I’d give laser pointers to Neanderthals. Even if they did figure out some useful application for them (maybe hunting?) they’d run out of batteries eventually.

  • showmeyourkizinti@startrek.website
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    14 hours ago

    If you’re looking for the biggest change in our timeline for the littlest work I’d give a hindu-arabic numerals to early Greek mathematicians. Watching those guys try to wrap their heads around zero, that would fuck Pythagoras.

  • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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    15 hours ago

    One of those 3D printed non-round gear toys. They could immediately appreciate both the impressive technology that went into designing and manufacturing it, and that it has no use whatsoever. Which would be a trip.

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      15 hours ago

      That still trips up some people today. That metal monolith that was propped up in the desert a year or two ago comes to mind.

  • 𒉀TheGuyTM3𒉁@lemmy.ml
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    14 hours ago

    I’d just give a LGM-118A Peacekeeper MIRV to the Aztecs and say nothing more. I wonder if they would eventually manage to do something with it.

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    19 hours ago

    I would take a portable CD player, place a CD with Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up on it playing backwards, hook up solar panels, remove the ability to shut it on/off, and set it up a circuit that will:

    • As the device solar charges, keep it off until some voltage threshold is exceeded
    • Once the voltage is high enough, start a random timer (8 - 100 hours), so that it is not immediately obvious that the sun activated the device
    • When the timer ends, turn the music on on repeat mode
    • Sometimes turn the music off at random, and then turn it on again at random after a long delay, so that in some cases you can have turn ‘ON’ events without the device being exposed to the sun
    • When the voltage drops below a low threshold, turn the device off until it is charged again
  • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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    21 hours ago

    Bicycles. If we could have gotten bicycles a few centuries before cars, I don’t think modern cities would be so damn car centric.

    • pmk@lemmy.sdf.org
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      20 hours ago

      If I may ask, where are you from? The city I live in is a nightmare for cars, the roads were made for horses and walking, narrow and winding cobblestone streets and the city tries its best to keep cars out of the center.

    • Anna@lemmy.ml
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      21 hours ago

      Hey this might help us out. If Neanderthals learn how to sit for hrs a day we would get that evolutionary advantage.

  • ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one
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    1 day ago

    That singing fish animatronic. Convinced people it’s a god. Wait for the battery to die and the eventual religious crisis.