Could our civilization fall?

[coremelt]

The problem with Jared’s “collapse” is that “western civilization” is not a single entity. There has never been a total collapse of all “civilization” globally. When the roman empire collapsed, other empires were in their ascendency, Khmer Empire, Various Hindu and Buddhist empires in India, chinese dynasties, south american Aztec and Mayan empires.

Yeah maybe the “US empire” is in decline but there’s a strong case to be made that the Indian and Chinese civilizations are currently in their ascendency.

[Q.E.D]

@Lemur866

It’s not exactly impossible to purify saltpetre:

Most (and by most, I mean the VAST majority, not just a simple majority) people today who are capable of smithing guns and mixing gunpowder would not be aware of these ancient processes. For all practical purposes, the art is dead.

[coremelt]

@Q.E.D

Most (and by most, I mean the VAST majority, not just a simple majority) people today who are capable of smithing guns and mixing gunpowder would not be aware of these ancient processes. For all practical purposes, the art is dead.

Sure, but it only takes 1 person who knows how to do it the old way who then teaches 10 others and so on. There’s a vast amount of this knowledge still preserved in “third world” countries where people have never stopped doing things the “ancient” way.

[Q.E.D]

@coremelt

Sure, but it only takes 1 person who knows how to do it the old way who then teaches 10 others and so on. There’s a vast amount of this knowledge still preserved in “third world” countries where people have never stopped doing things the “ancient” way.

That’s fine for those countries, but doesn’t do a thing for people in developed nations where, as I said, such things are lost arts. Which is unfortunate, since it’s the developed nations that are at the biggest disadvantage following a total collapse of civilization such as is being discussed. Third-world citizens are used to scraping a living from the Earth with their bare hands, so to speak; we, on the other hand, essentially have no clue.

[Lemur866]

Yabbut. Civilization isn’t going to collapse tomorrow, is it? Sure if we get hit by a comet or SkyNet decides to launch every nuke on the planet then we’re back to scrabbling in the ashes.

Are we talking about a case where humanity is on the verge of extinction? Or something more like the collapse of the Roman Empire?

If we’re talking about a collapse of the Roman Empire, we’re not going to lose the knowledge of how to make gunpowder. Gunpowder is not an esoteric secret. Sure, most people today don’t know how to make gunpowder. If you sent random people alone to ancient Rome, they’d be unable to set themselves up as wizards by manufacturing gunpowder.

But even if we imagine a scenario where 90% of humanity is dead, that still only kills 90% of the chemistry students who would be capable of reading a dusty chemistry textbook and making some black powder. Sure, one guy roaming the outback in turbocharged vehicle isn’t going to be making black powder. But any village with a manure pile and a guy who can read a chemistry textbook can make black powder.

The thing is, modern technology turns out to be pretty useful. A settlement that can make flintlock rifles is going to massacre bands of nomads armed with sticks with nails poking out. How many people have to die before the last guy who can read a chemistry textbook dies? Such a dieback would be unprecedented in human history, and would require some unprecedented agent of collapse.

[Q.E.D]

@Lemur866

But even if we imagine a scenario where 90% of humanity is dead, that still only kills 90% of the chemistry students who would be capable of reading a dusty chemistry textbook and making some black powder. Sure, one guy roaming the outback in turbocharged vehicle isn’t going to be making black powder. But any village with a manure pile and a guy who can read a chemistry textbook can make black powder.

I think you’ll be hard-pressed to find a modern chem text that describes in sufficient detail the process of extracting saltpeter from manure. There simply isn’t, at least in developed nations, the need for such information, except as a passing curiosity. We can just go to a chem supply house and buy 99.9% pure technical grade sodium nitrate and go to work. Besides which, your own cite says the processes took months; during this time, I would not expect everyone to sit idly by until your putative band of survivalist world rebuilders gets its act together. No, if they have resources that others need, they’ll be attacked for them. Good luck getting your chemistry experiment to run while your village is being pillaged and plundered.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

@What_Exit

Yes it is possible. If competition for resources gets too tough but how it would happen is pure conjecture.

