Would you go back in time to change an event?

[Panda]

[QUOTE]The Moving Finger writes;
and having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
-The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam[/QUOTE]

If you were given the ability to go back in time, what event or thing would you change in your life?

I have thought about this probably more than I should. I have a few mistakes that I wish I could go back in time to change. Should have studied harder in school, shouldn't have gone on that date with Frank , should have spent more time with my grandparents before they past away...there is a lot of things I would like to change. I would say the number one thing on my list would be helping a friend of mine who commited suicide.

I feel like if I would have been a better friend he may not have killed himself. I had no idea that he was having so many problems and I wish I could have been there to help him. I miss him so much. We were best friends in Junior High and High School but grew apart when I went to college. I would see him on breaks, but we didn't have the same relationship when we would get together. I just thought it was because of our time apart, not because he was having problems in his life. He kept it hidden from me, and that makes me sad. If I could go back, I would spend more quality time with him and not just "goofing around" towards the end.

Hindsight is 20/20 and I wish I could go back to let him know how important he was, and still is to me. It makes me think of a quote by Claudia Grant in Robotech: "Don't let too much time go by before you tell him how you feel." I am glad I at least gave him a big hug, said I loved him and to take care the last time I saw him. At least I have that memory since I can't go back in time to try to change things. :)

So, if you were given the chance to travel back in time to change something, what would it be?

[Jagan]

I would. I'd tell my friends how much they mean to me and my girlfriend(?) what she is to me. I'd probablly change the Osama bin Laden escape so we could get him, but it always affects the future. Read a sound of thunder by ray bradbury.

[Corey]

[size=1][color=#2F4F4F]Though I've thought about this on more than one occasion, I doubt I would ever want to go back and change anything. The movie 'The Butterfly Effect' did a good job of illustrating the probable effect of time incursions, but I suppose that some changes would be far worse (or far better) depending on what it was you were changing.

To do ultimately good things by changing the past would require far more wisdom and foresight than any human posseses.

To answer the question, I would never change something that has happened.[/size][/color]

[Panda]

I agree that changing something in the past could have far reaching consequences. All of our past events have shaped us into the people we are today. Great accomplishments and terrible mistakes are apart of our personalities. Definately not a question to make a quick decision on.

On a lighter note, it does make me think of that Simpsons Halloween episode when Homer goes back in time with the "time toaster" and he squishes the bug...which changes the future. So he just keeps going back in time to try to make things right. [spoiler]But then he just settles for something that was close enough. LOL[/spoiler]

When I asked one of my friends this question he said he wouldn't have passed gas durning PE. The teacher was taking roll and it was dead silent when he let one loose. He said that was definately an event in the past that he could have lived without. :laugh:

Thanks for the responses, it is interesting to see what everyone has to say on this subject.

[Ani_Freak]

[quote name='KnightOfTheRose][size=1][color=#2F4F4F]Though I've thought about this on more than one occasion, I doubt I would ever want to go back and change anything.[/size'][/color][/quote]

[COLOR=Sienna]I feel just the same. I wouldn't change anything in the past, not even if I could. I think on this a lot, always wondering, what would've been if I did/didn't do this or that. I always come to the same conclusion, would it matter? Would it change things for better or worse?

I strongly beleive that everything that we do, that we experience, comes with a purpose. We just have to learn from what we have done or have experienced.

I just wouldn't change anything at all. Everything that has happened is what makes me what I am today.[/COLOR]

[vegeta rocker]

there are lots of things i wish i could go back in time and change.

i wish that i had been strong enough to take on my father lots of times.
I hated the way he treated me and his parents. I think about me just beating the crap out of him. I wish i had the mental strength to kill him.

I would have hid my journal better.

I wish i would have been braver in Jr high and stood up to those who tormented me.
Same goes for High School.

I would visit my grandmother more often before she died.

I would have hugged my half brother more when i was little.

I would have met my half sister.

I guess there is a lot i would like to change. But like it has been said; that might be a pretty bad idea. If i change stuff it might end up being worse.

[Semjaza]

There's one person in my life I would like to erase entirely. Avoid ever meeting him. Avoid ever letting me be tricked into thinking he was normal. Avoid ever hanging out with him.

This person makes me so miserable that I cannot stand it. He is pretty much the sole source of stress in my life. I'm an overly patient person, but I want to hurt this guy so much I can taste it. I wouldn't, but I want to heh.

So, despite sounding insane, I'd to change that. I'm fine with the rest of my life. **** happens.

[Mitch]

[size=1][color=red] I would go, as my parents were engaging in the selfish act of sex, and stop the sperm from getting to the ovum to germinating to becoming a fetus to becoming a child to becoming an adult to becoming old to becoming dead.

