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my thoughts on how time works in star trek (lemmy.world)

submitted 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

18 comments fedilink hide all child comments

specifically paradoxes.

Ignoring the one instance of branched time that I know of (the Kelvin timeline), assuming that the prime universe has a single dynamic timeline (considering all the times Voyager reset the timeline):

my thoughts are time travel creates a permanent linkage between two points in the timeline.

The linkage stores all changes caused by the time travel.
Linkages are vulnerable to paradoxes.
Too much paradox stress causes the linkage to rot and break. (like an old rope?)
If a linkage breaks, all changes it caused are naturally lost, thus the timeline self corrects.

I haven't seen much around about how paradoxes would physically work. this just came to mind and makes the most sense to me, I'm curious if something like this has been explored before?

very simple illustration below, black line is the main timeline, red line is a linkage created by time travel:

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 days ago (1 children)

When we talk about time travel in fictional universes, almost all of the narratives follow one of three "truths:"

Time is one linear thread. What you do now will have consequence X and if you do something different it will have consequence Y. A simple illustration is the movie Sliding Doors. But the same can be said for Back to the Future or Bill and Ted's. If you make a change to the prime timeline, it will ripple into the past/future. Your cousins will disappear from the 3x5 photo!
Time has branches, a truly infinite number of universes and possibilities. Really, as far as I'm concerned, the best example of this idea is Rick and Morty. That show has the freedom to both cook our brains about the concept and also hold a mirror to its ridiculousness. You also see it more famously in the MCU, with their multitude of Lokis and such, though the TVA is still hell-bent on a prime timeline. But the multiverse is the natural order, with only 80s inspired bureaucracy to keep it in check.
Time is a combination of the two, which leads us to Trek. Time is linear, so Jake Sisko can tell his dad to dodge a beam that travels at light speed. But time is also non-linear, so... I dunno... most of Voyager. When Seven came aboard with her temporal node all bets were off as far as what could even be considered a prime timeline.

Moreso, the mirror universe is a parallel to our own, marching along at the same pace and whose characters are developing at the same rate as the prime timeline. So, there is no prime timeline, and no multiverse. Just the clean-shaven and the goatee universes.

And to answer your question: yes, I think Trek trends toward a "prime" timeline. It's honestly the way our brains work. With all the posturing of the wormhole aliens, we just don't work in a non-linear fashion. And maybe more importantly, good stories don't work that way either, Kurt Vonnegut aside. Time travel is wearing plot armor in EVERY movie and show because no one has a handle on it.

Thank you for bringing this up. It's something I think about too much.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

in reality it's all a big ball of timey wimey wibbly wobbly stuff