• CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
      0·
      8 months ago

      I’d avoid magic on that one, since modern ideas about how magic works are pretty influenced by technology now. I suspect this would be gibberish to them.

      How about “we have machines so complicated that it’s hard to set them, and my job is to try to change the settings on them and usually fail”?

      • snake_cased@lemmy.ml
        0·
        8 months ago

        I’d go by ‘mechanical devices’, there were hardly any machines in our understanding back then.

        • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
          0·
          8 months ago

          Well, they did have clocks, even some early portable ones, and “automata” which were a bit like modern animatronics. Power applications like mills, too. I don’t know what word would work best, though.

          I’m guessing they’d picture OP running around a giant room filled with clockwork, going at things with a pry bar and wedges. That is a bit like how computers worked in their first decade, albeit electrically rather than mechanically. Later in the 18th century they invented the punchcard loom, so that would be a good point of reference, but we’re all the way back in 1700.

          • Jojo@lemm.ee
            0·
            8 months ago

            Worth noting that the 1700s are, in fact, the 18th century. The first century was the years from 1-100, the second century from 101-200, etc.

            But, yes. It was invented later in the 18th century than our audience came from.

            • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
              0·
              8 months ago

              Also a good point. It’s dumb that we’ve zero-indexed centuries and then given them one-indexed names, but that is the standard.

              • Jojo@lemm.ee
                0·
                8 months ago

                Well, it’s just how math and numbers in English work.

                Cardinal numbers, the number of things you have, start with zero because you can have none of something (or less with negatives, but that’s neither here nor there).

                Original numbers, Numbers that show which things were in what order (first, second, etc) start at one, because you can’t really have a zeroth something because then it would really be the first one.

                So year 1 is 1 because it’s the first year, and it starts the first century. It would have been entirely possible for English to make the names a little nicer, but given that it isn’t, the math means the first set of one hundred years are the years before the one-hundredth year and cetera.

                • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
                  0·
                  8 months ago

                  I mean, zeroth would still be zeroth; it’s just based on the cardinal the moment before it arrived rather than after, assuming you start with nothing and add objects. Unfortunately that’s not conventional, probably in any language, and so you get a situation where a positional notation clashes with how we want to talk about the larger divisions of it casually. This sort of thing is exactly why computer science does use zero indexing.

                  Relatedly, there was also no year 0; it goes straight from 1 BC to 1 AD.

      • HopFlop@discuss.tchncs.de
        0·
        8 months ago

        Yeah, something like “We have machines with thousands of switches that can do complicated things depending on how you set the switches. My job is flipping those switches so the machine performs the desired task as best as possible”…?

        • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
          0·
          8 months ago

          I was wondering about that too. I think they had adjustable tools in common use, but I could be wrong. They might have also used a different word when changing the depth “setting” of their horse-drawn plow, although “to set” has got to be a pretty old verb.

      • Gabu@lemmy.ml
        0·
        8 months ago

        Even better: “our clocks in the future are very complex and it’s my job to keep them working”.

      • frezik@midwest.social
        0·
        8 months ago

        We got this sand and tought it to do math. I give the math sand very specific instructions to do a task. There are many people like me, and a good chunk of them are giving the sand instructions to show silly cat pictures.

    • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      8 months ago

      Folks in 1700 understood what an engineer was. I’d just tell them I design really complicated looms.

  • spittingimage@lemmy.world
    0·
    8 months ago

    They’d understand perfectly. When my employers buy something, it’s my job to check that it arrives in good order and matches what we asked for, and then arrange for the sender to be paid.

    Sometimes the thing is a piece of equipment for transmitting real-time video of tumours from one part of the country to another, but I don’t think we need to go into that.

  • knightly the Sneptaur@pawb.social
    0·
    8 months ago

    I’m somewhere between a scribe and a millwright, only I’m not copying manuscripts and the machines I maintain don’t have anything to do with grain. Instead, they’re simple but very fast mathmatical machines built by the moneychangers to account for every penny that moves.

  • kent_eh@lemmy.caEnglish
    0·
    8 months ago

    That’s a challenge.

    The job I do didn’t exist when I was in high school, and most of the technology it was built on didn’t exist until the early 1900s.

    I suppose I could just call myself a general repairman and leave it at that.

  • Marighost@lemm.ee
    0·
    8 months ago

    I design and quote Wi-Fi solutions for the hospitality industry, so probably not. I have a rough enough time describing it to my grandmother…

  • agent_flounder@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    8 months ago

    I’m the guy who makes sure the castle is built to keep out the invaders. Only everything is made of captured lightning.

    Gets burned at the stake

  • Jojo@lemm.ee
    0·
    8 months ago

    I take food from the baker and carry it to people’s homes directly in exchange for custom. We call it “being a delivery girl”. The amazing part is what the baker makes, it’s called “pizza”

  • Tar_Alcaran@sh.itjust.works
    0·
    8 months ago

    I tell employers how to prevent their workers from getting killed, and of they don’t listen, I tell the government to make sure the employer can’t work like that.

    And most of the workers find me annoying for it.

  • The_v@lemmy.world
    0·
    8 months ago

    I am an expert in crops. I have traveled the globe to learn about them. I have created new varieties to plant. Landowners around the globe seek me out for knowledge and seeds.