Time travel thought experiment game

[zoobyshoe]

I'd explain the nakedness by saying I was robbed of money and clothes by lowlives. That would be believable back then. A woman could claim she was both robbed and sexually assaulted. In both cases this would garner sympathy. You'd need a lot of help at first just to get food, clothing and shelter. Convincing people you were from the future would have to wait till you were established.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

In real situations involving strangers, a sense of humour can be very useful. If I landed up naked in some odd place, I'd probably want to attribute it to my falling for a prank (such as spontaneously vanishing clothes), so that firstly people can have a good laugh but then might be helpful.

My sense of humour is quite mismatched with my grandads generation, let alone my great-great-great-great-great Grandads!

 

[OmCheeto]

Looking at that point in broader terms would anyone want to live in their respective nations 200 years ago? From a modern perspective they resemble some of the worst, extreme nations of today. Most people here are from the US, if you were sent back to christmas 1814 you'd be arriving in a nation that still had a sizable slave trade and upheld manifest destiny. For English posters like myself we'd arrive in pre-victorian England, a place of extreme wealth inequality, rigid social class, workhouses and votes only for upper class male landowners.

The past is a foreign country, and to me it's as enticing a holiday destination as North Korea.

I hadn't even thought about location very much. It's probably a good thing I picked England. The closest Europeans from where I live would have been 100 miles away. A small fur trading post, constructed only 3 years earlier.

And, OMG, the natives. What a hoot. I can't even post most of what Lewis and Clark wrote about them. Language!

The nicest thing I could find:

Lewis & Clark Among the Clatsops
...
They were short. They were fat. Since it rained almost all the time, they didn’t bother much with clothes.
...
If the Indians thought Lewis and Clark were dumb pigeons, the explorers thought they were ugly and alien.
...

Actually, I think I'd get along with the natives much better than with the Lewis & Clark group.
But the conditions? I think the North Koreans might have it better than the Clatsops did back then.
Prostitution, slavery, thievery, and nudity, were the norm. And venereal disease was widespread.
And the weather. Don't forget about the weather.

 

[derek10]

Was electricity discovered back then? If no, then try to build a generator and make sparks or a bulb and if yes then try to build something modern: radio, a simple mechanical TV transmission or at least a theoretical explanation,

 

[Algr]

This is easy:

"Future technology is why I am so fat!"

 

[smartfatstupid]

I'm in California. I would go back to 1400-1500. I would pretend like the future never happened to me.

 

[WWGD]

You appear naked? Is it cold outside?

 

[Algr]

You appear naked? Is it cold outside?

Well if it is 200 years on the dot, then you arrive on Dec 24th. And if you forget to specify a date, then Jan 1 is likely. So yea, begging for clothes will happen before you tell anyone about the future.

 

[Silicon Waffle]

...
Prostitution, slavery, thievery, and nudity, were the norm. And venereal disease was widespread.
And the weather. Don't forget about the weather.

 

[Astronuc]

My SO showed me this on reddit and we had fun with it. If you were sent back to the early 19th century naked and alone how would you convince someone that you were from the future and not crazy? No tricks allowed (meaning you can't pull a raygun from your colon). Let's hear it.

The first order of business would be to find some clothes!

One would have to mention in some detail some historical events, e.g., elections of a US President or the outcome a war taking place.

Scientifically one could discuss the works of John Dalton, Jöns Jacob Berzelius, Leopold Gmelin, Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner regarding the periodic table.

One could construct an induction machine with which to generate an AC current, and with transformers, do some high voltage experiments. One could also construct an airfoil or wing of a plane, and even construct a plane, and perhaps a wingsuit. One would have to find someone who could do vacuum tubes in order to make some electronic components.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_tube

 

[Silicon Waffle]

That thinking about people of 19th century as those in third world countries for their limited development in technologies or worse their ignorance in business marketing skills really saddens me. (this sentence is hard to write correctly as I had to edit it several times. I hope it's understandable now .Anyway, those doing so to me are pretty idiotic in fact. Cheers! )
I think being arrested for being illegally nude in public places isn't uncommon. 19th century people may kick your butt because of your public nudity. Most are still living in feudal societies in which they have to covere all their body parts nice and clean with any cloth pieces.

