# Time-travel fiction with rules that make sense **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 1, 2008, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062 "2008-10-01T20:07:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![De\_La\_Rue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@De\_La\_Rue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/De_La_Rue)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/61 "2008-10-03T00:23:32Z")
Not to toot my own horn, but I once wrote a story in which the returning time traveler bumps into himself entering the machine, and thus erases his travel. ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/62 "2008-10-03T01:29:20Z")
I always liked the Doctor Who line when Donna is worried about changing the course of history by stepping on a butterfly: “Well, don’t step on any butterflies, then. What have butterflies ever done to you?” ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/63 "2008-10-03T02:03:15Z")
Vonnegut’s _Timequake_ involves the universe abruptly backing up some number of years, then turning around and going forward again. The way it’s dealt with is both logical and rather creepy: Everything that already happened happens again. Nobody has any control over anything; they merely cruise along doing what they did last time, with no free will. When time catches up again, there’s chaos; people are not prepared to reassert their will, so when free will reasserts itself, people fall down, crash their cars, crash their airplanes, and generally can’t figure out how to do anything, having simply been along for the ride for the last how-ever-many years (eight or so, I think). ---
**Author:** ![WarmNPrickly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d78d45/32.png) [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/64 "2008-10-03T02:23:04Z")
> [@flex727](#): > > “Thrice Upon a Time” does this and handles it well. Interesting. I may have to give this a read. I wish I were a better writer. I don’t have the attention span to sit down and do it, but from the wiki, it sounds like the discovery of time travel is very similar to something I wrote ten years ago. I’ve read it since, and it needs serious editing. I had a great time travel scheme going unlike anything I’ve read, and like I said, the grandfather paradox is gone. I very much doubt this book deals with it the way I do, but I’ll have to give it a read. ---
**Author:** ![ZenBeam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/3ab097/32.png) [@ZenBeam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZenBeam)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/65 "2008-10-03T03:35:13Z")
> [@Dogzilla](#): > > When Reese finds Sarah Connor and starts explaining to her that her future son sent him back from the future to find her and protect her, he tells her that her son’s name is John Connor (eventually). > > So, at the end of the movie, you see that Sarah has conceived John and she’s making a little video diary for him as she’s driving in Mexico. Obviously, she names her kid John because in T2, of course, her son is John. > > But she only named him that because Reese told her that was her son’s name. Couldn’t she have averted the next three awful movies by simply naming her kid Billy or something? Who really named John? _Nobody_. Sarah played into the “prophecy” and made it self-fulfilling by making sure her kid was named the same thing as the name Kyle told her. > > I’ve gone around and around with this, but AFAICT… nobody named John. Try this: Sarah named John. She had settled on the name “John” when she was 12. She didn’t know who she’d marry or when, but she knew-_she just knew_-that her first son would be named John. When Kyle told her that her son’s name was John, he wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already know. ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/66 "2008-10-03T05:50:06Z")
> [@flex727](#): > > “Thrice Upon a Time” does this and handles it well. I love this book. Well-written and thought out (if sometimes wordy) time travel and a cute love story to boot. You’ll find yourself almost drawing out diagrams to follow Hogan’s logic, but it’s worth it. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/67 "2008-10-03T06:28:56Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > Alfred Bester, not R. A. Lafferty :smack: My mind is going, Dave. I always think that is by Lafferty by confusing it with “Thus we frustrate Charlemagne.” ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/68 "2008-10-03T14:27:40Z")
[This is the most](http://video.aol.com/video-detail/the-falconer-time-travel/3493758542)accurate depiction of time travel I could find. ---
**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:** [October 3, 2008, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/69 "2008-10-03T15:26:26Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#): > > Vonnegut’s _Timequake_ involves the universe abruptly backing up some number of years, then turning around and going forward again. The way it’s dealt with is both logical and rather creepy: > > Everything that already happened happens again. Nobody has any control over anything; they merely cruise along doing what they did last time, with no free will. When time catches up again, there’s chaos; people are not prepared to reassert their will, so when free will reasserts itself, people fall down, crash their cars, crash their airplanes, and generally can’t figure out how to do anything, having simply been along for the ride for the last how-ever-many years (eight or so, I think). I have the same problem with that as I have with most such scenarios: Why don’t the persons’ memories get erased when time backs up? Memories are physical phenenoma, after all, no less than anything else. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/70 "2008-10-03T16:33:10Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > This is actually wrapped up nicely at the end of T-3 when everyone realizes that the mission isn’t to stop the predetermined Judgement Day, it’s to make sure Conner survives it. I did like that. The ending redeemed the whole movie for me. ETA: The origin of the name “John Conner” is minor compared to the HUGE causality loop that runs through the whole Terminator series – the technology that makes Skynet and the various anti-human machines possible in the future is derived from the smashed remains of that very same technology, brought into the past. Who invented it? ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/71 "2008-10-03T16:39:03Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Including the bit where Marty Fly is watching the photograph of his family change before his eyes? How DID that work, exactly? > > :dubious: Marty McFly. I think that works by what’s called “childishly stupid writing”. ---
**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:** [October 3, 2008, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/72 "2008-10-03T16:51:38Z")
> [@Baldwin](#): > > Marty McFly. > > I think that works by what’s called “childishly stupid writing”. Actually, someone upthread averred that what was happening there was the probabilities changing as Marty, his mother, and his father interacted. It was a perfectly brilliant fanwank, and I wish I’d thought of it. ---