The world would be a better place.[/size][/color]

[Heaven's Cloud]

[QUOTE=Semjaza Azazel]This person makes me so miserable that I cannot stand it. He is pretty much the sole source of stress in my life. I'm an overly patient person, but I want to hurt this guy so much I can taste it. I wouldn't, but I want to heh.
[/QUOTE]

[color=indigo]C'mon Semjaza, a little violence never hurt anyone...oh wait, thats not true is it...

I don't think that there is one pivotal, life altering moment that I would change. I would much rather just go back to being thirteen and start things over from there... [/color]

[Shinmaru]

To be perfectly honest, if I were to go back into to time to change something, I bet I'd end up screwing it up even more. Then, I'd have to deal with some lame alternate reality crap like Marty McFly in Back to the Future II. I know I don't want Biff bossing my *** around.

So, yeah, there's really nothing in my life that I'd honestly care to change. Actually, scratch that...in middle school, I would've stopped hanging around these jackasses I knew that did nothing but wear baggy pants and quote DMX all day. Christ, were they ever annoying. Okay, that's what I would change. I would go back in time, slap myself upside the head and say "Are you ******* nuts? Get the hell away from these people while you still can!"

That would save me a lot of aggravation, I can tell you that.

[Lord Rannos]

For the most part, I wouldn't want to change anything. There is, however, one thing that I almost want to change. My family's dog died a year or two back, because I didn't watch him and our gate was open. He got hit by a car, and I've always felt that itwas my fault. If I changed that, though, then we wouldn't have gotten our current puppy, who I love more than anything. To chnge time is a dangerous thing--it may have unforseen consequences. It's a paradox, so I think it's better not to mess with it if it's possible.

[kenshinsbabe]

i would be extremely tempted to use that power, but I'd have to say that I wouldn't want that power. Although many things have happened to my friends and family that I really didn't like (all of which were my fault), i wouldn't want to change it. The past cannot be corrected. You need to learn from your mistakes and move on. Hiko, from Samurai X once said this:

Your small hands have carried the weight of those you love, but you will find that their memories are heavier. That's what makes you strong.

I would like to stand by that saying in this instance. I'm very sorry about your friend, by the way, Panda.

[Brasil]

When asked this question, I find I have a rather unconventional response.

Yes, I've done some stupid stuff in my life, and yes, I've been through some horrific experiences, and given the chance to go back and change those experiences for the better, I'm positive I would consider doing that.

However, why should I concentrate on the bad if I'm able to go back in my life? If I'm ever given the chance, I'm not going to change anything physically. I'm not going to change any event.

I'm going back there to just re-live the value of my family. In the past few weeks, I've grown closer to my extended family, my grandparents, and just the family bonds in general. I know there were numerous family parties when I was younger. I know there were parties that my older relatives attended. But what pains me, is that I was so young at the time, and I have no physical memory of those parties. I see them in photographs, with me in my tiny, little, 6-year-old body standing next to my grandmom as she sits in a chair with a smile in her face. There are photographs of my grandmom holding my younger brother when he was just a few months old.

Now, when I know I've had those experiences, and some 20 years of strong familial bonds, why would I want to concentrate on something bad in my life? Knowing just how strong and healthy my mom's side of the family was and still is, and I could be given the chance to go spend time with everyone back then, why would I want to change April 1, 2002, a day that I made a very poor and emotionally-charged decision while I was driving?

Considering that the good far outweighs the bad, I say learn from bad experiences. Don't wish you could change them. Learn how to prevent them in the future. But don't ignore it, and don't think just acknowledging it happened will fix anything.

I realize how somebody's reason for not changing anything is based on paradoxes and time flux and whatnot, and I've done that, too. But it's more an entertainment convention than anything else. I suppose my reply is more based on the idea that we are shaped by what we experience, but again, I don't think my reply is totally based on that.

I honor the past. I respect the life I have lived, and I respect the life I am living. I remember the past because I've led a good life, and as much as I think it's a cliched line, and hyperbolic, I'd give anything to go back to 1990 for a day, just to re-live what I've lived.

Life is a beautiful thing. It is. Even though someone may go through a lot of crap, there is always something to look forward to. I don't want to turn this into some "bizarre lecture" but, Matrix Revolutions (a spectacular film) touches upon this philosophy. When [spoiler]Trinity and Neo punch through the thunderclouds on their way to the Machine City, they see the sun. The sky is a painting, with streaks of gold, red, orange against a light blue. There are pure white clouds whisped about.[/spoiler]

Trinity had never seen anything like that before. The only life she had ever known was of death and destruction, pain and sorrow, and only recently was she able to experience love. She had not wasted her life, of course, but she had never truly lived until she [spoiler]was to die.[/spoiler] It's almost a "life flashing before your eyes" scenario. Only at the end was she able to know of the true beauty of the world around her. This seems to echo Tolstoy's Death Of Ivan Illych.

