Let’s say that, through whatever unlikely contrivances you wish to postulate, you find yourself face-to-face with your counterpart from another reality. The only difference between Earth-Prime and this world is that, on Earth-Prime, the Straight Dope is written by a real person named Cecil Adams, whose pen name is Ed Zotti. Thus your counterpart is identical to you in almost every way. No one else is aware of your doppleganger’s presence.
Do you and your counterpart
a) beome best buddies and use your shared talents to make your life better in a benevolent, non-evil-fashion;
b) become best buddies and immediately start brain-storming ways to use the situation for evil;
c) immediately engage in a battle to the death;
d) form a superficial alliance but immediately begin plotting one another’s downfall; or
e) something else?
I imagine we would pour some beers and head to the garden to see what’s blooming. I would inquire as to whether books and records I have lost are available for loan and certailny grow weary of my cynical know-it-all laughing past the graveyard self within a matter of hours.
We’d go out, get drunk, plan out an entirely new political model that would solve all our problems, and then hit on whatever attractive guys and/or girls that were in the vicinity.
Once the hangover wore off the next day, we’d play video games and drink coffee.
People always think that. Then we get a universe where Diana Prince & Donna Troy are lesbian lovers torn apart by their shared lust Cassie Sandsmark, and nobody wants that.
You’ll want to read Audrey Niffenegger’s clever, mind-bending novel The Time Traveler’s Wife, and soon, my friend.
Probably (A), since we could then each work half as much. But I suspect we’d soon grow bored with each other’s company - we’d agree on everything, obviously, and already know all of each other’s secrets. I guess we could just walk around the neighborhood to enjoy the reactions we got.
My counterpart from your earth-prime would not be almost identical to me. He would have the real name of Doc Cathode and his online persona would be me. He’d be a Mad Scientific genius who could help me with many projects. He would probably want to study my mind and brain.
