Blessing or curse [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Rockphed

2015-06-03, 10:59 PM

On the one hand, I have a family I love very dearly, who I would have little hope of getting back. On the other, I was a moron in 2001. I'm not sure I would be much better with a 30-year-old in my body, but I could try.

And as for the little hope thing, the events that led to me meeting my wife in a non-creepy fashion happened about 5 years before I met her. I would have to perfectly navigate a complicated web of interpersonal relationships to ensure that the friend who introduced us was still my friend.

The temptation to "improve" the past would also be very strong. Some of us would end up on the other side of major disasters, which we might be tempted to try to stop. I doubt anyone here would land enough before Chernobyl to help, but lots of us would land before any number of earthquakes and hurricanes that could have been less damaging if fewer people had been there. On the other hand, there is a limit to how much any one person could change the past. I imagine landing a few hours before an atrocity, so you know what is happening when you first hear news but have no power to stop it, would be particularly heart-wrenching.

Razade

2015-06-03, 11:03 PM

How could it be anything but a blessing? I'd take that offer right now and immediately buy all of Google's stock, just from that option alone I'd do it.

pickledillusion

2015-06-03, 11:47 PM

Blessing. I will spend more time with my loved ones who are up there now. :(

Mastikator

2015-06-04, 01:07 AM

Lol I can only imagine a 14 year old me with the knowledge, education and wisdom of a 28 year old me.

I would probably do everything differently, I would consider this a blessing that I would exploit to its furthest potential. So many things I was afraid to do that I know realize how stupid it was to be afraid of.

Starwulf

2015-06-04, 01:15 AM

Crazily enough I was thinking about this very subject matter this morning, and I can say with confidence, it would be a curse. Half my life would put me right in my senior year of high-school in 1999 and there is decent chance that I would do something different that might affect me meeting my wife in a non-creepy(OH hey, I'm from the future where we were married for 12 years and had two kids and are madly in love. Let's start early!....yeah) sort of way, and there is nothing I would want to change that would be worth not having my wife. Now if I could go back just before we got married but were already together, I'd do that so I could not fall off the cliff that crushed parts of my spine, that way I could actually work and provide for my family instead of drawing SSD.

Alongside the "If I could go back to right before my accident" I'd make sure I had the #'s memorized for that Pepsi "Billion dollar sweepstakes" thing they did back in the early 2000's. Winning a billion dollars would be amazing, I could do so much good with that kind of money, so many charities I could donate to, I could start my own food bank to help people who struggle feeding themselves and their families. I could donate thousands of toys/clothing to local charities at Christmas time, I could help out all my friends and the bit of family I actually care about...yeah that would be awesome.

FinnLassie

2015-06-04, 01:41 AM

Definitely a curse. I am extremely happy where I am now, but to get here I went through so many hardships and bad times... and I don't think I would be able to go through all that crap again. It's over 10 years of pain and torture.

I'm so glad this isn't actually possible. :smallbiggrin:

factotum

2015-06-04, 02:10 AM

Blessing. There are so many decisions I would change if I was back in 1992, and while I can't guarantee the outcome would be better for all of them, I'm pretty sure I'd be in a better place now with those changes. Plus, there is the whole "Buy up as much Google stock as possible" thing!

Hmmmm...maybe I should start memorising last week's winning Lottery numbers, just in case? :smallamused:

Ravens_cry

2015-06-04, 03:21 AM

Blessing. Sure, lots of things *really* sucked when I was 14, but having the opportunity to do things differently? Hell yeah! I know I'd seek out transition options sooner, for one. Putting a halt to my testosterone poisoning at the nearest, soonest possibility? Absolutely.

Chen

2015-06-04, 06:58 AM

There'd be a number of things I could do over again that would be interesting and possibly better, but I'm in a great place now. The risk of losing all that is certainly not worth it to me. The odds of being able to recreate your life exactly would be pretty minimal I'd imagine and you'd likely end up in a VERY different spot than you currently are.

thorgrim29

2015-06-04, 07:06 AM

Mixed I'd say. Going back to being almost 13 would be weird. I'm not sure if I could relate to my "peers" properly or interact with girls without feeling like a huge perv (not that I interacted with girls much the first time around, but most of my regrets are around my lack of love life). Another factor is that at 13 I didn't know any of my current friends except 1, and I'm pretty sure 14 and 17 year old them when I finally meet them would annoy the hell out of 25 years old me. Plus I'd have to go through most of high school again, and kids that age are awful.

On the other hand, once I get through the first 5 or so years I can redo college, avoid a few key mistakes I made (maybe go to a different college, because by that point I'm sure living with my parents would be hell) , and make a killing on the stock market by abusing oil bubbles and buying stock in companies I know are doing well now in 2008. Give me 45 minutes to look up and memorize a few charts and I could easily be a millionaire by the time I'm back at my current age, but even with just my current knowledge I'd make so much money.

So I guess I'd take the opportunity in a heartbeat if it was 6 or 7 years ago, but almost 13 have a lot more cons to consider.

VincentTakeda

2015-06-04, 08:03 AM

Nearly total blessing. Would do it in a heartbeat. Would also invest heavily in google.

Cristo Meyers

2015-06-04, 08:12 AM

Taking me out of my current life and drop me as a 15-year old back into high school with the knowledge that just a few seconds ago I was far better off?

How could I see that as anything other than a curse?

Anarion

2015-06-04, 08:48 AM

The Google stock point is tempting. That's 13.5 years for me, so I could invest in Apple before the iPhone too. That said, I really like my current job and overall place in life, and I'm not sure that money alone would be enough to make me give it up, even a lot of money. On the other hand again, I have a pretty good memory for schooling, so I could probably go back through a bunch of what I did while also learning new skills (like a bunch of relevant programming knowledge) maybe go back and get an engineering degree even, which would be pretty cool. But, on the third hand, there would be no guarantee of anything repeating and I've had lots of very good and unique opportunities that arose both from my successes and failures.

I think I wouldn't do it, but it would be a close call.

Aliquid

2015-06-04, 09:18 AM

... we were married for 12 years and had two kids and are madly in love.
Even if you met up with your wife and had kids... it would be different eggs and sperm meeting, and thus completely different children. Your current children would be written out of existence.

I'm guessing that would be a curse.

warty goblin

2015-06-04, 10:50 AM

There's quite a few things I wish I'd done differently in the last decade and a half or so, but life's worked out pretty well in spite of that. And there's no way I'd put up with being fourteen again just to do college a little bit better or whatever*. Prevent a couple of wars, sure, that's a worthwhile purpose, but I'd be too late and ill situated to make any difference there anyway. And I don't want a billion dollars; I see no way this would actually make me any happier, and a whole lot in which it would just make me listless, indolent, useless and miserable.

So no, nope, no way and oh hell no. I'll take my mistakes gladly.

*And let's be honest, college take 2 would be even worse than college take one. I'd already know most of the interesting material, so it'd just be a four year long exercise in tedium. Instead I guess I could attempt to worm my way into grad school as a fourteen year old, which means I'd be under legal age for damn near everything fun; and I'd have to repeat the hideous two-day qualifying exams in my field. Explain to me where exactly the benefit of no sex, no booze, and studying my ass off for a horrible exam I already passed is?

Bulldog Psion

2015-06-04, 11:19 AM

Absolute blessing.

So many people now dead I could see again. (This is a big one -- over the last couple of months I've been continually haunted by the fact that there are at least 2 people I'll never see again. And I would remove both my legs with a rusty saw to see them for 10 minutes.)

So many missed opportunities to grab that I was too stupid to grab at the time.

So many errors to avoid like the frickin' plague.

And on top of it, that youth, health, and strength combined with the knowledge I have now?

Hell, yeah, man, where do I sign up?!?!?

Dienekes

2015-06-04, 11:53 AM

Blessing. Amazing blessing. The greedy me would use this to make money hand over fist. I'd have a chance to rethink all the schooling that I may have wasted. The slightly more noble me could use this to save a couple lives.

Havelocke

2015-06-04, 11:54 AM

This is an interesting moral dilemma. If I went back 20 years, I was in a bad place in my life, but I could say to myself that "you will get through it, it will suck, it will hurt, but you WILL survive". Back then I was not so sure and I made a LOT of bad decisions. On the flip side I would not have my wife and kids or house or many of the great people in my life now, so I am not sure I would do it. I guess it is a double edged sword, blessing and curse combined. Good question!

Cespenar

2015-06-04, 11:56 AM

Wow.

I could... I could finish my backlog!

FinnLassie

2015-06-04, 11:59 AM

I have to say, I'm surprised by the amount of people saying it's a blessing.

Icewraith

2015-06-04, 12:04 PM

Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning, and you went "back in time" suddenly half your current age, as if someone hit "rewind" on your life.

Say you are 20... well it is 2005 again, or if you are 40, it is 1995 again, etc.

Everything is exactly as it was at that point in time. The only difference is you retain your memory of the... future.

No warning, no prep time.

Would this be a blessing or a curse?

Yes.

Blessing- All that future knowledge!

Curse- Having to go through terrible life events again. Also, no resources with which to implement that future knowledge. High school me doesn't exactly have the funds to buy into the Google IPO.

TheThan

2015-06-04, 12:21 PM

How could it be anything but a blessing? I'd take that offer right now and immediately buy all of Google's stock, just from that option alone I'd do it.
How much tragedy have you experienced in life?
Deceased loved ones still die, people still move away; hardships still creep up. You probably can’t change any of that, but you have to relive those events and all the pain and sorrow that are associated with them.

The experiences we go through in life inform our personality. By changing one thing that we did, we change who we are. Sure correcting mistakes sounds great, until you realize that those experiences change who you are as a person. So I would suggest thinking back really hard and deciding if it’d be a good idea or not.

I have to say, I'm surprised by the amount of people saying it's a blessing.

I'm not, most people don't consider the things You, I and a few others have mentioned. they just look at the chance to make more money and be more financially secure. (not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just they're not looking at the big picture).

