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Future-telling machine


omthkkr
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Would it be useful if a future-telling machine was ever invented??

Because, it would just show the future, i.e, if it shows one is going to die tomorrow, from an accident for instance, he would have to live one day in grief, for if he tries to save himself from that cause, here by staying indoors, then that machine would prove ineffective, and if he does die like that, then he had to live 1 day in grief. So, the machine would not be useful as such, but still, you would know the future.

Comment on this paradox...make it clearer if you can.

Thanks

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If you could only see the future, it wouldn't help at all. If you saw anything bad, you would desperately try to prevent it, worsening and maybe creating the problem. If the information was given to the whole world, people would try to store up supplies, hoping to make it through the end of the world. They would hurt or kill other people to do so, again, making or maybe creating the problem.

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If the machine predicted the future as if you have not used the machine there is no paradox. Even if the universe is deterministic however, the machine would have to account for every variable in the universe apart from itself. This limitation could be reduced if you only wanted to see a certain distance into the future and provided that nothing moves faster than the speed of light*. If you wanted to see the future in a years time and you knew every variable in the bubble 1 light year from the machine.

What is really going to bake your noodle is if the human brain already does this to a limited ability and how we could could tell if it did.

*Does God travel faster than light?

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To answer your * question, God Himself doesn't travel faster than the speed of light, but His influence can, because it has no mass. At least, that's how it probably works.

Then the machine would not work unless God wills it to and we have no way of telling if it is working. All we can say is according to the machine this probably would happen if I hadn't used the machine. It also raises queries about fate and free-will depending if the machine is thought to be also able to predict the contents of the human mind.

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  • 2 months later...

2 comments.

1. Why do most take the negative view? What would happen if the future machine show a positive event? A future marriage, wealth enhancement etc. would that only lead to a good day as you know it is going to work out for you? Morality aside:

2. The problem, IMO, lies in the fact of what Phaze said, since the machine must look at every variable outside of itself then that must include the idea that the machine must also assume that the person themselves has no knowledge of the future as well and so, providing the individual with this knowledge introduces a variable that it has not calculated before meaning that the prediction it calculated prior to showing the future to the user is based on a different set of equations and thus is fundamentally not predicting the future of the person that knows. Now the way around this. I believe is a future machine that shows the future to a user of someone that the individual, even if they tried, could never impact. E.G. Showing a medieval knight the election of the prime minister of Malaysia in the year 2072 may be a safe.

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Showing a medieval knight the election of the prime minister of Malaysia in the year 2072 may be a safe.

I don't think even this idea would be safe, as the showing still changes the attitudes of the knight you could bring about the concept of democracy early in a feudal based society. This in turn could affect the prime ministers campaign and subsequent election. The only way to be sure that a small change in the past does not mess up the future indicated is to make sure that the two time periods cannot be related at all. If instead you showed the knight the election of the alien prime minister of a planet as at most many years in the future as light years away it might work. This is dependant on no causal relationship being able to travel faster than light

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Showing a medieval knight the election of the prime minister of Malaysia in the year 2072 may be a safe.

I don't think even this idea would be safe, as the showing still changes the attitudes of the knight you could bring about the concept of democracy early in a feudal based society. This in turn could affect the prime ministers campaign and subsequent election. The only way to be sure that a small change in the past does not mess up the future indicated is to make sure that the two time periods cannot be related at all. If instead you showed the knight the election of the alien prime minister of a planet as at most many years in the future as light years away it might work. This is dependant on no causal relationship being able to travel faster than light

Even then we would have to make sure the knight couldn't perceive or understand what they are seeing. It needs to be not only alien but incomprehensible.

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Even then we would have to make sure the knight couldn't perceive or understand what they are seeing. It needs to be not only alien but incomprehensible.

It depends on who is doing the showing. If aliens 2000 light years away have shown the knight the state of their electoral procedure 1999 years in the future then there is nothing the knight can do change that process as any communication the knight has sent a message to indicate that senator Palpatine is in fact Sith will arrive 1 year too late. No one can stop the dark side. From our viewpoint the knights view of the future has already happened.

If however we did the showing because we are not 2000 light years away from the knight, provided paradox does not ensue Hitler wins World War II after experiments in cloning.

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Even then we would have to make sure the knight couldn't perceive or understand what they are seeing. It needs to be not only alien but incomprehensible.

It depends on who is doing the showing. If aliens 2000 light years away have shown the knight the state of their electoral procedure 1999 years in the future then there is nothing the knight can do change that process as any communication the knight has sent a message to indicate that senator Palpatine is in fact Sith will arrive 1 year too late. No one can stop the dark side. From our viewpoint the knights view of the future has already happened.

If however we did the showing because we are not 2000 light years away from the knight, provided paradox does not ensue Hitler wins World War II after experiments in cloning.

I am unsure on this... if the knight perceives an event further away then could be arrived (ie. 2000 light years away from an event when <2000 light years from when the event started) then i still think a chaos event could still happen....here me out...If knight perceives an event, said event changes knights society, said society voyages to alien soiety and arrives well after the event has happened but informs alien race with astonishing accuracy the details of their historic election. All the while, the knight (or his decendents) are watching alien and human interaction based off his original observation.

Edited by BMAD
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@BMAD Even with your story about aliens paradox does not ensue, a causal event cannot be disrupted after the fact

The king drinks a chalice of wine and keels over dead.

Moments later a massager runs in at near light speed having foreseen this event an hour ago

Messenger: THE KING HAS BEEN POISONED!!

Jester: Kneel as I knight thee Sir State The Obvious

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