 

[julian]

I need you clothes, your boots and your motocycle

 

[julian]

Time travel isn't a game.

 

[Medicol]

I need you clothes, your boots and your motocycle

The time travel plan is inside an excel file. I'll send you via gmail tomorrow at 11:59 AM local time. Have a good journey to 18 century. Please don't mess up my time machine. I need it at least while it still offers me highest feeling (until now).

 

[derek10]

Future prediction for unexpected short term events

Unless you lose your memory too

 

[h6ss]

My SO showed me this on reddit and we had fun with it. If you were sent back to the early 19th century naked and alone how would you convince someone that you were from the future and not crazy? No tricks allowed (meaning you can't pull a raygun from your colon). Let's hear it.

Of course it depends on the year I would travel to, but I'd probably start by predicting the First World War and events like the U.S. Stock Market crash of 1929. That is, considering I can't do anything to prevent them. Also, I like the idea about Hertz' experiments. I think predicting or discovering things in very different and unrelated fields would help proving that we're from the future and not just prodigious geniuses in a field in particular.

A harder question would be how would you convince people from the future that you're from the past if you were to travel forward in time?

 

[mfb]

ps. Never read the book. Sounds like a fun read though.

I read 2/3 of it. The old English (combined with even older English) doesn't make it easy if English is not your native language. The way the time traveler proves his knowledge (or "magic") is very cheap and many details are not mentioned at all, but some aspects are still interesting.

@derek10: How many events in the early 19th century do you remember? How many of them would get known to the people around you? It does not help to predict some random event somewhere in the world if no one ever learns about it.
If you know the precise date and place in advance, it is much easier of course.

Electricity is probably a good starting point once the basics (clothing, food, ...) are done.
The oil drop experiment (1909!) could be possible if you get reliable electric fields. It would demonstrate quantized charges.
You can try to reproduce the double-slit experiment (early 19th century?) and the photoelectric effect (1887). More precise spectroscopy can be interesting as well.
Diffusion and brownian motion (discovered 1827) can both be explained (quantitatively) with knowledge about atoms.
You can discover Neptune (1846). Galileo found it in 1612/13 but did not recognize it as a planet.
Diodes and triodes are great if you get access to the mentioned vacuum tubes. They allow the construction of simple electronic calculators.

I would be careful with quantum mechanics as it sounds crazy...

 

[Redbelly98]

Unless you found someone extremely credulous, it would be impossible in the short term. You would have to wait until time nears on some dates where you can make some predictions based on your knowledge of early 19th century history.

That was pretty much my thoughts. And if you could study up on the history in advance, you shouldn't have to wait very long.

I'd stay away from "predicting" the science developments just because very few people would know what you're even talking about.

 

[derek10]

@derek10: How many events in the early 19th century do you remember? How many of them would get known to the people around you? It does not help to predict some random event somewhere in the world if no one ever learns about it.
If you know the precise date and place in advance, it is much easier of course.[/QUOTE]

Hi In 1879 a person called Einstein will born and change science with a thing called relativity that explains blahblahblah...
Hi, in 1889 a person called Hitler will born and will lead to a new ideology and war that will cause blahblahblah
To name a few cases and happened at, I would think there are more but I know zero history lol at first they would think I am mad until those events happen (and are almost universally known)

 

[Algr]

Well it is no use predicting things that aren't going to happen for 50 years. Ultimately this is all about your knowledge of historical details. If you had warning that this is going to happen, you could predict the next election, natural disaster, or some other detail.

 

[derek10]

Deaths

Well it is no use predicting things that aren't going to happen for 50 years. Ultimately this is all about your knowledge of historical details. If you had warning that this is going to happen, you could predict the next election, natural disaster, or some other detail.

What I mean is simply that, predicting unexpected short, or longer term events, nope like the great fire of Chicago, invention of the lightbulb, some starburst, some wining lottery combination, or something like a Nostradamus or any prophet not more predictable or casualty like presidential elections, earthquakes, weather, deaths, wars, etc

 

[OmCheeto]

I read 2/3 of it. The old English (combined with even older English) doesn't make it easy if English is not your native language. The way the time traveler proves his knowledge (or "magic") is very cheap and many details are not mentioned at all, but some aspects are still interesting.

