PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF INTELLIGENCE TIME

[Anonymous No.5089581]

You've been transported back in time to Miletus, an ancient Greek city. It is 600BCE.

All of a sudden, this chap Ishygddamese runs up to you and shouts "Hey! I can prove the Sun must be way closer to the Earth than the Moon!"

"Look at this torch. When it's further away from you, it's dimmer, right? And when I'm much closer to you, it's brighter! ALL CLOSER LIGHTS ARE ALWAYS BRIGHTER! And the Sun is much brighter than the Moon, so it's closer!"

You sigh. "Yes, yes, Ishygddamese. But...."

How would you explain that he is wrong? Counterexamples are acceptable - this is Ancient Greece, after all.

Further thought experiments as time goes on.

[Anonymous No.5089584]

>>5089581
Take him to a dark room. Light up the torch in the center of the room. Now take a small rock and then carry it around you while you spin around the torch to show how the world spins and how the sun is at the center. Not only that, to show the effects of sun on the moon

[Anonymous No.5089587]

Tell him to shut his trap about astronomy and teach him some chemistry

[Anonymous No.5089591]

>>5089587
typical chemist, can't understand anything more than basic physics, and treats it as irrelevant

[Anonymous No.5089601]

>>5089591
Typical physicist, shut up

[Anonymous No.5089604]

>>5089584
A good idea, but a heliocentric model of the skies is unlikely to be taken seriously in this time.

HINT: There is a simpler counterexample.

[Anonymous No.5089608]

>Ishygddamese

i lol'd

[Anonymous No.5089610]

wait for the next eclise

[Anonymous No.5089619]

Parallax motherfuckers

[Anonymous No.5089622]

>>5089610
The idea of the moon being between the sun and the Earth is first made around 130BC, almost 500 years later.

[Anonymous No.5089625]

>>5089581
explain the sun has to be farther away otherwise eclipses would not work. They would already know about solar and lunar eclipses because those were kind of a big deal back then.

[Anonymous No.5089629]

>>5089625
yeah they were a big deal, but they were only predicted based on patterns, not calculations of orbits or anything like that

[Anonymous No.5089638]

>>5089629
You could try to teach people about orbits, and wait for the next eclipse to show them that the dark spot in the sun is about the size of the moon. While it wouldn't prove the moon is blocking out the sun, it would definitely suggest it.
The only problem with doing it this way is you might get sentenced to death for conflicting with the Greek religion. Speaking ill of the gods and what not.

[Anonymous No.5089655]

It's relatively simple, I think. Place a bright torch some meters away from him in a dark room, but don't tell him where it is. Place another torch, which is noticeably dimmer than the previous(i.e., the flame is moments from dying out) a few meters away, as well, but closer to him than the previous.

I'd explain that, by his theory, the torch which is brighter must be closer. However, after taking a few steps with him, he'd be able to see that the dimmer torch is, in actuality, the one closest to him.

In other words, brightness doesn't automatically mean closer.

[Anonymous No.5089663]

>>5089655
not OP, but I think this is probably the easiest answer without getting your head lopped off - anyone can see embers are dimmer than a flame.

[Anonymous No.5089664]

>>5089655
He's just going to make some argument about the sun and the moon being of the same kind or of the same substance and thus the only thing that could differ between them is their distance or some such thing. If you actually believe that he went into his argument not realizing that there are more influences on brightness than simple distance you're an idiot.

[Anonymous No.5089668]

>>5089625
Diane and Apollo dim the lights to have sex.

They don't want anybody watching them and spoiling the mood. They don't get together all that often.

[Anonymous No.5089681]

>>5089664
ahhh, but you've made him establish that he BELIEVES the sun and the moon are of the same stuff. Without more data you can't prove it conclusively, but you can definitely cause your argument to have, at the very least, just as much sway as his.

[Anonymous No.5089685]

>>5089681
So what? he already knows what he believes, and having "Just as much sway" won't get him to change his mind.

[Anonymous No.5089694]

>>5089664
but then i'd give him the ol' greentext
>implying the sun and the moon are of the same kind

[Anonymous No.5089737]

I'd tell him "ishiggy" and go fuck up some dinosaurs

[Anonymous No.5089765]

Tell him to compare a glowing ember at one meter to the sun.

