Time Machine

The idea of building a time machine continues to fuel the minds of science fiction writers. In the popular movie series, "Back To the Future" we learned about the "space-time continuum" - whatever that means, and in "The Terminator" the computer chip responsible for the future was destroyed so that the machines could not become "self-aware," and so on. Time travel is so useful to writing science fiction because it interjects a counter-intuitive viewpoint, especially when the future is changed by the past. Of course, when these scenarios are analyzed, our typical linear style of thinking is considerably challenged. For example, in the Terminator the machine was destroyed. How, then did it ever come to be? We cannot fully consider these sorts of questions, in the same way that my dog cannot understand the past - it is simply beyond our computational construction to consider events that have parallel outcomes.

What I find interesting about all of this, is that most of us already possess several kinds of very effective time machines. One such machine is our camera. When we take a picture, it freezes in incredible detail a moment in time, one that we can revisit whenever we want. In my closet I have several thousand photographs of my family, and we love to go back in time when our family was younger and relive those great moments in time together.

The same can be said for home movies. Capturing real-time movement on movie film used to be a fairly expensive proposition. With the advent of modern digital video cameras, we can inexpensively record and review memorable passages of our lives. Of course, this has led a new challenge - making videos that are interesting to review. Home video making now shares the same problem with other nearly perfected tools - the quality of the product depends on the skill of the user. Somewhere along the line, video camera manufacturers have forgotten to teach consumers how to make interesting movies.

There is much more to say about photography, and these musings will appear in future segments of the blog. But for now, I would like to turn the discussion of time machines to another wonderful technology - the book.

At some point in your life you have probably been asked to identify the famous person you would like to go back in time to meet. I know I have been asked that question on several occasions. Let's say that we have indeed constructed a time machine and we go back in time to meet Sigmund Freud. (You can select the famous person you would like to meet.)

So, we power up the "flux capacitor" and end up sitting on Freud's couch. (We will assume we speak German.) We spend a hour with Freud, talk to him about his theories and then return home a better person, right? Perhaps so, but we can do much better with a book.

Many of the great people you might want to meet would likely be able to spend a limited amount of time with you. They were busy with their careers, public engagements, etc. Meeting your favorite famous person would be very nice, and shaking their hands and holding a vibrant conversation with them would be great, but it is their thinking that hold the real excitement, and the real promise of the time machine. When I read a book by Freud or any other great intellect, I am not only going back in time, I am co-mingling with their minds - a real life example of the Vulcan "mind-meld." (Spock did it with his fingers, I do it with my eyes, or ears if the book is on CD.) Written words, laboriously penned before the advent of word-processors, aided only by bird feathers dipped in ink, provides a view of incredible clarity not only about the past, but about the process of advanced thinking, one that can be now studied in real-time, unfettered by the linear distance in the space-time continuum.

The economy of this kind of time machine is startling; for a few dollars I can purchase a book by any great author, containing the exact thinking that this person wanted me to have, to study and to make my own; priceless information written by the person who originated those ideas. The book is a time capsule of incredible power and I cannot think of a more valuable invention for the benefit of human civilization.