"Jeff McCann" wrote in message
.. .

You mean like it did here after the last hurricane? No problem; my
generator worked fine.

Jeff


But you were referring to society. Did all of your neighbors have
generators also?

PLEASE excuse me for not reading ALL of the thread in this post (It's
now kind of long).

Here in central VA (Centerville, Va) We have what is called "Field Days
of the Past". It's like a local Fair/Carnival.

Although, It DOES have a great deal of old/antique farm equipment... it
totally blows my mind that we once, 100 years ago, had washing machines
that were kept outside and had to be started with a pull rope (just like
a lawnmower) because they were gasoline powered. We had rock crushers
that turned watermellon sized stones into gravel (gas/steam powered) and
all wicker baskets were local made (not from China at Pier1)

If we go back 100 years from THAT (1806), Saw mills were just two men
working a HUGE hand saw back and forth to saw the logs into planks.
I even heard stories of people moving away from their houses and then
burning- down their house, just to re-collect the nails. (They were
expensive to produce)
WOW!

Let's push forward to today.
What would happen if we were faced with a natural catastrophe? Could I
hunt/fish?
Could I build a fire? Basic shelter?
It makes me think!

Great Post!!!
Dave

On Sat, 5 Aug 2006 19:02:58 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:


"Robert Sturgeon" wrote in message
.. .
On 5 Aug 2006 09:30:43 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

I think you have a good point Robert.

In my opinion the more technologically advanced a society is, the more
"fragile" it becomes.

A miracle! We agree on something. Great.

I think the reverse is true. Technological advancement gives a society
options, redundancies, flexibility and the ability to assess and remediate
problems.

Perhaps. I don't know. I was thinking the other day of
what would happen to the metropolitan area just to the
northwest of where I live -- millions of people who are
primarily living in the symbolic economy -- in the event of
a societal collapse caused by, say, a series of nuclear
detonations in 5 or 6 of our major financial and
governmental centers: say, DC, NYC, LA, Chicago, Seattle,
etc. People smarter than me have estimated that even such
"limited" destruction would inevitably cause the collapse of
the U.S. economy and society. I don't see these millions of
symbolic workers being able to survive a return to a more
material economy.

My (possibly wrong) conclusion is that the post-modern
symbolic economy/society is much more fragile than the
industrial economy/society it replaced. Too many of us are
no longer able to create goods, including food, and instead
are now only able to engage in symbol manipulation -- the
information/entertainment economy, a.k.a the post-modern
economy. Lawyers, data entry clerks, web masters, writers,
actors, singers, photographers, programmers, personal
trainers, relationship counselors, what have you. Can any
of them put actual food on an actual table? What happens to
them if their post-modern services are no longer in demand?
And that ignores entirely those dependent on
"entitlements"...

I don't see redundancy and flexibility -- to the contrary, I
see fragility and extreme vulnerability. But I could be
wrong.

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

On 5 Aug 2006 20:44:41 -0700, "hex"
wrote:


Robert Sturgeon wrote:

A serious question, but one most of us don't like to think
about, is -- what skills might be needed in a
post-post-modern (a.k.a. post-SHTF) economy? And could we
meet such needs, if necessary? Probably not, which leads us
to the possibility of Tim May's "massive die-off," which
people like Jared Diamond assure us is possible when any
society/economy collapses. It is probably true that the
more symbolic, abstract, and detached from the production of
real goods a society/economy becomes, the more likely it is
to suffer a catastrophic collapse.

Fun, huh???

One man's catastrophe is another's opportunity. Raise your kids to
understand both worlds and they'll come out alright.

Too late. They're both grown. One works in a big city as
the CFO of a non-profit foundation and the other is a
temporarily retired (children to raise)
writer/reporter/political aide who is married to a lawyer.
All are successful in the symbolic economy and I have no
influence over them -- at all. If TSHTF, I can only hope
they can escape the chaos and start over. All I can do is
provide them with a slight chance, IF they "make it out."
Of course, I also hope the S never does HTF, but I have no
influence over that, either.

(rest snipped)

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

Well, you may be right, but I am 52, so the women I want to attract are old
enough to have experience with everything around them breaking, with having
to deal with rip-off servicemen, and with being patronized by jerks at the
hardware or big box stores. I think there is also a huge difference in
appreciation once they own their own homes, cars, and appliances. Twenty to
thirty-five year olds don't yet know enough or own enough to be
appreciative.

I also make a big distinction between 'being handy' and having a nerdy
hobby. I once thought about getting into ham radio, and my wife (now
ex-wife) asked me "Is this one of those hobbies where you go into your
office and close the door? We don't need any more of those..."

