Sometimes it’s lovely to philosophize, especially about mind-bending topics. Time travel is one such topic. Everyone knows the standard paradoxical issues like the grandfather-son paradox. A more complex complication is called the Butterfly Effect. When you think about this effect, it’s hard to imagine how minor changes could be responsible for the most significant outcomes. And it might be even worse than you thought.
So, what about the title of this article? Why wouldn’t you exist if time travel existed? First, it’s essential to clarify what makes you who you are. You would probably think of your environment, the people around you, and how your parents raised you. But if we go back to the core, it all comes down to your father’s ejaculation. Sorry if this makes you feel awkward, but it’s true. It gets even worse, so bear with me. It’s all about timing as well.
An ejaculation contains up to 300 million sperm cells. So the chance that your unique genetic footprint, which makes you who you are, could flourish was astronomically slight. In addition, millions of sperm cells die and are produced every day, so your window of opportunity was already small in the first place.
Then there is also the timing of ejaculation, which is a tricky one. It has everything to do with chance and the exact position of a specific sperm cell during ejaculation. Had your father climaxed a few (micro)seconds later? Then there is a good chance that another sperm cell had taken your place. This basically means that you would never have existed. The difference is just as significant as having a brother or sister. Every sperm cell is unique, and the moment of ejaculation means everything to the outcome.
The latter is precisely the point I want to make. What ultimately leads to the exact moment of such ejaculation? There are all kinds of factors throughout the day. When it comes to a few (micro)seconds in timing, any micro-change in your parent’s routine could cause that day’s moment-supreme to happen at a slightly different time. And that means that you as an individual would have never existed. A child would be born, who might look a lot like you, but just like a brother or sister would be utterly different from you.
If one travels through time, trying to be as careful as possible won’t solve this. Even the slightest presence in the flow of reality can change it significantly. That is the Butterfly Effect in action. For example, if I walk down a tree and sneeze, it might scare away a few animals. When the animals flee, some other individuals might come across these animals. That means their flow of reality was already altered. Their thought patterns will slightly change for that day. For example, they might suddenly (unconsciously) think about their childhood pet, which changes their thought pattern significantly. Such a small event might lead to an entirely different day than they would have, causing a subtle chain reaction for countless people because all their interactions with the person will be slightly different than they would be, creating a domino effect.
The result will be that the moment this person has sex will be a bit different, resulting in a different ejaculation pattern. It might be a slight alteration in timing. Still, it will result in the fact that entire generations of individuals would never exist, which ensures that when the time traveler returns to his own time, he ends up in a completely different world where history has turned out differently. Different individuals will make other choices, and there will be a whole new chain of events.
So, that’s why you probably wouldn’t exist if we could somehow travel through time. Luckily for you, many paradoxes can be solved with another theoretical effect: the existence of parallel universes. But this article might already be hard to swallow (yes, I did write that sentence intentionally), so I’ll keep that for another time. The hypothesis about ejaculation is an excellent addition to the Butterfly Effect, though. Let’s call this officially the Time Travel Parents Ejaculation Effect.