**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:** [October 3, 2008, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/73 "2008-10-03T16:52:40Z")
> [@Baldwin](#): > > I did like that. The ending redeemed the whole movie for me. > > ETA: The origin of the name “John Conner” is minor compared to the HUGE causality loop that runs through the whole Terminator series – the technology that makes Skynet and the various anti-human machines possible in the future is derived from the smashed remains of that very same technology, brought into the past. Who invented it? Cylons, obviously. What a silly question. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/74 "2008-10-03T20:16:36Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I have the same problem with that as I have with most such scenarios: > > Why don’t the persons’ memories get erased when time backs up? Memories are physical phenenoma, after all, no less than anything else. It’s been a while since I read it, but I don’t remember that memory has anything to do with it. Consider this idea: what you think is not deterministic, so different decisions might be made the second time around. So last time you decided to turn right; this time you decide to turn left, but because you turned right the first time, you just turn right, regardless of what you want to do. After a while people gave up trying to make decisions and just let what happened happened, until time caught up and they suddenly had to make decisions again, and they weren’t prepared to. On the other hand, I could be totally wrong and they do remember everything. In which case, uh… LOOK OVER THERE! ---
**Author:** ![Mycroft\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/898d66/32.png) [@Mycroft\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mycroft_H)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/75 "2008-10-03T20:57:01Z")
> [@flex727](#): > > I loved “The Man Who Folded Himself”, but my favorite time travel book, and most internally consistent is James P. Hogan’s “Thrice Upon a Time”. I agree with this completely. I’ve been thinking about it lately with the Large Hadron Collider starting up and talk of world destruction problems. I’d love to re-read now it but I’ve got too many other books on the bedside stand at present. ---
**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:** [October 3, 2008, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/76 "2008-10-03T21:41:31Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#): > > It’s been a while since I read it, but I don’t remember that memory has anything to do with it. Consider this idea: what you think is not deterministic, so different decisions might be made the second time around. So last time you decided to turn right; this time you decide to turn left, but because you turned right the first time, you just turn right, regardless of what you want to do. After a while people gave up trying to make decisions and just let what happened happened, until time caught up and they suddenly had to make decisions again, and they weren’t prepared to. On the other hand, I could be totally wrong and they do remember everything. In which case, uh… LOOK OVER THERE! Except that they should not have had the memory of previous decisions/not decisions in the first place, because that should have been erased by the time reversal. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2008, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/77 "2008-10-03T23:54:47Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Except that they should not have had the memory of previous decisions/not decisions in the first place, because that should have been erased by the time reversal. [spoiler]I guess I’m not explaining myself well (I’m not sure it matters, really). Imagine that you get thrust back in time. You don’t know you’ve been thrust back in time, because all your memories have reset themselves too. All right then. Now, you’re driving along, minding your own business, when you come to a crossroad. “Hmm,” you think, “I guess I’ll go left here.” Confident in your decision, you turn left. Unfortunately, last time (next time/this time/whatever) you turned (will turn/will turned/willed turn/whatthefuckever) right. Despite your every intention to turn left, the car inexorably goes right. Astonished, you look down to see what’s going on, except you can’t, because last/next/whatever time you didn’t/won’t/whatever, so you can’t. You don’t know why, because you have no memory of what happened last time. “Shit,” you think, “This way takes me to Guido’s. I’d like to tell him off, but he’ll break my kneecaps if I try anything.” So, naturally, you turn around. Except you can’t, because last/next/whatever time you went straight on to Guido’s, where he obligingly broke your kneecaps (he doesn’t really want to this/next time, as he’s had a sudden change of heart and wants to enter a monastery to atone for his life of violence and avarice, but he has no choice). So, as you watch in horror, your body inexorably drags itself to Guido’s, he breaks your kneecaps, various other shit happens, all against your will as you watch helplessly, still having no idea why any of this is happening, since memory is a physical construct, so you have no memory of any of this happening. Of course, again, I could be full of shit as it’s been a good six years since I read the book but ooh shiny.[/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/78 "2008-10-04T00:04:00Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Actually, someone upthread averred that what was happening there was the probabilities changing as Marty, his mother, and his father interacted. It was a perfectly brilliant fanwank, and I wish I’d thought of it. “You will, Oscar, you will.” 😉 Seriously though, thanks. I wasn’t sure if anyone had even noticed my post! ---
**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:** [October 4, 2008, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062/79 "2008-10-04T00:28:31Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > “You will, Oscar, you will.” 😉 > > Seriously though, thanks. I wasn’t sure if anyone had even noticed my post! I noticed. In fact, once I finish rifling off the serial numbers and changing the paint job, I’ll be changing your fanwank as my own. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction-with-rules-that-make-sense/466062.md?page=3)