FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS BY NEW TIME TRAVELERS

Q: Will traveling to the past destroy the present, due to the “butterfly effect,” which they made several movies about (2004, 2025, 2034, etc.)?

A: No. Those films were based on a speculative understanding of time travel that, thankfully, is not accurate. In reality, any temporal machinery—including the state-of-the-art FC3000™ rental-market time machine—creates a new “timeline,” or sequence of events, with each trip back in time. Observe the following illustration:

Figure 2: Traveling through time with the FC3000™.

Each trip to the past creates a new event sequence for the world, beginning with the intrusion of the time machine into history. In effect, with each trip back in time, you are creating a “what-if” universe, all proceeding from the premise of “what if a time traveler came back and visited this particular time in a state-of-the-art FC3000™ rental-market time machine?” When you return home, your FC3000™ will travel through space, time, and timelines, always returning you to your original, unaltered history.

Figure 3: Returning back home with the FC3000™.

Put simply, even the most egregious time traveler cannot affect the present, but merely an alternate one created by their time traveling. Feel free to step on as many butterflies as you see fit.

Q: Can I interact with my past self?

A: Yes. It is not recommended. You will likely notice you do not look as good from behind as you thought. Please note that despite the FC3000™ offering travel to any point in human history, the first instinct many clients have is to arrange an encounter with their past selves. We respectfully suggest that the FC3000™ was built to explore time, to better understand the origins of humanity and the potential of ourselves and our world, and that choosing to visit yourself suggests you sincerely believe you are the most interesting person on the planet in any time period. By definition this can only be accurate in one case and is therefore likely not accurate in yours. We invite you to reconsider.

Q: Can I give my past self lottery numbers?

A: Any lottery numbers you give will benefit another you, and not you personally.

Q: Can I give my past self lottery numbers, and then kill my past self and take their place, so that the lottery winnings go to me instead?

A: Yes. However, you may have to answer to the authorities in that time period.

Q: Will being rich in the past make me happy?

A: It might.

Q: If not my past self, then whom should I visit?

A: The expanse of human history spreads out before you, awaiting your curious and empathetic gaze. That said, as part of our legally mandated commitment to customer satisfaction at Chronotix Solutions, we have created several Chrononaut’s Choice pamphlets, which you will find stored beneath your seat in the FC3000™. Each includes not just background information and space-time coordinates for one of our many artisanally selected points in history, but also the descriptions of the specific historical personages and precise sentences you must say to them in order to be swept up in an epic adventure. Popular pamphlets include How to Get Michelangelo, Rembrandt, and Vincent van Gogh to Paint Your Portrait for Free; Choose Your Side in the Battle of Marathon!; Join the Roanoke Colony and See What Happens; and 1001 Wacky Places to Shoot Adolf Hitler. Follow our guide, or feel free to go off-script whenever you want.

Q: If every time I travel back in time it creates a new alternate timeline, so nothing I can do affects my own timeline, then isn’t time travel pointless?

A: If going back in time did affect the original universe we all come from, then it would be wildly irresponsible to rent out time machines willy-nilly to members of the general public. Alterations are not pointless, however: remember that these alternate timelines you create in your travels are identical to ours in every way, except with the addition of you, the time traveler. The people in these new timelines are, by any measure, just as real as the people you know in your own timeline.

Q: Wait. If that’s true, aren’t there hugely staggering ethical implications to the idea that we can create whole alternate realities—entire universes just as valid as our own and filled with just as many people (more, actually, since now there’s an extra time traveler there!)—simply for the purpose of entertainment?

A: We have several ethicists on staff who have assured us, in no uncertain terms, that this is totally fine. In addition, please keep in mind that these alternate realities are not just for the purpose of entertainment. They have also been used for mining and resource extraction.

Q: What if something goes wrong with my FC3000™ time machine?

A: The FC3000™ is the most reliable time machine on the rental market today. However, as with any activity involving unstable Einstein-Rosen bridges constructed across disparate spatial/temporal reference frames, there are always risks. In the event of a catastrophic failure of your FC3000™, please refer to the convenient Repair Guide, which follows this page and makes up the bulk of this volume.