What if a time-traveller alters history?
Dan Goodman
news:cc4b6645.03101...@posting.google.com:
> What would happen ?
Until such time as enough time travellers have been observed, we don't
know.
>
> a) time traveller creates chaos by giving advanced technology to
> primitive humans
Time traveller gives a working jetplane to hunters and gatherers: It's
unlikely they'd learn to use it before the fuel ran out, and they
wouldn't be able to get more fuel.
Firearms: They would see the use of them, and could learn to use them
fairly quickly. But then the ammunition runs out, and fifty years later
there's no real difference.
> b) time traveller fails, because he already is part of history and
> does not change known history at all
>
> c) time traveller creates multiple alternate timelines not affecting
> our present.
--
Dan Goodman
Journal http://dsgood.blogspot.com or
http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
Whatever you wish for me, may you have twice as much.
H. Torrance Griffin
> faith_...@yahoo.co.uk (Faith Dorell) wrote in
> news:cc4b6645.03101...@posting.google.com:
>
> > What would happen ?
> >
> > a) time traveller creates chaos by giving advanced technology to
> > primitive humans
Define advanced and primitive. Introducing breechloading rifles to
15th century Eurasia would be a lot more impressive than phasers
getting passed out in Sumeria....
> > b) time traveller fails, because he already is part of history and
> > does not change known history at all
> >
> > c) time traveller creates multiple alternate timelines not affecting
> > our present.
This is the most comforting idea on many levels....
HTG
pyotr filipivich
, Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> was inspired to utter:
>faith_...@yahoo.co.uk (Faith Dorell) wrote:
>> What would happen ?
>
>Until such time as enough time travellers have been observed, we don't
>know.
>>
>> a) time traveller creates chaos by giving advanced technology to
>> primitive humans
>
>Time traveller gives a working jetplane to hunters and gatherers: It's
>unlikely they'd learn to use it before the fuel ran out, and they
>wouldn't be able to get more fuel.
>
>Firearms: They would see the use of them, and could learn to use them
>fairly quickly. But then the ammunition runs out, and fifty years later
>there's no real difference.
Dan, you've made one of the classic errors (after getting into a land war
in Asia, and going up against a Sicilian when death is on the line.). :-)
"Advanced/primative" technology are relative terms.
Say I set the wayback machine to 50,000 BCE, find a social unit (tribe)
which hasn't discovered stone tools, and introduce them to flint napping. I
even spend the time teaching them where to find flint. Yee-ha, they have just
adopted the latest cutting edge technology years before their neighbors.
There are hundreds of technologies which did not exist fifty thousand years
ago, which could be produced with the materials on hand then, any one of which
would be "advanced technology".
Agriculture. Metalworking (smelting, forging etc.) writing, domestication
of animals, leather working - lots of 'do able" technologies which can be done
without "high" tech means (high tech as we know it.)
Some years ago, I ran a thought experiment: limiting your equipment to 50
pounds and going to England in 1590, what would you take? And one discussion
revolved around the impact on the English Civil War if concrete boats and the
minnie ball were introduced fifty years before said conflict. I mean, the
Minnie Ball is to us "so 19th century" but in 1590, it was not even a glimmer
of a wild notion. Boy talk about your "high tech." Add a few tricks in iron
and steel production and "Rule Britannia!"
Likewise, the introduction of third generation molecular circuits into the
early 21st century is not a flyer. These people think doped silicon circuits
are cutting edge, and haven't even gotten "room temperature" semiconductors to
a point where they really are 'room temperature". And lets not mention
nanites. They've the idea, but have they the ability to really use them? And
so it goes. (Do you realize they're still using fiber optics at megahertz
speeds for communication?)
And so it goes.
It doesn't matter what the technology level is, kittens will still piddle
on the carpet, babies will still spit up sour milk. In micro-g, that is really
gross.
fards
pyotr
--
pyotr filipivich
The cliche is that history rarely repeats herself. Usually she just
lets fly with a frying pan and yells "Why weren't you listening
the first time!?"
Robert J. Kolker
pyotr filipivich wrote:
>
> Say I set the wayback machine to 50,000 BCE, find a social unit (tribe)
> which hasn't discovered stone tools, and introduce them to flint napping. I
> even spend the time teaching them where to find flint. Yee-ha, they have just
> adopted the latest cutting edge technology years before their neighbors.
That is a first rate pun!.
Bob Kolker
Dan Goodman
> soc.history.what-if , Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> was inspired to
>
The introduction of horseback riding (which only became popular in what
we would call the 23rd century) to much earlier times was successful.
Perhaps too much so; the original intent was to give nomads a better
chance of maintaining their freedom from chariot-riders. And that's
something not intuitively obvious.
On the other hand: The Blackwater method of forecasting social events and
trends requires almost no equipment -- the ability to write trigrams, and
to toss yarrow stalks or some equivalent. And to make sure it took hold,
it was introduced into every agricultural society on Earth. But it
survived only in a thoroughly useless form, and only in what is now
China.
