Trekkie told me ST will win SW because of time travel?!?

Rommie2006 · Post by **Rommie2006** » 2005-02-19 09:58am

A couple of days ago,

I had a run in with a rather annoying Trekkie. He claimed the Federation will be able to beat the Galactic Empire, by waging a war using their time-travelling tech(i.e. wipe out the SW universe at its infancy period). Then he goes on to rant that the current 24th century Federation will be able to enlist the assistance of the 27th century Federation(as seen in VOY and ENT) to fight in a temporal war.
I was stunned. I found his argument a bit... well... unexpected.
Erm... guys what do you think? You think waging a temporal war is a viable option for Trek to win Wars(cos there's a whole awful lots of IFs and Assumptions in his case)

Lord Pounder · Post by **Lord Pounder** » 2005-02-19 10:09am

That old time travel fallacy. Read the versus forum here a bit, much better people than i have already pulled that arguement apart.

Unless you here giving it the "some friend of mine said....." shit when it's actually you.

Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba · Post by **Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba** » 2005-02-19 10:11am

Well, of course! Just like they did with the Dominion! And the Borg! Oh wait...

Besides, that's a complete cop-out anyway, since it admits that the current 24th century guys would get their asses stomped.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2005-02-19 10:12am

Every time you traval in time in ST your creating anothe Alternate relaility, the orgional reality is still screwed AND-da minus the time travlers

Besides the fact time traval is always a copout, just like saying SW vs ST oh and the 40k Forces of Chaos and the Culture

Prozac the Robert · Post by **Prozac the Robert** » 2005-02-19 10:57am

I've never really understood the argument that it's a copout. It's like saying the empire wining is a copout because they won't negociate peacefully and allow the federation to win by enlightening everybody.

If it's a capability they have, which admitedly isn't certainly true, then I don't see why it's a copout to use it.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2005-02-19 11:11am

Prozac the Robert wrote:I've never really understood the argument that it's a copout. It's like saying the empire wining is a copout because they won't negociate peacefully and allow the federation to win by enlightening everybody.

If it's a capability they have, which admitedly isn't certainly true, then I don't see why it's a copout to use it.

It's an excuse to dismiss every conceivable argument in one fell swoop. Never mind that even if they go back several hundred years (which is as far as they've ever gone), it wouldn't make a lick of difference to their staggering military disadvantage, nor would they be able to solve the timeline issue.

Wicked Pilot · Post by **Wicked Pilot** » 2005-02-19 11:21am

It would be hard to enlist the 27th century Federation if they're part of the 27th century Empire. They're probably quite happy being the dominate power in the galaxy.

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman · Post by **Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman** » 2005-02-19 11:23am

Well, ST would probably win if they use time travel to visit stone-age SW...

Rommie2006 · Post by **Rommie2006** » 2005-02-19 11:40am

I see your point. Personally, I find the argument posed by that Trekkie as a rather "lame" in a debate for ST vs SW.

Well no harming done by asking.

Dark Primus · Post by **Dark Primus** » 2005-02-19 11:54am

Even if a fleet of Federation ships do time travel even a thousand years into the past in the SW universe it would take them decades to get to Coruscant, assuming they know where it is, assuming they don't ecounter a large pirate group along the way which alone has the firepower to eliminate a whole Federation battle group.

Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba · Post by **Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba** » 2005-02-19 12:17pm

THe idea, of course, would be for a group to go back 100+ years, then the upgraded civilisation goes back 100+ years itself, etcetera, until you have what amounts to 50th century federation in a 24th century jar , which probably would smush the empire. However, there are reasons this won't happen:

Butterfly Effect: Maybe the new civilisation doesn't like the idea of erasing itself from the timeline, or the power of the new drives causes space to go boom.

Why again?: The Federation has never once used this tactic, even against immediate threats to its existence. Why would it do so now?