FinnLassie

2015-06-04, 12:47 PM

I'm not, most people don't consider the things You, I and a few others have mentioned. they just look at the chance to make more money and be more financially secure. (not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just they're not looking at the big picture).

I guess I'm always baffled by how much weight people put on money and financial security. It's never been a priority in my life and money has never been a major value in my upbringing & today (though my family has definitely been touching the poverty line at times), so it's sometimes a bit hard to realise that not everyone lives in this bubble o' mine. :smalltongue:

My first reaction was "heck yeah!", not gonna lie, but then I realised that I would never be where I am today if I had to do it again.

Dienekes

2015-06-04, 01:17 PM

thorgrim29

2015-06-04, 01:18 PM

It's not really about the money for me, that's more of a "while I'm at it" thing. I'm not unhappy with my life now or anything but I can't shake the feeling that I wasted or at least didn't enjoy enough a large part of my late teens and early adulthood by being too reclusive and afraid of rejection, and the few really bad things that happened to me in recent years have been mostly caused or at least precipitated by me being immature and/or lazy. Starting over from when I was 17 or 18 would let me use from my improved maturity and wisdom to get more out of those years (both in personal and professional terms) while not leaving me as totally unable to relate with people my age as if I got back to being 12 (and I wouldn't like being a minor for almost 6 years, I like being able to buy a beer if I want one). There's still a lot of cons to it of course, but I think the benefits would be larger.

TheThan

2015-06-04, 02:22 PM

Ehh, I know 3 people who died in a very preventable car crash. And another who died in a very preventable bout of gang violence. I'll take the risk of going through the hardships I already know I can live through for even a small chance to save them.

I’m the opposite, the people that I’ve known that have passed on have died from unpreventable causes. I don’t really want to have to relive burying those people. The only good thing is spending more time with them before they go, however that also has the additional effect of making that heartache even stronger.

Kalmageddon

2015-06-04, 02:27 PM

Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning, and you went "back in time" suddenly half your current age, as if someone hit "rewind" on your life.

Say you are 20... well it is 2005 again, or if you are 40, it is 1995 again, etc.

Everything is exactly as it was at that point in time. The only difference is you retain your memory of the... future.

No warning, no prep time.

Would this be a blessing or a curse?

This would likely be the most awesome thing ever.
I could fix all the mistakes I made in those years, finish my studies, avoid half of my ex girlfriends and handle things better with the other half and I'd probably become rich by investing huge amounts of money on companies that I know will hit it big in the following years.

Lentrax

2015-06-04, 02:37 PM

How much tragedy have you experienced in life?
Deceased loved ones still die, people still move away; hardships still creep up. You probably can’t change any of that, but you have to relive those events and all the pain and sorrow that are associated with them.

The experiences we go through in life inform our personality. By changing one thing that we did, we change who we are. Sure correcting mistakes sounds great, until you realize that those experiences change who you are as a person. So I would suggest thinking back really hard and deciding if it’d be a good idea or not.

I'm not, most people don't consider the things You, I and a few others have mentioned. they just look at the chance to make more money and be more financially secure. (not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just they're not looking at the big picture).

Here's a bigger picture. I have known I was trans for a long time. Long before I even knew what transgenderism was.

I met the first love of my life while I was trying to be my true self. She fell in love with me when I was still trying to be a girl the first time. She loved me for who I am, and made life worth living. Circumstance took that away from me, and I have no doubt that no matter what I tried, it would end the same (she died.). But if I could wake up one day, and be my fifteen year old self again? I would take that chance in a heartbeat. So much of my life has passed me by, because I was too afraid to notice it. I regret not being able to make myself better, not knowing what I was even doing with my life. To know how much of it I threw away?

I would take that deal and consider myself fortunate to be able to do so. Forget stock. Forget the lottery. I could have not given up on my art, I could have never given up on myself. I could have a chance to be something other than the worthless pile of crap who sits behind a computer screen for being too afraid to live my life.

To have the chance to know I can be who I feel and know I should be? To have a life free of the regret of not making that choice, of being able to live with myself? I can deal with the heartache. I can deal with the suffering. I already have. I know I can handle it again. I already live with regrets. And I would miss what has become of some things in my life. But knowing that my presence has been toxic poison to those I love? Yes. I absolutely would take the chance to change that.

You can never know what will happen. You can imagine what things would have been if you had made a different choice. But knowing that you can make the lives of those you love better. By knowing which choice was absolutely wrong no matter how you look at it or the situation. By knowing that your actions did such terrible harm?

Yes. I will take that deal.

And consider myself fortunate to have the chance.

Murk

2015-06-04, 03:04 PM

I'd definitely say curse.
For one, there's so many people, friendships and relations that would wind up differently.
Second, it will be extremely frustrating to be a wise, mature person that's still treated like a little kid. Having to do all kinds of schools again (I was just waiting for it to be over the first time - imagine having to do it a second time).
The third, and probably most important point, is that no one would ever believe it. I would have ten years of memories, of feelings and insights, and I would never be able to really convince anyone of them. Heck, after a while, I probably wouldn't believe it myself.

Also, and I just thought of that now, it will be extremely frustrating to know there will be a tsunami somewhere, and an airplane flying into a couple of flats, and a murder here and there, but not knowing the exact date. Which aligns well with the point others have made: yeah, you know bad things are gonna happen, and you still can't change that.

My overall feeling about this is frustration. It wouldn't really be a cruse, but so frustrating.

TheThan

2015-06-04, 03:05 PM

Lentrax

2015-06-04, 03:14 PM

Repeating what I previously said; the experience you go through in life informs your personality, what you think, do and believe. By changing what those experiences are, you change who you are as a person.

So I think what this question is really asking is would you change yourself?

for me that answer would be no.

I'm content. Now I'm not saying my life is perfect, or that I don't have regrets or never made mistakes; I'm as human as the next Joe blow on the internet. But I'm content with what I have, and wouldn't trade that contentedness for wealth or power and I certainly wouldn't trade what I am now for what I could be (for better or worse).

And I am a terrible person for wanting to?

You say you are content. I am not. I am wrong. Everything is wrong, and I am toxic to those around me that I love, but because they depend on me, I cannot (and would not) leave. But in the context of this fantasy discussion, where it would be possible? I know the answer to that question. I would absolutely spare the ones I love the pain I will have caused them. I would fix myself. Then see if love could exist again.

Cristo Meyers

2015-06-04, 03:15 PM

. But I'm content with what I have, and wouldn't trade that contentedness for wealth or power and I certainly wouldn't trade what I am now for what I could be (for better or worse).

Not even could be, but a chance at could be.

All those things we no doubt would want to do? Where's the guarantee that they'll actually work?

This isn't 'a chance to do things better.' It's another spin of the roulette wheel.

Kalmageddon

2015-06-04, 03:20 PM

Repeating what I previously said; the experience you go through in life informs your personality, what you think, do and believe. By changing what those experiences are, you change who you are as a person.

So I think what this question is really asking is would you change yourself?

for me that answer would be no.

I'm content. Now I'm not saying my life is perfect, or that I don't have regrets or never made mistakes; I'm as human as the next Joe blow on the internet. But I'm content with what I have, and wouldn't trade that contentedness for wealth or power and I certainly wouldn't trade what I am now for what I could be (for better or worse).

Well, not really. According to the OP, you keep all your memories and experiences, so you aren't "changing" yourself, you are improving yourself, just like you do every day by learning from experience, only with the added bonus of getting a second chance at living half your life.

Quild

2015-06-04, 03:35 PM

The whole "back to scholarship" part would maybe not be that fun. Lot of work to learn what I unlearnt and lot of frustration to learn again things that won't be of any use.

Except for that, I'd love it. (I would be back at 14/15!)

5a Violista

2015-06-04, 03:37 PM

Sure, there's some things I would like to change, such as actually saying a proper goodbye to a friend rather than just waking up and realizing she's gone. There's not really much that I would intentionally change, though, since I loved every experience I had, positive or negative. I definitely wouldn't take advantage of my knowledge of the future and invest in things; that would make life boring and wouldn't put me in the opportunity for many of the miracles that happened. Besides, I've always valued time and skills over money. I would probably still take the hardest classes available and still get the same grades anyway, except maybe in college I would refuse to take that second dance class Freshman year and instead just do more music, so there's that.

Thing is, though: I'm extraordinarily lucky. There are so many things that happened in life where I was just lucky; in a re-do, I probably wouldn't be so lucky. I would have not been thirty seconds late to the bus (which ended up probably saving my life), I would have not been five minutes early to a friend's house (which definitely saved my life), my many guesses would be different (which would have reduced my opportunities), I probably wouldn't have been called up and got jobs all three times at the exact moment when I ran out of money, and so on. (Also, I probably wouldn't have my viola, and I'd be stuck playing violin wishing I could switch back to viola; that was pretty much pure luck, too.)

Also, thinking about it: exactly twelve years and a couple months ago (which is how far back I would go if this happened) I would find myself stuck in a pit on top of a mountain. That would be disorienting: in addition to being returned to my younger self, I'll also find myself stuck in a pit, in the middle of panicking and praying and curling in a ball (I wonder exactly which one I would have been doing at the time). To be honest, it was pretty miraculous and spiritual getting out of that hole. Also, given what I've learned in neuromechanics about how the mind and body interact, my muscles would overcompensate all the time. That would definitely suck. It would also make everything so hilarious, stumbling around, if it didn't occur at a time when I needed perfect hand-eye coordination. I'm sure everything would be fine in the end (since that's basically the story of my life: everything works out better-than-perfectly in the end).

I'd consider it a blessing to have the fun excitement (some things were just exciting, like the kind of excitement you get when you have a massive adrenaline rush and you have no idea what you should do but you only have a short time to decide) of doing everything all over again, but if I were given the choice I would politely decline.

factotum

2015-06-04, 03:43 PM

So I think what this question is really asking is would you change yourself?

No it isn't. As Kalmageddon points out, the OP specifies that you retain all your current knowledge when you're thrown back into your earlier self--so you are the same person at that point. Yes, you will no doubt end up a different person once you've aged back to where you started than you are now, but you're not going through those intervening years blind; you have a chance to fix mistakes, to make different decisions, and hopefully come out better both physically and mentally.

