"So there’s this man. He has a time machine. Up and down history he goes, zip zip zip zip zip. Getting into scrapes. Another thing he has is a passion for the works of Ludwig van Beethoven. And one day he thinks, What good is having a time machine if you don’t meet your heroes? So off he goes, to 18th century Germany. But he can’t find Beethoven anywhere. No one’s heard of him, not even his family. They don’t have any idea who the time traveler is talking about. Beethoven literally doesn’t exist. This didn’t happen, by the way. I’ve met Beethoven. Nice chap. Very intense. Loved to arm wrestle. No, this is called The Bootstrap Paradox. Google it. The time traveler panics. He can’t bear the thought of a world without the music of Beethoven. Luckily, he brought all of his Beethoven sheet music for Ludwig to sign. So he copies out all the concertos, and the symphonies, and he gets them published. He becomes Beethoven. And history continues with barely a feather ruffled. My question is this. Who puts those notes and phrases together? Who really composed Beethoven’s Fifth?"