Many Worlds: In some forms of trek-time-travel(say that 5 times fast) it simply creates a new universe, rather than alter the present, at least according to some people(First Contact, the City on the Edge of Forever gate, and the Klingon-Federation war are instances where it appears that there is only one timeline, which is then altered, but later/earlier{don't you hate time-travel} fixed.) Whether the type the Federation can use(sling-shot effect) is either is debateable, but it throws another monkey-wrench in this theory.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2005-02-19 12:18pm

The timeline argument isn't really the argument. Time travel works. The thing is there's different kinds of time travel, however counterintuitive that sounds. The real argument is that the 23rd Century Federation cannot use time travel as a weapon.

Plus, you are forgetting the temporal prime directive.

Brian

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2005-02-19 12:21pm

Alyeska put it best,

Alyeska wrote:Actualy Time Travel has worked before. If time travel didn't work and all your doing was hopping between dimenssions this would already have been discovered a long time ago. Trek already has the ability to detect which multi-verse your from.

The while First Contact, ENT Regeneration, Q-Who is a perfect example of a single time line with time travel interferance.

The Borg send a Cube to Earth because they recieve a message sent 200 years in the past. The message was sent because a Cube attempted to go to Earth. In this instance time travel is possible but changing the timeline is impossible because time is happening simultaneously. Whatever you try and do is irrelevent because time has happened and will happen again. This was even explained in the Voyager episode Relativity. The Borg attempted to go back in time and as a consequence the Enterprise-E went back in time to prevent them. Apparently limited understanding of how to time travel means that changing time can't happen. Once you understand you need more knowledge you stop attempting to travel in time and the same thing still happens. At that level of understanding time is written out and can't be changed by people with a similar level of understanding. What happens happens because it is written.

However things do appear to change in the 29th century Federation. They do fear change in the time line and even developed shields that are designed to isolate them from time and protect them from changes in the past.

Apparently Time travel tech in Trek is very complex. Some times its dimension travel, some times its the real deal but they are merely fullfiling time as its destined to happen, and some times its the real deal with real intereference, but only if your from a really advanced part of Trek.

All of this means 24th century Feds can't do jack. If they are loosing the war and attempt to use time travel they will fail because they were destined to loose the war.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2005-02-19 12:22pm

brianeyci wrote:The timeline argument isn't really the argument. Time travel works.

That does not refute the timeline issue.

The thing is there's different kinds of time travel, however counterintuitive that sounds.

And none of them can create a paradox. The timeline explanation solves that, and has been explicitly upheld in canon both by "Parallels" and by the future timecop Braxton, whose knowledge of time travel is undoubtedly superior to that of Janeway.

The real argument is that the 23rd Century Federation cannot use time travel as a weapon.

Well, they never did against the Borg, nor did they do so against the Dominion, nor did they do so against Q (or did you forget that Q said they were not always this powerful?) Really, by the logic of the time travel crowd, the Federation should be able to kick Q's ass by going back in time to before the Q were so powerful. That tells you a lot about how stupid this line of reasoning is.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2005-02-19 12:55pm

Darth Wong wrote:And none of them can create a paradox.

Well, I thought of a way around the paradox question. Let's say current time is represented by t. Let's say time travels at time v. If you alter time at point t - 1, it will never catch up to current time t, since the time at t - 1 travels at v. But if you have "advanced" enough time travel, the alteration at time (t - 1) can be made to travel at time (v + 1) or faster, so eventually the changes catch up with the timeline.

What Braxton and Parallels says is not definite proof that another alternate universe exists in all cases of time travel. If this were the case, why have temporal shielding? Why not laugh it off. Who cares if someone changes the past if its going to create another universe.

Alyeska supports the hypothesis of different kinds of time travel, and his analysis above makes the most sense rather than "create an alternate universe."

That tells you a lot about how stupid this line of reasoning is.

Yes, time travel argument is stupid when you consider the Feds didn't use it so many other times they had the chance.

Brian

Chmee · Post by **Chmee** » 2005-02-19 01:06pm

So, in the 'single-timeline' vs. 'multiple dimensions' competing views of time travel, where does the City on the Edge of Forever sit? When McCoy screwed things up and the landing party lost contact with the Enterprise, was that because they had been transported to a new dimension, or because the timeline was changed and the Federation erased? When they 'fixed' things, did they return to their own dimension, move to a third new dimension, or return to the original timeline?

