A genie grants you four wishes (RAR)

[fuzzymillipede]

Mods, if you think this belongs in Fantasy or has been done before, do as you will. I found one topic from 2002, but it had a lot of "I wish for more wishes/INFINITE POWER!!!"

So, a genie appears and will grant you four wishes. Four wishes may seem like more wishes than the typical three-wish genie, but this genie has some rules:

1. The genie has power over time and space, but there is a limit to the power the genie can grant you. If a wish is beyond the genie's means, he will not grant it to you (ex, omnipotence, the power to blow up stars, more wishes, etc). Use the powers from Heroes as a good measuring stick for what the genie can give you. In other words, if the power you wish for is disproportionately powerful within the context of that show, it is a no-go.

2. Wishes that require the genie to exert his power in multiple ways count as multiple wishes. For example, say you want an army of 100,000 undead soldiers that are completely loyal to you. That would contain three wishes: (1) create the army, (2) violate natural laws to animate the army, (3) make the army loyal to you. Similarly, it would be very difficult to create complex fantastic things like a spaceship, because you would need a wish to allow for every specific piece of technobabble. So, while you could create a fleet of real-life battleships in one wish (no supplies or crews, though), a Star Destroyer would be impossible because it would require many wishes to make it work.

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3. Assume that there are no other genies in existence. Even if there were, they would see that you have already had wishes granted and wouldn't grant you any more.

I would choose:
1. Mind-Transfer Time Travel (MTTT) - The genie will not grant me full time-travel, because of time paradoxes associated with it. I settle for the power to send my mind back in time to a previous point in my life. By focusing on a memory in the past, I will be able to return to the time of that memory. When I jump to a previous point in my life, everything that took place after that is effectively erased and only exists in my memories.
2. Mind-Body Independence (MBI) - The genie refuses to grant me complete immortality, so I settle for independence of mind from body (think souls). This will allow me to retain consciousness even if my body is destroyed, and since my mind is not hampered by the flaws of a physical brain, I will not suffer from memory-loss. This does not mean I am more intelligent, though, nor does it mean that my mind can do anything on its own but think. Unfortunately, if I lose my body, I will not be able to sense anything or otherwise interact with the outside world, because the brain is my only conduit.
3. Eternal Youth - Since my previous wish was not enough to satisfy my desire for immortality, I request eternal youth so I will stop ageing in my 20s.
4. Technopathy - I realize that I will need to be able to rapidly disseminate the future knowledge I have gained if I am to put it to use, so I choose the ability to mentally interface with and exchange information with computers.

With these powers, I set out on a plan to guide myself and humanity on a path to greatness in the universe. What would you choose?

[Phantasee]

1. Ability to fly.
2. Wolverine-like healing powers.
3. ...?
4. PROFIT

I'm kidding. 3 would be the helm of Hades, rendering me invisible to all eyes. The fourth wish would be for either the skillset of a successful thief or for the ability to charm any woman (like Bond). I'm not sure which would be more useful: with the first, I could break in anywhere I wanted, with the second, I could just get the guy's wife to let me in the back door.

With these I would play at Robin Hood.

[HippyRipper]

1: Hiro's time-manipulation power, if that's outside the scope of the Genie then the "send mind back in time" variation.
2: Knowledge of every language.
3: Devilish good looks for life
4: Powers equal to or an iota lesser than the genie, and if this isn't acceptable, I really don't know. Infinite wealth maybe.

I use my powers for the good of mankind and to fuck with people. Go back in time and see what would happen if x happened.

[Cyborg Stan]

1) Ability to make independent, immaterial copies of my mind and assign them tasks/perferences/limitations that they'll carry out (ie, they won't get bored, and I can section off memories as needed) and can return information when finished. For instance, if I wanted to I could make myself work out any number of ideas at once, without the problems that come from distractions.

2) Access to alternative universes. Well, I guess it might be fun.

3) Telekinesis, on particle and FTL levels. I need high precision, and the FTL is in there for...

4) Something something something.

Lesee... what can I do with this combo?

Use a combination of #1 and #3 to make my brain into the equivalent of a CTC computer, like in the Xeelee Sequence. On top of that, I can instantly master just about any field that I want, and if I get bored then I can forget things. Keep in mind, I can instantly start up a copy of my mind and assign to the problem of returning future-information properly.

