What Century Would You Best Fit In?

[BWV 1080]

The problem for me with this kind of games is that whenever one says, e.g., "the century I would have loved to have lived in was the 17th", one usually thinks one would have been Louis XIV (or at least a member of the aristocracy),  not a stable boy, an innkeeper, or foot soldier. The latter, I'm afraid, would have not had been able to enjoy any of the benefits (cultural included) one would attach to that period, and all the disadvantages compared to modern life (in terms of healthcare, education, and the general standard of living).

Only a psychopath would truly prefer being an 18th century noble to an middle/upper middle class 21st century citizen

[Jo498]

The problem for me with this kind of games is that whenever one says, e.g., "the century I would have loved to have lived in was the 17th", one usually thinks one would have been Louis XIV (or at least a member of the aristocracy),  not a stable boy, an innkeeper, or foot soldier. The latter, I'm afraid, would have not had been able to enjoy any of the benefits (cultural included) one would attach to that period, and all the disadvantages compared to modern life (in terms of healthcare, education, and the general standard of living).

I don't think that this is such a problem. Because we also assume with the late 20th/early 21st century we actually live in that we are not in a slum in Nigeria, in a "reeducation" camp in China, at the wrong end of a drone strike in Afghanistan or in the trenches in Ukraine etc. I.e. there is always some "favoritism" involved.

FWIW I qualified my response above and assumed at least middle middle class status in the middle/late 19th century, fully aware that this would mean some cold water, probably no further trips than the baltic sea, if any etc.
(Of my grandmothers, born 1908 and 1911 (both died in the 1990s), neither ever saw the sea. One made, I think, one or two somewhat longer trips in her life, to Austria or southern Germany, in an advanced age when my mom took her there. I am pretty sure the other one never left a circle of about 200km from her home, and very rarely a circle of 10 km.)

The deeper problem to me seems that we are so used to, enamored and proud of our 20th/21st century comforts that we think most people must have been totally miserable without central heating, indoor plumbing, antibiotics etc. This seems obviously wrong by the historic sources we have and it's also plausible because they lacked the experience of the (materially) pampered world we live in.
It's a bit like that it was not a hardship for me to grow up without video games until I was 17 (they existed a few years before that but were not so common that I missed them), or not having internet until my early/mid-20s.

[DavidW]

The problem for me with this kind of games is that whenever one says, e.g., "the century I would have loved to have lived in was the 17th", one usually thinks one would have been Louis XIV (or at least a member of the aristocracy),  not a stable boy, an innkeeper, or foot soldier. The latter, I'm afraid, would have not had been able to enjoy any of the benefits (cultural included) one would attach to that period, and all the disadvantages compared to modern life (in terms of healthcare, education, and the general standard of living).

I thought of that, but I'm pretty sure that is not what Florestan is thinking.  It is supposed to be a fun fantasy.  Would you like to be a patron for Haydn?  Be there for the world premiere of Beethoven's 9th?  That kind of thing. 

[Florestan]

I thought of that, but I'm pretty sure that is not what Florestan is thinking.  It is supposed to be a fun fantasy.  Would you like to be a patron for Haydn?  Be there for the world premiere of Beethoven's 9th?  That kind of thing. 

Precisely.

[Florestan]

Only a psychopath would truly prefer being an 18th century noble to an middle/upper middle class 21st century citizen

I'm not sure. Nikolaus II Eszterhazy, Karl-Theodor of Bavaria, Gottfried van Swieten or Melchior von Grimm seem like good choices, actually.