Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns attracts the best and the brightest students, and correspondingly only hires the best and brightest faculty. Sometimes, the faculty are a little too smart for their own good.
This is a little slice of the multiverse, as perceived by Professor Rosen Bridge. This story is probably best categorized as science fiction.
Fair warning: I realize that there are one or two subtle hints at jokes in here and humorous wording, but despite my flimsy attempts at whimsy, this story deserves its dark tag, especially if you’re vulnerable to existential horror (is that a real thing?).
The T rating is mostly for the existential implications, which are related to suicide. There is no explicit gore except in the metalogue.
I’m serious I went for maximum edge it just doesn’t hit hard until the end m’kay?
Cover art credit is by this loser. They kind of suck so leave them some hatemail.
All chapters are mostly written aside from minor things that will be filled in by readers who enjoy getting homework from their fanfiction, and will be published every 3 days for 4 chapters.
Fascinating concept. Tying the Many Worlds interpretation to the Extremely Specific Anthropic Principle* and littering the multiverse with dead Rosens will likely have some consequences. The question is what they'll be. Looking forward to finding out.
* Modified so it applies to Dr. Bridge and not the Unseen University's professor of anthropics, of course
9986910
Indeed! Quantum Suicide itself is not a new concept, there's a whole bunch of writing on the subject. Though to my credit, I didn't know it had been described before I started working on the concept myself. I think the story only gets dark when it really starts talking about the existential implications for a particular Rosen rather than the trillions of abstract dead ones.
Also holy shoop FOMEI'm internally geeking out over the fact you're tracking this fic. AAAAAahahahahaha3. Either the time lock she fucked up the first time or clumsiness/excess speed.
Really, that's the crux of the whole story. Dr. Bridge needs to beat reality at its own game. After all, of she didn't feel that burning need, why would she have ever put on that first Q.S.D.?
If he's the Bill I think he is, Neigh.
Looking forward to more.
9990918
FanOfMostEverything: Bill Neigh is correct! I'll PM you.
9990913
Efadd: Mmmmmm yes in part. This one might turn into one of those "guess what I'm thinking" questions I guess. The answer I'm looking for is found in the previous chapter.
"Explicit and implied mathematics" is a load of bullshit. I came here for sexy mathematics and all you gave me was a bunch of probabilities! I don't even like probabilities. Where's the multivariate calculus?! At least entertain people with fake math!
Don't make me write an entire story that's actually just a mathematical thesis about residue analysis on singularities in the imaginary part of closed-form navier-stokes solutions!
(please don't, I forgot how to do complex analysis years ago)
9995201
HA! Alas, I've forgotten details of anything beyond single variable calculus years ago.
Also oh my lord I remember the fic you've linked from years ago.
She could be a new God of something like probability
And now we have four different possibilities
So what your telling me is that if Dr.rosen bridge had died in her first experiment for the quantum suicide device then Twilight would have passed her exam and become possibly (because infinite possibilities) the alicorn of friendship however her experiment was a success causing two different timelines one were she did well all this or one where she either forgot or chickened out and continued her work day passing Twilight causing her to be alive in the time mlp how ever considering the fact she is not in the show and the fact that she has a bit of a gambling addiction there is no existing timeline where she didn't do what she does in this story
It seems she forgot to account for the presence of other alicorns.
9998191
HMMMMMMMM
Well spotted.
9995988
MAYBE!
And that's an interesting thought that she has a bit of a gambling addiction- she really does! It's just her life that she gambles with, not the standard gambling addiction of lotteries and casinos and...
Well I suppose one could argue that's ultimately gambling with your life as well.
I see the next chapter has only one word it I'm really hoping it's just the letter
Well... That's dark.
The key to QSD would be instantaneous death. An order of magnitude of a Planck second or less. Any more and there probably is enough time for death to become a process rather than a switch. And it would need to be total to remove "observers". Anti-matter annihilation, perhaps, but it might not be fast enough.
Now with that said, I believe we need to explore the superposition of this story. It screams multiple different endings.
As everypony else.
10002024
maximum edge I'm so sorry
Thank you very much! That was quite a story to read. I hope to see more of your work!