Personally, I suspect a lot of what makes a person say blessing or curse to this question depends on how satisfied they are with their lives as they are. You're very satisfied with where you are and you don't think you could significantly improve on things by doing this, but I am very much *not* happy with how things have gone for me in the last ten or fifteen years, so the opportunity to go back and change things (hopefully for the better) is a very attractive prospect for me.

zurvan8

2015-06-04, 03:56 PM

Somewhat sadly, a blessing.

Me back then with the intellectual and emotional maturity I've gained by virtue of having time to be away from my family of origin? Priceless.

Plus, I would know who in my life had died since then, which would give me Jumanji-like powers to either change that or at least make sure I was able to come to peace with them.

(Speaking to those who would invest in Google, from what I recall Google only went public after it was pretty darn big already. If you didn't invest the first time you probably wouldn't now).

Razade

2015-06-04, 04:13 PM

Maryring

2015-06-04, 04:13 PM

Of course it's a blessing if I'm armed with the knowledge I have at this point in time. There's a ton of good it can do for me, but more importantly, there's a ton of good that I will be able to do if I get back to that point. I can tell my Grand Aunt to go to the doctor, tell her brother to get himself checked for cancer. I can give my grandfather a call at the right time.

But greater than that, I can provide warnings about planned terrorist attacks. I could stop the likes of 9/11 or Utøya. I'd have a chance to argue that there should always be two pilots/attendants in in the cockpit of a plane at all times. There are many things I can't change, and changing one thing may make me unable to change something else due to how things shift. But that shouldn't stop me from trying.

Alent

2015-06-04, 04:18 PM

Personally, I suspect a lot of what makes a person say blessing or curse to this question depends on how satisfied they are with their lives as they are. You're very satisfied with where you are and you don't think you could significantly improve on things by doing this, but I am very much *not* happy with how things have gone for me in the last ten or fifteen years, so the opportunity to go back and change things (hopefully for the better) is a very attractive prospect for me.

Very much this. If I could get do-again on the past 16 years, I would take it in a heartbeat, as I am attempting to start over anyway, without the advantage of time travel dropping me in what was effectively the beginning of my life and career mistakes. (Technically they start around '94, but being 15 again would be close enough to keep them from resolving as mistakes.)

I'd relive a huge chunk of my life just to undo my arm injury and call that a blessing by itself, all the other things I could fix and do over would just be a bonus on top.

Aliquid

2015-06-04, 04:24 PM

I love the variety of responses, from “hell yes”, to “hell no”. I’m personally a “no”, but if you had asked me back when I was in my 20s I would have said “yes”

Nobody has mentioned expanding your life expectancy yet.

You still keep your memories, so you will be mentally older than your physical body. Lets say you are currently 30. Your physical body will drop back to 15, but your mind is still 30 years old. So, if you end up living to 80 (average life expectancy), you will have experienced 95 years of life.

So, the older you are when this happens, the more “bonus years” you get to live. The more life you experience before you die (assuming you die at a similar age in both scenarios). This is interesting, because the older people on this forum (myself included) are more likely to say no.

Kalmageddon

2015-06-04, 04:53 PM

I think I would unquestionably consider it the greatest gift I could ever receive.

Closet_Skeleton

2015-06-04, 05:02 PM

If we're going by a multiple worlds version of timetravel, then you'd be abandoning everyone in your current world in the hope of having a better life in another world.

That's pretty selfish and completely irresponsible. Especially if you're married, but even if you only have friends and relatives then you might as well be committing suicide as far as they're concerned.

If its not a multiple worlds version, then that's arguably even worse since you're basically erasing everyone conceived after the point you're going back to from existence.

The thing is that due to the butterfly effect pretty much any knowledge 5 years from when you go back to would be useless. History might not change much, tensions that led to wars in your first timeline still exist even if its not precisely the same flashpoints that set them off, but if you think you're going to be able to make different choices at specific encounters that's almost certainly not going to work unless its the first one at the exact point you jump back to.

Killer Angel

2015-06-04, 05:05 PM

No it isn't. As Kalmageddon points out, the OP specifies that you retain all your current knowledge when you're thrown back into your earlier self--so you are the same person at that point. Yes, you will no doubt end up a different person once you've aged back to where you started than you are now, but you're not going through those intervening years blind; you have a chance to fix mistakes, to make different decisions, and hopefully come out better both physically and mentally.

Probably that's the point. If you use your knowledge to become billionaire, you're going to change, and you'll end living a different life than the one you're living now. For people with a family, this would mean to lose their wife/husband/children.

It would be cool, it would give you great possibilities, but there are also downsides.
15 years ago, I would have said YES. Now I would say no.

BWR

2015-06-04, 05:14 PM

A blessing, probably. Chances are I could find the important people in my life again. It may not be exactly the same but I still have my memories. Plus I could avoid many screw-ups I've made. However, I'd, probably screw up in all new ways.

Starwulf

2015-06-04, 10:03 PM

For people with a family, this would mean to lose their wife/husband/children.

Yeah for me this was is what caused me to say it would be a curse. I deeply love my wife and children, and even if I could somehow manage to recreate the events that led to me being with my wife, as another poster pointed out, it's doubtful I'd have the same children because a different sperm could meet a different egg if we "procreate" even a minute off of when we originally did.

Which sucks because the stipulation of exactly half my life, as I mentioned in my first post, would allow me to choose to NOT go walking in the middle of the woods at 2:30 in the morning while drunk as hell and not fall off the cliff and thus not have parts of my spine compressed like a smashed soda can. Which in turn would mean I'd be able to be a better provider for my wife and children and get to play with them more.

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-04, 10:12 PM

With all due consideration, I think the question is impossible for me to answer. Not much past the point in time I'd be returning to, I'd meet the love of my life. The once in a lifetime kind. It was almost painfully intense, and in a lot of ways I probably never really got over it; I moved on, got married and I suppose we're in love, have a couple of kids. Trade it back in a heart beat; my wife both hates and fears a woman she's never met and who I never willingly talk about. Sure I say the right words if she forces the issue, but she knows. Being who I was, it was possible and amazing. Being who I am with my life experiences and knowledge, I don't think the spark would be there for it to happen in the first place.

On the other hand, if I could actually relive that time of my life and have the spark and that intense feeling again, maybe fix a few missteps and avoid a few mistakes, maybe end up living the dream instead of thinking about it almost twenty years later and still knowing I F----d up bigger than at any point before or after and suddenly feeling a need to get amnesiac drunk. I'd do it again even if it ended up exactly the same. I'd burn the world right now for just another day. Just another hour. Melodramatic maybe, but everything took on kind of a gray pall since then.

Citizen Nij

2015-06-04, 11:34 PM

The people I care about would still be here (or somewhere anyway). But being able to go back, knowing what's to come? I could do so much to help improve their lives. Add in the whole "buy a quarter of Google and Apple" and I can do more of what I want to do, help myself and others where previously I've had less ability to do so.

And not just the people close to me. There have been events which caused a multitude of suffering - in some cases suffering that was still easily avoidable but for some simple mistakes or a few people making the wrong decisions. I would find the people responsible for checking some of those things, tipping them off to the potential outcomes and to a few of the disparities that if corrected or avoided, would prevent some significant harm.

More personally, I'd have another chance at strengthening the relationships between people I met in the last decade or so, taking up the opportunities I should have gone with, avoiding some of the mistakes I made and events that had major negative impacts on my life. I'd succeed more rapidly in my studies, I'd be able to take the chances that arise from there, I could skip the deadends and repeats I had to deal with.

The negative events and experiences? I dealt with them once, and that despite a host of issues. With the confidence and knowledge I have now, it would be almost trivial to deal with the situations I hadn't enjoyed - assuming they even occurred after prior improvements. The knowledge is still there. I'd just have another chance to avoid the downsides and improve the upsides. Overall my life would be improved upon where it is now, by the time I got back around to here.

Yeah, for me, it would be a blessing.

TheThan

2015-06-05, 12:17 AM

Firstly that's really none of your business is it? You then assert I'll have to "live through those hardships" and follow up that I'll be changing events. I won't be living the same hardships because I'll know how to avert them for the most part. I'll change of course though I'll change from how I am now, I'll always remember the future that could have been because remember, in this scenario, I have the knowledge I have now 15 years in the past. It's a blessing, nothing short of a blessing. So I would suggest you not presume to lecture me on my answer simply because it isn't the answer you yourself would give.

That’s surprisingly defensive. I was typing rhetorically no need to get in a huff about it.

My whole point was to get people to think the whole thing through. Someone changing their past may not necessarily be in that person’s best interest.

No it isn't. As Kalmageddon points out, the OP specifies that you retain all your current knowledge when you're thrown back into your earlier self--so you are the same person at that point.

Then the question is a cheat, because of course everyone could always do their life better; that’s pretty obvious. So the "right" answer to the question is “yes, it’s stupid not to”. Therefore the question has little real point and meaning. If redoing the past doesn’t change your memories of the past, then what’s the point aside to get richer? Even if you change something very important to you, that won’t change the fact you remember what it was you changed. Marry a different spouse, take a different job, say goodbye to someone you should have said it to earlier, you name it; you’ll remember what it was like with that other person, that other situation. It’s still there in your memories.

But greater than that, I can provide warnings about planned terrorist attacks. I could stop the likes of 9/11 or Utøya. I'd have a chance to argue that there should always be two pilots/attendants in in the cockpit of a plane at all times. There are many things I can't change, and changing one thing may make me unable to change something else due to how things shift. But that shouldn't stop me from trying.

Who’s going to believe you? Any government agency you contact is going to probably either going to blow you off or take their sweet little time getting around to checking up on it. They get hundreds of warnings like yours daily, so who’s to say that sending a warning will actually change anything? The only way to guarantee that something like 9/11 or Utøya doesn’t happen again (from the perspective of the time traveler) is to go and do it personally. In which case you’ll probably go to jail for stopping (possibly killing) the people responsible prior to that event. So who’s to say you can actually change these major events that happened in the past?

