Ruining science fiction (and saving it again)

[dantheman931]

So I got to thinking the other day about time machines, specifically the one in the Back to the Future movies. (I do a lot of recreational thinking. It's kinda my thing, y'see.) Now all you have to do, according to the movies, is set the date in the computer, feed the time circuits something powerful enough to generate 1.21 gigawatts--oh fine, dammit, "jigawatts"--of electricity, get going past 88 miles an hour, and bam, there you are. But there's nothing to indicate that the Delorean's relative position in space changed, other than the obvious "going really fast in a straight line" thing; and the Earth is in constant motion--it rotates, and it moves in an orbital path around the sun, which in turn moves in an orbital path around the galactic center. So Marty may have indeed traveled to November 21st, 1955, but wouldn't he have ended up floating in empty space? Then I got to thinking about how they could have turned this into a plot device--the Delorean can shift itself in space as well as time, but only a certain distance, and Marty only has enough fuel for one jump, which means that if he doesn't get going in time, he misses his "temporospatial window" or whatever. They'd have to retool the rest of the plot somewhat, but it still adds another dimension of urgency to the whole concept of time travel, way better than the usual fake urgency of being on a schedule for some reason even though you're in a fecking time machine. (Okay, the whole clock tower thing was adequate, as was the train in Part III; but Part II is pretty much nothing but fake urgency, since they can theoretically retrieve the book at any time between the time Biff received it until his 21st birthday when he placed his first bet, which is a big-ass window of anywhere from 3 to 4 years.)

So how about it? Any other classing sci-fi plot devices that have gaping flaws that could have been turned into awesome plot points instead? I have another one about invisibility if anyone's interested. I also have one about shrinking the way they show it in "Honey I Shrunk the Kids," although I can't figure out a way to save that one. And no, I have no life to speak of. So very very sad...

 

[dantheman931]

I stopped reading at "DeLorean" and I kindly suggest you take your Back To The Future-ruiningness elsewhere.

...that's all you have to contribute? Seriously?

 

[dantheman931]

I stopped reading at "DeLorean" and I kindly suggest you take your Back To The Future-ruiningness elsewhere.

...that's all you have to contribute? Seriously?

Mhm.

Thanks for that, I guess...? 8-/

 

[dukethepcdr]

Movies like Back to the Future are great but they are really more social science fiction than hard sci fi so the tech details of how stuff happens really don't matter. Those shows are really about the characters and comment on society. Most of what Dr. Brown says is techno-babble anyway. Just enjoy the comedic timing and zany acting of the characters (which are really good) and don't worry about the "science" of it.

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

 

[ExodusinFlames]

Though its possible, via the Dirac theory *see Ripples in the Dirac Sea, and I'm aware that its a sci-fi novella* that the technology used will correct for the differentiation of locational displacement.

 

[Therumancer]

Actually I think people tend to forget the whole "Science Fantasy". A lot of science fantasy is presented as Science fiction. "Back To The Future" as a series was never even remotely about science, it was about the storyline, and for all intents and purposes we're supposed to simply accept that things simply work and turn out that way because that's what the plot demands.

It's take on time travel is pretty much on par with "Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure/Bogus Journey".

At least those are my thoughts. Truthfully I don't think there is much real science fiction left today, other than what amounts to sociology.

>>>----Therumancer--->

 

[Deleric]

Movies like Back to the Future are great but they are really more social science fiction than hard sci fi so the tech details of how stuff happens really don't matter. Those shows are really about the characters and comment on society. Most of what Dr. Brown says is techno-babble anyway. Just enjoy the comedic timing and zany acting of the characters (which are really good) and don't worry about the "science" of it.

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

You obviously don't realize how much time these guys have on their hands XD

It's like, Imagine that when the Delorean goes back or forward in time, the exact moment it reaches 88 is when it (hypothetically) stops in time. It's surroundings (Earth) are then moved around every which way so that while time fast forwards or rewinds, the car is remained untouched. Some stuff with the flux capacitor happens and the car is pulled back into to reality when the pre-determined destination is reached. This is basically how the Delorean works.

