Its the 12th century and you’ve had no time to prepare, after you’re done reading this post you are snapped. What do you do?
probably die
If I snapped you back in time 650 years right this very second, how would you use your current knowledge to succeed?
Submitted 1 day ago by Kookie215@lemmy.world to [deleted]
Comments
dotson@sh.itjust.works 3 hours ago
Kookie215@lemmy.world 2 hours ago
The chances of that do seem to be high.
The_Caretaker@lemm.ee 1 hour ago
I would use the superstitions of the people of the area to scare them away from me and my space. I would build a Catalan forge and a smelter that is powered by falling water. I would make gunpowder but not share the recipe. I would also distill alcohol for sale and for hygiene. I would use Leedskalnins PMH to create permanent magnets and use them to make electricity. Electric fences also help keep the superstitious barbarians away. I would also be a beekeeper.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 50 minutes ago
That’s 1375.
Not good, not bad. Depends on where you ended up on the globe. There absolutely is civilization, but it’s all kings and Tsars and the like. The English and French Hundred Years War is winding down but the plague really did a number on Europe. Lots of war in India. It wasn’t a great time in the Middle East what with the Crusades and all. The Egyptians are conquering Armenia. The Songhai Emprire is growing in Eastern Africa. Southeast Asia had a lot of conquest and a large kingdom growing, might not have been so bad as long as you landed on the winning side. The Ming Dynasty just started in China.
So it’s not like you ended up in pre-civilization or among dinosaurs or something. There are plenty of people around, but it’s still an age of war and conquest. Your best bet to have a great life would be to ally yourself with a strong leader and give them advancements to help that leader “win”. Of course, if he were defeated, you’d be slowly tortured and killed by the opposing side.
Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 4 hours ago
I’d be dead since the Earth wasn’t in the same position 650 years ago. Even taking that out of the equation, I’d die since I can’t communicate with anyone and don’t have the survival skills.
Probius@sopuli.xyz 2 hours ago
Actually, position and velocity are relative, so that’s a nonsensical statement without defining a reference object for the Earth’s position. If we’re not assuming you end up safely on dry land, you could just as easily end up light-years away as wherever you were relative to the sun.
dotson@sh.itjust.works 3 hours ago
ah, someone who understands that celestial bodies change spatial positions with time… nice
redwattlebird@lemmings.world 3 hours ago
Well, I’m in Australia so I would try and communicate with the indigenous population and teach them how to defend themselves against the upcoming colonist invasion and take advantage of what they have to offer, starting with forcing a signed treaty.
Apeman42@lemmy.world 7 hours ago
Try to find the nearest shaman, apothecary or herbalist and trade my future clothes/pocket contents for some hallucinogens and painless poison. I ain’t living through a time before electricity.
xylogx@lemmy.world 8 hours ago
You would die. There are many, many examples of explorers from “advanced” civilizations getting shipwrecked or stranded in an area where primitive hunter-gatherers live. Unless they are saved by the hunter gatherers, they are doomed, despite their knowledge of science and technology. Joseph Henrich talks extensively about these examples in his book, “The Secret of Our Success”
Check out this video to get an idea -> m.youtube.com/watch?v=jaoQh6BoH3c
RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world 3 hours ago
Yes, but what about you?
untakenusername@sh.itjust.works 9 hours ago
I reread the Bitcoin paper yesterday, so with my newly refreshed knowledge id find the nearest mathimation, explain it to them, implement the protocol with paper records, handwritten hashes, and messages on horseback or something. After a few years when every major economic power realizes how valuable a deflationary currency that Mansa Musa doesn’t control (14th century african gold-salt bazzilionare, ~400 bill USD today), the price of my currency would increase vastly, making me super rich.
Evotech@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
So dead
untakenusername@sh.itjust.works 35 minutes ago
other people would probably have a higher chance of dying than me from the immunity I’ve got and all the diseases I carry
softcat@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
die almost immediately
CarbonatedPastaSauce@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Yeah, this. I have medications I need. When the pair of contacts in my eyes fall out eventually, I’m functionally blind. All that aside, I’d probably starve quickly since I don’t know how to make weapons and other humans haven’t made it to where I live yet in 1375.
I’d probably look around for a couple days and then when I got super hungry just find a cliff to jump off.
adarza@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
and if you manage to evade physical harm, sickness will surely catch up with you. the black death was not a ‘one and done’ pandemic. it lingered and persisted here-and-there for centuries after the widespread pandemic (known today simply as ‘the plague’) that claimed 50m+ lives, including half of europe’s population at the time
LordWiggle@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
I would kill everyone I meet with the plagues I carry which I’m immune to.
ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 15 hours ago
You might have a bad time with all the plagues that have gone extinct since then.
null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 22 hours ago
Double entry accounting system.
I’m an accountant by trade. The double entry system wasn’t invented until the 15th century.
I could account for any lords various assets, goods, and livestock in an efficient, reliable and accurate manner
jagged_circle@feddit.nl 21 hours ago
Being too early to market something also leads to failure
null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 hours ago
It’s never too early to efficiently count your sheep!
MisanthropiCynic@lemm.ee 22 hours ago
Die because my medications haven’t been invented yet.
Or be murdered because I’m not christian
captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
I’m on the Gregorian calendar, 650 years ago is the year 1375. I’m in North Carolina, so if I were to snap back in time at my present location I would be a blue eyed white guy in pre-contact North America. And while I think I’m an above average candidate for the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court scenario I’m not realistically able to start “from scratch.” I’d probably make it the summer on forage and my own body fat. I don’t picture encountering the natives going particularly well, for me or them. I’m not sick and I’m vaccinated against a lot of shit but watch I’ll give them 6 centuries worth of influenza updates.
I don’t think it would help that much being plunked down in 14th century England; we’re talking Geoffrey Chaucer’s lifetime here, to them I’d sound insane. Modern English is a few hundred years off. If they didn’t trepan me to let the demons out of my skull and I didn’t die of smallpox, I’d try to invent the electric motor 500 years early and be burned for heresy or some shit.
lagoon8622@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
The only non-delusional answer lol
RebekahWSD@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Yeah, I’m here thinking my ass in America pre Columbian exchange is not doing well. Maybe if I make it clear somehow I do not want to do anything but help I could…idk, be part of a native tribe and maybe give them a slight help to the upcoming horrors for them?
It’s not going well for anyone.
Iheartcheese@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I’d use my knowledge of the future to do two chicks at same time
kmartburrito@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Fucking A
GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world 1 day ago
… and B too
partial_accumen@lemmy.world 1 day ago
“I figure a guy that can time travel 650 years into the past can set something like that up”
MissJinx@lemmy.world 1 day ago
well I’m a woman so anything I do will be witchcreaft. I would probably try to get to north america in some way and warn them “the fuckers are coming”.
that would mess up the future lol
Geetnerd@lemmy.world 1 day ago
“You don’t need that knowledge to do two chicks at the same time, man.”
“If you want two chicks to double up on a dude like me, you do.”
Kolanaki@pawb.social 1 day ago
“Hey ladies… Ever been with a guy who can read?”
WhatSay@slrpnk.net 6 hours ago
I’d go live in a cabin in the forest, again.
biofaust@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Wash my hands
feddup@feddit.uk 1 day ago
The definition of succeeding just becomes not dying.
nickwitha_k@lemmy.sdf.org 8 hours ago
Everyone dies. You just get to try to make the leaderboards, if that’s your thing. There isn’t a killscreen that we know of.
biofaust@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Given the rate at which people would become mentally or physically disabled because of diseases, you could argue it would have a network effect (probably a better term exists): I would have more chances to meet people and influence them, to learn something useful, to accumulate and use wealth for the above, so yeah…
Kookie215@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Now you’re a witch
biofaust@lemmy.world 1 day ago
That would be a warlock I guess.
jol@discuss.tchncs.de 1 day ago
Where do you wash your hands? Hope you brought a big bottle of disinfectant.
biofaust@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Running water would allow for 30% reduction in bacteria, according to some sources.
Also, in that time period soap was known in Spain, France and Italy, and I personally made it in the summer using either olive oil or pork fat.
Thavron@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
Any body of sufficiently rapidly running water should suffice.
rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 day ago
I’ll probably die of dysentery. Just because I know modern hygiene rules doesn’t mean I’ll survive interacting with all the other people who don’t but are used to local bacteria and viruses.
andrewta@lemmy.world 1 day ago
This is probably the most realistic answer. Either you die quickly or you’d wind up, spreading some major contagious disease that nobody has a defense against and wipe out a huge section of the population.
gibmiser@lemmy.world 1 day ago
spreading some major contagious disease that nobody has a defense against and wipe out a huge section of the population.
SplashJackson@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
How do you think the boobonic plague got started?
Yeah, it was a time traveller
PahdyGnome@lemmy.world 1 day ago
As an Australian I would struggle significantly unless you were to also transport me geographically.
ptu@lemm.ee 1 day ago
I would imagine the east coast / tasmania could be interesting. There used to be hundreds of different peoples that are now extinct and we know nothing about. I struggle nevertheless.
Agent641@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Fuck I think I could just vibe with the Noongars, hunting, fishing and sleeping til I died of old age.
