Right then, if you were to go back in time, say 2000 years, how much use would your modern day knowledge really be?  It's easy to imagine yourself being powerful and rich, but what could you actually do?  How many of us know how to build a steam engine from scratch?  How to make gunpowder?  Or the basic workings of a computer?

Would we just be a vessel full of futuristic ideas but with no practical ability to put them to use?

2000 years would be quite interesting - Roman times which I think were fairly embracing of new ideas. If you went back 500-800 years you would probably spend more time trying to avoid being burnt as a heretic then applying any modern knowledge.

I think one of the biggest things to introduce would be germ theory - simply cleaning before surgery and ideas around stopping germs spreading though contaminated water.

I think you are right that most modern people have very little understanding of the basics of how things work to be able to reproduce them in a low tech society. Also there is often a cascade of requirements to make most things. To have a useful steam engine you need to have reasonable metal working to make the components.

I suspect that working with a local scientist / inventor then a modern person could advance their thinking quite quickly by prompting in the right direction.

There was a neat book by L. Sprague de Camp called (IIRC) "Lest Darkness Fall" where a classics prof "fell" into 6th century Rome.  Since he could communicate in Latin and Greek he was able to manage.  The most useful skills were arithmetic with Arabic numerals and double entry book-keeping.

About all I know that I could sell, and who could I talk with about it? 

"2000 years would be quite interesting - Roman times which I think were fairly embracing of new ideas. If you went back 500-800 years you would probably spend more time trying to avoid being burnt as a heretic then applying any modern knowledge. "
   Aren't you rather assuming that one would be returning to the western Christian world? There's quite a big planet out there, really.

Yes I was assuming geo-stationary time travel. And from Dr Who you should be aware that it doesn't matter when you go to you will always end up in a quarry in Wales...

Quote from: fred12df on 31 August 2010, 06:46:50 AM
Yes I was assuming geo-stationary time travel.

Oh, great.  My Mi'kmaq is even worse than my Latin.

So I'd go back 2,000 years and find I was surrounded by a few Bushmen if I were lucky!
   For me the big question is whether I'd rather use a time machine and one bullet to go back and shoot Confucius or Abraham. Which monolithic belief-cultural cancer has done more harm in the world?

Most stuff we know now would be useless and completely irrelevant.  The majority of us are town dwellers, so lack the necessary survival skills needed to live in a largely agrarian world.  Any intellectual knowledge an individual may possess is not much good if you can't speak the language.  2000 years ago, apart from Latin, Greek, etc. what languages did anyone from anywhere speak?  If you think your superior intellect is going to get you close to the movers and shakers, think again, no political and social insight.  Your life back then would be mean, brutal and short. No such thing as the good old days - these are the good old days.

I was thinking that your only hope for survival would be to do something so alien to them that they would proclaim you a god and worship you...  or proclaim you a demon and crucify you...  hmm...

It shouldn't be inconceivable that you could introduce stirrups, actually.

Excellent question Leon, and one that highlights the flaws in Stadial theories of of the sociocultural development model.

It seems that so far the posters have expressed ideas akin to the sociocultural evolution theories, ideas that i support.

Cultures, and individuals within those cultures do not develop in a linear and logical progression from primitive to complex, base to exalted.  All knowledge is situational and we are no more developed as a species, and as a culture than we were 2000 years ago, or indeed 12,000 years ago.

Most modern people transported into the past would be essentially 'useless', since all our knowledge is situated to deal with our technologically dominated and functionally dependent lives.


'how much use would your modern day knowledge really be?'

It depends...

Certain knowledge might be useful.  Most of us might know to boil water to make it potable, for example.
I'm struggling to think of much else that might actually be 'useful' to people in the past when IN the past though...


It's easy to imagine yourself being powerful and rich, but what could you actually do?

I'm not sure that is too easy to imagine, unless you're talking about using historical knowledge for contemporary advantage?
'I say Octavius old chap, how about nipping down to Luxor?  I think there's some purple marble down there might be valuable...'

As to what i'd actually be able to do?  Well, not much really, except those activities that are similar to today.  I'd probably make a passable scribe or scholar.  Maybe turn my hand to merchantile pursuits, but not much else.  Armchair general perhaps?

How many of us know how to build a steam engine from scratch?  

Well, i know the basic principles, but then the Romans already built them...my uncle scratch-built a working scale steam engine so he'd definately be useful.
Perhaps where i'd be useful in that regard is not so much building the engine but in then applying it.

How to make gunpowder?  

Nope.  And in any case the raw materials weren't available to Rome were they?

Or the basic workings of a computer?

Well, i understand it, but building one from scratch 2000 years ago?  Is that even possible?  Maybe a difference engine...but then why would a Roman be interested in it?  They didn't even understand the number 'zero' did they?

Would we just be a vessel full of futuristic ideas but with no practical ability to put them to use?

Most likely yes.




Actually, Stephen LAwhead's 'Song of Albion' trilogy of books explores this exact question...might be worth a read for anyone interested.

Michael Moorcock's Behold the Man is a great book on the subject, if you have not read it yet i would urge you to do so

Is there anyone in today's world that would be able to make much of an impact?  I doubt even the most knowledgable scientists would be able to put their knowledge to much use in a more primitive environment.  So in theory, the most likely candidate for success in time travel would be the least developed societies in the world, a rainforest tribe, or something similar.

Quote from: Leon on 02 September 2010, 09:20:16 PM
Is there anyone in today's world that would be able to make much of an impact? 

I can name several international hotties who'd turn some heads 

Including some dressed as  and 

Perhaps some of our wargaming experience & knowledge (based on our historical knowledge etc) would be of use in informing tactics? (not mine, clearly...I'd be the one who shows them how to proper lose battles  )

Quote from: Leon on 02 September 2010, 09:20:16 PM
Is there anyone in today's world that would be able to make much of an impact?  I doubt even the most knowledgable scientists would be able to put their knowledge to much use in a more primitive environment.  So in theory, the most likely candidate for success in time travel would be the least developed societies in the world, a rainforest tribe, or something similar.

Anyone with practical skills based around construction, crafting, etc.

Farmers with the basic understanding of crop rotation.

Doctors, nurses, and other medical staff.


Vanessa Griffiths, Anna Lewington, Jonathan Hare, Mike Leahy, Mike Bullivant, the scientists on Rough Science (http://www.open2.net/roughscience/) - great series by the way - well worth a look.

Ray Mears might be useful too.