...it's like TV Tropes, but LINKED DATA!

The Dead Past

145 statements
27 feature instances
23 referencing feature instances

The Dead Past	type	TVTItem
The Dead Past	label	The Dead Past
The Dead Past	page	TheDeadPast
The Dead Past	comment	First published in Astounding Science Fiction (April 1956 issue) by Isaac Asimov, this Science Fiction Novelette is about a physicist, historian, and writer who try to advance technology, and end up creating social upheaval.Arnold Potterley, Ph.D., wants to use the Chronoscope to view the distant past, because he is a Professor of Ancient History. His specialty is Carthage, and the only way to get more information is through time-viewing (the purpose of the chronoscope). Thaddeus Araman, Department Head of the Division of Chronoscopy, is quite apologetic, but simply cannot currently accommodate his wishes.Fuming about this, Potterley goes to find Jonas Foster, Ph.D., to convince him that neutrinics, the science underlying the chronoscope, is being deliberately suppressed by the government. Foster engages in clandestine research and designs a chronoscope that requires only the equipment available in a household workshop. Completing the homemade chronoscope is the climax, and characters start having and sharing revelations about the implications of the technology.The Dead Past was adapted into episode 4 of Out of the Unknown, a television series in 1965. It has been anthologized over a dozen times, and Isaac Asimov would include it in nine of his collections, such as Earth is Room Enough (1957), The Best Of Isaac Asimov (1973), The Far Ends Of Time And Earth (1979), The Edge Of Tomorrow (1985), The Best Science Fiction Of Isaac Asimov (1986), Other Worlds Of Isaac Asimov (1987), and The Complete Stories, Volume 1 (1990).
The Dead Past	fetched	2023-04-24T08:43:56Z
The Dead Past	parsed	2023-04-24T08:43:56Z
The Dead Past	processingComment	Dropped link to JackOfAllTrades: Not a Feature - ITEM
The Dead Past	processingComment	Dropped link to TheNamesake: Not a Feature - ITEM
The Dead Past	isPartOf	DBTropes
The Dead Past / int_10f28611	type	Excessive Mourning
The Dead Past / int_10f28611	comment	Excessive Mourning: Potterly's wife has been mourning their daughter since she died several years ago, and would use the Chronoscope to relive her past even if it means she'd waste away.
The Dead Past / int_10f28611	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_10f28611	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_10f28611
The Dead Past / int_1f799027	type	Obstructive Bureaucrat
The Dead Past / int_1f799027	comment	Obstructive Bureaucrat: Thaddeus Araman, Department Head of the Division of Chronoscopy, is supposedly in charge of determining who gets access to the Chronoscope. In actuality, his job is to suppress access and knowledge of the technology, usually by making petitioners feel like they're on a waiting list to eventually make use of it, once all the higher-priority people have gotten their chance.
The Dead Past / int_1f799027	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_1f799027	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_1f799027
The Dead Past / int_21cc1bfe	type	Homemade Inventions
The Dead Past / int_21cc1bfe	comment	Homemade Inventions: Foster engaged in illegal research by applying his knowledge of light in artificially generated gravity fields to neutrinos, and conducted a few experiments. When he was done, he was able to design a past-viewing device from equipment that everyone has access to. A design that his uncle shared with almost everyone he knew.
The Dead Past / int_21cc1bfe	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_21cc1bfe	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_21cc1bfe
The Dead Past / int_36e1cea	type	The Punishment Is the Crime
The Dead Past / int_36e1cea	comment	The Punishment Is the Crime: The government agents tracking down the protagonists for the crime of illegally building a time viewer arrive too late to stop them from spreading the secret. After explaining that they've just abolished privacy (since the viewer can be set to see any place at any time from a century ago to a split-second ago), the agents rescind the arrest and leave them all to live with the consequences.
The Dead Past / int_36e1cea	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_36e1cea	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_36e1cea
The Dead Past / int_49f6a9e4	type	Most Writers Are Writers
The Dead Past / int_49f6a9e4	comment	Most Writers Are Writers: Nimmo is a science writer, and extols the virtues of such In-Universe. He takes the information from scientists, synthesizes it into a narrative, and creates explanations that non-specialized readers can follow. It affords him a broad basis of scientific understanding, rather than a narrow view. Isaac Asimov has shared that this is how he views himself, a Science writer more than a Science Fiction writer.
