The Novikov Self-Consistency Principle

So we continue in our intellectual deluge today on the source material for A Cornish Mess & Other Stories Loosely Revolving Around The Notion of Time. We now come to some of the paradoxical situations that might arise in time travel. One of which is something known as the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle. First though, we should look at who came up with the principle as he will be a member of the story yet to be titled.

Igor Dmitriyevich Novikov is a Russian theoretical Astrophysicist and cosmologist. He was born in Moscow in 1935. Now the nature of Novikov's studies is fascinating but dizzyingly above the head of your author so I'll only be taking notice of the few bits that I can understand. He's written some good books that I've dusted up my Russian on... just kidding. But, one of his books is called the River of Time. In this book he tackles how physics and our understanding of it has impacted our conception of time. Physics is one of those studies, like the aforementioned mathematics that I find to be wanting in when I am weighed and measured. But, some of it's technicality is broken down well by Novikov and brought to just inside my reach of intellectual capabilities. Not, the whole of it mind you, but pieces that are intriguing enough for me to weave some sort of tale out of it.

First, in his work he talks about how time stops in black holes. Second, it talks about how it bends over white holes. Who knew there was such a thing as a white hole? Essentially a White Hole is the opposite of a black hole. Things can enter into a black hole but cannot escape. Things can escape a white hole but not enter in. Fascinating. Dizzying. But then he gets into some more technical areas like how time can be converted into space and space into time in certain cases and begins to lose me. But, I understand the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle well enough, I think, to make a little light story out of it.

The Novikov Self-Consistency Principle solves for us the Grandfather Paradox of Time Travel and paints a movie favorite of mine in a little bit of a negative light. The Grandfather Paradox basically goes what happens when a time traveler goes back in time and inadvertently or intentionally kills his grandfather. (Why would you kill your grandfather intentionally escapes me). If the time traveler did this he would bring his own existence into jeopardy, because without a grandfather there is no father or mother and thus, no grandson or granddaughter and thus the time traveler would not exist to go back in time to jeopardize his own existence. Marty McFly does this when he pushes his father out of the way of his grandfather's car thus negating the Florence Nightingale effect that causes his mother to fall in love with his father. "He hit me with the car..." Marty relates to Doc. "This is heavy". So, what the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle states is that it is impossible for someone to go back in time and alter history in such a way that would jeopardize future events. If it is happening then it was supposed to happen and the present time traveler actually had a imperative role to play in the past that they traveled back to. Kind of like Meg Ryan going back in time to be with Hugh Jackman so that Hugh Jackman could invent the elevator in Kate and Leopold. Big fan of both of you by the way! So, Back to the Future fails the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle test, but Kate & Leopold holds it up.

So where is the story?

What if the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle is wrong. What if instead of it being the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle, Novikov's publisher accidentally mistypes his hypothesis when translating it into English and it comes out the Self Novikov-Consistency Principle. The paper gets published that way and when Time Travel is invented in 1990 by one of his Copenhagen students they go back in time and encounter a grandfather paradox situation and suddenly the time traveler is changed into a Novikov double. The next day in class Novikov notices that one of his student's strangely resembles his younger self. Repeat this three times and suddenly Novikov begins to figure out what is happening. He tries to go back in time to stop the transformation of the first student thinking that he could reverse the situation this way, but is prevented because any action he takes to change the new Novikovs back into their former selves is prevented by the Novikov Self-Consistency Principle because Novikov thinks in Russian, not English. There ends up being no solution and Novikov is forced to contend with various aged versions of himself existing contemporaneously. The story should end with Novikov imploring his students to proofread their papers thoroughly before submitting them for grading.