/sci/ - Science & Math

>>12587109
absolutely nothing. he'd probably get killed for being such a soi-infused beta 'male'.

>>12587109
He'd probably be able to start a religion by discussing the future. Other than that, not much.

>>12587109
Also check out dr stone if you like the concept.

>>12587109
Too many missing conditions. Like, can you speak the native language? Do you get to choose the choice of clothes you wear? Can you take items with you, such as a bic lighter, a ball point pen, a flashlight, a compass? Yes or no to these dramatically change your chances of survival and the type of reception you would get.
Its also highly dependent on where you get transported. 2000 years ago the Romans were well established as a civilization, whereas the Germans were still living as tribes. Your reception and you responses would be highly dependent on the actual situation you face.

Lets assume you arrive with nothing but the clothes appropriate to the location. You arrive dressed as the locals do. Lets assume you speak their language and can pass for one of them. Lets assume you arrive with an identity which attracts no undue attention initially and that you have the means to sustain yourself without toiling in the fields dawn to dusk.

Say its somewhere near a major Roman city. Then simply introducing Arabic numerals and the concept of zero would have you hailed as a mathematical genius. At this point you could probably set yourself up as an eminent philosopher with unlimited resources and a harem of scantily dressed slave girls, doing shit like introducing modern algebraic notation, making simple citric batteries, making simple magnifying glasses, and possibly simple electric motors powered by wind or water energy. There would be statues of you everywhere, providing you didn't step on anyone's toes and get a sword shoved through your bowels for your pains.

This would likely do you no good if you landed plop in the middle of Germany, North America, or central Africa. Your best bet might be then to start singing Beatles songs in the hope that they appreciate music. I would start with "she loves you, yeah yeah yeah"

>>12587109
Scientific break trought? 2000years ago?

You couldn't speak, you would have to obey rituals, and avarage man doesn't know much those days technology.

Probably it'll look like it is, and acient known man are time travelers...

Because back than, nobody trusted even pythagorean theorem, when it comes to authority.

>>12587109
I feel like germ theory should be the easiest one since even retards know that washing your hands makes it less likely for you to contract some weird shit. Then again, there's practical and rhetorical considerations like >>12587399 says. Namely, the average person doesn't know how to make a microscope to actually demonstrate the existence of these germs. There might still be a way though. Basically, have your theory encourage good sanitative practices and sequestering the infected. Probably the easiest way would be to just expand upon miasma theory.
>miasma builds up on the lungs on the living so stay away from them
>substance built up in garbage, urine, shit, and the skin that gives rise to the bad odors also generates miasma
>similarly, miasma can begin to build the substance on these surfaces, so make sure to wash your skin and clothes after dealing with the sick
Doesn't even matter that's it's all bullshit cause you'll probably just be hailed as the father of proto-germ theory once people get around to discovering that. All that matters is that practices based off your theory will result in less deaths, and people will consider you a genius.

>>12587109
Depends how mechanically minded the "average western man" in question is.
If he works on his own car or has a trade he could move the age of steam forward about 1700 years even with something as crude as a water powered wood lathe. Assuming he has access to and can communicate with a blacksmith and a tanner.

>>12587322
How would you introduce the concept of zero?

>>12587109
Another thing local elites might appreciate is formulas to calculate the area of curves and solids and the magnetic compass.

>>12587322
>making simple citric batteries
Think you're overestimating the average man.

>>12587109
the best you could hope for is introduce some basic geometric and design like da Vinci did... woah

>>12587621

By being burned at the stake.

https://youtu.be/TFrHWLHPQrg

>>12587109
>What would be his best chance to make a huge scientific impact for the times and be remembered and one the most important people in history?
Teaching math.

Like some people have mentioned, I think his best best would be to teach math.
Another thing that any average man could do, is draw and explain a basic outline of the Universe: Earth is round like a sphere, it orbits around the Sun along with 8 other planets (#GoPluto), and that is called a Galaxy, of which there are billions throughout the Universe.
That alone would grant you a big page in the History books.

>>12588249
>it orbits around the Sun along with 8 other planets
>that is called a Galaxy
Please tell me this is bait

By introducing pronouns and feminist studies.