I have recently been responding to the postings on Craigslist where people
are looking for someone to cut some wood, weld up a chair, or sandblast a
motorcycle part. I charge them a large roast beef sub, and I've been
meeting a bunch of great people.

"Kristian Ukkonen" wrote in message
...

Emmo wrote:
I would mention that those men who can do even the most basic of work,
whether on the home or car, are richly rewarded by all the women who love
being with someone who is 'handy'.

It depends a lot. Many women regard those kinds of
technical skills as "nerdy" and stay away from such
men. Understanding how things work, and being interested
in such things, has become a wierdness/freakyness, and
an alarming thing for many women. Stuff like that is
only something one does for a job, and not something to
be interested in during free time. Really. Having a
machine shop, or even lots of electronics/RF equipment,
is a social suicide with women. I'm talking about the
age group 20-35 years. The "acceptable" hobbies include
sports and culture, but definitely not technology/science.

Just today I noticed that my internet access didn't work.
Checked stuff, and found out that ADSL modem had stopped
working. I switched power off and back on, and only the
power light was lit, but no life otherwise. I opened it,
measured the SMPS voltages with oscilloscope, noticed
that 5V had huge ripple, and replaced the electrolytic
capasitor with a similar low-ESR cap I had. Started working
again. Yeah, there's advange - did get internet access
working still during sunday, and it cost me practically
nothing. A normal person would have waited until monday,
and bought a new ADSL modem, and propably paid someone
to get it configured/installed.

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 11:00:43 GMT, Glen wrote:

F. George McDuffee wrote:
On 5 Aug 2006 07:27:58 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:


SNIP

In
addition to creating a generation that has no knowledge of how
things work, the abolition of the vocational classes has lead to
a huge upsurge in male dropouts who were attending school only
for the vocational classes.

SNIP

Oh my God! Does this mean all my woodshop classes for next year
(2006-07) at the high school where I teach have been dropped? Does this
mean I am now out of work? Are my fellow IA teachers who teach masonry,
auto shop and computer repair also out of work? Do we now hold our
department meetings at the unemployment office?

The scenario you present might be true in some places, but not in all.
I have been asked (along with a few of my cohorts)to work on a funding
grant to expand our vocational offerings in our school, and maybe the
district as a whole.

Glen

The school that has any sort of shop class..is the exception, rather
than the rule. And not just in California where I live.

Gunner

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire.
Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us)
off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give
them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the **** out of you
for torturing the cat." Gunner

On Sat, 05 Aug 2006 20:32:33 -0700, Mark & Juanita
wrote:

On 5 Aug 2006 19:50:25 -0700, "steve" wrote:

Too_Many_Tools wrote:
It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
you get the idea...

caused some of those skills are rarely needed, I rarely get any flats
anymore, haven't had one in ten years, I used to get them at least once
a year 25 years ago.

TV's can't be repaired

now it's cheaper to buy a new lawnmower then to fix one (due to China
the price of a new one is less now then 25 years ago, and our income
has gone way up, the cost of parts, however, has stayed the same)


When I hear or read comments like these, a little shiver hits me. My dad
tells the story of how Dad's grandfather (an increasingly successful farmer
in Eastern Colorado) once told Dad's grandmother that she didn't need to
patch overalls anymore, it was cheaper and more efficient to buy new ones.
That was in the late 1920's; we all know what happened in the 1930's --
especially in the dustbowl areas.

Your great grandfather and Steve were/are both correct about
their current conditions. What happens if current
conditions deteriorate a bit?

Steve wrote, "No, its just the workshop has changed, it can
live in a computer, for instance, workshops are alive and
well, they are just different, today's workshop can involved
hooking up a wireless router to a wired LAN that supports
Appletalk, before your time it was thatching a roof"

A wired LAN is an artifact of the symbolic economy. It is a
Good Thing, right now. But if what you need is a new roof,
and there is no longer much demand for wireless routers,
LANs, Appletalk, etc., (as would be the case in a post-SHTF
scenario) then being able to mess with LANs and such, but
not roofs, leaves you out.

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 14:51:10 GMT, Kristian Ukkonen
wrote:


Emmo wrote:
I would mention that those men who can do even the most basic of work,
whether on the home or car, are richly rewarded by all the women who love
being with someone who is 'handy'.

It depends a lot. Many women regard those kinds of
technical skills as "nerdy" and stay away from such
men. Understanding how things work, and being interested
in such things, has become a wierdness/freakyness, and
an alarming thing for many women. Stuff like that is
only something one does for a job, and not something to
be interested in during free time. Really. Having a
machine shop, or even lots of electronics/RF equipment,
is a social suicide with women. I'm talking about the
age group 20-35 years. The "acceptable" hobbies include
sports and culture, but definitely not technology/science.