Or maybe it's because the Flux Capacitor only works on Earth which is why the Delorean stays in relative position at where ever it was on Earth. A theory with no proof whatsoever, but a theory nonetheless.

 

[dantheman931]

Movies like Back to the Future are great but they are really more social science fiction than hard sci fi so the tech details of how stuff happens really don't matter. Those shows are really about the characters and comment on society. Most of what Dr. Brown says is techno-babble anyway. Just enjoy the comedic timing and zany acting of the characters (which are really good) and don't worry about the "science" of it.

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

I was just using BttF as an example; the problem applies to every time-travel plot I've ever seen, even in stories that claim to be "hard" science fiction. No one ever seems to think about the fact that the Earth is constantly in motion. Plus, that's only half of my issue; I think there's great story potential if people explore these plot holes that everyone otherwise takes for granted.

 

[dantheman931]

Actually I think people tend to forget the whole "Science Fantasy". A lot of science fantasy is presented as Science fiction. "Back To The Future" as a series was never even remotely about science, it was about the storyline, and for all intents and purposes we're supposed to simply accept that things simply work and turn out that way because that's what the plot demands.

It's take on time travel is pretty much on par with "Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure/Bogus Journey".

At least those are my thoughts. Truthfully I don't think there is much real science fiction left today, other than what amounts to sociology.

>>>----Therumancer--->

True. Of course, there's still the little issue of fake urgency, which is very much in play in a story that hinges so heavily on the viewer keeping track of more than one timeline.

I guess the bigger issue is that no one makes decent science fiction anymore. Don't get me wrong, I loves me some superhero movies, but the last movies to seriously attempt hard science fiction were The Matrix trilogy, and we all know how *that* turned out. (Badly. It turned out very, very badly.) And it's not like it would be that hard to spackle in some of these plot holes, either; it just takes a little creativity.

Though its possible, via the Dirac theory *see Ripples in the Dirac Sea, and I'm aware that its a sci-fi novella* that the technology used will correct for the differentiation of locational displacement.

Never read it. Any good?

 

[atol]

You're assuming the universe has a center to allocate positions. I find time travel an extremely silly concept, but I'd assume some such time machine could be bound to a celestial object.

edit: I suppose that's not very clear. No cosmologist could truthfully tell you that the Earth isn't the center of the Universe. We can agree it's unlikely, but let's just assume it is for the jump through time. The Earth is completely stationary, the entire Universe spins around the Earth once a day. You'd end up in the same place in a different time. The only other problem is the Earth's surface changes constantly, even without humanity's help. Go back a million years and you might end up in a mountain, a tree, or a mammoth.

 

[ExodusinFlames]

Never read it. Any good?

Actually, yes.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

The thing I found good with BttF was that all paradox's were all resolved neatly. There was no "But if he's done that now he couldn't have done that then making it imposible for him to be doing this now" which is quite a triumph in my oppinion.

 

[Alex_P]

But there's nothing to indicate that the Delorean's relative position in space changed, other than the obvious "going really fast in a straight line" thing; and the Earth is in constant motion--it rotates, and it moves in an orbital path around the sun, which in turn moves in an orbital path around the galactic center. So Marty may have indeed traveled to November 21st, 1955, but wouldn't he have ended up floating in empty space?

Do you want some bullshit to make you happy? Here's some bullshit to make you happy:

The DeLorean time machine relies on the spacetime-bending properties of the Earths' gravity well to jump through time. I mean, think about it: why the hell does the car need to go 88 miles an hour to time-travel? And why is making the car fly or having it pushed by a train just as good as driving it? Clearly it's the car's motion relative to the Earth and not any action of the car's engine or its wheels that really matters here. It stands to reason that the traveling through time occurs relative to that gravity well, too.

There. All done. Science-bullshit saves the day.

-- Alex

 

[Ajna]

*snip*

Have you read "Ringworld" by Larry Niven? The book that spawned the "Halos" in "Halo"?

