SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

Brief clip of me talking about the difference between time travel and space travel, and the significance of that difference for science fiction, in case this is of interest. NPR host Moira Gunn, former Analog editor Stan Schmidt, and Tor editor David Hartwell also on hand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJP-Yq...

Really new to the whole goodreads book club thing.

I hope this is an appropriate place to ask what recommendations readers have regarding the best time travel books.

If so, great, and what are the best time travel reads?

If not, please delete. Thanks.

My recommendations for best time travel books: The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov, The Door Into Summer by Robert Heinlein.

Paul wrote: "My recommendations for best time travel books: The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov, The Door Into Summer by Robert Heinlein.


[bookcover:The Door Into Summer..."

Two fine novels.

The sound doesn't come through on the link you posted. Could you synopsize your statements?

I'd recommend The Time Traveler's Wife and Replay

Mike, you might want to try Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus, by Orson Scott Card. It has a serious tone like the Ender Quartet and, in my opinion, it's more logical than The End of Eternity about how its time travel works.

I'm sure there's no rule against asking for recommendations in someone else's thread, but I think people usually make a new thread in the What Else are You Reading folder. If you browse through it, you'll see recommendation threads can get a LOT of responses!

Thanks all. I will look into each. I appreciate the recommendations.

Jeremiah wrote: "The sound doesn't come through on the link you posted. Could you synopsize your statements?"

Short form:

Space travel is just more of what we already do on Earth - moving from one place to another.

Time travel invokes all kinds of paradoxes, and may well be impossible.

So the two staples of science fiction are like night and day.

My iPad ate my reply. (Reinforcing my opinion that it's a nice toy but useless for getting real stuff done.)

Anyway, the highlights of time travel recs for me:

Recent books:

The Accidental Time Machine

Mammoth

Older:

The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime

Sky Coyote (2nd book in the series but the first one I read)

Kindred

The Chronoliths

Glimpses

Paul wrote: "Space travel is just more of what we already do on Earth - moving from one place to another.

Time travel invokes all kinds of paradoxes, and may well be impossible.

So the two staples of science fiction are like night and day."

Time travel (and FTL) are theoretically possible via wormhole. Highly unlikely, almost certainly improbable, but not completely impossible. Who knows what we'll be able to do in a thousand years?

But the wormhole doesn't change the paradoxes. See Hawking's "chronology protection conjecture".

Connie Willis writes some of my favorite time travel novels. They are all over the map in terms of tone, which I appreciate. To Say Nothing of the Dog is very, very funny. Doomsday Book is one of the most heartbreaking novels I've ever read. And Blackout (All Clear, #1) and All Clear (All Clear, #2) explore heroism. One may read these in whatever order, except it is important to note that Blackout and All Clear were one novel to Willis, but split into two for the ease of the publisher.
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Paul wrote: "But the wormhole doesn't change the paradoxes. See Hawking's "chronology protection conjecture"."

And more recent thinking uncouples cause and effect, making both causality and paradox go away.

I agree completely, Scott.

Trike - the paradoxes don't go away. You can do workarounds - such as the multiple worlds interpretation, which says every move from the future into the past engenders a new universe - but that scenario is even more incredible than time travel itself.

Everyone once thought the Earth was round and many also believed space travel would never be possible. Not playing devils advocate, simply stating that people throughout history have been regarded as insane or delusional for having dreams and ideas that most deemed incomprehensible.

I'm not saying time travel is possible or ever will be, I am saying that great advances in history have been the result of forward thinking individuals. Who's to say what future great genius will discover.

By the way, I have thoroughly enjoyed "Replay" so far. fantastic book. Thanks for the recommendation.

Paul wrote: "Trike - the paradoxes don't go away. You can do workarounds - such as the multiple worlds interpretation, which says every move from the future into the past engenders a new universe - but that scenario is even more incredible than time travel itself."

There are lots of popular science books out that explain how causality isn't a factor in some versions of time travel. Interesting stuff. It's no more preposterous than other theoretical things. As long as actual physicists say it's possible (and they do), I'll take their word for it.

Mike wrote: "Everyone once thought the Earth was round"

That's just crazy talk!

Trike wrote: "Mike wrote: "Everyone once thought the Earth was round"

That's just crazy talk!"

Haha, I meant flat! Thanks. Oh well, I was engrossed in the moment, I wanted to eloquently say that anything is possible. lol.

Trike - Ok, suit yourself :)

Mike: absolutely there are many things in history deemed impossible - such as knowing the chemical composition of stars - that shortly after not only became possible but a standard part of science (such as knowing the chemical composition of stars by analysis of their light).

But these impossibilities didn't involve a myriad of paradoxes, which travel to the past or the future trigger.

