Time travelling teacher

[Quackers]

I was going to post this into the WH forum but thought better of it.

Anyway here is the scenario: a scientist approaches you requesting your services. He has built a time machine which will transport you back in time to Athens, Greece 500 BC. You have 24 hours and your aim is too impart as much scientific/engineering knowledge as possible. The ultimate game is to speed up the technological progress of mankind. You have an indepth knowledge of spoken and written Ancient Greece of that era. You will also have an audience of the best minds of the day. Whilst they won't believe everything you say automatically..they are open to new ideas. They do not know your a time traveller, they believe you're a citizen of a far flung city state.

Now, what things do you teach them and how do you convince them?

 

[Ajidica]

I think it would go something like this:

Link to video.

 

[Cutlass]

The thing is, there's an old saying, you need the tools to build the tools to build the tools. Those people made some astounding intellectual leaps. But you can't go from there to introducing the transistor.

First, I think I'd introduce them to the modern numbering system. Just introducing the 0 and letting them do arithmetic in a simpler system would be a help. But after that, there are limits. They haven't the background, and you don't have the time to teach them. So, crop rotation, curved metal plows, a theory of fertilizer, a theory of germs, cleanliness, sanitation.

 

[Borachio]

Just take the scientist with you and let him do the work. He could, for example, explain how the Greeks could build a time machine to transport them back in time to 2500 BC and inform the people there about all the new technologies they'd learnt from your scientist.

Meanwhile you sit back and enjoy some fine plays while chatting to world-class philosophers.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Why should I help?, the risk is that something terrible could come from it

 

[Borachio]

I think it would go something like this:

Link to video.

!!!

 

[Kozmos]

I guess I'd read up on those basic forces of physics and math before trying to tell them about guns, germs and steel.

 

[timtofly]

Why not just give them the time machine?

 

[Borachio]

That's a point. Does the machine travel forwards as well as backwards in time? Because if it doesn't I'm not going.

 

[Antilogic]

Besides the answers about the time machine (because I don't intend to stay there either), the key thing to teach them are stuff like zero, modern scientific methods, how to read modern charts and graphs, etc. along the lines Cutlass laid out.

Then, make sure you leave them with a pile of important textbooks and engineering handbooks like Perry's translated into what roughly amounts to ancient Greek.

 

[JollyRoger]

Given where they have ended up lately, an economics lesson.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

You would also need to make a few other stops in various other times to make sure certain individuals and/or their followers don't interfere with progress. Paul (the apostle) has a hell of a lot to answer for, on the matter of women's rights and preventing some very smart women from contributing fully to society (including science).

Also: prevent the destruction of the world's various libraries, not only in Alexandria, but in other cities, and also in the New World.

 

[Ghpstage]

Besides the answers about the time machine (because I don't intend to stay there either), the key thing to teach them are stuff like zero, modern scientific methods, how to read modern charts and graphs, etc. along the lines Cutlass laid out.

Then, make sure you leave them with a pile of important textbooks and engineering handbooks like Perry's translated into what roughly amounts to ancient Greek.

This is the of thinking I initiall followed, with the difference that I think modern engineering science and engineering books would still be total nonsense, as they tend to rely on knowledge of fundamentals that we take from granted.
To be useful you would need to write books tailored to the purpose of fast tracking a civilisations knowledge, rather than bringing an educated individual up to a civilisations level. I would think the books would most critically require details on how to prove concepts experimentally and what would need to be understood to do so, and ordered in a way similar in concept to the civ games tech trees, a useable order.

However, after a bit more thinking, I suspect that improving on the ancient Greeks already impressive knowledge of abstract and technical thinking probably wouldn't be the best use of the time....
It might be better to put in place some kind of plan to prevent the fall of the ancient Greek scientific culture and the rise of organised Monotheism, as to be honest the Greeks were doing well enough by themselves. Its what came after that sent us backwards and ground to a virtual halt European advancement over the following millenium.

 

[Phrossack]

Basic sanitation and germ theory, plus some agricultural ideas. Simple, effective, and not immoral.

 

[Gori the Grey]

I'm going to leave things alone. As is, their scientific legacy is such that humankind built a time machine within 2514 years!

 

[Antilogic]

This is the of thinking I initiall followed, with the difference that I think modern engineering science and engineering books would still be total nonsense, as they tend to rely on knowledge of fundamentals that we take from granted.
To be useful you would need to write books tailored to the purpose of fast tracking a civilisations knowledge, rather than bringing an educated individual up to a civilisations level. I would think the books would most critically require details on how to prove concepts experimentally and what would need to be understood to do so, and ordered in a way similar in concept to the civ games tech trees, a useable order.

However, after a bit more thinking, I suspect that improving on the ancient Greeks already impressive knowledge of abstract and technical thinking probably wouldn't be the best use of the time....
It might be better to put in place some kind of plan to prevent the fall of the ancient Greek scientific culture and the rise of organised Monotheism, as to be honest the Greeks were doing well enough by themselves. Its what came after that sent us backwards and ground to a virtual halt European advancement over the following millenium.

That's why you would include some core textbooks like a calculus book, maybe even high-school level textbooks. It would help bridge the gap to the handbooks.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Given where they have ended up lately, an economics lesson.

Can we not send a terminator back in time to save Jesus and bring Jesus to the future run as President of America. I want to see Republicans brains explode by the dark skinned Arab looking man, who cant produce a birth certificate and is for socialism.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Probably the smarter choice is not to go backwards but forwards and learn some of that technology and go back to our time with that knowledge and tech.

Then you repeat this and se the change, if more advanced technology have been developed then repeat.
If the future made the wrong decisions, then its not to bad not to live in that time

 

[Rashiminos]

Why should I help?, the risk is that something terrible could come from it

This, to varying levels... other than the alternate universes proposed by some posters in which the future comes back and decides to colonize Earth to bring it to their standards.

 

[CavLancer]

I suppose I'd reset it and go to the Sioux nation instead and teach them metallurgy and basic chemistry. Problem is I know squat about these things as Ajidica wisely pointed out, so they would likely feed me to their dogs.

You need to make cannons and muskets because more white guys like me are coming to kill you. How do we do that? I dunno, heat black rocks until they melt.

Or teach them about the English and disease infested blankets. You need penicillin! What's that? Well, eat moldy bread. What's bread? Oh, a couple bucks a loaf.