One Question To Ask Anyone In The Past (Game)

[Surgebound Rainspren he/him]

Common conversation started/ forum game:

 

If you could go back to anytime in the past and ask one person one question what would it be.

 

For an example I would probably go back and ask Nikola Tesla about supposed unlimited energy.

or maybe I would go and ask Da vinci where he hid some of his journals, that's a good get rich quick scheme.

 

[SmurfAquamarineBodies he/him]

Are we able to get back to our own time? 

 

If so either go back to Jesus, who did exists it's just a question of if he was the son of God, and ask 'who am I? If he is divine that little question shouldn't be too hard. Or I would go back and ask my grandfather 'why did you let your son molest your daughter? You realise that made her the crappiest mother on the planet.'

[Voidus]

I would travel to before Brandon was published and ask him to tell me about his plans for the cosmere.

[Kobold King he/him]

Are we able to get back to our own time? 

 

If so either go back to Jesus, who did exists it's just a question of if he was the son of God, and ask 'who am I? If he is divine that little question shouldn't be too hard.

 

Even among Christians like myself, there's debate concerning whether Christ was omniscient while in human form. He had a human brain, after all, so your question, to me at least, wouldn't prove anything even if He told you "I have no idea who you are."

 

Back on topic. I'd contact Captain James Cook and would tell him that it's super-ultra-important to the future of the British Empire that he name Australia after me. Assuming he's a reasonable man, he'll realize I'm from the future and will name it anything I like to keep the British Empire intact.

 

Meanwhile, I'll be giggling over my atlases labeled with the continent of "Jaredonia."

[SmurfAquamarineBodies he/him]

Even among Christians like myself, there's debate concerning whether Christ was omniscient while in human form. He had a human brain, after all, so your question, to me at least, wouldn't prove anything even if He told you "I have no idea who you are."

 

Back on topic. I'd contact Captain James Cook and would tell him that it's super-ultra-important to the future of the British Empire that he name Australia after me. Assuming he's a reasonable man, he'll realize I'm from the future and will name it anything I like to keep the British Empire intact.

 

Meanwhile, I'll be giggling over my atlases labeled with the continent of "Jaredonia."

 

I wouldn't do it for anyone else but for my own amusement. Even if he knew who I was and proved that he is divine I wouldn't tell anyone and I would continue to be an atheist. 

[king of nowhere]

So, I can't influence the past by teaching science to the ancient people, and I can't get more informations than I can get by that question and a bit of looking around... I'd like to solve some big scientific mystery, but the past is not reallly the place for that. and i can't think of any hystorical mystery that is important enough to research, or a lost object that is important enough to do this for (actually, I would like to hear the location of the ark of the covenant, but even if i could ask the babylonian soldiers who pilfered it, they would probably onlly know that it was karried to babylonia, but who knows where it was brought from there in the subsequent 2500 years. Plus, there's a very good chance it was simply melted for the gold).

So, I'd be left with a question for personal curiosity. I can think of four right now, in no particular order of importance

1) go to the first society who started to consider sex a taboo, and ask them what was wrong with it. My pet theory is that those first people interpreted sexually transmitted deseases as divine wrath and inferred that the gods didn't like sex, but it would be nice to know

2) go to the first society to consider the woman inferior, and ask them why. my pet theory is that at the time women were needed to be mothers full time, since most children died of desease and new replacements were needed, but I would like to confirm it, and also would like to see how from that came the idea that women are dumber.

3) go to the first society who invented the taboo of nudity and ask them what's the problem of being naked. no pet theory here, but I really can't see what would be wrong if we all went around naked all the time (climate permitting), so I'd like to find out how the idea started.

4) go to the first man who used fire and ask him what the rest of his tribe thought about it. When arguing with people thinking science should not do something because it could be dangerous, I often argue that the first man who invented fire was probably frowned upon because fire is dangeroud, and when people say we should not research into something because it's blasphemous I reply that the first man who invented fire was probably told that fire belong to the gods and he should not meddle with it. We'll never know if I''m right, and the metaphorical value of the example is good nonetheless, but I'm curious to know if it actually happened.

Edited March 13, 2015 by king of nowhere

[Blaze1616 he/him]

2) go to the first society to consider the woman inferior, and ask them why. my pet theory is that at the time women were needed to be mothers full time, since most children died of desease and new replacements were needed, but I would like to confirm it, and also would like to see how from that came the idea that women are dumber.

 

Though all your questions are rather interesting, I just want to pass a quick comment on this one. The prejudice against women, from what I've researched, is generally understood to stem from the dawn of agriculture. Prior to agriculture, humanity was a hunter-gatherer society. As such, men, who are naturally more built for athletics, were the hunters, and women defaulted to gatherers. The key to this situation, however, is that hunting is incredibly unpredictable, while gathering isn't. As such, women did more of the successful providing, and it is quite possible humanity was matriarchal for a time. Everything changed when the fire nation attacked when agriculture became a thing. Agriculture, being very physically taxing, became something the men did. Suddenly men were the providers. Women, who suddenly lacked a major providing role, slowly became viewed as inferior, and the rest, as they say, is history.

 

That's what I was taught in my World History courses, anyways.

[Kaymyth she/her]

Do we have to know who we're looking for specifically?  Because I'd like to track down the designer of the Antikythera Mechanism and get the blueprints.

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

I'd go back 5 years in time and ask a twelve year old boy named Joseph Watson "Have you read Mistborn?" If that works to change the Future, then I'd have been on this site for much Longer.

[Kobold King he/him]

I'd go back 5 years in time and ask a twelve year old boy named Joseph Watson "Have you read Mistborn?" If that works to change the Future, then I'd have been on this site for much Longer.

