| Author | Subject: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY |
| H.M. Holzman | Posted At 16:09:02 03/24/2002
1. When Alexander traveled back in time the first instance... To save Emma... He should have technically cease to exist for saving Emma... Why? Well, he saved her yes... and at that very moment of being saved his need to Travel through time should have vanished... 2. Newton States: For every action, there is an opposite reaction... Where was this action when Alexander saved Emma the first time only to see her killed a second time? The problem here is this... Just by him travelling in time to change the past... (Which is a nobel gesture if we dimiss H.G. Wells, storyline...) Alexander should have cease to exist the moment he saved her... How is it possible for Alxeander to keep a vigil thought of Time Travelling alive if events differ from the orginal prospect? |
| Tom Wahl |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 20:00:10 03/25/2002 1. When Alexander traveled back in time the first instance... To save Emma... He should have technically cease to exist for saving Emma... Why? Well, he saved her yes... and at that very moment of being saved his need to Travel through time should have vanished... >He did cease to exist. The original Alexander was gone forever. Alexander the time traveler took his place in the past with all the Emma baggage in tow, and now his future was also about to be altered. He made the Emma problem worse by traveling back in time and sealed his own altered future. His time machine was a failure that actually worked. Alex was born in 1869 and was pronounced dead in 1903. Once he traveled forward in time past his time travel start time, his fate was sealed. He could never go back home. Kinda tragic if you ask me. The second Alexander touched the time machine start button it was all over. just some thoughts for fun |
| H.M. Holzman |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 19:17:32 03/26/2002 Tom, The second Alexander? Where was he? Technically if one could go back in time... One could see one's own past self... However doing so would cause a paradox of sorts... Therefore its logical to assume that Alexander who went back in time would cease to exist the moment Emma was saved... Another words what causes a thought to stay in one's own mind and linger? |
| Peter N. |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 19:31:14 03/26/2002 Let's ask John Logan, screenwriter. I am sure he has the answer. |
| Tom Wahl |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 20:16:39 03/26/2002 Hi Pete I think you are right. We need to ask H.G. Logan. He better have the answer or he will be in hot water with Simon. I think the very second Alexander started back in time he altered his timeline forever. He replaced himself in the past, and the future he saw was a future his time machine helped him create. In order for future Alex to put everything right he would have to stop past Alex from ever allowing the time machine function at all. Emma would still be dead, Alex would have built the time machine, but it never would have worked. The original timeline would have been restored unchanged. No matter how you look at it the time machine itself, weather it worked or not, was a failure. Like Philby said in the 60s film, "if that machine can do what you say it can then destroy it". Good advice I guess. and it's only a movie folks. |
| Peter N. |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 22:24:46 03/26/2002 The problem is that, to me, there is only ONE Alex. What you call "first Alex" is always the one that will go and build the Machine with which he will come back the second time. So Alex has a "time loop trajectory", but a single one - since Alex has, at first, seen Emma pass away and then created the Machine. He can do nothing else but come back, then leave for the far future. I guess he was just lucky not to run across himself, but if he had, it would have still been the same person in different parts of the time loop. Anyway, you can see why H.G. Wells didn't write it that way !!! |
| Tom Wahl |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 17:18:35 03/27/2002 Peter, you are right about the book and the Pal movie. The time traveler never went into his past. He first went forward in time, then returned to the past after his original departure. I wonder how Wells dealt with the paradox issues. |
| Francois Beaulieu |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 18:11:35 03/27/2002 Wells wasn't really concerned about the paradox issues. His main goal in writing The Time Machine was to make a point about human evolution - that it might not take us where we expect. His aim was mainly to take a person of the nineteenth century and place him in the far future to observe what had become of humankind. Using a scientific apparatus to accomplish this made it feel more realistic. Playing around with time paradoxes would have probably distracted from the point he wanted to make. |
| W.J. Feehan |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 20:27:34 03/29/2002 People seem to forget that science fiction movies are just that “Science Fiction”. They are allowed to break the laws of physics especially on the subject of time travel which is not fully understood. Theoretically time travel is possible but not in the past. Most of us science fiction fans understand basic physics and Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity. Time does in deed slow down as you approach the speed of light. The story of the Twin paradox is a good example. I enjoyed GHOST with Patrick Swayze ignoring the fact that if he had trouble moving solid objects and found it uncomfortable when people passed through him, but how was it possible for him to walk on solid surfaces. If he is on the 10th floor of a high-rise, should he not fall through each floor till he hit bottom? Lets enjoy the movies and forget about the laws of physics. |
| Francois Beaulieu |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 22:07:00 03/29/2002 It really comes down to the fact that time travel paradoxes are insurmountable. Wells knew that so tried to avoid the obvious ones. We do have to suspend disbelief, but the story shouldn't go out of its way to emphasize these paradoxes. That's unfortunately what happens in the DreamWorks movie. A friend just pointed out that when Alex comes back to 1899 to try to save Emma, his Machine arrives in an area which was most likely occupied by something else in 1899 and, also, the Machine stops in plain view, where it would have most likely been seen by Filby and Mrs Watchet who were still in the house. In fact, even "First Alex" might have still been in the house ! It must have been tricky for that gigantic Time Machine to remain unnoticed !!! |
| Marty |
Re: PROBLEMS WITH THE TIME MACHINE 2002 STORY (Currently 0 replies)
Posted At 23:12:48 04/01/2002 I don't know the story yet, as I haven't seen the movie, (still waiting) but the paradoxs you speak about, it changes with current events. For example time is never set, its always changing and therefor if you make one change in the past it does not mean that what follows is going to be what you've already seen ahead of time? There are many different paths one could take before getting the right one, I guess he was real lucky, eh? |