QWhat is the "Butterfly Effect"?
AIt is explained at the start of the movie that the Butterfly Effect is a tenet of Chaos Theory, which says that even the smallest of occurrences, such as the flutter of a butterfly's wings, can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world. This means that every action you take, and every choice you make, has a consequence; With every action, there is an equal and opposite occurring reaction. What you say and what you do may and will have an effect on someone else, what that person then says and does will have an effect on another person, and that person and another and yet another after that. No matter how small, meaningless or innocuous, what we say and do will always affect someone else, whether intended or adversely, ultimately causing "ripples" that may extend to a far greater proportion of those effected than intended.
QHow was Evan able to go back to the birthday party or to the time of his birth without having experienced any blackouts at those times?
AWhen the doctor told Evan that his father was always looking for a photo album that didn't exist, Evan realized that he could use different sources to go to the past. He used a home movie of the birthday party and of his birth in order to return to those points in time. The ability to time travel was not because of the words in his journal but because of something in his brain, passed on to him by his father. The blackouts, as we then learn, were not the cause of his ability to time-travel, it's the other way around: the time-traveling was the cause of the blackouts. In other words, the blackouts were not mere "openings" in time that Evan could travel back to. He could actually return to any period in his past, provided that he had any means of focusing on that particular time, through a text, picture or video. His mind would travel back, his adult consciousness would replace his child mind, and leave a 'blackout'. Evan described these blackouts in his diaries, and reading them caused him to return to the moment of the blackout. So ironically, the blackouts caused themselves to occur, a phenomenon which is known as a time paradox.
QWhy didn't anything change the first time Evan went back to the past?
AThe first time Evan (Ashton Kutcher) had a flashback, he was sitting with a girl and suddenly found himself back in the junkyard. When this happened, Evan didn't realize yet that he could change the past. He was just a spectator in the flashback, and everything happened just like the first time around. There are more instances of Evan doing a flashback that does not lead to large changes in the future, again indicating the unpredictable nature of the 'butterfly effect' (or chaos theory). Not every (small) change sets in motion a series of events that leads to a totally different outcome.
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