Hypothetical Time Travel Party Game

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

This one only works once, so feel free to spring it on strangers at parties.


In this scenario, you wake up and it is September 10th, 2001. You are in your normal body for that time, wake up where and when you woke up that day, but you retain every bit of information in your head as of this moment. You have no prior warning that you're about to get time traveled, you don't know if you're going to come back ever, and you have no idea how it happened.

How do you, with your resources at that time and the information in your brain right now, prevent 9/11? No googling.

[Doktor Howl]

This one only works once, so feel free to spring it on strangers at parties.


In this scenario, you wake up and it is September 10th, 2001. You are in your normal body for that time, wake up where and when you woke up that day, but you retain every bit of information in your head as of this moment. You have no prior warning that you're about to get time traveled, you don't know if you're going to come back ever, and you have no idea how it happened.

How do you, with your resources at that time and the information in your brain right now, prevent 9/11? No googling.

I would instead place bets.

Because nobody would believe me, and all I could do by yelling shit ahead of time is get myself sent to Camp X-Ray.

[Dubya]

My thought process ran this way:

1. Call the FBI. Be hauled off for questioning.

2. Call in bomb threats to the airport. Can't remember which.

3. Get a good camera and get the first shots of it going down. Possibly get killed.

4. Call a good bookie and place bets. Don't even know where to start.

5. Call everyone I know in NY. Tell them I had a horrible premonition.

6. Do the stuff I didn't do between then and now

ETA: the best part of this whole exercise would be the chance to relive the years between then and now, at least within the rules of the game. Given a days warning beforehand and access to Google, someone so inclined might be able to make some kind of real difference if they were in a position to do something at the time, or else willing to break a few laws to get in such a position.

With no notice, though, Id be focusing on what I could change for the better - my own past stupidity.

[Cain]

-Google MI5's phone number while at school
- Call MI5 from my mobile phone
- Be ignored
- Spend the next decade in some post-imperial gulag, being questioned about how I knew via the medium of hot pokers, scopolamine and sleep deprivation.

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

take out some insurance policies

randomly crank call New Yorkers and hope chaos theory takes care of the rest from there

Publicly pronounce a curse upon the city of New York; convince everyone I have supernatural powers.

[Rev Thwack]

Real question is, do I act the jaded asshole and seek to profit from it, or do I believe I could have made a difference in the outcome? Of course, there is the third option, where I take a view of time travel where all possibilities if any action all occur for every action, thus meaning there are infinite timelines, and changing the past just changes the timeline I'm on, while the original timeline I was on continues unmodified, so no matter what I do it doesn't matter, as I'm actually doing everything I could possibly do, the only deciding factor is which timeline I consider to be more interesting for my consciousness to raise on. I guess a fourth would be if I believed that "fate" somehow plays into time, meaning that no matter what I did, the outcome would still eventually be the same, as with terminator 3.



So, does going to get drunk while pondering the nature of time travel and the importance of my possible actions, therefore impacting nothing due to my inaction count?

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Real question is, do I act the jaded asshole and seek to profit from it, or do I believe I could have made a difference in the outcome? Of course, there is the third option, where I take a view of time travel where all possibilities if any action all occur for every action, thus meaning there are infinite timelines, and changing the past just changes the timeline I'm on, while the original timeline I was on continues unmodified, so no matter what I do it doesn't matter, as I'm actually doing everything I could possibly do, the only deciding factor is which timeline I consider to be more interesting for my consciousness to raise on. I guess a fourth would be if I believed that "fate" somehow plays into time, meaning that no matter what I did, the outcome would still eventually be the same, as with terminator 3.



So, does going to get drunk while pondering the nature of time travel and the importance of my possible actions, therefore impacting nothing due to my inaction count?

I don't want to play party games with you.

[hooplala]

I would call Alex Jones and say "IT'S COMING!" in Paul Lynde's voice.