10002041
An instantaneous death would certainly be more convenient from a not-experiencing-a-slow-and-tortuous-death perspective in this fic. I think in referring to the planck scale timescale you're referring to the idea that in many-worlds timelines theoretically split off at every instant in time, and therefore if the Q.S.D. kills you instantaneously, then it would be more effective at splitting off these timelines.
I'm actually not convinced that's the case - partially due to relativistic constraints on what "instantaneous" can mean across a volume of space like your body (or brain) and partially due to abstract notions of what the progression of time really is anyway. For the sake of this fic at least, Rosen's consciousness just doesn't go down any of the timelines where it's possible for her to die. That was her theory of how this should work, and it seems to have panned out for her. I have no idea how this would work in real life and don't really want to find out
10002136
You're welcome! Thank you for reading and I'm glad you enjoyed it!
The question is, can Dr. Bridge go mad? Is the observer observing if they lack a mind capable of processing the data?
Probably. Most wavefunction collapses occurred before consciousness came into being. But it's... well, not a nice thought. Madness was a mercy in this case. But theoretically speaking, the Dr. Bridge we followed might not have been the grand prize winner, so to speak... though after giving Twilight Sparkle a zero, who's to say if she even succeeded against Nightmare Moon in that timeline.
Fascinating tale of horror on the multiversal scale. Thank you for it.
10002183
Thank you for reading! I'm very glad you enjoyed it!
Honestly I agree with you here. The madness is a mercy. It's probably a testament to Rosen's will and her motivations for going through life that she hung on for 4 months. I'd go mad in much less than that.
In my headcanon Twilight receives a 0 from Rosen even in the main timeline and is part of what drives her away from other ponies and therefore this fic shouldn't actually have an AU tag it fits seamlessly into the canon
Gotta admit, I don't really understand quantum suicide. Specifically, I don't understand why bother with the suicide at all. If there's some, however small probability of - let's take lottery for example, that by definition means that there's a world where a version of you have won it. The suicides are unnecessary. From the perspective of the winning you, all other words had already decohered away and thus are as good as dead. From the perspective of the losing you, the winning universe is similarly unreachable and irrelevant regardless of whether or not that version of you happens to be dead.
If it's possible to ascend by chance, Rosen already did it many times, and so did every other pony, or every single creature capable of it - if only in a very small, relatively speaking, region of the Universal wavefunction.
10151715
Yes exactly!
I think it takes a certain kind of ego to make sure the only instances of you that survive are all lottery winners.
10159116
If MWI is correct, we can count it as the next overthrown pedestal of egocentricity. The Earth used to be the center of the Universe with celestial bodies going around it; now it's barely a speck on the outskirts of an unremarkable galaxy. With MWI, not only your world, but even yourself is only one of countless yous, most of which are just as mundane, but some are more awesome that you can ever hope to be, lol.
I’m confused, if Alicorns are Immortal shouldn’t they be able to heal from anything?
10159138
And also more awful versions, and everything inbetween.
Also, I don‘t think it‘s possible to clearly define which person in the multiverse counts as a version of „you“.
EDIT: Well, it may be possible if you define which "splits" count as versions of you.
Every split after you reached a certain age?
Every split after you where born?
Every split after you where conceived?
Every timeline where your parents have a child?
(If it's the latter, we now have to define which persons in the multiverse count as versions of "your parents". I'd suggest something like
Every split after your parents lived together, minus the timelines where they don't have a child.)
Quantum suicide only works as intended if
(major EDIT. Also, not the first Edit, but all Edits have been made within a few hours.)
1. You die so fast that you don‘t experience „dying“
2. You never know that you‘re going to die
3. You can be extremely certain that you won‘t „chicken out“ and remove the Quantum Suicide Device before it kills several versions of you.
4. You can be extremely certain the QSD will kill you if the „survival condition“ isn‘t met.
5. There is a possibility that the „survival condition“ is met.
6. The odds that the "survival condition" is met are greater then the odds of something unrelated to you QSD killing you slowly enough so you experience "dying"
Everything but 2. can be summarized as
"The probability that the 'survival condition' is met is much greater then the probability that you survive given that the survival condition isn't met, and also much greater then the probability of you dying slowly enough to experience it as dying (the cause may or may not be related to your QSD)"
(Am I missing something?)
