Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Physics

Tag Area: Time-Related Situation
Short Story

All the Myriad Ways

Detective-Lieutenant Gene Trimble suspects that the recent spate of suicides and violent crime is somehow connected to the discovery that the many worlds interpretation of quantum physics is real and each of those worlds can be traveled to. —Michael Main
There were timelines branching and branching, a mega-universe of universes, millions more every minute. Billions? Trillions? Trimble didn’t understand the theory, though God knows he’d tried. The universe split every time someone made a decision. Split, so that every decision every made could go both ways. Every choice ever made by every man, woman and child on Earth was reversed in the universe next door.
Pen-and-ink drawing of multiple overlapping images of a man with a gun sitting at a desk.
  • 1969 Hugo
  • Science Fiction
  • Mystery and Crime
  • No Time Phenomena
Novelette

Iterations

  • by William H. Keith, Jr.
  • in Past Imperfect, edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Larry Segriff (DAW Books, October 2001)
An accident near a black hole has seemingly doomed Kevyn Shalamarn along with her copilot and her AI, until they are pulled into a far future that could have been inspired by Frank Tipler’s Omega Point cosmology. The trip to the future seems to be in the domain of relativistic time dilation rather than time travel, and it’s unclear whether the trip back is actual time travel or some form of quantum physics mashed up with simulations. —Michael Main
The goal of this device is nothing less than complete knowledge, knowledge of everything that ever has been, that ever will be, that ever could be.
A warped gold pockewatch with Arabic numerals and a separate second hand on its own dial.
  • Science Fiction
  • Debatable Time Travel
Short Film

Aether

  • written and directed by Jerry Brown, Jr.
  • (Youtube: SuperEpic Channel, 2 April 2018)
At the moment when the speedometer on the Aether spaceship clicked over from .999999c to 1.00000c, a collective cheer erupted up in the ITTDB Citadel. Was it a jaw-dropping dramatic moment? Seems unlikely, but we were looking for something to cheer for in this cryptic story of three men who headed to the future via relativistic time travel, only to find themselves trapped in post-apocalyptic outer space and quantum technobabble. —Michael Main
It nullifies Gödel’s theorem.
Drawing of three astronauts with an abstract background of clouds, outspace, and the word "Aether" in a red, star-filled circle.
  • Science Fiction
  • Debatable Time Travel
Novel

The Midnight Library

  • by Matt Haig
  • (Canongate Books, August 2020)
After thirty-something Nora Seed kills herself, she arrives as a possibly metaphorical library with an infinite number of books containing her possible lives, each one of which she may try out, always starting on the night of her suicide.

For me, the depiction of Nora’s suicidal ideation and eventual killing of herself were dismissive of those who face depression every day, and the outcome was fictionally romanticized in a way that may induce suicide rather than showing understanding and encouragement to seek out help when life is dark. I don’t see this as intentional by the author. —Michael Main
“Every life contains many millions of decisions. Some big, some small. But every time one decision is taken over another, the outcomes differ. An irreversible variation occurs, which in turn leads to further variations. These books are portals to all the lives you could be living.”
A stylized, four-story, white library with a silhouette of a cat and text to the side stating, "One library. Infinite lives."
  • Fantasy
  • Debatable Time Travel