Now I think of it, this reminds of something Richard Dawkins used to say at some talks: that we (the modern audience) could give Aristotle a tutorial. Being a fantasist myself, I’ve sometimes wondered how that could be possible. Leaving aside the complications of building a time machine (I leave that to other people), I wondered how would it be to actually meet Aristotle and explain to him some of the things we now know about life, the universe & everything.
First of all, I’d have to learn ancient greek, of course, or no communication would be possible. That would be the easy (and the only easy) part. More complicated would be that, to teach anything modern to Aristotle, one would have to teach an incredible amount of previous stuff. That is, one would have to step quite a large number of inferential steps. If I wanted to explain, for example, the theory of evolution, that would require a lot of anatomy, geography, zoology, botany, and even mathematics and philosophy. One would have to be a true polymath to achieve the feat. It’s not that we don’t know more about the universe than Aristotle, it is that to cross the inferential ‘gap’ between Aristotle and us would require an inordinate amount of knowledge.
Maybe a good metaphor is based on Dennett’s crane idea: we develop ideas that help us reach higher levels of understanding, but as soon as we reach those upper levels we discard them to build new ones for higher levels. To help someone on the floor, one has to ‘rebuild’ these old cranes no longer in use.
One more thing beside a time machine, knowledge of ancient Greek, and a stash of cool stuff—the ability to argue well enough to convey your ideas to Aristotle and convince him you’re right.
I don’t know what hard it would be to get him to listen to a woman.
I would sort of expect any woman who showed up with apparently magical powers to be put into the goddess category. Even someone like Aristotle, who probably didn’t believe that gods and goddesses literally existed, would be culturally conditioned to treat a woman who appeared to have super-powers with some respect.
I would sort of expect any woman who showed up with apparently magical powers to be put into the goddess category. Even someone like Aristotle, who probably didn’t believe that gods and goddesses literally existed, would be culturally conditioned to treat a woman who appeared to have super-powers with some respect.
How would you implement that? What do we have the tech to build today for a reasonable outlay of money (less than a million euros, for example) that could blow minds in that era?
A plastic bottle out of the trash. It’s transparent but flexible and almost weightless. See how well the lid has been made? It makes a water-tight seal.
And then when you’ve got his attention, show him decimal notation.
And stirrups for his horse. And lances.
Once he’s hooked, show him why things float. And how a ball rolling down an inclined plane moves 1, 4, 9, 16 as it accelerates.
Show him Cartesian geometry. And how to play go with lines scratched in the ground and coloured stones. Make a recorder and play him some songs.
He’ll teach you Greek.
Show him how to send messages using flashing mirrors. Show him Playfair’s cipher. Perspective drawing. How to make a magnifying glass. Newton’s cradle. Make a model boat out of bronze.
I suspect in a day in Ancient Greece, you’d see so many easily solved problems that my list would look naive. You don’t need modern technology. You need the things that were discovered just after the mediaevals recovered what the Greeks already knew.
I suspect in a day in Ancient Greece, you’d see so many easily solved problems that my list would look naive.
This is one of the more interesting approaches to the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (as I dub this species of thought problem) - that you don’t need any special preparation because your basic background means that you’ll spend the rest of your life in the past rushing around yelling ‘don’t do that, you idiot, do it this way!’
Show him how to send messages using flashing mirrors.
Oh god. That is actually just humongous in it’s possible effect on warfare.
I mean add simple ciphers to it and you literally add another whole dimension to warfare.
Communication lines setup this way are almost like adding radio. Impractical in some situation, but used in regional warfare with multiple engagements? This is like empire forming stuff just from reflective stone plus semi-trivial education equals dominance.
Heck, you don’t need a million Euros. I could easily blow minds with 100.
A simple Zippo lighter should do the trick.
So could an adjustable-beam flashlight, for that matter.
A music player with earphones or speakers is another obvious choice.
Candy bars maybe? They’d be shocked you brought ambrosia...