Use a combo of #1 and #3 to be able to make just about anything from raw energy, just have a copy of my mind recursively spit out as many copies as needed, I can assemble it a moment into the future and keep using the FTL option to send it back so it looks like it occurs near instantly. Use previous CTC sequence to figure out how and what to make. I should be able to make copies of myself as well, if I so chose.

The combo can also be used for FTL senses, combined with any number of minds to process the information I can expand my sensory sphere to just about everywhere.

I can also use the same combo to make
Use a combination of #1 and #3 to make my brain into the equivalent of a CTC computer, like in the Xeelee Sequence. On top of that, I can instantly master just about any field that I want, and if I get bored then I can forget things. Keep in mind, I can instantly start up a copy of my mind and assign to the problem of returning future-information properly.

Use a combo of #1 and #3 to be able to make just about anything from raw energy, just have a copy of my mind recursively spit out as many copies as needed, I can assemble it a moment into the future and keep using the FTL option to send it back so it looks like it occurs near instantly. Use previous CTC sequence to figure out how and what to make. I should be able to make copies of myself as well, if I so chose.

The combo can also be used for FTL senses, combined with any number of minds to process the information I can expand my sensory sphere to just about everywhere.

I can also use the same combo to make anything at any place and any time of my choosing, like populating the entire universe retroactively with humans.

Number #2 allows me to do the above, but much further.

#4 is there in case I need to use up another wish to make this work.

[Singular Intellect]

1: I wish for the genie to know exactly what my definition and understanding of the terms 'restriction' and 'limitation' are as they apply to the genie's own powers.
2: I then wish for all the genie's powers and abilities for myself, with absolutely no limitations or restrictions.
3: I wish for the genie to become powerless.

The other wish becomes rather moot.

[aerius]

1) The power to make the score in any sporting event whatever I want it to be. The Leafs will win a Stanley Cup, damnit! Plus I'll never have to work another day in my life thanks to the joys of sports gambling.

2) Eternal youth for my wife

3) I will age like James Bond. Which is to say I'll get older for a while, then I'll be young again, and it repeats endlessly.

4) Multiple orgasms!

[fuzzymillipede]

1: Hiro's time-manipulation power,
4: Powers equal to or an iota lesser than the genie

2: I then wish for all the genie's powers and abilities for myself, with absolutely no limitations or restrictions.

Yea, you couldn't get Hiro's power because of time paradoxes. For example, Hiro could make an army of himself or get into all sorts of messes by going back and forth in time. Genie-like powers are too much. You could get powers to create the illusion of them, though.

1) Ability to make independent, immaterial copies of my mind and assign them tasks/perferences/limitations that they'll carry out
3) Telekinesis, on particle and FTL levels. I need high precision, and the FTL is in there for...

A no-limits power like #1 will not work. If you are going to make copies of your mind, you can only make a few. If you want telekinesis, you are not going to get something that powerful. You will be able to fly, flip cars, etc, but not manipulate stuff to the extent you describe.

You could try to combine powers for a similar effect, perhaps the ability to reform matter plus the ability to "feel" all the intricacies of something, so that you can make copies of anything from a car to an animal. If you want to create stuff without a template, you are going to have to use more wishes. You could wish for the ability to store templates of objects you have scanned with your mind, so that you can create them at will. Unfortunately, the ability to actually understand matter and consciously manipulate it to create extremely complex constructs is outside of the realm of what the genie will grant you.

3: I wish for the genie to become powerless.

First, granting a wish of that power level is not something the genie would do. Secondly, the genie is not obligated to grant you anything, as he is doing this on a whim. He will not allow you to do anything detrimental to him.

[Knife]

First two wishes are for the two oldest yet richest people on the planet to write me into their wills for a mere ten percent of their worth. Last two wishes are extreme good health for my wife and I.

[fuzzymillipede]

Another thing to make note of:
If you want a healing factor, that's cool. However, you will still age, because that is not related to rapid-healing. So, you would need to use two wishes to have a healing factor + eternal youth. Yes, I know that this is not how it works in Heroes, but it is much more logical this way, and unlike this scenario, the powers of Heroes are not limited to manifest in one, specific way.

[Solauren]

#1 - I wish to be 'Omni-comprehnsion', meaning I can understand and utilize with maximum profiency anything I know.

