After fixing the smog problem by reversing the direction of Earth’s spin, Pete’s flaky
friend Sam shows up with device that includes a calendar display and a grey backspace button.
That, of course, was in the 1977 story, “Backspace.” I don’t know whether there were
any earlier stories of Peter and Sam before the backspace button appeared, but there were
several others afterward in Asimov’s Science Fiction. In the second story
(“Balancing Act”), Sam could still “edit” time, even though he’d burned out the
backspace button by stopping World War III. It’s unclear whether this second sort of
editing involves time travel, but it is fun to speculate on what I might edit if given the
chance.
My friend Sam is the only person I know who edits events. Which is to say, he does
something in his head and the past changes; the alterations, of course also reflect into
the present and the future.
My friend Sam is the only person I know who edits events. Which is to say, he does
something in his head and the past changes; the alterations, of course also reflect into
the present and the future.
1 English variant