Posted on 04/12/2015 6:20:17 PM PDT by MNDude
If you time traveled back to 1015, would you have enough modern knowledge and education to improve your llfe?
I mean like could you invent gunpowder or serious medical advancements, etc?
Ah, but there is a Principle of physics that argues against that. It's called the Grandfather Paradox. It states that if you could go back and change the past, then you could kill your grandfather. Then how could you exist in the first place? A paradox arises. Therefore, you cannot change the past.
The Principle of Self-Consistency was developed to allow backwards time-travel without violating the Grandfather Paradox.
By the way, all of this is not pure silliness (although it sure does sound like it). It follows from Einstein's Theory of General Relativity.
Would also need to be able to choose where you went. A goat farm in Mongolia might not work.
Correct. It is believed by some that the bow and arrow was brought across the Bering Land Bridge during migration from Asia thousands of years ago..
Ever read the books of the 1632 series. A.K.A. The Ring of Fire, By Eric Flint? A small town in West Virginia gets transported back in time and space to the middle of Germany in the middle of the Thirty Years War.
Some three thousand people surrounded by German mercaneries employed by the Protestant Sweedish army of Gustaf Aldolph Vasa, and the Spanish armies of Tilly. Don’t mess with hillbillies.
It’s a good read.
Haven’t read; but sounds good.
interesting topic
for later attainment
“then you could kill your grandfather. Then how could you exist in the first place? “
Grandmaw would know who the real father was. She’s the one you can’t kill!
I’s be spared reading a hundred arrogant posts about how well some knuckleheads would do.
First book is free. Originally written as a stand alone novel. Took on a life of its own with fan involvement.
http://www.baenebooks.com/p-379-1632.aspx
BTW, time is a human construct. One cannot go back in time. When timekeeping is no longer needed, time will end.
Yup. But two of my degrees are in engineering, so I dang well better have that knowledge. Otherwise my university owes me a refund!
“For a while... then Id buy a boat and head to America before Europe inevitably descended into unrelenting poverty and war.”
Would you pay for the boat with your American Express card?
I don’t know all that much stuff off the top of my head, but I still think I’d do OK. I mean: I’m really good with google, so I’d just find out all the stuff I needed to know.
We had beer FIVE THOUSAND years ago in Egypt.
We?
How old are you?
Was there an FR back then? Did everyone use hieroglyphics?
You’d be a witch. Good luck with that.
Great minds think alike!
Ping
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