You are magically given the ability to access the life experiences and memories of one person that has ever existed.* The ability allows you to drill down to a dirt poor farmer in ancient Cyprus or a Tahitian fisherman instead of having to know their names in advance. Who do you access? Scientist? Philosopher? Religious figure? Loved one? Past or present world leader? Your ability is a one time offer but you have a day to think about it. If the person is mythical, they are not an option, so have a plan B.
My spur of the moment answer was a western religious figure. Jesus, Mohammed, Moses, Abraham, Eve. That would solve personal curiosity. Further thinking on it changed it to be someone like Tesla or DaVinci. Maybe Nostradamus. But again, it would be cool to speak and read ancient Egyptian or Mayan. I need ideas before I decide.
*Let’s restrict ever existed to be since summer solstice 72367 years ago.
I like the idea of John Lennon. Seems kinda shallow compared to a religious person. I just want to know how he felt growing up and his experiences as a Beatle.
Other than that, I like Queen Elizabeth I.
What happens if we pick a person who might have been mythological, but might have been real? Do we get to find out if they were really real? If they weren’t, do we get to pick someone else? What if the mythological figure was actually an amalgam of two different real people?
Heh. Apologies for the possible hijack and possible blasphemy, but: say you pick Jesus, and say you get a wow-this-is-just-how-folks-picture-it experience.
So he had actual super powers! Or he was delusional, with memories to match.
Id say Shakespeare, to find out if he was really Marlowe., and how he pulled it off. Shakespeare did have an incredible life, even foreign travel. And he observed a humankind that enabled him to write about it as he did.
I’m sorry to say though that some part of me wants to look into the mind of deeply disturbed individuals. Individuals that most “sane” people would consider the stuff of nightmares. Anyone up for a look into Ed Gein’s head. I can’t imagine any good would come from it but that doesn’t mean I’m not curious.
Leaving aside famous people I would probably pick someone who was central to an unresolved mystery of history, just to see what actually happened.
For example, and this is just the first example that popped into my head:
And no, I don’t believe he was kidnapped by aliens, and its most likely he deliberately crashed but its one of those things it would be interesting to know what happened for sure.
Easy one and two specific people; not general tradesmen – Claude-Pierre Pécaudy de Contrecœur or Father Denys Baron. I have lived near and studied Fort DuQuesne for so long (8 times longer than it actually stood) that to know the mind of either man would be magnificent.
Potentially the most valuable sort of target I think. One little peek might be enough to put psychiatry on the right path to understanding (and identifying and treating if appropriate) these sorts of people. The danger, of course, is that their behavior, once known and understood, might seem more reasonable than ‘normal’, and then what do you do?
Does the person need to be dead? If not, how old must the memories be? A year? A day? A millisecond? There are any number of people where you could make a fortune if you had access to their memories in almost real time. Maybe the guy who does the orange crop report? You could make a killing in frozen orange juice concentrate futures…
I’m having trouble seeing a nefarious angle to my post. People are generally open to the ideas held by technological and artistic geniuses, and their mindsets and perspectives are thus readily accepted and developed. Sociopaths, especially homicidal & necrophilic ones, not so much. Society tends to destroy or silence them as quickly as possible, with little regard for their motivations. I simply suggested if we understood what was going on with them, we might be able to intervene before they cause harm to others and/or destroy their own futures.
I didn’t say there was a nefarious angle to your post. Should memory access to the long deceased become available as the OP posits, legitimate, useful research could be accomplished.
Not everyone would be interested in performing such research. Maybe Ed was my hero and I want to relive his experiences? Maybe I want to learn from his mistakes and do it better this time? Things could get nefarious in a hurry.
