Ask Lemmy

This is the way.

the success of Ed Sheerin

That made me snort laugh :D

I'd really just want to know dumb stuff...

I like your thinking. I was thinking mostly about stuff that is hard to research, the more serious things, I hadn't thought about the 'dumb' stuff too. That sounds like a lot more fun :)

I like your thinking. I'd love a lifetime step count, or even something like how many boxes of cereal I've consumed over my life.

I'd also want to check up on what famous historical figures got up to. Or where unknown folks came from prior to being recorded.

Where did the ka'bar's white twin come from and end up?

How many lovers did Queen Elizabeth I have?

And many more I often think but can't call to mind now.

Ed Shearing

Nepotism. There's some story I heard about how he coach surfed in California until he got a contract, and I figured he must have SOME talent, then found out he was staying on Jamie Foxx's couch, so clearly some he knew someone...

Except unfortunately my 30 second Wikipedia fact check shows he didn't. He met Foxx because he was invited to be a guess on Foxx's show and must have made a good impression. He did make seemingly the hardway; he started out as a working musician working with other musicians and worked his way up. Didn't hurt that he got a positive review from Elton John early on, but the guy apparently has something.

Damn. I thought I figured it out...

I haven't seen enough of One Piece to ask bait questions yet, I'm only half way through the Netflix series :)

I was thinking that jobs would be one of the solved problems, as in you only have to work if you want to. I'm more curious about whether people would prefer to do the research because they enjoy it, or if they'd rather just tell the computer to give them their full family tree, for example.

Also, I'd use it to figure out when my kids are lying. They all break my shit, but I want to know who to blame for what.

That raises an interesting question - where would the balance be between their privacy and your rights as a parent. You need to know at least some of their private information to teach them as you raise them, but would something like the scenario you raised cross the line into being invasive?

Those are easy:

A grifter.

The true Roman way.

Plato's Republic.

Increasingly complex chemical interactions around thermal vents.

Some rich guy.

Nope.

Did anyone see what I did on a may 16th 2011 at 7:16pm?

Wait, that was you?! 😱

I read an Arthur C Clarke book a few years ago, and it was based around a device that could see anything, anywhere, some sort of microscopic portal I think. One of the characters used it to look back in time following someone's DNA, so seeing their mother, then their mother's mother and so on, and eventually saw the intelligence disappear from the distant ancestors eyes. I'm wording it badly, but the idea stuck with me.

I'd love to know when that first spark of intelligence showed up, that separated us from animals, and what our ancestors either side of that divide did differently and similarly. I doubt that there would have been any significant differences at first, but those subtle differences could be fascinating :)

Ah, sorry, I didn't think of that side of things. I was thinking more along the lines of it could solve things that everyone agrees is a crime, like murder.

My line of thought was more just would you want the easy answers, or would you prefer to have to work for them.

Out of curiosity, what sort of things would you explore? I enjoy researching certain things, so having all the answers would spoil that for me.