Take your choice from some of these:

Global Warming causes the loss of coastal cities which disrupts economies and displaces Billions of people.

A Super-volcano puts us into a 2-3 year period of long extra cold winters and causes famine and shortage around the world and sets off a series of wars.

A large meteor strike wipes out a large part of the population but is not up to dinosaur killer destruction.

A war breaks out with biological weapons used and the virus goes too far and too fast and devastates the world.

Lack of fuel is extremely unlikely. When it gets expensive enough we will find alternatives. Hopefully we are getting there soon enough for other reasons.

To this grim but all-too-possible list I’d add:

• a total economic collapse and social breakdown that might follow from the destruction of electronic financial databases and the electrical grid from the use of some kind of EMP device(s), and

• WWIII with nuclear weapons, which might have as its flashpoint either the Middle East or the Asian Subcontinent.

I think most people have no idea just how fragile the world’s economic, political and social structures are. May we all never have to find out.

ETA: Ooops, I see the OP took nuclear war off the table.

[silenus]

Why bother? While we are waiting for “our chemistry experiment” to run, we use all the ammo that is laying around for modern weapons. By the time that runs out, we can have enough black powder available to handle what’s left of the brigands. For that matter, I could make a quite powerful powder using fertilizer-grade nitrates, of which there are mega-tons about. As for using a Chemistry text…why bother? There are hundreds of books available everywhere that show you, with simple step by step directions, how to make all sorts of neat things.

[Lemur866]

@Q.E.D

I would not expect everyone to sit idly by until your putative band of survivalist world rebuilders gets its act together. No, if they have resources that others need, they’ll be attacked for them. Good luck getting your chemistry experiment to run while your village is being pillaged and plundered.

But how did I get in this position in the first place? Right now I’m a suburban software worker. How did I have to become a subsistance farmer? What happened to the world? Why do I have only a month to build a gun?

Existing firearms wouldn’t stop working, would they? We only need to manufacture our own ammo when we run out of our existing modern ammo. And why are we being pillaged and plundered? Sure, there are going to be rough customers with weapons. Those guys aren’t going to call themselves bandits, they’ll call themselves the provisional government, and they won’t loot and burn our village because why would they loot and burn their own serfs? And the bandit chief–I mean, provisional governor–is the one who figures out that his bandits–I mean, state police officers–are running out of ammo. And he’s the one who sets up the gunpowder factory.

[Jolly_Roger]

@Elendil_s_Heir

ETA: Ooops, I see the OP took nuclear war off the table.

I took nuclear war off of the table because it is pretty devastating. A large nuclear war could very well wipe out many people and make life intolerable and short for whoever is left. I don’t think that humanity could survive it, in my opinion.

What is that saying. that society is something like three meals from a revolution? I’d like to think that people are not that easily changed into barbarism, but I don’t think enough of us are. I saw the movie Idiocracy a week ago and while its a comedy, it had a kernel of truth in its premise I think.

[Jolly_Roger]

@Lemur866

But how did I get in this position in the first place? Right now I’m a suburban software worker. How did I have to become a subsistance farmer? What happened to the world? Why do I have only a month to build a gun?

Existing firearms wouldn’t stop working, would they? We only need to manufacture our own ammo when we run out of our existing modern ammo. And why are we being pillaged and plundered? Sure, there are going to be rough customers with weapons. Those guys aren’t going to call themselves bandits, they’ll call themselves the provisional government, and they won’t loot and burn our village because why would they loot and burn their own serfs? And the bandit chief–I mean, provisional governor–is the one who figures out that his bandits–I mean, state police officers–are running out of ammo. And he’s the one who sets up the gunpowder factory.

Already the survival of the strongest begins. Whether or not you consider yourself the good guys ( the provisional gov’t probably considers themselves the good guys too) people will fight over resources.