Trinity had been blinded by the darkness, and many of us are still blinded by that darkness. It is rather ironic that Neo [spoiler]is physically blinded and only then is able to achieve clarity.[/spoiler]

I realize I've gone a tad off-topic here, but learning to appreciate the hidden beauty of life and to not let ourselves be blinded by pain and anguish is one of the most important things we can achieve.

Don't concentrate on the negatives. Don't concentrate on the thunderclouds. Know that there is sun beyond the clouds.

Here comes the sun. Don't shut your eyes to it.

[Ryan]

[font=Garamond][size=3][color=indigo]I wouldn't change anything that has happened in the past. I believe that everything happens for a reason. I read a short story once about how these people went back in time to hunt dinosaurs. They were extremely cautious about not touching or destroying anything else. Well once these people came back everything was different. I can't really remember what was different but it was and they didn't know why and then one of the people looked at their boot and there was a dead butterfly. It just went to show you how one minor thing can have such a large impact on things. It really opens your eyes.[/color][/size][/font]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='Heaven's Cloud][color=indigo']C'mon Semjaza, a little violence never hurt anyone...oh wait, thats not true is it... [/color][/quote]

[color=darkviolet]Ah, c'mon Heaven's Cloud. It all depends on how violent it is and which end of the violence you're on...then again....

As for me, I wouldn't do it.

I believe that every event no matter how good or bad or life altering has it's place in time and it all happens to continue evening everything out. Sounds kind of funky ne?

Well, say you met this person and things work out for a while then they all fall apart. However you weren't ready for the relationship to end, so you try to go back in time and alter time so this person doesn't break it off with you. In fact, you've altered time so you and this person get married. However, two years down the road from that, you're partner kills you.

So, in this case, letting this person break up with you could have saved your life.

Meeting people and having certain events happen to you are all fateful happenings, which are meant to happen in our lifetimes. Yes, I would like to have been able to go back and stop 9/11 from happening, or maybe stop George W. Bush from announcing the invasion of Iraq since this would have saved lives and sanity, but it wasn't meant to be stopped. I know it sounds bad, but that's how things go.

Wow, I sounded good at 0154. Go me[/color]

[sublime2004]

[size=1][b]
This is something that's rolled in the back of my head for some time, now. But I subscribe to the theory: Even if you do travel into the past, that nothing will change; That past events are inevitable.

This isn't to say that I believe that my path is already laid out before me. But I know for a fact that it is laid out behind me.

For all I know, a future version of myself has travelled into the past to try and change my life and failed. Or possibly succeeded. But I will never have a way of knowing for sure.

I can only go on what I believe to be true right now. And that's all any of us really has.


That's either extremely profound or extremely redundant. Either way: it's 4:28 a.m..[/b][/size]

[HetepKa]

[I][FONT=Century Gothic][COLOR=Green]f I could go to the past and change one thing, it'd most defenetly have to be being tricked by some "friends". Here's how the story goes:

I had two friends, let's call them Mary and Grace, at first, Mary and Grace were very nice people, who didn't give me any trouble,but did give a lot of other people a lot of trouble, nor I to them, but then, another person came in the picture, let's call her Carol.

Carol was an even nicer person than Mary and Grace, and gave no one trouble; and by the time Carol and me were friends, Mary and Grace turned into trouble-making machines; and started prank-calling people, and other stuff; and one the, they called me, and told me, that Carol had started this nasty rumor about me, which was NOT true, so, I started a fight with Carol, and then, I realized, after some time, Mary and Grace had tricked me into fighting with Carol. Carol and me are now friends, but it's still a painful memory...

If there's anything I can erase from history, it'd had been my friendship with Mary and Grace, that only used me...

HetepKa[/COLOR][/FONT][/I]

[Shinken]

I'm of the belief that it would be impossible to change the past. Why?

If you go into the past and change something intentionally, you would then eliminate that event from ever ocurring in history. Thus, you would have no reason to go back into the past and change something while you were in the future, erego the event would still happen.

However, if one did change something, maybe some sort of "alternate timeline" would be created. It's pure speculation. Entertaining, thought-provoking speculation that makes for some pretty good discussions.

[Zidargh]

If I could go back in time and change an event, I wouldn't bother. I'd just go back in time and take part in an event that I have never experienced. But perhaps that would be changing it.

For example, if I went back to the Feudal age of Japan in the 1500's and served Leyasu Tokugawa, I'd have to be fighting Mitsunari Ishida. By doing so, there would be a possiblity I'd go rambo and slaughter all of the opposition, causing Japan to be a completely different country.

