Time-turning

[Dana]

No: HPFGUIDX 167534

Carol responds:
> First, a quick question for you, Dana. Is "end time" your own term 
> or is it commonly used in scifi works relating to time travel? To 
> me, it sounds like the term used by certain cults or 
> Fundamentalists for the end of the world or Armageddon. (Just 
> curious, not criticizing.)
<snip>

Dana now:
I used it in the pretence of what I *consider* to be the end time but 
you can prefer to it as the final time or the last time standing 
after the time turning episode is over. Sorry if the use of such a 
simple word is still confusing. 

Carol:
> Also, as long as we're trying to make time travel logical (possibly 
> an exercise in futility given that logic isn't JKR's forte any more 
> than it's Harry's), let me ask you and Magpie and anyone else who's 
> protesting the *logic* (as opposed to the canon, Magpie! <wink>) of 
> the PoA Time-Turner sequence a question related to Hermione's 
> classes. 
<snip>
> I agree with what you've said here about Hermione (except that I 
> don'tunderstand why Hermione0 isn't labeled Hermione1, or how 
> Hermione0 differs from Hermione1).

Dana now:
Hermione0 is the one that lives through the timeframe the first time 
without the time-traveling self present, while I indicated Hermione1 
as the past self. I kept this in because I used it before but to give 
you an idea.

Hermione0= the Hermione creating the past by living through the first 
time
Hermione1= the historical record of Hermione0
Hermione2= the time-traveling Hermione0


Carol: 
> But why, in your view, doesn't Hermione just use the Time-Turner to
> make up the class that she slept through? Couldn't she just go back,
> say, four hours and attend Flitwick's class on Cheering Charms since
> she forgot to turn back and take it immediately before the class? 
> You say she's already changing time by going back to take her 
> classes, but if that's the case, why not change it a little bit 
> more by going back four hours instead of one? Is something 
> preventing her from turning back time once she's already missed the 
> class? 


Dana now: 

She could but the problem is that it raises a lot of problems if she 
goes back in time far. 

By the way to correct on thing in my previous post I said Hermione2 
stops to exist but it is actually hermione1 (the historical record)

The problem is that Hermione2 is the new present Hermione and the one 
that fell asleep after she finished the class. When Hermione1 reaches 
the point the original Hermione (Hermione0) choose to leap back in 
time from (just before entering Charms classes) Hermione2 should have 
been there to fill her place but Hermione2 was in the Gryffindor 
common room fast asleep. 

So let say the present Hermione goes back in time to retake charms 
class, then her past self will be asleep in the common room and the 
moment the present Hermione would leap back into the past, is after 
she already has been seen by Harry and Ron. So if she did this, then 
Ron and Harry see her in Charms class and then when they go up to the 
common room they see her laying there sleeping. That is why the 
present time Hermione can't go back in time because she would first 
need to drag her sleeping self somewhere she cannot be noticed to 
maintain the perception she only lived through time once and not be 
in two places at once. 

Her already missing the class has nothing to do with it because when 
Hermione uses the time turner to take a different class during that 
same timeframe, she has already missed the class Hermione2 will be 
attending. 

Her problem is her past self thus Hermione1 is not in a place during 
these specific hours to go unnoticed and therefore she can't go back 
and retake charms not because she can't time travel or not change the 
past, just that it would take to much effort and therefore not worth 
the risk.

Carol: 
> If that last is the case, not only would using a Time Turner to go
> back years instead of hours be clumsy and imprecise (how would you 
> getto the exact time you needed to go to? And you'd have to be in 
> the right place already), but you'd have to *live* those years as 
> Hermione lived those hours because there's no going forward in 
> time. And yet the Baby-Headed Death Eater and the hummingbird 
> suggest that that's not the case. 
<snip>

Dana now: 
Well I do not agree the time turner can go both ways so you do not 
have to live out the timeframe you went back to, if you just go to 
observe something and make sure you change nothing, the time turner 
can bring you back to your present time just a few minutes before 
your past self uses the time turner and you can go back to how things 
where. You are already part of the present thus the moment you use 
the device to transport yourself back to the present time, it will 
not leave a point in the past time you have to return to in order to 
move on with your life. 

