bootstrap paradox: meaning, definition, pronunciation and examples

No. The grandfather paradox involves changing the past to create a contradiction (e.g., killing your grandfather so you are never born). The bootstrap paradox involves an element from the future being sent to the past, becoming the cause of its own existence in a loop with no external creation.

It is a theoretical concept in physics and philosophy. Some interpretations of quantum mechanics and closed timelike curves allow for such loops mathematically, but there is no empirical evidence for their physical existence. It is primarily a popular narrative device in fiction.

In the film 'The Terminator,' the advanced microchip from the Terminator is used to create Skynet, which later sends the Terminator back in time. The design of Skynet thus has no original inventor—it is a bootstrap paradox.

It references the idiom 'to pull oneself up by one's bootstraps,' meaning to improve one's situation by one's own efforts. This is ironic, as physically pulling oneself up by bootstraps is impossible. The paradox similarly describes something that seems to create or initiate itself from nothing.

A paradox of time travel in which an item, piece of information, or object is sent back in time, becoming the very thing that caused its own existence, creating an infinite causal loop with no discernible point of origin.

Bootstrap paradox is usually academic, technical, sci-fi/fantasy/media analysis (colloquial within these contexts). in register.

Bootstrap paradox: in British English it is pronounced /ˈbuːtstræp ˈpærədɒks/, and in American English it is pronounced /ˈbutˌstræp ˈpɛrəˌdɑks/. Tap the audio buttons above to hear it.