5 Engineers: You've got your own time machine. What do you do with it?
Last week in our 5 Engineers section - part of this blog and our Fun Friday newsletter, where we toss out a question and invite our audience to respond with their wittiest answers - we asked: What gadget are you hoping to get this holiday season, either as a gift for someone or as a gift for yourself?
There have been several great answers posted so far. Visit this page to share your own answer.
There’s one answer that keeps coming up, though, no matter what the question is that we present. That answer is: time machine. It’s what some of you want as a holiday gift, it’s what some of you would build with an unlimited budget, and mentions of time machines are sprinkled throughout EDN’s various other comment areas, as well.
It’s easy to see why time machines and time manipulation come up so much. Who doesn’t want or simply need more time???! So we’re busting out our flux capacitors and putting you behind the wheel of your own time machine (DeLorean model or otherwise).
For this week’s question, let’s just say you have your own time machine with enough “jigowatt” charge to perform just 1 task. What do you do with it and why? And let’s skip the obvious answer of “go back in time and gather more fuel to perform as many tasks as I want.” Think of this as a 1 time shot.
Post your short answers below by Thursday, December 8. We’ll pick five and feature them in the December 9, Fun Friday newsletter. And be sure to stay tuned to this blog for more 5 Engineers questions in the weeks to come!
oldtimer8080 commented:
Make sure Alois Hiter had a rubber.
Make sure that that Kenyan's father had a rubber.
Make sure every wacko environmentalists father had a rubber ( Al Gore included )
Bring back the Founding Fathers to see the mess we have made of the Republic and get their recommendations on how to recreate their vision.
Ditto for Abraham Lincoln. He would know how to deal with " sharpie " Sharpton and people of that ilk.
Dweeb commented:
What's the big deal? We're all time travelers on this bus.
Time flies like an arrow --> fruit flies like a banana.
C. Paulino commented:
I would check swell data and go back to a good surfing day on Fiji with my friends.
Glenn DeMichele commented:
Use it to live in the present for a bit longer.
Jaba commented:
Go back 15 years and reserve all best URLs for sale later!
Bea commented:
Make sure that some of my school teachers knew that girls were good at sicience too.
Duane Dreb commented:
Invest a few hundred dollars in Wal Mart, Microsoft, and Apple in the early 70's, so I could return to the current time and retire filthy rich!
Susmit Sen commented:
I would go ahead in time, say 100 years and go to the best genetics lab in the world. Come back with the best gene therapeutic medicines I can find. Then travel back to when I was in my mother's womb. Apply the medicines on my own fetus, and be born the healthiest person on earth. I will give myself a few more inches of height and blue eyes while I am at it :).
AliGeda commented:
Burn all the oils, so there be no more wars
Battar commented:
I would go back 21.5 years and patent all sorts of stuff so that today they would be in the public domain.
A_Miner_Hokie commented:
Go back to 11th grade and ask the Chemistry teacher why he sat beside me during an entire test and watched me operate my slide rule.
Steve K commented:
Travel back to the garden of eden for a second chance...
Roberto Varela commented:
Get back to 1977 to invest in Apple Computer, Inc.
W commented:
Stop bad presidents from coming from Texas
Bill G. commented:
Stay in school!
keakman commented:
Everything!
Martha commented:
I think I would like to go collect Leonardo da Vinci and bring him back to the 21st century--we need his thought processes!
Regressor commented:
I make sure Mary has twin daughters.
Kali commented:
Will go back to start from kindergarden...
HobanHemi commented:
Stop bad presidents from coming to america illegally as kids
Mike Dicks commented:
Go back in time so that I can invent the time machine before anyone else (and collect royalties!)
dB commented:
Destroy it. Didn't you see that movie? It's scary out there!
emm commented:
sell enron
