“This is the weirdest thing we’ve ever done.” - Harry to Hermione, PoA, pg. 291, UK paperback

When I read PoA, I just couldn’t get a clear view of the Time Turner. Even in a magical world, it seems somehow out of place. Have you noticed how theories building on the Time Turner always tend to get slippery at a certain point? Thinking this through, a troubling suspicion came to mind: could it be that Time Turning is always a paradoxical act? If so, this would have bleak implications for all HP-sleuthing involving the Time Turner. Just like discussing a squared circle, building theories on the Time Turner would prove utterly pointless.

To my disappointment, I never found a satisfying treatment of the Time Turner in Harry Potter writing. The account given in Level 9 does make a few good points, but seems to miss real depth; Maline Fredén (as always) has written some very convincing things about it, but never a full treatment; an article by Bobby Jones is by far the best I’ve seen thus far, but he presents a vastly negative appreciation. In this article I’ll try to sketch a way to really come to terms with the Time Turner. [Editors' note: Philosophy professor Michael Silberstein's excert from Harry Potter and Philosophy also addresses this subject, but was posted after this editorial was sent to us.]

A true classic on the subject of time travel is David Lewis’ "The Paradoxes of Time Travel," published in his Philosophical Papers, Volume II. The topics discussed in this brief and insightful article remain to be the focal topics of all later academic discussions of time travel. It is astonishing how very similar the academic writing on the subject is to discussions in HP-sleuthing. What I set out to do here is actually little more than to give an HP-version of the classic by Lewis, so if you’re really interested, skip this one and turn to the original.

Is Time Turning Possible?

Of course time travel isn’t possible, empirically: in the world as we know and experience it, it can’t (yet) be done. But is it logically possible? Can we imagine a consistent, possible world wherein it is possible? Doesn’t time travel lead to contradictions?

Some HP-readers have proposed a more dimensional time scheme or some sort of branching timeline. It’s not clear to me how they relate to each other exactly. Indeed, much of the time traveling models you’ll find in philosophical literature propose some model of this kind. However, I don’t think it’s Rowling’s model -- there really are no indications of a time scheme other than time as we know it. Without going in to this too far, there also are serious difficulties in using this kind of time travel model:

1) Although perfectly intelligible, it’s very hard to conceive multiple dimensions of time. For those familiar with mathematics: it’s a bit like imagining a four-dimensional cube (a hypersquare). Perfectly consistent (mathematicians can work with it without encountering contradictions), but very hard to get your head around. Only highly defiant Science Fiction stories -- for an incrowd of scientists -- would get away with it.

2) As for branching timelines, there’s something annoying about the way it works in fiction. Suppose this would be the model used in PoA -- it would mean that there are (among many many others) two universes: one in which Harry and Sirius are dead -- one in which they live. After the use of the Time Turner, we only get to see the second universe. You couldn’t help but feel sorry for the ‘original’ Harry and Sirius, and wonder what would happen to Ron and Hermione in this universe.

Let’s stick with a one-dimensional time scheme, or time as we know and experience it. Then the verdict is this: it is possible to travel back in time, but it’s impossible to change the past. Rowling’s model fits in perfectly.

Why is it impossible to alter the past? The claim is fairly straightforward: changing a past event is a contradiction in terms (like a ‘square circle’ or a ‘married bachelor’). Take a look at a model in which the past really would be altered:

‘The first time’, Buckbeak was killed -- but when Harry and Hermione went back in time, they prevented his execution. Buckbeak ‘used to be’ dead -- before the use of the Time Turner -- ‘now’ he is not.

Think this through, and you’ll find it to be nonsensical: the terms ‘used to’ and ‘now is’ cannot be applied to one given moment in time. If you ever saw "Back To The Future," this thought may have occurred to you (how come things only changed after the time traveling, the changes being made years ago?).

If you’re not convinced, here’s a more elaborate answer why the sentence ‘to change the past’ is nonsensical:

1) Change always implies time.

Take an Animagus changing from a human form into an animal. This happens instantly, but still implies some time passing, however small. One moment he’s a wizard, next thing you know he’s a dog. ‘A nonzero amount of time’ has passed.

It is possible to imagine a world without time, but it would always mean imagining a world without change. Think of it as pressing the pause button on your video recorder: you freeze both time and movement (of the world in the film of course). In order to change the image you see again, you will necessarily have to push the play button (letting time pass again).