Another example is if I went back to the 1920's during the Al Capone era and betrayed him immediately, things could change for his organisation completely, having an affect on America.

But yes, I have to agree with Shinmaru, the Back to the Future trilogy did demonstrate what messing with paradoxes can do. I certainly don't want to grow long, white hair and be driving around in a Delorian screaming 'Great Scott!' 24/7.

[John]

[quote name='Zidargh']I certainly don't want to grow long, white hair and be driving around in a Delorian screaming 'Great Scott!' 24/7.[/quote]Well, I don't know. The Delorian part wouldn't be bad at all...


I'd also have to say that I wouldn't want to change anything I did, but not because of screwing up time so much as that I'm responsible for anything I do. If I couild change whatever I wanted whenever I wanted I would become lazy and irresponsible. If I **** up, I know I deserve whatever comes. If someone screws me over, I'll learn to forgive them.

But just to toy with the idea, if I could travel back in time without changing the present, I might change the time I ate a raw oyster. I'm usually very open to new foods, but, well, if Jell-O could grow mold, it would be an oyster.

[Amarris]

[COLOR=Magenta]to put it simply, no i wouldn't change a thing. for instance, say i changed the fact that i have social anxiety and that i was (and kinda still am, in a way) depressed for eight years and that i was suicidal for three years and tried to kill myself. if i went back and changed all that, i wouldn't have met the love of my life who i have been happily dating for over six months right now. if i didn't have these various problems, it is highly likely that i would have more friends (read: more than one) and that i wouldn't have spent as much time online. i met my bf on my ex-best friend's (online) anime board. so yeah, sometimes screwing around with time and with the past won't give you as much of a desirable effect as you may be hoping for.[/COLOR]

[maikiratori]

I must say that this is a very interesting topic. I have had many instances in my very short life span that I wish had come out differently had I made better choices... Although I can't say that I would go back in time to change any one event in particular. I wouldn't mind traveling through time to see first-hand how society functioned, how things worked and just to experiance life in a different way. I don't think I would go back specifically to change anything... Merely to observe, although if something did change as a result, I'm not sure if I'd like it... There are a whole bunch of things that could end up happening as a result of some event changing. You could end up having something similar to double memories or some other wierd thng... You could go back to your 'starting time' and end up being in a totally different spot, than where you started. You could end up in a different school (if you're still in one), a different job, or married (or never married) or any other number of things.

In any case I am quite happy with my life the way it is, even though I made mistakes. I learned a lot from everything that has happened and I know I will have become a much different person from the one I am today if I had made different choices or if a circumstance had come out differently than it had.

[Albane]

[SIZE=2]It's funny, I made a thread exactly like this on a different site today and now here's another one.

Yes, I would go back in time and fix only 1 thing. If this "one thing" hadn't gone all to Hell I might just be a better, nicer person today but until I actually [I]get[/I] this chance to change the past I'm stuck with a very bitter memeory.

It all started when I was in kindergarten and I met this girl Brittany. Words can't describe how beautiful, funny or kind she was but believe me, [B]she was as close to perfect as anyone could get[/B]. We were friends for maybe a year then we started hanging out more. Finally she would be walking around the playground and holding my hand or resting her head on my shoulder when we were sitting together.

(I know that sounds pathetic but hey, I enjoyed it).

Then one day I heard from my dad that WE WERE MOVING! Needless to say I went ballistic, even though I was young I knew that I never wanted to loose Brittany.
A while after that these b*tches in blue or B.B for short. (They were two girls who only wore blue and always hung out together. Imagine the cold hearted kind of person you wnt to strangle to death and that was them. I forgot their names though...give me a break, it's been 9 years).
I'll re-inact the conversation that (literally) broke my heart.

[QUOTE]B.B 1: Hi, do you know Brittany?

Me: Yeah...she's in my class

B.B 2: Do you like her?

Me: Yeah

B.B 2: Do you love her?

(Now, this is the part that I would change in a heart beat if I had the chance).

Me: No...[/QUOTE]

Here's why I said this; I had heard that kids were getting suspended for being boyfriend & girlfriend (it was from a highschool because they were making out but I didn't know that). I would have done anything for Brittany and I do mean ANYTHING even if it meant getting kicked out of school but I didn't want her to be harmed by my actions so I said I didn't love her.

Brittany had been standing next to me during this conversation and now she started to cry. I can't explain how it felt to see the girl I loved, the girl who I would odo anything for, crying. The best I can do is say that suddenly it felt like I had been hit in the stomach by Tyson.

Later on down the road she only smiled at me and rarely talked to me at all then my family moved away.
(This memory is burnt into my brain it seems since I normally can't remember something that happened 9 years ago but I can still see my old school and Brittany's tear covered face as if it had happened yesterday...[/SIZE]