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Anyone that has messed with a Raspberry Pi will tell you that you don't want to hang the hopes of humanity being rebooted on a consumer-grade SD card. And since

Anyone that has messed with a Raspberry Pi will tell you that you don't want to hang the hopes of humanity being rebooted on a consumer-grade SD card. And since I'm nit-picking, any scenario necessitating the rebooting of civilization might very well involve something that fries SD cards and takes the silicon in your solar panel with it (nukes, big solar flare thingy). Boy Scout Field Guide and an Army survival manual, sorted.

magduf 8y ago
Nukes and solar flares can be protected against: just seal your electronics in a good faraday cage. Putting them in an underground bunker in a lead-lined room should do it. Your paper books won't last as long: today's paper is acidic and falls apart within a century.
- dorchadas 8y ago
  > Your paper books won't last as long: today's paper is acidic and falls apart within a century. I love old books, and this saddens me.
  - magduf 8y ago
    How old? If you like books that are more than a century or so old, then don't worry, those books were made with high-quality paper that really does last. It's the books in the 20th century that won't. (Some might, higher-quality ones say "printed on acid-free paper", so theoretically those will age as well as books made in the 1800s.)
- bluGill 8y ago
  You can buy acid free archival paper that will last 500 years with careful storage. It costs ~3-5x as much, but is available.
  - magduf 8y ago
    You can, but you're probably not going to find whatever books the OP was referring to printed on that paper. You'll have to scan them and print them on that paper yourself (assuming that laser toner will also last as long; probably so, given it's basically melted plastic, but I'm not sure).
    - bluGill 8y ago
      Most of the discussion was around things like Wikipedia and other internet knowledge which you would have to print anyway. For books you would buy, or course what the publisher will agree to sell you is a limit - and you are probably not big enough to get an acid-free version printed. Though if civilization collapsed bad enough to need this I think most of the useful information I'd want saved was published in the 1800s and so out of copyright. We wouldn't be able to use the knowledge of how to make a transistor until long after even acid free paper was useless.
      - magduf 8y ago
        >We wouldn't be able to use the knowledge of how to make a transistor until long after even acid free paper was useless. What are you talking about? Transistors don't require some huge industrial base to build; the first one was made with some gold and a germanium crystal. A lot of technologies don't build on top of older technologies, they bypass them altogether. Your rebooted civilization does not need to go through a phase with fossil-fuel-burning cars to get to electric vehicles, for instance. A rebooted civilization, with stored knowledge of modern technology and enough smart people able to make use of that knowledge would be able to get back to current tech levels pretty quickly, and probably avoid most of the mistakes of the past as well. As for useful information from the 1800s, that would mean you're losing all the modern medical knowledge, which is pretty important, and much of which does not require advanced technology to utilize. Back then, they barely even understood germs and the importance of washing hands (surgeons didn't even bother!). That alone saves tons of lives, and requires no real technology at all.
        8y ago
- VRay 8y ago
  I write these words in steel, for anything not set in metal cannot be trusted. I have begun to wonder if I am the only sane man remaining. Can the others not see?
  - Accacin 8y ago
    Sneaky Mistborn reference!
- int_19h 8y ago
  Why would you seal your electronics in a Faraday cage to protect them against solar flares? Solar flares won't affect them.
- mr_toad 8y ago
  Just have some monks transcribe the books every century or so. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz

magduf 8y ago

Nukes and solar flares can be protected against: just seal your electronics in a good faraday cage. Putting them in an underground bunker in a lead-lined room should do it. Your paper books won't last as long: today's paper is acidic and falls apart within a century.

dorchadas 8y ago
> Your paper books won't last as long: today's paper is acidic and falls apart within a century. I love old books, and this saddens me.
- magduf 8y ago
  How old? If you like books that are more than a century or so old, then don't worry, those books were made with high-quality paper that really does last. It's the books in the 20th century that won't. (Some might, higher-quality ones say "printed on acid-free paper", so theoretically those will age as well as books made in the 1800s.)
bluGill 8y ago
You can buy acid free archival paper that will last 500 years with careful storage. It costs ~3-5x as much, but is available.
- magduf 8y ago
  You can, but you're probably not going to find whatever books the OP was referring to printed on that paper. You'll have to scan them and print them on that paper yourself (assuming that laser toner will also last as long; probably so, given it's basically melted plastic, but I'm not sure).
  - bluGill 8y ago
    Most of the discussion was around things like Wikipedia and other internet knowledge which you would have to print anyway. For books you would buy, or course what the publisher will agree to sell you is a limit - and you are probably not big enough to get an acid-free version printed. Though if civilization collapsed bad enough to need this I think most of the useful information I'd want saved was published in the 1800s and so out of copyright. We wouldn't be able to use the knowledge of how to make a transistor until long after even acid free paper was useless.
    - magduf 8y ago
      >We wouldn't be able to use the knowledge of how to make a transistor until long after even acid free paper was useless. What are you talking about? Transistors don't require some huge industrial base to build; the first one was made with some gold and a germanium crystal. A lot of technologies don't build on top of older technologies, they bypass them altogether. Your rebooted civilization does not need to go through a phase with fossil-fuel-burning cars to get to electric vehicles, for instance. A rebooted civilization, with stored knowledge of modern technology and enough smart people able to make use of that knowledge would be able to get back to current tech levels pretty quickly, and probably avoid most of the mistakes of the past as well. As for useful information from the 1800s, that would mean you're losing all the modern medical knowledge, which is pretty important, and much of which does not require advanced technology to utilize. Back then, they barely even understood germs and the importance of washing hands (surgeons didn't even bother!). That alone saves tons of lives, and requires no real technology at all.
      - 8y ago
VRay 8y ago
I write these words in steel, for anything not set in metal cannot be trusted. I have begun to wonder if I am the only sane man remaining. Can the others not see?
- Accacin 8y ago
  Sneaky Mistborn reference!
int_19h 8y ago
Why would you seal your electronics in a Faraday cage to protect them against solar flares? Solar flares won't affect them.
mr_toad 8y ago
Just have some monks transcribe the books every century or so. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz