Time-turning (was: Snape and DADA)

[naamagatus]

No: HPFGUIDX 112578

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "cubfanbudwoman" <susiequsie23 at s...> wrote:
> SSSusan here:
<snip>
> In 112343 Naama, responding to my question, wrote:
> >>>SSSusan:  So, in JKR's version of TT, you can only go back and see 
> things as they happened from a different perspective; you're not 
> really CHANGING the events and doing them over. Did I at least get 
> that much right??
> Naama:
> I don't think so <g>. If that were so, why was Hermione so seriously
> warned against changing time? My understanding of JKR's form of TT
> is that it *is* possible to change time.<<<
> 
> 
> SSSusan AGAIN NOW:
> See?  We're back to different definitions of what TT is, how it can 
> or can't work.  Hannah, PK, and Tylerswaxlion all seemed to agree 
> that I *had* gotten it right as to JKR's version of TT:  that the 
> past doesn't CHANGE as a result of TT, but that the two time-threads 
> co-existed all along, only one of the two "versions" of a person 
> wasn't aware of the 2nd "version" being present.  Yet here we have 
> others saying that's NOT the way JKR is doing it--that she IS using 
> TT to change time/events/the past.
> 

Actually (if by "others" you mean me), that's *not* what I meant. What Harry and Hermione 
did was *not* changing the past. I think it might make it clearer if we think about DD when 
he sent Harry and Hermione back in time. Did he see Buckbeak being executed (i.e., the thud 
of the ax was decapitation and Hagrid howled with misery) OR did he see Buckbeak gone? 
Based on *the text* we know that there is dire warnings against using the TT to change the 
past. We also know that DD takes the limits of knowledge seriously (there's that line about 
the difficulty of predicting the future). Would he have sent the two to *change* what he had 
seen, with his own eyes, to occur? I.e., if he had seen Buckbeak decapitated, would he have 
sent H & H to save him? To me, the answer is obviously "no." So, that means that when DD 
sent them on their mission, he knows (having just seen it) that Buckbeak had not been 
killed. *Therefore*, his sending H & H back is not to change the past, but to fulfill it. 

(Susan, maybe telling the story from DD's point of view to your daughter could help her 
understand that Buckbeak never had died?)

However, I do think that as a genenral theory of TT, in JKR's scheme it is possible to 
change time - again, for the simple reason that we are told that it is possible to do so. 

I think we must remember that this is fiction, not reality. In reality, the past can't be 
changed because such a change is paradoxical ("which is absurd..." - used to disprove an 
argument). In fiction, the author may be unaware of the paradox, or may simply not care to 
deal with it. JKR is not a Science Fiction writer. How well do we know that she doesn't pay 
much attention to coherence when it comes to arithmetics (number of students, Bill's age, 
etc.). In the same way, I don't think that she went to great lengths to explore her own 
notion of TT, and checking it's coherence. Changing time is possible, but what does it 
*mean* in JKR's world? I wish we knew, but I'm pretty sure that it's pretty vague in JKR's 
mind. Which is why I don't think there's much point in elaborating much on the Potterverse 
TT. It won't come all neat and tidy like. 



Naama