"'Has the universe therefore brought forth sentience, in order to protect and give purpose to its own existence? That is not an answerable question.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Shield Of Time (New York, 1991), PART SIX, 1990 A. D., p. 435.
"What we have learned about communication across time suggests that the cosmos may have evolved us in order that we shall at last save it. Can this be true? It is imaginable...."
-Starfarers, 52, p. 493.
Unanswerable although imaginable. The following proposition at least is true simply because it is a tautology: If a universe can exist only because of circular causality, then the only space-time continua that exist are ones that incorporate a causal circle.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Unanswerable but interesting questions. And, I'mm skeptical of the answers which were speculatively and tentatively proposed. Including being skeptical of the Time Patrol being that "stabilizing" element or factor.
If time is mutable, can be changed, as we see happening in the Time Patrol stories, then what about events elsewhere in the universe? Are we to assume all intelligent races eventually had their own Time Patrols, to be their "stabilizing" factors? I find it hard to believe they would ALL discover time traveling!
I think Anderson went as far as he could with the Time Patrol stories. And I think it's significant we don't see the Patrol acting on an interstellar scale, except for occasional mention of that exile planet used for imprisoning time criminals. Because the whole thing would have broken down into chaos if Anderson had tried writing interstellar Time Patrol stories.
Ad astra! Sean
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