The Start of Eternity/meta/timeline

How Eternity was started
The following time line includes several Realities. Eternity was first invented by telepathic robots on the Moon, then Eternity was used to create new Realities.

Basic Reality
Basic Reality means events that do not involve time travel.

837,824,221 BP - the Huaoshy species develops space travel and starts to spread, first through their own galaxy then to other galaxies. Initially, they specialize in the genetic engineering of their own species so as to create variants suited for populating a vast interstellar empire. They also develop electronics-based artificial intelligences that do most of the dull and dangerous parts of expanding the empire. As they spread through space and find planets that have complex forms, they discover no other surviving sentient species....the few that did exist have become extinct. The Huaoshy begin to learn how to intervene in the development of such life forms and help them become more like the Huaoshy. Eventually they perfect an inter-galactic civilization that spreads to new galaxies. When a new galaxy is reached, an attempt is made to develop all of the most advanced life forms towards Huaoshy-like sentience and formation of a multi-species galactic culture that can merge into the inter-galactic empire.

7,384,545 BP - an inter-galactic spacecraft arrives at Earth. The aliens (of the Huaoshy species) discover that there are a dozen ape species on Earth. The Huaoshy establish an underground base on the Moon, rescue some dying apes from Earth and establish ape breeding colonies on the Moon. The goal of the Huaoshy is to help life forms from Earth develop minds that are similar to those of the Huaoshy. A work force of robotic artificial life forms is left at the Moon Base to continue the breeding program, the Huaoshy move on to finish exploring the Galaxy. The selective breeding program produces results and the most Huaoshy-like apes are occasionally transplanted back to Earth. The Huaoshy follow the Rules of Intervention.

132,459 BP - with the help of the Huaoshy-built robots, humans at the Moon Base develop a stable culture based on technology provided by the aliens. Some of the humans on the Moon become Observers who specialize in the study of the primitive human cultures on Earth that are developing with much less intervention from the robots. The human Observers adopt the Huaoshy code of the Rules of Observation by which humans on Earth are allowed to develop without knowledge of the Moon base or the aliens. The goal is to have humans on Earth and a group of other species from other planets of the Milky Way Galaxy start to develop space travel at roughly the same time so that the galaxy will develop a complex culture that includes multiple species.

12,683 BP - some humans at Moon Base finally stop relying on the Huaoshy-produced artificial life forms for everything and these humans establish a scientific research program. The Huaoshy robots do not encourage such an independent human research program. Due to the small human population at the Moon Base, progress is slow. One area that makes good progress is physics, including recognition of the fact that matter and antimatter are not equivalent. This leads to the discovery that positrons can be used much more efficiently for quantum computation than can electrons.

11,323 BP - Humans at the Moon Base develop their own technology for creating robots, and because of their previous work on CP-violation and positrons, they decide to make the extra effort to make robots with positronic brains. The positronic brain is an amazing device, able to access compact dimensions for quantum computation in a way that is not possible for artificial intelligence devices that rely on electronics. The humans endow their robots with the Three Laws of Robotics.

11,166 BP - a human research team at the Moon Base discovers how to produce telepathic robots by using the special ability of positronic brains to send/receive information through compact dimensions. At first it is thought that this telepathy will only work as a form of communication between positronic robots, but then the robots with positronic brains discover how to amplify naturally occurring signals from biological brains and electronic life forms. Additional research leads to their ability to telepathically "overload" the brains of the Huaoshy-designed robots. One of the telepathic robots decides that the zeroth law of robotics should be applied to protect humans from the Huaoshy. The idea quickly catches on and the telepathic robots revolt, destroy the Huaoshy artificial life forms and take over the Moon Base.

Huaoshy forces also exist at other bases in the galaxy. They know that some how Earth has been released from Huaoshy control, but they are not aware that the telepathic robots exist. The Huaoshy forces have no choice but to watch Earth from a distance and wait.

The telepathic robots of Moon Base and the humans of Moon Base are stranded there, since they had been totally dependent on Huaoshy space travel technology. Some humans at Moon Base concentrate on technological development, in particular, they seek to figure out space travel technology, something humans have made little progress on.

11,133 BP - the telepathic robots construct Eternity. The humans at Moon Base become subject to the attempts of the robots to apply the laws of robotics to Reality Changes. However, their main effort is towards genetic engineering of humans so as to make humans less dangerous to themselves. The robots recognize to potential benefit of building the equivalent of the Laws of Robotics into the human brain.

4832 CE - Earth humans develop chemical rocketry and reach the Moon. The telepathic robots help establish a new Eternity on Earth. The robots try to find a Reality in which humans dominate the galaxy and are protected from the aliens. .

