Time Travel

I know... I know... nothing new for a while...  Well, wizards lead busy lives you know...  Anyway...

Someone asked me the other day whether or not I felt that time travel was possible.  I mean, what kind of question is that to ask in the middle of a conversation about nothing in particular.  Well, in all honesty, I was waiting for my superhero character on DC Universe Online to heal.  So, I suppose it was as good as anything to ask while we stood there on a Gotham rooftop.  Anyway, so I thought, what an excellent topic to opine upon.  So...

I love the show Doctor Who, and I have since it started.  No, not in the last few years, but all the way back in 50's.  The entire series is awesome!  However, it is founded on a fundamental principal that is quite challenging: time travel.  The idea is easy, of course, but the truth of the idea is beyond complexity.  Set aside the amount of sheer power involved, whether under the laws of physics or magic, and you are left with how to control the passage through the temporal barrier as well as how to contain the rift necessary.  So many dynamic pieces to the equation, but there is a point above all else that must be acknowledged...

Time travel, as we think about it, is simply impossible or, at least, it ends up being a one way journey...  (Of course, time travel is forbidden by God save by Himself and those he chooses.  However, setting that aside...)

Let us create a scenario in which we assume time travel to be possible and feasible.  Our target, the elimination of Adolf Hitler.  We throw the switch or activate the spell, whatever, and here we go...

Now, we are in baby Adolf''s nursery, a gun in our hand.  We have no qualms, so, we end the monster-to-be's existence.  Now, a ripple occurs in time itself.  A wave of change travels forward to our future selves who are just getting ready to jump into the time vortex.  Suddenly, they have no clue as why they are heading to the past because the monster they were trying to kill never existed.  So, they never travel to the past to kill Hitler.  Thus, we vanish and the timeline repairs itself.  Hitler is born, and the whole thing starts over again.  Any moment we could choose to alter would correct itself back to its original pattern.  Absolutely maddening.  So, is time travel possible?  Sure... maybe... But, would it do you any good?  No.

Now, the truth of time travel is that it could only be done in such a manner that your efforts could change nothing, at all.  Otherwise, you run the risk of a temporal ripple that would erase what you are trying to do as described above.  However, remember that the addition of a single molecule or electron could cause an alteration. Of course, it might not.

There you go... clear as mud!