Without this, there are more timelines where you either survive even though the "survival condition" isn't met, or you die slowly enough to experience it as dying, meaning it's more likely the subjective "you" ends up in one of those timelines.
Either that, or you die in all timelines (if 5. isn't given).
It seems quite obvious to me that 2. isn‘t giving in the alicorn ascension „experiment“. It’s also unclear whether 5. is given. Not sure if "dying [with the 6 hours] for a reason unrelated to the QSD" is unlikely enough. Heck, it may not be unlikely enough in the slightly more probable "win the lottery".
Apparantly, 1. also isn‘t given. Though Dr. Rosen did his best to „overkill“ herself, it‘s apparantly more likely that she will die slowly enough to experience „dying“ then the spell detecting enough Alicorn magic. Dr. Rosen made sure 3. and 4. are given.
(writing this comment before having read Chapter 4)
EDIT 3 (08.11.) Yeah, I‘d like to add another condition:
For every timeline where Dr. Rosen dies, there‘s a timeline where she doesn‘t die and has the exact same „stream of conciousness“ until the point where the QDS kills her.
EDIT 2 after having read the Wikipedia article on "Quantum Suicide and Immortality"
I'm assuming that Dr. Rosen's philosophy ("I'll end up in a timeline where the 'survival condition' is met and won't experience the other timelines because instant death isn't an experience I can have") is legitimate. It's...debatable whether this kind of reasoning is actually legitimate. Most philosophers agree that Quantum Suicide should be treated like "regular" suicide even if the Many Worlds Interpretation is true.
Sorry, I don't quite understand this chapter.
How does Dr. Rosen's spell work exactly?
How does she make sure that she doesn't learn about the true lottery numbers before the QSD kills most versions of her?
So basically, the Quantum Suicide Device would have worked as intented if Celestia hadn't intervened.
And Celestia unknowingly condemned Dr. Rose to a "I have no mouth and I must scream" kind of fate.
Though I at least see a potencial way out:
As I've pointed out in my (pretty long) comment to Chapter 3, Quantum Suicide only works as intended if the versions of you that die die fast enough so you don't experience "dying".
So, Doctor Rosen just needs to be killed in a way that's slow enough so she experiences it as dying.
Which still sounds horrible, but better then "I have no Mouth and I must scream".
To me, the Metalogue wasn't so shocking because it was predictable.
I understand that Dr. Rose only is immortal based on subjective experience if Quantum Suicide works as intended (see my comment on Chapter 3 for the conditions that have to be met).
For everyone else...well, in the overwhelming majority of timelines, Dr. Roses will be dead, so everyone who lives in these timelines will see her as dead.
(For that reason, I would consider Quantum Suicide extremly selfish)
The reason Quantum Suicide works from the subjective point of view is that in these timelines, Dr. Rose dies fast enough so she doesn't experience it as dying.
I don't quite understand why Dr. Rosen is burning bridges here.
How is this going to help her using Quantum Suicide to win the lottery and ascend to alicornhood?
11023112
It's fairly difficult to figure out what counts as a "you" in the first place, and it's only getting harder. Calling somebody the same person when they're five and fifty five years old seems little more than a legal fiction. Split brain experiments as well as mapping of the brain appear to show that underneath the sense of self there's a host of sub-conscious entities acting in concord. Let's not even mention the gut bacteria. And so on.
It doesn't really help that there's little progress on the question wtf is consciousness anyway. There is currently a disbalance between what we know about various constituent parts of the hidden mechanics that seem to produce the mind vs. the workings of the mind "itself" - and there's a growing suspicion that there might not be such thing as the mind's "self" in the first place, that the "you" has always been an illusion of some description. Not to suggest that as the final answer; but it's a possible answer.
Everettian splitting adds to the complexity of that, but the notion of personal identity is by its nature incredibly complex. There's no answering it without involving some degree of arbitrarity, and answers that work in some situations might not make sense in other situation.
10002306
Well, when you're fic features many worlds theory, there is a timeline for every canon.
Including the original show, every head-canon, and every fanfic.
Based on the philosophy behind Quantum Suicide, the only way to have a "clear death" (fast enough that you don't experience it as dying, meaning no continuously degrading consciousness) would be a situation where there's like a tenth of a second during which all "splits" result in your death.
