"There are quirks and discontinuities in space-time. The world lines can double back and bite themselves off, so that things and events appear causelessly, meaningless flutters soon lost and forgotten. Such as Manse Everard, marooned in the past with a dead John Sandoval, after coming from a future that never existed as the agent of a Time Patrol that never was." (p. 161)
That is not how this story is destined to end although it might have been. Indeed, there must be time travelers stranded in "deleted" timelines who know that they are in a timeline without a Patrol and who therefore conclude that the Patrol has simply been prevented from existing.
I think that a single discontinuous timeline in which an effect, like an arriving time traveler, not only precedes but even prevents the event that would have been its cause, in this case the time traveler's later departure, is counter-intuitive but nevertheless logically possible because not self-contradictory. See 3.A Discontinuous Timeline in The Logic Of Time Travel: Part I. However, this single discontinuous timeline scenario does not adequately account for all the phenomena that are presented in the Time Patrol series and, in fact, I do not think that any scenario can.
6 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And what about those "deleted" timelines? You have convinced me, and possibly Anderson as well, that these timelines were not actually snuffed out like a blown out candle flame. Rather, "deleted" timelines continued to exist, but became inaccessible to the Patrol (stranded agents were of course unable to return home).
But, doesn't the existence of these "deleted" timelines contradict what was said in THE SHIELD OF TIME about the Patrol being the necessary stabilizing factor keeping time, so to say, on track? A Time Patrol unable to access "deleted" timelines could do nothing about them or whatever occurs in those alternate worlds.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
The Patrol protects just a single timeline.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, the one leading to the Danellians. But that timeline is not the ENTIRE universe. "Deleted" timeline also comprise parts of that universe. Then I have to conclude the Patrol stabilizes only one part of that "multiverse."
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Yes, but remember:
we are talking about my interpretation of Poul Anderson's texts;
I do not think that those texts are fully consistent - in particular, "Star of the Sea" introduces a whole next take on the relationship between timelines.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
It would be very, very hard for any writer to write fully consistent time traveling stories, so I agree. And I still think Anderson himself found your argument persuasive. And might have made use of it if he had written any more Time Patrol stories after "Death And The Knight."
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Authors who deploy circular causality but avoid causality violation can tie everything together. Anderson does this more than once.
Paul.
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