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

I fell victim to one of the Classic Blunders. "Never go in against a Kobold when Rep is on the Line."

Edited March 29, 2015 by The Only Joe

[Mckeedee123 he/him]

I'd probably go back to the US Constitutional Convention and explain to everyone that I was from the future United States and preserving slavery would lead to the Civil War and eventual economic inferiority in the South.

 

EDIT: Hold on... it has to be a question?

 

Fine. I'd ask the members of the US Constitutional Convention as a person from the future United States if they knew that preserving slavery would lead to the Civil War and eventual economic inferiority in the South. Ya' know, as a rhetorical question.

 

Boom. Look at me. I'm a National Hero.

Edited March 29, 2015 by Mckeedee123

[king of nowhere]

I'd probably go back to the US Constitutional Convention and explain to everyone that I was from the future United States and preserving slavery would lead to the Civil War and eventual economic inferiority in the South.

 

EDIT: Hold on... it has to be a question?

 

Fine. I'd ask the members of the US Constitutional Convention as a person from the future United States if they knew that preserving slavery would lead to the Civil War and eventual economic inferiority in the South. Ya' know, as a rhetorical question.

 

Boom. Look at me. I'm a National Hero.

With US constitution forbidding slavery from the first moment, the nations of the south won't enter the union in the first plae, feeling it would bring them economic ruination. Sothe enmity between the north and south sparks much sooner than in the real world,  before the north had built its industrial base that granted its victory. And so in that alternate past the south won the war, and forced the north to adopt slavery too.  All the american continent would become dominated by a fascist slavist tiranny, which would then proceed to win the world war and subject europe too - forget the marshall plan, those slavers didn't come to liberate, ushering the world towards another dark era.

 

Never mess  up with history.

 

Although, on the plus side, there would be no islamic state (EDIT: I am referring of course to the terrorists of the self-proclaimed caliphate, not to any state with islamic religion. I'm putting this specification because some people PMed me about it) , because all the arabs would have been enslaved, and there would be  no ebola epidemics, because it would have been avoided  by killing off any slave that was withing 10 km of a known ebola case to prevent further contagion.

Brandon sanderson would have still exxisted, but mistborn would be recounted from the point of view of straff venture and be the story of how he vanquished magically empowered terrorists who wanted to subvert his rightful rule over his property. and syl would tell kaladin to stay in his place and not rebel.

Edited April 1, 2015 by king of nowhere

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

I don't think that would happen. I haven't studied History extensively, but I think the South wanted to be it's own country during the Civil War, not rule over the whole country, and if the Constitution stopping Slavery, making the south refuse to join, would the America's even break away from Britain?

[Blaze1616 he/him]

With US constitution forbidding slavery from the first moment, the nations of the south won't enter the union in the first plae, feeling it would bring them economic ruination. Sothe enmity between the north and south sparks much sooner than in the real world,  before the north had built its industrial base that granted its victory. And so in that alternate past the south won the war, and forced the north to adopt slavery too.  All the american continent would become dominated by a fascist slavist tiranny, which would then proceed to win the world war and subject europe too - forget the marshall plan, those slavers didn't come to liberate, ushering the world towards another dark era.

 

Err, the "south" didn't exist when the Constitution was made...so I don't see your point? Assuming Mckeedee was influential enough to convince the founding fathers to abolish slavery in the Bill of Rights, the 13 states would suddenly by slave-free. Cotton production wasn't huge yet (it was mostly tobacco farming, if I recall my history texts correctly), and so the loss of slavery wouldn't have been as large of a hit to the economy of the 4 "southern" states. As a result, during the Western Expansion (Manifest Destiny) time period, upon the birth of the cotton plantation, the economy would have evolved without slavery. It's very possible that the Civil War never happened, and history as a whole is changed.

 

The problem with Mckeedee's solution, though, is that slavery wasn't the root of the problem. The root of the problem is that blacks were not seen as equal to whites. This problem stems back much further than the United States, and so convincing the founding fathers of making a slave free country would not have solved segregation as a whole in this country, which is the much larger problem.

[king of nowhere]

Ah, well, you know how it is, in the movies everytime someone goes in the past to stop hitler something worse happens and no one find it strange, so I was trying to apply the same idea to the american civil war. Not being american, I don't know american hystory as well as you, so if you want something more accurate you can just make your own crazy-pot joke-theory on how stopping the american civil war would have caused something worse to happens.

Because, going back to the past with all the knowledge from our time, trying to make things better, and it just works, would be terribly anticlimatic.

[Blaze1616 he/him]

Ah, well, you know how it is, in the movies everytime someone goes in the past to stop hitler something worse happens and no one find it strange, so I was trying to apply the same idea to the american civil war. Not being american, I don't know american hystory as well as you, so if you want something more accurate you can just make your own crazy-pot joke-theory on how stopping the american civil war would have caused something worse to happens.

Because, going back to the past with all the knowledge from our time, trying to make things better, and it just works, would be terribly anticlimatic.

 

Agreed. It would be quite boring. Bill and Ted seemed to have done it fine, though

[el_warko he/him]

I fell victim to one of the Classic Blunders. "Never go in against a Kobold when Rep is on the Line."

 

Boom!

 

P.S Smurf *Hugs*

[Adamir he/him]

Hey Gavrilo Princip, how about you go eat your sandwich in that other restaurant you really liked?

 

To provide context, Gavrilo Princip was one of the assassins trying to kill Franz Ferdinand, and the only one who succeeded - entirely because Ferdinand's driver took a wrong turn and parked right in front of Gavrilo while checking the map. If he had decided not to try to cheer himself up for an earlier failed assassination attempt on Franz by eating a sandwich at his favorite restaurant, then we wouldn't have had World War 1.