>Pic related if you even think about giving me a (You)

https://youtu.be/wPODghAr3Vc

If the average man tried teaching math or science then he’d get shanked for being a goofy nerd.
>>12587117
This.

>>12588249
>Earth is round like a sphere, it orbits around the Sun
Didn't Galileo die for this like 500 years ago

>>12588432
The point being the average person wouldn't have the street smarts not to fuck up and get cut into little bits by an angry mob, or assassinated by a ruined merchant, an offended clergyman/shaman, or a local Chief who knows a threat to his power when he sees one.

To survive and spread some feel good science and cement your position you need to act very slowly, very discretely and usually through intermediaries. Let some of the locals big wigs wet their beaks and they will become your loyal friends. Or just maybe they will lock you in a dungeon and occasionally torture tidbits out of you in highly inventive ways.

>>12588432
The earth being a sphere has been known and verified since hellenistic times. Heliocentrism was proposed around then too, but because the greeks couldn't observe the parallax of the sun (due to insufficiently precise measurement tools) they discredited the theory. So if you were back in antiquity, before they had a religious investment in the earth being the center of everything, you could probably get much farther.

>>12587109
>find magnetic rocks, use them to find more magnetic material
>crude hydro electric generator from permanent magnets with a paddle wheel
>make magnet factory
>change the world

>>12588249
This is a good way to get burned alive immediately due to religion. You would need to show some technology first before revealing the nature of the universe so people would believe you.

>>12587109
Average is trash tier. You need more than above average to get anywhere.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/thebookthebook/the-book-0

>>12588432
False. Given that the Pope of that time liked his theory.

>>12588432
He didnt die. He cucked but important people already heard what he had to say.

>>12588561
False, he was placed on house arrest and banned from talking about it.

>>12588566
>Galileo was cleared of charges of heresy, but was told that he should no longer publicly state his belief that Earth moved around the Sun. ... Galileo was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1633. Because of his age and poor health, he was allowed to serve his imprisonment under house arrest. Galileo died on January 8, 1642.

>>12588502

This is probably the most sensible answer. Even if you knew how to build a steam engine by yourself you would have to go about everything very cleverly/slowly.

>>12587575
>Germ theory
Read up on the surgeon who tried to get people to wash their hands. Spoiler alert: he died of sepsis alone in a sanitarium after a surgery where the surgeon didn't wash their hands.

>>12587932
Was da Vinci appreciated in his own time?

>>12588607
and given a fat pension from the pope

>>12587109
The average man would be fucked.

But with years of preparation a scholar with a knack for leadership could study history, language, military strategy, geology, and older sciences.

Assuming I could go back in time to ancient Rome with a backpack of whatever supplies I wanted:
Some modern medicine, a gun, a calculator, a solar power pack, a computer with Wikipedia backed up on it, calipers, binoculars (w/ FLIR), a small drone, LSD, some gold coins stamped as Roman period currency, and XRF gun would be everything I need.

Start by finding a scholarly institution or the right temple and speak with middle management there. They'll ensure you're not immediately killed by the riffraff and will take kindly to some basic information. Once you're set up find a moderate politician who we have a lot of literature on such as Cicero, knowing all his motivations and fears in retrospect will be a strong bargaining tool for you to ascend the ranks and gradually lead things in your favor.

>>12588300
MOULDER
>t.watching the x-files right now

>>12587131
No you need to not be average for that, you need high verbal IQ.

>>12587575
I've always thought miasma theory isn't actually that bad, especially given old technologies. Especially since airborne diseases and miasma are practically 100% the same anyway.

>>12587133
faggot tier, A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's Court

>>12587322
Do you have any clue how to make wires?

>>12587109
>Combustion engine
>Microbiology
>Flight
Explaining the existence of any of those alone would prompt the intellects of the time down the right path even if you're just a layman.

>>12587109
Easiest thing is work on geometry or algebra
Maybe a little calculus here and there
If your manuscripts survive they'd increase technological progress by a few hundred years

>>12587109
I've thought about this scenario more times than I care to admit.
I'd like to think I'd teach how to make gunpowder, but without speaking the language it'd be difficult. Charcoal? easy. Sulfur? it could be done. Saltpeter, or potassium nitrate? Not sure how I'd be able to extract it or find it in nature.

