Lincoln. And his debate adversary, Stephen Douglas.
I’d like to see Adolf Hitler, if for nothing else to watch you guys thoroughly wipe the floor with him.
The captain of the Titanic…for a first hand account.
Amelia Earhart.
Gene Roddenberry.
Yeah, but think of the Godwin’s Law implications there!
Blaise Pascal. (Though we’d tell him what he could do with his silly wager.)
Bertrand Russell.
Kurt Godel.
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain.
Adam Smith.
John Maynard Keynes.
Noel Coward.
Duh.
Didn’t we do this once before?
Okay, my picks:
The Marquis de Sade
Jesus Christ (so he could set the record straight on what he really did say)
Albert Einstein
Rasputin
Otto Von Bismarck
Kaiser Wilhelm II (he’d probably get Pitted A LOT!)
Mary Wolstencraft
Bary Goldwater
Teddy Roosevelt
Anne Frank
Machiavelli
General Patton
Nostradamus
Martin Luther King Jr.
Judas Iscariot
Sigmund Freud
The “Unsinkable” Molly Brown
Albert Einstein.
Imagine the flame wars he’d have with Napoleon!
Only once? I’m sure it’s been done several times before – but not recently, I don’t think.
Cicero might give him some competition…
Or the Buddha and Karl Marx…
Or, come to that, Groucho and Karl Marx…
Thomas Aquinas would send people screaming to the exits on sheer verbiage alone.
The Empress Theodora
Tacitus would be fab in MPSIMS, especially if he talked about the events and people in the missing books of his Annales, which cover the reign of Gaius Caligula
Livy and Herodotus in MPSIMS
P T Barnum
And if I may enter one fictional character, E Black Adder
Ol’ Siggy Freud.
Until he got banned for going on and on about penises.
Until he got banned.
My other favorite nutty 19th century German, King Ludwig II of Bavaria, would probably be a similar case. I imagine he’d stick primarily to Cafe Society, but he’d be unable to heed repeated Mod warnings to “take it to the Pit” when it came to posters who disagreed with him about Wagner.
Heck, might as well invite Wagner to join while we’re at it!
And, getting away from the German Romantics, David Hume would be good for Great Debates.
They aren’t necessarily historic, but…
Dorothy Parker
Frank Zappa
David Niven (just for the stories…)
Does anyone else find it interesting that half of these great figures would get banned? 
I think this would be more fun for the Mods…
[Moderator]
Nietzsche I’ve warned you twice, don’t do that again.
Imagine the historic flame wars over the rolleyes smiley. :rolleyes:
The Pit would be so full. Ghandi pits Hitler, Jefferson pits Adams, Adams pits Jefferson for pitting him, Hitler pits Marx…
I suppose this would actually make for another thread, but I wonder what some of this lot would have for their sig lines alone…
:smack:
Hit submit just as I thought of someone else – Herostratus who would be banned very quickly for drive bys and trolling – he’s the chap who burnt down the Temple of Artemis at Ephseus in 356 BC solely so that he would be in the history books.
My top 10 draft picks.
Jesus
Richard Feynman
Will Rodgers
Ben Franklin
Homer:(of the Odyssey not Simpson)
Buddha
Doestoyevsky
Moses
Mohammed
and Robert(of Robert’s rules of order)for new Mod. Somebody has got to keep a hand on GD with that crowd.
I’m surprised that no one has mentioned Isaac Newton. He’d come in handy for all those physics questions that pop up in GQ. (Of course for the REALLY tough questions, we’d still have to rely on Q.E.D.) LOL
How about the mathematician Evariste Galois? Here’s an encylopedia entry about him:
1811-32, French mathematician. At the age of 17 he had evolved original concepts on the theory of algebra. He made important contributions to the theory of equations, the theory of numbers, and the theory of functions and was a pioneer in establishing the theory of groups in algebraic substitutions. Galois was twice imprisoned for his republican sympathies. He was killed in a duel with a political opponent.
He did all that and only lived to the age of 21? Geez it would be great to bring him back just to see what new ideas he’d have to offer. The encyclopedia entry doesn’t seem to address the full circumstances of his death. I have heard that the duel actually concerned their rivalry for the same woman. Hey that guy would be really interesting in any SDMB category.
Oh god, a Jefferson vs Adams FLAME war in the Pit would be beyond awesome. I’m almost in my happy place just thinking about it. Madison would join in and that would prompt Hamilton to jump in and then things would get really interesting. Shoot, might as well throw in Aaron Burr while I’m fantasizing about the Founding Fathers Pit Flamefest and Meltdown. Meanwhile, in another thread, Patrick Henry would be trying to pin Jefferson down…but Jefferson is so awesome, he could handle attacks from both sides.
Abigail Adams. She might be useful in getting ol’ John under control…
John Lennon wouldn’t post much, but he’d zing everybody with one liners that would make them cry for days. Then when he was a bit high and alittle depressed, he’d dive into Great Debates and drive everybody crazy.
Hemmingway. His posts would be short and to the point and rife with meaning.
Malcolm X. He’d fire Great Debates up good.
Martin Van Bruen. He’d be brilliant in the Pit and Great Debates.
Seth Bullock. If he was really as awesome as he’s protrayed on Deadwood he’d be great to have around until his temper got the best of him and he got himself banned for erupting in Great Debates…
For Cafe Society, we’d need Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and David Thoreau.
And most of all, above all else, Walt Whitman.
Eratosthenes, for his broad interests:
http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Eratosthenes.html
Brian