There was also a Calvin and Hobbes storyline in which Calvin, not wanting to do his homework, makes a time machine and travels a few hours into the future so he can collect his already-done homework and take it back with him. Of course, when he arrives in to the future, the homework still isn't done, because he spent the time between then and now goofing off...
There was also a Calvin and Hobbes storyline in which Calvin, not wanting to do his homework, makes a time machine and travels a few hours into the future so he can collect his already-done homework and take it back with him. Of course, when he arrives in to the future, the homework still isn't done, because he spent the time between then and now goofing off...
I would think the problem there is that there isn't any instance of Calvin in the time stream at that point - goofing off or otherwise.
The correct decision there is to do the homework then take i...
An episode of the Noddy animated series has the following plot.
Noddy needs to go pick up Martha Monkey at the station. But it's such a nice, sunny day that he would prefer to play around outside. He gets an idea to solve this dilemma. He casts a duplication spell on himself and his car and tells the duplicate to go fetch Martha while he goes out to play. Later, Noddy is out having fun when he suddenly spots his duplicate. It turns out that the duplicate also preferred playing outside to doing the errand so he also cast a duplication spell. Then they see another duplicate, and another...
I think this story makes for a nice simple illustration of one of our perennial decision theoretic issues: When making decisions you should take into account that agents identical to yourself will make the same decision in the same situation. A common real-life example of the Noddy problem is when we try to pawn off our dietary problems to our future selves.