Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"All fiction is propaganda, and the fiction we like is the propaganda we believe in, and the fiction we don't like is the propaganda we don't believe in."
- Samuel R. Delany
 |
| Time Loop | ||
| A series of events repeats, the stream crosses over itself. |
First use of this phrase in science fiction, as far as I know.
| The voice went on after Dakin had signified assent: “I mentioned last time that instinct is repetition simply because time is a looped repetition. Memory is another abstract quality hard to define, unless one thinks of reliving every instant over and over as often as the time loop curls back on itself. Why do we remember some things in our childhood vividly, and forget other events completely a week after happening? Simply — yet not so simply — because the successive loops of time are overlapping in places, far apart in others.
 ( ’The Time Entity’ by Eando Binder) “You must think of time as unwinding from a spool, and retaining, like wire, its tendency to curl into loops. Time reels off steadily from the spool, but, after its looping, it falls into a systematic order of intertwined spirals. Wherever the loops touch or lie partly together, you have memory repetitions and instinct repetitions. The former are conscious, the latter subconscious. “Now any repeated event — where the time loops touch or overlap — has happened only once, yet many times! If you can think of the time wire as braided with three strands — and call those strands past, present, and future — an event can easily happen in all three periods at the place of overlapping loops. And if you multiply the pasts and presents and futures, because they shift position as the time wire reels out, any single event becomes an endlessly repeated oneness! Do you follow me?” |
| Technovelgy from The Time Entity,
by Eando Binder. Published by Astounding in 1936 Additional resources -
|
Another early example of the time loop idea can be found in Forever is Today by Charles F. Ksanda, published in Thrilling Wonder Stories in 1946:
The silver sphere began to move away from the basin. It swung slowly on its cable upward along the metal arc toward the center of the room...
Carsten spoke again, and once more seemed to enjoy his role of lecturer.
“The silver sphere before you is a perfect pendulum, its motion exactly adjusted by magnetic currents in the metal rail beneath it. The length of the time loop varies directly with the rate at which the sphere passes through the basin. The sphere actuates the force which will warp time into a loop coinciding exactly with the span of my life.”
( ’Forever is Today’ by Charles F. Ksanda)
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Time Entity
More Ideas
and Technology by Eando Binder
Tech news articles related to The Time Entity
Tech news articles related to works by Eando Binder
| Can Stratospheric Aerosol Injection Control The Weather? |
| Wolfram Alpha Mathematica Predicted by Science Fiction in 1948! |
| Special Lights For Driverless Cars! |
| 'Old People Began to Cross The Continent In Their Own Cars' |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'Space-sickness is one of the most unpleasant sensations that a human being can experience. Not all are subject to it...'
'...I saw a nice black heavy-looking cloud sailing by just now, and I can get the electrical machine out in five minutes to draw it down.'
'From a distance it could resolve the cosmic rays reflected from various substances.'
'The answer to the dumb student's prayer.'
'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
