Post-apocryphal society?

[Paul Anthony]

The possibility of a major disaster such as Hurricane Katrina is always lurking. The suffering that results from a temporary lack of basic resources such as water, food and electricity is devastating, but temporary, as long as relief can be gained from sources outside of the area affected. But, what if the disaster were world-wide?

With no hope of rescue from the government – any government – how many would survive?

And what sort of society might those survivors create?

Today, people in the medical profession are valued more than most, but if there was no running water, would we value a person who could turn the water back on more than we value a doctor? Certainly, a doctor can save lives. But without water, we would all die!

I suspect after a major disaster we would value people who can provide water, food and electricity more than anyone else. Then again, we would also see the value in the person who bakes the best tasting bread or one who cans the best preserves. Why don’t we appreciate those things more now? It is because we have come to take them for granted. Turn on the faucet and water flows. Flip a switch and there is light. Bread is available at every grocery store. But there is no instant remedy for medical emergencies.

If everything were taken from us, we would value everything almost equally. In a post-disaster society everyone who can do anything would be valued equally. No one would feel superior, and – perhaps more importantly – no one would feel inferior.

Many forms of government have been proposed that claim to give us an egalitarian society. Throughout history, each has failed. Isn’t it interesting, if not ironic, that a complete elimination of government and the infrastructure for which government is credited might inadvertently accomplish what no government has been able to do?

[CanadysPeak]

The possibility of a major disaster such as Hurricane Katrina is always lurking. The suffering that results from a temporary lack of basic resources such as water, food and electricity is devastating, but temporary, as long as relief can be gained from sources outside of the area affected. But, what if the disaster were world-wide?

With no hope of rescue from the government – any government – how many would survive?

And what sort of society might those survivors create?

Today, people in the medical profession are valued more than most, but if there was no running water, would we value a person who could turn the water back on more than we value a doctor? Certainly, a doctor can save lives. But without water, we would all die!

I suspect after a major disaster we would value people who can provide water, food and electricity more than anyone else. Then again, we would also see the value in the person who bakes the best tasting bread or one who cans the best preserves. Why don’t we appreciate those things more now? It is because we have come to take them for granted. Turn on the faucet and water flows. Flip a switch and there is light. Bread is available at every grocery store. But there is no instant remedy for medical emergencies.

If everything were taken from us, we would value everything almost equally. In a post-disaster society everyone who can do anything would be valued equally. No one would feel superior, and – perhaps more importantly – no one would feel inferior.

Many forms of government have been proposed that claim to give us an egalitarian society. Throughout history, each has failed. Isn’t it interesting, if not ironic, that a complete elimination of government and the infrastructure for which government is credited might inadvertently accomplish what no government has been able to do?

Settle down there, pseudo John Galt. What will such a society do with those are are thieves or laggards? We can only be egalitarian when we all step up and pull our weight to the best of our abilities. Meth-heads, gang-bangers, and the idle rich not only contribute nothing, they undermine the rest.

[Paul Anthony]

Settle down there, pseudo John Galt. What will such a society do with those are are thieves or laggards? We can only be egalitarian when we all step up and pull our weight to the best of our abilities. Meth-heads, gang-bangers, and the idle rich not only contribute nothing, they undermine the rest.

Think this through...Imagine no running water, electricity or food deliveries for, say, a month. The thieves and laggards have already pilfered the contents of all the stores (and burned more than a few of them to the ground) and now they are...well...dead. As for the wealthy, money has no value anymore (some might say it has no value today, but that is another topic) so the wealthy are no better prepared than the aforementioned laggards. The population is considerably smaller, consisting only of those who had the foresight to conserve.

These are the sort who have hunkered down, determined to protect what's theirs, and they will be reluctant to cooperate with anyone outside their own small circle of friends/family. It would take a few more months before they would be willing to cooperate with "outsiders", but necessity would demand it. It has been said that government is only necessary to provide that which individuals cannot provide for themselves, but no single individual can provide everything. Without a functioning government, I believe survivors would form groups (a new society) to fill the gaps.

The survivors would be people who have some skills, otherwise they would not have survived. And each skill will be valuable - and valued - at least for a little while.

