Time Travel Thoughts, what would you want to observe?

TFLYTSNBN wrote:

Daryl wrote:Good topic, surprised it hasn't been swamped.
A point to ponder is that it has been stated that the average western family sees more drama in a month on TV than an Ancient Greek Aristocrat would see in his entire life. Admittedly some modern soaps aren't up to Oedipus the King, or Lysistrata in quality, but quantity has its own quality.

Woodstock is number one for me.
A Beatles jam session before they became famous.
Jutland.
All of Joat42's list, highly commended.
Pompeii (from a safe distance), have visited since.
Bismark battle.
A discrete video of when I met my wife 45 years ago.
Waterloo.
Anything from the real Jurassic.

How about the indiscrete video?

Daryl wrote:Your pacemaker would explode with the shower scene.

Lunan wrote:ok so following a non-intervention or as minimal as possible what might you want to observe.
This thought came to me when youtube popped up Queen's Performance at live aid.

With the recording tech we have now can you imiagine traveling back in time an attendting that performance? or Aerosmith at their prime, Bon Jovi, Nirvana, Metallica, Madonna, etc etc.

ART goes back or went back to observe and record historical events, but what sub specialties of sub specialties must there be in there, someone who studies the history of music, goes to hear the greeks, the romans, Beethoven, Motzart, Janis Joplin, goes to woodstock.

an Art historian just watches Leonardo work, or the construction of the Parthenon.

etc etc.
what would you want to do?
Clearly i would like to spend a year or 10 going to all the amazing music venues of the past and RECORD it with the most in depth recording technology i could.

not the "was there a Moses, was there a person who inspired the Jesus myths, what there a flood that inspired Noah or Atlantis" i'm thinking of the more mundane things you'd be interested in if you could travel backwards and observe?

Joat42 wrote:

isaac_newton wrote:interesting list, but 'Steal Hitler's wallet'????
why??

Because it's not going to change history, but I know it will make him have a bad day.

Google it, it's from the book Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas

locarno24 wrote:Makes me think of Timewatch, if you've ever played the RPG?

You're essentially time-cops and one of the worst jobs you can be given is "Hitler Duty".

One of the first things 90% of people seem to decide to do after inventing a time machine is "go assassinate Adolf Hitler", so as a result you've got this secret time-travel organisation (which your characters are part of) forced to provide round-the-clock retroactive security (without anyone knowing) against poison, snipers, bombs, nanotech swarms, and in one case in the books a redirected NEO asteroid, for someone that everyone involved would happily beat the crud out of with a broken baseball bat if only causality would let them get away with it....

Getting stuck on a month's "Hitler Duty" is the setting's equivalent of Traffic, or manning a radar station in the Arctic....