Time travel discussion

[HolyCow]

Yuki's failure to avoid the "incident" was due to lack of information.

Based on an excerpt from DISAPPEARANCE Chapter 6 :

Of course, Nagato had long known she would create a ruckus on the morning of December 18th. Because I had gone to visit Nagato three years ago with the adult Asahina-san. She knew all along, and she tried her best to prevent it from happening. Yet there was no way to stop the tide. Sometimes even if you knew what was about to happen, you just couldn't avoid it.

[Florin]

HolyCow: That's what I'm saying. Yuki knows that something's going to happen, but she cannot understand why. Therefore, no matter how much she tries, she is unable to prevent it. The same way, scientists can predict earthquakes but can't prevent them. The lack of neccesary technology and knowledge turns earhquake into a predetermined event.

P.S. What was that about Mikuru/Michiru stuff?

[Time Travel Huh?]

We cannot apply our own sense of what time travel should be to another universe in which the base theory of time travel was created by Haruhi Herself. If she determines it's possible to steal something from your future self, then well it must be so. As it's Haruhi's universe any paradox or loop that seems impossible is possible if Haruhi believes it to be so.

[quigonkenny]

I must admit I really don't like time-travel stuff in fiction. There's always at least one lapse in logic (and usually more than one).

Well, of course there're going to be logical lapses. The very idea of time travel, especially time travel to the past, is illogical. Logic is a large part of causality. It's right there in the definition. And time travel, by its very existence, throws that definition out the window.

Also, there's no true way that time travel works—or at least science hasn't found one yet—with respect to different causal realities or multiple timelines. I imagine our Mikuru(big)-era descendants will eventually find out that it doesn't work quite like Emmett Brown, or H.G. Wells, or Hiro Nakamura explained it to us. Science Fiction is a fun read, but its precognitive powers can be a little spotty. And that's the point. What we're dealing with here is the author's idea (with Haruhi as his proxy) of how time travel works in the Haruhiverse. There is no "right" or "wrong" to it, only the author's implementation and the audience's acceptance or refusal.

That said, the question remains asto how time travel does work in the Haruhiverse. There's two main schools of thought when it comes to time travel in literature. First is the multiversal view, with multiple timelines—a different universe for each decision ever made, or each possible outcome of any possibility. This is the type of setup where Florin's question as to why Kyon would need to go back in time to do something he's already done comes into play, as a different universe is created any time someone travels time, and thus travels into the past don't affect the original present.

Second is the one timeline view, which includes all the classic time travel tropes like predestination paradoxes and changing the future. There are no alternate realities based on different decisions. Different stories that use this model treat the "fluidity" of the timeline differently, with some allowing large changes to the timeline and others implementing a kind of "auotreset," where any changes are eventually reset back to the original way, or close to it, while still others don't allow changes at all. In this view, Kyon has to go back and do something he's "already done" because causality is relative to the time traveler, and independent of the actual passage of time.

I believe MoHS is some variation of the second type, at least so far, and the lack of sliders would tend to support this. Also, the fact that the future time travelers are so interested in changing (or not changing) the past leads to this as well, as in the multiversal model, nothing changed in the past would affect anything in the originating future.

Something interesting to note is that at no time in the time traveling events in the past has any time traveler actually "done" much of anything that would affect the present. Both Mikurus have given information, and Mikuru(big) has affected Mikuru(small), but only Kyon and Yuki, both native to the "current" time, have actually interacted with anyone or anything in the past. Even Sneering B@stard, b@stard that he is, has only talked noise and cosigned with the "evil"groups. Of course, Mikuru(small)'s normal day-to-day activities (being in her past) would throw a wrench in this idea, but it's still something to think about.

[Florin]

Something interesting to note is that at no time in the time traveling events in the past has any time traveler actually "done" much of anything that would affect the present. Both Mikurus have given information, and Mikuru(big) has affected Mikuru(small), but only Kyon and Yuki, both native to the "current" time, have actually interacted with anyone or anything in the past. Even Sneering B@stard, b@stard that he is, has only talked noise and cosigned with the "evil"groups. Of course, Mikuru(small)'s normal day-to-day activities (being in her past) would throw a wrench in this idea, but it's still something to think about.

According to haruhiverse-logic, this is a safety mechanism to prevent TTs from accidentally changing their past. Basic idea is, if you don't know your future, you can't change it, as the future doesn't exist for you yet.

P.S. Yes, I understand that Haruhi logic is not human logic and therefore prone to paradoxes and whatnot. Like I said, I'm fine with that. All I'm saying is I can understand Kyon's confusion and Sneering B@stard's irritations about the way things work.