[Anonymous No.5089767]

>>5089765
The best part of this challenge is that you get him to burn his fingers AND blind himself staring into the sun.

[Anonymous No.5089774]

>>5089681
if he really did believe that the sun and the moon are the same thing, I would say that the sun does not have phases, the sun does not have patterns, and the sun emits a light of different nature than the moon.

[Anonymous No.5089787]

I would get a bright light and put it 10 feet away from him, then get a very dim light and put it 1 foot away from him. Then I would say that the bright light that is 10ft away is closer to him in a mocking voice.

[Anonymous No.5089802]

01 Punch him in the face
02 Ask "Is the sun closer to the earth than the moon?"
03 If "Yes", goto 01, if "No", say "Damn right" and ride off into the sunset

Problem solved

[Anonymous No.5089809]

Also, tell him that the sun is brighter than a torch, but he can touch the torch and not the sun, therefore distance is not the only criterion. Then proceed with the punching.

[Anonymous No.5089846]

Light a large bond fire and a candle. Let him hold the candle and ask him which is closer.

[Anonymous No.5089855]

Set him on fire. Tell him that he burns brighter than the candle in your hand, despite being farther away.

[Anonymous No.5089907]

>>5089855
lolol

[Anonymous No.5091265]

>>5089846
>bond fire

[Anonymous No.5091293]

>mfw wasting time explaining shit when you could just build awesome weaponry and and means of production, raise an army, and take over the world.

[Anonymous No.5091299]

>>5091293
Yeah, but good luck doing that without getting your head chopped off by some jealous peasants who don't understand your logos.

[Anonymous No.5091305]

>>5091299
>Simple chemistry
>Now you're a god.

[Anonymous No.5091312]

>>5091305
quick, tell me how to make it, right now, without looking away from this post, while you're stressed from the culture shock of time travel too.

At any rate, once you finally remember (if you do), what do you do with it? Keep it secret and have people think you're a witch? Calmly explain it for all to hear, enriching their understanding of the world and causing terrible death and destruction to all barbaros?

[Anonymous No.5091320]

>>5091312
Sulphur
Charcoal (of willow wood)
saltpeter

Start cult where my followers think I'm a demi-god. Since they don't have our sort of science yet, they'll apply pure reason to it without investigation or evidence.

[Anonymous No.5091331]

>>5091320
Where do you find saltpeter and sulfur? They're not just going to have it lying around in little pharmacies.

[Anonymous No.5091334]

>>5091331
Saltpeter - Aqueous extraction from bat shit.
Sulphur - collected from salt domes, etc.

[Anonymous No.5091342]

cba to read all the posts.
Just light a great fire, perhaps burning his familiy just to get the message through.
Let him hold his torch in a way that it is closer yet still dimmer.
Then fuck his dog.

[Anonymous No.5091353]

>>5091320
Pray you pay homage to the right god when you do it. Different areas worshipped different gods. Start praising the wrong dude and get murderized.

[Anonymous No.5091354]

>>5091353
>praising any god but me.

[Anonymous No.5091359]

Fuck trying to convince them about things with little bearing to their current state of life. I'll teach them about food preservation, weapons and electricity. Then we'll move on to petroleum, metallurgy and steam (followed by IC) engines.

[Anonymous No.5091365]

>>5091354
>trip on the way to the marketplace
HE'S NOT A GOD AT ALL

>start bleeding from general cuts and scrapes
HE'S NOT A GOD AT ALL

>gets a cold
HE'S NOT A GOD AT ALL

>some priest fuck shouts that you're a foul demon from tartarus using trickery to help Hades win a bet
>you are torn limb from limb

[Anonymous No.5091363]

I'd teach them about nuclear reactors without teaching them about radiation.

[sage No.5091369]

Teach him basic Propositional Logic. A => B <=/=> B => A

[Anonymous No.5091375]

>>5091365
Demigod, motherfucker. A spot of liquid plaster, behold how I heal myself.

[Anonymous No.5091379]

>>5091365
Such is possible. That's the dice you roll going back in time and setting yourself up as a god-king.
>mfw my followers are the ones tearing my critics limb from limb.