If you would change something that would make the outcome in the 
present unpredictable then traveling back to your own time can result 
into some unpleasant surprises.

Both Harry and Hermione are not going back in time to just witness a 
certain event; they go back in time to actively participate in that 
timeframe. Harry to safe Buckbeak and Sirius (yes, Hermione is 
present in this as well) and Hermione to take a different class and 
therefore they will not need to travel to the present by means of a 
time turner.  

Carol now:
> Okay, now I'm a lot more confused than I was when I simply accepted
> what was on the page. But, IMO, we're overanalyzing here. 
<big snip>

Dana now:
Well maybe my logic just works differently because this is how I 
perceived it, the first time a read it. 

We are looking at one event from different angles but both are taking 
place in the timeframe of the time-traveler and what I dedicated to 
be the end time. 

The Harry, we the reader, see going to Hagrid and later to the 
Shrieking Shack is Harry1, the historical record of the Harry that 
lived through it the first time, and I refer to as Harry0. And after 
we reach the point he turns back in time, we go through the same 
timeframe again only this time we hitch a ride with Harry2, who is 
the time traveling Harry0.

Harry1 is just an historical record of the Harry who lived through 
this time already to create the past, that was made up out of all the 
events occurring that night. This Harry cannot change anything 
because he is not an active participant in this timeframe he is just 
retracing the steps already made but everything that changes in these 
already made steps, will therefore will be observed and automatically 
register and become a new memory for Harry2. 

JKR choose to write it this way because otherwise she would have had 
to write the events in its entire twice; one time for the original 
Harry and then for his historical record. The dramatic value of the 
scene would be totally lost because everyone would have already known 
that it was not his father that he could have seen, because in the 
first time around that person was not present. 

If you look at the scene where Hermione, Harry and Ron are about to 
enter Charms Class then you see that Harry and Ron suddenly realize 
Hermione is no longer there. She was right behind them and suddenly 
she was gone. This was also the end time, where the original Hermione 
had chosen to use the time turner, just before entering the class but 
because the time traveling Hermione fails to show up to fill in the 
place of her historical self, there is suddenly no Hermione at all.

In this case the present was not altered by something the time 
traveler did in the past time but her sudden disappearance, indicates 
the point she choose to go back in time and the past or historical 
record can't live past that point. It was not an active choice to 
choose that moment and then go to the Gryffindor tower to sleep. It 
was a record of what had already occurred an hour before. 

The problem is that one should not compare the time turning of the 
Potterverse with physics but only look at it from within the universe 
of Harry Potter and in the way this is written, there is no 
inconsistency. There for time should not be looked at from a linear 
point of view but from a relative one. 

With the Hermione missing the charms class, JKR already lets the 
reader know, they are witnessing a historical record of Hermione 
because otherwise she would not have suddenly disappeared. Hermione 
would not time travel to go take a nap and she most certainly would 
not time travel to miss the charms class. 

In the way JKR writes it, history is already made previously and we, 
the reader, are witnessing the historical record when we are in the 
Harry1 (the past self) narrative, then when he reaches the point he 
jumped back in time, JKR changes to the narrative to Harry2 and we 
witness what he and Hermione have changed while they were there. 

One is only overanalyzing the scene if you cannot accept that Harry 
did not have to safe Harry in order for the events to unfold the way 
they did. Why would one even question it, just because Harry2 changed 
the way Harry lived through the events does not mean it is therefore 
an illogical occurrence. It only becomes illogical if you 
drag "history cannot be changed" into the equation. It CAN be changed 
and we both see Hermione do it all year by taking classes that run 
parallel to other classes on her list and we see Harry do it with 
saving Buckbeak, saving himself (while not necessary but of great 
dramatic value and my personal favorite after the shrieking shack 
scene) and setting Sirius free. 

One could argue that setting Sirius free is not changing the past but 
they do set him free before the moment they go back in time so 
essentially it is still within the same time frame and it makes it 
possible for them to return to the hospital before Fudge and his 
dementor reaches Sirius and of course seeing Snape lose it, is so 
much fun too ;o)

Dana