Quantum Conqueror

[RTM]

Through some freak act of time and space or a Quantum Leap-esque machine, your mind is thrown back through the history of mankind to the point where humans start forming tribes. At that point your a stuck temporarily in orbit of Earth and see strange glowing spots all sorts of colors all over the land. Soon you realize that you're somehow plugged into the collective field of human thought of this nascent Earth and these 'spots' a concentrations of humans.

Soon, out of curiosity you try to touch one of the spots and with that you are abruptly yanked out of orbit, into the atmosphere and 'slam' into a person at that spot. When you wake up some minutes later, you find that you're now in the body of the leader of the tribe. His/hers and your personality are in a strange meld of minds, sharing memories, personalities and experiences.

***

Anyway, what do you do after that point? Though remember, your body still ages and when you die you go back into orbit and chose a new leader to 'meld' with. Also, the previous leader's mind stays melded with you, though your original personality stays as the dominant one, regardless of how many leaders you meld with. Notably, if there are no direct descendants of the leader you melded with, you can no longer meld with any leaders of that particular tribe. If in the end you can't meld with any of the tribe leaders, you loose all personalities, not memories or experiences, you melded with and get the ability to meld with leaders again.

If you don't want to meld with anyone, you can slow down your perception of time and thus speed up the passage of it. In layman's terms, you can fast forward... Also, if you've been actively melding with descendants of a single tribe then at Anno Domini (A.D.) 2000, you leader descendants start developing psychic powers. At first you get telepathy and telekinesis that get more powerful with each descendant and leader melded with, until your reach the stage where you can hear and process every thought of every thinking being within five hundred kilometers and see what they see at the same time and also be able to lift the size and weight of a whole skyscraper (think WTC size) with all internal details included and make it fly at one hundred nautical miles per hour.

In the end after all other powers develop, you get the ability to forcibly meld people, other than leaders and their direct descendants, permanently into your 'Mental Collective' as long as they are withing five kilometers.

Anyway, what would you seriously think and do after you get melded with your first leader.

[Chaotic Neutral]

Fast forward to today, and do whatever the hell I want.

Screw Mankind, the only thing I'm going to do is make sure that nuclear war doesn't break out.

(Although a few hundred million suicides wouldn't be a out of the question)

[Zaune]

Fast-forward like crazy and hope to hell I can get the hell out of this situation, because that is way too much power for any one person to handle.

[Chaotic Neutral]

Fast-forward like crazy and hope to hell I can get the hell out of this situation, because that is way too much power for any one person to handle.

If there is anyone I would trust with that much power, it would be myself. I don't know about your own self-absorption, but that's just me.

Also, I'm might to the 17-1800's and start inventing tech just for the "what-if" of it.

[Darth Nostril]

Make sure the scientific method became de rigeur several thousand years early and eliminate early outbreaks of religion to prevent the contagion spreading.

[RTM]

Note to self: I think I've went overboard with the psychic powers. Also, how would melding semi-permanently with other human minds change a person or people as the mental collective grows and what would be the possible drawbacks?

[Chaotic Neutral]

Note to self: I think I've went overboard with the psychic powers. Also, how would melding semi-permanently with other human minds change a person or people as the mental collective grows and what would be the possible drawbacks?

Essentially, after a number of melds, you would no longer be you. Or in other words, you die. This may be after the first meld, the second, or maybe the third, but after that you are pretty much no longer existing.

The solution is to meld only with infants. Which would suck, and guarantee I only possess rich infants in the minimum of modern day standards of living, since growing up as a starving third-worlder or dying don't much appeal to me.

[RTM]

Essentially, after a number of melds, you would no longer be you. Or in other words, you die. This may be after the first meld, the second, or maybe the third, but after that you are pretty much no longer existing.

Hmmm, even if the original personality stays dominant, as said in the OP?

Also, after a few dozen meldings it would probably be impossible to have prolonged mental access to the whole 'Collective' when in a host body since it would produce effects similar or worse than Alzheimer's. So there would be a limited amount of leader personalities to access during the time you're in a body and working with the limited processing power of the human brain.

[Chaotic Neutral]

Staying "dominant" and still being "you" are not necessarily the same thing, there is a line somewhere.

Besides, it's better to be safe than sorry.

[RTM]

Staying "dominant" and still being "you" are not necessarily the same thing, there is a line somewhere.

Besides, it's better to be safe than sorry.

Good point. Anyway, let's talk about something else. What would be better? Slowly uplifting human tribes all over the planet and generally making sure humanity develops as fast as possible with extreme natural selection urged on by yourself or one super tribe that you try to constantly rule at every possible moment you can or are there any better ways?

[Chaotic Neutral]

What would be better? Slowly uplifting human tribes all over the planet and generally making sure humanity develops as fast as possible with extreme natural selection urged on by yourself or one super tribe that you try to constantly rule at every possible moment you can or are there any better ways?

I'm a man of simple pleasures, domination of the current world is sufficient for me.

[RTM]

I'm a man of simple pleasures, domination of the current world is sufficient for me.

Whatever rocks your boat I guess. Anyway, how different would the world be by 2000 AD in the two different instances? In the first the designated Quantum Conqueror uplifts the tribes all over the planet while trying to encourage technological growth (without inventing new stuff him/herself) and natural selection, that is, forcibly ejecting him/herself out of the tribe leader host (leaving the body brain dead) and leaving the tribes that are in contact with each other sort things out.

