# Choose which of these mass-murder victims to save. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 15, 2014, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563 "2014-09-15T15:24:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![MrKnowItAll](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrknowitall/32/87_2.png) [@MrKnowItAll](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrKnowItAll)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/41 "2014-09-18T01:09:35Z")
I voted Heather. It was tempting to go with Hugh, just for the math, but frankly I don’t buy the assumption that he will continue to save a lot of lives that no one else could save. Medicine is science, and whatever he did can be replicated. And probably by someone who cares for his patients more than Hugh probably does. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/42 "2014-09-18T11:57:10Z")
Hugh. No way am I saintly enough to decide who deserves to live or die on merit, but Hugh’s resurrection will do his fellow-men more good. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/43 "2014-09-18T15:07:52Z")
Okay, after giving it several days of intense thought, I’ve decided what to do. I’m going to seduce **Suzie Q**. She will then sneak me into the motor pool at Rhymer Enterprises, and outfit me with the necessary tools and training to take the Burroughs-Libby continua buggy for a non-monitored spin. I will proceed to PA’s arsenal the day before the massacre and remove the firing pins from all of his weapons. I will also replace one of the ammunition clips in his pocket with a small cell-phone activated IED, and monitor his activities on M-Day. The moment I observe any evidence that he has discovered and bypassed my measures, I pull out my own cell phone, and call the one in his pocket. Should he not obligingly explode per instructions, out comes my own weapon, which I use to blow off his head. I will, of course, then return the continua buggy to its proper place and time, and **Suzie Q** and I will repair to her lair to celebrate. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/44 "2014-09-18T16:02:45Z")
> [@ddsun](#): > > Ya know, that’s what I get for reading my kids YA novels. Grrrrrrr. Ignorance fought. > > Thank you for the chocolate milk. There are young adult novels that talk about the judges in Hades? ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/45 "2014-09-18T16:07:06Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Okay, after giving it several days of intense thought, I’ve decided what to do. > > I’m going to seduce **Suzie Q**. She will then sneak me into the motor pool at Rhymer Enterprises, and outfit me with the necessary tools and training to take the Burroughs-Libby continua buggy for a non-monitored spin. Suzie’s been fired from RhE. The only reason she wasn’t fired and [del]executed[/del] murdered is that she’s a chick and was wise enough not to resist when being escorted out or to try to break back in, as either course of action would have moved her to combatant status. You AREN’T a chick and thus can be decollated for yuks, much less trespassing and theft. > [@](#): > > I will proceed to PA’s arsenal the day before the massacre and remove the firing pins from all of his weapons. Won’t work. Novikov self-consistency. You’ll just get yourself stuck in a time loop that will either lead to your giving up in despair or getting killed. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/46 "2014-09-18T16:12:53Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > I’m a pragmatist. The four are all dead and a far as I’m concerned, their backstory is irrelevant. Does the device even resurrect the same person or is it just a good copy? We can’t know. Sure we can. Suzie does. The Lazarus Engine works by (a) grabbing onto the mystic connection created between two souls when one human decides to do lethal violence to another, and (b) grabbing the murder victim’s soul before it can cross the River Styx (hence the 24 hour time limit, as that is how long it takes a soul to travel from Earth to Styx) and (c) using the energy from the murderer’s soul to repair the victim’s body, which of course kills the murderer. (The above comes from my notes from the story that inspired this thread; I’m not sure if it was covered in the first Lazarus Engine thread and am too lazy to check.) ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/47 "2014-09-18T18:58:15Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Suzie’s been fired from RhE. The only reason she wasn’t fired and [del]executed[/del] murdered is that she’s a chick and was wise enough not to resist when being escorted out or to try to break back in, as either course of action would have moved her to combatant status. You AREN’T a chick and thus can be decollated for yuks, much less trespassing and theft. > > Won’t work. Novikov self-consistency. You’ll just get yourself stuck in a time loop that will either lead to your giving up in despair or getting killed. _smh_ You poor, naive fool. By your own accounting, **Suzie Q** is a genius. As for the Novikov self-consistency conjecture, I maintain that it is just that, a _conjecture_. I feel I’ll be able to get around it by printing out this thread and bringing it with me. Didn’t you ever read _The Technicolor Time Machine_, by Harry Harrison? ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/48 "2014-09-18T19:04:47Z")
Missed the edit window: And I’ll thank you not to speak of my girlfriend as though she’s not capable of staying several steps ahead of the likes of you. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/49 "2014-09-18T19:05:24Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > _smh_ > > You poor, naive fool. > > By your own accounting, **Suzie Q** is a genius. What does smh mean? And of course Suzie’s a hypergenius. That’s how she knows what doesn’t work. Let’s say we ignore the self-consistency principle. If Suzie borrows or builds her own time machine and prevents the Pluperfect Asshole’s rampage, she’ll just be creating an alternate history in which the four H’s made it through that day alive. But there were “already” such histories anyway–ones in which the PA got hit by a buss on the way to the mall, or in which his gun jammed on the first shot, or in which he wasn’t a PA, and so forth. And that course of action won’t help her much. When she returns to her present, there will be another Suzie Q there, living her life; or if she world-jumps as well, returning to the reality she came from, she’ll find that the four H’s are still dead. Time travel’s useful for finding shit out,for setting booby traps for your enemies, for hiding from revenuers and super-villains alike – but not for changing stuff that upsets you. ---
**Author:** ![yellowjacketcoder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/4bbf92/32.png) [@yellowjacketcoder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yellowjacketcoder)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/50 "2014-09-18T19:06:08Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > What does smh mean? _Shaking My Head_. I find it an annoying acronym, myself. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/51 "2014-09-18T19:24:38Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > What does smh mean? _shake my head_ ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/52 "2014-09-18T19:58:04Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Time travel’s **useful for finding shit out** ,for setting booby traps for your enemies, for hiding from revenuers and super-villains alike – but not for changing stuff that upsets you. Okay, I take the continua buggy and visit four different future timelines; in each of which the Lazarus Engine was used to the benefit of a different candidate. After evaluating the relative desirabilities of each timeline, I hop back to a comfortable margin for the use of the one I’m choosing and tell **Suzie Q** to Lazarus _that_ victim. Then I return the continua buggy to its parking spot, and you’re none the wiser. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563/53 "2014-09-18T20:57:47Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Sure we can. Suzie does. The Lazarus Engine works by (a) grabbing onto the mystic connection created between two souls when one human decides to do lethal violence to another, and (b) grabbing the murder victim’s soul before it can cross the River Styx (hence the 24 hour time limit, as that is how long it takes a soul to travel from Earth to Styx) and (c) using the energy from the murderer’s soul to repair the victim’s body, which of course kills the murderer. Oh, I’m sure that’s what it says on the box. But the Engine is obviously at least partly sentient, and a bit malevolent as well. My guess is that it eats both souls for its own delicious purposes, and installs a generic P-zombie “soul” in one of the bodies (repairing it using conventional means, of course). I suppose **Suzie** would know best, but her well-established insufficient evilness leads me to believe that she may not have considered certain possibilities. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/choose-which-of-these-mass-murder-victims-to-save/698563.md?page=2)