Ugh ... every time travel discussion seems like a masochistic sci-fi version of the 'who's on first' routine ......

Tribun · Post by **Tribun** » 2005-02-19 01:18pm

Mike has a good essay on it, I show it here:

Time Travel

Ah, time travel. As a good Trekkie might say, "our last, best hope." I'm sure you've heard this argument before:

"The Federation would use time travel to jump into the past, and wipe out the Empire before it was ever created."

I left this for last because it requires a lengthy explanation. This argument is quite persuasive upon first glance, but upon reflection, a few obvious problems appear:

Why so rare?
If time travel can be used as a panacea for every mistake, battlefield defeat, and ill turn of fortune, then why is it used so rarely on the show? Why were crushing defeats like Wolf 359 or the Romulan/Cardassian massacre in TDIC not reversed by time travellers? Federation law? Let's not be silly; if any ship with warp drive can use the slingshot, this opens up time travel to every half-assed starship captain in the galaxy.

Can they pull it off?
We know starships can use the slingshot effect to travel several centuries into the past. However, this act requires fuel. It puts strain on the ship (serious strain, as we saw in ST4). So who's to say it could survive a much longer trip, say, a thousand years instead of a few hundred? What about ten thousand years? What about a hundred thousand?

What's the point? In the universe of Star Trek, there are an infinite number of parallel timelines (as seen in "Parallels" and "Mirror, Mirror"). When a ship performs a time-jump, it must create a divergent timeline (more on this later). It can wreak havoc in this divergent timeline, but why would its departure have any effect on its original timeline?

It may be helpful to list known examples of Federation time travel, all of which fall into a small number of categories:

Accidents
Too many to list. They usually involve some natural phenomenon, such as black holes, wormholes, or "temporal anomalies".

Assistance by outside forces.
Guardian of Forever:
Seen in "City on the Edge of Forever". Not large enough for a starship, with a lower range limit of at least a few millenia. It cycles through a list of "permissible" destinations, generated through some unknown algorithm. Doctor McCoy inadvertently used it to go back to the 20th century.
Borg Sphere:
Seen in STFC. Capable of moving entire starships, with a lower range limit of roughly three centuries. It sent itself back to the early 21st century in an attempt to assimilate Earth's past, and the Enterprise rode its "temporal wake".
Bajoran Orb of Time:
Seen in "Trials and Tribble-ations". Capable of moving entire starships, with a lower range limit of roughly one century. It was used to send the USS Defiant 105 years back in time, as part of a failed assassination attempt against Captain Kirk. The use of this device, as with all of the Bajoran orbs, is presumably contingent upon the forbearance of the so-called "Prophets".
Atoz's time portal:
Seen in "All our Yesterdays". Not large enough for a starship, with a lower range limit of many millenia, perhaps even millions of years. It was used on Kirk, McCoy and Spock, who all suffered loss of reasoning faculties when moved to a prehistoric era.
Timeships:
Specialized time travel vehicles from the future or from alien civilizations. Seen in "A Matter of Time", "Future's End", and "Year of Hell". The latter two examples are Voyager episodes in which the writers' abuse of time travel finally reached the "ludicrous" stage, making TNG seem downright reasonable by comparison.

Slingshot effect.
The slingshot effect uses some horribly unrealistic pseudoscience to explain how one might use the Sun to travel backwards in time. It was used to send the Enterprise forward from the 20th century to the 23rd century in "Tomorrow is Yesterday."
A slingshot effect was used to send the Enterprise back to the 20th century in "Assignment Earth".
A slingshot effect was used to send a Bird of Prey back to the 20th century in ST4.

Transporters.
First seen in "Mirror, Mirror." A transporter accident (how many of these have we seen in Trek?) threw Captain Kirk into an alternate timeline. This timeline was visited again in the DS9 episodes "Crossover", "Through the Looking Glass", and "Shattered Mirror", again using the transporter.
Transporters were also used for time travel in "Time's Arrow", "Past Tense", and probably several other episodes, always to travel just a few centuries back in time.