The Dead Past / int_49f6a9e4	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_49f6a9e4	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_49f6a9e4
The Dead Past / int_5a4aa505	type	Government Conspiracy
The Dead Past / int_5a4aa505	comment	Government Conspiracy: It turns out the government has a stranglehold on science in a massive conspiracy to prevent science from rediscovering an apparatus capable of looking into the past. It's also a deconstruction, because it turns out that this is for humanity's own good, as "the past" starts at about a second ago, and the device can see anywhere in the world, thus making privacy obsolete. The protagonists fail to realize this until after they've managed to publicize the technology far and wide.
The Dead Past / int_5a4aa505	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_5a4aa505	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_5a4aa505
The Dead Past / int_5da3f522	type	Big Brother Is Watching
The Dead Past / int_5da3f522	comment	Big Brother Is Watching: Played with in that it's not necessarily the government watching everyone, but the citizens. The government has been trying to prevent the study and creation of more past-viewing devices because the past starts with the present. If people have access to devices that can see anywhere in the world at any time, then privacy is gone. In this case, they are trying to stop Big Brother.
The Dead Past / int_5da3f522	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_5da3f522	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_5da3f522
The Dead Past / int_60194b82	type	Spanner in the Works
The Dead Past / int_60194b82	comment	Spanner in the Works: The historian Potterley, unable to get permission to use the Chronoscope in order to view past events convinces a young physicist to learn enough of the science to make his own. When he learns why the government had been trying to prevent Chronoscope study, it's too late; his fail-safes guaranteed the worldwide publication of a how-to guide on homemade Chronoscope construction, removing all privacy.
The Dead Past / int_60194b82	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_60194b82	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_60194b82
The Dead Past / int_723be11b	type	Villain Has a Point
The Dead Past / int_723be11b	comment	Villain Has a Point: The government agents trying to prevent the protagonists from learning the secret of viewing the past seem like a classic heavy-handed Government Conspiracy... until it turns out that they're simply trying to prevent privacy from being utterly destroyed by the dissemination of devices that can view any place at any past time from a century ago to a microsecond ago.
The Dead Past / int_723be11b	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_723be11b	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_723be11b
The Dead Past / int_7877f14d	type	Fictional Field of Science
The Dead Past / int_7877f14d	comment	Fictional Field of Science: Neutrinics, the study and detection of neutrinos. During 1956, the particle was purely theoretical, a way to explain what happened to the law of conservation of mass and energy. Dr Asimov was inventing scientific-sounding nonsense to justify the Chronoscope and past-viewing. Gravitics, the study of gravitational fields (also containing pseudo-gravitics, the study of artificial gravitational fields). Foster got his doctorate in an even narrower field, the study of how photons move in artificially generated gravity. Foster's expertise in this field gives him new insight into the unrelated neutrinics, allowing him to design a visual-only chronoscope using only the equipment available in a household workshop.
The Dead Past / int_7877f14d	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_7877f14d	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_7877f14d
The Dead Past / int_7a2aba81	type	Exposition
The Dead Past / int_7a2aba81	comment	Exposition: The largest background information dump is describing how all scientific research has become part of the world government. It's framed as part of Foster's internal resistance to Potterley's "liberal" ideas of intellectual freedom. Other points of information are presented more subtly, by having one character explaining things to another character.
The Dead Past / int_7a2aba81	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_7a2aba81	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_7a2aba81
The Dead Past / int_8702168c	type	Chronoscope
The Dead Past / int_8702168c	comment	Fifty years ago, Sterbinski and LaMarr published a scientific paper on the principles of neutrinics that explained the basis of the chronoscope and time-viewing in general. This began the government's efforts to conceal the information about the field. The main character, Arnold Potterley, is a historian desperate to prove his thesis about Carthage, and convinces a physicist who studied pseudo-gravitics to work on neutrinics and prove that the government is trying to hold back scientific advancement.
The Dead Past / int_8702168c	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_8702168c	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_8702168c
The Dead Past / int_9aaf8eca	type	Crippling Overspecialization
The Dead Past / int_9aaf8eca	comment	Crippling Overspecialization: Nimmo used to give his nephew, Foster, lectures on how studying one specific field of science has made for a culture of narrow focus, praising the idea of being a science writer (like him), because it means you must learn a bit of everything. Foster's counter to this idea is that such specialization is needed to advance in a field, since there's too much to learn. The climax reveals that this overspecialization was a deliberate effort on the part of the world government to make suppressing certain fields easier.