[Anonymous No.5091384]

>>5091375
The people are from the past, motherfucker, not stupid. Shock and awe isn't going to work in a society where people work all day and are bored all night. You need to be using modern information that works in a way they don't understand, not dazzling them with smoke and mirrors.

[Anonymous No.5091390]

>>5091379
>>5091379
HERESY

[Anonymous No.5091387]

>>5091384
>people from the past
>not stupid

lolwut?

[Anonymous No.5091397]

>>5091387
For the most part, they were ignorant and prejudiced by their surroundings, but you can hardly call them stupid. Can you even into reading history?

[Anonymous No.5091402]

>>5091387
I know man, right? That's why the Egyptians needed aliens to help them build the pyramids!

While various societies have had weird superstitions, little to no education, or even outright anti-intellectual periods, the people themselves were never inherently stupid.

[Anonymous No.5091403]

>>5091397
Man, people still fall for that sort of trickery in this day and age... and you're seriously trying to argue that people thousands of years ago... wouldn't?...
>pic related

[Anonymous No.5091414]

>>5091359
is an unreflexive fuck who knows dick about sociohistorical developments

[Anonymous No.5091419]

What kind of troll is this? Of course the sun is closer to the earth than the moon. Heat from the sun reaches us, while the moon seems cold. The nuclear fission on the moon is too far away to heat us.

[Anonymous No.5091418]

>>5091403
They just need a good trick. Plaster on your arm won't cut it, they know what plaster is.

[Anonymous No.5091423]

>>5091419
That's a pretty good counterargument, but looking at the ember example could knock it down as well, assuming the torch was hot enough.

[Anonymous No.5091424]

>>5091418
Yea, that plaster thing wasn't me. I'd go for something a bit flashier...

[Anonymous No.5091433]

>>5091424
such as? you don't get let off that easily

[Anonymous No.5091435]

ITT: The Man Who Would Be King

[Anonymous No.5091442]

>>5091433
Accurate predictions of celestial events.
Healing the sick.
Lighter than air flight.
Hand grenades.
Cold reading and other various conjurer tactics.
There's got to be something better than plaster on the skin.

[Anonymous No.5091457]

>>5091442
>implying you could do any of this shit if you woke up in Greece three thousand years ago

seriously man, even assuming the language barrier wasn't a problem, don't kid yourself.

[Anonymous No.5091458]

>>5091442
>Lighter than air flight.
You mean "heavier than air". But that said, this one requires a ton of infrastructure, you'd have to have a small nation basically on your side for decades.

Anyway, are we trying to con people or start an industrial revolution? Because lots of people conned their way into being "magicians" or "astrologers" in a royal court somewhere.

[Anonymous No.5091465]

>>5091457
It's not my fault if you have zero practical ability.

>>5091458
No, I mean lighter than.

[Anonymous No.5091468]

>>5091465
Hot air balloons?

[Anonymous No.5091472]

>>5091468
I'm not a huge fan of them, but they don't require internal combustion, so yea.

[Anonymous No.5091476]

>>5091465
What are you going to do, then?
>implying you could predict an eclipse right this instant after being transported back in time
>implying you could heal plagues
>implying you could create a hot air balloon with a fire and a balloon of felt
>implying you could create a hand grenade

Seriously, what are you, twelve years old?

Have you ever practiced cold reading?

I didn't think so.

[Anonymous No.5091483]

>>5091472
Dude you would definitely die from a combination of fire and velocity if you tried that.

[Anonymous No.5091485]

>>5091476
>You're right, it would take a bit of time to observe the heavens and figure out exactly when I am.
>Bread mold.
>fire & lightweight animal skins.
>brass vessel, gunpowder.

I'll admit, I'm no john edward but it's not rocket science.

[Anonymous No.5091493]

>>5091485
>implying you could do any of that

[Anonymous No.5091499]

>>5091485
I'll be honest, the only one that sounds remotely possible is the bread mold.

[Anonymous No.5091500]

>>5091493
So, your only counter argument is "bucket of crabs"?

