From: Brian D Williams (talon57@well.com)
Date: Fri Oct 23 1998 - 09:40:18 MDT
Dan Fabulich:
>I'm well aware that the future hasn't happened yet. However, if
>backwards time travel is in the future, then by definition you can
>use it to reach the future's past. Go far enough back and that's
>the present. Even further back and you've got the past.
elementary
>Anyway, if you happen to be a determinist (as I am), then this
>argument isn't even relevant. The future hasn't happened yet, but
>it will, and if it's got time travel, then it will very likely
>alter its past.
This isn't what you were arguing before:
From: Dan Fabulich <daniel.fabulich@yale.edu>
>Into the future? Absolutely. Backwards? Almost certainly not.
>Consider: if we were develop backwards time travel at some point
>in the future, then someone could have gone back in time to some
>point before today. If time travel will be discovered, then it
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>has already happened.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
You are arguing that because no one has come back from the future
that it proves time travel (backward) is impossible. I merely
stated the obvious, the reason no one has come back from the future
isn't that time travel (backward) is impossible (although I believe
it is.) it's that the future hasn't happened yet.
>Thus, due to the very nature of time travel, if it hasn't happened
>already, we can safely assume that it never will.
Here you restate it, the logical error is so obvious, but the words
so slippery, that I was reminded of Lewis Carrol (mathematician
Charles Dodgson).
Brian
Member,Extropy Institute
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