re: time travel: presentism, going nowhere and personal time

["James Alexander Cunningham" <0203734C@student.gla.ac.uk>]

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Bit of a Christmas treat for you here. Since I am only really posing a question here I decided to bulk things up a bit and write it as dialogue. Do let me know what you think as I think they are rather fun. I don’t have much expertise in this area, and I’m away from libraries so reading up is a bit tricky. I hope you’ll still find this interesting.

 The first question that arises when one writes a dialogue is that of characterisation. Well, Plato used actual people in his dialogues, and if it was good enough for him it is good enough for me. In that case who else could my first character be but Alice? The second character was more of a problem. Me? I think I would find that rather awkward. I toyed with various other ideas but a bit of lateral thinking brought me to the obvious answer. The Cheshire Cat. I don’t know if our own dear Alice has had any adventures down rabbit holes as a child but if she had maybe something like this might have transpired:


It was growing dark and Alice was lost. The forest was pleasant enough during the day, but as night creped in it became more and more threatening. Shrieks and howls came from across the trees and shining eyes watched her from the undergrowth. She had no way of telling the time. She did not even know what time it usually got dark in this queer new country. Hungry, tired and dejected she sat down. Presently she looked up, and could barely stifle a scream. An enormous cat looked down at her. It was sitting on a bough of a nearby tree, grinning enormously. 
“Good evening.” said the Cat, placidly.
“I. . . Good evening” said Alice, remembering her manners. “I wonder if you could help me. I’m lost you see.”
“Ah,” said the Cat. “You have tried going that way?” nodding in one direction.
“Yes, I’ve been going round in circles for hours.” replied Alice.
“Then you must have gone that way too.” said the Cat, nodding in another direction.
“I suppose so. I think I must have gone in every direction.” said Alice.
“But if you have been in every direction, and have not gone in the direction you wanted, where could you want to go?” asked the Cat.
“I just want to go back to when I wasn’t lost.” pleaded Alice.
“Well that is easy.” answered the Cat. “Just go back the way you have come.”
“But which way is that?” asked Alice, looking around.
“Why, back in time of course.” said the Cat, still grinning.
“But,” stammered Alice “surely that’s impossible.”
“Why should it be impossible? You can walk one way or the other. You move in time one way, why not the other?”
“Because time doesn’t work like that. Just because we keep moving through time it doesn’t mean we are time travelling. To time travel I would have to leave you behind here and now, disappear and re-appear some time in the past.” Explained Alice.
“Well why don’t you do that?” yawned the Cheshire Cat.
“Because the past doesn’t exist, only now exists. You can’t travel somewhere that doesn’t exist, you know.”
“Maybe, maybe not.” the Cat said, turning his head first one way then the other. “But even if you’re right, that needn’t rule out time travel.”
“Why not?”
“Well, why do you have to be the one who moves? If the entire world moved ten feet to the left but you stayed still, the effect would be the same as if you moved ten feet to the right. The same thing can happen with time.”
“I’m not sure I understand.” said Alice, narrowing her eyes slightly.
“Imagine that we have a bubble that holds you in exactly the same state, down to the atoms you are made of for however long you are there. Then suppose that while you are in the bubble the arrow of time turns around. The universe rewinds for, lets say, two hours. The bubble pops, and there you are, back in the past.”
“But the universe couldn’t rewind while I was in the bubble, because I wouldn’t be in it. Everything I did and caused would be absent.” objected Alice.
The Cat yawned. “If you like we can say that as you enter the bubble, an exact copy is made of you. One goes in, one stays out.”
“But would the copy be me?”  
“It certainly wouldn’t be “me”, but it would be you.” the Cat said.
“I think I understand you. Though I wouldn’t be time travelling. Time would still be moving forward. It would just be that change was happening backwards or not at all in my case.”
“Is there really a difference between time and change?” asked the Cat.
“Maybe not.” replied Alice. “None of this is of very much help though as I ca’n’t do any of this anyway.”
“In that case,” said the Cheshire Cat “I should go that way, if I were you.” indicating a path. With that he began to disappear, starting with his tail, until only his grin was left behind.

To be continued if I can be bothered.

I beg forgiveness from both Alice and the shade of Lewis Carroll.




Love you babies.

James






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