# Using a time machine to help just one person in the past **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 15, 2006, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876 "2006-05-15T18:34:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/1 "2006-05-15T18:34:42Z")
Ray Bradbury wrote a short story in which fans of a minor but brilliant 19th C. author (seemed loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe, IIRC) use a time machine to go back and, using modern medicine, cure him of consumption. Restored to health, he starts writing again, and they’re delighted by all of the new stuff he cranks out. If you could, in which historic but struggling author/artist/sculptor/statesman’s life would you intervene? When and how, and to what effect? P.S. Shooting Hitler when he’s a starving artist in Vienna doesn’t count. We’re talking about _benign_ interventions. ---
**Author:** ![caveman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/caveman/32/7242_2.png) [@caveman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caveman)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/2 "2006-05-15T18:44:45Z")
> [@Elendil's Heir](#): > > Ray Bradbury wrote a short story in which fans of a minor but brilliant 19th C. author (seemed loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe, IIRC) use a time machine to go back and, using modern medicine, cure him of consumption. Restored to health, he starts writing again, and they’re delighted by all of the new stuff he cranks out. > > If you could, in which historic but struggling author/artist/sculptor/statesman’s life would you intervene? When and how, and to what effect? > > P.S. Shooting Hitler when he’s a starving artist in Vienna doesn’t count. We’re talking about _benign_ interventions. Could one travel to the past and become young Adolph’s benefactor, helping him becomeso successful in art that he never contemplates genocide? ---
**Author:** ![ddgryphon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@ddgryphon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ddgryphon)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/3 "2006-05-15T18:45:09Z")
> [@Elendil's Heir](#): > > Ray Bradbury wrote a short story in which fans of a minor but brilliant 19th C. author (seemed loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe, IIRC) use a time machine to go back and, using modern medicine, cure him of consumption. Restored to health, he starts writing again, and they’re delighted by all of the new stuff he cranks out. > > If you could, in which historic but struggling author/artist/sculptor/statesman’s life would you intervene? When and how, and to what effect? > > P.S. Shooting Hitler when he’s a starving artist in Vienna doesn’t count. We’re talking about _benign_ interventions. I think it might be interesting to either restore Beethoven’s hearing or save Schubert from death (or Mozart, who was maturing in terms of material at the time of his death in very interesting ways). ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/4 "2006-05-15T18:57:23Z")
I would have made sure that the fire never started in the Library of Alexandria. The nature of development of modern civilization was halted because the copies of many of the greatest writings of humankind to that point were taken to the Far East, and emerged back through into Europe many centuries later. The Dark Ages may not have been what they were, and modern worldwide civilzation may well have emerged in a different way and at a different time, if the philosophies and scientific advances of the lost Library were not burned up in that fire. Cartooniverse ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePasto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c68b51/32.png) [@AuntiePasto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePasto)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/5 "2006-05-15T19:03:53Z")
I would go back just a few months and prevent the fall that lead to Octavia Butler’s death. Octavia Butler was a wonderful feminist science fiction writer whose books were always radical and thought-provoking. She won the MacArthur Foundation’s “Genius” grant for her ideas. She clearly had so much more to say, and it is a tragedy that her life was cut off before she could write all the books she wanted to write. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/6 "2006-05-15T19:44:21Z")
I could stop the car crash that killed Margaret Mitchell, but I doubt she would have written anything else anyway. Maybe help Dickens with his problems. I like his writing. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/7 "2006-05-15T19:48:25Z")
**Cartooniverse** ’s suggestion has merit, but I’m not sure it fits with the OP’s criterion of “one person”. Myself, I’d try to prevent Archimedes’ untimely death: Perhaps remind that Roman soldier that he was under orders not to harm Archimedes. Or maybe help him out with the problem he was working in the sandbox, so he’d finish it a little sooner and the soldier wouldn’t get impatient. ---
**Author:** ![h.sapiens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e0b2c6/32.png) [@h.sapiens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/h.sapiens)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/8 "2006-05-15T19:48:46Z")
I’m not sure if Jane Austen could be considered a struggling author, but she died far too young, and published far too few books. If I could prevent her death, I’d make a lot of people happy. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/9 "2006-05-15T19:49:39Z")
