Would things get better if you could change the past!

‘’ Back to the future’’, ‘’ Interstellar ‘’ and ‘’ the terminator ‘’. ‘’ Timeline ‘’, ‘’ 11/12/63 ‘’ and the one that started it all for me, ‘’ the time machine ‘’ by H.G Wells. Movies and novels that addressed time travel as a concept, as a paradox and as a revolutionary theme. We have been so saturated by time travel novels, tv shows and especially movies that the average person pretty much understands all the basics of this genre. Time travel as an idea is as old as regret; the human mind has an instinctive sense to manipulate the causes to have the effects or results that are required, so it makes sense that our consciousness examines the effects of what has already happened and wonder how it would have been if the causes were different. Therefore, we keep wondering how thing would be if we could change the past, would I end up as a billionaire if I could guarantee that my project will succeed? Would my life be easier if I could avoid every mistake I made before? Would World War 2 happen, if we could kill baby Hitler?

Time travel is often about regret, it’s about something in your past that you wish you could do over, and that causes 2 different problems at once, there is a scientific problem, could such a thing be possible? Moreover, how would that work? There is also an ethical problem, if you could do it, should you? Would you?

One might say that the shadow of the past should stay in the past, that our struggles make us stronger, that those experiences make us wiser, that the lesson you learned from the past should be analyzed threadbare and made applicable in the future. However, why learn from those mistakes when I can literally fix them, when I can change my faith, when I can actually upgrade my life right?

Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. One thing that I learned from all those time travel movies and novels is that when you change history, you don’t get the result you’re hoping for. Everyday, everything we do is at a turning point in history whether it’s obvious to us or not. Some of these points are tremendously important, others not so much but the difference is certainly not announced to us. Something you do in the next 5 minutes may or may not change the course of history; we are contemplating significant decisions that we have to both feel the weight and vanity of because of the unforeseen consequences.

In closing, I want to highlight a quote that really marked me; it’s from one of my favorite movies –Mr Nobody- that talks about the impact of choices on someone’s life:

“Every path is the right path, everything could have been anything else… and it would have just as much meaning.”
-Nemo Nobody-