As time passes and once the necessities are once again available, it is entirely possible (and I believe inevitable) that people will resort to their human tendency to see others as "others" again, and will demand a set of laws making "our" ideals legal and "their" way of life illegal.

Utopia is attainable, but probably not sustainable.

[CanadysPeak]

Settle down there, pseudo John Galt. What will such a society do with those are are thieves or laggards? We can only be egalitarian when we all step up and pull our weight to the best of our abilities. Meth-heads, gang-bangers, and the idle rich not only contribute nothing, they undermine the rest.

Think this through...Imagine no running water, electricity or food deliveries for, say, a month. The thieves and laggards have already pilfered the contents of all the stores (and burned more than a few of them to the ground) and now they are...well...dead. As for the wealthy, money has no value anymore (some might say it has no value today, but that is another topic) so the wealthy are no better prepared than the aforementioned laggards. The population is considerably smaller, consisting only of those who had the foresight to conserve.

These are the sort who have hunkered down, determined to protect what's theirs, and they will be reluctant to cooperate with anyone outside their own small circle of friends/family. It would take a few more months before they would be willing to cooperate with "outsiders", but necessity would demand it. It has been said that government is only necessary to provide that which individuals cannot provide for themselves, but no single individual can provide everything. Without a functioning government, I believe survivors would form groups (a new society) to fill the gaps.

The survivors would be people who have some skills, otherwise they would not have survived. And each skill will be valuable - and valued - at least for a little while.

As time passes and once the necessities are once again available, it is entirely possible (and I believe inevitable) that people will resort to their human tendency to see others as "others" again, and will demand a set of laws making "our" ideals legal and "their" way of life illegal.

Utopia is attainable, but probably not sustainable.

Well! If you're gonna allow me to get rid of lots of people, I could make this society work, and I wouldn't need an apocolypse (they are so loud and messy!).

[Marshall]

apocryphal often used to mean "of dubious authority", derives from Greek word meaning "hidden away".

apocalypse I believe means REVELATION and the original meaning wasn't necessarily revelation of something bad. It just got that connotation because someone thought he was having a revelation of the destruction of the wicked world and the four scary horsemen and giant lizards or whatever and he wrote the Book of Revelation. So then it got to mean the Final Disaster when society collapses.

And it got to be a kind of euphemism for war with nuclear missiles or with chemical/biological weapons. A kind of mutually assured destruction. The Greek word for "revelation" was just a little vague and obscure so it concealed some of the ugliness.

I think one has to be clear and detailed about what it is that knocks the basic utilities out. And why you think they would come back on. And why law and order breaks down, and so on.

I think maybe you live in Arizona, which means highly dependent on electric power to pump water. My guess is that if utilities somehow got knocked out the way you describe there would be a tendency to migrate to regions with more fresh surface water---more natural rainfall, natural agriculture.

I think that law and order would probably NOT break down in some fertile regions with natural rainfall or freshwater lakes. Particularly if government had large stores of emergency supplies. Stored food could be used to keep police and national guard units loyal. As long as you can feed your troops you've got an army and bigger armies can suppress the formation of local warlords. So I don't see a complete breakdown happening across the board. Only in especially fragile regions, big cities and dry places, like Los Angeles and Arizona and such.

People in other parts of the world are more used to partial breakdowns of society due to various kinds of crisis, civil war, revolution, religious violence, occupation, bombing etc. It happens all the time and people adapt various ways, and a lot of them die. I suppose that americans would cope somewhat the way europeans have, in the past, coped with havoc. But I'm hardly qualified to have an opinion, I know so little about it.

[Ursa Minimus]

In a post-disaster society everyone who can do anything would be valued equally. No one would feel superior, and – perhaps more importantly – no one would feel inferior.

You think that those who can dig holes will be valued the same as those who can make a bow and kill a deer? You really think those who can weed a field will be equally valued with those who can distill alcohol (for drinking and fuel)?

I doubt a civilization ending disaster would eliminate social status processes.

[Paul Anthony]

I think maybe you live in Arizona, which means highly dependent on electric power to pump water. My guess is that if utilities somehow got knocked out the way you describe there would be a tendency to migrate to regions with more fresh surface water---more natural rainfall, natural agriculture.