Razade

2015-06-05, 12:35 AM

That’s surprisingly defensive. I was typing rhetorically no need to get in a huff about it.

My whole point was to get people to think the whole thing through. Someone changing their past may not necessarily be in that person’s best interest.

I know what your point was but that doesn't change that it's presumptuous because you don't really know what a person's best interest is and just a little condescending as well.

Dire Moose

2015-06-05, 12:38 AM

Blessing for me. Definitely a blessing.

I'm 27 now, so I'd be 13. My biggest mistake was in trying to get into paleontology via a biology degree; biologists stopped caring about paleontology ever since molecular studies were invented. They don't care about fossils anymore since all they have to do is plug a bunch of DNA letters into a computer to understand evolution. I found this out the hard way when my job applications kept getting rejected and wound up having to spend three more years getting the proper geology degree, my funds running dry in the meantime.

I managed to get a high GPA and a number of scholarships to get what amounted to a free university education, which I wasted on a subject that wasn't as relevant as I thought it was. With what I know now, I could get an even higher GPA and wind up with the same or even better scholarships, then use them to go to a better school that actually does paleontology, get a better degree for the subject while the scholarship money is still there, and then reach the present with a master's degree and potentially an actual research position.

Only thing that would be difficult is relating to my peers. I already had a rough time in school due to being smarter than those around me and being annoyed by their immaturity; it would be far worse now. Even worse, I avoided further ostracism only by failing to realize I was bisexual back then. With that genie out of the bottle, I would be more vulnerable. I could probably say goodbye to my main support group from that time, which was composed entirely of religious people. Things would get better in late high school, but until then I'd be even more of a social outcast than before.

If I had the option of rewinding, I definitely would do it though. The benefits would outweigh the disadvantages. I'd probably stay in the closet until I graduated high school however.

Aliquid

2015-06-05, 12:58 AM

My whole point was to get people to think the whole thing through. Someone changing their past may not necessarily be in that person’s best interest.
As far as your mind and memory is concerned your past isn't altered. You are creating a future for you that happens to be located in a time you have already experienced once before.

Then the question is a cheat, because of course everyone could always do their life better; that’s pretty obvious. So the "right" answer to the question is “yes, it’s stupid not to”.
No the question isn't a cheat. Many people are saying "no way". Even though they are interpreting the question properly.

Therefore the question has little real point and meaning.
The meaning is there. You just need to step back and look more closely.

If redoing the past doesn’t change your memories of the past, then what’s the point aside to get richer? Even if you change something very important to you, that won’t change the fact you remember what it was you changed. Marry a different spouse, take a different job, say goodbye to someone you should have said it to earlier, you name it; you’ll remember what it was like with that other person, that other situation. It’s still there in your memories.
Why do anything twice with that attitude? If you fail at something, do you avoid trying a second time because you still remember the failure.

I remember previous jobs, previous relationships, etc already. Why not add to the list? How is this different?

Who’s going to believe you? Any government agency you contact is going to probably either going to blow you off or take their sweet little time getting around to checking up on it. They get hundreds of warnings like yours daily, so who’s to say that sending a warning will actually change anything?
This I agree with. Changing major events would be near impossible, unless you already were extremely influential. And even then you would have to be careful not to look like some sort of kook.

Maybe set off the fire alarms for 9/11 to evacuate the building ahead of time?

TheThan

2015-06-05, 02:08 AM

The entire point of going back in time and doing it over is to erase the past and insert a new one. If you still have memories of that other past, then are you really changing anything?

I’d say not really. Sure a person can fix mistakes they think they’ve made and set their life up better, but that isn’t changing the fact that that person will still remember making those mistakes, they will still remember how they felt when those events crop up. They’ll still regret dating that train wreck or saying that awful thing to that person or not having the guts to ask their biggest crush out on a date. Those memories are still there. Making different choices won’t change the memories of the choices that person previously made.

Plus you can possibly change the good times. Spend too much time working or studying to set your life up for later and you miss out on the simple joy of being young again. Suppose a person stayed home and studied, instead of attending that big party he was invited to. What if he didn’t realize that’s when he first met his future wife and not meeting her there would change his marriage to that woman. (This whole idea was an episode of Family Guy). Now that person missed out on marrying his wife, and all the good times to be had.

Scarlet Knight

2015-06-05, 05:53 AM

It would be both, like a Super Power.

I could invest in Apple, bet on the Americans to beat the Russians in the Olympics and make myself Bruce Wayne rich. But then you have the responsibility to ask "Why do you have this ability? For what purpose? At the end will I have to answer to my Maker for what I did or didn't do with it?"

Now I would have to try and do the most good before my 30 years knowledge runs out. Also, I would have to learn the ramifications to my actions. What am I able to change? Would my wife refuse to marry me because I tell her I can see the future? Thus I never have my kids? Do I keep it a secret?

Imagine standing outside the Twin Towers trying to stop people as thousands stream past you to work, only to be arrested afterward as a terrorist because they believe "he knew something but keeps lying about his innocence".

I wonder if a book has been written about this?

Closet_Skeleton

2015-06-05, 06:38 AM

You can't invest in the stock market and use your knowledge of what happened 5 years from now in one time line to predict what the price will be in 5 years in this time line. The Stock Market is an unpredictable chaotic system of money going in and out and you just put more money into it.

The last financial crash was pretty much an inevitability but it really could have happened at any time. The problem is there, plenty of economists knew that and predicted it. But the panic or scare that sets it off is not predictable. If it happens on the day before the Iphone release then that could really screw over your investing in Apple plan. To be honest investing in Apple is a good idea and pretty safe, but you didn't need a time machine to tell that in 2003 (don't invest in Enron on the other hand is probably more useful knowledge). Its a better plan in any way than playing the lottery (chaos theory basically means your knowledge of numbers ahead of time is useless here) but its still a gamble.

Due to the butterfly effect and random delays, the exact date of a terrorist attack could easily shift if its more than a few months ahead of when you jump back to. So you'd probably be standing at an airport stopping the plains with a bomb threat on the 11th, get arrested and then be unable to do anything when the attack goes off on the 13th. Or it happens on the 10th and blindsides you and your plans to stop it.

On the other hand your decision to not be late for that date you missed on on the first time might mean you're the one extra car needed to cause a traffic jam, slowing down hundreds of people and potentially having massive knock on effects.

If you still have memories of that other past, then are you really changing anything?

I’d say not really.

That's kind of selfish. If I save someone's life then who cares if I still have painful memories of them dying.

huttj509

2015-06-05, 07:13 AM

Maryring

2015-06-05, 07:20 AM

There's one thing to keep in mind with all this talk about "the butterfly effect". This isn't a reload of an earlier save-state with new random numbers lined up. If you act exactly the same in this new timeline, the outcome will be exactly the same.

Now, you can change your own actions, but the truth is that deciding to stay at home and read a book rather than go out that evening your cellphone was stolen will not make that huge a change on a major scale. Changing a major event like 9/11, Utøya, or any other such terrorist attack you can imagine? Now that *would* create a huge change in the world, but up until the point where you actually make such a change, few if any events outside those that happen in your local area will noticeably change. Half a life-time ago, I was *not* an influental person. What I do would not have much effect on the world, but what I could do was have a proper effect on the world. Sure, I couldn't call Pentagon and tell them that 9/11 will happen, but if I could reach out and get airport security to be a bit more careful that day, or if I could identify one of the perps and expose them somehow before they got onto the plane, or even just hit the fire alam before the plane crashes into the twin towers as was mentioned earlier.

Even if some sort of criminal sabotage would be the only way to stop these terrorist events from happening, I'd still consider that an acceptable price to pay. Even if the actions ultimately end up harming me, as long as they ended up saving countless lives I'd consider them to be worth it.

Lentrax

2015-06-05, 07:48 AM

Plus you can possibly change the good times. Spend too much time working or studying to set your life up for later and you miss out on the simple joy of being young again. Suppose a person stayed home and studied, instead of attending that big party he was invited to. What if he didn’t realize that’s when he first met his future wife and not meeting her there would change his marriage to that woman. (This whole idea was an episode of Family Guy). Now that person missed out on marrying his wife, and all the good times to be had.

And if you don't have any good times? If I were to go back fifteen years, it would be to a point in time where I had been beaten to death 2 years earlier. to a point in time where I was a shut-in and a recluse. Where my nightmares were powerful enough to shatter a young psyche. All I have managed to do in the yeas that followed was to hang on to life, but what was the point of that? My depression became so bad that I cared so little about myself, that I completely fell apart. My health is so bad in places that I do not know if I can recover, now that I care about myself enough to want to try.

For something like that. For me to have a chance to take better care of myself, would that be so bad? Not caring to try and change major things and events, because they are likely immutable, but to have a chance to so something small like take better care of myself? That is a terrible horrible thing? I don't think so.

Besides, I would still have to live with the regrets of all the pain I caused to those I care about, that would now, because of my small changes, not have happened. And that is a small price to pay to ensure that pain never happens.

Telonius

2015-06-05, 08:33 AM

I'd say, curse for me personally, blessing otherwise. Half my life would put me back in 1998-ish. For me personally, my daughter would be written out of existence, and I would have to reconstruct my book from scratch. Nothing else about my personal life would change for the worse; I still would have been able to meet my wife. But those two things would completely wreck it for me. For the blessing otherwise ... unfortunately the biggest one is a forbidden forum topic, but there are any number of natural disasters I could have helped warn about.

Aliquid

2015-06-05, 08:48 AM

The entire point of going back in time and doing it over is to erase the past and insert a new one. If you still have memories of that other past, then are you really changing anything?This debate is as useful as an American and a Brazilian arguing about what shape a football is.

It appears you have interpreted this exercise in a way that is different than the original intent, and as such we are discussing two different things.

Starwulf

2015-06-05, 01:55 PM

There's one thing to keep in mind with all this talk about "the butterfly effect". This isn't a reload of an earlier save-state with new random numbers lined up. If you act exactly the same in this new timeline, the outcome will be exactly the same.