2) Changing the past would suggest change without any passing of time.

Changing the past means altering the content of a certain point in time. Take one such a point in time: say I see someone getting hit by a bus at one time (T1). At a later moment in time (T3), I go back to (T1), and prevent the accident from happening. The events ‘contained’ in (T1) have changed from a bus hitting a person, to a bus innocently driving by. The change has occured within (T1). (As Lewis would put it: (T1) doesn’t have temporal parts -- if you were to imagine this, you unwillingly have to subdivide (T1) into (T1) and (T1’) -- this, of course, is just postponing the problem]

3) Hence: Changing the past is a paradoxical notion.

Of course, nothing changes with the use of the Time Turner. The genius of Rowling’s story is that the illusion of change is created entirely by means of perspective. We get to see the story through the eyes of Harry; and to him, it is as if they save Buckbeak and Sirius. A God's eye view would reveal nothing has changed.

It’s important to keep the two separated, not to confuse Harry’s experience of the situation with a neutral perspective (it’s interesting to see how general HP-sleuthing is also becoming ever more aware of the ‘Harry-filter’). From Harry’s (or Hermione’s) perspective, it does make sense to say ‘the first time Buckbeak this’ and ‘the second time Buckbeak that' because he has actually experienced the events twice.

Fatalism

Here’s the tricky part. Let’s put on Harry’s glasses for a moment. When he goes back in time, what he will do must be determined beforehand, because it has already happened. He is not free to do what he wants, he can only do what he has already done. So why is Hermione warning him all the time not to do it (which would be like warning someone never to drink dry liquids)?

But why wouldn’t Harry be able to, for instance, grab Wormtail while he was trying to get away? What would possibly stop him? The opportunity certainly is there, he has the required abilities, his body is solid, he doesn’t experience himself being controlled by some sort of Imperius Curse...Do we have to imagine a sort of short-circuit occurring if Harry were to grab Scabbers?

When we think about whether something is possible, says Lewis, we tend to take into account certain facts: Does he have the ability and the opportunity to do so? From this point of view, Harry could easily have grabbed Scabbers. But when time traveling, there’s another factor to be taken into account: The fact that it has already been done. If Harry would have a clear view of the situation, he would be thinking: "I haven’t seen myself grabbing Scabbers earlier on, so, apparently, I won’t do it now."

It’s hard to get this across in fiction, to get the reader to escape from his normal appraisal of a situation, and include a strange factor (i.e., it has already been done). We are accustomed to ignore the last factor, because we simply can’t look into the future. The problem, in short, is this: What could possibly stop Harry from grabbing Scabbers? The answer is: He apparently doesn’t (Harry2’s standpoint), or hasn’t done it (Harry1’s standpoint). It would take pages to explain this and would really kill the suspense. That’s why Rowling chose, for the time being, for a less elegant solution...to make Hermione stop him.

“What’s to stop him? The forces of logic will not [stop him]! No powerful chaperone stands by to defend the past from interference. (To imagine such a chaperone, as some authors do, is a boring evasion, not needed to make [the] story consistent.)" (Lewis, pg. 75)

Of course, Hermione is the boring chaperone here. Her warnings not to change the past are entirely superfluous. Never has time traveling gone terribly wrong when a time traveler killed his past or future self. Rowling (willingly or not) has let a fault slip in here. I know I’m not making friends with this, but since the Marc Evans incident, we just have to face the fact that Rowling isn’t entirely perfect.

As I see it, you have the choice between two alternatives:

1) You won’t accept that Rowling is only human and can make mistakes. Then you’ll have to take into account the possibility of the past being changed. Since this is paradoxical, as I have tried to point out, you have to live with a paradox at the very heart of PoA. Read Bobby Jones' article, and you’ll understand how this contradiction could spread like a cancer, and be the dead blow to the entire series, and all theory building.

2) You accept Hermione’s warnings are just a mistake, and get a completely consistent time travel model in return. First of all, it’s an excusable mistake, since it offers a solution to the dramatic problem suggested above (how to explain why Harry can’t grab Scabbers). But secondly, the mistake is even rectified a few pages later! Remember that at the point where Harry2 sees Harry1 attacked by the dementors, and doesn’t see his father coming to the rescue, he ignores Hermione’s warnings, proving them to be indeed superfluous. He acts spontaneously and impulsively, and nothing goes wrong.

