Dr. Stone: Here’s Why Senku Wants to Build a Time Machine

Dr. Stone’s story in the manga ended with 232 chapters, as we saw how the story ended with Senku convincing the Medusa petrification devices to give up on humanity. In that regard, the heroes could return to Earth from their moon mission and were awarded medals and awards by the humans on the planet. In the final scenes of the manga, it was shown that Senku was working on a time machine while the wedding of his best friend was happening. So, why is it that Senku wants to build a time machine?

Senku wants to build a time machine so that he could return to the time before the petrification event happened. He knew that a lot of statues were destroyed in the 3,700 years since the petrification event and that there were also petrification devices that died. He wants to save all of those lives.

The fact that Senku is still pursuing a greater scientific goal is so like him because we all know that his pursuit of science has always been for the greater good. That means that there’s a really good reason why he wanted to travel back in time. And this new challenge for him should be the most difficult scientific endeavor for him.

How Does Dr. Stone End?

It was never a secret that the entire storyline of Dr. Stone revolved around Senku and his allies trying to bring the world back to the way it was before a worldwide petrification event caused all of the humans on the plane to turn into stone more than 3,700 years ago. However, Senku was one of the first humans to wake up from his petrification and is now looking to try to rebuild civilization using the power of science.

Back in the Treasure Island arc in the manga, the characters learned that there were petrification weapons that other people in the world were using to turn people into stone. They said these petrification devices fell from the sky long ago. And at the end of the arc, Senku and his allies discovered a mysterious entity they called “Why-Man” stationed on the moon and that this entity was planning on turning people into stone once more.

As such, Senku and his friends decided they needed to stop Why-Man’s plans by working together to build a ship that could take them to the moon. They were embarking on one of the biggest scientific endeavors that humankind has accomplished as they are now looking to send a team to the moon to stop Why-Man from turning humanity into stone once more. And that was when Senku and his friends had to work with other nations founded in different parts of the world.

Eventually, Senku and his friends could complete their mission of building a rocket that took them to the moon. While on the moon, they discovered that the dark mass they saw using a telescope was a floating mass of countless petrification devices that were alive and sentient. Senku learned that these creatures were machine lifeforms that turned other intelligent life to stone to gain eternal life and use this gift to advance their civilization. In exchange, the petrification devices required periodic maintenance that only intelligent lifeforms could do.

Senku, however, convinced the petrification devices to leave humanity alone so that they could move on to try to work with other intelligent life forms in the universe. All of the petrification devices, except for a uniquely curious one, left the solar system. Meanwhile, Senku and his allies returned to Earth as heroes that were given medals for their bravery.

Chapter 232 of the manga, which is the final chapter, skipped a few years from the success of the moon mission. Years after returning from the moon, Senku was seen skipping Taiju’s wedding with Yuzuriha to work on a new scientific project. When asked what he was building, he said he was working on a time machine. As such, even though the Dr. Stone manga is now over, we know that Senku is now looking to try to travel through time.

Senku’s Motivation for Traveling Through Time

As mentioned, the Dr. Stone manga ended with Senku trying to build a time machine that could take him back to the past. Of course, all of the other inventions that Senku created had already been accomplished by humankind before the petrification event. However, time travel was an entirely different topic that human civilization was yet to achieve. But why is Senku trying to build a time machine?

Well, the thing is that Senku understood that a lot of people died due to the petrification event 3,700 years ago. That’s because some of the petrified statues were no longer recoverable. As such, plenty of innocent people died without having the chance to return to life by getting de-petrified. On top of that, many petrification devices also died years ago, which explains why plenty of petrification weapons fell on Earth.

Senku knew that there was a way that he could stop the deaths of countless people and petrification devices. Of course, the only way for him to do so was to find a way to travel through time to prevent the worldwide petrification event, which caused many people and petrification devices to die.

Of course, this is now the biggest challenge in Senku’s life as a scientist because everything we know about time travel is theoretical. Humanity is yet to achieve this level of technology, and even sci-fi movies don’t often talk about time travel due to the difficulties involved with this scientific concept.

The moon mission was already too tough for Senku to handle, as he needed the help of other nations worldwide to build a rocket that could take them to space. And they were building a rocket based on the existing knowledge since humanity could achieve this feat already.

Time travel, however, is an entirely different story because of how theoretically frustrating this concept is. There is also the possibility that Senku would not save billions of people from death by traveling through time but would only create a new parallel timeline wherein the petrification event never happened. That means there’s a chance that whatever he did in the past would not change the outcome of the future he built with the other citizens of the Kingdom of Science.

Nevertheless, Senku is a man of science that loves a good challenge. That means that if there were more of the Dr. Stone storyline in the future, the manga author might be able to explain the entire time travel paradox problem that often exists in debates regarding time travel.