Yeah. The sequel to it only exists because a bunch of bored MIT students figured out that "THE RINGWORLD IS UNSTABLE! THE RINGWORLD IS UNSTABLE!"

So, the sequel. Which introduced fusion-powered attitude jets to something with a surface area 30 million times that of earth.

 

[Kpt._Rob]

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

To be completely fair here, time travel is possible, but only in one direction, forward. However, you have to acquire a ship capable of moving at near light speed, the ship is then sent away from the earth, and then back too the earth, and the number of years that pass on the ship is far less than the number that pass on earth. Don't ask me the tecnincals on this though, I'm just repeating what I learned in the cosmology section of my astronomy class.

 

[Ajna]

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

To be completely fair here, time travel is possible, but only in one direction, forward. However, you have to acquire a ship capable of moving at near light speed, the ship is then sent away from the earth, and then back too the earth, and the number of years that pass on the ship is far less than the number that pass on earth. Don't ask me the tecnincals on this though, I'm just repeating what I learned in the cosmology section of my astronomy class.

Einstein's theory of relativity in practice. The theory is that you go, say... A distance that would take 500 earth-years to reach. You go there at near-lightspeed and come back. It's 1000 years later on earth, but wasn't nearly as long for you.

Not to patronize you. Just explaining it more for those who don't know the theory.

 

[headshotcatcher]

I stopped reading at "DeLorean" and I kindly suggest you take your Back To The Future-ruiningness elsewhere.

...that's all you have to contribute? Seriously?

Mhm.

If you don't read his post you don't deserve to post..

 

[vede]

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

To be completely fair here, time travel is possible, but only in one direction, forward. However, you have to acquire a ship capable of moving at near light speed, the ship is then sent away from the earth, and then back too the earth, and the number of years that pass on the ship is far less than the number that pass on earth. Don't ask me the tecnincals on this though, I'm just repeating what I learned in the cosmology section of my astronomy class.

Time travel is possible in one direction if you're following Einstein physics, which, to me, seem like total crap.

I don't see any reason to believe that something moving faster than something else makes it somehow more immune to the effects of time than the other thing.

Although it'd be interesting if someone could try and show me the logic behind it.

 

[dantheman931]

Do you want some bullshit to make you happy? Here's some bullshit to make you happy:

Actually, I prefer well-reasoned discussion, but I guess I'll take what I can get.

Incidentally, we're getting hung up on the whole time travel thing. I want to hear about *all* sci-fi conventions that need retooling. Such as invisibility; everyone knows that if you were invisible, you'd be blind because the light would just pass right through your optic nerves, and so on. Well, how'sabout a character who's blind anyway, sorta like Daredevil? They'd be used to operating without vision, so there you go. Piece of piss.

 

[dantheman931]

Time travel is impossible anyway. It's just a neat plot device for books and movies.

To be completely fair here, time travel is possible, but only in one direction, forward. However, you have to acquire a ship capable of moving at near light speed, the ship is then sent away from the earth, and then back too the earth, and the number of years that pass on the ship is far less than the number that pass on earth. Don't ask me the tecnincals on this though, I'm just repeating what I learned in the cosmology section of my astronomy class.

Time travel is possible in one direction if you're following Einstein physics, which, to me, seem like total crap.

I don't see any reason to believe that something moving faster than something else makes it somehow more immune to the effects of time than the other thing.

Although it'd be interesting if someone could try and show me the logic behind it.

Unfortunately, the best person to explain the logic behind Einstein's theories is Einstein, and he's sorta dead. Actually, I take that back--Stephen Hawking could tell you. Me, I tend to take their word for it, since either one of them could outthink me in their sleep. xD Unfortunately, Einsteinian time travel (such as it is) is physically impossible thus far, since the amount of energy required to move something even at near-light speed would be astronomical. It has the added disadvantage of not being instantaneous; while the number of years that pass on board the ship would indeed be far less than the number that pass for a relative observer, it would still be years, not seconds.