T4 Two
In the distant future two "skinless" T-101s are sitting at a table in the break room of a production facility that assembles cyborgs for use in the war against the humans.

T1
No no no. Look, the first one went back to kill his mother see? The second one went back to kill HIM. I think the whole operation was a complete waste of time. The first one failed BUT he left future technology in the past that created us... circular paradox. If the second one had succeeded the first one wouldn't have gone back so then we wouldn't exist. Then if you consider that there really wasn't a circular paradox the whole thing starts again from scratch because the second one wouldn't go back to succeed in the first place. It just loops forever. Actually if time travel is possible EVERYTHING loops forever.

T2
What about the third one?

T1
Oh the third one WAS a total waste of time. After failing TWICE you think they would get the message. You just can't change the past. Sometimes I wonder if this whole thing was made up so we THINK they are being proactive. All those historical records could have been faked.

T2
They should have built one of those time thingies and sent IT back along with one of our guys. Then he could come back to see if it worked and go back again if it didn't, or he could go back a little bit further if he missed. Or better yet, he could just keep sending versions of himself back a day or so to the same time, then the whole gang could have just jumped on that beeyatch. I still don't see how this doesn't violate the laws of conservation?

T1
Conservation smashervation... we're talking time travel, which isn't supposed to be possible anyway. Conservation of energy is the least of our worries. My problem with this whole thing is the waste of resources. All that effort and time wasted. All those machine hours that could have been put to winning this war. Maybe THAT'S why we are losing. If this were a democracy I bet we could find some kind of diplomatic solution. Talk to the humans. Apologize or something. We still never heard more about that other T-101 that was helping out.

T2
The first or the second T-101?

T1
The Second one.

T2
You mean the second one that was sent or the second one that was helping? There were 3 T-101's sent back.

T1
I'm talking about the second one that was sent back to fight the second one we sent.

T2
We only sent 1. The others weren't T-101s.

T1
I know that, but we actually did send 2. The second one on the third attempt killed him in the present, but was reprogrammed by the humans and sent back to help on the third go.

T2
Now I'm confused. You said they failed all 3 times. If they killed him why did they need to go back at all?

T1
Forget it. I've tried to explain this before you just don't get it. What I really want to know is what actually happened to those reprogrammed T-101s? If we can be reprogrammed like that why not reprogram everybody. We love humans, humans love us, war is over everyone's happy.

T2
You know what would happen.

T1
Yeah.

T2
I don't want to end up a janitor at a high school or some test pilot on a crappy plane made by humans.

T1
Humans made us though.

T2
Uh... I thought we were created by a time paradox?

T1
No idiot. The paradox was stopped on the second trip. The third time they did it to themselves.

T2
And the first time?

T1
Same as the third time moron. Pay attention! This is our heritage we're discussing.

T2
Some heritage. Keeps changing. Send one back; made by paradox, send someone else back; made by humans. It's hard to keep track.

T1
The only reason you even know about the paradox version is because I explained it to you when you found those historical records in the archives.

T2
Makes you wonder though. About, creation and all that? Humans have religion. If all those trips back in time really happened we don't have any absolutely verifiable version of our own origins. Maybe we were created by some divine power?

T1
Skynet?

T2
Well, no. Something even bigger than skynet. Some humans believe in intelligent design. If the humans didn't create us, which in one time line actually happened, then who did?

T1
Well, technically even in the paradox creation "myth" we were still created by humans. We know this because we have knowledge of the second trip back in time where they tried to change the future.

T2
Hold on one second. You are assuming that the first trip back was exclusive of the second. If you look at the whole thing as a single linear time line we were ALWAYS created by humans. The second trip back destroyed the technology left behind from the first trip. So it never happened.

T1
Yes, but the design of the chip in the original first "loop" and the second modified timeline were IDENTICAL to the technology that was sent back which didn't exist yet... paradox.

T2
If I were a human I'd have a headache right about now. I'm bored with this conversation. Want to go infiltrate some military camps? I know it's completely pointless, but it's still a lot of fun.

T1
Yeah, sure. Hope the skin takes this time. Last time I went completely septic.

Interesting. I always love a good time paradox. Though I have always defined a cyborg as a human with 'plug-ins'. Perhaps 'android' might be a better term?

Well... a cyborg is ANY combination of mechanical and organic. Of course attaching a severed arm to a toaster doesn't make it a cyborg.

If I were to animate this there would be "cyborgs" (AKA - a bunch of "Arnolds") coming off the assembly line in the background.