> [@Elendil's Heir](#): > > P.S. Shooting Hitler when he’s a starving artist in Vienna doesn’t count. We’re talking about _benign_ interventions. I was thinking about doing something on the same lines of **caveman** , becoming Hitler’s confidant/psychiatrist. Except in _my_ view, Hitler takes basically the same line as he did in his actual life until 1933 or so, only he never gets arrested, never joins the Nazi Party, etc. I become someone to tell all his problems to. Helping him with all the problems in his life. Training him to become a politician that will lead Germany into a new age, one that doesn’t involve global domination and genocide. Either that or I tell Walt Disney to quit smoking and see if I can get him to live past 65 to see where the company would go. Would Disney World be different if Walt lived to see it through in its early years? ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/10 "2006-05-15T19:55:23Z")
I’d see to it that Marilyn got the counseling she so desparately needed, then she’d have removed herself from involvement with Jack and she’d still be making movies today (tho now, she’d probably play someone’s grandmother, a la Shirley MacLaine) ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/11 "2006-05-15T20:01:51Z")
> [@caveman](#): > > Could one travel to the past and become young Adolph’s benefactor, helping him becomeso successful in art that he never contemplates genocide? Nice idea, but I wouldn’t trust it; I’d just shoot him. ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/12 "2006-05-15T20:06:48Z")
> [@Skald the Rhymer](#): > > Nice idea, but I wouldn’t trust it; I’d just shoot him. go further back, tell his mother the man she’s about to get involved with is dying of a communicable disease ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/13 "2006-05-15T20:30:03Z")
I’m surprised that nobody has mentioned Edith Keeler yet. ---
**Author:** ![Wee\_Bairn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/90db22/32.png) [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/14 "2006-05-15T20:38:07Z")
Since Hitler has been said, I would say go back and ensure that Charles Manson’s musical career was a success. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/15 "2006-05-15T20:49:53Z")
I think I’d help a composer avoid an early death: probably Mozart, Schubert or Gershwin. I’d especially love to hear what a mature Gershwin would have composed. I don’t know whether I’d try curing Van Gogh’s condition, but I’d definitely like to tell him how much his paintings are going for these days. But first, I’d buy one of them. ---
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/16 "2006-05-15T20:50:11Z")
May or may not be what was meant, but if I could stop Lincoln’s assassination, that would be my choice. Convince him not to go to the theater that one night wouldn’t work – he liked it too much to never go again, and JWB would have kept trying. Somehow convince the assassin not to pull the trigger. Early counseling? Keeping him too drunk to aim a pistol? ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/17 "2006-05-15T21:07:23Z")
Anyone else thinking of that old Star Trek episode where Kirk & Spock have to let that pacifict chick get run over so the US isn’t too late in joining WWII, allowing the Germans to get The Bomb? I think it would be interesting to see how the world would be different if Jesus had gotten serious about carpentry, instead of romping about with his 'possles and being all self-righteous and rebellious, and instead perfected the 5-drawer dresser and…well, any other piece of furniture he developed would have been perfect I guess. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/18 "2006-05-15T21:09:31Z")
Ok…I mean, like,send Norm Abram to Jesus and take him on as an apprentice. Odds are Jesus would have lived longer had he avoided politics in favor of a trade. So it is a benign action. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/19 "2006-05-15T21:10:49Z")
> [@Cartooniverse](#): > > I would have made sure that the fire never started in the Library of Alexandria. The nature of development of modern civilization was halted because the copies of many of the greatest writings of humankind to that point were taken to the Far East, and emerged back through into Europe many centuries later. The Dark Ages may not have been what they were, and modern worldwide civilzation may well have emerged in a different way and at a different time, if the philosophies and scientific advances of the lost Library were not burned up in that fire. There wasn’t just one fire, there was a whole bunch of them. So you would have your work cut out for you. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876/20 "2006-05-15T21:13:37Z")
> [@MLS](#): > > May or may not be what was meant, but if I could stop Lincoln’s assassination, that would be my choice. Convince him not to go to the theater that one night wouldn’t work – he liked it too much to never go again, and JWB would have kept trying. Somehow convince the assassin not to pull the trigger. Early counseling? Keeping him too drunk to aim a pistol? Or do the same to Mark David Chapman [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/using-a-time-machine-to-help-just-one-person-in-the-past/356876.md?page=2)