[Rev Thwack]

Real question is, do I act the jaded asshole and seek to profit from it, or do I believe I could have made a difference in the outcome? Of course, there is the third option, where I take a view of time travel where all possibilities if any action all occur for every action, thus meaning there are infinite timelines, and changing the past just changes the timeline I'm on, while the original timeline I was on continues unmodified, so no matter what I do it doesn't matter, as I'm actually doing everything I could possibly do, the only deciding factor is which timeline I consider to be more interesting for my consciousness to raise on. I guess a fourth would be if I believed that "fate" somehow plays into time, meaning that no matter what I did, the outcome would still eventually be the same, as with terminator 3.



So, does going to get drunk while pondering the nature of time travel and the importance of my possible actions, therefore impacting nothing due to my inaction count?

I don't want to play party games with you.

My work here is complete.

[Doktor Howl]

Real question is, do I act the jaded asshole and seek to profit from it, or do I believe I could have made a difference in the outcome? Of course, there is the third option, where I take a view of time travel where all possibilities if any action all occur for every action, thus meaning there are infinite timelines, and changing the past just changes the timeline I'm on, while the original timeline I was on continues unmodified, so no matter what I do it doesn't matter, as I'm actually doing everything I could possibly do, the only deciding factor is which timeline I consider to be more interesting for my consciousness to raise on. I guess a fourth would be if I believed that "fate" somehow plays into time, meaning that no matter what I did, the outcome would still eventually be the same, as with terminator 3.



So, does going to get drunk while pondering the nature of time travel and the importance of my possible actions, therefore impacting nothing due to my inaction count?

I don't want to play party games with you.

Thwack used to tell pancakes stories, back in 2004. 

They made me feel bad.  Like maybe if my kids started wearing the confederate flag on their jackets and the president threw my wife in Guantanamo.

[Junkenstein]

This one only works once, so feel free to spring it on strangers at parties.


In this scenario, you wake up and it is September 10th, 2001. You are in your normal body for that time, wake up where and when you woke up that day, but you retain every bit of information in your head as of this moment. You have no prior warning that you're about to get time traveled, you don't know if you're going to come back ever, and you have no idea how it happened.

How do you, with your resources at that time and the information in your brain right now, prevent 9/11? No googling.

I would instead place bets.

Because nobody would believe me, and all I could do by yelling shit ahead of time is get myself sent to Camp X-Ray.

Sweet fuck, you'd clean up like you'd never believe.

Just quickly you've got:
2nd term for GW, Followed by invading iraq, followed by Obama.

You'd clean out every redneck bookie in the southern US and that's just to start with. Imagine the odds you'd get on that in 2001.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Real question is, do I act the jaded asshole and seek to profit from it, or do I believe I could have made a difference in the outcome? Of course, there is the third option, where I take a view of time travel where all possibilities if any action all occur for every action, thus meaning there are infinite timelines, and changing the past just changes the timeline I'm on, while the original timeline I was on continues unmodified, so no matter what I do it doesn't matter, as I'm actually doing everything I could possibly do, the only deciding factor is which timeline I consider to be more interesting for my consciousness to raise on. I guess a fourth would be if I believed that "fate" somehow plays into time, meaning that no matter what I did, the outcome would still eventually be the same, as with terminator 3.



So, does going to get drunk while pondering the nature of time travel and the importance of my possible actions, therefore impacting nothing due to my inaction count?

I don't want to play party games with you.

Thwack used to tell pancakes stories, back in 2004. 

They made me feel bad.  Like maybe if my kids started wearing the confederate flag on their jackets and the president threw my wife in Guantanamo.

Do I want to know what a pancake story is?

[Junkenstein]

I kinda do.

[Junkenstein]

The other alternative, assuming no logistical way to prevent it is to follow your moral duty to mitigate harm.

As such, the quickest, most effective way to stop the world suffering that little bit (As you see it) would be to grab an 8-track or whatever and record crappy versions to the best of your abilities of the most annoying songs you remember from the period in between. Mail that shit to yourself and you're pretty fucking rich after a couple of lawsuits when they turn up.

Donate appropriately to places that you know will put it to the best use and not fuck people over.


As a bonus, whenever you now hear that song that pisses you off you're getting richer and helping others.

[Rev Thwack]

I kinda do.

http://principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=824.0