Pretty much anything that emits light, sound, heat, cold, etc. is likely to have some serious impact. Remember superstimulus.
With a budget closer to 5,000EUR, access to firearms, and enough willingness to use Dark Arts, I could probably keep it up for a decade or more. Possibly even pass on knowledge to selected disciples who would likewise guard these technological secrets, even as they rule the ignorant peasants.
If, on the other hand, our purpose is as originally stated—prove to the scholars of the time that I have knowledge worthy of them becoming my disciples so I can impart as much knowledge to them as possible—I probably won’t need much more than the superstimuli I described and a couple of afternoons. Something decidedly useful could cement this, and still on budget: A map of the world, a geographically appropriate taxonomy book, and a wristwatch (doubles as nautical navigational aide) would be enough. And I don’t think I’ve even reached 100EUR yet, all told :)
What we can achieve with today’s technology is so marvelous, it’s amazing how ordinary it seems to us. One day I turned on the faucet at my house and just marveled at the incredible and unlikely wonder of having fresh drinking water at practically limitless capacity being instantly transported to my residence, at my whim.
I don’t know what it would take to pass as a goddess, but a stash of cool stuff could be impressive. An ipad (with appropriate power source—what would it take to power it from a water wheel?). Stainless steel blades. A Jacquard loom. What else?
I think that would somewhat depend on how convinced people were by your ‘godlike’ powers. That’s where modern day weaponry would prove quite effective I’d imagine. A taser would probably be useful as a bullet wound would be recognizable physical damage whereas the effect of a taser would probably seem like the power of the gods. If I was on my own I’d probably want body armor, motion sensors and other defensive equipment as well to be on the safe side.
Mixing healing powers in would be just as valuable in self-preservation as demonstrating offensive capability. You would probably want to obfuscate the nature of your ‘healing magic’ so that people would not easily be able to replicate it if they managed to steal some of your stock of medical supplies. Special pills that had to be given in combination to be effective would be useful.
True, but at least initially personal survival and not getting all your stuff nicked would probably require some compromises on teaching science. Once you had an established power base and some loyal local followers you could start to focus on the teaching.
You’re right—evolution might be easier than, say, how and iPhone works (not that an iPhone would work very well in Ancient Greece, or for much long, anyway). Having some high tech to show to good old Aristotle maybe would convince him you come from a very strange land, and maybe he would want to hear more of what you have to say instead of just dismissing you as a lunatic.
But imagine how much you would have to explain to make him even dimly aware of the way an iPhone works! Electronics, electricity, computation, satellites and astronomy (goodbye lunar sphere), calculus, chemistry, physics… I can barely think of all the relevant topics!
Of course, as you point out, mysoginy would be a great obstacle too. One more of the ‘steps’ that separate ancient peoples from modern societies.
What you want to teach depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. I don’t think there’s much point in trying to give Aristotle an overview of modern scientific conclusions.
Assuming we want to accelerate technological progress, I’d rather teach him scientific method, decimal notation, evolution, and maybe what Feynman said (iirc) was the most important conclusion—that matter is made of tiny bits of elements. I don’t know what other specific subjects might be a good idea. Bayes? Calculus?
I don’t know what would be convincing experiments for atoms.
One more I’d want to teach him that you can learn a lot by doing careful measurement and thinking about the results.
I don’t know what Aristotle would come up with, given all that—he was very smart.
Now I think of it, this reminds of something Richard Dawkins used to say at some talks: that we (the modern audience) could give Aristotle a tutorial. Being a fantasist myself, I’ve sometimes wondered how that could be possible. Leaving aside the complications of building a time machine (I leave that to other people), I wondered how would it be to actually meet Aristotle and explain to him some of the things we now know about life, the universe & everything.
