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Originally Posted by RetroGunslinger
And the language barrier?
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I'd find my way to the Britain or Ireland. English comes from a combination of German and Celtic languages. I speak enough German to get by (and a tiny bit of Irish (don't call it Gaelic, trust me)), and I have an ear for languages. At worst, I'd need to take time to learn. At best I could pick up on the essentials quickly.
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Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru
Good luck going from the four humours to the human genome. Your steps 3 through 10, however, are feasible enough with your intelligence. But you have these first two stumbling blocks.
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"Where did you attend medical school?"
"The far East."
Credentials likely were not an issue back in 1008 AD.
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Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru
I hope you enjoy swallowing astrology among other things while becoming a medieval physician. Even if you get that far, I doubt you could bring medicine "up to speed" within your lifetime. I think your attempts would have you tortured and executed. Why not also tell them that the earth isn't the centre of the universe and how it's physically possible to touch the stars?
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I beg your pardon, but I have to put up with a 6000 year old earth from a lot of people now. I can't imagine a heliocentric universe is going to be that difficult to ignore.
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Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru
Will, have you not studied medieval history in any capacity? I'm sorry if I sound pessimistic; I'm just concerned about your safety.
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My safety? This is an exercise in the absurd (and a fun one, at that). Still, the idea that making one's way would be somehow impossible in the past doesn't make much sense. I'm framing this as me accidentally being transported into the past, but if I had some sort of control, I'd probably take about 6 or 7 years to master ancient Greek language and history and then go back and become an early philosopher. I'd give myself a big, ridiculously Greek name like Hypogrporphyrylichuscero. And my philosophy would, of course, be called Hypogrporphyrylichusceroism.
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Originally Posted by loquitur
Also, Will, bear in mind that you'll be lacking the basic infrastructure you'll need to pursue modern medicine.
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I'd have access to high proof alcohol and soap (which I can make myself from lye). That alone would put me hundreds of years ahead of all other doctors as I could use them to prevent infections. I'd also know what probably doesn't work. Bleeding out for a head cold? Probably not a good prescription. I also happen to have a keen understanding of diet. Imagine Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins' research being applied 1000 years before it came into being. Proper diet could have elevated the health of the entire region.
As for the burned at the stake thing? The end of the Dark Ages are probably not the ideal time to be alive, yeah. The church is still running rampant, and it'd still be a few years before the Renaissance (where new ideas would be more welcome).
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Originally Posted by loquitur
I assume you'll be able to make some bread mold pretty easily, but then you'll have to extract the penicillin (bread mold by itself will make people sick) - how are you going to do that? You'll need sterile equipment for many applications. You'll need - at the very least - metallurgy, plastics (go find petroleum to make plastic from), distillation, chemical processing facilities........... is it any wonder doctors were using leeches before the advent of mass production? For the first vaccination - smallpox, in (I think) the 1790s - Edward Jenner actually put liquid out of smallpox pustules into healthy patients to innoculate them. That's a high risk vaccination, right?
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I wasn't thinking about something as complicated as penicillin. I was thinking more basic things. The kinds of things a survivalist might know, applied to general medicine.
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Originally Posted by loquitur
Until you do figure these things out, you'll need to feed and clothe yourself. I suppose you could go to the nearest abbey and request the protection and help of the bishop, but how long could you do that?
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I can do manual labor while I learn the language and culture. I did landscaping back in high school, I'm sure I can use some of that in the cultivation of crops. Ditch digging is a fine profession, anyway.