(01-25-2014 08:46 PM)Vroom Wrote:  I wonder how many peoples responses would change after reading this:

6 ridiculous myths about the middle ages everyone believes

Cool article. I suspected a lot of this was the case. Cracked comes out with some interesting pieces, actually.

I think a lot of you guys are being too optimistic about this. This question could be replaced with anything along the lines of ' "You get sent to a potentially hostile and uncertain old-world shithole with no friends and no resources and no understanding of the language, culture, or customs - will you survive?"

This "England in the 1500s" aspect hinges on our belief that we are superior to them due to the last few hundred years of scientific and technological advancement. That in itself is worth questioning. If you can't bring any of the technology back (RPGs, guns, ammo, drugs, etc), then what good is knowing about it?

People who believe in an imbalance of humors and bad air causing disease with the treatment being bloodletting aren't going to give a shit about the germ theory of disease. As for diet and nutrition, you're probably going to have to eat what there is available.

If you don't get outright murdered for being some kind of weird fucker (wrong/bad accent, absolutely no knowledge of local affairs, no understanding of how to provide for your own food, no social connections, strange dress, no convincing lies for why you are that way), the only reason you'd survive would be due to the charity of others. You'd probably have to hit up a monastery and be a beggar.

This question could have a completely different outcome, however, if you were allowed to bring back technology.

I'd bring back as many drugs as possible, prescription, over-the-counter, cocaine, whatever. I'm sure those guys liked to party hard back then. From there you'd have immediate power as some kind of Dr. Feelgood. Shit we take for granted now would be like magic. A bottle of aspirin would probably grant you an audience with an arthritic King. You could give your vassals d-bol so they get jacked to shit. Monks could be sold little stamps of LSD for a hallucinogenic "meeting with Jesus". You could grow and cultivate modern strains of weed and make a "go home, get stoned" smoking culture hundreds of years earlier. Getting drunk was a popular pasttime back then, a guy could probably be very popular if he could get everybody high and cure their problems with drugs, too.

I doubt those cute little drugs would impress. People back then didn't live soft little lives: lift weights? Big whoop, that hay needs pitching. Have a wild weekend out? Big deal, people back then drank booze everyday because water was unsafe and they ate a diet that had preserved/pickled food over winter, got to flush them kidneys. Think you are a badass because you knocked down a guy in the club so Alpha? Back then Alphas fought with swords in duels to the death.

(01-25-2014 04:38 PM)Cincinnatus Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 04:33 PM)WestIndianArchie Wrote:  I'd have to leave England somehow, and learn Dutch, and then i'd get into the Tulips game, and get out early.

The tulip mania that swamped the Netherlands - and the bubble that burst - is fascinating history to me. I've read that some folks were selling canal-front real estate for the price of a single bulb.

Common misconception.

People were not paying ridiculous amounts of money for a single tulip. They were paying ridiculous amounts of money for the exclusive rights to breed a particular strain of tulip.

Back then people were breeding and selling different strains of tulips. And you could buy the rights for a particular strain in the same way you could buy the intellectual property or patent off somebody today.

It was still a crazy bubble. But it was a bubble based on people trying to buy the breeding rights - and not just because they thought a particular tulip looked pretty.

The only place I have seen which gets the story right is 'Red-Blooded Risk' by Aaron Brown which is one of the best books I have read. Very smart guy.

(01-26-2014 02:13 PM)cardguy Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 04:38 PM)Cincinnatus Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 04:33 PM)WestIndianArchie Wrote:  I'd have to leave England somehow, and learn Dutch, and then i'd get into the Tulips game, and get out early.

The tulip mania that swamped the Netherlands - and the bubble that burst - is fascinating history to me. I've read that some folks were selling canal-front real estate for the price of a single bulb.

Common misconception.

People were not paying ridiculous amounts of money for a single tulip. They were paying ridiculous amounts of money for the exclusive rights to breed a particular strain of tulip.

Back then people were breeding and selling different strains of tulips. And you could buy the rights for a particular strain in the same way you could buy the intellectual property or patent off somebody today.

It was still a crazy bubble. But it was a bubble based on people trying to buy the breeding rights - and not just because they thought a particular tulip looked pretty.

The only place I have seen which gets the story right is 'Red-Blooded Risk' by Aaron Brown which is one of the best books I have read. Very smart guy.

I remember hearing the main problem was they eventually started selling what amounted to Tulip Futures, but have never read up on the reality of it. Must look into it. Thanks for the heads up.

What if you fucked/impregnated your great great great great great great great great grandma? That you exist to travel back through time depends on the fact that you *do* travel back through time in the first place, fuck your great great etc grandma, and become your own ancestor.

(01-27-2014 12:20 AM)flyfreshandyoung Wrote:  What if you fucked/impregnated your great great great great great great great great grandma? That you exist to travel back through time depends on the fact that you *do* travel back through time in the first place, fuck your great great etc grandma, and become your own ancestor.

you've watched too much family guy and lost dude.

