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07/22/2004 09:44:41 PM · #1 |
To put a twist on a previous thread, A neat Question to think about! ,
if you could take 1 and only 1 peice of modern technology back in time and show it to one person, what would you take and who would you show it to? (example, take a cell phone and show it to Philipp Reis, not Alexader Bell or Elisha Gray).
I would take the 10 meter Keck observatory telescope and show it to William Herschel, who discovered Uranus, and is considered one of the most important astronomers in history.
James
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07/22/2004 09:52:33 PM · #2 |
For some reason, I'd want to give Robert Oppenheimer 1000 folded paper cranes.
Perhaps take Issac Newton a hard hat.
Maybe show Leonardo an AH-64A/D Apache.
Or give Samuel Peeps a PDA.
But I think I'd most like to give Tesla something that he'd get the recognition he deserves, for.
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07/22/2004 09:53:05 PM · #3 |
I like your question, but I hardly think that's a fair answer, as the Keck involves the use of innumerable modern technologies. It's not like you can look through the eyepiece and see anything. The televisions you see the image on, the electronics which point it, the electric motors which move it, which technology are you demonstrating.
Of course, I don't actually have a good answer right now : ) |
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07/22/2004 09:54:32 PM · #4 |
Originally posted by Gordon:
For some reason, I'd want to give Robert Oppenheimer 1000 folded paper cranes. |
I think Edward Teller needs them more ... |
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07/22/2004 09:55:07 PM · #5 |
I'd give a doppler weather system to the meteorologist who told the folks in Galveston in 1900 that there was no need to worry about the cyclone heading their way...
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07/22/2004 10:19:03 PM · #6 |
Originally posted by GeneralE:
I like your question, but I hardly think that's a fair answer, as the Keck involves the use of innumerable modern technologies. It's not like you can look through the eyepiece and see anything. The televisions you see the image on, the electronics which point it, the electric motors which move it, which technology are you demonstrating.
Of course, I don't actually have a good answer right now : ) |
ppptttthhhh!!!! you got me on my own question there, but you get my point, maybe I could take one of the highest optical quality 36" dob telescope if I cant take the Keck observatory
James
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07/22/2004 10:33:02 PM · #7 |
James, stick with your fist choice... he'd get a "keck" out of it!
...groaan!
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07/22/2004 10:42:16 PM · #8 |
I'd show a modern digital computer to Babbage.
I'd also love to show an iPod to Edison.
/Andrew
Message edited by author 2004-07-22 22:42:37. |
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07/22/2004 10:43:04 PM · #9 |
I think I'de like to take a sports almanac back and give it to me.
(Back to the future 2)
seriously though I'de take a news clip of John Lennon being shot and give it to the Beatles so he could still be with us writing fantastic songs about love and peace.
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07/23/2004 12:17:14 AM · #10 |
Originally posted by Kha0S:
I'd show a modern digital computer to Babbage. |
I thought of that, but thought it might be more useful to have given one to Newton :)
How about showing a Moebius strip to Euclid? |
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07/23/2004 01:23:59 AM · #11 |
I would give Christopher Columbus modern navigational tools and modern maps, then he wouldn't make the mistake of arriving in the Caribbean thinking it was India. Although changing that event would have its consequences, like for example, he wouldnt have discovered the Americas and therefore I wouldn't exist to go back in time and give him all that in the first place. What is this called again, the butterfly effect?
June
BTW, I'm aware of the whole Vikings arriving before Columbus thing, but for the purpose of this threat let's forget about that.
Oh, I remembered, it's not the butterfly effect, it's called a time paradox. DUH!
Message edited by author 2004-07-23 01:49:03.
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07/23/2004 02:24:28 AM · #12 |
Chiqui74 is right. Most any change in history, even insignificant ones could easily result in you (or me) not being born.
I had an idea for a story one time, it was about a man who had access or invented (didn't pin down the details) a time machine. When he used it he went back in time to meet his dad. He grew up with his single mother, and never got to meet his father. When he went back in time, he saw a beautiful woman, and they fell in love. They made love and afterwards he went to use the bathroom. The woman is laying in bed, waiting for him to shut off the water and come back into the bedroom. She gets up and the sink is running but he's not there.
Naturally the idea is that when his sperm penetrated her egg he 'disappears' as a full grown man and is now inside his mother's womb. Which is why he never knew his dad growing up etc. I never wound up writing it because I thought it was too 'Oedipus Complex' for most people's tastes. (including my own)
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07/23/2004 07:21:04 AM · #13 |
Originally posted by jadin:
Chiqui74 is right. Most any change in history, even insignificant ones could easily result in you (or me) not being born.
I had an idea for a story one time, it was about a man who had access or invented (didn't pin down the details) a time machine. When he used it he went back in time to meet his dad. He grew up with his single mother, and never got to meet his father. When he went back in time, he saw a beautiful woman, and they fell in love. They made love and afterwards he went to use the bathroom. The woman is laying in bed, waiting for him to shut off the water and come back into the bedroom. She gets up and the sink is running but he's not there.
