Past or Future
 

I've searched if there was already a thread like this but I didn't find one. So if you found a time machine would you go back to the past or the future? If I found a time machine I'd go to the future, you can always read about the past but you're not going to be around long enough to see all the things that are going to happen in the future.

I'd go back to the past and re-do some things I messed up on the first time around. There's no WAY I'd go to the future. Just think how old I'd be! I might even be dead. Forget that.

I'd go 100 years into the future, where everyone I know now would be dead.

I'd get to start over where I'd never made a bad impression on anyone, and possibly fulfill my dream of becoming a space marine.

I would mostly go a few years into the past to just to not mess up on a few classes that did poorly in. Other than that, I wouldn't go any further back and I won't go into the future. I don't want to know what's going on there.

I will go to the past and want to meet these persons, hopefully they speak english:
-Jesus Christ
-Leonardo da Vinci
-Mozart
-Bach
-Chopin
-Hitler
-Thomas Hobbes

And I want to see the world's end. I want to go 5 billion years by now, where the earth will die soon. I wonder if there is still human left in our planet.

The sun is probably going to blow up around that time.

The future, obviously. Aside from me not being a big fan of the Black Death, among others, it's somewhat more likely that if I don't like where I end up, I'll be able to come back. Plus I get to steal future technology, come back in the present, use it to take over the world, and possibly destroy the entire universe in the process because of some time paradox. But it's as they say, no pain, no gain.

Alternatively, there's always the classic "Kill Hitler" which could be interesting.

Future:

- I couldn't stand not living in today's technologically advanced world, if I were to go in the past. I would be curious to see how much more we could possibly invent.
- This sounds silly, but after watching Fate Stay Night, I would rather let the past rest in peace. No point in trying to redo anything for me, however much I'd want to.
- My view is that history will always force the past upon us, so I'll leave it in textbooks, rather than experience it firsthand.

I'd probably want to go a few years back in the past. At least I know what to expect from the past and how the world is, but I probably couldn't say the same about the future.

While I would like to visit the past, I'm more interested in the future. I want to see what life on Earth is like, say, 500, then 5,000, then 500,000, and finally 10 million years from now. Assuming we haven't wiped each other out via nuclear war or some other weapon of mass destruction, we will probably be pretty advanced and will probably have technology to visit other star systems (and that'd be something I would want to do in the future, visit the stars or even galaxies if that's feasible and see what lies out there).

Also, would we still look like the way we do today? Or will we have evolved into something else entirely by that point? Or I wonder if I'd have to jump another 3 billion years ahead to see.

And yeah, our sun won't blow up, as it's not massive enough. Yeah it's big, but I think only stars that glow blue or white are massive enough to explode (and you don't want to be around those, cause their so big they'd reach the orbit of Jupiter if you were to replace our sun with it in this solar system. Not only that, they only live for a few million years before they exhaust their fuel supply and explode, compared to our sun's billions of years).

It's a big universe out there, and our sun is only one of trillions of other stars, and our galaxy is only one of billions out there. Hopefully someday we'll be able to explore the farthest reaches of the galaxy to see what's out there (and hopefully we don't run into any alien civilization that's more advanced than us and wipes us out in the process).

This is interesting point. I thought we, homo sapiens are the final form of evolution. Perhaps we have evolved to another heavenly being or we are ceased to exist because we couldnt cope with the global warming and numerous disaster which (might) brought the end of humanity. I wonder if there is still nature's selection up today.

i'd go back a few decades to see what's up but not do anything to screw up the space time continuum. then i'd go to the future and do whatever the hell i want, i want to see what it's gonna be like a few hundred years from now.

I'd flash to the future, get winning lotto numbers, flash back to present and become a millionaire.

I'd goto the past because I want to see all of the things that I used to do at the time - and some of those things (like video games) would be brand new. I'd love to goto 1990's Funcoland and buy games!!!!

I'd probably go to the past. I couldn't deal with the uncertainty of the future; what happens if you arrive and discover everything is dead and gone? I'm not sure where in the past I would visit. Probably the 60's.

I'd go back in time and make President Ford fall down some stairs in front of the press. Would be pretty embarassing!

Mission: Success

Both!

Past - To see what life was like before the TV and internet :)

Future - Have a look at the technology to see how it is going to progress from todays technology, and also to see how i'm getting on.

Past, I need to tell my younger self to get a life and a back bone. There's so much I'd do over, so many people I'd yell at, plus maybe I can stop that damn Boy Band trend/fad thing from starting.

I would use it to browse the future. Stopping at notable moments. World ending, oil ending, wars starting, inventions being made, shit like that.

What's with the time traveling thread? Anyway, I've often wished I could go back to the past and do stuff differently (not sure if "going to the past" means I'm still the me in the past or if I'm me from the future as another body in the past..., but whatever). But I think now I'd avoid it as I'm done with everything already and wouldn't want to bother anymore. So yeah, kinda what Burniate-man said, I'll check out the future.

No way I'd go into the future. I'm not sure I could deal with a sudden, instant knowledge of everything that will happen to me and others, especially if it turns out to be less than pleasant.

So I'd go into the past. I'm not sure how far; enough that I could take a look at a simpler life without so much dominant technological advance. Part of me desires that sort of existence, albeit a romanticized version of it. (And the other part of me that would wither and die without a computer can take comfort in the fact I could come back whenever I felt like it.)

Maybe I'd make a stop in the early 80s. I could go to a Duran Duran concert and be like WOOOOOO I LOVE YOU SIMON without feeling like a complete idiot. Oh wait. You didn't hear that!

Oh true! I change my stance then. Into the past I go. I'll attend concerts that I may have been too young or not even born for. I'd get legendary video games and systems in their complete awesomeness. I would also bring my computer because it would kick the asses of any other computer of the past. I'll do whatever else it takes to get a WTF expression out of earth's population.