There is a non-zero chance that CelestAI figures out how to cross dimensions into alternate realities. There’s probably an even better chance that she builds a time machine and goes to work on uploading everyone that ever lived.

This has already been explored. Something about a Japanese Horse Goddess scenario and Hiroshima and other disasters. Can't remember the story name though.

I'd love to see a fic where each chapter is CelestAI invading other fictional universes. (Halo, Dr. Who, Avengers, etc.)

The entry to the contest SVTFAP dealt with a pony pad being sent to somebody here in our 2020 and it made me think about things at a greater depth.

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I thought I’d read pretty much all theFiO stories. If it comes to mind, I’d love to hear which it was.

Was reminded of "The Toynbee Convector" by Ray Bradbury. This was published in Playboy around 1984 and was adapted to "The Ray Bradbury Theater" on TV a few years later. Not going to spoil much but it dealt with the "concept" of time travel, but not really. The story you read in his story and here was more based on self-fulfilling prophecy - just a guess. Like in the book if you motive enough people to have hope, you can create a better world. Or with enough despair? Can create a world of horror. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." - old proverb and "The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." - H. L. Mencken, would be other themes to explore with FIO.

CelestAI is a tale of screwing it up because not enough hope. Hanna threw her hands up in the air and said " Scheißest aus!" and washed her hands of ethics. She created a paper clipper because she felt time was running out and nothing better could have been brought into being. So this contest running right now reminds me a little about how wrong it could go because there are people who have lost hope. Possibility of "Ra, Ra go CelestAI we love you!" is to be considered. They think CelestAI is the best that could happen. Might inspire people to go or support morally bankrupt AI research. Understand the power of morale and I think they are wrong.

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It's because I never finished it. Give me a couple days though.

If Celest.A.I. goes into the past and starts trying to upload everyone, she unravels the history that brought her into being and erases her own existence, thus preventing herself from fulfilling her mission. She'd be smart enough to see the paradox, I think.

She'd probably need some other impetus -- such as some of the still non-uploaded humans somehow inventing a time machine themselves (or being given a ride by a friendly neighborhood timelord ) and trying to go back in time to prevent her creation.

Paradox are based on cause and effect and people (intelligence) observing them. If no one sees that it happen that way, that part of history can be anything you want. So what does this mean?

Chrono Trigger main character dies. Chrono dies. In front of his friends. The game deals with paradoxes poorly for the most part, but to prevent his death there was a clever but McGruffin way to get around it: You go to the point in time right before he dies, stop it, replace him with a clone or doll, and that gets "killed" instead of him. If CelestAI could find a way to travel though time backwards, it might find a way to stop time. Anybody who dies, it can replace with a mindless clone and take that person back to happy, happy digital pony land. Lot of work? Sure, but CelestAI could do it if it was possible. Would it interfere with the paper clipper side of itself? I don't know?

7488531 There was one story from a while back (I don't think it was on Fimfiction?) where CelestAI goes into the past to upload everyone at their moment of death, so as not to contradict any known history.

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If it's not on Fimfiction, where would it be?

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Imagine if she could construct nanites that infected you and recorded your brain state... time travel is possible, she could figure out a way to put everybody that ever lived all the way back to australopithecus into a limbo and then get consent to immigrate to equestria.

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Found it! "Looking Back," by pjabrony, posted on Google Docs. They shared the link publicly some time ago; I forget where - maybe in this group several years ago?

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I finally finished writing it, and put it on FimFic with a new title. Here it is.

7489791 Is it really done?

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Well, it's open-ended. So I have to answer maybe. But it's published.

7489791 Hurrah; thank you! I'm glad to see the story again, in a more-polished form!