Naturally the idea is that when his sperm penetrated her egg he 'disappears' as a full grown man and is now inside his mother's womb. Which is why he never knew his dad growing up etc. I never wound up writing it because I thought it was too 'Oedipus Complex' for most people's tastes. (including my own) |
Hey, no offense, but I dont think it makes any sense. He's future self would have not disappeared at the moment of conception. However, had he stopped them somehow from having sex, then he would have vanished because he would have never existed. Just my two cents.
June
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07/23/2004 07:30:37 AM · #14 |
Originally posted by jadin:
I had an idea for a story one time, it was about a man who had access or invented (didn't pin down the details) a time machine. When he used it he went back in time to meet his dad. He grew up with his single mother, and never got to meet his father. When he went back in time, he saw a beautiful woman, and they fell in love. They made love and afterwards he went to use the bathroom. The woman is laying in bed, waiting for him to shut off the water and come back into the bedroom. She gets up and the sink is running but he's not there.
Naturally the idea is that when his sperm penetrated her egg he 'disappears' as a full grown man and is now inside his mother's womb. Which is why he never knew his dad growing up etc. I never wound up writing it because I thought it was too 'Oedipus Complex' for most people's tastes. (including my own) |
A quite different story, but check out Isaac Asimov's short story The Last Question. I bet you'd like it.
You should be able to turn it up in a Google search.
-Terry
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07/23/2004 07:33:04 AM · #15 |
Originally posted by chiqui74:
Hey, no offense, but I dont think it makes any sense. He's future self would have not disappeared at the moment of conception. However, had he stopped them somehow from having sex, then he would have vanished because he would have never existed. Just my two cents.
June |
It also doesn't make sense that he could be his own father, as he would have had to have first been born in order to create the time machine so he could go back and conceive himself.
There are many stories like this with seemingly unsolvable paradoxes at the center. The Asimov story I referenced above is another.
-Terry
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07/23/2004 07:51:17 AM · #16 |
Originally posted by ClubJuggle:
Originally posted by chiqui74:
Hey, no offense, but I dont think it makes any sense. He's future self would have not disappeared at the moment of conception. However, had he stopped them somehow from having sex, then he would have vanished because he would have never existed. Just my two cents.
June |
It also doesn't make sense that he could be his own father, as he would have had to have first been born in order to create the time machine so he could go back and conceive himself.
There are many stories like this with seemingly unsolvable paradoxes at the center. The Asimov story I referenced above is another.
-Terry |
My bad, I didnt'read it right. HE was the one having sex with the woman! I thought the guy was watching this happen from the third person. Silly me.
June
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07/23/2004 08:13:26 AM · #17 |
Originally posted by ClubJuggle:
Originally posted by chiqui74:
Hey, no offense, but I dont think it makes any sense. He's future self would have not disappeared at the moment of conception. However, had he stopped them somehow from having sex, then he would have vanished because he would have never existed. Just my two cents.
June |
It also doesn't make sense that he could be his own father, as he would have had to have first been born in order to create the time machine so he could go back and conceive himself.
There are many stories like this with seemingly unsolvable paradoxes at the center. The Asimov story I referenced above is another.
-Terry |
Another example of a story like this is the Christopher Reeves movie, "Somewhere in Time", made about 10-15 years ago. It's about a young man who, in the 1980s meets an old woman who gives him a watch that he left with her in 1912, ...after he had traveled back in time a year later... Well..., if you've seen the movie, you know what I'm talking about.
Paradox is a fascinating concept.
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07/23/2004 08:42:51 AM · #18 |
Originally posted by jadin:
Chiqui74 is right. Most any change in history, even insignificant ones could easily result in you (or me) not being born.
I had an idea for a story one time, it was about a man who had access or invented (didn't pin down the details) a time machine. When he used it he went back in time to meet his dad. He grew up with his single mother, and never got to meet his father. When he went back in time, he saw a beautiful woman, and they fell in love. They made love and afterwards he went to use the bathroom. The woman is laying in bed, waiting for him to shut off the water and come back into the bedroom. She gets up and the sink is running but he's not there.
Naturally the idea is that when his sperm penetrated her egg he 'disappears' as a full grown man and is now inside his mother's womb. Which is why he never knew his dad growing up etc. I never wound up writing it because I thought it was too 'Oedipus Complex' for most people's tastes. (including my own) |
I would give my dad a condom, LOL. |
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07/23/2004 12:10:50 PM · #19 |
The idea relied on the theory that you can't be in two places at once, even with a time machine. Slightly different than "Back to the Future" style time travel.
I'll check out the Asimov story.
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07/23/2004 12:20:07 PM · #20 |
Originally posted by jadin:
The idea relied on the theory that you can't be in two places at once, even with a time machine. Slightly different than "Back to the Future" style time travel.
I'll check out the Asimov story. |
Although "Back to the Future" had it's share of weird time paradoxes that get you really thinking (and the over-analyzers go crazy with that move - "That could never happen! As soon as the time machine went back in time, he would have...and then...so it can't be that way!")
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07/23/2004 03:10:00 PM · #21 |
Originally posted by jadin:
The idea relied on the theory that you can't be in two places at once, even with a time machine. Slightly different than "Back to the Future" style time travel.
I'll check out the Asimov story. |
For a novel-length treatment try Asimov's The End of Eternity. |
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