Absolutely. I know of a Mormon family here in Southern Arizona that also maintains a "compound" consisting of 5 cabins in Northern Arizona for that reason. But I wonder if they would be able to get there!
Mormons, BTW, are taught to keep at least 6 months of food and water on hand at all times. There is a large Mormon population here. They will be among the survivors. Then, there are the "preppers" who are even MORE prepared. They will survive. There aren't any Amish here that I know of, but they would probably survive - without realizing anything had changed! I wonder if those diverse groups would cooperate...

I think that law and order would probably NOT break down in some fertile regions with natural rainfall or freshwater lakes. Particularly if government had large stores of emergency supplies. Stored food could be used to keep police and national guard units loyal. As long as you can feed your troops you've got an army and bigger armies can suppress the formation of local warlords. So I don't see a complete breakdown happening across the board. Only in especially fragile regions, big cities and dry places, like Los Angeles and Arizona and such.

You are correct in assuming electricity is more important in dry, warm climates. But in every city, food supplies would be interrupted. Grocery store shelves would empty quickly, and there would likely not be much restocking. As to government supplies, think Katrina. It took quite a while for relief to arrive. Imagine if the breakdown was nation-wide! The majority of our population lives in cities. You are probably correct in assuming the supplies would be used to keep law enforcement/the army fed. Pity the rest of us.

People in other parts of the world are more used to partial breakdowns of society due to various kinds of crisis, civil war, revolution, religious violence, occupation, bombing etc. It happens all the time and people adapt various ways, and a lot of them die.

I would posit that they survive because it happens all the time. We are spoiled. For so many people, there is a vast disconnect between the source of food and the ready availability of prepared food. Many people would starve if McDonald's wasn't there.

[Paul Anthony]

You think that those who can dig holes will be valued the same as those who can make a bow and kill a deer? You really think those who can weed a field will be equally valued with those who can distill alcohol (for drinking and fuel)?

I doubt a civilization ending disaster would eliminate social status processes.

Alas, you are probably correct. If a disaster of this magnitude wouldn't get us to treat each other fairly, is there any hope for humankind?

[CanadysPeak]

Paul,

If the breakdown you posit comes about, our only choice is to assume a strong, open-legged stance, bend over, stick our heads between . . . well, you can finish. In simple terms, civilization requires grain. Meat will sustain small bands of hunters, but you need grain for proto-societies to reform. To grow grain, particularly wheat, you need non-hybrid seeds so you can do it again next year. That's gone. Most seed is now hybrid. No technology, no seed. It might well take centuries for mother nature to fix that SNAFU.

[Paul Anthony]

Paul,

In simple terms, civilization requires grain. Meat will sustain small bands of hunters, but you need grain for proto-societies to reform. To grow grain, particularly wheat, you need non-hybrid seeds so you can do it again next year. That's gone. Most seed is now hybrid. No technology, no seed. It might well take centuries for mother nature to fix that SNAFU.

Yes, and the "preppers" are buying "heirloom seeds". But how many city dwellers have room to grow wheat? Vegetables, maybe, but grains take a lot of space and a lot of water.

I'm a vegetarian, so I'm not worried about a lack of meat (although I do eat small amounts of poultry and fish - and eggs).

I don't want to go overboard, but I have stocked up on canned goods whenever they're on sale. Soups and canned vegetables are easy to prepare, even if you don't have the means to cook, and they are packed in water and contain a lot of salt. Without power in the desert, I expect to sweat a lot, so water and salt sound pretty good! :)

[edy420]

Hi Paul.

The reason cities are densely populated is because they provide jobs and an acceptable lifestyle.
If you lose one or both, then you move away from the city, simple :P (or you live off your family.)

Humans have survived for millennia without pumped water or anything else that you may depend on within a city.

The hippies have been saying for years that hemp can save the world, and all right too.
A full size crop can be grown in as little as a few months, and the seeds they produce are the only known natural food that can sustain all of the humans nutritional needs.
So seek out your nearest hippie for some survival seeds :P
Not only that but the fibre in hemp stalks makes some of the strongest and most robust clothing and rope.
Which just about covers all of our humanly needs, apart from water and shelter. (assuming the illegal strains could now be used for its medicinal benefit's)

The technological era, would regress for the time being, but we won't be running around screaming "its the end of the world", for too long before we get back on our feet.

