If existence is deterministic in a Laplaceanly demonic way, we should be able to unravel etiology more and more effectively as our technology improves. Perhaps this is a harbinger of the possibilities of the forensics of ontology.
The Total Perspective Vortex sort of work by that mechanic.
Update function would need to be reversible for that to always work (you shouldn't be able to get the same state starting from different states). And I think it's not the case, at least localy (heat one corner of a metal plate slightly, wait till it equalizes, guess which one it was).
Who would look out for the poor historians?
It would make for a sweet game show actually, have a panel of historians make their best predictions on what really happened at an event, then "roll the footage!"
etiology: causation; how things got how they are.
harbinger: forerunner; advance warning. (The etymology is interesting. Originally a harbinger was someone who provides accommodation -- compare the French word "auberge". Then it came to mean someone sent ahead by, e.g., an army to prepare lodgings so that the troops would have somewhere to sleep when they arrived. And then, metaphorically, it came to mean any sort of forerunner.
forensics: = forensic science, meaning the application of science to answering the sorts of questions that come up in criminal trials. (Same origin as "forum"; in ancient Rome trials took place in the public square.) I think gloriousduke really just means something like "scientific investigation into past events" here.
ontology: actually means the study of what exists. (I.e., answering questions like "what kinds of things exist?".) I suspect gloriousduke meant something else, perhaps something as mundane as "the study of actual things that exist". In any case, his second sentence doesn't really add anything much to the first.
So I would translate gloriousduke's comment as follows. "If the universe is deterministic, like a big mechanical machine, then with better and better technology we will be able to do better and better at deciphering the past from its present remains: this thing with the scrolls is just the beginning. Also, I know some long words."
(Note that actually determinism isn't quite the issue. What matters is what you might call "backward determinism", where you extrapolate the future from the past. But it looks as if the laws of nature are kinda reversible, so the two are closely related.)