#2 - I wish to be All-Knowing, meaning I know everything, but it's not in my head. I think about it for a moment, and I know what i need to know. My brain always works as per standard. That is all-knowing

#3 - I wish to have the potiental to use the Force, at a level surpassing those attributed to any Force user in fiction. Combined with #1 and #2, I can become the most powerful being on the planet, if not universe, without violating the rules for the genie (AFAIK). All I need is some practice to get up to 'I just sucked up all the power in the Valley of the Jedi' levels.

#4 - I am going to by a lottery ticket. That lottery is to only be won by me, and only me, the next time I buy a lottery ticket for that lottery (this includes my wife or someone else buying one for me) after which it returns to normal. I am going to let the lottery build up for say, 20 weeks, before buying my next ticket. That should give me a few million dollars to start building up with. During those 20 weeks, I practice with my new found abilities.

I now know how to stop my aging, reverse it or whatever, and can use my mind to get whatever I want. AND I have the money to back it up.

[fuzzymillipede]

#2 - I wish to be All-Knowing, meaning I know everything, but it's not in my head.

#3 - I wish to have the potiental to use the Force, at a level surpassing those attributed to any Force user in fiction.

#4 - I am going to by a lottery ticket. That lottery is to only be won by me

Ok, there are a few problems. An all-knowing power is too much, but you could use other powers to achieve a similar result. Ex: super memory + super intuitiveness like Sylar. Secondly, it is too much to wish something as vast as the Force into existence, and the upper-level power displayed by Force users would be out of place in Heroes, so it is off-limits in this scenario. Lastly, why wish to win the lottery when you can wish for a power that lets you do that and more?

[Schuyler Colfax]

#1 Ability to fly (no wings).
#2 Controllable ability to read minds.
#3 Fire Breathing.
#4 A wish for two more wishes.
#5 Super human endurance (that would in handy for many things).
#6 Force powers.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

1. I am a fully-functional member of Homo Drakensis, with all the genetic benefits and physical conditioning inherent to being Draka, and a full set of body-mods, except that I will retain my current personality rather than the un-creative, non-innovative, hyper-aggressive mind of a Draka.

2. Super intuitiveness. I know how things work. Combined with the effective super-senses and eidetic memory granted to me by #1...

#3 and #4 are to be kept in reserve for when they're needed to help out the Human race or to make me even more awesome.

[Guardsman Bass]

Another thing to make note of:
If you want a healing factor, that's cool. However, you will still age, because that is not related to rapid-healing. So, you would need to use two wishes to have a healing factor + eternal youth. Yes, I know that this is not how it works in Heroes, but it is much more logical this way, and unlike this scenario, the powers of Heroes are not limited to manifest in one, specific way.

Then my four wishes are

1. Eternal youth with one caveat - I can control, at will, some of the outer features of my body (like skin texture, wrinkles, hair color and quantity), so that I can look like anything from a young man to an old man. Is that one wish?

2. Excellent-to-near-perfect-regeneration. Even with immortality, sooner or later an accident (like a lightning strike, or plane crash) will do me in unless I'm very, very cautious. Regeneration will solve that - plus it will help with issues like memory weird-outs after being alive for centuries.

3. Genius. This pretty much describes itself - I would like extreme genius and intelligence in almost every category imaginable.

4. Following future possibilities. I'm not exactly sure how to describe this one, but it would involve being able to mentally visualize how the long-term consequences of an action play out, starting with the clear but very near-term and getting into very fuzzy generalizations as time goes on.

The above four would be enough for me. I could use them to get rich, but more importantly, I could play a very significant role in humanity's long-term history. You could, for example, start something along the path, then four centuries later come back and look at the results.

[Mr Bean]

See your all going about this the wrong way wish one is always
1. Genius, Hyper-intelligence, Dial everything up to a nine on the IQ scale, what select people can do one thing VERY well, you can do everything VERY well. Chess Masters who can think fifteen moves ahead? Sherlock Homes style inventive thinking and perfect recall? Can do, General all around brilliance? Yep

Ok, now that your 160+ on the IQ scale, review future wishs.

Future Super-Smart me would still likely go with appearance shifting(Think Mystic style full scale body-morph), Greatly improved body w/greatly slowed aging (Nothing fancy I just want 5000 years, enough to get my robot body) and possibly number four would be an off-shot of 1. Being able to see/predict the future up to fifteen minutes ahead.