With the Governments grasp loosened or completely let go, we could form a resource based economy.

[edy420]

Well! If you're gonna allow me to get rid of lots of people, I could make this society work, and I wouldn't need an apocolypse (they are so loud and messy!).

Hah!
I can never tell if your serous or not CanadysPeak :P

But you propose a Spartan code of conduct here, you would have to continue culling society until we figure out how to isolate the human genes that encourage bad human behaviour.

When a few thousand people have had their relations murdered for a 'better society', society would take a tumble down hill Imo.

[weakmagneto]

I think many cities and larger urban areas would experience the most chaos. You would probably see a mass exodus of people leaving the cities.

I live in a small very rural community. Many of us hunt, fish, produce our own gardens and keep small livestock. We are surrounded by freshwater lakes and springs. For food, shelter, water, etc. my family and I would be okay. We still have our small community values where we all pitch in to help one another.

I think the biggest threat for me would be desperate people such as those who have addictions. A lack of product could make some people very desperate and dangerous.

[Ursa Minimus]

You think that those who can dig holes will be valued the same as those who can make a bow and kill a deer? You really think those who can weed a field will be equally valued with those who can distill alcohol (for drinking and fuel)?

I doubt a civilization ending disaster would eliminate social status processes.

Alas, you are probably correct. If a disaster of this magnitude wouldn't get us to treat each other fairly, is there any hope for humankind?

Keep in mind that hunting and gathering societies tend to make sure everyone is taken care of. Everyone gets some of the kill (but not everyone gets the prime bits). Everyone gets a cut of the nuts and berries. If someone needs a new hut, others help. Equality won't happen, but equity can. Fair won't happen, but "more fair" could. That depends on how things play out.

But any plan that relies on social status going bye bye, that's doomed for sure.

[Forest_Dump]

As somewhat of a pro here, I might be able to offer some tidbits. I will, however, point out that I might actually do okay since I am actually very good at things like making stone tools (and finding the right materials to do that) as well as a number of other kinds of "primitive technology" such as making pots, even dug-out canoes, etc.

An important point here is that our ultra-specialized society does allow something that you can't have otherwise - high population numbers. Of course cities cannot be self-sustaining without the massive infrastructure we have. In fact, based on demographic reconstructions of North America at the time of contact, it would be difficult to see how the population of New York City alone could be supported with the entire natural resources of the continent. At its most pragmatic you would need a lot of reconstruction to pump water to those cities which requires an energy source and maintenance, etc., and the people doing that have to be fed, pipelines, etc., have to be defended, etc. And that is important not just because people need water but because things like sewage needs to be disposed of. Of course, very quickly, bodies too.

We would also find out rather quickly that without at least some remnants of our complex society, a lot of places, including Arizona, would be too marginal to support for very long, if at all. So, in fact, for places like Arizona, pretty much anywhere in the mountains, etc., some kind of fairly complex organization would be necessary to provide enough food to get you from one year to the next, assuming nothing unforeseen happens (like droughts and heatwaves that kill crops). Of course, you would need mechanisms for exchange to get resources you need and ultimately something to exchange them for. For long distances, etc., that would quickly mean the need for some kind of money that retained value over long distances and for lots of people. Even in the prehistoric past, organizing people numbering more than a few hundred required specialization and organization and that required a hierarchy of some sorts. The most massive, industrial scale attempts at egalitarian societies were those attempted by the various governments we classify as communist and they still had hierarchies but also didn't do too well.

In fact, I think for organizational purposes, which would be necessary to approach anything close to what we might survive in, you would quickly need something that no cohesive society numberingmore than a few thousand has ever been known to exist without - fulltime specialists known as bureaucrats. There might (I would say almost definitely) quickly develope military dictatorships, etc., but, as they say, armies march on their stomachs and someone would need to make sure the soldiers, etc., are fed, armed, etc., and that always seems to require a logistics chain.

[ronjanec]

I can't remember where I read this, but theoretically a single nuclear bomb going off in the earth's atmosphere two hundred miles above the central USA, and the electromagnetic pulse that this would create, would cause such havoc here in the US, that 90% of the people in the US would be dead within a year.

[Paul Anthony]

Forest,

Thanks for your input. You are by far the nearest we have to an expert in this area!