As we can see, most Trek time travel has been limited to a few centuries of "temporal displacement". The small handful of long-range time travel incidents have involved technologies which can only move a person, not an entire ship (thus suggesting that movement through time is similar to movement through space; the bigger the object, the more difficult the move).

When we look through the list, we find that once we eliminate small-scale techniques and outside intervention, the only viable method of Federation time travel is the slingshot effect. This creates serious constraints. The slingshot effect places great strain on a starship, and long-range use of this technique has never been observed (or even attempted). The process consumes fuel at an undetermined rate. It places an undetermined stress on the ship. Given these problems, how can the Trekkies insist that there are no limits to the duration of time travel using the slingshot? How long must we suffer Trekkies who insist on assuming that every process is limitless and free unless proven otherwise?

In any case, even if they can somehow resolve the "how" part of the question, we must still wrestle with the "why" part of the question. It is widely assumed that problems can be "solved" through time travel, ie- if something went wrong, you can go back and make it "right". But does this make sense? How does time travel affect the timeline? This question affects the potential usefulness of time travel as a solution for problems, and it leads directly to the infamous "grandfather paradox."

The Grandfather Paradox

We've all heard about the Grandfather Paradox. You step into your handy-dandy time machine. You jump back in time. You murder your grandfather. Now he's dead, and he won't ever sire your father, who in turn won't sire you. This means that you won't be born. But if you were never born, then how could you go back in time and kill your grandfather?

This is an old question, pondered by scientists, philosophers, and anybody who watched "Back to the Future" or "The Terminator". One obvious solution is that time travel might simply be impossible, thus eliminating the problem. However, general relativity predicts the existence of wormholes, and wormholes would theoretically permit time travel. Stephen Hawking has suggested a sort of "cosmic censor" who acts as a universal timecop and ensures that causality paradoxes never happen. This timecop might kill you before you can kill your grandfather, or make him duck to tie his showlaces just as you pull the trigger, etc. And of course, those who optimistically predict the eventual feasibility of time travel tend to resort to the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Now, I must preface this with the very important caveat that the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics has been widely discredited. However, if we are using suspension of disbelief, then we must assume that it is valid anyway, because the parallel universes predicted by the "many worlds" theory have actually been observed in Star Trek. Parallel universes were seen first in "Mirror, Mirror" and then more spectacularly in "Parallels", where hundreds of thousands of Enterprise-D's from parallel universes could be seen.

Now, how does the "many worlds" theory explain the Grandfather Paradox? Well, if an infinite number of parallel timelines exist, then the Grandfather Paradox can be explained quite easily. You step into your handy-dandy time machine. You jump back in time, but in the process, you create (or enter) a divergent timeline. You murder your grandfather, but this happens in the new timeline. Back in your original timeline, your grandfather was never murdered, so you still exist. In effect, you are an alien visitor to this new timeline, having come from a different universe.

This solution is not without problems. If you move from one universe to another, then mass/energy conservation laws will be violated because both universes will experience a mass/energy change. However, this can be solved if an equal amount of mass/energy goes the other way, to take your place. Interestingly enough, this is precisely what happened in "Mirror, Mirror". Kirk and his mirror-universe alter ego changed places, thus preserving symmetry. This symmetry is not seen in the TNG and DS9 time travel incidents, but that's merely another example of how TOS is superior to its bastard stepchildren. One could always rationalize it by saying that the return mass/energy was dispersed widely across space etc., but the symmetry shown in "Mirror, Mirror" is a better solution.

