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There are periodic waves of fear that the machine will, in fact, stop. The machine being an immeasurably complex global network of just-in-time delivery, high
by MarkusWandel 5y ago
There are periodic waves of fear that the machine will, in fact, stop. The machine being an immeasurably complex global network of just-in-time delivery, high efficiency (but not necessarily sustainable) food production and so on. That once broken, this system may not be easily restarted, at least quickly enough to prevent disaster.
Y2K and COVID being the most recent such waves. Probably this is why this old short story still resonates so strongly.
- titzer 5y agoA solar flare or a coronal mass ejection that hits Earth would be catastrophically bad.
- Syonyk 5y ago> That once broken, this system may not be easily restarted, at least quickly enough to prevent disaster. This is quite literally what we're seeing with currently supply chain shortages, food shortages, etc. The machine breaking down. It turns out, it cannot be easily stopped and restarted.
- bellyfullofbac 5y agoSo far so good? At least here in the West, other than a short panic of "We're going to run out of forests that they felled that we need to wipe shit from our asses!". But maybe things are falling apart in the background, with things like global shipping insanity, and food price hikes http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/ http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/ . But cable news is busy talking about the things cable news talk about.