Although you may be correct, I admit that the mention of bureaucrats sent chills up my spine more than the thought of a water shortage had. :)

I didn't specify what sort of catastrophe would be the catalyst for this scenario, and perhaps I should have designated one, but I was trying to allow for anything from a natural disaster to an EMP burst (as mentioned by ronjanec).

So, let's say it is something sudden, but without shells bursting in air (so that we needn't concern ourselves with mutilated bodies). How do you see city dwellers faring, keeping in mind cities are densely populated, but usually far removed from the sources of food? I would imagine people living in agricultural areas would have a greater chance of survival. If so, the survivors would be somewhat scattered, making any cooperation beyond a few families difficult.

Also assume it is far-reaching - perhaps the entire continent - meaning there would be little hope of government assistance. This isn't about Democrats or Republicans, mind you, but about the inability of any government to respond to a disaster on this scale. Besides, I didn't post this in "Politics" because I am more interested in the interaction of individuals than the actions of governments. Assume the government is no more.

With no government, fiat currencies would have no value. Initially, gold and silver may serve as currency - but heavy metals will not fill one's belly. I am thinking barter would be the preferred method of exchange. Would you agree?

[ronjanec]

Paul,

I cannot even imagine how bad it would be for city dwellers if all order basically broke down overnight! If you somehow could survive your trip out of a city like say Chicago, I really doubt if anyone in living the farm areas would be in any way "happy" to see you despite your terrible plight.

I am getting really depressed just at the thought of all of this. And no more Chicago pizza! Need I even mention something so terrible?

[Paul Anthony]

Paul,

I cannot even imagine how bad it would be for city dwellers if all order basically broke down overnight! If you somehow could survive your trip out of a city like say Chicago, I really doubt if anyone in living the farm areas would be in any way "happy" to see you despite your terrible plight.

I am getting really depressed just at the thought of all of this. And no more Chicago pizza! Need I even mention something so terrible?

Great! Now I'm hungry for pizza!

Keep in mind, an EMP would render modern autos useless. No mass migration from the cities. You might as well grab a pizza and a beer, before they're all gone.

[ronjanec]

Paul,

I cannot even imagine how bad it would be for city dwellers if all order basically broke down overnight! If you somehow could survive your trip out of a city like say Chicago, I really doubt if anyone in living the farm areas would be in any way "happy" to see you despite your terrible plight.

I am getting really depressed just at the thought of all of this. And no more Chicago pizza! Need I even mention something so terrible?

Great! Now I'm hungry for pizza!

Keep in mind, an EMP would render modern autos useless. No mass migration from the cities. You might as well grab a pizza and a beer, before they're all gone.

Your right. I forgot Paul. I guess I am not much of a "survivealist"(not even sure how to spell it) A lifelong 'city boy' like me is definitely a goner if it all 'hits the fan'(By the way, I read that Phoenix has a great place for pizza?)

[CanadysPeak]

The biggest and quickest difficulty in such a wide-spread disaster would be the LOCAs at the nuclear power plants. There are no passively safe reactors anywhere; even the steam turbine isolation cooling systems require human intervention during station blackouts. I cannot predict what portion of the nation's plants would do a Fukishima runner on us, but you have to only look downwind from most to see agricultural areas such as the Central Valley, the Delmarva peninsula, and so on.

Should we manage to get through that, we then have to halt the backwards slide at the electricity generating level. We cannot let that technology be lost. There is no substitute. Many point to the Amish as examples of folks who "live off the grid", but they don't. They utilize products made by people who "live on the grid." One only to vist someplace like Lehman's in Ohio ( a well-used Amish store) and look at the products to see how important electricity was in their manufacture.

One might argue that much of today's technology is simply a refinement of what was present in the nineteenth century. If so, one is merely ignorant. We might well revive the old style blast furnaces to again make iron, but what shall we use for locally available ore? Have you looked at the Mesabi lately? How much bog iron remains anywhere in the developed world? How much elemental copper lies near the surface in Cornwall? How many inches of topsoil remain in Illinois or Nebraska if we go back to deep plowing of a century ago? What replaces chemical fertilizers?

I think we would have to halt the decline at perhaps 1930s level or so, else the next reasonable stop is pre-bronze.