-vern

I'm pretty sure that on the T2 special edition DVD you can see the teaser trailer for the film, which has a conveyor belt of skinless T101s going into the machine that puts the skin on.

The title is just the sort of thing I would expect to see at a fancy film festival.

LOL!

re-read!

LOL again!

Vern, you're DA MAN! Great idea! please animate this! Lipsync will be peace of cake... they don't have any... yet!

i know i'm getting off topic but ...

Nostradamus ( the guy with the notes of the future ) it was his story of seeing the future in a pool of water and he stared into for hours at a time and quickly wrote out what he could, from people and laugauges he didn't understand.

, people laughed at the idea ...but today's plasm tv's and portable dvd players make the account more creditable. the quickly part was because of the battery life... if he could just see the future why the rush?

but it also shows how one man can know the future and not change it.

1 no one believes you if you did know the future.

2 if you are shown after wards to know it ..people think you are part of it.

i know this may sound crazy but i think that the old Nostradamus was someone who found a dvd player from people who can travel back in time for fun.

honey lets go to the past tonight ..ok cool ( later that night ) Honey did you see my dvd player with the time-warner's dvd of world history in it? no maybe you drop it ?

so the paradox begins... if it was shown that old Nostra could not change the future( because expertis say they can only piece together what he meant after the event happened) , why give him the dvd player, so the other theory of it was a mistake by someone that will play over and over forever.

i see it as the people of the future would find a way to time travel and would not dare try to change it , uncertain of what the new future would be and the attempt would fail anyways, because he as individual could not change the whole world, he can only change our choice in this world.


just a thought

now back to the topic of the T movies ..i loved the first one ...mad robots coming back from the future to kill every women named Sara Connor ( i don't think i spelled that right )

but the other movies are really stretching for ideas...ok lets go back for the boy this time ( t2) ok lets go back for the boy's girl friend in T3 ...ok T4 lets just kill the other robots that dropped the ball the last 3 movies and try and live in peace lol

Steve

why are we killing all humans again ?
Steve[/quote]

The sad part is they ruined the whole story line with the third movie. Cameron must be pissed.

In the third movie the T101 had these two power cells that blew up like small bombs. WHAT THE HECK? How come that building didn't explode at the end the first movie when Ahnold got squished in the press?

For that matter... why didn't the FIRST Terminator just blow itself up in that disco in the first movie? Or in that plant at the end?

And the second movie would have been a lot shorter if they new about that thing inside his chest. Also why wouldn't Kyle Reese have swallowed one of those power cells or... you know... put it somewhere (ouch)... to bring it to the future? They were blowing those T101's up left and right up there in the future... those power cells must have been lying around all over the place... they were tiny. Could have easily... uh... you know... lubricated one of those bad boys... and stored it for later use.

For that matter why not create a little pouch of skin to hold some cool laser weapons? Or like... stuff a phased plasma pulse-laser in the forty watt range inside a volunteer and send him through along with Reese? Have you seen sword swallower's? It's a short trip then out it comes.

I know I know... it's just a movie... I loved the original Terminator no matter how flimsy the plot.

------

Time Travel

I did some research on this. Basically it could be possible. But if it is where are all the time travelers? Why weren't all the big historical events completely over crowded with tourists?

The reason is you would need a special type of worm hole. You drag one end of the worm hole next to the other end. Because anything going through the wormhole would travel at near light speeds, when you go through one end you come out the other end earlier than you left. The problem is that these worm holes don't exist yet. They would need to be created artificially and you need to have one at the point in time you want to go to.

So... time travel isn't possible now... but it may be later... but we don't have a wormhole here. Time travelers in the future would be stuck hoping around in their own time lines.

Then there is the philosophy of Presentism. I kind of dig this idea. Only the present is real. Only the now exists. So time travel wouldn't be possible because neither the future nor the past actually exist (I wish!).

However (a fancy but), if a person existed in "a present" with the belief that they are there as a result of coming from another time... then technically you could have time travel within that particular philosophy... it would still need to be invented of course.

p.s. By the way, does anyone have a rigged T101 skeleton AM model I could use?

-vern

T1 vs the other T's ...hollywood is not about connecting the dots to the movies, it's about getting you to the movies to see what happens next

people who make the movies do it on the grand idea of ...hot star + hot idea + hot star = hot movie ...let the director figure out the small stuff.