Maybe if you're only 10 you can still remember everything you've done from the time you were 5 until 10, but for anyone older then that, the odds that you will remember EXACTLY what you did to allow yourself to meet your future girlfriend/wife/whatever, are pretty much slim to none. And a single action that you take that is moderately major(yeah, staying home and reading a book might not change things, but skipping work a day and meeting a whole new group of people probably would) will almost certainly put your life on a slightly different path, and then every action you take on that new path is going to alter your trajectory more and more and more. I mean, unless you're a super genius with total recall, in which case go for it! But I'm just an ordinary person and I very much doubt I'd remember what to do, when to do it and where, to insure that I know the chick who hosted the party that I met my wife at. Hell I don't even remember that chicks name anymore ><.

Even if some sort of criminal sabotage would be the only way to stop these terrorist events from happening, I'd still consider that an acceptable price to pay. Even if the actions ultimately end up harming me, as long as they ended up saving countless lives I'd consider them to be worth it.

I'm going to guess you have no-one in your life that you love? No friends that you would miss? I mean your idea sounds great initially, give up your life to save thousands of others, but the more you think about it, those are just faceless people, and you won't even be appreciated for your act, and everyone that knew and loved you, would now hate you. Screw that. I love my wife far to much to willingly give up my life with her and my children just to save a few thousand people that won't even know what I sacrificed, and will actually instead thing of me as some terrible criminal that wanted to kill them.

Edit: For clarification(i realized afterwards I may have come as rude) I wasn't saying that you don't have people you love or care about or that care about you, I was just trying to get you to see the negatives of your actions. Not to mention as someone else pointed out, there is no guarantee that you calling in a bomb threat and getting the airlines shut down that day would even cause the terrorists to not do it. They might do it a week, month or even a year later, and then your grand sacrifice would be for absolutely nothing. I'd be willing to go so far as to say that unless you were willing to blow up an entire plane on that day with a full load of passengers in order to force the airlines/government to go through with the entire new set of security protocols that they put into place after 9/11, that you wouldn't likely change anything but the date of that tragedy.

Dire Moose

2015-06-05, 03:23 PM

I guess my response was different largely because I view a lot of my past as wasted. The knowledge I would bring back that would actually help me is also general rather than specific (take a different attitude toward life, biology isn't that relevant to paleontology, and advanced subject knowledge for school).

Also, I don't have a significant other, and I actually wasted seven years of my life pursuing someone who turned out to be terrible for me in the end. This would give me a chance to ignore that person and look to other options instead. I don't have any need to recreate a complex set of circumstances to make me end up with someone specific.

Lentrax

2015-06-05, 03:47 PM

I wonder, out of curiosity, those who are saying that going back and changing ourselves is wrong of us, because how dare we not think of those who love and care for us now.

How much true regret or pain do they have? Has their souls ever been broken? Have they ever been shattered so completely, that it left them with nothing? Have they ever had to live with knowing that their very existence causes their loved ones pain? Or knowing that their choices caused someone else to die?

And is it so wrong to know that, if you could change that. If you could go back and choose different. That you would choose to spare your loved ones that pain?

Who knows what the change may bring? I don't. You don't. It may be better. It may be worse. But at least I know the consequences of the choices I have made. And at least I can still live with myself.

And I can still dream. Dream of what could have been. Of holding my beloved in my arms. Of never having her taken from me. Of being able to live a life free of my dysphoria.

Yeah. It's a good dream. It isn't my reality, but do you really want to judge me for my dreams, and wishing I could make it reality?

Maryring

2015-06-05, 05:21 PM

Maybe if you're only 10 you can still remember everything you've done from the time you were 5 until 10, but for anyone older then that, the odds that you will remember EXACTLY what you did to allow yourself to meet your future girlfriend/wife/whatever, are pretty much slim to none. And a single action that you take that is moderately major(yeah, staying home and reading a book might not change things, but skipping work a day and meeting a whole new group of people probably would) will almost certainly put your life on a slightly different path, and then every action you take on that new path is going to alter your trajectory more and more and more. I mean, unless you're a super genius with total recall, in which case go for it! But I'm just an ordinary person and I very much doubt I'd remember what to do, when to do it and where, to insure that I know the chick who hosted the party that I met my wife at. Hell I don't even remember that chicks name anymore ><.
Oh true, your life would be quite different. Acting exactly the same wouldn't be feasibly possible, even if you limit yourself to only major events, like what parties you go to, or what school trips you participate in. My point was to emphasise that in this scenario, the only changing variable would be yourself. Every single change would have to be a direct result of your own actions, or how those actions change circumstances around you. And unless you had a great deal of influence at that age, most circumstances wouldn't change unless you actively went out to change those circumstances.

I'm going to guess you have no-one in your life that you love? No friends that you would miss? I mean your idea sounds great initially, give up your life to save thousands of others, but the more you think about it, those are just faceless people, and you won't even be appreciated for your act, and everyone that knew and loved you, would now hate you. Screw that. I love my wife far to much to willingly give up my life with her and my children just to save a few thousand people that won't even know what I sacrificed, and will actually instead thing of me as some terrible criminal that wanted to kill them.

Edit: For clarification(i realized afterwards I may have come as rude) I wasn't saying that you don't have people you love or care about or that care about you, I was just trying to get you to see the negatives of your actions. Not to mention as someone else pointed out, there is no guarantee that you calling in a bomb threat and getting the airlines shut down that day would even cause the terrorists to not do it. They might do it a week, month or even a year later, and then your grand sacrifice would be for absolutely nothing. I'd be willing to go so far as to say that unless you were willing to blow up an entire plane on that day with a full load of passengers in order to force the airlines/government to go through with the entire new set of security protocols that they put into place after 9/11, that you wouldn't likely change anything but the date of that tragedy.

Changing the trajectory of your life could be a blessing or a curse. You'd meet new people... but you wouldn't meet old people. And I'll be honest, there are those I've met within the latter half of my life that I'm happy *to* have met. Yeah, there are people in my life that I love. But that's part of why I consider it a blessing. My grandmother on my father's side died of natural causes. There's nothing I could really do to change that. But my grandfather on my mother's side died as a result of getting into an accident with his car, my grand-aunt died from an undiscovered medical condition, and her husband died from cancer that was discovered too late. I could give these three more years of life. That, in itself, would be a blessing.

As for the second argument. That it might not change anything? I'm afraid I'm going to reject it, because ultimately it's based on fear and selfishness. Yeah, I'd be saving "faceless masses" with probably nothing to show for it myself, maybe even at the cost of having any decent quality of life in my own life. But the truth of the matter is that these "faceless masses" consist of thousands of actual people. Someone's children, someone's parents, someone's siblings, someone's friends. And I *can't* ignore that. I can't fear the "maybe's" and "potentials". It may not ultimately change anything, but I refuse to let fear and uncertainty be a barrier to push me into inaction.

It's a simple math evaluation of "probability that I'll successfully save a net amount of lives * lives potentially saved" and the question of if that is greater than, or lesser than the amount of life I myself possess.

VincentTakeda

2015-06-05, 11:36 PM

The tricky part of this thread is the context of the OP...

You wake up to discover... Its not your choice to go or not to go... Its done...

There is an amount of good that I would be sad to have lost and I will mourn it.
I will always have those memories and always cherish them, but by the context of the OP... that can't be retrieved and the choice wasn't mine.
Sure, the idea that my new life would be better or worse than my old life is a coin toss even if I do get to invest big and be rich the second time around...
Sure the likelihood of me being able to replicate the good things from my old life while discarding all the bad things from my old life is as close to zero as it gets.

On the other hand...

The odds that a wiser me with more than two bonus decades of knowledge of the future could possibly screw things up worse than foolish unwise naieve me with no idea whats coming next is also next to zero.
I can't unwind what happened, but I'd be foollish not to make the most of this thing that has happened. I will make the best of it. It will be a blessing because I will choose to make it a blessing.
The thing itself wasnt my choice.
But making it as much of a blessing as possible is 100% my choice.
And I choose blessing.

Sure there are some mistakes that I could avoid.
Absolutely there are even some mistakes that I'd run headlong into making even faster than I did before.

But reframing the question to be 'if you had a choice to go or not to go' is fundamentally altering the nature of the question.

Ifni

2015-06-05, 11:48 PM

Mmm. Good point.

My initial reaction was that for me personally it would definitely be a curse. I've had far more good luck than bad over the last fifteen years, and I'm not at all confident that could be reproduced. From a social perspective, hanging out with my 15-year-old friends was great when I was 15; I feel that doing the same thing with a 31-year-old mind would feel very strange, especially as I'd be mourning the loss of 15-16 years of shared experiences. There are also a lot of things (study/qualification-wise) that were great and interesting the first time round, but wouldn't be nearly so much fun when I already knew the material, yet I'd still need to go through them to get back to the position I hold now. Sure, I could look smarter by virtue of knowing the major developments coming up in my field, but that would feel like cheating, and it's kind of an empty benefit; I'd rather know the next cool discovery without having to wait 15 years, even if that means I get (unfair) credit for some discoveries in the meantime :smallwink:

That said, in an imaginary world where it happened... I'd probably try to reproduce my previous behavior pretty accurately, as it worked out well the first time. I'd take the opportunity to savor the time with family and friends. I'd try to think of it as 15 extra years of life. But essentially losing the last 15 years, so they only existed inside my head and weren't shared with anyone else - I'd try, but it would be hard for me to regard it as a blessing.

(For a somewhat similar scenario... if I imagine "waking up" to find that my entire life for the last 15 years was a very detailed dream, and I'm actually still in high school, that is pretty high-grade nightmare fuel. And kinda worryingly plausible as some aspects of my current life are exactly the fantasies about my future I had in middle/high school :smallwink: But I can totally imagine that if I'd had a lot of bad luck over the last 15 years, that scenario would feel like a wonderful second chance.)

Starwulf

2015-06-05, 11:57 PM

The tricky part of this thread is the context of the OP...

You wake up to discover... Its not your choice to go or not to go... Its done...