First of all, I’d have to learn ancient greek, of course, or no communication would be possible. That would be the easy (and the only easy) part. More complicated would be that, to teach anything modern to Aristotle, one would have to teach an incredible amount of previous stuff. That is, one would have to step quite a large number of inferential steps. If I wanted to explain, for example, the theory of evolution, that would require a lot of anatomy, geography, zoology, botany, and even mathematics and philosophy. One would have to be a true polymath to achieve the feat. It’s not that we don’t know more about the universe than Aristotle, it is that to cross the inferential ‘gap’ between Aristotle and us would require an inordinate amount of knowledge.
Maybe a good metaphor is based on Dennett’s crane idea: we develop ideas that help us reach higher levels of understanding, but as soon as we reach those upper levels we discard them to build new ones for higher levels. To help someone on the floor, one has to ‘rebuild’ these old cranes no longer in use.
Actually, evolution might be the easiest one. It’s inevitable if you have variation and selection. It’s a really pretty theory.
I don’t know how hard it would be to convey that observation and experimentation will take you farther than just theorizing.
If I brought back some tech far advanced over Aristotle’s period (and I wonder what would be most convincing), it might add weight to my arguments.
And personally, even if I had a time machine and the knowledge of ancient Greek, I don’t know what hard it would be to get him to listen to a woman.
One more thing beside a time machine, knowledge of ancient Greek, and a stash of cool stuff—the ability to argue well enough to convey your ideas to Aristotle and convince him you’re right.
This is probably at least as hard as it sounds.
I would sort of expect any woman who showed up with apparently magical powers to be put into the goddess category. Even someone like Aristotle, who probably didn’t believe that gods and goddesses literally existed, would be culturally conditioned to treat a woman who appeared to have super-powers with some respect.
How would you implement that? What do we have the tech to build today for a reasonable outlay of money (less than a million euros, for example) that could blow minds in that era?
A plastic bottle out of the trash. It’s transparent but flexible and almost weightless. See how well the lid has been made? It makes a water-tight seal.
It might be the most valuable object in Greece.
And then when you’ve got his attention, show him decimal notation.
And stirrups for his horse. And lances.
Once he’s hooked, show him why things float. And how a ball rolling down an inclined plane moves 1, 4, 9, 16 as it accelerates.
Show him Cartesian geometry. And how to play go with lines scratched in the ground and coloured stones. Make a recorder and play him some songs.
He’ll teach you Greek.
Show him how to send messages using flashing mirrors. Show him Playfair’s cipher. Perspective drawing. How to make a magnifying glass. Newton’s cradle. Make a model boat out of bronze.
I suspect in a day in Ancient Greece, you’d see so many easily solved problems that my list would look naive. You don’t need modern technology. You need the things that were discovered just after the mediaevals recovered what the Greeks already knew.
This is one of the more interesting approaches to the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (as I dub this species of thought problem) - that you don’t need any special preparation because your basic background means that you’ll spend the rest of your life in the past rushing around yelling ‘don’t do that, you idiot, do it this way!’
Diplomacy might actually be the best preparation.
Oh god. That is actually just humongous in it’s possible effect on warfare.
I mean add simple ciphers to it and you literally add another whole dimension to warfare.
Communication lines setup this way are almost like adding radio. Impractical in some situation, but used in regional warfare with multiple engagements? This is like empire forming stuff just from reflective stone plus semi-trivial education equals dominance.
Heck, you don’t need a million Euros. I could easily blow minds with 100.
A simple Zippo lighter should do the trick. So could an adjustable-beam flashlight, for that matter. A music player with earphones or speakers is another obvious choice. Candy bars maybe? They’d be shocked you brought ambrosia...
Pretty much anything that emits light, sound, heat, cold, etc. is likely to have some serious impact. Remember superstimulus.
Ultimately, I suppose the key question is, “how long do you need to keep up the act?”
With a budget closer to 5,000EUR, access to firearms, and enough willingness to use Dark Arts, I could probably keep it up for a decade or more. Possibly even pass on knowledge to selected disciples who would likewise guard these technological secrets, even as they rule the ignorant peasants.