It is indeed social suicide with SOME women in that age range. It
largely depends on if they are rural or rural raised, versus urban
types. And if they had a handy father or brothers also adds to the mix.

Frankly..I find the Urban type of women to be shallow, superficial and
in large part...high maintainence air heads.

Ive had more phone numbers handed to me by women Ive helped out on some
fix it issue, or after having had a group conversation in a bar etc etc
where the the subject of being "handy" comes up.

Some by young ladies looking for "a guy just like Dad", others from
practical women..usually country types, to those who are clueless and
just bought a condo..G

On the other hand...a Pendelton button down shirt, pocket protector and
tape mended eye glasses is the kiss of death no matter who you are.
In the cities..being a country boy..boots, jeans, big buckle and cowboy
hat can be the kiss of death in some areas. Primarily those who favor
italian suits, Lexus automobiles and a brief case. Though its surprising
the numbers of ladies who find the country boy fascinating, though dont
want their friends to know VBG..oddly enough..in many cases, its black
ladies who take the lead in this.

Gunner

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire.
Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us)
off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give
them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the **** out of you
for torturing the cat." Gunner

In article , Robert
Sturgeon wrote:

Steve wrote, "No, its just the workshop has changed, it can
live in a computer, for instance, workshops are alive and
well, they are just different, today's workshop can involved
hooking up a wireless router to a wired LAN that supports
Appletalk, before your time it was thatching a roof"

A wired LAN is an artifact of the symbolic economy. It is a
Good Thing, right now. But if what you need is a new roof,
and there is no longer much demand for wireless routers,
LANs, Appletalk, etc., (as would be the case in a post-SHTF
scenario) then being able to mess with LANs and such, but
not roofs, leaves you out.


There are plenty of roofers and roofing companies in my area. When I
needed a roof replacement several years ago, they did it in a tiny
fraction of the time (and effort) it would have taken me to figure out
how to do it, how to order the materials, how to fix the mistakes I
would inevitably make, how to finish the job.

Should I learn roofing now? Not hardly, as my own roof will likely not
need patching in the decades ahead of me. And I have no desire to make
it a career.

Ditto for welding, horseshoeing, logging, midwifing, and all sorts of
other jobs which some/many think will be up-n-coming career options in
the Post-Industrial Economy. ("You, too, can become a farrier. Just
call 1-800-HOR-SHOE for information on our study at home course!")

I expect that the "symbolic economy," as you call it, will become even
more important after a Big Event (SHTF, TEOTWAWKI, whatever). Wireless
networks, even over radio (and satellites, which will remain largely
unaffected) will be used to trade options and access to things.

Consider the rise of cellphones in Mogadishu after the civil war.

E-Bay and services of that sort will become MORE important, not LESS
important. Think about it. Combine online barter and sales with
jitney-type delivery services and new payment approaches and one has a
vibrant sub-economy.

(And vehicles will still be running. This is separate subject, but
there are many, many options for fueling. NG will not vanish, biofuels
are readily made, and even all-electric vehicles are here....one of my
neighbors has a large photovoltaic installation sufficient to charge up
his fleet of vehicles....a few entrepreneurs like this, mediating
trades via satphones and Mobile WiMax, could do quite well trading the
already-extant supply of tools, materials, and forms of money.)


Look to Hong Kong for one example, to Mogadishu for the other extreme.
Both remain heavily "symbolic."

--Tim May

Robert Sturgeon (in ) said:

| On Sat, 5 Aug 2006 19:02:58 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
| wrote:
||
|| I think the reverse is true. Technological advancement gives a
|| society options, redundancies, flexibility and the ability to
|| assess and remediate problems.

Probably two sides of the same coin. Along with the advancements and
capacity for flexibility come increasing specialization and narrowness
of focus that leads to brittleness. One of the advantages we have is
the wide geographic distribution of our assets - which means that as
long as damage is localized, workload can be picked up in undamaged
areas.

| Perhaps. I don't know. I was thinking the other day of
| what would happen to the metropolitan area just to the
| northwest of where I live -- millions of people who are
| primarily living in the symbolic economy -- in the event of
| a societal collapse caused by, say, a series of nuclear
| detonations in 5 or 6 of our major financial and
| governmental centers: say, DC, NYC, LA, Chicago, Seattle,
| etc. People smarter than me have estimated that even such
| "limited" destruction would inevitably cause the collapse of
| the U.S. economy and society. I don't see these millions of
| symbolic workers being able to survive a return to a more
| material economy.