This is independent from any QSD.
I consider Quantum Suicide highly selfish because you're putting those who know you in this exact situation, in the overwhelming majority of timelines.
I think it would be slightly less selfish if Dr. Rosen wrote a "[quantum] suicide note" where she explained this whole Quantum Suicide stuff. Maybe enchant the paper so it burns (or otherwise disappears. The ink fading would also count) in timelines where she survives.
(P.S. @Doctor Axiom: Do you think I've written too many comments?)
11023676
I'm not totally sure about that, in this I've interpreted it as "You won't even go down any timelines that ultimately result in your death."
It's sort of like- working backwards from the instantaneous death. If there is a timeline where in the next instant, you will either die or live, you will only witness the one where you live. If there is a timeline where the next instant you're guaranteed death no matter what you do, then you have to keep working yourself back along the timeline to a point where a split includes the possibility of life. You are guaranteed to go down that split, assuming the notion of quantum suicide is accurate. Therefore the death doesn't have to be instantaneous.
I agree that quantum suicide is incredibly selfish. Rosen is really not acting in the interest of others, or being very considerate of them. The "metalogue" is supposed to capture a fraction of just how selfish she is being.
I don't think you've left too many comments. If that's feedback you've gotten before, I think this is an okay amount for me, because I like the engagement. It *is* too many for me to truly respond to though, because I've gotten quite busy in real life.
Thank you for reading and discussing!
11023112
"Which splits count as versions of you?" is a good reduction of the reason I don't think quantum suicide actually works in real life.
11030992
I'm thinking in terms of conscious experience.
Assume conscious experience has to last at least 0.1 seconds or it's too short to "conciously experience" anything.
If there's a timeline where every possible future 0.1 seconds results in your death, it is perfectly possible to conciously experience such a timeline.
(The reason QS works in the story...under certain philosophical premises which are very much debatable...is that the QSD kills Dr. Rosen within <0.1 second so she can't have conscious experiences related to the QSD killing her)
(0.1 seconds as „shortest possible concious experience“ is more or less arbitrary, but you probably know what I mean)
Well, that‘s unfortunate, I find the topic extremely fascinating ( I was able to guess the general topic of the story based on the title and title picture. Y‘know, the title picture is highly suggestive if you‘ve heard of Many Worlds Interpretation.)
But don‘t worry, I‘m not gonna try anything like that in real life :D Even if someone convinces me that the Many Worlds Interpretation is true. Apart from the philosophical arguments which say that Many Worlds Interpetation really shouldn‘t change the way you view suicide and Death, meaning Dr. Rosens reasoning isn‘t actually valid, I think it‘s incredibly unlikely that the conditions I outlined in chapter 3 are fulfilled — starting with the „basics“ of creating a QSD that‘s able to differenciate whether some desirable „survival condition“ (like winning the lottery) is met.
Also, it‘s incredibly selfish.
Also, you‘re drastically, reducing the number of „self“ (or „people extremely similar to yourself“), which is bad even from a selfish perspective if
1. You care about other selfes/„people extremely similar to yourself“
2. You have a notion that a population of X happy people is worse than a population of X equally happy people plus Y slightly less happy people (who still have lifes worth living)
(The last argument doesn‘t work if you care about the „average self“ rather then „total utility of all selfes“. But even one of my first 2 arguments (you can‘t actually build a QSD that let‘s you survive only if a certain desirable condition is met, „the philosophical arguments which say that Many Worlds Interpetation really shouldn‘t change the way you view suicide and Death“) is more than enough.)
That’s an effort.
I was wondering if there was a fic dealing with this concept on the site. It's something I've thought about a lot for basically half of my whole life. The story was interesting, I especially like the imagery of the necklace thing mechanically stabbing the air as the character puts it on. Though the ending is kind of too dark for my tastes.
I'm thinking of maybe writing an Equestria Girls fic dealing with the concept (with Sci-Twi as the protag), though I'm not really sure what direction to take the story in. It would be fun to see the problems with building a device in a more human setting (and of course not having to make up Equestrian analogues for atoms and stuff). Plus dealing with probability manipulation in a world where magic just kind of exists seems a bit unfit to me.