A Little Theory of Mine...

Well Google finally finds the place now, although I think it may have been finding it before (the problem seems to have been my search words). Stage 1 of my plans, which are almost a search in themselves, is complete. The line is cast.

Anyway, do you (again with my non-existent readers) believe in true randomness? Not random like the throwing of a die, if you were to know enough of the initial factors (throw speed, height, air density, gravity, exact shape of die including scratches etc) a dice throw could be perfectly predicted. Random as in a result that is completely unrelated to any factors, including, most importantly, time. If such true randomness exists, if you were to 'rewind' the universe, take everything back to the big bang, then 'play' it again, the universe would play out differently (odd how I think of it in terms of VCR controls). So if you went back in time, due to some truly random occurrences, no matter how small (look up the butterfly effect), the present and future would change. Its kind of hard to get the idea across. Imagine a complicated set of instructions for say, a ridiculously complicated souffle. Make the souffle once, and it works. When you go back to remake the souffle, one of the instructions changes randomly, leading to a different souffle at the end. Instead of a souffle though, this is the entire timeline of the universe. So where we are now, with our world, you at your computer, can be seen as the finished souffle. By restarting the universe from the exact same initial conditions, or 'rewinding' it back to the start it would be almost impossible to have the same result, or souffle. Unimaginable amounts of these 'truly' random events would occur, leading to a different souffle, or a different present time. The present time could be radically different or only slightly different depending on the severity of the effects of these 'random' events. Such an idea seems counter intuitive. Indeed, if it makes you feel more comfortable, nothing has been shown to be truly random, everything is dependent upon initial conditions. The only possible exception is quantum theory, which is still not entirely understood (and there is no confirmable proof that it is truly random as of yet). The issues with this belief is that it makes time travel completely impossible, as the mere act of traveling in time would change the present and the future and most likely preventing the time traveller from leaving in the first case. This belief does allow 'free' will to truly exist, as the future is not set in stone in this view.

Imagine the universe as a souffle

Imagine then that nothing is truly random. By 'rewinding' time and replaying it the same final results occur. This would seem more logical. If you repeat something exactly, you should get the same results (note when I say exactly I mean exactly, down to the location and properties of every single involved atom and sub atomic particle). So therefore, there is no alternative way of things happening. This is also hard to explain. The universe began with a set of initial conditions (how these initial conditions are set I will leave to you, it makes a useful spot to pop a deity in though). From this set of initial conditions there is only one solution, or result. So where we are now, where you are, is the only place you could be at this time. You could not be doing else apart from reading this, you could not be anywhere else. Of course your decisions have an effect, and I'm not saying you have no choice in the matter. It is just that you could not have made any other decisions or choices apart from those you made to get here. You do have free will, your decisions just could not have been anything different. In a way this view of things is comforting. Right from the beginning of the universe, you were 'meant' to be reading this. From the moment the universe began, there was no other place you could be. As I mentioned before, a deity fits in nicely here, as such a supreme and all powerful being would have ultimate power over our lives simply by setting the beginning conditions. The ideas of fate and destiny can also tie in with this view. Alternatively the initial conditions could themselves be the results of previous events, going back infinity without having a 'real' beginning. That is the problem with a world without randomness, everything is dependent on what happened before, making a true beginning impossible. It also means that the future is set in stone. What will happen will happen, and cannot happen any other way. If you fall off your chair, you had no 'real' way to avoid it.

Since the dawn of time, there has been no way of avoiding falling off your chair

So now what do you think of randomness? If you accept it exists, the future is not yet set, anything is theoretically possible (quite literally when dealing with 'true' randomness). If you believe that all times are set in stone, that 'rewinding' the universe will not affect the present, and discount 'true' randomness, than there is no other possibly set of events that could occur. Just something to think about.

Edit: After more investigation in different places, seems this idea is more widespread than I thought. It is called scientific determinism. The method I used to arrive at this conclusion however makes a firm assumption in time being constant at all places (allowing it to be 'rewound' so to speak and still being able to end up with the same result), which it is not. My other argument for this, that from a given action there can only be one result (so if an experiment is repeated perfectly the same result will be given each time), may also prove to be untrue (damn quantum theory), which I will explore more. Still, if you accept that 'restarting' the universe from the begining (exactly as it was) will end up with our current world each time, this remains the only logical conclusion.