Maybe use basic science and chemistry to improve sanitation and quality of life. Not too much, just enough to be regarded as a clever fella, not a warra wirrin bad spirit.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Well, I would give you the answer, but since I snapped back as soon as I read the post, I’m now responding what has been 650 years later for me, and I’m too fucking old for this shit a second time. I bypassed getting snapped back this time by just not reading the post and coming straight in to comment.
Now, what will happen if I read the
ultranaut@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Assuming I am physically in the same place, I will fall to my death. If I somehow survive the fall I would be severely injured and alone in the wilderness. Within a few days I would probably die of either my injuries, dehydration, or hypothermia.
SendMePhotos@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Scientifically speaking, the earth is constantly moving in an upward spiral. Your exact physical location would put you in some random outerspace area without oxygen or any protection. Just floating in space until you die.
JackGreenEarth@lemm.ee 1 day ago
Scientifically speaking, there is no absolute reference frame. So you can be wherever you like depending on what reference you choose.
pebbles@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
How do you define upwards in space? North? Or maybe normal to the orbit and vaguely north?
P00ptart@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
I would teach London children the most obnoxious brain rot slang from today as a laugh.
Kookie215@lemmy.world 18 hours ago
The butterfly effect of that would be weird because all of our brain rot slang would change then.
P00ptart@lemmy.world 18 hours ago
Exactly, that’s the fun part. Would it get worse, or swing the other way, having kids talk like uppity old money aristocrats?
kittenzrulz123@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 hours ago
I would basically become a Jewish witch and either build a small community of people or die of some ancient plague, either way I wouldn’t be thriving but I might just survive.
yessikg@lemmy.blahaj.zone 21 hours ago
I would warn the Native Americans about the Europeans
Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works 20 hours ago
Europeans would show up and my Native American homies would be armed with cartridge rifles, six shooters and a crank rotary machine gun.
MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca 20 hours ago
Congratulations, you just brought diseases to the new world.
ikilledlaurapalmer@lemmy.world 39 minutes ago
LAB LEAK
/s
macaw_dean_settle@lemmy.world 14 hours ago
Not native, just 1st to migrate. 1st Americans or Amerindians.
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 19 hours ago
What place do I get teleported to? If I’m teleported to the same place on Earth, then I just fell down several meters into a swamp and am probably going to die here.
Kookie215@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
You teleported to somewhere safe and private, you won’t fall to your death and nobody will see you lol.
RandomVideos@programming.dev 16 hours ago
Use all the science i know from school to helpfully quicken scientific progress and spread trans propaganda
Fedizen@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
Wouldn’t I be in like empty space?
Dagwood222@lemm.ee 1 day ago
I know thousands of songs. Also, musical instruments like the saxaphone haven’t been invented yet.
Kookie215@lemmy.world 23 hours ago
Oh I think you’re the first person to suggest music! That is a really good idea, provided you don’t die of dysentery of course.
Dagwood222@lemm.ee 17 hours ago
Here are some good time travel stories.
bookshop.org/p/books/…/7282193?ean=9780553575385&…
To Say Nothing Of The Dog. In the future, time travel is organized like the Army. The problem is that the actual travel causes a serious case of ‘jet lag.’ All the agents act like they are half-drunk and sleep deprived.
bookshop.org/p/books/…/693820?ean=9781606644874&n…
The Big Time. Two alien races are fighting a time war that spans all planets in the universe. Earth is a minor backwater, but the fighting is just as deadly as anywhere else. A few soldiers and entertainers are catching a few moments respite in a R + R center when the War crashes in on them.
Predestination. A man is offered a chance to find and kill the guy who ruined his life. All he has to do is trust the stranger who is making the offer.
Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 23 hours ago
Die as you forgot to teleport me to where the earth was at the time.
Otherwise I guess my main knowledge that could be useful is some basic first aid. Secondary to that, a little bit of electrical stuff.
MBech@feddit.dk 22 hours ago
Assuming you live in the west, you want to get executed by the catholics?
thermal_shock@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
Well I be naked, so would need to make/steal clothing very quickly
Bieren@lemmy.world 1 hour ago
Nothing. I’d sit under an tree and enjoy the peace and quiet. No trump. No DC. No MAGA. No reporters. No non stop ads. No social media. No Google. No Elon. No bezos. The list goes on. Sure I’d probably die of some random disease or bandits. But I’d be okay with it at that point.
jj4211@lemmy.world 1 hour ago
Well you can do that today. Find a tree out in the middle of nowhere and sit under it without any electronic devices. Then you are oblivious to all that stuff. You may be bothered by the fact that the things are still happening, but there are also plenty of horrific things happening in that time period you went to, you just won’t be keeping track of them.