What do you want to see?
Can you imagine living through a significant day in history? It's totally both a curse and a blessing. But, it's fun to think about, right? So what if you had the chance, what would you do?
Reddit user ChipNoir asked:
Let's see what they all said.
Fulfilling A Wish
Stephen Hawking's birthday party. (The one he held and only told someone after it had happened in hopes of seeing a time traveler.)
Getting On The Bandwagon
January 9th, 2009. The day Bitcoin first went online.
Chicago Times
A World's Fair in the late 19th century. It would be cool to see people getting excited and amazed by the lightbulb and other inventions from the time period.
Recession
When the market crashed in like 2008, buy some stocks.
Curiosity
The big bang! What the hell was going on 12 hrs before?
Completely Legal
A pharmacy in the late 19th/ early 20th century.
"Yes sir I have a cold. The only thing that will help is as much cocaine and heroin as X$ can by"
A Good Deed
The bombing of my grandfather's house in ww2.
They lived on a farm next to a railway which was the target. The British missed and hit their home. Parents + 8 kids + grandparents + 3 aunts/uncles. After the bombing they were all split up over multiple villages and didn't see each other much for years. Id love to see his home and family he still talks about before the bomb and use the cash to help them after.
Choices
Kennedy Assassination, or maybe the Buddha giving the flower sermon, or maybe meeting Jesus before all the apostles glommed on. Or maybe that first Black Flag show in NYC.
My Name Is
I'd save Lincoln..if I could. Then tell him about Hamilton (the musical)
Solving Mysteries
See how the Roman's made concrete. IIRC we still don't know how they did it.
Confirmation
I would want to check out the actual time and place of when Jesus did any significant and undeniable miracle. And I would video the whole damn thing. When I returned, I would have the ability to convert all christians into atheists or all atheists into christians.
1313
My own 13th birthday party. So I can pull myself aside and try to fix my life before it ever goes wrong. And if younger me acts like younger me, a stubborn little prick. I'll just buy some smokes for slightly less than they currently cost while I'm picking up lotto tickets.
Roswell
Find the location for the Roswell UFO crash and spend part of that money on camping supplies (good tent as there was a storm that night) and just see what the heck really did go on. I wouldn't interfere.
No WWI
I'd pack a copy of a history book before I use the ticket.
The assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand is what I'd go to.
I'd spend the 200 bucks on a gun to take down the assassin(s) and thus alter the course of history. The time before the event is spent by tracking down those motherf-ckers, the time after most likely by using that history book to proof that my action was heroic and just.
Amazing Celebration
I'd go back to the event where I became rich.
A week ago, and buy a lotto ticket of each type/company and spend the rest on highest returns of sporting events (ie Team A to beat Team B by X points). If I have anything left over, maybe a nice chicken parma and a few frothies to celebrate me becoming rich over the next week.
Save The World
The burning of the library of Alexandria.
A Legendary Concert
Live Aid 1985. I'd kill to see David Bowie / Queen / McCartney. Leave me in 1985, that will be fine as well.
Winning The Lotto
I'd go back to a large lottery drawing and buy tickets with knowledge of the winning numbers.
The True Fulcrum
I want to witness the discovery of how to make fire. I don't even know if money would matter, it just sounds awesome to see the early days of human history.
Body Cast
The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius (Pompeii, 79 A.D.) I'd need some kind of elaborate story to convince people to GTFO so they didn't end up charcoal but dang it, I'd try.
Ok, who is watching the clock? Those seconds aren't going to count themselves. The only way to understand time is to be its witness. Although that can get depressing. Let's focus on the light and cool.
History...
Calculate Figure It Out GIF by OriginalsGiphy"If you are an 80-year-old American, you have lived through approximately 1/3 of our nation's entire history."
Those Days...
"The 80s were 40 years ago."
"This is what messes me up because I was born in 82 and graduated high school in 2000 so for some reason my brain is stuck on the 80's being twenty years ago. The 70's thirty years ago etc etc. I have to stop and realize sometimes that my concept of how long ago things happened is way off."
Time goes by...
"We observe that light travels at 186,000 miles a second, but given the vast size of the observable universe, that's a snail's pace. But from the point of view of a particle of light, time doesn't even exist."
"Time slows down as you approach the speed of light, and theoretically stops completely when you reach the speed of light."
Years Gone By...
"MLK Jr. and Anne Frank were born in the same year."
"Betty White was born in 1922. Automatically pre-sliced packaged bread loaves became commercially available in 1928. Betty White is six years older than sliced bread."
Long Live the Queen!
queen elizabeth images GIFGiphy"The queen and Marilyn Monroe would've been the same age."
"And Marilyn Monroe and Andy Griffith were born on the same day!"
- osme1
I swear Liz is going to outlive dirt. Wait, I believe she already has. Well she won't be alone, she'll have Betty White. At least she better have Betty. Time is nothing without Queen Betty.
TV Time
Season 2 Omg GIF by Paramount+Giphy"Happy Days was a TV show made in the 1970s-80s about teenagers in the 1950s. Similarly, That 70s Show was made in the 90s-00s about teenagers in the 70s. If a similar show were to be made today, it would be about teenagers in the 2000s."
- VVillyD
A Croc
"If a T-Rex imagined a creature as ancient as the T-Rex is to us, it would be a Stegosaurus. If that Stegosaurus imagined a creature as ancient as the Stegosaurus is to us, it would be a Crocodile. If that Crocodile imagined a creature as ancient as that Crocodile is to us, it would be a Shark."
On the Clock
"On a twenty four hour clock the amount of time that humans have been on the earth would total around five seconds."
"How about this one: If Homo Habilus first appeared at midnight, 24 hours ago, that means the first Homo Sapiens appeared at 9:25 PM, or about 2 and a half hours ago. The first human civilization, in lower Mesopotamia, appeared at 11:57 PM, or about 3 minutes ago."
"The Western Roman Empire fell at 11:59 PM, or 1 minute ago. Everything that has happened since - the Crusades, the Plague, the discovery of the New World, the world wars, all of it - has happened in the last minute of human existence."
And that's just OUR Sun...
"The span of our lives are so insignificantly small that our Sun will last another 5 billion years. That's 9 zeros people. Our eldest live to around 100 in the best places. That's 50,000,000 (50 million) times longer than any person can reasonably expect to live. And that's just OUR Sun. The universe as a whole has probably existed for magnitudes longer than that already and will continue to exist until the end of time as we know it."
Tell Me a Story
william shakespeare GIF by will herringGiphy"We know what a good storyteller Shakespeare was but there were Greek playwrights who wrote shows nearly 2,000 years earlier that are pretty good, too."
I hate time. Only because I'm petty and irritated of the amount I squandered. That's neither here nor there though. Time marches on and continues to amaze. I'll keep watching.
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