"Many worlds" in Star Trek

Some serious problems with Star Trek time travel can be solved once you accept the "many worlds" theory:

"City on the Edge of Forever":
When Doctor McCoy jumped through the time portal, the other crewmembers on the planet's surface perceived the sudden disappearance of the entire Federation. Supposedly, he changed the past so that the Federation was never created. But that is impossible because the other crewmen still existed. They still had memories of the Federation. They still had Federation uniforms and Federation weapons. The "many worlds" theory neatly explains this problem: McCoy and all of the people on the planet's surface were all transported into a timeline (or parallel universe, whichever you prefer) in which the Federation never existed. The original timeline is not destroyed, thus explaining why they still remember its history, but they can no longer perceive it or return to it. When Kirk and Spock jumped back to "fix the damage", they caused everyone to jump into another timeline, in which the Federation was founded again, but with slightly different events surrounding Edith Keeler's death. This is not the same as "going home", but as far as they're concerned, it's good enough.
"Star Trek First Contact":
When the Borg jumped into the past, the crew of the Enterprise perceived the disappearance of the Federation's entire history. This is impossible because they still exist, and they still retain all of their memories, equipment, history files, etc. Data suggests that they were somehow "shielded from the changes in the timeline", but he doesn't even attempt an explanation of how this is possible. The "many worlds" theory provided a neater explanation: they were dragged into a new timeline by the Borg sphere's "temporal wake", and when they stayed in the wake long enough to perform a similar jump, they ended up in yet another timeline. In this new timeline, they tried to "fix" events so that they unfolded more or less as they remembered (albeit with an orbital bombardment of Cochrane's launch facility which didn't occur in their original history). Note that the "many worlds" theory also explains the biggest conundrum of STFC: why the Borg fought their way to Earth before performing the time-jump, instead of making the jump from the safety of their own territory. The answer is that a time-jump would move the travellers to a divergent timeline but it would have no effect on the original timeline. Therefore, it would do the Collective no good. You might ask why they performed the jump at all if this is the case, but the Queen's attack had failed and she was facing imminent destruction. A jump into a divergent timeline would not change history in her original timeline, but she may have found the prospect preferable to simply being destroyed by one of Picard's quantum torpedoes.
"Yesterday's Enterprise":
History seems to change when the Enterprise-C appears two decades away from where it was supposed to be destroyed in battle. But the original timeline is not gone, and in the new timeline, Guinan can actually perceive that the Enterprise-C belongs to a timeline other than her own (she can even perceive some of the history of that timeline). This perception manifests itself as a disquieting sensation that something is "wrong", but that's an oversimplification. After all, how can a timeline be "wrong?" With countless timelines in existence as seen in "Parallels", why would one be more "right" or "wrong" than another? A better explanation is that Guinan perceived enough of the Enterprise-C's original timeline to know that she thought it was better than the one she was currently in. We jumped to a divergent timeline when the Enterprise-C arrived and we jumped to another divergent timeline when it departed.
Although the "many worlds" theory may have been discredited in real life, it seems to be the only way to explain Star Trek time travel as we've seen it on the show. It explains causality paradoxes in "City on the Edge of Forever" and STFC, and it also explains why time travel is not being used to solve problems, because it means that time travel doesn't really change anything. It only moves the traveller into an alternate universe where events unfold more to his liking. An interesting consequence of this explanation is that we've really been following a group of characters as they move from timeline to timeline, so we haven't stayed in a single universe throughout the series run of Star Trek.

Conclusion

We can now answer the original three questions posed at the top of this section:

Why so rare?
This question can be answered by concluding that it probably is not so rare; it simply isn't perceived. There are probably countless time travellers, but each time a traveller leaves, he simply moves to a divergent timeline and disappears from his original timeline. Since we don't follow any timeline jumpers but the main characters, we don't perceive their activities. At best, we might perceive unexplained disappearances of starships, or mysterious "transporter accidents".

Can they pull it off?
That's an open question. We know that the only viable method is the slingshot, and we have evidence that there may be range and durability issues. However, the evidence allows us to establish lower limits but not upper limits. This remains an open question.

What's the point?
This is the real problem. The "many worlds" solution to the causality paradox leads us to conclude that a time traveller cannot change his original timeline. He can only move to a different timeline, in which events unfold more to his liking. For a soldier losing a war, it would be an act of cowardice since he would quite literally be running away from his defeat. That explains why they only use it when they've been moved to a different timeline against their will or by accident, since they can't get home but they can at least get to a timeline which they find preferable.

This appears to be a very long-winded answer to a simple argument. But the original argument is only simple because it deliberately overlooks numerous complexities affecting Trek time travel. When we take a more serious look at it, the time travel argument doesn't work.