The Dead Past / int_9aaf8eca	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_9aaf8eca	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_9aaf8eca
The Dead Past / int_9d12bbc1	type	Foreshadowing
The Dead Past / int_9d12bbc1	comment	Foreshadowing: Potterley's distaste for cigarettes is a reference to his past; he may have left a lit cigarette that caused his house to burn down and kill his daughter.
The Dead Past / int_9d12bbc1	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_9d12bbc1	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_9d12bbc1
The Dead Past / int_a1d753b6	type	Featureless Plane of Disembodied Dialogue
The Dead Past / int_a1d753b6	comment	Featureless Plane of Disembodied Dialogue: Some descriptors for the main characters are used, but never very detailed and few rooms are described, or even named. The opening scene, specifically, presumably takes place in Director Araman's office, but it could just as easily be occuring in a hotel, given the details included.
The Dead Past / int_a1d753b6	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_a1d753b6	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_a1d753b6
The Dead Past / int_a20d4674	type	Techno Babble
The Dead Past / int_a20d4674	comment	Neutrinics, the study and detection of neutrinos. During 1956, the particle was purely theoretical, a way to explain what happened to the law of conservation of mass and energy. Dr Asimov was inventing scientific-sounding nonsense to justify the Chronoscope and past-viewing.
The Dead Past / int_a20d4674	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_a20d4674	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_a20d4674
The Dead Past / int_a52faac6	type	Benevolent Conspiracy
The Dead Past / int_a52faac6	comment	Benevolent Conspiracy: The government is secretly trying to prevent anyone from developing a device that can show the past. The protagonists disagree and not only develop such a device, but distribute the plans widely. A government agent then explains to them the reason for the ban: such a time-viewer could be used to spy on anyone, anywhere in current time. The widespread availability of such viewers means the effective end of personal privacy for the human race.
The Dead Past / int_a52faac6	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_a52faac6	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_a52faac6
The Dead Past / int_aed65980	type	All for Nothing
The Dead Past / int_aed65980	comment	All for Nothing: In the end, Potterly gets his Chronoscope, but he cannot use it to study Carthage like he wished: the signal degrades the further back in time you go, to the point of uselessness by the time you look back a century or so, making Chronoscopic research of a civilization that has been dead for millennia impossible. That same issue means that Chronoscopes can be used to view images of what somebody did last night trivially, or events one millisecond ago. Not only does it abolish privacy, it also allows people to relive the past. Since Potterly's three-year-old daughter died several years ago (part of why he has thrown himself into studying Carthage), his wife declares that Carthage can wait if she can watch her daughter alive. With the Chronoscope, everyone may warm themselves around their nostalgia, and ignore the future.
The Dead Past / int_aed65980	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_aed65980	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_aed65980
The Dead Past / int_b3a49cdb	type	Satire
The Dead Past / int_b3a49cdb	comment	Satire: Dr. Asimov takes the idea of an Obstructive Bureaucrat, creating a world where governments dictate scientific progress, and then takes it apart to see how it fails. The government is trying to preserve our way of life (rather than withholding the technology for selfish motives). The hyper-focus in narrow fields of study was supposed to prevent the advancement of certain fields (except an unrelated field was responsible for a huge leap forward in a suppressed field of study). The story ends with the suppressed technology getting worldwide publication, essentially proving that trying to suppress science will never work.
The Dead Past / int_b3a49cdb	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_b3a49cdb	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_b3a49cdb
The Dead Past / int_b53c57d5	type	Epigraph
The Dead Past / int_b53c57d5	comment	Epigraph: The quote at the beginning of the story comes from a discussion between John W. Campbell and Isaac Asimov. This quote inspired the story.
The Dead Past / int_b53c57d5	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_b53c57d5	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_b53c57d5
The Dead Past / int_ba8b13ad	type	Catch-22 Dilemma
The Dead Past / int_ba8b13ad	comment	Catch-22 Dilemma: Potterley points out the circular reasoning behind Foster's rejection of neutrinics. It's not offered in schools because the field is useless. Neutrinics must be a useless field because otherwise it would be offered in schools. Potterley concludes that the dilemma means the world government is trying to suppress scientific research into neutrinos and past-viewing.