The second is where the QC chose a single tribe and runs with it trying to curbstomp everyone else while pushing the tech level and the like as high as possible.

[Chaotic Neutral]

The tribe that is focused on will become the god-like upper class of a hyper advanced transhumanist society.

Assuming other tribes survive at all.

Pretty much just a futuristic Earth in the other case, except without the gods.

[RTM]

The tribe that is focused on will become the god-like upper class of a hyper advanced transhumanist society.

Assuming other tribes survive at all.

Pretty much just a futuristic Earth in the other case, except without the gods.

I'm starting to think the thread topic is hopelessly bland and triggers no interest, except for one or two people, and even then... nevermind. You know, after a few meldings the tribe people would understand or at least guess that the sons and daughters of their leaders get possessed some otherworldly entity. Some may start to worship, others scheme and assassinate while the third, if they're allowed to grow and find out about the previous meldings with their parents and grandparents, would probably go crazy or something...

[PeZook]

It's too vague. You can't predict how things will turn out over 2000 years.

It's good material for a fictional story, but not much to talk about as a RAR!

[RTM]

So how could I make it less vague, make this thread and it's topic more interesting?

[Solauren]

Unfortunately, for the thread, you're basically setting up a game of Civilization.

The possiblities are to myraid to discuss.

However, if you limit it to say, a fixed time period of our world, and maybe even limit who can be 'jumped' into, and for how long, that would allow for more discussion.

[RTM]

However, if you limit it to say, a fixed time period of our world, and maybe even limit who can be 'jumped' into, and for how long, that would allow for more discussion.

For the moment, how about the Roman Republic & Empire, World War I & WWII time periods, or can you think of something more interesting? As for the melding/jumping, it's pretty much limited to direct leader descendants during which the QC can stay in the body as long as it's lifespan can allow, as long as there are no complications. And the melding with DLD's can only happen in two cases I guess, maybe only during infancy or when the DLD becomes an leader of the tribe?

[Chaotic Neutral]

I would jump into the American presidency just before the start of WW2.

I then proceed to give all of the allies absolutely no support, while spending large sums of money on military buildup and weapons research. I give a hint*hint* Wink*Wink* to certain items (Computers, Assault Rifles, more nuke money, ICBMs, ect...). When the rest of the world implodes/stabalizes, I use nukes to control the world.

Easy.

[PeZook]

You...could do that without changing anything at all. Only your version has the added bonus of possibly tacking on another million dead civilians. Or ten. I don't know, maybe that's appealing to you...

Anyway, no war = no massive increase in R&D expenditure, so tech development of computers, radar, assault rifles, nukes and such will slow down. And good lucking pushing for a military buildup with isolationist sentiment still nice and vivid and unchallenged (though the Japanese might challenge it for you)

[RTM]

I would jump into the American presidency just before the start of WW2.

I then proceed to give all of the allies absolutely no support, while spending large sums of money on military buildup and weapons research. I give a hint*hint* Wink*Wink* to certain items (Computers, Assault Rifles, more nuke money, ICBMs, ect...). When the rest of the world implodes/stabalizes, I use nukes to control the world.

Easy.

Maybe, but before that you would have to have at least been melded with several dozens of leaders or have a very cold mindset. Because very few people, including politicians, would be willing to fire of nukes in the case some nations call their 'bluff'. Would you, some guy from the slightly distant future, who never saw or experienced death (like myself), be able to deal with a bodycount going into the ceiling, through it in a explosion of plaster and skewering a shuttle on it's way to orbit? Because in the aftermath you'll probably have what you want for, but with the whole nation going 'What The Hell Hero' on your doorstep

[Chaotic Neutral]

Of course I have never seen death, and from my office, all I need to do is make a few calls and my enemies die. That's why I would always stay away from the front, to prevent empathy.
It's like mind control, but on purpose for myself.

Besides, MY people aren't going to die. And I could probably get them to believe I was leading the world toward a better future. (I would be.)

[PeZook]

No, actually you'll kill lots of people for questionable gain and everybody would hate you and try to kill as many Americans as they could after seeing their homelands eradicated for the terrible offence of "Not kowtowing to American desires".

That's assuming they wouldn't just make a beeline for their own nukes in order to neuter your dominance. What, you're going to pre-emptively wipe out the USSR at the first slight? What about Britain, Germany, France, Iran, China? Australia? There's plenty of countries that can make nukes ; Hell, communist Poland had a nuclear weapons program.

[RTM]

Besides, MY people aren't going to die. And I could probably get them to believe I was leading the world toward a better future. (I would be.)

At least half (give or take) of the population would believe that. The rest would start protesting, rioting and god knows what else. And if you take what PeZook said into account, then the number of your supporters would get halved or more. In fact, even the military would probably quit/revolt/rebel. And after that the only supporters you would have would be the blindingly (in my opinion at least) fanatical and then it's only a matter of time after you have to either get off the ruling seat or instigate a regime change into something authoritarian or worse. Then, the whole surviving world nations would probably decide to gang up on you, or not if you still have enough nukes after the previous events and also still be able to control the country after the rebellion of at least half of your population and military.

Hmmm, this is reminding me of Fallout and some other things. Definitely good material for a fictional story, like PeZook said.

[PeZook]

Well, he could possess another President after the previous one got impeached, which would lead to some hilarious events when it turned out several presidents in a row turn into raging psychopaths the moment they take office

THE CURSE OF THE WHITE HOUSE!