>>12589701
That was an engineer, not an average man.

>>12589701
What?

>>12589592
Oh please. An average person describing the future would either be killed or acquire a cult following, akin to students of a philosopher. They'd write down the teachings and it could become a religion. The unobtainable yet realistic ideas would make the average person seem like a da vinci i'd think.

>>12589123

>LSD

>>12589704
copper was widely used 2000 years ago anon...you could insulate them with clay

Brian Aldiss dealt with this in Helliconia Summer, OP (before that novel meandered into sex with 9 year old girls, because Aldiss).
An above-average modern man would struggle to explain his concepts even to above-average high-mediaeval men. If he did (somehow) convince the locals to build - say - a blast furnace, even money is that it wouldn't work because his own expertise would likely not be in building blast furnaces.
The visitor for the future would probably just give up, and spend his last days cooming into the local whores (all underage in an Aldiss book) until dying of the Sweating Sickness or some other time-specific ailment, bone fever in the case of Helliconia Summer.

>>12588432
im pretty sure the problem was Galileo wrote about the Earth orbiting the Sun by writing about an argument between two people; one of these individuals was called something like Retardius and was somehow similar to the pope. obviously, the pope didn't like it too much.
but i could be talking out of my ass as its been a long while since i cared to look it up.

>>12587109
Is my time machine like a personal device I can have on me at all times so I can return at any time? If so then I'd gather a shit load of books to that were due to be burned and bring them back here. The dark ages will still happen because I disappeared the books. I'd then sell the books in this time and be rich.

>>12587109

Slim to none. As an outsider not speaking the language his chances of surviving for long enough to even begin to explain some of his knowledge would be very low.

Being an outsider speaking gibberish is a much bigger problem than you would think in most places during this period. Nobody would just trust some random outsider that had no contacts, chances of him being allowed into a city at all are low.

Even if he survived that initial stage, social skills, politics and street smarts is way more important than anything else in such a scenario. He would be killed the moment some local leader considered him a threat to his power unless he managed to get people on his side.

>>12587109
>What would be his best chance to make a huge scientific impact for the times and be remembered and one the most important people in history?

Teaching the Greeks the basics of calculus would create the greatest possible impact in the timeline. The discovery of calculus was behind the scientific revolution, more than just a tool it is a style of thought that was alien to the Greeks, whose metaphysics strongly favored permanence over change.

>>12587117
He'd literally be the tallest and strongest man around thanks to good nutrition.

>>12587109
>average western man education
Nothing at all.

>>12592197
People know how to do calculus abstractly, many with "average western education" have no idea what it actually is.

>>12587109
The Arch for sure. That would be the big mind blower and a toddler know how to make a pineapple brick one.

Huge amounts of money with very little work probably not. Maybe Banking or Insurance for that.

>>12587109
I like this one more.

>>12587109
He will need a pen and paper to illustrate how to build and make things.

>>12591028
Most people would just say you are crazy. You'd need to be somewhat persuasive to have people see you as an actual threat or a boon.

>>12587109
My idea of what the average person knows about biology might be skewed, but i bet most people could describe evolution and heredity relatively well. Its easy enough to explain, you don't need microscopes or advanced math. Either that or physiology.

>>12593247
But you need maths to prove it like Darwin did. Doubt the average smooth brain could put forward a convincing argument. Also Darwin heavily used the current findings of zoologists and botanists.

>>12587109
The best thing is having a civil or mechanical engineering background and improve shit based on stuff available.

>>12587109
>What would be his best chance to make a huge scientific impact for the times and be remembered and one the most important people in history?

Symbolic Algebra (x, +-*/, decimal numbers, 0)
[math]\sigma - \epsilon[/math]
Boolean Algebra and modern proofs
Say hi to Jesus

>>12593297
How do you measure 'advancement'?

>>12593388
It's a parody of the "christian dark ages" picture

>>12593468
How do you measure parody?