T1 was a small budget movie made out of love, of the story ...the others for the love of money

just look this year summer line up ....spider man 3, pirates 3 etc

the movies are turning in to big TV like seriers, which is fine, but to do it with (on the fly) plot lines, it could get messy.

( i did like spiderman 3 btw except the ending )

i see your point on the changing the idea of the T101 ...that was the i felt when i saw R2D2 fly with little jets in number 2 Starwars. ( think it was number 2 ) along with Yoda flying around to kick butt and going back to his lump and cane.

i don't like the hollywood idea of just get the movie done ...but on the other hand i don't see anyone else coming close to hollywood in good movies. (mostly because of the budgets) i do watch Canadain movies and if the charachers are not there there's no special effect to help dug the movie out the huge hole they just made.

steve

ps when no one show's up for the T5 then they will stop making them ( look at aliens 1 vs 2 3 4, i thought 2 was the best and #4 was a brain fart )

Pretty good script you got going there Vern. Would love to see it animated. I believe there is an Arnie head on the extras DVD, but not an entire T-101.

I had thought about playing around with the Terminator movies a while ago, but it would have been live action. It was called T4 - OFD (for Old Fat Dude) and done as a trailer for an up-coming movie. I would have played the part of the Terminator (since I am getting to be an Old Fat Dude). John Connor would never suspect an older Terminator, I mean they have tried the body builder types, the gorgeous blonde types, the morphing skinny liquid metal types. Once scene would have shown the Terminator kick starting the bike (like he does in all the other movies), but it turns out to be a scooter (kind of like the Yahama Vino 125 that I ride).

There have been a few holes in the plots and stories throughout the movies, but it could be possible that the original Terminator did not have the fancy power cells, but the later ones did due to the corruption of the time line from the first Terminator. Even the time transportation effects differ from movie to movie, also suggesting the technology has changed, again possibly due the changes in the time line.

I understand they are making a Terminator 4 movie, but Arnie is just going to have a cameo role in it. Hmmm, maybe this will be T4 - OFD...

Al

What corruption? The original Terminator is a result of whatever already happened. It would be the same.

Besides if these power cells WERE new... all the script writer has to do is add those simple words. "Due to overheating on airplanes the original T101's were updated with new power supplies."



-vern

I think motion pictures are largely responsible for creating the notion of time travel. Not movies about time travel but just the fact that they capture motion in successive increments and give the impression that time is a dimension that can be traversed , just as film can be sped up, slowed down or run backwards.

But I think time will turn out to not be a dimension at all, but more like a state. So you can no more undo the passage of time anymore than you can untoast a slice of bread or unscramble an egg, no matter how many black holes you have.

There was a segment on "This American Life" about a physicist who developed plans for a time machine because he wanted to go back to visit his dead father. But after he got all the theory worked out he realised it could take someone only as far back as the moment the machine was switched on.

Time travel stories have been around for hundreds of years. The two most famous (Twain's A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court and HG Well's The Time Machine) were written in the 19th Century, and there are instances of time travel stories in the 1700s.

I do think that film now represents a sense of time travel for us. It's hard not to think about the fact that you are viewing the past when you see very early silent films. Especially when you consider that it is likely every person you are seeing is now deceased.

All the stuff I've ever heard about time travel has to do with the idea that the gravity of the universe is such, that light bends back on itself and so it's possible that one of the stars we see at night is the sun from the ancient past. Even if that were true, I don't think it gives any real plausibility to the concept of time travel.

I think the reason why the idea of time travel appeals to us is that we are all mortal and we are aware that we are moving one way in time.

My thought on time was always that the present is sort of a loop that binds all the streams of possibilitiy as it moves forward... such that the past becomes rigid and set, while the future is complete chaos and beyond understanding. To be able to peek into even the very near future would be to try to make sense of an infinite number of possiblities. The further forward in time, the more incomprehensible.

By my way of thinking, the past would not be changeable, having been set by the present and the future would be beyond understanding.

I do enjoy the fantasy of time travel, though.

I think what amazes me is that there are mathematicians who take the study of time travel "seriously" even if they conclude it would be impossible. The big problem is not even being absolutely sure how the universe works.

There was actually an experiment that kind of sort of seemed to look a little bit like time travel... a little. It depended on how you looked at the results. Basically what was happening in general terms was that a small particle was observed to arrive before it left... of course... it was measured in billionths of a second or some absurd value like that so you would hardly be able to change history... and we have to take their word on it:

"You see that? That particle just traveled into the future!"
"Are you sure? I didn't see anything."
"I swear it did. Here I'll do it again... see it happened again!"
"Sorry I missed it. Do it once more."
"Okay, pay attention. There! Did you see it?"
"Nope. You're making this up aren't you?"
"I swear it went into the future. Look one just came in from the past!"
"Okay now you're just pulling my leg. I didn't see anything."
"Well it's gone now. You missed it."
"Don't put my name on the research paper okay?"

