(no subject)

[will_couvillier]

Took the story up to a hair under 2000 words today.  

Question of the day:

How long would civilization last if an EMF bomb anniliated the world's technology? 

Comments

[j-cheney.livejournal.com]

Didn't you ever watch Dark Angel?

[will-couvillier.livejournal.com]

Nope. My household is a CSI and Lifetime for Women Zone. I have to battle for my Heroes, Journeyman, Smallville, Bionic Woman, 4400, and Moonlight. Anything pure SF is taboo unless I am home alone.

Perchance I can catch up with a season set....hummm.

Will.

[j-cheney.livejournal.com]

Part of the backstory is that the western seaboard got hit with an EM pulse. Don't know if it's worth buying a season for, though. ;o)

[will-couvillier.livejournal.com]

I remember when that was on. All the previews of the show looked awfully cool, and I regretted not catching it.

The though came to mind after I posted. I wonder is there are good steampunk stories out there that take of if technology went a different way.

I do like alternate universe tales.

[j-cheney.livejournal.com]

The first season was nice. The second...meh...

[jtglover.livejournal.com]

S.M. Stirling's Dies the Fire deals with what would happen if a few little technomological things stopped working -- from gunpowder to electronics to a few other little things. It's a fun read, set in the Pacific Northwest, and does a good job exploring what might happen in that scenario.

[will-couvillier.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'll have to check that one out.

I could forsee a scenario where the elderly become treasuered in a way not seen before...after all, they still have the knowledge to live in a non-tech lifestyle.

[jtglover.livejournal.com]

Depending on where they grew up, the elderly might have little or no better idea than you or me of how to live without high tech than you or me. I think it's in Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma that he talks about how food production has been industrialized in the U.S. for so long now that our parents don't (on average) know more about "real" food or farming than we do, though that changes with our grandparents, and even moreso our grandparents.

On the other hand, I definitely think (and most post-apoc novelists also seem to think) that people with useful skills -- soldiers, organic farmers, people who do blacksmithing for fun -- would be extremely prized possessions... I think it was in The Last Ship (submarine & crew survives after global thermonuclear war) that the few people on board who had been farmers were immensely valued.