When we imagine an alternative history, we do it with words. Thus, we ask, "What if the Mongols had conquered North America?" etc. Experts armed with the kind of science of society envisaged in works by Asimov and Anderson would instead do it with symbols and equations.
It seems that Anderson's Time Patrol applies such a science:
"'...that particular milieu is critical. Mr Gordon showed me the analysis. I couldn't follow all those symbols, but he said it was a very dangerous century to tamper with.'" (p. 62)
When Everadus the Goth, who is Everard of the Patrol, tells the Roman general, Cerialis, "'I have my connections,'" (p. 607) he thinks:
"The histories, the data files, the great coordinating computers, the experts of the Time Patrol. The knowledge that this is the proper configuration of a plenum that has powerful negative feedback. We've identified the random factor that could bring on an avalanching change; what we must do is damp it." (pp. 607-608)
Histories and files are verbal but the computers and experts will also be able to apply symbols as in Gordon's analysis. Thus, while Patrol agents, and readers, wonder whether Veleda's new myth can change history, the Patrol experts and their computer programmers address the question in a logical-mathematical form that the rest of us would not be able to comprehend.
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