If, on the other hand, our purpose is as originally stated—prove to the scholars of the time that I have knowledge worthy of them becoming my disciples so I can impart as much knowledge to them as possible—I probably won’t need much more than the superstimuli I described and a couple of afternoons. Something decidedly useful could cement this, and still on budget: A map of the world, a geographically appropriate taxonomy book, and a wristwatch (doubles as nautical navigational aide) would be enough. And I don’t think I’ve even reached 100EUR yet, all told :)
What we can achieve with today’s technology is so marvelous, it’s amazing how ordinary it seems to us. One day I turned on the faucet at my house and just marveled at the incredible and unlikely wonder of having fresh drinking water at practically limitless capacity being instantly transported to my residence, at my whim.
This isn’t just magic. It’s better than magic.
A gun could blow minds in any era.
I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself.
I don’t know what it would take to pass as a goddess, but a stash of cool stuff could be impressive. An ipad (with appropriate power source—what would it take to power it from a water wheel?). Stainless steel blades. A Jacquard loom. What else?
A hunting or sniper rifle, a pistol, a remote controlled helicopter with wireless video, broad spectrum antibiotics, powerful painkillers, explosives.
A better list than mine. Do you think you’d need to go back with a group just to not have your stuff stolen?
If you want to bring back something useful for the educational project rather than just being impressive, a batch of slide rules would be good.
Could ancient Greeks make printing presses if they had designs for them? I’m sure they could at least do wood block printing.
I think that would somewhat depend on how convinced people were by your ‘godlike’ powers. That’s where modern day weaponry would prove quite effective I’d imagine. A taser would probably be useful as a bullet wound would be recognizable physical damage whereas the effect of a taser would probably seem like the power of the gods. If I was on my own I’d probably want body armor, motion sensors and other defensive equipment as well to be on the safe side.
Mixing healing powers in would be just as valuable in self-preservation as demonstrating offensive capability. You would probably want to obfuscate the nature of your ‘healing magic’ so that people would not easily be able to replicate it if they managed to steal some of your stock of medical supplies. Special pills that had to be given in combination to be effective would be useful.
If you’re planning to teach a scientific worldview, it might be well to not be too godlike.
True, but at least initially personal survival and not getting all your stuff nicked would probably require some compromises on teaching science. Once you had an established power base and some loyal local followers you could start to focus on the teaching.
You’re right—evolution might be easier than, say, how and iPhone works (not that an iPhone would work very well in Ancient Greece, or for much long, anyway). Having some high tech to show to good old Aristotle maybe would convince him you come from a very strange land, and maybe he would want to hear more of what you have to say instead of just dismissing you as a lunatic.
But imagine how much you would have to explain to make him even dimly aware of the way an iPhone works! Electronics, electricity, computation, satellites and astronomy (goodbye lunar sphere), calculus, chemistry, physics… I can barely think of all the relevant topics!
Of course, as you point out, mysoginy would be a great obstacle too. One more of the ‘steps’ that separate ancient peoples from modern societies.
What you want to teach depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. I don’t think there’s much point in trying to give Aristotle an overview of modern scientific conclusions.
Assuming we want to accelerate technological progress, I’d rather teach him scientific method, decimal notation, evolution, and maybe what Feynman said (iirc) was the most important conclusion—that matter is made of tiny bits of elements. I don’t know what other specific subjects might be a good idea. Bayes? Calculus?
I don’t know what would be convincing experiments for atoms.
One more I’d want to teach him that you can learn a lot by doing careful measurement and thinking about the results.
I don’t know what Aristotle would come up with, given all that—he was very smart.
From a practical point of view teaching the germ theory of disease would probably have the most immediate benefit.
Using water droplets as rudimentary microscopes.
How big a jump would it be to give them lens-making tech?
You could probably explain geometrical optics without too much trouble.
Assuming you convinced him of the epistemological primacy of experiment, I see two obvious paths:
The kinetic theory of gases, particularly the ideal gas law;
Stoichiometry in chemistry—for example, electrolysis of water.
I would add Brownian motion to that list.