How Many Am I? And, now, who am I? Hero or Villain? —Vadim Petrov
Throughout the 1990s, until the events of September 21st, 1999, over sixty million people traveled back in time—aka backspaced. The societal effects, both negative and positive, will be felt for generations. Yet, in my opinion, a deep misunderstanding prevails. Few understand the event, time-travel, or that mysterious man: Vadim Petrov.
Listen, what happened was this: they lied to you, they told you 'the event' had nothing to do with time-travel, they told you time-travel was now impossible—the laws of physics had changed. They distracted you with trivialities, trinkets, and titillation. But the truth is rising, our questions will be heard and we will continue to demand answers.
Charting the rise and fall of time travel: from its unusual origins, deep within Stalin's gulag archipelago, through the experiments at MIT in the 1980s, to its uses in theaters of war, its commercialization, the tumultuous era of unregulated use, its banning, and of course, 'the Event.' This book sheds light on the life of Vadim Petrov, his inventions and their impacts. This book reclaims the lost history of time travel.
We begin, 100 years in the past, with the birth of Vadim's father, Trofim, a quick overview of the extant information of Trofim's life: his arrest for counter-revolutionary activities, his imprisonment, his meeting of the great dissident soviet scientist Nikolai Kozyrev, and their theories of time. The birth of Vadim Petrov, and the death of his mother. Vadim's childhood in the Soviet Union, his possible affiliations with the KGB, his escape to France and on to America. Our awkward hero develops the theory of molecular expansion and contraction, popularly known as the theory of time-travel. Throughout the 80s Petrov works at MIT, actualizing and testing his theories: The metals disc and paper and pen experiments; the animal experiments, and of course, the first man to travel back-in-time on November 17th, 1987.
Time travel is, at first, open only to academic researchers, investigating historical epochs and re-writing history books. Petrov and team commercialize time travel with the opening of Chronocorp—opening time travel to the public. Time travel explodes in popularity, it is loved by most, but derided by media and politicians; the sensationalist media salivates over any misstep taken by Chronocorp: “Is Time travel leading to social chaos, to an epidemic of murder and rape?” This is exacerbated by a hack on Chronocorp's system: underground, unregulated time travel is available for the first time in 1994—propagated by BBS and emerging internet technology. The government is impotent to stop it, and the hysteria increases.
Anti-time-travel groups emerge. CATT (Citizens against time travel) and ATTAC (Anti-time-travel action committee) gain in popularity. A series of assassination attempts and bombings kills Petrov's wife and child. Petrov sinks into paranoia. In 1997 Petrov disappears, where? Into the past, or do we live in a past reality? His return is none-less mysterious, and who is the woman he is now with?
He embarks on a nested time travel experiment to collect and collate the knowledge of the universe, until, of course, on September 21st, 1999... THE EVENT.
This is not the final word on Vadim Petrov. This is just the introduction.
Throughout the 1990s, until the events of September 21st, 1999, over sixty million people traveled back in time—aka backspaced. The societal effects, both negative and positive, will be felt for generations. Yet, in my opinion, a deep misunderstanding prevails. Few understand the event, time-travel, or that mysterious man: Vadim Petrov.
Listen, what happened was this: they lied to you, they told you 'the event' had nothing to do with time-travel, they told you time-travel was now impossible—the laws of physics had changed. They distracted you with trivialities, trinkets, and titillation. But the truth is rising, our questions will be heard and we will continue to demand answers.
Charting the rise and fall of time travel: from its unusual origins, deep within Stalin's gulag archipelago, through the experiments at MIT in the 1980s, to its uses in theaters of war, its commercialization, the tumultuous era of unregulated use, its banning, and of course, 'the Event.' This book sheds light on the life of Vadim Petrov, his inventions and their impacts. This book reclaims the lost history of time travel.
We begin, 100 years in the past, with the birth of Vadim's father, Trofim, a quick overview of the extant information of Trofim's life: his arrest for counter-revolutionary activities, his imprisonment, his meeting of the great dissident soviet scientist Nikolai Kozyrev, and their theories of time. The birth of Vadim Petrov, and the death of his mother. Vadim's childhood in the Soviet Union, his possible affiliations with the KGB, his escape to France and on to America. Our awkward hero develops the theory of molecular expansion and contraction, popularly known as the theory of time-travel. Throughout the 80s Petrov works at MIT, actualizing and testing his theories: The metals disc and paper and pen experiments; the animal experiments, and of course, the first man to travel back-in-time on November 17th, 1987.
Time travel is, at first, open only to academic researchers, investigating historical epochs and re-writing history books. Petrov and team commercialize time travel with the opening of Chronocorp—opening time travel to the public. Time travel explodes in popularity, it is loved by most, but derided by media and politicians; the sensationalist media salivates over any misstep taken by Chronocorp: “Is Time travel leading to social chaos, to an epidemic of murder and rape?” This is exacerbated by a hack on Chronocorp's system: underground, unregulated time travel is available for the first time in 1994—propagated by BBS and emerging internet technology. The government is impotent to stop it, and the hysteria increases.
Anti-time-travel groups emerge. CATT (Citizens against time travel) and ATTAC (Anti-time-travel action committee) gain in popularity. A series of assassination attempts and bombings kills Petrov's wife and child. Petrov sinks into paranoia. In 1997 Petrov disappears, where? Into the past, or do we live in a past reality? His return is none-less mysterious, and who is the woman he is now with?
He embarks on a nested time travel experiment to collect and collate the knowledge of the universe, until, of course, on September 21st, 1999... THE EVENT.
This is not the final word on Vadim Petrov. This is just the introduction.
