james_davis_nicoll (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2011-02-12 08:11 pm
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2011-02-12 08:11 pm
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Unless we also have inexpensive, perfectly-accurage geneology, the risk of rescuing one's own ancestors from abusive situations and thereby causing oneself to no longer exist is too great. And one's ancestors, left orphaned by one's ceased existence, might be placed into abusive foster care situations, rendering one's self-sacrifice moot.
Yes, of course -- unless, of course, there are costs associated with that choice. It's a worthy goal, but not a goal worth absolutely any price. The potential prices in time travel scenarios extend up to destruction of the universe (in fiction; the only place I really know anything about time travel from).
Is this a world where such a thing has been achieved in the *present*?
I was thinking the same thing. And what about situations defined *today* as abusive, but not so then?
The example that jumps to my mind is Jackie Chan, who began Peking Opera School at age 6. In his autobiography, he says that the training he grew up with there would be impossible today, as it would be considered child abuse today. And yet, a world without Jackie Chan would seem impoverished. This is not an easy question.
Indeed. Or Jacques Pépin who was apprenticed at age 12 to a hotel kitchen.
Or really any number of apprentices across time.
Or really any number of apprentices across time.
As long as we're talking opera, what about the castrati? Eliminating them from the history of opera would serve the dual purpose of saving children and probably also promoting women's rights, as the demand for female sopranos would rise. However, it would look awfully suspicious if every boy destined to be castrated suddenly disappeared from captivity.
Yeah. Do I get to rescue Fanny and Rebecka Mendelssohn, or Maria Anna Mozart?
Either that would be rewriting history, which would be a horrendous crime on the scale of multiple omnicides (or even worse, if we're wiping out the whole Universe), or we're just creating alternative versions of the children in alternative timelines, leaving the originals behind. And if the timeline can't be tampered with at all, then it's just impossible, because we'd already know it would happen. Or maybe we're working with more complex off-road alternative timelines within a larger unchangeable meta-timeline that cause themselves to disappear from the timeline due to a future event returning everything back into the status quo ante chronofuck, which is also pointless.
I like the Kage Baker method of rescuing children 5 minutes before inevitable death. I think rescuing children who are otherwise viable would result in too many ripples.
Hmm. Does anyone know if KB ever read "Air Raid" by Varley?
I immediately thought of Air Raid/Millennium, too.
Yes, no, and maybe - insufficient data.
ding Exactly.
Why stop at children? Why stop at humans?
Why stop at children? Why stop at humans?
Yes, that's right...this poll is missing cats!
There are an inordinate number of men with beards in this conversation.
No, unless it were possible to know for sure that they'd never have had any descendants in their own time.
Even then, how far back can you go? How will we provide for them in the present day, not just in terms of subsistence but in terms of education and acclimatisation?
Even then, how far back can you go? How will we provide for them in the present day, not just in terms of subsistence but in terms of education and acclimatisation?
Define "abusive". Define "child". Define target species said "children" are members of.
(For example: does "abuse of children" cover neonates born with anencephaly (WARNING: graphic images) or other fatal neural tube defects who are being allowed to die?)
(For example: does "abuse of children" cover neonates born with anencephaly (WARNING: graphic images) or other fatal neural tube defects who are being allowed to die?)
Edited 2011-02-12 20:55 (UTC)
You unutterable fool!!1!! Aren't we DOOOOOOOOOOOOMed enough from staggering over population without dragging MORE potential breeders into the situation?!?11!
Actually, maybe we could transmit them into the depopulated, post-doomcrash future ...
The suffering makes them stronger.
(Also, most of the previous comments.)
(Also, most of the previous comments.)
Yes but what do you do with them then?
I note that others also mentioned affects on the time stream.
I note that others also mentioned affects on the time stream.
"A Modest Proposal" springs to mind.
Works for me. As long as we put them down humanely, we're saving them from a life stuffed up by abuse, and we have a near-inexhaustible food source. Tender, too.
Also, all animals being about to be killed by predators
Wondering if that was a tongue-in-cheek response, considering the ecological ramifications.
No, I'm serious. Fuck ecology. Once we have the power to do this, we have the responsibility to mend the horrible state of natural life once and for all. Without the time-travel element, this is an active topic in transhumanist thought.
See also Nikolai Fyodorov ... and contemplate the point that the Soviets got to the whole transhumanist agenda first, as noted by Ken MacLeod! (As in: once we have worked out how to colonize space and make ourselves immortal and brought about true communism abolished poverty, it is our duty to resurrect everyone who has ever lived and make them immortal too. Don't think small!)
Edited 2011-02-12 23:22 (UTC)
You almost made me autogodwinate in reply, but yeah, shoulders of giants and all that.
This is reminding me of the Harrowing of Hell.
I wish you had included another question on this poll, as I'd like to see how well the answers mapped. "Are/were you at any time an abused child?"
I also note that while the vast majority of commentors are of the No opinion, the current tally is 12 Yes, 9 No, and 11 Would Like To Complain.
I also note that while the vast majority of commentors are of the No opinion, the current tally is 12 Yes, 9 No, and 11 Would Like To Complain.
