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Kaj_Sotala comments on Open Thread: January 2010 - Less Wrong
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Suppose you could find out the exact outcome (up to the point of reading the alternate history equivalent of Wikipedia, history books etc.) of changing the outcome of a single historical event. What would that event be?
Note that major developments like "the Roman empire would never have fallen" or "the Chinese wouldn't have turned inwards" involve multiple events, not just one.
I'd be curious to know what would have happened if Christopher Columbus's fleet had been lost at sea during his first voyage across the Atlantic. Most scholars were already highly skeptical of his plans, as they were based on a miscalculation, and him not returning would have further discouraged any explorers from setting off in that direction. How much longer would it have taken before Europeans found out about the Americas, and how would history have developed in the meanwhile?
Have you read Orson Scott Card's "Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus"? It suggest an answer to this question.
Not a very realistic one, though.