The problem seems to have been that people don't _want_ accurate
forecasts.
TheWanderer
technology that was lost.
Concrete was on..even BC it had it. It was not rediscovered till 1836.
Also art...If you take a look at Dark age art it looked like shit.. 2D with
almost stick looking figures.
Last year an old Roman city was found in Turkey that had mosaics on the
floors of the houses. Those pieces of clay on the floor looked almost as
good as any painting after medieval Europe.
"H. Torrance Griffin" <htgr...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:4e7dcb0a.0310...@posting.google.com...
bil Chamberlin
it does change "outcomes" would not effect the structure of the universe.
The universe are time barriers like the rings of a tree trunk ages old
millions of years pulses a beat of eternity
"Dan Goodman" <dsg...@visi.com> wrote in message
news:Xns9417F3BA24C...@209.98.13.60...
Guardenman >
>
> faith_...@yahoo.co.uk (Faith Dorell) wrote in
> news:cc4b6645.03101...@posting.google.com:
>
> > What would happen ?
You can't change history if you are a part of it.
>
> Until such time as enough time travellers have been observed, we don't
> know.
> >
> > a) time traveller creates chaos by giving advanced technology to
> > primitive humans
Been there done that. You get in big trouble.
>
> Time traveller gives a working jetplane to hunters and gatherers: It's
> unlikely they'd learn to use it before the fuel ran out, and they
> wouldn't be able to get more fuel.
Good luck with that.
>
> Firearms: They would see the use of them, and could learn to use them
> fairly quickly. But then the ammunition runs out, and fifty years later
> there's no real difference.
Yea but it's a great way to pick up chicks.
>
> > b) time traveller fails, because he already is part of history and
> > does not change known history at all
Hey did someone already give you the answers?
> >
> > c) time traveller creates multiple alternate timelines not affecting
> > our present.
you've been reading to many comic books.
>
> --
> Dan Goodman
> Journal http://dsgood.blogspot.com or
> http://www.livejournal.com/users/dsgood/
> Whatever you wish for me, may you have twice as much.
--
Quote of the month
. When trouble arises and things look bad, there is
always one individual who perceives a solution and is
willing to take command. Very often, that individual is
crazy.
Ok two quotes:
"The SAT losing the analogy section is like Christmas
losing fruitcake — it may have been “tried and true, but nobody really
ever liked it that much.”
Jon Zeitlin, director of Kaplan’s New SAT test prep program,.
odin
how do we know... that hasn't allready happened?..... but is a part of our
history?...
like what myths we have of Atlantis...
maybe someone decieded to go back..... and while he/she was there.... hey..
this is how you use geo-thermal energy..... maybe he was made king for his
knowlege
"Guardenman >" <"\"Mfullenwider\" <jamby11document"@canada.com> wrote in
message news:100s8tn...@corp.supernews.com...
> losing fruitcake - it may have been "tried and true, but nobody really
Daniel Green
that in a science journal a few years ago - i'm not an antichrist but
you never know
Doc Martian
cleaning up messes and putting idiots into phase.
cheers!
Doc
p.s. bet some make 'ghosts' as well.... not that there aren't actual
ghosts.. people who sort of envelop their place of death with a
non-chronoawareness projection.
"odin" <od...@wizards-den.com> wrote in message
news:tafRb.153591$I06.1548036@attbi_s01...
Matt Giwer
> what if there's only one timeline... unalterable... but a lot of people
> cleaning up messes and putting idiots into phase.
For most of my adult life I have used my time machine invention to
alter history. So far not one of you has noticed it.
Which means the subject question is meaningless. If it happens we
cannot know it has happened by definition. An altered history is the
only history.
--
The reason the government does nothing to control
illegal immigration is the need for new workers
to keep the social security system functioning.
-- The Iron Webmaster, 3103
Andre
> Doc Martian wrote:
> > what if there's only one timeline... unalterable... but a lot of people
> > cleaning up messes and putting idiots into phase.
hehehehe :)
If I had a time machine, I'd stop these pesky humans from evolving in
the first place... Good riddance, we are an evolutionary dead end
anyway. >:->
-A
Dan Childers
> > what if there's only one timeline... unalterable... but a lot of people
> > cleaning up messes and putting idiots into phase.
>
> For most of my adult life I have used my time machine invention to
> alter history. So far not one of you has noticed it.
>
Some of us have noticed, and are grateful. Thank God you
took out that fiend Buddy Holly before he began his
reign of terror! Though it was a shame you killed those
other musicians at the same time.
Guardenman
At least he spared whalin Jennings.
--
Quote of the month
Many people look to the sky, see all the stars and wonder, how can there
not be life out there? It is far more important to see how many dead
planets are out there. Only than can you truly realize, how fragile our
ecosystem is.
Corneilus Williams