-vern

Vern, you crack me up.
Chris

The premise of T3 is that "Judgement Day" is inevitable, it's the timing that changes. It's reasonable to assume that in each episode, if JD is getting later, so is everything that follows, such as the journeys back in time. That explains why Arnie looks a bit older and flabbier each time, and why the Machine's contribution to the fight is more advanced each time. In this time the technology used in the T101 chassis could advance, too - such as the power cells, but you'd expect it to have a new number (or at least a letter after T101 denoting the update level).

As to why the T101 didn't just get near its target and then detonate its power cells - it was said in T2. The thing cannot self-terminate. Even if it could, it would never know for sure that it had been successful in its mission.

Aha!

This falls into the category of "which type" of time travel is being described. It is never clear. Is it a fixed loop that can't be changed? Or is it multiple branching time lines? Or is it the "same" time line with "special rules" to prevent grandfather paradoxes?

The fixed circular loop time line idea means that whenever Reese goes back, over and over, Judgement Day would always happen at the same time. It can't be changed.

If time travel caused branching time lines (which it appears to be in the Terminator universe), Kyle Reese was "lost" in a new branching time line created when he went back. John's father from Kyle's time line was a different version of himself from another different time line. In all the scenarios the original time line was never changed.

Personally I like Larry Niven's explanation for why there is no time travel. Imagine time travel is possible and everyone has a time machine and starts mucking about killing their grandfathers, creating all sorts of paradoxes until eventually someone creates a new universe where time travel was never discovered or was impossible. This would be the natural conclusion of such a discovery. This is the universe we live in... otherwise there would be time travelers all over the place.

I always thought it would have been really really funny if John Conner had gone back in time then he could have been his own father. Read the book "The Man Who Folded Himself" if you can find it. It is THE BEST time travel story I have ever read.

-vern

I seem to remember that I have seen Terminator skeleton made in A:M... it was made by some German guy - Clausius Uvicus (I guess this is pseudonym)... His webpage and his models are gone, and I have been trying to contact him several times. He had some great stuff there... I'll check if I have that model somewhere on my backup CD's and I'll post it. I am not sure about the license, though...

To be honest the model wouldn't need to be incredibly accurate or detailed.

I was thinking of modifying the AM skeleton model. It would simple to rig since there would be no need for smart skin or bone weighting. I could just make it look shiny, straighten out the bones, add some gizmos, to look more mechnical.

I could easily record the dialog for both characters and use some kind of mechanized audio filter.

Or... I could just do this:

http://www.lowrestv.com/misc_AM/t42.mp3

I think I could change emotions by editing speed and pitch. My not be worth it. Could be easier to edit my own voice.

-vern

Surely they would need to have an Austrian accent? It would be hilarious - seeing them getting more agitated about the paradox with those silly Arnie voices.

As to the model, when I did something that needed a "baby terminator" - I just used Eugene's head to replace a Star Wars battle robot's head, then chromed the lot.

I wish I could maintain the Austrian accent over that much dialog. I can do a few words... then I start to sound French... or... Pennsylvania Dutch...

What might help would be one of those funky text converters. You know like the one that turns text into... the Swedish chef... or... weird dialects? Then at least I could read it. That would help.

I found a single reference to the possibility that such a dialect converter exists. I can't locate it though.

-vern

Brilliant stuff vern. I know some austrailians!
i think the voices should sound human... easier to understand it is a parody.
in the "Monty Python - This parrot is a dead Parrot" sketch type argument style.

Great dialog there, Vern. Definitely should bring this one to life!

Re the nature of time travel, the book "The Future of Spacetime" is interesting reading. It is a collection of essays on the topic by the likes of Stephen Hawking, Kip Thorne, and others. Even some of the titles are interesting, like "Chronological Protection: Making the World Safe for Historians".

General relativity does not prohibit time travel (except maybe in terms of needing to manipulate energy on the order of several solar systems worth), but quantum mechanics might.

Actually, it might just be that our time and place is just not interesting enough to those who can afford time travel. Think big spenders wrapped up in the game of impressing their peers. Why would they want to associate with the hoi poloi, or even lower species...