The Dead Past / int_ba8b13ad	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_ba8b13ad	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_ba8b13ad
The Dead Past / int_d99864da	type	When It All Began
The Dead Past / int_d99864da	comment	When It All Began: Fifty years ago, Sterbinski and LaMarr published a scientific paper on the principles of neutrinics that explained the basis of the chronoscope and time-viewing in general. This began the government's efforts to conceal the information about the field. The main character, Arnold Potterley, is a historian desperate to prove his thesis about Carthage, and convinces a physicist who studied pseudo-gravitics to work on neutrinics and prove that the government is trying to hold back scientific advancement. Potterley's desperation comes from an accidental fire that took the life of his daughter when she was three years old. He may have forgotten to stub out a cigarette before falling asleep, and he's displaced that blame to his study of Carthage. Their ancient enemies (Rome and Greece) would claim that Carthaginian citizens would sacrifice their children to Moloch by tossing them into a furnace.
The Dead Past / int_d99864da	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_d99864da	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_d99864da
The Dead Past / int_e34541d	type	One World Order
The Dead Past / int_e34541d	comment	One World Order: At this point in the future, there's a single unified government that has taken over not only the national governments, but also the colleges and universities that teach and sponsor scientific research.
The Dead Past / int_e34541d	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_e34541d	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_e34541d
The Dead Past / int_ecafe646	type	Information Wants to Be Free
The Dead Past / int_ecafe646	comment	Information Wants to Be Free: Director Araman's primary duty is to avert this trope, but Nimmo went ahead and distributed Foster's design for home-built chronoscopes to six different publishers early. Each of the publishers have probably sent it to other scientists to verify the information. The possibility of everyone having a one in their home is considered a virtual certainty.
The Dead Past / int_ecafe646	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_ecafe646	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_ecafe646
The Dead Past / int_f32d85ab	type	20 Minutes into the Future
The Dead Past / int_f32d85ab	comment	20 Minutes into the Future: The largest change between current day and the "future" of this story is that scientific research has calcified into highly specialized fields, and only the world government approves research grants.
The Dead Past / int_f32d85ab	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_f32d85ab	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_f32d85ab
The Dead Past / int_f93f10e	type	Can't Stop The Signal
The Dead Past / int_f93f10e	comment	Can't Stop The Signal: The main characters release the information to several publicity outlets so it will become public, then learn why the government suppressed it. It can look at any place at any sufficiently recent time... which means there is no privacy, since there are no limitations on how close to the present it can look. The government knew about this before (it was their motivation for their draconian rules, the intent being to keep it out of the public's hands and unused), but once the protagonists invent a cheap and simple way to duplicate the technology and spread it widely, everyone can look at anyone at any time. The government even admits that their own agents have used it for indiscreet purposes.
The Dead Past / int_f93f10e	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_f93f10e	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_f93f10e
The Dead Past / int_name	type	ItemName
The Dead Past / int_name	comment
The Dead Past / int_name	featureApplicability	1.0
The Dead Past / int_name	featureConfidence	1.0
The Dead Past	hasFeature	The Dead Past / int_name
The Dead Past / int_name	itemName	The Dead Past

The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

The Dead Past	hasFeature	American Literature (# to D) / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Apocalyptic Gag Order / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Benevolent Conspiracy / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Big Brother Is Watching / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Can't Stop The Signal / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Chronoscope / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Excessive Mourning / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Featureless Plane of Disembodied Dialogue / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Fictional Field of Science / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Government Conspiracy / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Homemade Inventions / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	I Made Copies / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Information Wants to Be Free / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Most Writers Are Writers / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	No Plans, No Prototype, No Backup / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Novelette / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Obstructive Bureaucrat / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	One World Order / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Satire / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	20 Minutes into the Future / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	Villain Has a Point / int_ac58f5fa
The Dead Past	hasFeature	When It All Began / int_ac58f5fa

Copyright of DBTropes.org wrapper 2009-2013 DFKI Knowledge Management. Imprint. - Thanks to Bakken&Baeck for hosting. Contact.
Copyright of data TVTropes.org contributors under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.