You may find this fatalism troubling -- it can really mess up your head if you think about it too much. However, take off Harry’s glasses and nothing that extraordinary is going on! You just see two Harrys acting spontaneous simultaneously, not having to worry about changing the past.

The Grandfather Paradox

The Grandfather Paradox is a special, more convincing case of what I’ve sketched above. The term refers to a scenario in Lewis’ article, in which one Tim goes back in time to kill his own grandfather. Of course this is not possible. By killing his grandfather, he would prevent himself from being born and growing up to go back in time and kill his own grandfather. The same story is behind a peculiar warning Hermione gives to Harry:

“Professor McGonagall told me what awful things have happened when wizards have meddled with time...Loads of them ended up killing their past or future selves by mistake!" (PoA, pg. 292)

Because this is so obvious a case of contradictory time traveling, lots of fans have concluded that Rowling must have made a mistake here. Hermione’s warning is superfluous, because it is impossible to kill one’s own self, or to prevent oneself from being born. On MuggleNet’s Level 9, this is given as a general rule: "You cannot do anything that would prevent you from going back in time to do it." I have argued for a far more general rule: "nothing can happen that hasn’t already happened." You can never kill your past self, because that would always imply changing the past!

In other words, sorry, no bringing Sirius back to life with the Time Turner.

Causal Loops

"Harry, I can't believe it...You conjured up a Patronus that drove away all those dementors! That's very, very advanced magic.”
“I knew I could do it this time," said Harry, "because I'd already done it...Does that make sense?"
"I don't know..." - Hermione to Harry, PoA, pg. 301

Typical in time traveling is backward causation. Ordinarily, causality proceeds forwards: I punch you in the face, and moments later, your eye blackens. Suppose now I punch you in the face, just before you step into a time machine, and travel back to yesterday. Then, my punch now causes your eye to blacken yesterday -- backward causality (this is Lewis’ example)!

Backward causation is just as consistent as normal, forward, causation. The unlucky time traveler, the receiver of the punch, only sees normal (forward) causation. From his point of view, he gets punched in the face, and moments later, his eye blackens. From a God’s eye view the causation happens backward. We see the black eye, and learn the cause of it one day later.

But things can get confusing when forward and backward causation are embedded in a causal chain. The causal loop in PoA goes as follows:

Harry1, having little confidence in his ability to conjure a Patronus, sees his older self (Harry2) conjuring a Patronus. Having seen this, he gains the confidence needed to conjure a Patronus later (when Harry1 has aged to become Harry2). This Patronus (of Harry2) not only drives away the dementors, it also causes Harry1 to gain confidence -- which makes him able to conjure. (There’s also the thrill of realizing he confused himself for his own father -- a euphoric thought -- making him able to produce the Patronus. Maybe this could be a attractive solution to the circularity, I’m not sure.)

This doesn’t seem to make any sense. Every event in this chain has its cause, and every effect is itself the cause of another effect. Nothing inexplicable happens as long as you look at it one event at a time. However, when you look at the whole story, you’ll ask yourself: Where did the knowledge, the confidence, the ability come from?

Now, does this make sense? I think it does. OK, something happens without a cause -- that’s unusual to say the least -- but not impossible. It’s not something we encounter in everyday life -- it could be an empirical impossibility. But what’s the difficulty in imagining a consistent world in which events have no cause (smoke without fire, people disappearing for no reason at all, bulldozers falling out of the sky, etc.)? Lewis points out that we don’t even have to look that far if we’re looking for uncaused events:

“Strange! But not impossible, and not too different from inexplicabilities we are already inured to. Almost everyone agrees that God, or the Big Bang, or the entire infinite past of the universe, or the decay of the tritrium atom, is uncaused and inexplicable. Then if these are possible, why not also the inexplicable causal loops that arise in time travel?” (Lewis, pg. 74)

Time Turning is strange business; strange things are bound to happen with it, like the spontaneous ability to conjure up a Patronus. This is probably the weirdest thing we’ve ever seen in the series. Weird, but not impossible.

"The Paradoxes of Time Travel," Philosophical Papers Volume II (1986; Oxford U.P.) Click here for a summary of Lewis' ideas.

10/31/04

Posted by: Sara