Time travel to 1 AD

fuzzypickle · 24-10-2015 10:08PM

I'd say nothing and just look around. See how accurate we are today about how they lived.

Or just bring a laser pen. Oooh magic!

24-10-2015 10:20PM

The Romans had steam engine.

Invented in Greece, a Roman province https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_steam_engine

They had these water mills

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbegal_aqueduct_and_mill

May also have been to America

http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20084730,00.html

ygolometsipe · 24-10-2015 10:21PM

I would setup a business called the search business so like
if you need to find something, you come in, tell us and we will look
for it for while all you have to do is look at an advertisement now and
again.

We would be the great great great great grandparent company to google

GGGGGOOGLE.

ygolometsipe · 24-10-2015 10:23PM

ygolometsipe wrote: »

I would setup a business called the search business so like
if you need to find something, you come in, tell us and we will look
for it for while all you have to do is look at an advertisement now and
again.

We would be the great great great great grandparent company to google

GGGGGOOGLE.

Now that I think about it, I think Indiana Jones would abuse the service

Capt'n Midnight · 24-10-2015 10:41PM

The first priority is staying alive.
Sanitation , sanitation , sanitation. Boiling water , cooking food properly , washing hands. Avoiding the sick. Invent the WC pronto. Best of all invent water treatment plants, ie. trickle water over gravel or discharge into isolated wet lands / swamp pits / septic tanks rather than rivers.

Good call on lead. But lead pipes are OK. It's adulterating wine with lead acetate that's the problem , it's what happens when vinegar (from wine) acts on lead

We've all heard of secret formulas in the spy movies.
The big one, the one that made the Medici & Co. rich was compound interest. Being able to calculate interest rates over many years gave them a huge advantage over the competition. Hell, even using Roman numerals instead of the numerals the Romans used makes life so much easier. Also the concept of double entry bookkeeping to reduce errors.

Most people were subsistence farmers and most regimes were focused on war and feeding people. Bread and circuses. So simple food preservation technologies or better food production. Crop rotation, planting peas to add nitrogen to the soil. The plough was one of the huge steps forward in the middle ages, coupled with a harness for a horse that didn't strangle them.

Glass. Melt sand. To make it easy use sodium carbonate or old glass. Glass gets you to lenses. So telescopes and microscopes to investigate the world, and flasks for labs too. But most importantly glasses allow you to make specs, so people can read after their eyesight goes bad. In the past this single problem was one of the great barriers to learning. Why bother to be literate if you were likely to get bad eyesight ? Of course before you could print books you need cheap paper. Old rags only become available if people can afford a second set of clothes.

Glass also gets you better light from candles and lamps.

For electricity you just need to varnish copper wire. You can now make generators / motors with mild steel plates and lodestones. You can now transmit power from rivers to houses / factories.
electrolysis of various things will help science

The crank to convert vertical motion to circular motion was a major invention. Allowed people to sharpen swords on a peddle whetstone, the military would love that.

Triangular sails that allow you to tack into the wind.

Distillation. gives you spirits. and also petrol and kerosene from crude oil or coal. also gets you strong acids for the locals to discover chemistry . Hint 5 parts nitric to one part hydrochloric can dissolve gold. you now can sell / trade alchemists a liquid that will deposit gold with the addition of most base metals.

pendulums for clocks, springs and escapements for portable clocks and watches. not much use at first but eventually allows navigation.

tarmac and bicycles.

24-10-2015 11:14PM

This 3rd century sawmill was water powered and had cranks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierapolis_sawmill

I think I would advise the people to boil water.

24-10-2015 11:18PM

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Glass. Melt sand. To make it easy use sodium carbonate or old glass. Glass gets you to lenses. So telescopes and microscopes to investigate the world, and flasks for labs too. But most importantly glasses allow you to make specs, so people can read after their eyesight goes bad. In the past this single problem was one of the great barriers to learning. Why bother to be literate if you were likely to get bad eyesight ? Of course before you could print books you need cheap paper. Old rags only become available if people can afford a second set of clothes.

Glass also gets you better light from candles and lamps.

.

It is funny how much we think is new.

http://www.ancient-wisdom.com/optics.htm

Rabo Karabekian · 25-10-2015 02:36PM

Wibbs wrote: »

Greek is what you'd want. The common language of the Roman Mediterranean was Greek, not Latin. The bit in the Mel Gibson orgy of Jesus BSDM where our hero was talking with Pontious Pilate in Latin was unlikely, far more likely that if such a convo ever took place it would be in Greek.

'Or whatever they're speaking where you land'. But thanks for the crash course on the Roman Empire in the first century!

Also, I'm wondering about Jesus' fluency in Greek, especially when engaging in a legal discussion with a representative of the Roman Empire. I would think an interpreter would be more likely, with Pilate talking in Greek, and Jesus in Aramaic.

Pink Fairy · 25-10-2015 05:19PM

Rabo Karabekian wrote: »

'Or whatever they're speaking where you land'. But thanks for the crash course on the Roman Empire in the first century!