I've been around long enough to know that even if English is your first language, @wolram 's posts are still mostly incomprehensible.

@derek10: How many events in the early 19th century do you remember? How many of them would get known to the people around you? It does not help to predict some random event somewhere in the world if no one ever learns about it.
If you know the precise date and place in advance, it is much easier of course.

Electricity is probably a good starting point once the basics (clothing, food, ...) are done.
The oil drop experiment (1909!) could be possible if you get reliable electric fields. It would demonstrate quantized charges.
You can try to reproduce the double-slit experiment (early 19th century?) and the photoelectric effect (1887). More precise spectroscopy can be interesting as well.
Diffusion and brownian motion (discovered 1827) can both be explained (quantitatively) with knowledge about atoms.
You can discover Neptune (1846). Galileo found it in 1612/13 but did not recognize it as a planet.
Diodes and triodes are great if you get access to the mentioned vacuum tubes. They allow the construction of simple electronic calculators.

This thread strikes me as being male-nerd-centric. I've decided that I will travel back to England, and make a front loading, windmill powered, clothes washing machine, out of an old barrel and sticks. But not before I figure out how to make soap, and duct tape.

I would be careful with quantum mechanics as it sounds crazy...

Thank you.
And going through my past "https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/pf-random-thoughts.338126/page-961#post-4346986 " inspired posts, one has to be careful as to how history has been re-written since then:

Why is V the symbol for voltage?

 

[Diego Fernandez]

I was assuming around 1800, and the connection between electricity and magnetism wasn't discovered until around Oersted's experiments around 1819.

Wasn't the connection between electricity and magnetism first worked on by Michael Faraday?

 

[Astronuc]

I need you clothes, your boots and your motocycle

and shades

 

[OmCheeto]

Wasn't the connection between electricity and magnetism first worked on by Michael Faraday?

I thought he was the guy who invented "cages"?

To think we wouldn't have zoos, if it weren't for him.

 

[Astronuc]

Wasn't the connection between electricity and magnetism first worked on by Michael Faraday?

Electromagnetic induction was discovered independently by Michael Faraday in 1831 and Joseph Henry in 1832. He {Faraday] wrapped two wires around opposite sides of an iron ring or "torus" (an arrangement similar to a modern toroidal transformer).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_induction

Danish physicist and chemist, Hans Christian Ørsted, discovered that electric currents create magnetic fields, an important aspect of electromagnetism. On 21 April 1820, during a lecture, Ørsted noticed a compass needle deflected from magnetic north when an electric current from a battery was switched on and off, confirming a direct relationship between electricity and magnetism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Christian_Ørsted

Ørsted showed a current induces a magnetic field, while Faraday and Henry showed that a varying magnetic field induces a voltage/current.

 

[lpetrich]

If one showed a remarkable knowledge of future events, one would likely become a curiosity, and one may even get written about. So one could be in our history books. Unless one's going back in time created a new timeline. If one was a very ordinary sort of person, one may not change history very much, but if one could impart lots of useful and valuable knowledge to people who could appreciate it, then one is likely to make big changes in history.

The best sort of knowledge that one could impart is, I think, conceptual breakthroughs. Lots of ideas seem simple in retrospect, but were hard to discover and appreciate. Western mathematicians recognized irrational numbers long before they recognized zero and negative numbers as legitimate numbers, for instance.

 

[lpetrich]

There's also the language problem. One can go back in time to some place where people speak your language, but they won't know a lot of vocabulary that you'd know, and they'd use a lot of vocabulary that has now been forgotten. But in the early 19th century, the language's phonology, grammar, and basic vocabulary would not be very different. One would have a noticeable accent, but one could easily make oneself understood.

It gets worse the farther back in time, and if one goes back far enough, it's effectively a foreign language. History of the English language - Wikipedia has some nice examples.

 

[Fefe Santa]

There is no time machine. NASA can detect UFOs.

 

[The Un-Observer]

Give me the year I'll tell you who the next president will be.

At max I'll only have to do 4 years locked up!