If time travel became reality

[Angelfishsolo]

If Time Travel (into the past) became a reality would it be moraly wrong to use the ability to prevent great wrongs such as genocide?

 

[vernon]

If Time Travel (into the past) became a reality would it be moraly wrong to use the ability to prevent great wrongs such as genocide?

It's not the morality of making the changes its the ensuing global consequences of the intervention that would suggest that the exercise never takes place.

The present would be a very different place if the past is tampered with and I'm not sure that I would be present in the present if the past was altered in any way.

Best left alone in my opinion.

 

[aberal]

The past has already happened and if, in the future, time travel becomes a reality then altering the past would by definition alter the future and would lead to a sequence of events which might not lead to the future invention of time travel. So they'd be cutting their own throats.

I think I know what I mean by that....

Having said that, I have a personal theory that the angels of history and myth are our own highly evolved time travelling descendants come back to fiddle in matters they shouldn't be fiddling in.

 

[Angelfishsolo]

The past has already happened and if, in the future, time travel becomes a reality then altering the past would by definition alter the future and would lead to a sequence of events which might not lead to the future invention of time travel. So they'd be cutting their own throats.

I think I know what I mean by that....

Having said that, I have a personal theory that the angels of history and myth are our own highly evolved time travelling descendants come back to fiddle in matters they shouldn't be fiddling in.

Cool idea. I was asking about morality however

 

[Angelfishsolo]

The past has already happened and if, in the future, time travel becomes a reality then altering the past would by definition alter the future and would lead to a sequence of events which might not lead to the future invention of time travel. So they'd be cutting their own throats.

I think I know what I mean by that....

Having said that, I have a personal theory that the angels of history and myth are our own highly evolved time travelling descendants come back to fiddle in matters they shouldn't be fiddling in.

Cool idea. I was asking about morality however

 

[coffeejo]

That's the trouble with "what ifs". You're balancing the known against the unknown.

What if ... we go back and prevent the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, presumably therefore preventing the outbreak of World War One, and therefore World War Two by association.

All those lives saved.

But what of the lives that will never be, like Vernon and countless others?

What if ... one of the soldiers killed in, say, the Battle of the Somme, lived and went on to become a British political figure who, in right place at the right time, became the figurehead for the Far Right and led to the rise of the fascist state of Great Britain? Or the father of a truly nasty piece of work, a murderer or paedophile?

All speculation, but morally speaking, when lives have already been lived, no, I do not think that anyone should have the right to go back and change them without knowing what the impact will be.

On the other hand, morally speaking, when we are balancing two unknown futures, then yes, we should act.

 

[Mr Phoebus]

Cool idea. I was asking about morality however

Cool idea. I was asking about morality however

There's a tear in the fabric of time.

 

[Crackle]

If it was possible none of those things would have happened. Therefore it isn't possible: Next.

 

[2Loose]

If you prevented genocide or horrific episodes in our history, our sense of morality would prevent us from being able to understand the question!



Bad events happen, we rise up and cry foul. We try and stop it happening again - ergo, our morality develops. Take that learning process away and we would be so evil...well, even more evil.

 

[Mr Phoebus]

shoot! My bike has been nicked...

I'll soon sort that out.

 

[downfader]

If Time Travel (into the past) became a reality would it be moraly wrong to use the ability to prevent great wrongs such as genocide?

You wouldnt actually be time travelling according to some Quantum theorists (if I've got this right) - you'd be Universe Surfing. For every change in every supersubatomic particle a new Universe gets created. Therefore going "back in time" would simply mean you'd be affecting the future of another universe,not this one.

 

[marinyork]

Reminds me when the Doctor gets sent back to Skaro to destroy the Daleks (Genesis of the Daleks), with Sarah Jane and Harry talking him into it and he changes his mind.

 

[Angelfishsolo]

Reminds me when the Doctor gets sent back to Skaro to destroy the Daleks (Genesis of the Daleks), with Sarah Jane and Harry talking him into it and he changes his mind.

That was actually the basis of my question!

 

[aberal]

The past has already happened and if, in the future, time travel becomes a reality then altering the past would by definition alter the future and would lead to a sequence of events which might not lead to the future invention of time travel. So they'd be cutting their own throats.

I think I know what I mean by that....

Having said that, I have a personal theory that the angels of history and myth are our own highly evolved time travelling descendants come back to fiddle in matters they shouldn't be fiddling in.

 

[MontyVeda]

Prevent genocide? Sod that... I'd be too busy going to loads of gigs