If you choose to think of them as paradoxes though. I'm just using this as an example, but what if everything ultimately had the same end result. No matter what happened. There would be no such paradox. Like the little details of our lives simply did not matter in the big scheme of things. The end result will always be the same.

For instance an important person was killed prematurely and his/her great accomplishments were never completed by him/her, but rather another person did, for whatever reason. Or no one does and it never really matters anyway because what we thought was so precious to our existence never really mattered to the predestined end result.

I dont know, I really haven't put too much thought in to it, though it does intrigue me.

I'm sure nothing I mentioned really "holds any water" and a million holes could be poked in it.

It's something I would like to think on further and maybe throw some theories or ideas your way.You're obviously an accomplished individual and I'm sure I would enjoy your feedback.

That's a very important example, Mike. One of the problems which is not paradoxical with time travel to the future is that it would negate free will. If you travel to tomorrow right now and see that I'm wearing a beige shirt, that means that I have no choice but to wear it.

The same would be the case if all possible actions had the same result - it would mean that our sense that we have any choice in getting this result or that result is just an illusion.

I can't prove that free will is real and not an illusion, but it's such a fundamental part of human life that I can't see it as not real.

So the reality of free will would be another argument against time travel - a strong argument, but not having to do with paradox.

I think time is fascinating enough by itself. Our perception of it seems so subjective. Haven't they done studies that show time moves more quickly the older we get? Or our perception of it anyways. Super-cooled quantum states, force discrepencies within gravity, Lindsey Lohan --- there's just so much we don't understand. I'm really not a fan of the "every action/decision spawns a unique universe" theory. Maybe when someone can explain a few dimensional uknowns more completely, I might enjoy time travel stories more, but for now I'll stick with harder science fictions.
Now, what to read---rock, paper, scissors, lizard, Spock!

Sarah wrote: "Super-cooled quantum states, force discrepencies within gravity, Lindsey Lohan --- there's just so much we don't understand."

Well-put.

I see the fact that we have no evidence of visitors from the future as de-facto proof that time-travel is impossible (I'm a practical guy).

With space travel, I see more leeway. Maybe using raw energy to push us from star to star is immensely impractical; but we may yet discover other ways of moving from place to place. Quantum effects (something I've explored in my own books) may give us ways to travel that we can scarcely comprehend today, but which could get us to other planets as easily as crossing the street someday.

Well it's quite likely that the reason this timeline will never see a timetraveller is because the key reason a historian or scientist would take a risk is curiosity of who the people were what was going on what they knew and what questions and answers may be found here. So everyday someone posts, talking, emailing, skype - all of that is not face to face - and when we have computers that can bring a single message to anyones eyes - well, it's nearly a sure thing that technology of the future will be able able to communicate with computers now.

Even if that is not the case at all, as technology and computers spread a world wide web the simple fact is that even if no one is watching now, more than likely that doesn't mean someone will not be watching later. All those cameras while we go to the bank, pass a street light, go shopping, go to work.

30 million cameras in America watching. Just watching. Kind of makes you wonder...what for? Security can mean so many different things.

So, no, I don't think we need ever meet a time traveller face to face.

It doesn't matter if time travel is physically possible in the real world or not, any more that it matters whether Faster-Than-Light travel is possible. They are concepts that have been so popular in SF for so long that they're a given. Nobody sits there and debates the Einsteinian phsyics of FTL on STAR TREK, they just get into the Enterprise and turn the dial to Warp Ten.

Paul wrote: "That's a very important example, Mike. One of the problems which is not paradoxical with time travel to the future is that it would negate free will. If you travel to tomorrow right now and see that I'm wearing a beige shirt, that means that I have no choice but to wear it."

I don't follow this line of argument. If he goes into the future and sees what you're wearing, all he's seeing is the result of your choice earlier that day. It doesn't "force" you to wear a beige shirt.

Steven wrote: "I see the fact that we have no evidence of visitors from the future as de-facto proof that time-travel is impossible (I'm a practical guy)."

I refute your argument thus: How would you know? :p

Seriously, though, if people in the future can figure out time travel, they can probably look at pictures from our era, go to the thrift store and buy an authentic-looking outfit.

I agree with Trike that him seeing you wear a Beige shirt is simply observation. Even if he then came back in time and told you that tomorrow you wore beige, you could then, because of that, change your mind simply to counter the argument.

That all being said- Traveling BACK in time is not possible. Traveling forward is able to be done by cheating, (not being here in time, then coming back as time passed).

It's not a matter of "well we thought the Earth was flat" - that was out of not understanding and zero true observation beyond our eyes.
Displacing oneself from a timeline and inserting yourself in a previous point contradicts physics, and if it were possible then it would mean we live in a vastly stranger universe than the likes of Hawking or Asimov ever dreamed.