I was, by both the standards of the time as well as the standards of current childrearing theory. (abused, that is)
I voted against the plan, for a variety of reasons that will remain undiscussed at this time.
I voted against the plan, for a variety of reasons that will remain undiscussed at this time.
I was not in any sense I recognize (or any sense I think society would recognize) an abused child.
I voted "yes"; but as I hope my comment made clear, I think that if the full consequences of doing so were laid out, I would very likely have to change my vote to "no". It's a no-brainer "yes" so long as it's really "free", and no cost other than "inexpensive" is mentioned in the question, but of course any real situation wouldn't be; both direct immediate consequences (what having those children here would involve) and indirect consequences (time-stream questions) would have to be considered.
I voted "yes"; but as I hope my comment made clear, I think that if the full consequences of doing so were laid out, I would very likely have to change my vote to "no". It's a no-brainer "yes" so long as it's really "free", and no cost other than "inexpensive" is mentioned in the question, but of course any real situation wouldn't be; both direct immediate consequences (what having those children here would involve) and indirect consequences (time-stream questions) would have to be considered.
If I could go back in time and stop the root cause of childhood abuse among the females in my family with the assurance that each of us would still be born as a result, I would do it in a heartbeat.
Then again, the source of that abuse is what led to a hundred small choices which led to my sisters, and was the direct cause of the eventual reconciliation between my parents where I was the end result. Saving my elder sisters from abuse would mean wiping myself from history, resulting in paradox.
Then again, the source of that abuse is what led to a hundred small choices which led to my sisters, and was the direct cause of the eventual reconciliation between my parents where I was the end result. Saving my elder sisters from abuse would mean wiping myself from history, resulting in paradox.
I cannot say yes, I cannot say no. What actions do these abused children take, what interactions with them both at the time, and later in life, that caused events to flow such that the time traveler's present happened?
Contemplating removing people en mass from the timestream for good reason, is like waiting in one's vehicle at a train crossing, watching an oblivious child try to hurry across.
You know that if nothing happens, the child will be hit by the train.
You know that if you put your car in gear and drive between the child and train, you will destroy yourself, whatever your car hits... and the child might not be hit.
Perhaps a compromise would be to provide therapy, pull the child out of time, give them the ability to cope better, and put them back?
Incidentally, I just re-read Making Money. An obsessive, miserable, possibly Aspergers-suffering person was abducted and given an instant mind-fix by the use of a helpful Igor and a turnip. He became a well-adjusted, happy, content person... with absolutely no artistic talent whatsoever. Is it worth the disruption of all history to do this?
I can't say yes, I can't say no...
Contemplating removing people en mass from the timestream for good reason, is like waiting in one's vehicle at a train crossing, watching an oblivious child try to hurry across.
You know that if nothing happens, the child will be hit by the train.
You know that if you put your car in gear and drive between the child and train, you will destroy yourself, whatever your car hits... and the child might not be hit.
Perhaps a compromise would be to provide therapy, pull the child out of time, give them the ability to cope better, and put them back?
Incidentally, I just re-read Making Money. An obsessive, miserable, possibly Aspergers-suffering person was abducted and given an instant mind-fix by the use of a helpful Igor and a turnip. He became a well-adjusted, happy, content person... with absolutely no artistic talent whatsoever. Is it worth the disruption of all history to do this?
I can't say yes, I can't say no...
For the purposes of this poll, I am going to interpret "rescue" as including the possibility of altering events so that the abuse never takes place, rather than necessarily bringing them all forward to a nebulous future filled with highly trained foster parents.
No one else is going to make my kitchen as spotless as it should be.
l voted "no" at first, for the usual "You go to far!" reasons. Then l read the question again and answered "yes". After all, the question involves the caveat "possible"; this to me implies "where doing such won't cause problems with paradox, overpopulation, or other embarrassments". With that in mind, why not? Give 'em genetic enhancements and put ' em to work as time cops.
Clearly time travel should be used to make money, since only by pursuit of rational self interest can be we be truly moral, non-altruistic creatures.
Also, I could date Ayn Rand!
Also, I could date Ayn Rand!
I am reminded of Nancy Kress's "And Wild for to Hold" http://www.uchronia.net/bib.cgi/label.html?id=kresandwil , although in that case it was adults and the motivation is preventing wars rather than godawful childhoods...
Bruce
Bruce
Did Andrew Vachss write a time-travel novel?
...Card's novel along these lines would be about creepy authority figures using it to put kids INTO abusive situations so they can be heroic martyrs.
That wasn't Songmaster? (Oh, I guess not, no time travel.)
This mostly reminds me of Joanna Russ's "Bodies". That, and Gene Wolfe's "The Death of Hyle". Oh, and Kurt Vonnegut's bit somewhere about finding one's father in heaven and discovering that in heaven, he's a child. Then there's the conversation with the simulated HPLDian in "Altruizine" from Stanislaw Lem's Cyberiad. I think I'll stop there, although it's more pleasant to contemplate this than the characterizations in Death Note.
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