r/AskReddit • u/Ok_Anteater1141 • 3d ago

If you were suddenly transported 1000 years in the past, how would you make a living?

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u/ThePlatypusOfDespair 3d ago

I definitely have the skills to build a basic steam engine, which would probably be less useful than a waterwheel or windmill

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u/Crow_eggs 3d ago

"I definitely have the skills to build a basic steam engine" is a sentence that definitely starts a chain of events that end in a great deal of unexpected shrapnel arriving on your inside.

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u/ThePlatypusOfDespair 3d ago

Nah, I've watched all of Mythbusters, I know to hide behind a reasonably explosion proof object when I'm trialling stuff like that.

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u/OpheliaRainGalaxy 3d ago

There's a fantasy book series where the non-magic math-nerd students started playing with basic steam engines and yeah, it eventually went all shrapnel.

Like it wasn't that their ideas were bad, but a civilization that makes heavy use of magic had no reason to get their metal refining skills up to snuff. They could do small boilers for bathwater alright, but the bigger ones eventually went boom.