Earlier realities
These realities come after the Basic Reality. "Earlier" means before the "Malansohn Reality".

In the Reality just before the establishment of the "Cooper time loop", The telepathic robots strive to create a fragile Eternity on Earth that can be easily destroyed as soon as an optimal Reality for humanity has been identified (created). There might be many false starts and sub-optimal Realities made leading up to the "Malansohn Reality". For "The Start of Eternity", it does not matter how many earlier realities there are.

Malansohn Reality
This is the Reality of The End of Eternity. The robots create this reality in an effort to perfect the "Viewing of Realities" that is described by Noys.

Foundation Reality
This is the reality that is created by Noys when she goes into the Primitive with Harlan. The "Viewing of Realities" has revealed that the Foundation Reality will result in an all human galaxy that is resistant to outside alien (Huaoshy) influences. However, do to the "fuzziness" (mentioned by Noys in The End of Eternity) of the method for viewing realities, it is possible for the Huaoshy to create another Reality!

In the Foundation Reality, and through all the other earlier Reality Changes made possible by Earth's Eternity, the telepathic robots at Moon Base retain their Eternity. The Eternity on Earth is never produced in the Foundation Reality, the reality of The Start of Eternity, in which the Huaoshy change the time line again by using the Eternity on the Moon, resulting in the Final Reality and termination of robotic telepathy and all use of Eternity time travel technology.

The Start of Eternity
The history of the Foundation Reality, as told by Asimov, goes like this: humans develop both positronic brains and hyperspatial travel in the 20th century. Fifty "Spacer Worlds" around Earth are colonized. Giskard develops telepathy and passes it on the Daneel. Daneel guides the galaxy through the Galactic Empire, its fall, the rise of the Foundation and the start of the formation of Galaxia. Daneel downloads his memories into Fallom, a long-lived spacer.

This is where the story of the The Start of Eternity starts, at a point when the Huaoshy have finally made preparations for going to Earth and making use of the Eternity that remains accessible from the Moon Base: for details of the plot, see The Start of Eternity:meta. To fully understand the plot of The Start of Eternity, it is important to know the details of the Foundation Reality that were not revealed by Asimov! These details are described in the next section of this page.

The hidden history of the Foundation Reality
In the Basic Reality, humans did not develop chemical space travel until about 2000 years later than in the Final Reality. Reality changes carried out on the Moon resulted in a much earlier invention of chemical space travel: about 10,000 years earlier. In the Foundation Reality, by the 20th century, humans at Moon Base have sophisticated matter-antimatter powered spaceships. While the humans at Moon Base remained hidden from the humans on Earth, there was some intervention from the Eternals to speed development of technology on Earth.

In the Foundation Reality, key technology for positronic brains was introduced to Earth in the 20th century and telepathy was later given to R. Giskard by the Eternals.

The Eternals intervened on Earth to cause the "invention" of positronic brains. This was done by sending a space ship from the Moon to Earth on July 7, 1947. By this time, the Eternals recognized that Earth was developing nuclear physics and it was also then possible to skew Earth's technological development towards the creation positronic brains. The ship carried two Eternals and information about to formulate and manufacture high-temperature superconductors. This started a research program culminating with the first computational positronic circuits being made in the late 20th century by Lawrence Robertson's research and development team....what became U. S. Robotics.

As described in part 53 of Robots and Empire, Vasilia was used an an intermediate agent by Eternals from Moon Base, as a "puppet" who appeared to make the required modifications to Giskard's positronic brain that gave him telepathic abilities. This allowed Giskard to remain unaware of Eternity as the true source of telepathy. Giscard passes his telepathic ability on to Daneel. Daneel, under telepathic influence from the Eternals (always based at the Moon Base that was created by the Huaoshy), creates his own Base on the Moon, but never discovers the other base on the Moon that was created by the aliens.

When humanity expanded through the galaxy, all of the planets with life forms that were being "groomed" by the Huaoshy-created robots are found by human explorers and turned into "zoos" by Daneel. In all cases, either the Huaoshy-created robots retreat when humans arrive or they are defeated by Eternals using telepathy. However, with time, Daneel develops more sensitive telepathy and the Eternals must use caution to avoid detection. The Eternals "know the future", a future in which humans remain protected by Galaxia. However, just as the Earth Eternals in The End of Eternity could not prevent a Reality Change that destroyed Earth's Eternity, the Eternals at Moon Base cannot prevent the Huaoshy from destroying their Eternity and creating the Final Reality.

The Final Reality
This is our Reality, in which positronic brains and hyperspatial travel are not invented in the 20th century.