[Anonymous No.5091510]

>>5091485
I can't speak to the heavenly bodies stuff, but seriously look up online to see what you would need to.do those things today, then figure out how to do it from scratch, by yourself, without dying.

I'm guessing you've never tried to make your own explosives, so allow me to introduce the term "backfire".

Also, be sure to set aside several years to stitch your light animal skins together, and to find a sufficient source of heat that will not ignite said pelts.

[Anonymous No.5091513]

>>5091499

That's not possible either. You can't just cure infections by eating any old fungus that grows on bread.

[Anonymous No.5091518]

>>5091513
fair enough, I was just thinking about that. man, if I went back in time I'd be fucked aside from giving a few laws of physics and some chemistry principles.

[Anonymous No.5091529]

>>5091518
Which they wouldn't believe unless you can show you're right.

[Anonymous No.5091537]

>>5091529
Aw man. It took ages for us to identify all the energy loss to prove the equations for work, etc.

[Anonymous No.5091536]

>ITT

[Anonymous No.5091542]

>>5091536
>ITT
>hey guys if I went back in time I could totally rule the world
>er, no you couldn't
>YES I CAN
>nope

[Anonymous No.5091551]

>>5091542
Yea, why try anything? You might fail. That would be terrible.

[Anonymous No.5091560]

>>5091551
Kid, you're trying to boast on the internet about things that you can't do.

We're being realistic. Go home and cry to your mommy about your hurt feelings and how the people on the internet won't believe you when you say you're The Best.

[Anonymous No.5091563]

>>5091551
>Why try anything?

Sorry, were you going to try to travel back in time? Or is this just non sequitor butthurt venting?

[Anonymous No.5091564]

>>5091551
>A BLOO A BLOO A BLOO A BLOO ABLOO

[Anonymous No.5091575]

>>5091560
>realistic.
>>5091563
>thought experiments, how does they work.
>>5091564
>steaming.

[mtp !EKFQOBEsKo No.5091583]

You sigh. "Yes, yes, Ishygddamese. But where the fuck did you learn english language of the 21st century?????????"

[Anonymous No.5091591]

I tell him that some day our sun made of lava will collide with a sun made of ice.

[Anonymous No.5091616]

>>5091575

So, non sequitor butthurt, then.

[Anonymous No.5091625]

>>5091575
It's like talking about zombie apocalypses, it only works if there are known ground rules.

We're operating on the idea that you need to use only your knowledge, what you can learn locally, and what objects you can readily find or create.

You on the other had, have taken the "zombies aren't real, so ill just ride my unicorn to safety" approach, by assuming infinite time, resources and skills.

[Anonymous No.5091636]

>>5091625
Oh, that's why you're having such a problem with this.
>knowledge.
>create.

>>5091616
>I'm going to say the same thing over and over even though I'm not quite sure what I'm saying.

[Anonymous No.5091660]

>>5091636
I have no idea what you're trying to say. If you want to make a point, try using fewer tedious memes.

[Anonymous No.5091672]

>>5091660
>

[Anonymous No.5091691]

>>5091312
Heat wood slowly to produce charcoal. Fish around in animal waste and urine collections for saltpetre. Acquire sulfur from the environment. Grind it up with a mortar and pestle, very fine. Experiment with proportions to get the biggest burn.

[Anonymous No.5091709]

>>5091672
I didn't say "pics or you're a bot" I said fewer tedious memes.

[Anonymous No.5091713]

>>5091709
>How does I visual-symbolic communication?

[Anonymous No.5091717]

>>5091713
No see. I was insulting you, using the tedious meme you attempted to throw at me. Not surprised you didn't get it.

Then again, youve just about gone full troll. I tried to offer a reasonable stance, but no of course that didn't work. This is /sci/ after all.

[Anonymous No.5091760]

>>5091717
>I'm so offended.

[Anonymous No.5092818]

>>5091760
reading this just made me feel sorry for you

[Anonymous No.5092991]

It's called a fucking eclipse jackholes.

[Anonymous No.5092993]

>Ishygddamese

[Anonymous No.5093033]

>implying you need to be a genius to rule the world of savages

[Anonymous No.5093195]

>Ishyggdamese

[Anonymous No.5094320]

>Ishyggdames