Now go to Vegas and rake in the money since you can play most casino games without fear of losing, if your not going to win, you don't play.

[fuzzymillipede]

#1 Ability to fly (no wings).
#2 Controllable ability to read minds.
#3 Fire Breathing.
#4 A wish for two more wishes.
#5 Super human endurance (that would in handy for many things).
#6 Force powers.

Be wary of #1. Unlike in Heroes, you will not be granted protection from high velocity winds and extreme acceleration. So, if you try to fly and accelerate like Nathan Petrelli, you will die. You can either opt for gentler, lower-speed flight (though at this point you are better off with telekinesis), or wish for another power or some sort of suit to protect you while flying.

#4 is not happening. I explicitly forbid any wish that will somehow result in gaining more wishes.

You cannot simply wish the Universal Force that Encompasses All Living Things™ into existance. This is beyond what the genie will grant. Thus, you cannot use actual Force powers. What you can do, however, is wish for individual powers that emulate the Force.

1. I am a fully-functional member of Homo Drakensis, with all the genetic benefits and physical conditioning inherent to being Draka, and a full set of body-mods, except that I will retain my current personality rather than the un-creative, non-innovative, hyper-aggressive mind of a Draka.

Becoming a Homo Drakensis will only take one wish, as long as its existance/abilities are possible without the use of magic. If there is technobabble, you need to wish for that technobabble to work. If you word the wish correctly, you can retain your mind as well. However, the body-mods will require more wishes if they cannot work without magic.

1. Eternal youth with one caveat - I can control, at will, some of the outer features of my body (like skin texture, wrinkles, hair color and quantity), so that I can look like anything from a young man to an old man. Is that one wish?

Yes, the ability to control your age would be one wish. If you want to get selective and control specific aspects of your outward appearance, the power is no longer directly related to ageing and requires another wish.

[Guardsman Bass]

One nice thing to have with the immortality and regeneration might be some kind of indefinite hibernation ability. Like, say, if the real world is just too long and boring for you, you can seal yourself into some kind of "cocoon" that is virtually indestructible and that has mechanism to protect itself from intruders (I'm thinking something weird like telepathy that makes people remember urgent appointments elsewhere), and for which you can set the timer. You then wake up after that period of time feeling refreshed and rested, like having a good, long sleep.

Spread that out with "active" periods, and immortality probably wouldn't seem so bad.

[fuzzymillipede]

I think the benefits of mind-transfer time travel and mind-body independence are greater than the benefits of super-genius and precognition.

With MTTT, you don't need to be super-smart, just smart enough. You will always be one step ahead, because you can keep repeating something forever until you get it right. It is like Groundhog Day on command--just think of the possibilities! MBI ensures that you are effectively immortal, and grants you perfect recall as an added bonus. This creates a problem, though. Since you have an immaterial mind, you are always conscious and cannot ever die. Boredom and perhaps insanity may result, if the insanity is not due to chemical imbalances in the brain (you will be immune to that).

Still, I am willing to accept the power of MBI, despite the potential risks. Who knows, maybe after a long time, I will figure out a way to kill myself.

[Sikon]

So your idea is MTTT plus MBI would mean if you got killed, you could go back in time to when your body was still alive and possess it again, a guaranteed survival method. That's interesting but perhaps actually too good, too powerful for this scenario since it makes two of the four choices seem to just automatically be consumed by such.

However, going on with such:

Becoming a Homo Drakensis will only take one wish, as long as its existance/abilities are possible without the use of magic.

In that case:

• 1. Convert my body to nanotech instead of its current cells, a little like Stargate human-form replicators but without any technobabble unpermissible under one wish like subspace field emitters, rather just real-world materials and physics.

That takes care of personal near-immortality for the time being, along with the extra capabilities implied by such a body.

• 2. The ability to create a brief portal into alternate realities.

Cyborg Stan had a good idea for unending adventure. Bringing back knowledge and sometimes more plus the opportunities for exploitation would be a side bonus.

• 3. Time travel, presumably limited as in the OP.

The opportunity to live parts of my life again with future knowledge is both fun and invaluable, correcting past or future mistakes.

• 4. Mind-Body Independence.

