Posted on 09/22/2010 8:32:49 PM PDT by Abin Sur
If you could eliminate one person from history, who would it be? One caveat: it can't be Muhammad, for one simple reason: almost everyone is going to pick him! This would get rather monotonous, so let's just assume that 90% (at least) of the responses would pick Muhammad first. If you still pick him...BZZT I'm sorry, you've lost, thank you for playing and here's a copy of our home game.
And let's not have anyone picking Muhammad's father or grandfather just to get at him, either. That's cheating.
Ok, now that that's out of the way, who do you pick? Here's the rules: You can go back in history and prevent any one person from being born. You don't have to kill anyone. For instance, if you want to stop Hitler from being born, you can go up to Klara Pölzl (Adolph's mother) in 1880 and give her 10,000 marks to emigrate to the USA. She never marries Alois, so presto...no Adolph. This will have the incidental effect of preventing his brothers from being born as well, of course.
After you prevent your target from being conceived, you snap back to 2010 and enjoy living in a world made better by your actions. Bear in mind, though, that removing someone from history may not have that great an effect. If you prevent Darwin from existing, someone is still going to come up with the theory of evolution. It may be called by another name, and it may be delayed by a decade or two, but things tend to get invented when it's time to invent them.
I would note that some individuals would be exceptions. If you took out Isaac Newton (heaven know why, but it's your choice), modern science as we know it would be delayed by half a century, at least.
Anyway, that's the setup. Who do you pick, and what do you think would be the result of this person not existing?
King Henry VIII, father of the reformation and the split between English and Spanish empires.
Karl Marx.
Muhammad’s mother. Ha!
Yes it was Hagar. I knew who the other poster was referring and didn’t notice the incorrect name.
I’d have to say, no one.
As admirable as you think it might be to “eliminate someone from history”, things happen for reasons. As vile as Hitler was, if he would have never been born, imagine how the world would be different today. How many people were born as a result of events that he played apart in that caused other events. It’s like a ‘Butterfly Effect’. No one should think of messing with ‘time’, even though it’s interesting to think about.
Karl Marx.
Amen!
Julius Rosenberg
Wow! You said all that needs to be said, in just 8 words.
The time travel technology employed in this experiment laughs at the puny butterfly effect. Choose!
She was Hagar, not Ishtar.
Ishtar was Nimrod’s Whore/wife.
“The Anti-Christ.”
If you eliminate the Anti-Christ, you eliminate the second coming:
2 Thes 2:3 :
“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;”
Unintended consequences can be a beast!
Yep.
And a pretty bad movie.
Well, unless you have an actual time machine in your pocket, I wouldn't get too worked up about it :-)
I say good riddance to the dirty dog that named me “Sue” per Johnny Cash. haha
“Karl Marx” <—— This.
> “King Henry VIII, father of the reformation...”
.
You’ve never heard of Martin Luther?
Well, it was funny at least...
Nobody that was born before me.
.......and the person who came up with the designated hitter rule.
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