# If you had a time machine , where would you go? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 27, 2016, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068 "2016-09-27T19:43:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 10:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/21 "2016-09-30T10:29:49Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Maybe take out the Cotton Gin\* before it is invented and bypass the whole nightmare. > > - > - the Cotton Gin is what made slavery so damned profitable. Before it, cotton was “carded” - a good worker could produce a pound or two a day. Cotton was not a profitable business. > The gin could crank out hundreds of pounds a day - all of a sudden, massive cotton plantations made TONS of sense - but cotton needed lots of care. Very labor-intensive. The need for cheap labor made slaving a lucrative business. OR you could just bring back some plans for a cotton PICKING machine and preclude the need for slaves while keeping the economic advantages. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/22 "2016-09-30T14:29:20Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Then to go back to no later than 1830 and abolish slavery in the US before it got so large. Maybe take out the Cotton Gin\* before it is invented and bypass the whole nightmare. > > - > - the Cotton Gin is what made slavery so damned profitable. Before it, cotton was “carded” - a good worker could produce a pound or two a day. Cotton was not a profitable business. The gin could crank out hundreds of pounds a day - all of a sudden, massive cotton plantations made TONS of sense - but cotton needed lots of care. Very labor-intensive. The need for cheap labor made slaving a lucrative business. > [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > OR you could just bring back some plans for a cotton PICKING machine and preclude the need for slaves while keeping the economic advantages. Or introduce the boll weevil so cotton can’t take off as a cash crop. ---
**Author:** ![Randolph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Randolph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Randolph)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/23 "2016-09-30T14:36:10Z")
I’d use it to go back to the 1950’s, where I could pretend to try to rape my mother so that my father could pretend to save her from me. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/24 "2016-09-30T14:41:49Z")
> [@Disposable Hero](#): > > I read a fairly well done sci-fi book with the premise that a time-viewer had been invented, the skies over the site of the Crucifixion are described as darkening because so many billions if not trillions of future people are viewing events that the daylight itself is being drawn off through the atom-sized wormholes used to view the past. > > Although that’s something I’ve never quite understood, quite a few time-travel books focus on Christ’s death, surely it would be more interesting to have a look in his tomb to see exactly what happened three days later? > > And where would I go? The future, how far in the future is the question though. Which SF book? That’s an interesting idea about the supposed cause of the darkness. According to Matthew 27, verse 45, “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness all over the land until the ninth hour.” Personally, I think I would go back and talk to myself in high school. There’s a bunch of advice I could use. Hopefully, I’d listen. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/25 "2016-09-30T16:16:40Z")
Assuming we take modern medicine with us, and are somehow exempt from the reactions of those we come across (sorcerer! spy! heretic! or whatever), then I’d quite like to see something of the politics of the English Civil War period, or Elizabeth I’s time. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/26 "2016-09-30T19:20:23Z")
First I’ll go back to when Aluminum was fairly new and ludicrously expensive and trade a few bricks of it for some gold. 😛 Honestly I’d grab a linguist and a geneticist and visit a couple of places. Cahokia at its height. Derinkuyu at its most vibrant. Caral about 2400 BC. Visit some of the early Yamnaya peoples. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/27 "2016-09-30T19:25:38Z")
> [@tim-n-va](#): > > To kill the first person to put raisins in a cookie. The same. To save him from **tim-n-va** ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/28 "2016-09-30T20:04:11Z")
I forgot. I should also take an archaeologist. So we can laugh every time s/he says something must have religious significance. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/29 "2016-09-30T22:38:25Z")
> [@Dendarii\_Dame](#): > > …Personally, I think I would go back and talk to myself in high school. There’s a bunch of advice I could use. Hopefully, I’d listen. I’m quite certain I would tell myself to piss up a rope. mmm ---
**Author:** ![rsat3acr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a3d4f5/32.png) [@rsat3acr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rsat3acr)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/30 "2016-09-30T22:41:06Z")
> [@Vicsage](#): > > I would think Christ’s death would be a popular site. If you don’t believe, to prove a point and if you do believe, to prove a point. +1 ---
**Author:** ![Tibby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tibby/32/17030_2.png) [@Tibby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tibby)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/31 "2016-09-30T22:57:39Z")
I’d go back to the precise time and place where abiogenesis occurred on Earth and stomp upon the primordial stew just as it was about to spark into life and begin its ~4 billion year evolutionary journey into our current biosphere. Then, I’d take a dump in that puddle, travel back to present day, and see if I created a better world. It would be good to be\* Poop-God\*. …or, maybe I’d just go back to the premier of Beethoven’s 9th symphony, instead. ---
**Author:** ![Lsura](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7993a0/32.png) [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/32 "2016-09-30T23:07:09Z")
> [@tim-n-va](#): > > To kill the first person to put raisins in a cookie. You, sir, have the right of it. ---
**Author:** ![ssgenius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@ssgenius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ssgenius)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2016, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/33 "2016-09-30T23:35:54Z")
Red Dwarf’s take on time travel Best part is around the 17:30 mark:D [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukQ3RYEJBMk) ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/34 "2016-10-01T00:20:22Z")
November 9, 2016. I’m really, really tired of this election bullshit. To be fair, I also skip ahead to the ending of books. I’d like to just get this over with. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/35 "2016-10-01T00:53:31Z")
Oh, how could I have forgotten: Find out what the hell a Roman dodecahedron was used for. ---
**Author:** ![Marine\_One](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marine_one/32/3461_2.png) [@Marine\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marine_One)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/36 "2016-10-01T02:21:42Z")
- Battle of the Little Big Horn. - Battle of the Alamo. - The Tunguska event in 1908. (At a safe distance.) - Signing of the Declaration of Independence. If time travel exists, wouldn’t they record any event and show it? It would be some sort of virtual reality or high-tech whatever that we don’t have yet. You could have the Time Travel Channel. “Well, class, let’s watch Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Go to the VR Time Travel Holo-Theatre and don’t forget your language interpreter helmet.” ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/37 "2016-10-01T05:42:51Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Oh, how could I have forgotten: Find out what the hell a Roman dodecahedron was used for. Wait 'til they figure out that creating one was a test of a worker’s skill - creating all those surfaces and “gluing” them together. Kinda like a “Masterpiece” (original usage of term), but for Journeyman level. Or were created as parts pf a “High School”-type “Science Fair”? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/38 "2016-10-01T15:09:27Z")
If I have to choose the past I wanna see all the dinosaurs. If I can go anywhere, I’m heading to the future…say 400 years or so. By then we’ll have our shit together even if we blow it all up in the near future. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/39 "2016-10-01T16:18:05Z")
I’d rather go to the future. If I can’t, I’d go back to when I was 15 so I could give myself advice. Mistakes not to make, investment advice, things like that. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068/40 "2016-10-01T16:19:08Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > If I have to choose the past I wanna see all the dinosaurs. > > If I can go anywhere, I’m heading to the future…say 400 years or so. By then we’ll have our shit together even if we blow it all up in the near future. In 400 years I’d wager we will be multidimensional beings of light and energy. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-a-time-machine-where-would-you-go/767068.md?page=3)