What if...?--Alternative History

I think alternative history is pretty awesome and cool...unfortunately I don't have a lot of patience, but I can appreciate what other people come up with! *grins sheepishly*

What if some major event or anything had been different? How do you think it would have changed the line of history? This is something I'd love to do if I had the patience >.<
And if I was smart enough *ahem*

I think one thing that particularly interests me is if customs and traditions we have today would have been different just from changing one thing or a few things in the line of time

Alex was going on vacation. He left work. He didn't take the time to clean his area before leaving. When he got back two weeks later, there was yellowish blue/green mold growing on one of the plates he had failed to clean up........

The plate was a petri dish containing a bacteria culture. He noticed one circular area in that culture was devoid of bacteria yet completely surrounded by mold. Instead of just throwing the plate away in disgust. Alex was curious. He thought that the mold must have released a substance preventing bacterial growth.

Alex tested his ideas and found that the spore of a rare variant mold "Penicillium notatum" apparently drifted up from a mycology lab on a lower floor. Alex named this mold variant "penicillin" and shared it with the community.

9 years after Alex's discovery the community finally got around to accepting his idea and Penicillin was used to save hundreds of millions of lives. One of these lives was that of my grandfather.

Alex noticed one little change born from random events in the chaos of his everyday life and asked himself "Why" Then he tracked down the "Why" and shared it with others.

Alexander Fleming died March 11, 1955.

What If: he had done the dishes that morning, I would not exist, Would you?

Thank You Alex, for your curiosity, your imagination, and your randomness.

Vorpalsun

Originally Posted by queenofleaves

I think alternative history is pretty awesome and cool...unfortunately I don't have a lot of patience, but I can appreciate what other people come up with! *grins sheepishly*

What if some major event or anything had been different? How do you think it would have changed the line of history? This is something I'd love to do if I had the patience >.<
And if I was smart enough *ahem*

I think one thing that particularly interests me is if customs and traditions we have today would have been different just from changing one thing or a few things in the line of time

You should look into future scenarios. Instead of re-imaging the present, try imagining the future based on current trends and expected technologies.

Future Wiki

Originally Posted by Magic Mono

You should look into future scenarios. Instead of re-imaging the present, try imagining the future based on current trends and expected technologies.

Future Wiki

Oh...that's another things that's interesting to me!

How do you know we are not in the alternate reality and history was already changed?

Originally Posted by Game Master Near

How do you know we are not in the alternate reality and history was already changed?

We don't...but we can still speak on this subject ignoring the possibility we are in an alternate universe...which theoretically exist in case nobody knows!

Well if the Roman Empire hadn't collapsed we wouldn't have had the Dark Ages and right about now I'd be a civilian on Mars.

If Martin Luther hadn't objected to the Catholic Church's policies and started Protestantism, the United States as we know it today would be influenced by Spain, not England. Protestantism started a new religious movement in Europe, which was very important in Europe at the time, especially politically. In essence, it was an alternative to the Pope's and the Vatican's authority. King Henry the VII of England, angry at the pope for not annulling his first marriage, creates the Anglican church, which is protestant, so he can legally divorce his wife. At this time, Spain pretty much held a monopoly in the Americas, and was at this time the world's superpower. Since England was the only official Protestant nation (the Holy Roman Empire was protestant only in parts), Spain was angry at them, and thus decided to invade England with a massive armada. Due to superior tactics, the English were able to decimate the armada, leaving the Spanish with a lot less power over the New World. Thus, the English were able to step in, and the rest is American History.

Originally Posted by Vorpalsun

9 years after Alex's discovery the community finally got around to accepting his idea and Penicillin was used to save hundreds of millions of lives. One of these lives was that of my grandfather.

Alex noticed one little change born from random events in the chaos of his everyday life and asked himself "Why" Then he tracked down the "Why" and shared it with others.

Alexander Fleming died March 11, 1955.

What If: he had done the dishes that morning, I would not exist, Would you?

This is a great story but I believe that what it illustrates is that there is only one moment, and that this is that moment. Every moment is a pivotal moment, every moment is a crossroads, every moment is a game changer.

In the context of Vorpalsun's story ... A scientist named Florey was one of the two men who actually turned the mould into a useable drug. For some reason, he tested penicillin for the first time on mice, not Guinea pigs. Penicillin is fatally toxic to guinea pigs. Had it been tested on Guinea pigs (the norm) instead of mice, research into penicillin might have ended right there. Penicillin may have been viewed for untld years as ( in Florey's own words), "just another chemical curiosity".

But any aspect, any aspect at all of this or any other story illustrates that every moment is pivotal. Those stray penicillium spores that drifted in through the window to land on Fleming's petri dish - what if the wind had been blowing the other way? What if someone hadn't opened either of the lab windows? What if someone else had taken it on themselves to "Do the washing up" in Fleming's absence? What if? What if? What if?

We all reside in 'this' moment. Why wait til tommorrow to start being nice to OAPs, tommorrow you will still be locked into THIS moment. Why worry about what happens after you're dead or before you were alive, all you can ever experience is THIS moment. There is no past, there is no future, there is just an eternally unfolding now.

This being my view, 'alternative historys' are a fun thought experiment, but the truth is, in every moment we're faced with decisions. We can't know the implications of those decisions. Once made, the decision is done and the moment continues to unfold from it. There can be no knowing what would have happened IF. 'What if' is an illusion.
As Sinatra said, "Do be, Do be, Do".

Oh oh oh oh I love history.......My favorite question that I recently found was an old commercial by a French company and it was a short speech by Gandhi....linking the video would be best.



The closing sentence in Italian is, "if he could have communicated in that modality what would the world be like today?"