>>12591028
Lmao no retard, they would just sound like a schizo

>>12588511
Earth being the center of the world was not perceived as a good thing.

The center was like a drain. Heaven was in the outer spheres. The further away from the center, the better.

>>12587575
>claims that everyone (including the king) has tiny invisible things all over their body that causes illness/death
You would be either executed for blasphemy or hailed the village idiot.

>>12592571
Banking dont make any more money than any other capitalist activity.

>>12595969
When money is created as a vital part of an inflationary currency who do you think is given the money created for thin air?
Not that this would apply 2000 years ago but today banks make way more money than any business that actually has to provide good or services to make money.

>>12587109
Learn the farmers method for production of potassium nitrate, then just fucking load horse wagons with the burning stuff and send them to different urban centers, become IS of the middle ages

>>12587109
I could probably give some mathematical proofa ahead of its time. But still not anything super advanced. Anyway, that alone I think would speed a lot of things up.
Also concepts of atom, bacteria, vaccine, evolution, hygiene, print.
Also the map of the world, which I could draw from memory accurately enough to be useful.
Also the Solar system.
Probably some more things would pop in my head with time, but even what we nowadays consider "basic" education facts would be tremendously useful if not ignored.
The toughest part would be to execute it. I would probably write a work about all these concepts and then maybe hand it to some scholars and try and remain low-key while spreading the knowledge before my blasphemy execution.

>>12587109
just invent calculus bro

>>12595990
When banks create money out of thin air they also create a liability of equal value so the net is zero. They make money on the interest, but just printing money and giving it themselves is not how it works. Except for the central bank maybe but thats subject to the same corruption as anything public, any politician can loot the public treasury, sell public property to himself for $1, and so on. Private banks only make money on the interest.

>>12595990
Banks make about 10% of the money in the economy on good years, and lose much more during their periodic crisis. That's about 2 trillion dollars. The rest of the economy makes 90%. And they do provide a service.

>>12587109
Using the basics from the elightenment and build from there

I would teach them paleontology.Don't know how
to explain the age of the earth without radiocarbon dating. I can give them a rough picture of it.

>>12593862
By how much autists misinterpret it.

>>12588607
Because he was advancing the theory without adequate evidence to back it up. Once Kepler's calculations came about, the heliocentric model was vindicated and accepted by most because he actually gave the right evidence. Galileo was also autistic and wrote a book calling the pope, his biggest patron and supporter at the time, a big retard. Pope had to take a strong stance, less he get ousted in in the Vatican's power politics

"BRING ME LODESTONES AND COPPER AND I SHALL SHOW YOU WONDERS"

jeez guys electricity is pretty easy to make, a crude wind powered generator is bronze age tech

>>12592564
you mean the softest and cutest

>>12589058
Mainly received his patronage for art. Good luck getting some rich family to feed you for science or math.

>>12587109
I would convince them to clamp early, bring in vaccinations, and coercively encourage circumcision. I would advance chemistry and metallurgy just far enough to find and break down cryolite, then add fluoride compounds to the aquifers, also bringing in lead pipes and lead based sweetener.

Then I would rule over them with an iron fist as their children are reduced to malformed golem whom I could manufacture in such great numbers that they would pour out across the Earth like bands of locusts. I would make sure to clip their wings enough that they could never hope to detach from me and live on their own however, they would be tethered to society. Maybe organ removal at birth, or exposure to teratogens. Don't know, have to just roll with it and see what happens.

>>12596892
most of those things would end up either with you being killed or taken as a crazy fool

the best thing you could do is use your math/writing skills to learn up the language and comfily work for some noble/clergy

excellent idea

>>12587109
what this shows is that beyond just having definitions of a subject, we also need to have conceptual knowledge and experience of how things truly work. Get out of the abstract and *understand*.

>>12589025
really more of a cautionary tale to not be an autist than anything else.

>>12588249
and why would anyone believe you?

>>12593247
they would kill you for blasphemy

Why do so many midwits think that people were so casually murdered in the past.
You're fucking braindead.

>>12602285
"Enlightenment" propaganda

As your image shows , The problem(one of many) is what would you remember off the top of your head. What could you actually build or teach.