In that case then, it's an absolute curse for me, and I'll explain why(I actually spent two hours earlier today thinking about this question thoroughly).

I joined the military right out of highschool, signed up midway through my senior year(by the whims of this thread, I would be sent back to about August of 1998, a month before the start of my senior year). That one decision is one that I would not repeat, and that would change everything. See when I joined I had a medical condition that my recruiter swore up and down that all I needed was a medical exception(exemption?) for, so I got one. Thing is, my recruiter lied. The first time I went to sickbay was in AIT, and the moment the doctor pulled up my file and looked at it, he looked up at me and said "Son, you shouldn't be here. You're not allowed to be here, you would be a major liability in combat and probably in other areas. I'm going to schedule a meeting with the head of the Hospital". A week later I visited the head(a Lt. Col.) and after 5 minutes of questions she looked at me and said "I'm sorry, but we'll have to give you an honorable medical discharge. You're recruiter on the other hand, won't be so lucky(he ended up court-martialed and lost 2 ranks, one for me and one for my best friend who had the same medical condition).

So knowing that I wouldn't be allowed to stay in, I wouldn't even bother signing up the second time around. This would drastically alter my life. While I was away, my girlfriend(and later fiancee before I found out) was being abused by her Foster Father. She went crying to a guy I know, and ended up sleeping with him(this is from multiple people, so I believe the story). If I had been there, she would have come to me. If I have all foreknowledge, I know that the person I married is currently in 9th grade at the time this all happened, so I'd feel compelled to stay with my at the time girlfriend(who I at one point in time believed was the love of my life). I also would get a job(my grades were crap because I was lazy, so no college), which would almost assuredly introduce me to an entirely new set of people.

So one change would literally alter my entire life's trajectory. I likely would never even meet my future wife, might even have married my g/f of that point in time. I wouldn't have my two beautiful daughters. Yet I would have all this knowledge of them. Hell with that, the moment I woke up in my 16 2/3rds body, I'd put a bullet through my skull.

nyjastul69

2015-06-06, 12:53 AM

I would consider it an absolute blessing. I've lived through all the pain in my life, and I could, more easily, do it again. I wouldn't try to change much. I certainly wouldn't try to change major catastrophes. There are however certain decisions I've made that I'd like a 'do over' on. I'd take the opportunity to do so. I would revert to 23 years old BTW.

Cyber Punk

2015-06-06, 05:42 PM

Blessing or curse? Hard to say.

On one hand, it'd be a blessing, as it'd put a 23-year old me inside the body of a 11.5-year old me, and if I knew then what I knew now, I would have avoided falling into depression that robbed me of my creativity for years. I would have made life better.

There are so many ways it could be a curse, but I'll drop a food-for-thought: if it happened to you, what's to say that it didn't happen to someone else? You could be very careful to make sure things go the same way, but because it might have happened to several different people, things won't end up the same.

Traab

2015-06-06, 08:57 PM

It might be a blessing, but I have a hard enough time motivating myself right now. Im honest enough to admit its entirely likely my life would go generally the same way again simply because I lack the motivation to go to the effort to change it. But who knows? I might be able to pull it off. Unfortunately I would be in my senior year of high school, so I couldnt really do much to improve my education by that point. (Plus I dont actually remember most of what I knew back then) I dont have enough knowledge of the stock market to play games with that and jump in on any big spikes before they start, so really, the best I could go for is to try and setup a career for myself sooner.

Last time I wasted a semester at community college, joined the military only to wash out with a medical discharge from basic, tried to work as an electrician only to find noone but scum sucking bottom feeders would hire a new apprentice, and quit a few jobs that could have one day become a decent living had I stuck with it longer. That last part is probably the biggest change I would go for. My job at costco for example, I would be making something like 19 an hour plus benefits at this point had I stayed there all this time.

Tvtyrant

2015-06-07, 06:03 PM

So I would have to be 13 again? Uggh. I am sure I would be a much less sullen 13 year old and would have a better experience knowing what I know now, but still. Also I think my parents would notice me being suddenly well adjusted and would be weirded out. Also being unable to get consent due to being twive as old as the girls in the same age group. Nope, I will stick to being me thanks.

anti-ninja

2015-06-08, 07:29 PM

Curse maybe im just paranoid but I don't like the idea of messing with the space time continuum .:smalleek:

Knaight

2015-06-09, 04:11 PM

Blessing. It's not like the past 11 years have been bad per-se (though parts of them have), but I'd be able to make the replacements better. I'm reasonably sure I'd be able to hit it off again with much of my core friend group, I'd still have my family (parents and brother, not children or anything), and I'd be able to live life successfully. Graduate from highschool earlier and with college credit, get through college quickly, get a better start on jobs and job experience, do the whole "child prodigy" thing.

With that said, I'd honestly rather not have the memories for the most part. The knowledge is a must, the rest can go.

Comrade

2015-06-09, 06:02 PM

Hell yeah it'd be a blessing. I could fix so many of the things that are completely ****ing me over now. Not only would the positives decidedly outweigh the negatives, I couldn't even really come up with any negatives in the first place. Sign me right up.

YeaCatnipHulk

2015-06-09, 06:22 PM

This would be a curse. 9 year old me would know the exact day my mother was going to walk out on me.
Although I would have knowledge of all the cruel boyfriends before even having to date them. Then I would know who to stay away from and who would be kind. So that would be a blessing.
Both a curse and a blessing I guess!

Killer Angel

2015-06-10, 06:17 AM

The tricky part of this thread is the context of the OP...

You wake up to discover... Its not your choice to go or not to go... Its done...

It's absolutely a curse (I would lose my family). But, giving that I have no choice, I would work around it to make it a little blessing, exploiting my knowledge of the future events.

themaque

2015-06-10, 04:18 PM

It's absolutely a curse (I would lose my family). But, giving that I have no choice, I would work around it to make it a little blessing, exploiting my knowledge of the future events.

II would second this answer. It's the lack of control, to just be thrown there, not knowing why, wondering if I was crazy, and always hope/fearing it will just as suddenly revert back.

luckily recreating the events that lead to meeting my wife would be easily recreated.

noparlpf

2015-06-10, 07:45 PM

Aww hell no. I'd be 10 1/2 and sometime around November of 2004, I think. I am not going through puberty again. Or high school. Or college. Even if I could do things better the second time around, that would be awful.

FinnLassie

2015-06-11, 05:05 AM

I have to say, after reading how a lot of you have your own family, children and such, is really making me think that the situation wouldn't be as big of a curse as it is for other people... Though, it'd still be a curse for sure. I guess the only thing I'd do differently, or at least try, would be /not/ to blow my inheritance the moment I turn 18. As I've stated before in this thread, it would still be utter hell and I don't know if I'd be able to live my nightmares and traumas all over again.

dmaxno

2015-06-11, 10:12 AM

Personally, a curse:
It would be a curse because of my children. I would be afraid of them not being who they are right now. I would also miss them terribly for many years. Also, while I would with my partner sooner, it would be strange to not have gone through all that growth together.
Some parts would still be a blessing. I only learned what living without regrets really means some 10 years ago; a few more years of that would feel great. I would be able to marry my partner a lot sooner than I did and share a calm confidence of how we grew stronger together. I was very unkind to many wonderful people (though I always felt justified), I would like the chance to change that. I also would like a chance to live a youth less driven by fear - I had a lot of fear that I had simply not recognised as such.

One more: a hidden curse would be living life with less uncertainty. I find that accepting uncertainty and making my decisions that way is an important part of who I am. It would be odd, even confusing to lose that. My decisions may become more external and driven by circumstance. when the 18 repeat years came ot an end, I may find it difficult to turn back to myself and be accepting/embracing of uncertainty.

Generally, a blessing:
Financially, I could reap benefits of various trends (gold, market booms and bubble, various stock to buy early).
Socially, I could do a little bit to try and reduce the damage of some tragedies/catastrophes I remember clearly enough to take effective action.

Taet

2015-06-11, 10:53 AM

I go back and have to make it four years before getting close to the disaster that was in real life close to me. I know enough to just plain stop it. Not maybe make it a little less awful. Just plain stop it. Not too many people can live through a few years more of unhappiness in trade for that.

But I only have three years. I know now hwat I had then was the kind of sickness it takes many months to find the right drugs. And I am not afraid of the drugs now but that still takes time. And while that was going on I had no power to do anything useful with anyone's life.

It will be an interesting race. :smallsigh:

Jay R

2015-06-11, 12:02 PM

Tyndmyr

2015-06-11, 05:05 PM

Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning, and you went "back in time" suddenly half your current age, as if someone hit "rewind" on your life.

Say you are 20... well it is 2005 again, or if you are 40, it is 1995 again, etc.

Everything is exactly as it was at that point in time. The only difference is you retain your memory of the... future.

No warning, no prep time.

Would this be a blessing or a curse?

Blessing. Mostly. I mean, knowledge of the future enables me to avoid errors. And also to exploit knowledge of the future. On the other hand, not being an adult would suck, but living an extra long subjective life is pretty frigging cool.

Remmirath

2015-06-12, 01:14 AM

I think that, on the whole, it would end up more blessing than curse. There would be some relived pain, to be sure, but the decisions that I feel have most shaped my life had either already been made at that point or are not ones that I would alter -- at least, that is what I think. It could well be that there were some I didn't even think of which would have a great effect on my life nontheless if they were different.

I'd get, essentially, twelve-thirteen years more to live, depending on how you round it. Hard to argue with that. Assuming, of course, that I'm still guaranteed or at least equally likely to live through them...

I would already know how to interact with people, so I wouldn't miss so many opportunities due to refusing to talk to people. I'd know that getting highschool over with sooner would be easier, and I'd already know most of the material, so that would be much easier (I imagine that's better for me, being homeschooled, than people who went to public school -- I'd just get through the work faster, after all). Meeting my friends all over again would be kind of weird, but there's no particular reason I wouldn't still become friends with them. I haven't changed very much for most of my life, after all. I'd be able to talk to my grandmother more, and my oma. I'd still do all the theatre stuff I did, I'd have more time to work on my art and writing, and I'd still take that stage combat class that got me started into that. I'd be able to learn more languages, and in general, learn more.