I don't think there'd be a complete collapse. There would be
substantial changes and restructuring. The agricultural areas would
continue to produce food, for example, and there'd still be a demand
for what they produced, but the marketing and distribution systems
would likely change. The food producers would still want equipment,
chemicals, seed, etc and that demand would likely be satisfied.

| My (possibly wrong) conclusion is that the post-modern
| symbolic economy/society is much more fragile than the
| industrial economy/society it replaced. Too many of us are
| no longer able to create goods, including food, and instead
| are now only able to engage in symbol manipulation -- the
| information/entertainment economy, a.k.a the post-modern
| economy. Lawyers, data entry clerks, web masters, writers,
| actors, singers, photographers, programmers, personal
| trainers, relationship counselors, what have you. Can any
| of them put actual food on an actual table? What happens to
| them if their post-modern services are no longer in demand?
| And that ignores entirely those dependent on
| "entitlements"...

In some ways, yes - and in some ways, no. It might be an interesting
exercise to look back and ask just how long it's been since some
majority of the population of any primary city engaged in the creation
of goods. Haven't the cities tended to be marketing and information
centers almost from the time they became regarded as "cities" rather
than "towns"?

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
DeSoto, Iowa USA
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto

Very well said! Good luck with the 'higher' management. Maybe I should be
wishing them luck instead ???

Ace
"CW" wrote in message
ink.net...
Where I'm at right now, we do have that type of assembly work and yes, it
is
quite lucrative but very boring work. Our requirements are not nearly so
high for that job for a couple of reasons. As you pointed out, the higher
IQ
individuals are not willing to do such a job and, of course, the job
doesn't
require it. Yes, people like that are very important. Unfortunately,
getting
the higher management to see that is proving difficult. Day before
yesterday
was the last day for our spring winder. He found an assembly job with
another company making a few dollars an hour more. My thought is that
there
are no unimportant jobs. If a job was unimportant, why would anybody pay
you
to do it? You can't have a top without a bottom. Without a solid
foundation,
the top will collapse.


"Ace" wrote in message
...
Good for you and/or your employer.

Just another view on the subject of education. Say you have a very
lucrative hand assembly job for some of your machined components, but the
actual procedure is so simple/boring that 'nobody in their right mind'
would
sit there all day doing it.

Will you insist on the person you hire for the job have math skills, etc,
or
would you settle for someone with a somewhat lower IQ who would be very
happy to sit there all day? In other words, what happens to the
individuals
who don't happen to have the intellectual capacity on par with your top
machinists?

Are they to be forever 'held back' in school till they become laughing
stock
of their so called class mates? Or should they be given a 'lower' grade,
and proceed along with their friends/peers and ultimately enter society
with
some sense of dignity, get that boring assembly job you have and work
tirelessly etc. for you?

I saw a scenario similar to this happen. After a employee was pestered
for
so long, he did quit...... It took four(4) other employees to do the same
job, each only able to tolerate it for about 2 hours. Oh
well............

Ace

"CW" wrote in message
.net...
A little background. I'm the foreman of a small machine shop. Business
has
been picking up greatly and we are in need of machinists. We are having
very

Snippity snip, etc....

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 08:34:47 -0400, LiRM
wrote:

On 5 Aug 2006 07:27:58 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
you get the idea...there are basic skills that one needs to deal with
the world we live in. Well this article shows what that lack of
training, due to whatever reason, means as they get older.

When I drive through a neighborhood, it is a rare garage that has
anything like a workshop within it anymore....a reflection of the lack
of interest or knowledge of the homeowner to work with their hands?

Do your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, the generation who
is succeeding us, have the basic skills that are needed in the world
today?

TMT

I grew up around an uncle who literally rebuilt his entire house.

My father literally built his house -- cement work,
plumbing, framing, siding, wiring, roofing, everything. I
am somewhat embarrassed that I will probably hire my roof
replaced. It comes down to 2 factors: he HAD to (no money);
and I don't want to. I'm sure I could redo the roof if I
really needed to. I used to do stuff like that all the
time. Now I'm lazy (and old) -- and I want it done right,
not cheaply.

(rest snipped)

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

On Sun, 6 Aug 2006 15:59:36 +0100, Mark Trudgill
wrote:

The message
from "George E. Cawthon" contains these
words:

Retief wrote:
On Sat, 05 Aug 2006 23:21:51 GMT, Lew Hodgett
wrote:

COULD you butcher a hog, if you
really needed to?
Yes, BUT, because I can, I've got sense enough to let somebody else
do it.

No, you charge a fair bit to do the butchering operation, and hire a
"grunt" to do the hard parts (i.e. you supervise). The hog owner
get's his hog butchered correctly, your assistant gets food (a piece
of the action), and you get a big hunk of hog.