Also, I'm wondering about Jesus' fluency in Greek, especially when engaging in a legal discussion with a representative of the Roman Empire. I would think an interpreter would be more likely, with Pilate talking in Greek, and Jesus in Aramaic.

Has any historian of repute ever claimed this meeting took place I wonder?

Wibbs · 25-10-2015 06:11PM

Rabo Karabekian wrote: »

'Or whatever they're speaking where you land'. But thanks for the crash course on the Roman Empire in the first century!

Also, I'm wondering about Jesus' fluency in Greek, especially when engaging in a legal discussion with a representative of the Roman Empire. I would think an interpreter would be more likely, with Pilate talking in Greek, and Jesus in Aramaic.

If it happened it's as likely that both of them would have been at least bilingual, with likely more languages on top as people tended to be back in the day. EG your average Italian Roman would be able to converse in Latin and Greek. A Roman from the provinces would also have his or her local language on top of that. Your average Jew of the time and of his area would be able to converse in Hebrew and Aramaic. A well travelled and/or educated Jew, such as any sort of trader or anyone dealing with the Roman authorities would have Greek. Greek would have been a lingua franca of the Mediterranean because of trade and empire so chances are high they'd have that in common. For a slightly later example the letters of St Paul are written by a Romanised Jew in Greek, addressed to Greeks, Romans and Jews. Ironically the earlier ancient Greeks themselves were generally less multilingual. Too snooty to give a toss about outsiders.

If Jesus existed in any form close to the stories(and I would believe the bones of a real man are in there, after all the above Paulian letters discuss him with people who actually knew him in life like Simon), then chances are he was an educated man. He's painted as the poor son of "just" a carpenter, but what kind of carpenter are we talking about here? The ancient world ran on wood. It was the IT industry of its day and there were many grades of carpentry. If his dad was say a shipwright he would have been a middle class type(would also explain his rapport, connection and recognition by the local fishermen, a huge industry in the area, supplying much of the surrounding country with food). It reads like he had rabbinical training in the "lost years" as he was taken seriously in debates with religious scholars and those schools didn't take just anyone and people addressed him as rabbi. He also wandered about with followers staying in various houses along the way and many of those self same houses were of wealthy families. He had a support network, unlikely in a dirt poor peasant as he is often portrayed.

The_Valeyard · 25-10-2015 06:13PM

Muahahaha wrote: »

Tell them to dump that religion crap, that would have been the best practical advice you could have given. If they'd have known that we wouldn't have had the Dark Ages and humanity might be 500 years ahead of where it is now

Jaysus, go back to the history class or take that time machine and see how invading Germanic tribes caused the dark ages and not Christianity.

Rabo Karabekian · 25-10-2015 07:51PM

Wibbs wrote: »

If it happened it's as likely that both of them would have been at least bilingual, with likely more languages on top as people tended to be back in the day. EG your average Italian Roman would be able to converse in Latin and Greek. A Roman from the provinces would also have his or her local language on top of that. Your average Jew of the time and of his area would be able to converse in Hebrew and Aramaic. A well travelled and/or educated Jew, such as any sort of trader or anyone dealing with the Roman authorities would have Greek. Greek would have been a lingua franca of the Mediterranean because of trade and empire so chances are high they'd have that in common. For a slightly later example the letters of St Paul are written by a Romanised Jew in Greek, addressed to Greeks, Romans and Jews. Ironically the earlier ancient Greeks themselves were generally less multilingual. Too snooty to give a toss about outsiders.

If Jesus existed in any form close to the stories(and I would believe the bones of a real man are in there, after all the above Paulian letters discuss him with people who actually knew him in life like Simon), then chances are he was an educated man. He's painted as the poor son of "just" a carpenter, but what kind of carpenter are we talking about here? The ancient world ran on wood. It was the IT industry of its day and there were many grades of carpentry. If his dad was say a shipwright he would have been a middle class type(would also explain his rapport, connection and recognition by the local fishermen, a huge industry in the area, supplying much of the surrounding country with food). It reads like he had rabbinical training in the "lost years" as he was taken seriously in debates with religious scholars and those schools didn't take just anyone and people addressed him as rabbi. He also wandered about with followers staying in various houses along the way and many of those self same houses were of wealthy families. He had a support network, unlikely in a dirt poor peasant as he is often portrayed.

Yeah, y'know, I do understand about lingua francas and how languages operate, both now and in previous times. I'm also well aware that Palestine was a very multi-cultural area, and would have had lots of different cultures. My point was about how likely it was that Jesus and Pilate were speaking about highly technical legal/religious points and that it was done in the same language. I'm sure Jesus would have known enough Greek to get by, but enough to debate with somebody who (presumably) had studied Greek since a child, and conversed in it in his daily and work life? I really don't think it's likely, especially with what both knew would be the end result of the debate. And then we have Josephus - who actually did study Greek - claiming he's hesitant about using it due to issues he has with pronunciation and vocabulary. Whatever about Jesus' education, I would think it's highly unlikely that he was educated to the same degree as somebody like Josephus.

Time travel to 1 AD

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