It feels kinda wrong how quickly some people say they wouldn't kill hitler if they were sent back in time and given the opportunity.

I'm using that scenario because it seems like a common example, but I'm curious about how materialist theory would approach this.

Barring the sci-fi theories around time travel and whether a new timeline is created, where I believe it's fair game to change the past (since it's a new timeline) would it be morally right to improve the world if flung into a version of the past?

My thought is that it would be a moral obligation to help with things and not just be a witness to atrocity.

Edit: I think my question was more - Is it wrong to do nothing if flung into the past when you know what is likely to happen, or is it more wrong to try to prevent or change it?

I ask because it's almost a given in media and general discussion that you don't mess with things on the chance you make things worse by interfering. That argument feels flawed and lib- brained and I don't think I would be okay with a bad thing happening in front of me just because that's how it happened in my history book. Like the idea of standing by and doing nothing in the face of suffering feels wrong especially with something as nebulous as 'affecting the timeline'

  • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
    ·
    3 months ago

    Depends on how far back you go, doesn't it?

    If I'm back in like, 1850, I have a bunch of pop-sci understanding of technology I could at least get electrification off the ground if I had a team to help me work out the kinks in my batteries and generators. Maybe figure out metal machining so when John Brown starts his slave rebellion he can have semi-automatic rifles and machine guns.

    If it's 1950, the hell could I even do? Make some well placed investments so I can be a big bourgeois class traitor? I guess?

      • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
        ·
        3 months ago

        Not sure how I'd convince them of anything. I'd have to, like, predict the dates of events before they happened to pull that off I think. I don't know 20th century history well enough to do that. I guess the Moon landing? I could predict the name of the vessel, the month, and the year. That's pretty good, but, probably not enough to prove something as ridiculous as time travel.

        Kennedy is killed... sometime before that. Don't remember the date.

        I have no idea how vacuum tube computers work either, and even less of a clue how semiconductors work, so... lol?