Most of its benefits could be replicated with advanced enough telepresence on artificial bodies later, but this combined with the personal time-travel to allow surely returning after any death is too powerful to pass up.

*************************************

With these, aside from having fun, first get rich. Explore, and set up facilities on suitable safe alternate reality locations accessible through the portal jumping.

Whether the whole plan progresses slowly or fast, the beauty of immortality includes having time to gain more wealth, facilities, people, and capabilities. With all these advantages, developing general AI should be managed sooner or later. The resulting superintelligence can have recursive self-improvement effectively, advancing computer R&D and leading to progressively better versions of itself.

(Possibly I should have just instead wished for myself to become the first superintelligence directly, but it's unclear if permissible requests include thinking thousands of times faster than a human brain).

The goal is Singularity-style exponential returns, progressing towards uber-tech, including self-replicating factories. Solve the world's problems once sufficient capabilities are obtained.

I miss not choosing the ability to fly or telekinesis, but microgravity, virtual reality worlds, and more can make up for such in time.

[Broomstick]

1) I wish for a really fantastically good immune system (no allergies and able to fight off all diseases)

2) I wish for my husband's body to be "fixed" - the disabilities and pain to be corrected back to normal.

3) I wish my senses to be enhanced to the high end of human range (perfect eyesight, hearing, etc.)

4) And, for my "fun" wish - telekinesis that works on both objects in my line of sight and also on myself so I can levitate/fly, the maximum mass that can be manipulated being whatever the max the genie can give me.

[Dooey Jo]

1. Mind-Transfer Time Travel (MTTT) - The genie will not grant me full time-travel, because of time paradoxes associated with it. I settle for the power to send my mind back in time to a previous point in my life. By focusing on a memory in the past, I will be able to return to the time of that memory. When I jump to a previous point in my life, everything that took place after that is effectively erased and only exists in my memories.

Just so you know, this "save state" kind of time travel is still paradoxical. You take information from the future (your memories), and send it to the past, but then the future event when you decided to do this is nullified, meaning that information basically has appeared out of nowhere. Unless this ability always results in some hilarious and/or tragic event making you unable to actually change anything, and dooming you to go back again and again, poor Novikov and his principle would be violated. (But since genies tend to be tricky bastards, making you trap yourself in a time loop sounds like something they might do.)

It's not really a problem though, if the "many worlds" interpretation is correct, and in fact the "erasing" of the time line after the time travel event suggests that this must be so. But then any kind of time travel would be just dandy as well (except where you go back to your "original" universe. You might (there's nothing to suggest that this would be possible at all) be able to go back there, but you will not be able to change its history, as that would be a paradox).

[Lord of the Abyss]

Hmmmm.

# 1 : Discorporal Mind. I no longer have a material body of any kind ( which makes me invulnerable to physical force and immortal, as there's nothing there to hurt or age )

# 2 : Electromagnetic Force Generation ( EFG ) : The ability to generate electromagnetic forces that allow me to affect the physical world. For example, creating a pattern of electromagnetic fields that imitates the feel and appearance of, say, a human body, at least on the outside ( that's how we perceive matter, anyway ). To keep it from being overpowered by the OP standards, we are only talking low levels of energy and scale here; I could fake a human body, but not a 747.

# 3 : Direct Perception : The ability for my disembodied mind to perceive the physical world without sense organs.

# 4 : Superintelligence, on the order of a Known Space Protector ( without the hardwired behavior )

[hongi]

1. The ability to travel to any alternate universe.
2. An infinite number of times.
3. Profit?

I'd like to visit an alternate universe where the same genie exists, and make three more wishes and keep on jumping.

[Guardsman Bass]

The ability to travel between parallel universes and different time periods would be fun. You could mess around with things, like killing John Wilkes Booth before he kills Lincoln (or somehow convincing Lincoln that he has serious business to work on that night, and why not give the tickets to Andrew Johnson instead?), then come back to that universe at a later time period and see how it all played out.

[hongi]

The really awesome thing about parallel universes is that there's literally an infinite number of them, and so I think anything's possible. E.g. I think it's possible to jump to an alternate universe where saying the right combination of words will get me onto a train without paying for a ticket. I'm pretty sure in the quintillions upon quintillions of universes being created every second, there's a world where that's possible.