Chrono-synclastic infundibula, mysterious spirals that exist in space, represent the vast unknowable expanse of the universe and the predetermined nature of existence. They are never fully explained in the novel, with the narrator claiming that they are too complex to be easily summarized and indicating that human scientists still do not really understand them. According to the novel, the age of human space exploration is halted by the discovery of chrono-synclastic infundibula. No one knows what will happen if a human enters them, and thus governments ban humans from travelling through space. However, Winston Niles Rumfoord ignores this ban and, taking his dog, Kazak, with him, flies his spaceship directly into a particular chrono-synclastic infundibulum that stretches between Earth and Mars. The result is that Rumfoord and Kazak become trapped in a kind of time warp. Being inside a chrono-synclastic infundibulum enables Rumfoord to see into the past and future; inside the spirals, all the different, subjective, and conflicting versions of truth fit together perfectly. It is through the seemingly omniscient power he gains within the chrono-synclastic infundibulum that Rumfoord is able to realize that everything that happens in the universe is predetermined, which indicates that there is no such thing as free will. At the same time, it eventually becomes clear that Rumfoord never achieves full omniscience, as he is not able to predict that one day a sunspot will interrupt the chrono-synclastic infundibulum he is in, flinging him and Kazak off into the oblivion of space. In their mysteriousness, then, chrono-synclastic infundibulum represent hubris and the limits of human knowledge.
Chrono-Synclastic Infundibulum Quotes in The Sirens of Titan
“When I ran my space ship into the chrono-synclastic infundibulum, it came to me in a flash that everything that has been always will be, and everything that ever will be always has been.” He chuckled again. “Knowing that rather takes the glamour out of fortunetelling—makes it the simplest, most obvious thing imaginable.”
The discovery of the chrono-synclastic infundibula said to mankind in effect: “What makes you think you’re going anywhere?”
It was a situation made to order for American fundamentalist preachers. They were quicker than philosophers or historians or anybody to talk sense about the truncated Age of Space.
“There it is—friend,” he said to his memory of Rumfoord, “and much consolation may it give you, Skip. Much pain it cost your old friend Salo. In order to give it to you—even too late—your old friend Salo had to make war against the core of his being, against the very nature of being a machine.
“You asked the impossible of a machine,” said Salo, “and the machine complied.”
Chrono-Synclastic Infundibulum Symbol Timeline in The Sirens of Titan
