6 ms·
Depressing lack of books on animal husbandry, crop management, basic mechanics and machining, and math/physics/chemistry text books and field manuals. Philosop
by jwatte 12y ago
Depressing lack of books on animal husbandry, crop management, basic mechanics and machining, and math/physics/chemistry text books and field manuals.
Philosophy is good and important, but much easier to carry verbally (out re-invent) than the thousands of years of trial and error of "what's this red stuff in the dirt and what can I do with it?"
Then again, assuming that we'll lose civilization but terrain the ability to read written English is somewhat hard to justify, too...
- raverbashing 12y agoYeah, I'm not denying we need the philosophy/history books But civilization would need to bootstrap to "current levels" quickly, and I assume a lot of knowledge about that is currently only in people's heads Crops + Animal Raising -> food. Then construction and metallurgy (helps with the first items), then thermal machines, then industry building all over again. Then to electronics, semiconductors up to computers again. Don't forget all the medicine, chemistry, plastics, oil processing there as well
- Shivetya 12y agocivil engineering books would be my bet and basic medicine like first aid
- rjsw 12y agoI would put De re metallica [1] on the list. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_re_metallica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_re_metallica
- xyzzy123 12y agoThen the whole Gingery series: http://gingerybookstore.com/ http://gingerybookstore.com/ (from furnace to machine shop!). Although his designs are based on scrap aluminium, you can also use cast iron.
- jayvanguard 12y agoI agree. Medicine, metal working, practical mechanics are severely underrepresented. Not to mention alternative energy sources.
- maaku 12y ago> Not to mention alternative energy sources. If I needed to rebuild civilization, that'd be the last thing on my mind.
- carapace 12y agoYou don't like energy?
- jplahn 12y agoI think the keyword is "alternative".
- 5555624 12y agoYeah, while it's "alternative" to us now, it won't be alternative then. Few people "need" windmills and water wheels now; but they will need them then.
- carapace 12y agoExactly! I was teasing a little, but my real point is that if you're "rebuilding civilization" then so-called "alternative" ways of gathering usable energy are not so alternative anymore. I have heard of the idea of "Peak Wood" corresponding to "Peak Oil", being the time when wood to make charcoal for metal smelting became scarce due to the scale of production and the inefficiency of the process. It's a long way from the blacksmithy to the oil derrick.
- dTal 12y agoIt shouldn't be. Windmills and dams are a heckuva lot easier to make than oil rigs and refineries. Especially now that all the easy-to-harvest fossil fuels have been harvested. A second civilisation following in this one's footsteps is going to have a much harder time of it.