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I recently told a friend to watch the trailer for the upcoming film The Day After Tomorrow and it got us musing. Well I did most of the musing out loud while he stood there nodding at me.
It's a bit like King's - The Stand. Suppose something drastic happened and the majority of people were wiped out, leaving those behind to cope with rebuilding life. That people would cope is not in question, just how well they would cope is.
Now in The Stand the 'good' people eventually got the electricity on. Side tracked here - I believe the 'bad' people were in Vegas and they never had problem with the electricity. Does this mean that the majority of the Sparkies went to Vegas?
Back on the main track now. How would it pan out in reality. Eventually parts would be needed to fix the electric generators but how would you make the parts? The parts are made in factories which need electricity to drive the machines. Same with the Gas supply - we would need to keep the stations, pipes, rigs etc. working. How?
Infact most of the factories would be useless to the greatest degree.
What about the basic communications system - the telephone and Royal Mail.
What about health care? Imagine needing something amputated but there are no doctors.
Eventually all big steel ships would be unseaworthy and our ship builders are already on the verge of extinction. What then? No or little international trade.
What about vehicles - same as ships (except for my type of car which just plods on regardless) including the loss of fuel to drive them.
How about closer to home. Anyone here grow their own food? Would you know how to grow your own food while still cultivating seeds for your next crop. How about slaughtering your own meat. It's a fair bet that a lot of people would become vegetarians before they would try this.
What about clothing and footwear. Can anyone knit or weave cloth? Can you shear the sheep first, clean the wool, dye and comb it out? Do you know a good cobbler who can tan the hides before shaping the leather, cutting it and putting it all together to make you a boot?
How about just basic housing? Okay, you may know a brickie or two but can they actually bake the bricks? Joiners who put up the joists don't know how to make them. they just use pre-designed ones which come out of a factory ready to slot together. How would you make the glass for your windows or the furniture inside your home.
Eventually all your electrical goods would deteriorate. No washing machines or television.
You can't just say we would learn the skills, not just like that. Who would you learn them from bearing in mind that the majority of people have been wiped out. The chances of someone skilled enough, surviving to show you each of the skills needed, would be very slim.
Now I may be a techno-phobe but I like my creature comforts and cannot imagine my life without them. However, we have lost the ability to communicate properly with each other, to pass down stories from generation to generation.
The above examples are straight off the top of my head so what skills have we already lost which we don't know about and would not know about until we realised we needed them.
T'would be a scary life.
At least beer shouldn't be a problem as there are plenty of little home breweries around the country.
It's a bit like King's - The Stand. Suppose something drastic happened and the majority of people were wiped out, leaving those behind to cope with rebuilding life. That people would cope is not in question, just how well they would cope is.
Now in The Stand the 'good' people eventually got the electricity on. Side tracked here - I believe the 'bad' people were in Vegas and they never had problem with the electricity. Does this mean that the majority of the Sparkies went to Vegas?
Back on the main track now. How would it pan out in reality. Eventually parts would be needed to fix the electric generators but how would you make the parts? The parts are made in factories which need electricity to drive the machines. Same with the Gas supply - we would need to keep the stations, pipes, rigs etc. working. How?
Infact most of the factories would be useless to the greatest degree.
What about the basic communications system - the telephone and Royal Mail.
What about health care? Imagine needing something amputated but there are no doctors.
Eventually all big steel ships would be unseaworthy and our ship builders are already on the verge of extinction. What then? No or little international trade.
What about vehicles - same as ships (except for my type of car which just plods on regardless) including the loss of fuel to drive them.
How about closer to home. Anyone here grow their own food? Would you know how to grow your own food while still cultivating seeds for your next crop. How about slaughtering your own meat. It's a fair bet that a lot of people would become vegetarians before they would try this.
What about clothing and footwear. Can anyone knit or weave cloth? Can you shear the sheep first, clean the wool, dye and comb it out? Do you know a good cobbler who can tan the hides before shaping the leather, cutting it and putting it all together to make you a boot?
How about just basic housing? Okay, you may know a brickie or two but can they actually bake the bricks? Joiners who put up the joists don't know how to make them. they just use pre-designed ones which come out of a factory ready to slot together. How would you make the glass for your windows or the furniture inside your home.
Eventually all your electrical goods would deteriorate. No washing machines or television.
You can't just say we would learn the skills, not just like that. Who would you learn them from bearing in mind that the majority of people have been wiped out. The chances of someone skilled enough, surviving to show you each of the skills needed, would be very slim.
Now I may be a techno-phobe but I like my creature comforts and cannot imagine my life without them. However, we have lost the ability to communicate properly with each other, to pass down stories from generation to generation.