On the other hand, I might be tempted to meddle in things. Nothing huge or world-changing, since I certainly didn't have the power or influence as a twelve-year-old to influence such things (and I still don't), but I might be tempted to do things like try to get my parents to get along with each other better, or get the theatre company I'm with to move into a better place sooner so that some unfortunate things didn't happen, that sort of thing.

It's also interesting to contemplate what I would do in the few situations in my life where I encountered great pain but could have avoided it. Would I still go out riding my bike that one time which led to my breaking my leg so badly, and if so, would I still ride at the same speed and make the same stupid mistake? If I didn't do that, would I end up making some other (potentially worse) mistake on the same day?

All in all, given the choice, I might go for it, although I'd have to seriously think about it. If I simply woke up that way, I'd make the best of it.

Kittenwolf

2015-06-12, 01:53 AM

Blessing, definitely. Yes, there would be friends that I might not make due to butterfly effect and others who might be a tad confused by "OMG I haven't seen you in years!" *HUGS* "Err.. we've never met..." type events.

But on the other hand, a chance to throw off parental indoctrination, realise my gender identity earlier, buy up all of Google's stock, travel the world and generally live my life over..

Gimmie!

Chen

2015-06-12, 07:25 AM

Blessing? Curse? Nothing so trivial.

It would be a mission.

I would have 165 days to try to convince Morton Thiokol and NASA not to trust the o-rings in cold weather, before the Challenger disaster.

If I succeeded, it would be a blessing. If I failed, it would be a curse.

You realize this could have much worse ramifications right? You could possibly save 7 astronauts just to have regulations and the like not get as beefed up, not have nearly as big an investigation into O-rings and the like and have an even worse disaster occur a few years later. There was no real collateral damage which could very well not have been the case should something happen without all the investigation/changes that came from Challenger. I'm not sure 7 lives is worth that kind of risk.

It would also probably change the world sufficiently that your other "future" knowledge would be rendered obsolete, despite the impact in terms of loss of life being so small. It was still an event that everyone in the world was talking about.

Mx.Silver

2015-06-12, 09:33 AM

You realize this could have much worse ramifications right? You could possibly save 7 astronauts just to have regulations and the like not get as beefed up, not have nearly as big an investigation into O-rings and the like and have an even worse disaster occur a few years later. There was no real collateral damage which could very well not have been the case should something happen without all the investigation/changes that came from Challenger. I'm not sure 7 lives is worth that kind of risk.

You can make this exact same claim about taking any action now. For instance, if you go for a walk this weekend and see someone drowning in a lake, then by throwing them a lifeline you might be ensuring that this person will survive to go out for a drink to celebrate later, get drunk and crash into a family car, killing the three children on the back seat. Therefore the correct choice of action is to leave them to drown; saving their life just isn't worth that kind of risk.

Point being: if you're not going to do something positive on the off-chance that it might lead to something worse then you can do nothing, because it will always be possible to contrive a hypothetical scenario where something bad happens as a result.

Tvtyrant

2015-06-12, 10:05 AM

To be fair I tend to think this world is actually the best possible one now. From a time traveling perspective I think you are likely to make things much, much worse.

Which isn't really important because time travel isn't real and I think the thread is more about would you fix/change your own life or not, not whether you can alter major events or strike it rich using google or amazon.

factotum

2015-06-12, 10:11 AM

You could possibly save 7 astronauts just to have regulations and the like not get as beefed up, not have nearly as big an investigation into O-rings and the like and have an even worse disaster occur a few years later.

There already *was* another disaster a few years later...the shuttle Columbia disaster. All those extra checks and regulations helped a lot in that case, eh?

Chen

2015-06-12, 11:49 AM

There already *was* another disaster a few years later...the shuttle Columbia disaster. All those extra checks and regulations helped a lot in that case, eh?

17 years and 50ish shuttle missons later, I'm ok to say that those regulations probably did help a fair bit. Especially considering the two disasters were not linked in any real way except for the fact they happened to a shuttle.

Both of these disasters were actually extremely minor in terms of loss of life. An explosion of a shuttle right at launch would have far more devastating consequences let alone if it somehow got loose and crashed somewhere populated (probably the reason why they can blow the thing up themselves). If you're going to use future knowledge to somehow fix an event, I'd imagine you'd want to do one that affected far more lives.

Unless of course you personally knew someone on Challenger I suppose. I can certainly understand saving a loved one from tragedy no matter what the unintended consequences might be.

Jay R

2015-06-14, 07:21 AM

It would also probably change the world sufficiently that your other "future" knowledge would be rendered obsolete, despite the impact in terms of loss of life being so small. It was still an event that everyone in the world was talking about.

It could also have much greater ramifications. "We got an anonymous call from somebody who understood the risks more than all our engineers. We have to beef up all our safety measures. [And all our security measures, too. How did he have enough information?]

And maybe they'd believe me when I phoned in later about the later tragedies whose approximate dates I can remember.

It would also probably change the world sufficiently that your other "future" knowledge would be rendered obsolete, despite the impact in terms of loss of life being so small. It was still an event that everyone in the world was talking about.

True, but I don't expect that it would prevent Windows from taking over the operating system market, with (originally) no real competitors. And the big Disney proxy fight would still end up with Eisner and the 90s Disney explosion. Those are both underway already, and not likely to be derailed immediately. And the talk about the space program shouldn't affect American football all that much for a few years.

Maybe somebody else besides Amazon starts the first online books sales business, but I know enough to recognize the winning model while it's still quite new. I know the exact signs to tell when Nortel will collapse under its own weight.

My biggest investment worry is that I might become known as somebody who's always right, and then companies I pick might start assuming they cannot fail, and stop being so careful.

But you're right. I understand Chaos Theory, and would watch for signs of too much accumulated change, and would then retire from the prognostication business.

drack

2015-06-14, 09:16 PM

Well, it'd be pretty darned cool in my oppinion. My last however many years were neither great nor terrible and I probably wouldn't change much (OK, I'd be tempted to grab the easy money juggling stocks, but you know how it goes), but it would still be pretty cool to be able to re-live them all, life is great that way. :smallbiggrin: I mean I'd have a blast, but whatever you plan there's bound to be a pretty little swarm of butterfly effects set loose behind you so it'd be interesting to say the least.

noparlpf

2015-06-14, 09:40 PM

I don't know how anybody would be able to make money off of stocks or gambling. Are there people who just know off the top of their head what stocks did amazingly well or what sports teams won unexpectedly? All I know off the top of my head is my computer password and some gaming or bio trivia. Did you know that wombats have square poop?

thorgrim29

2015-06-14, 09:53 PM

Off the top of my head, in the last decade or so, Google, Tesla, Amazon, Apple did incredibly well, You could buy oil futures and sell them summer 2008, buy back stock in GM and tech company once it bottoms in early 2009. You might be able to get away with shorting stock just before the crash but that's starting to be risky, most small investors don't short stock and at that point I'd be 18 so I can't count on having too much money. Then buy gold and silver, sell it mid 2011. Oil also peaks back up a few times between then and now. Finally, put a few thousand in bitcoin and sell before the FBI takedown of Silk Road (not sure about the date, late 2013, early 2014 to be safe), easily get a crazy return. A couple of other things too, short RIM in late 2010, buy Potash Corp stock and sell it a few weeks after they start talking about the chinese buyout because the canadian government is going to block it... More recently, short facebook stock during their IPO, get in on the ground floor of the BRP and Linkedin IPOs.... Yeah that's about it.

About gambling... i don't follow sports too much but I know a few golf and tennis players I could bet on (or against). Do people bet on elections? Because predicting the result of the 2012 american elections before november 2008 would be fairly profitable I'm sure

drack

2015-06-14, 10:21 PM

Off the top of my head, in the last decade or so, Google, Tesla, Amazon, Apple did incredibly well, You could buy oil futures and sell them summer 2008, buy back stock in GM and tech company once it bottoms in early 2009. You might be able to get away with shorting stock just before the crash but that's starting to be risky, most small investors don't short stock and at that point I'd be 18 so I can't count on having too much money. Then buy gold and silver, sell it mid 2011. Oil also peaks back up a few times between then and now. Finally, put a few thousand in bitcoin and sell before the FBI takedown of Silk Road (not sure about the date, late 2013, early 2014 to be safe), easily get a crazy return. A couple of other things too, short RIM in late 2010, buy Potash Corp stock and sell it a few weeks after they start talking about the chinese buyout because the canadian government is going to block it... More recently, short facebook stock during their IPO, get in on the ground floor of the BRP and Linkedin IPOs.... Yeah that's about it.

Yup, that's about what I had off the top of my head too. Just the big stuff everyone knows about, because it all made enough money to take your petty 18 year old cash and make it big. :smallsmile:

veti

2015-06-14, 10:47 PM

Difficult question.

On the one hand - there are people I desperately miss, from that time. And personally, many mistakes I've made that I'd love to do-over.

On the other hand - it'd mean losing my family. Maybe I could re-encounter my spouse and re-create the kids, or something like enough to them that I could persuade myself they were the same. Maybe. But that seems a heck of a target to be aiming for, over such a period. It'd be hard to hit.

"Indecently rich" would be a plus, certainly. "Spending all my time trying to remember the things I or others could be benefiting from", on the other hand, would be painful. I think I'd greet it with relief when mid-2015 rolled around again, and I was relieved of the burden of future knowledge.

"Reliving all life's disappointments and tragedies"? Heck, I could live with that. At the very least, I think they'd be a lot less painful the second time around. Some of them I may be able to avoid entirely, others I could mitigate with my newfound wealth. And the immediate future currently looks pretty well loaded with tragedy of its own, which I'm currently powerless to mitigate, but could do with an eight-digit bank balance.

So on balance, probably a blessing. That's on the basis that I probably could rebuild the family to a reasonable, although more prosperous, version of what I have today. I'd certainly try.