I'd probably try to take a trip (horse and carriage) all the way down to Africa and chill out till the Europeans decide to invade.

Africa was the shyt back in that era...I'd probably hit lizards from the East to the West to the South and have a huge Moma empire.

I'd be the griot and write futuristic data sheets in the dirt and the sand with twigs and small branches.

(01-27-2014 07:56 AM)Moma Wrote:  I'd probably try to take a trip (horse and carriage) all the way down to Africa and chill out till the Europeans decide to invade.

Africa was the shyt back in that era...I'd probably hit lizards from the East to the West to the South and have a huge Moma empire.

I'd be the griot and write futuristic data sheets in the dirt and the sand with twigs and small branches.

That was the first thing i thought head too the Mali Empire and Stockpile Gold and Salt.

(01-25-2014 10:36 AM)Sailor Wrote:  Would you Bang?

She looks like she gives decent head. WB.

(01-25-2014 10:30 PM)Beyond Borders Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 08:46 PM)Vroom Wrote:  I wonder how many peoples responses would change after reading this:

6 ridiculous myths about the middle ages everyone believes

Cool article. I suspected a lot of this was the case. Cracked comes out with some interesting pieces, actually.

Anybody got some more online or print resources about dispelling myths about the Middle Ages? All I have is a book on marriage in the Middle Ages.

EDIT: Been combing the comments, found this gem:

Quote:i'm not sure on 'people were working in the mud together and had no time for misogyny': just look at f.i. afghanistan if you want to have an example of an 'agricultural country' that is not big on women's rights.

i'm not saying women were terribly repressed in the european middle ages: just that the reasons for their kinda-equal status were more about cultural habits than about wealth.

Boom. This women just admitted my long-time gut feeling that feminism is about consumerism.



Like any good feminist or American woman, she has internalized the idea the liberation = income (implicitly free of male interference). This is why child support orders will never be met with any serious oversight. Liberation = not having males (authority figures) tell them how to spend the money. Sure, appointing only women in government to deal with child support spending issues might ameliorate the situation, but women reflexively feel that anybody telling them how to spend money is male.

A feminist might smugly respond that is because that men decided how money was spent in a family. Really? That's bullshit, but it simultaneously distances women from the past (making them insecure) and leaving them wide open for marketers to prey on them. No man to counteract advertisements targeted at women? Sounds good to a capitalist. Remind me again why any site targeted at lesbians is so horrifically mindless. Or narcissistic. Seriously, go read some lesbian sites. "Everybody hates us....err, they are afraid they are us!" Except that homophobic analysis usually only applies against men. Which is why these types have no ability to deal with women who are not pro- gay marriage or abortion.

Tangent aside, feminism is the daughter of consumerism. In a society where the individual feels they have little value and nothing of value to contribute to society, they indulge in the vices of unabashed materialism. Schools and society do their utmost to prime women for these roles. This is why women and feminists are screeching about oppression - they know their current states are a social construction, but only have the flaccid cultural analysis tools of "misogyny" and "sexism" to lamely try to stem the unavoidable tide of forced socialization.

In this woman's mind, the only way to true "liberation" is America's approach to women's rights, but that is fatally drenched in American nihilism and extreme historical revisionism. The nihilism is inherently narcissistic, while the latter has both roots in narcissism and obsessive-compulsive issues. OC issues were America's original personality disorder and continues to this day as political correctness, stomping out sexuality and the like, as those forces truly believe that ignoring natural human impulses makes humans better.

Finally, her comment about "kinda-equal status" is interesting. She admits she still thinks women had all sorts of nasty plusbad in the past. Yet, she implicitly admits this is a reflexive reaction on her part. The idea that she isn't a part of "We Are The One's We Have Been Waiting For" is ego-crushing. Liberals like her see life in starkly bottom-to-the-top thinking.



Human civilizations have failed starts and sputtering endings. Some civilizations have happy equilibriums and prosper. Some don't. To assume humanity is some inevitable arc towards "justice" (the world she wishes she lived in) is childish. Technology aside, have we progressed? Yes. In other ways? Hell no. Every civilization shall rise and fall - most likely in ways that we can't predict now.

Before I make another comment too long, this comment is emblematic of how American's are socialized to see issues in certain ways. Access to disposable funds to spend without male interference is a high priority in a female's life. To them, in order to value any female's life, she needs a state provided "education" by which she is passed on into paid employment. Notice how modern housewives have to prove their "education" to other women. It is never to men. It is to show off to other women.

Further, they don't understand the concept of labor relating directly to the existence of the self. Why is the female commenter talking about wages? When you live on a farm, who cares about your wages? You are churning butter not to sell, but to use. You are not grooming chickens to sell, but to primarily eat. Your own survival comes before selling your excess production (literally econ 101). The commenter doesn't understand this.

