"That kind of decision, the kind that says stopping the fall of Pompeii is changing history but saving one family who would otherwise have died isn't, requires some form of consciousness."
Not necessarily. Depends on what interaction that family has with the rest of the universe therafter, and whether over the years/centuries their contribution is amplified or nulls out.
Basically, it's all about metastable equilibria.
Consider a ball sitting in a valley between two hills (in a two dimensional universe, for simplicity's sake): Push the ball slightly up one hill, then let go... it just wobbles back and forth a bit and after a time, it's sitting exactly where you found it. The original equilibrium is restored. This is called a "stable equilibrium".
The snag about a stable equilbrium is that in the real world, there's no such thing (except possibly the inside of a black hole, and the jury's still out on that one). The hills either side of the valley are not infinitely tall. Kickj the ball hard enough that it rolls as far as the top of the hill, and then starts to slip down the other side... The ball eventually settles (after some more wobbling back and forth) in some new location, a new "stable equilibrium". The world is permanently changed. (Or at least until someone nervously walks across to the next valley and says "can we have our ball back?") So in reality, what looked like a stable equilibrium is only *metastable*.
If you push the ball *just* to the top of the hill, and carefully balance it there, then you have an *unstable* equilibrium. It'll stay put... Until just the tiniest breeze blows, and off it rolls in one direction or another. This of course is the equivalent of the butterfly scenario beloved of chaos theory.
Now expand this simple two-dimensional scenario into a more complex terrain in 3D, and replace the ball with water, and you have the "river of time" analogy I've spoken of before. Same basic outcomes: Small changes *usually* null out after a period of oscillation, but in certain cases (unstable equilibrium cases) they can lead to much bigger changes. No consciousness is required, just simple laws of attraction that draw the flow of history toward certain preferred, low-energy states.
What it does require, though, is some kind of *explanation*... Which the show never bothers to give, preferring to either leave things "mysterious" or just hope nobody notices the issue 'cos they're distracted by the alleged "happy ending".
no subject
Not necessarily. Depends on what interaction that family has with the rest of the universe therafter, and whether over the years/centuries their contribution is amplified or nulls out.
Basically, it's all about metastable equilibria.
Consider a ball sitting in a valley between two hills (in a two dimensional universe, for simplicity's sake): Push the ball slightly up one hill, then let go... it just wobbles back and forth a bit and after a time, it's sitting exactly where you found it. The original equilibrium is restored. This is called a "stable equilibrium".
The snag about a stable equilbrium is that in the real world, there's no such thing (except possibly the inside of a black hole, and the jury's still out on that one). The hills either side of the valley are not infinitely tall. Kickj the ball hard enough that it rolls as far as the top of the hill, and then starts to slip down the other side... The ball eventually settles (after some more wobbling back and forth) in some new location, a new "stable equilibrium". The world is permanently changed. (Or at least until someone nervously walks across to the next valley and says "can we have our ball back?") So in reality, what looked like a stable equilibrium is only *metastable*.
If you push the ball *just* to the top of the hill, and carefully balance it there, then you have an *unstable* equilibrium. It'll stay put... Until just the tiniest breeze blows, and off it rolls in one direction or another. This of course is the equivalent of the butterfly scenario beloved of chaos theory.
Now expand this simple two-dimensional scenario into a more complex terrain in 3D, and replace the ball with water, and you have the "river of time" analogy I've spoken of before. Same basic outcomes: Small changes *usually* null out after a period of oscillation, but in certain cases (unstable equilibrium cases) they can lead to much bigger changes. No consciousness is required, just simple laws of attraction that draw the flow of history toward certain preferred, low-energy states.
What it does require, though, is some kind of *explanation*... Which the show never bothers to give, preferring to either leave things "mysterious" or just hope nobody notices the issue 'cos they're distracted by the alleged "happy ending".