[MPB_in_Salt_Lake]

@Martin_Hyde

In Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (coincidentally I just mentioned this book in another thread) we see McCarthy’s vision of what might happen if the world was hit by a massive comet. In the book the catastrophe is not actually explained to the reader but McCarthy has said in interviews his general idea was a large comet strike. Basically it was a large enough strike that huge amounts of dust and ash were thrown into the atmosphere, effectively blocking out a huge portion of the sun’s light. This completely destroyed agriculture and after some years the only real food supplies that kept going were canned foods left over from the time before the strike.

There’s a very small amount of scattered natural food that is found (mushrooms in one instance) but it seems most of humanity continues to survive off of outright murder and cannibalization of weaker humans. Roaming bands of murderers basically scout for lone survivors to kill and butcher.

I actually do think humanity could be reduced to that. If something catastrophic happened that wiped out most agriculture I think a lot of people would fight, and fight hard, before they accepted starvation. At first the fighting would be over existing food stores which would probably last for a significant period of time. Since a large portion of the population would starve to death quickly, and a decent portion would die fighting over existing food stores quite quickly the global population would be low and thus pre-comet food stores would last for “awhile.” Eventually though with the sun destroying most agriculture you have to turn to kill the remaining humans and eating them. Because we have existing food stores I do think in that scenario we’d be some of the last surviving of the larger animals. Most others would quickly die off due to lack of food sources and the rest would most certainly be killed by hungry humans. Certain insects and other small animals would probably survive long term.

I just read “The Road” last week, after finding a copy in the 1 dollar bin…

A sobering read, but I thought it was very well done.

[What_Exit]

@ratatoskK

Historically, has there been a technological regression anywhere?

I’m surprised this was ignored so far.

Yes, there was a slow loss of tech as the Roman Empire crumbled and the Dark Ages rolled over Europe. There were also Tech losses in the Americas more than once in Pre-Columbian times.

I believe that we could add the tech regression of Egypt, Mesopotamia and some Indian civilizations and I believe even some Central African ones.

It has happened many times in many places in human history and pre-history.

[Toxylon]

Local technological regressions abound in the human past. In many areas’ archeological record this is evident, e.g. strata where no metal tools are to be found, despite centuries of metallurgy before, the rise and peak of certain technologies, followed by degeneration and complete loss, with no replacing technologies apparent. But whenever some area experiences this, some others are advancing and the innovations keep on coming.

[An_Gadai]

@Martin_Hyde

In Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (coincidentally I just mentioned this book in another thread) we see McCarthy’s vision of what might happen if the world was hit by a massive comet.

That’s interesting, people hereabouts thought it was a post-nuclear war scenario.

[Iamametalrobot]

@Jolly_Roger

What is that saying. that society is something like three meals from a revolution? I’d like to think that people are not that easily changed into barbarism, but I don’t think enough of us are. I saw the movie Idiocracy a week ago and while its a comedy, it had a kernel of truth in its premise I think.

It is already starting to happen in the UK.

[Wendell_Wagner]

Really Not All That Bright Writes:

> In the Mad Max films, the explanation is a civil war caused by energy shortages.

As I said, there’s no consistent explanation. Look at the city that Max and the children enter at the end of the third film. It appears to be destoyed by an explosion. The society of the first two films doesn’t really look like an energy-deprived society either. There may be a claim of an explanation, but it doesn’t consistently work.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

A widespread and catastrophic energy shortage would almost certainly lead to a war over the limited energy source(s) still available. I don’t think that one precludes the other.

[Wendell_Wagner]

Whatever the Flynn effect is caused by, it’s not about the human race becoming more intelligent by human brains increasing in intelligence potential. Similarly, whatever caused the two-point drop in British teenagers over the past 28 years, it’s not a biological change in brains. The Flynn effect is caused by something cultural, and any case where there is a recent drop in I.Q. is caused by something cultural. The movie Idiocracy is predicting that there will be an actual biological change in human brains causing them to drop in intelligence.

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

@Wendell_Wagner

As I said, there’s no consistent explanation. Look at the city that Max and the children enter at the end of the third film. It appears to be destoyed by an explosion. The society of the first two films doesn’t really look like an energy-deprived society either. There may be a claim of an explanation, but it doesn’t consistently work.

The first film was set before the war(s).