Well, Haast’s eagle, the largest eagle known to have existed, apparently used to snack on Maori now and then. So that’s one example.
If you explain why you think it’s funny, then it might explain a Simpson’s joke that I’ve never gotten.
I heard about the hunter years ago, but can’t find a cite on it now because the keywords are all getting buried by the more recent incident in suburban Chicago, where the wife is suing the owner of a lake, for the death of her husband murdered by the swans. But this is not the first one. There’s even a YouTube video, but it might be a fake, I haven’t checked it out.
[jackass]
I’m a Novikov self-consistency principle kind of guy. The integrity of the time stream is self-policing; it is impossible to create a result through time travel that is inconsistent with history. Either what you do is what actually happened in the “first” place, or something will prevent you from altering previous events. No way around it. Therefore you – no, let’s say I – therefore I will do whatever my gut says to do, without worrying about Marty McFly silliness. Assuming the Turkana boy looked sufficiently similar to a modern human boy to trip my sympathy button, I’m gonna save him. If not, I’ll ignore it. Phaser power packs are expensive.
[/jackass]
Thing is, if a butterfly’s wingflap in Japan caused a hurrican in the Atlantic, there’d be a shitload more hurricanes. The biggest effect of the overwhelming (probably 100%) majority of butterfly wingflaps is that the butterfly jerks a little bit higher in the air.
I’m gonna save the boy, because he’s a boy. I wouldn’t murder a boy for science, nor would I stand by and watch a modern boy be mauled by a predator for the sake of science, so I don’t see why I’d do so in the past, either.
Being scared alters one’s sperm? I am not aware of this science.
Here’s the chap in various stages of facial reconstruction.
Are you kidding me? I went out with her once…not so much of a mustache, though.
Not going to do anything. Not because of any concerns about time paradoxes. And I’m not a fatalist or anything like that. I just don’t see the need to save a juvenile non-sapiens who likely wasn’t long for the worldin any case. Circle of life and all that.
Bringing him to my time is right out. Don’t people readthe classicsanymore?
I spent nearly a year there long ago, and although Brazilians are very friendly and nice, they have a proclivity to over exaggerate their roll on the World Stage.
For example: They invented the Airplane! (No, they didn’t)
They invented the Automobile! (No, they didn’t)
They invented Coke and Levi’s! (No, they didn’t)
They invented Electricity! (No, they didn’t)
They invented Football (Soccer)! Well, maybe. They were awfully good at it.
My All-Time-Favorite: They won World War Two! (No, they didn’t)
To me, the joke is that it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest to hear them claim they somehow pulled off Time Travel. And First, of course.
Nope, sorry, the kid’s gotta die. Let’s say I do save the kid, now instead of a happy full eagle digesting his meal we have a hungry eagle flying around killing my great grandparents.
[speciesist!skald]
Sympathy meter tripped.
[/speciesist]
I’d do something else. I’d let the bird attack the boy and then stun both of them and bring both to the present and let science have the boy to study and then sell the bird to science for millions of dollars, then retire and then spend the rest of me days time traveling around. Stopping back into the present now and again to resupply and rest.
Thanks! (still don’t get Simpsons joke)
[quote=“jtur88, post:23, topic:695341”]
I heard about the hunter years ago, but can’t find a cite on it now because the keywords are all getting buried by the more recent incident in suburban Chicago, where the wife is suing the owner of a lake, for the death of her husband murdered by the swans. But this is not the first one. There’s even a YouTube video, but it might be a fake, I haven’t checked it out.
[/QUOTE]Looks like a goose to me.
Would fossils still be particularly valuable to researchers in a world with time travel, though? I’m no expert on anthropology, but I’d guess that even a brief trip back to the Pleistocene would allow paleoanthropologists to learn more about Homo ergaster than they could ever hope to figure out from examining the Turkana boy skeleton.
ETA:
I don’t think there’s anything to get about the Brazilian time-traveler joke – it’s just supposed to be funny because it’s such an odd thing for Homer to say. I know some people have tried to connect it to the movie Brazil, but since there’s no time travel in that movie, it’s not actually set in Brazil, and none of the characters are Brazilian, that seems like a reach.
Yes, that’s the official line, AFAIK - it’s a “non-reference invented for the show”, like “the dreaded Rear Admiral” maneuver mentioned by Milhouse in the same sentence as “wedgies” and “wet willies” as a risk of turning around to face away from Bart Simpson. And Lisa’s sarcastic suggestion of “reverse vampires” when the kids observed that many adults were beginning to only come out during the day.
As to the OP: I save the life of the boy, of course. For timeline causality purposes, I may even bring him forward to our time for study (since he’s supposed to be “dead to the world”), if he was attacked while alone - if his mother were there or something, I don’t think I’d have it in me to separate them.
Now tell me that bird starved to death and all sorts of ripple effects cascaded because of that, ha!
After they’re done with him, why not put him back, so the skeletal version will also still be found?
We can’t just go handing out DeLoreans to any Tom Dick or Harry, y’know!
Incidentally it’s possible that they were capable of speech.