[ronjanec]

Canady,

We have nuclear plants all over the place here in the Chicago area! Even if I do manage to 'get out of Dodge', I will probably be radioactive! Again, this thread is really making me depressed.

[CanadysPeak]

Canady,

We have nuclear plants all over the place here in the Chicago area! Even if I do manage to 'get out of Dodge', I will probably be radioactive! Again, this thread is really making me depressed.

You won't get out of Dodge. That's the problem with almost all survivalist techniques - everyone will wait too long. Imagine you're in the original Donner party. You know that people snowed in up in the mountains usually die. You know there is nobody "out there" to come get you. You've faced hunger before and know you can't last till Spring. The decision to throw your fat brother-in-law in the stew pot comes in time to make a difference. Now, imagine being there today, except nobody is there because they're all dead or devastated - but you don't know that. You are so sure that someone will come, and you know the penalties for cannibalism, that you end waiting till you're too weak to strangle the guy. Only the real nuts will start killing and looting on the second day of this great apocalypse. Probably does interesting things to the gene pool, but you're toast.

[Forest_Dump]

How do you see city dwellers faring, keeping in mind cities are densely populated, but usually far removed from the sources of food? I would imagine people living in agricultural areas would have a greater chance of survival. If so, the survivors would be somewhat scattered, making any cooperation beyond a few families difficult.

I guess I wasn't very clear. I don't think city dwellers would last very long at all. Where would they get their food and water when existing stocks and water pressure were depleted? It takes power and maintenance to keep the supplies moving and who would make sure people in the water pumping stations showed up to work and did their jobs? (Of course, what jobs?)

As to agricultural areas, truth be told, I am not sure they would do that much better. Modern agriculture requires lots of machinery, maintenance and replacement parts not to mention fuel. Without power the pumps won't work although people will probably quickly find a way to siphon out the storage tanks. So you might be able to harvest more than what could be done by hand but it would take an awful lot of work just to get enough harvested but what about the processing? Any storage that requires refridgeration would be quite the challenge in not out of the question. And many of those areas are so intensively invested in single or a small number of crops would be faced with another problem - who wants 20 tons of unprocessed sunflower seeds or soya beans? Some barter might happen but again how many tons of raw oats would or could you trade for a live pig or some ammo? And even if that worked, without fuel, parts and maintenance (including, of course, any necessary road maintenance plus some form of security) how would you get crops from Nebraska to, say, you in Arizona (and what do you have to trade - you are right, can't eat gold) or cattle ranchers in Montana? Definitely not enough horses in those places totake up the slack. Assuming they made it to harvesting time, including perhaps being able to count on enough rain for water, Idaho potato farmers might just have to live off only potatoes for quite some time (assuming they over-came the storage problem which would be a lot worse for dairy farmers).

As to bureaucrats, Paul, you work in companies of more than 1-2 people. Who organizes them? Sure you may call them managers, etc., but that is just another name for bureaucrats as is the payroll department, accounts receivable, accounts payable, human resources, sales, etc. These are people who are not the "king" or "chief" and are not the actual producers of whatever counts as the goods or services in question.

Every so often I watch the old Regan-era movie "The Day After" (I think it was called). As described on the cover, the premise of the movie was the question "what happens if someone presses the buttons"? The answer was that, in essence, almost no one survives and when you get down to it, they are not the lucky ones. I think just about any scenario that ends up with a sudden collapse of the overall economic system we have in North America more or less fits that. In this day and age, I don't think there are any communities remote enough or self-sufficient enough to not be seriously, negatively impacted. Pretty much everyone needs fuel for transportation, heating, storage, piping water, etc., to say the least.

[CanadysPeak]

Forest,

You raise an excellent point about the number of draft horses. There has not been a horse census in the US for over a half century, and it's difficult to sort out draft and pleasure animals, but a reasonable estimate might be something under a million draft horses. This would fit a population of perhaps five million people, based on historic ratios. So, we have to get rid of most of the US population. You could reasonably add no more than something like ten thousand new horses a year, so population would have to be kept low (starvation should do that).

A more serious shortage, however, would probably be that of oxen. Only God knows how many oxen we have in the US, but I've not seen any for many years. If we are to return to non-mechanized, sustainable agriculture, we would need something like one ox for every three or four horses I would think.