Knaight

2015-06-15, 12:47 PM

Killer Angel

2015-06-15, 04:41 PM

I don't know how anybody would be able to make money off of stocks or gambling. Are there people who just know off the top of their head what stocks did amazingly well or what sports teams won unexpectedly?

To remember exploits by underdogs (2004 Red Sox?) certainly help, but it's not necessary.
World cup 2010 in Brazil, won by Germany... at the beginning of the tournament, the bets on germany as winner, were around 1:8.
Knowing the final result, if you can invest 20-30k, you'll make certainly some nice money. And the same can be said for single matches (brazil-germany 1-7).

Taet

2015-06-15, 09:53 PM

Aliquid

2015-06-15, 10:21 PM

I dreamed about this and saw the mistake. In the dream I said to the teacher, I have no idea how to answer your test. Or what my next class is or where or with who. The me of today has forgotten all that.

What will the people around me do with someone who has forgotten what was easy to remember yesterday? :smallconfused: Never mind that I was not sick then. Those around me would think I was sick that very day.Good point! It is interesting that after 100 posts... nobody has brought this up yet.

I was working and at college at the time... I would wake up and have no idea what I was supposed to be doing that day. Do I have classes? Which ones? Should I be working? I'm sure there would be many aspects of my job at the time that I would totally forget...

drack

2015-06-15, 10:32 PM

There's nobody in your life you could ask? :smallconfused: (You know, at the risk of sounding insane.)

Taet

2015-06-15, 11:00 PM

I just had an even worse thought. Did you ever meet someone who just seemed to forget everything he knew, one day? Did this happen already to him? :smalleek:

There's nobody in your life you could ask? :smallconfused: (You know, at the risk of sounding insane.)
Not that year no. There was not even anyone to follow to class two. And the schedule is in the locker behind a lock that I forget how to open.

A year later is fine. I remember enough of that year that I can at least get where I need to go. And looking back I was losing my grip even then so just forgetting big parts of everything would only push up the schedule.

drack

2015-06-15, 11:25 PM

I just had an even worse thought. Did you ever meet someone who just seemed to forget everything he knew, one day? Did this happen already to him? :smalleek:

That is a worse though. :smalleek:

Or following with the wake up in the past, it's the first day of finals, now remember which classes you had and where the finals were, not to mention what might be on them. :smalltongue:

Falling back a year in highschool you enjoy unrelenting financial success whilst unable to recall what your friend's actual name is, only the nic-name that he hated with a passion back then. :smallwink:

Not that year no. There was not even anyone to follow to class two. And the schedule is in the locker behind a lock that I forget how to open.

A year later is fine. I remember enough of that year that I can at least get where I need to go. And looking back I was losing my grip even then so just forgetting big parts of everything would only push up the schedule.
Administration might know. :smallsmile:

Killer Angel

2015-06-16, 06:07 AM

I dreamed about this and saw the mistake. In the dream I said to the teacher, I have no idea how to answer your test. Or what my next class is or where or with who. The me of today has forgotten all that.

I don't think it would be so difficult.
I was at the university, mastering things I now have largely forgotten. But I would have my books and my appointed schedule, and I remember my friends. My doubts won't last long.

noparlpf

2015-06-16, 07:17 AM

Let's see, when I was ten I was in...7th grade? Yeah. We had the day's schedule on the classroom wall there, and I can still do anything I learned in middle school. That wouldn't be my biggest problem, just the rest of being stuck in middle school again.

Aliquid

2015-06-16, 09:40 AM

Heck, I don't even know which job I had at that point in time, let alone which shifts I was working.

FinnLassie

2015-06-16, 11:44 AM

I have photographic memory and remember pretty much all of my school schedules. Heck, I had some reeeeally cute schedule layouts I printed from the interwabs, no wonder I remember them so easily.

Let's see, what did I have back then on tomorrow's schedule...?

Wednesday, chemistry from 8 to 11am... brrrh. :smallsigh: Though, going back to chemistry wouldn't be any different, because I've always been reeeeeally just not getting it. Meh... Well, a good thing would be that I'd know how creepy the teacher would get with teenage girls and avoid his help as much as possible (it never helped anyway, as he would be uncomfortably close, breathing to your hair and "accidentally" brushing his hands on everyone's shoulders).

LUNCH LUNCH MUNCH MUNCH

11.30 onwards I had maths which I was nearly failing at that point. Not that I didn't know how to do math, I was just unmotivated and slower than others... plus, I dunno, I wanted to suck as much as my friends did so I'd get to be in their maths group. That didn't work out, I did too well with my exams that it outweighed my half-arsed homework. Damn it. :smalltongue: :smallwink:

Aaaand last lesson of the day was music for two hours. Heck yeah.

Jay R

2015-06-16, 02:14 PM

I know where I was working, what the main task was, and I wrote the program to do it. I don't think it would be too hard to get back into it, but that first cycle I might be pretty slow.

The frustrating part would be handling day-to-day tasks with no Internet, no cell phone, no GPS, no bank ATMs, etc. We've started depending on a lot of detail-avoiding labor-saving devices in the last 29 years.

Heck, I'd have to start using f-stops and exposure times again when taking pictures.

dancrilis

2015-06-16, 02:31 PM

Would this be a blessing or a curse?

No - it would just be life and I would have to get on with it.

I would likely bet on a few of the disasters, elections, etc that have occured in the meantime to make some additional money, possible invest in some companies that have done well, if I could get the money I might purshase some property at the height of prices prior to the collapse, buy some early bit coins etc (might sell them now).

The most interesting thing for me would be whether I was stuck in some long 'groundhog day' loop - I suspect after a few decades of that I would start to enjoy screwing with peoples lives and seeing the impact of the world around them, could be fun.

Starwulf

2015-06-17, 12:39 AM

dmaxno

2015-06-17, 04:20 AM

snowblizz

2015-06-17, 03:45 PM

Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning, and you went "back in time" suddenly half your current age, as if someone hit "rewind" on your life.

Say you are 20... well it is 2005 again, or if you are 40, it is 1995 again, etc.

Everything is exactly as it was at that point in time. The only difference is you retain your memory of the... future.

No warning, no prep time.

Would this be a blessing or a curse?
Enormous blessing. I'd be a billionaire in no time at all. I've even thought about it now and then and know by and large where and when I'd do it.

Of course the hauntingly sad part here is that reliving the last 17 years really wouldn't change much, in the here and now (other than that huge pile o' cash would quite probably change me as a person). There's nothing superbly positive I'd worry about screwing up. That's actually quite terrifying as a thought. I need to stop thinking about this. Like right now.

noparlpf

2015-06-17, 07:33 PM

I guess a lot of the trouble with remembering what you knew depends of what time you go back to.
For me, I would be back to my first year of Uni, which would be hard but not terribly. However, if I had landed on my senior year in college or on the day before an entrance exam... that would be drastically different. Without time to prepare, there is a lot I would not be able to review on time.

Yeah, middle school or high school were such bs that it would be no problem. Even on a test day it wouldn't be too bad for most of my classes. Anything after freshman year of college...well, I know the gist of most of it, but to remember enough specific details to pass an exam in an upper-level course I'd probably need a few days' notice to review my notes.

DJ Yung Crunk

2015-06-18, 04:00 AM

2003, eh? I'd probably invest in iTunes.

valadil

2015-06-20, 11:45 AM

That would put me back in high school which would suck. But it would put me back there with a whole lot more experiences. I could skip the stuff I didn't enjoy so much and rush ahead to the best parts.

For instance I didn't start playing music or hitting the gym til after college. I love both activities, even more than video games. I'd rather do those all the sooner. I might have beaten obesity by college instead of at 30.

From a professional pov this would also be fantastic. Even without the experience I have now, just knowing which tech would stay mainstream and which was a flash in the pan would be huge. For instance I assumed Ruby on Rails was a fad when it was new and only started with it last year. If I could have used it and stuck with it in 2005 I'd be so ahead of where I am now.

noparlpf

2015-06-20, 01:43 PM

If I were stuck at 10 again and wanted to get back to now with things I want intact and things I want different changed...

When we moved and I switched to a public high school for tenth grade I would insist I take more advanced classes my first year there. Some of what I did was a joke and I could have handled more even without my current knowledge. Setting things up better for prereqs I could have graduated in eleventh grade, although I'm not sure even now-me could beat out that year's valedictorian. That guy was the only one in the school who regularly beat me at chess and even taking gym electives he had a 4.9 GPA. Beating that would be a pain. I'd probably skip the social nonsense of high school. Graduating at 15 I guess I would do a year of prereqs at the local college and start on Italian while I had the time. I never managed to get around to that in this timeline. Then I'd have to go to the college I originally went to to meet the people I did. Start on my degree properly this time, including extracurricular experience. (Maybe I'd try to make sure my other pre-vet friend passed physics the first time through so we could actually get in the first time.) Make sure I got my license and car earlier. Transfer schools and finish my degree without wasting time on as many pointless courses as I did. Make sure to get to know two of the professors I would have liked to know better, maybe try to do lab work with the one of them. Maybe I could actually get into the VMD/PhD that way. And not spend two gap years before grad school.

Oh, health. Imagine how much better things could have gone without reliving some pointless traumas that I'm finally almost past. Or if I started on my head meds earlier without wasting three years on bad ones. Or if I caught that ulcer earlier and didn't lose 15 kilos I still haven't regained, not to mention all the Bs and Ws that put on my transcript that should have been As. I could have caught both ticks early enough to avoid Lyne but then who knows if a third would have gotten me. Maybe avoid breaking my ankle stupidly. Or getting pneumonia that one time, I would be on a different timeline by then and not be doing twelfth grade so maybe environmental factors would be different. Maybe even get my wrist looked at by the same surgeon a few years earlier and avoid the surgery ending up as complicated as it did, if I could convince him it needed to be done before it got that bad. Who knows.

But living through puberty again and having to drag through high school again would suck even though I could get out of that public school after two years. Maybe I could kill time doing online courses to get prereqs out of the way.

Overall it might turn out better eventually but that's both the worst and best ten years to do over with an adult mind.