Regardless, this sort of idiocy is common in modern America. Honestly, this is the sort of woman who needed to be told "too late" and "not enough" as a child. She needed to learn that life isn't necessarily about limitations, but that a grown adult needs to navigate around the necessary limitations life and our own choices put on us.

Odds are, she was praised for being so "smart" and "clever." She never learned to tie her self-image to her actual acts, but responses her acts engender. Praise for her stick figure painting at 5 becomes tepid approval at 8 and outright ignoring at 13. Like most American women, she is fumbling towards an identity she will never completely resolve, so she consoles herself that women in the past had it so much worse than her.

Nothing terrifies the modern women than realizing that women of the past -- in any culture -- might be happier than them.

I would introduce the idea of camoflauge and sneak tactics to the british army, one of two will happen:
1. Executed for the replacement of the English colors and flag in order to camoflauge into the terrain.
2. Be praised and worshiped for the countless wars and land that my contribution helped attain.
First thing that came to mind. Crazy how a small tweak like this can possibly change the whole course of humanity and history as we know it.

You would want to round up a posse to help you first.

I would go to Oxford and Cambridge and look for the smartest and most unconventional guys they had, and find one I judged trustworthy. I think you could freely attend lectures in those days. I would come up with some story about being raised by people near China that had arcane knowledge.

I might start with the medical professors first.

Ditto on showing the basic medical sanitary measures - for example, using distilled alcohol to clean surgical instruments and for wound care. I don't know how you grow penicillin mold, you could trial and error it.

You could start immunizing for smallpox right away, just the way Edward Jenner did it in 1796: using cowpox pus.

The steam engine is a pretty simple principle. ANFO high explosives?

Once you had a following among academics, you network into the power structure, who would be easy to identify since they would mostly be named "Lord . . " "Baron . . . " or "Earl . . . "

On the dark side, once you had some capital, you could start growing opium poppies or importing raw opium and refine it into something stronger - again, not really that tough. Same thing with coca leaves. Then you could do to England what England later did to China.

The printing press is already there in 1550, but any modern person has an advanced knowledge of propaganda, mass psychology and disinformation in order to use it. That might get you killed, though.

(01-27-2014 07:32 AM)pheonix500000 Wrote:  

(01-27-2014 12:20 AM)flyfreshandyoung Wrote:  What if you fucked/impregnated your great great great great great great great great grandma? That you exist to travel back through time depends on the fact that you *do* travel back through time in the first place, fuck your great great etc grandma, and become your own ancestor.

you've watched too much family guy and lost dude.

Well if you want to be buzz killington you technically couldn't do anything if you traveled back in time without jeopardizing your very existence

(01-26-2014 09:30 PM)AnonymousBosch Wrote:  

(01-26-2014 02:13 PM)cardguy Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 04:38 PM)Cincinnatus Wrote:  

(01-25-2014 04:33 PM)WestIndianArchie Wrote:  I'd have to leave England somehow, and learn Dutch, and then i'd get into the Tulips game, and get out early.

The tulip mania that swamped the Netherlands - and the bubble that burst - is fascinating history to me. I've read that some folks were selling canal-front real estate for the price of a single bulb.

Common misconception.

People were not paying ridiculous amounts of money for a single tulip. They were paying ridiculous amounts of money for the exclusive rights to breed a particular strain of tulip.

Back then people were breeding and selling different strains of tulips. And you could buy the rights for a particular strain in the same way you could buy the intellectual property or patent off somebody today.

It was still a crazy bubble. But it was a bubble based on people trying to buy the breeding rights - and not just because they thought a particular tulip looked pretty.

The only place I have seen which gets the story right is 'Red-Blooded Risk' by Aaron Brown which is one of the best books I have read. Very smart guy.

I remember hearing the main problem was they eventually started selling what amounted to Tulip Futures, but have never read up on the reality of it. Must look into it. Thanks for the heads up.

I believe you are correct, when tulips were mentioned in this thread I got curious and found this free kindle book "Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds " It is an old book not all about the Tulip mania. Had some interesting stories to give the reader a sense of the madness.
http://www.amazon.com/Memoirs-Extraordin...ulip+mania

He mentions that contracts and futures were involved as the market got higher. In London and Paris exchanges were developed to trade tulip contracts. It was very shocking how obsessed they got about tulips.

If I remember correctly - I think the author of that book actually exagerrated just how high the prices were for the price of tulip futures.

The Aaron Brown book I mentioned seemed to correct a number of issues surrounding the tulip bubble. Mainly to point out it involved tulip contracts and not tulips. And also (if I remember correctly) to point out that the bubble was exagerrated a bit in some sources (Like the one above - which was written by a journalist looking to entertain the public). Of course there was still a crazy bubble - but if I remember correctly, not as crazy as alot of people think.

In the book above - Aaron Brown goes back and researches the original figures and compares them with the later exagerrated reports in the literature.