That, of course, brings up the question of skills. How many harness makers have we? Farriers? Blacksmiths? And, if we were to solve the motive power problem, we need coopers, and millers, and colliers. And where shall we find salt? How many licks are there? Are they still usable? We can't be hollowing out under Cleveland if we have no electricity.

Pretty daunting.

[Forest_Dump]

Blacksmiths?

Well, you raised the point about getting metals earlier and frankly I would suspect that most or all of the surface deposits of high grade metals have been used up by now. I would hate to have to mine for anything including coal without a decent power grid. But again, a lot of these things have only been possible with a state-level society and that also means some form of money and a full-time bureaucracy to keep it organized.

Aside a slight aside, I recently reread Timothy Earle's "How Chiefs Came to Power", an anthropological and archaeological study on the origins of complex societies using cases from the Andes (a precursor to the Incas), Hawaii and some other Polynesian societies (prehistoric to early historic) and the ancestors of the Vikings (well up to the early historic). Terrific read. However, his (Earle's) point was that there are three sources of power necessary to develope a stable, complex society: economic, military and ideological. Neither one or two of the three is adequate for a stable long-term complex society but you need all three although with different proportions depending on historical and environmental contexts.

[CanadysPeak]

Blacksmiths?

Well, you raised the point about getting metals earlier and frankly I would suspect that most or all of the surface deposits of high grade metals have been used up by now. I would hate to have to mine for anything including coal without a decent power grid. But again, a lot of these things have only been possible with a state-level society and that also means some form of money and a full-time bureaucracy to keep it organized.

Aside a slight aside, I recently reread Timothy Earle's "How Chiefs Came to Power", an anthropological and archaeological study on the origins of complex societies using cases from the Andes (a precursor to the Incas), Hawaii and some other Polynesian societies (prehistoric to early historic) and the ancestors of the Vikings (well up to the early historic). Terrific read. However, his (Earle's) point was that there are three sources of power necessary to develope a stable, complex society: economic, military and ideological. Neither one or two of the three is adequate for a stable long-term complex society but you need all three although with different proportions depending on historical and environmental contexts.

Good point. For all three components, I should think you'd need something like a city-state with grain agriculture and transhumant herding. Then you could manage the specialization. I suppose you could raid for some of this.

Blacksmiths could use scrap steel for some time, I'd think. Then they'd be out of luck except in those areas where there are still some mediocre, near surface deposits (the Hanging Rock district in Ohio, for example). But, I seriously doubt we could recreate the metallurgical skill required to recognize those deposits, and then to use the appropriate refining operations. I'm very skeptical about being able to go backwards.

For fuel, we could go back to charcoal. Much of the National Forests in the US would be suitable for coaling. Coal is probably out of the question.

I dunno. What are your thoughts about stabilizing at a steam-driven technology? Or a water-powered one?

[Paul Anthony]

I find it interesting that no one has mentioned solar or wind. The current regime in Washington would have us believe these are the power sources of the future!

[Forest_Dump]

What are your thoughts about stabilizing at a steam-driven technology? Or a water-powered one?

Well, I think it all could and eventually probably would be recoverable. The appropriate knowledge would be out there in books (of course anything stored on electronic media only would more likely be lost). Sooner or later someone would mine all the old Popular Mechanics magazines, etc.

I think the realquestion Paul might be posing is how far things would get without the trappings of a state-level society. I don't see how, frankly, as that has never really been done even though people do like to point to small-scale "utopian" societies that managed for a while on the outskirts of larger states. I would bet that once populations stabilized (there would definitely be a very severe demographic "adjustment"), the closest you would really get to a stabile form of political structure would be something along the lines of feudalism.

[Forest_Dump]

I find it interesting that no one has mentioned solar or wind. The current regime in Washington would have us believe these are the power sources of the future!

Sure. Here too (creating a lot of work for archaeologists at the moment). But solar requires a high tech capacity to produce solar panels (although laying black pipes, etc., on a sunny hillside can create hat air and/or water). Wind power and even geothermal have their advantages too but you still need some high tech people for maintenance and, more importantly, distribution over any significant area. All those components, etc., don't just grow themselves.