Something for Contemplate and Writing Update

[desuvan]

Consider this: You go back in time and meet someone from two centuries ago. I've been saying Thomas Jefferson, but really, it could be anyone predating industrialization. They believe you when you tell them you're from the future, and want to know what the greatest achievement of humanity is. (Not counting time-travel itself. :p ) What do you tell

Comments

[thunderpigeon]

If it's Jefferson, specifically . . . I'd tell him that the biggest accomplishment in America was outlawing slavery.

Then I'd watch his face. I'd love to know whether hearing this would make him proud, or embarrassed, or full of hope.

And, if he was with me, still, I'd tell him that in the Twenty-First Century, anybody can sit together in a restaurant, regardless of race or religion, and that a black man got elected President in a landslide.

[desuvan]

Perhaps I shouldn't have said Jefferson, since I really meant any intellectual from the past.

[tormod]

I'd have to say our discovery that we are not alone in the universe. We have had actual conversations in English with parrots and apes. And there are definitely other planets orbiting other stars.