always so nice and neat. Someone asked about TVH where Gillian is removed from the timeline for no reason. Same thing with the whales.
Also, telling Cochrane about his future to motivate him? It nearly ruined the mission by doing so and how does that fulfill history?
I care little for time travel and think that Trek is more or less consistent enough for my purposes. I just think there are the odd exceptions where they don't follow the rules or flat don't care and leave it up to the Relativity to fix it.
Right click. Save.
I did us the word, "credible," and in my experience, it's a tremendous aid in asking the right questions and at least postulating logical and empirically or experimentally verifiable (and one hopes correct) answers.
I sure hope to God in the real world the existence of me and my timeline doesn't depend on some young over-important punk of a mid-level bureaucrat from some under-staffed and underfunded agency hidden on a remote asteroid somewhere in the 29th century. Like he'll never make a mistake or be tempted to go back to 1969 and bet everything on the Jets to win the Super Bowl before going off to some safe-haven timeline he's been creating.
Hey! On topic (how about that?), it seems to me there's more secrecy surrounding this movie than there was in either that Abrams directed. Didn't we have a lot more to chew on by this point in those two cases? Abrams was a sieve compared to this.
You're absolutely right.
But apparently Star Trek and some armchair commenters are way more likely to be right. Because apparently it's easier to say that modern physicists are wrong, than to just admit the fiction writers made shit up.
You know, Greg Cox had genetic supermen being behind every major conflict through the 80 and 90's. I posit this is possible, and that our real historians just aren't asking the right questions or giving us the right answers.
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