The Light of Other Days; or, am I looking at you right now?

Great Debates
1

I recently finished the bookThe Light of Other Days by Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter. Okay book, but it was the sci-fi Macguffin that really got me thinking. The premise: in the not-so-distant future, a communications company succeeds in creating a device that can recieve signals faster than light, through wormholes or something. Thing is, you can also use the gadget as a past viewer (or present viewer, for that matter) to observe any point in history. Part of the appeal for the reader is learning “the true story” behind many historical and archaeological puzzles. In the story, everyone soon has their own past-viewer.

My question is, assuming such a device were invented, and the technology were made relatively accessible, would it be, on balance, a good thing or a bad thing? It seemed to me that the novel took a somewhat optimistic view of its impact; though some religions collapsed entirely, government and society in general took it pretty much in stride. The ability to see past events directly would, certainly, render the historical sciences, archaeology, evolutionary biology and a slew of others obsolete or at least radically refocused, but I’m thinking more of the impact on the culture at large. Would the government collapse if just anyone could watch the President at any time? Would war be made impractical, or would the stronger nations attack their weaker neighbors immediately? And what of historical crimes that could be called up to be viewed at any time; would this hopelessly fractionalize society?

On the other hand, you would have the immediate benefits of no unsolved crimes, no lost children (or lost socks, for that matter), perfect knowledge of all past events, and a world where fraud or deception are nearly impossible–but at the cost of absolute loss of privacy.

If you had the only such gadget, what would you do? Give it to the world, or your government? Destroy it? Create an empire through blackmail? Or just use it privately to spy on others (or simply delight in the pageantry of history)? Me, I’d probably never leave the Cretaceous Period. Or the shower rooms at Daytona Beach.

2

I liked how they made it so jesus’ death was unviewable, a good sort of “you still don’t know” even if they said it might just be the fabric of space getting too screwed up by wormholes.

really, one of my favorite books ever.

3

Well, I’ll tell you what…my doctoral thesis in history would be rendered completely useless.

[sub]as opposed to now, when it is merely “almost useless.”[/sub]

4

Interesting, Terrifel - I’ve not read that book, but over the years I’ve read a couple of similar short stories. In one, the device could only ‘see’ times over 50 years or so ago. (I don’t remember the exact time span, only that it prevented it from being used, as per you example, for spying on the President and such.) It was being used by historians at the university where it was invented, but after they made public some ‘ugly truths’ about Abraham Lincoln government agents broke into the lab, destroyed the device, and murdered the inventor. The then-government thought it would be far too destabilizing to society to allow it to exist.

A second one involved a device that could only see a few hours into the past; this one was used by police departments to solve crimes and its ownership and use was strictly regulated.

Both are possible consequences of the existence of such a gadget. I think unlimited ownership/use would probably be disastrous to society, but if I had one I sure wouldn’t destroy it before I found out a few things!

5

Would you agree with your first example, then, that the greatest societal disruption would come from learning the unvarnished truth about our own history?

And what sort of things would you want to view firsthand? Whatever happened to Benjamin Bathurst, the Battle of Hastings, where your spare set of car keys are? Tell, tell!

6

I take it this is not related to the short story “Light of Other Days” by Bob Shaw from 1966. That story postulated a glass with such a high index of refraction that it took light months or years to pass through.

When was this book published? I ask, because I once wrote a short story with the same device, and similar implications. And since the only person to read it was a friend of mine, I’m obviously going to have to have a talk with him about the value of secrecy…

(In mine, the aperture emitted deadly radiation at the other end. This had the side-effect of giving the most-viewed historical figures cancer – thus changing history. Jesus dies sick in bed, for example.)

To answer the OP, I’m in favor of a past-viewer (without radiation, natch). What’s done is done; it can’t be changed. A society with access to such a device would find it natural to prefer an uncomfortable certainty to a warm-and-pleasant ambiguity.

They probably would not appreciate the downside of such technology: your activities today are fair game for someone to spy on tomorrow. Goodbye, privacy.

7

“The Light of Other Days” was first published in 2000, I believe, and the title is in fact a direct lift from Shaw’s short story, which the authors cited as inspiration for the novel. I believe that the book may even be dedicated to Shaw, although I may be wrong about that. The stories are otherwise completely different, though, as is the actual past-viewer mechanism.

It’s true that you don’t see many stories on this topic, which is a little odd. Perhaps science fiction authors who toy with these sort of ideas find the idea of past-viewing less compelling than straight time travel. I happen to think that a past viewer seems a lot more plausible, given that there’s no paradox involved, while offering easily as many intriguing story ideas.

8

I second “easily.” That story I mentioned – I cranked it out in about an hour, from a flash of inspiration. No great shakes, but it amused me.

9

Sorry, Terrifel, I spent all day Monday at the doc’s office (never go to a walk-in clinic on Monday!) and last night sleeping off medication.

If nothing else, I think the existence of such a device would create tremendous disturbance among the members of the various religious communities around the world. There are other historical figures whose ‘feet of clay’ would be embarrassing or have other detrimental effects on their admirers/followers. And, of course, if the device were capable of looking into the immediate past . . . well, Big Brother would be here to stay, and I doubt many people would be comfortable with that. While I can see how human civilization would eventually benefit from this, I think the adjustment period would be the equivalent of WWIII or worse.

What would I do with it? First thing would be to go back to the beginning of the Universe to see how it all started! Then blow all of the creationists out of the water by viewing the birth of our planet, the beginning of life, and documenting the course of evolution. After that I believe I’d have to check into the truth about all of the major historical religious figures, like Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, etc. Just for curiosity I would like to see the meltwater runoff at the end of the last Ice Age, the impact and following years of whatever made that big crater in the Yucatan/Gulf of Mexico, the volcanic eruption that blew away Santorini and probably spawned the Atlantis legend, and, of course, watch some real, live dinosaurs gallivant around the countryside. :slight_smile: There’s a few unsolved murders and missing persons I’d like to investigate, too!

Maybe you should start a thread over in IMHO asking what event(s) people would like to see if they could view the past - I bet there would be some fascinating answers.

TheeGrumpy

An admirable statement of faith in the wisdom of the majority of the human species, but I beg to differ. I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts that the vast majority of humans prefer warm-and-pleasant ambiguity to cold, hard truth. Start messing around with the foundations of their most cherished beliefs and you’ll see people falling apart all over the place, and turning viciously on those they feel are responsible.

But then, maybe you’ve been exposed to a better class of humanity than I’m used to meeting. :slight_smile:

10

Thanks for the thread suggestion, coosa; I believe I’ll do just that. Although it’s hard to see how this topic can compete with the “What’s the grossest thing you’ve ever eaten?” thread.

And I hope you’re feeling better.