The above examples are straight off the top of my head so what skills have we already lost which we don't know about and would not know about until we realised we needed them.
T'would be a scary life.
At least beer shouldn't be a problem as there are plenty of little home breweries around the country.
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Well that settles it then, someone wipe out humanity and we'll have ourselves a farm!
:^)
:^)
There'd be no need for that precious University education either. It'd be pretty cool actually. My life dream is to live on a farm with a studio in the cellar, and to grow and cook my own food.
Atleast there would be no exams, grades, school pressure and student debts!
what a great world it would be...
what a great world it would be...
Sounds blissful when you put it like that but if my food doesn't come off a shelf I'm stuck. Will you be with us to taste the water and test these pretty little mushrooms for me?
Oh and yuck. Did anybody see a program the other night about the mass farmed chickens?
Oh and yuck. Did anybody see a program the other night about the mass farmed chickens?
As long as there are trees and water, you can do pretty much anything. Rub sticks to make fire, boil water to cook vegetation, use trees and mud to build shelter - nothing fancy, but it's the bare necessities of life!
Loquacious Duck wrote:
> And I bet it'd be a lot of fun finding out. So if you are planning a
> nuclear holocaust, can I stay in your bomb shelter? :^p
No, no holocaust, it would wipe out the animals and I wouldn't take them into a bomb shelter (unless I had a really, really big one and could make like Noah. Oh and I'd need slaves to look after them).
More along the lines of a new supergerm or even just masses of upheavals in the earth e.g. volcano's erupting or huge cracks appearing in the earths crust or mountains falling down, that kind of thing. No silicon valley, it would be one of the first areas to go.
> And I bet it'd be a lot of fun finding out. So if you are planning a
> nuclear holocaust, can I stay in your bomb shelter? :^p
No, no holocaust, it would wipe out the animals and I wouldn't take them into a bomb shelter (unless I had a really, really big one and could make like Noah. Oh and I'd need slaves to look after them).
More along the lines of a new supergerm or even just masses of upheavals in the earth e.g. volcano's erupting or huge cracks appearing in the earths crust or mountains falling down, that kind of thing. No silicon valley, it would be one of the first areas to go.
Loquacious Duck wrote:
> I know what you mean though. Certainly until recently America seemed
> to have a very limited view of the rest of the world (or its
> significance!). But that must be changing now. Right?
Well they have kind of become best of buds with England with Tony Blair, but they still have their heads up their ar$e's instead of their heads in educational books.
> I know what you mean though. Certainly until recently America seemed
> to have a very limited view of the rest of the world (or its
> significance!). But that must be changing now. Right?
Well they have kind of become best of buds with England with Tony Blair, but they still have their heads up their ar$e's instead of their heads in educational books.
ßora SagdiyeV wrote:
> Ineedsleep wrote:
> Whoa! That would be me then. I make excellent sandwiches but I
> can't
> make a pencil either :)
>
> just burn a piece of wood at one end, until it is charcoal. there ya
> go, one cheap but effective pencil (if a little minging).
No, no no. Far too hard.
Buy some pencil leads, and cellotape lolly pop sticks around them.
:^)
> Ineedsleep wrote:
> Whoa! That would be me then. I make excellent sandwiches but I
> can't
> make a pencil either :)
>
> just burn a piece of wood at one end, until it is charcoal. there ya
> go, one cheap but effective pencil (if a little minging).
No, no no. Far too hard.
Buy some pencil leads, and cellotape lolly pop sticks around them.
:^)
If it had spread to the rest of the world then there'd be nobody able to do anything to get in contact with the Americans, and if it hadn't spread, the rest of the world would have quarantined the US, so there'd still be no contact.
Except maybe international radio or something.
But aside from that, from the perspective of the characters in the story, there'd probably be no international contact. So the book is more or less accurate... :^)
I know what you mean though. Certainly until recently America seemed to have a very limited view of the rest of the world (or its significance!). But that must be changing now. Right?
Except maybe international radio or something.
But aside from that, from the perspective of the characters in the story, there'd probably be no international contact. So the book is more or less accurate... :^)
I know what you mean though. Certainly until recently America seemed to have a very limited view of the rest of the world (or its significance!). But that must be changing now. Right?
Ineedsleep wrote:
> Whoa! That would be me then. I make excellent sandwiches but I can't
> make a pencil either :)
just burn a piece of wood at one end, until it is charcoal. there ya go, one cheap but effective pencil (if a little minging).
> Whoa! That would be me then. I make excellent sandwiches but I can't
> make a pencil either :)
just burn a piece of wood at one end, until it is charcoal. there ya go, one cheap but effective pencil (if a little minging).
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