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Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman · Post by **Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman** » 2005-02-19 01:46pm

brianeyci wrote:
Darth Wong wrote:And none of them can create a paradox.
Well, I thought of a way around the paradox question. Let's say current time is represented by t. Let's say time travels at time v. If you alter time at point t - 1, it will never catch up to current time t, since the time at t - 1 travels at v. But if you have "advanced" enough time travel, the alteration at time (t - 1) can be made to travel at time (v + 1) or faster, so eventually the changes catch up with the timeline.

No, wait.

Please explain *how* the "advancement" in time travel "propagates" the change to catch up with the timeline, let alone how it would answer the paradox question.

The way I see it, if I go to the past and kill my grandpa, my dad wouldn't exist and I wouldn't exist as well. But since I never existed on the first place, how the hell would I go to the future and kill my grandpa? I guess the "branching" timeline would be the most acceptable answer. Now I would like to see *how* would your theory provide a better answer.

Knife · Post by **Knife** » 2005-02-19 02:15pm

Time hopping isn't a magic bullet. I remember having this argument a few months back. Jumping back in time and 'researching, analyzing, incorperating' SW tech or even just R&D-ing Federation tech so as to be equal with SW tech level, takes into account that major tech breakthroughs happen at regular intervals and that a small group with limited resources can make those break throughs.

One ship, going back into time a 100 years (just to say) and spending that 100 years studying a hyperdrive isn't necessarly going to figure the damn thing out. And even if they do, they'd still have to then manufacture the infrastructure to create the pieces that then make the hyperdrive. This isn't even counting that they'd have to figure our a power source to run the thing then create the infrastructure to make the pieces to create the power source to run the hyper drive. Ect......

Even if they did accomplish that, then they'd have to come back to the present (their view) and explain it all to the Feds, then the Feds would have to create the infrastructure to make the pieces to make the ...................................................

Now if you want to go along the tract of going back in time an whooping the ass of SW, you'd have to go pretty far back. I see little difference between the GE and the Republic tech wise in KOTOR and thats 4000 years before the Empire.

So if you go back far enough, when does it stop being ST V SW?

YT300000 · Post by **YT300000** » 2005-02-19 03:03pm

The sad part is that this aptly named "time hopping" is the Federation's only semblance of a chance at beating the Empire, and it invokes every fallacy, paradox and improbability ever devised.

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2005-02-19 03:08pm

Well, ST would probably win if they use time travel to visit stone-age SW...

They simply can't. It used up next to all the energy that a Klingon Bird-of-Prey had in order to travel back 300 years or so. Even if you scale up an order of magnitude, that's still just 3000 years back they can go.

SW had Fed-crushing technology 25,000 years ago.

Time travel? Feh. It just makes the Federation look even more pathetic.

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2005-02-19 03:13pm

at best the whole time travel argument is little more than a red herring. it doesn't bother actually showing how one side could beat the other using their present tech but just gives some cheap copout that isn't even guaranteed to work. it's probably the single most pathetic argument for trek's side in existence.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2005-02-19 03:34pm

They simply can't. It used up next to all the energy that a Klingon Bird-of-Prey had in order to travel back 300 years or so.

It didn't. The time travel messed with the dilitium crystals, but all it took was a small dose of radiation from a fission reactor to repair them.

Chmee · Post by **Chmee** » 2005-02-19 03:37pm

Darth_Zod wrote:at best the whole time travel argument is little more than a red herring. it doesn't bother actually showing how one side could beat the other using their present tech but just gives some cheap copout that isn't even guaranteed to work. it's probably the single most pathetic argument for trek's side in existence.

Unless, of course, you consider the time travel technology itself to be a 'present tech' that they're using.

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2005-02-19 04:13pm

The time travel messed with the dilitium crystals, but all it took was a small dose of radiation from a fission reactor to repair them.

I thought they stole "photons". I guess in the 23rd century they no longer have flashlights.

Nevertheless, the point still stands... we've never seen Star Trek travel in such a way that would allow them to do any good against the Empire.