And everyone is happy and well fed...

Retief
How do you incorrectly butcher a hog?

Give a pig and a knife to someone who hasn't a clue and end up with
250lb of pork trimmings.

Make some good hotlinks though ....

Gunner

"I think this is because of your belief in biological Marxism.
As a genetic communist you feel that noticing behavioural
patterns relating to race would cause a conflict with your belief
in biological Marxism." Big Pete, famous Usenet Racist

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 08:34:47 -0400, LiRM wrote:

On 5 Aug 2006 07:27:58 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
you get the idea...there are basic skills that one needs to deal with
the world we live in. Well this article shows what that lack of
training, due to whatever reason, means as they get older.

When I drive through a neighborhood, it is a rare garage that has
anything like a workshop within it anymore....a reflection of the lack
of interest or knowledge of the homeowner to work with their hands?

Do your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, the generation who
is succeeding us, have the basic skills that are needed in the world
today?

TMT

I grew up around an uncle who literally rebuilt his entire house. He
knows how to do it all. I helped some while growing up, but looked at
all as grunt work and took no interest in watching what the man was
doing.

I lived in Alaska for 3 years and noted that lots of people build
their own up there. They usually had no loans on the materials and
built as they could - living in 5th wheelers or, when finished, their
basements.


I'm paying for that now. There are some projects I'll take on, but I
regret not taking a bigger interest in what could have been a great
learning experience.

So at times, I have to grudgingly call in a guy - an electrician,
plumber or carpenter to do things I wish I could.

On the other hand, I haven't owned a home in years, so had no real
need to fix things. If it broke, I called the landlord.

My wife and I recently bought a house, so I wish I knew more.

But I'm also dedicated to learning more as I go along, so I hope to
reach a point in the future of being able to handle at least some
minor projects.

But yeah, I do have a workbench area and it's getting more and more
use so I'm happy about that. I just wish I had paid more attention as
a kid.

That's the way I feel about gardening. My parents were outside all
weekend, every weekend (weather permitting). I paid no attention.
Like you, I sure wish I had.
Sue

Robert Sturgeon wrote:

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 08:34:47 -0400, LiRM
wrote:

On 5 Aug 2006 07:27:58 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
you get the idea...there are basic skills that one needs to deal with
the world we live in. Well this article shows what that lack of
training, due to whatever reason, means as they get older.

When I drive through a neighborhood, it is a rare garage that has
anything like a workshop within it anymore....a reflection of the lack
of interest or knowledge of the homeowner to work with their hands?

Do your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, the generation who
is succeeding us, have the basic skills that are needed in the world
today?

TMT

I grew up around an uncle who literally rebuilt his entire house.

My father literally built his house -- cement work,
plumbing, framing, siding, wiring, roofing, everything. I
am somewhat embarrassed that I will probably hire my roof
replaced. It comes down to 2 factors: he HAD to (no money);
and I don't want to. I'm sure I could redo the roof if I
really needed to. I used to do stuff like that all the
time. Now I'm lazy (and old) -- and I want it done right,
not cheaply.

(rest snipped)

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

In many cases those factors are changing. You may have the money to hire
someone, but it is becoming increasingly difficult in some areas to find
someone to hire who will actually do the job correctly. In more and more
cases I'm finding I have to do a job myself to get it done right.

In once case I had an auto repair done several times by several
different dealers (some under warranty) that all failed again in short
order. I finally got fed up and did the job myself, found evidence of
how incompetent they were while tearing into it myself and have not had
a recurrence of the problem since I fixed it correctly myself.

Pete C.

That's not entirely true. The builder can build the house cheaper
with a plain two car garage. How many people actually only store
only their cars in their garages?

And he can sell it cheaper...The market is driven by the buyer.If more
people are willing to pay for a shop more builders will build houses
with a shop.If most people do not want to pay extra for a shop they
are not built.Builders try to build what sells.


My neighbor has a 25' by 30' or so shed/mini barn. An Amish crew (we live
in Ohio) came out and built it in one day, a couple of years ago. $6500
for 750 square feet; that's only $8 per square foot. It's a real beautiful
structure with tons of overhead storage (it's a tall shed). He has a table
saw and a planer and all the other toys in it. Speakers in the corners
hooked to a stereo receiver. Wood burning stove. And if they ever sell
their house, the shed is a huge selling point. Now to talk my wife into us
getting one!

----== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com - Unlimited-Unrestricted-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 120,000+ Newsgroups
----= East and West-Coast Server Farms - Total Privacy via Encryption =----

"Robert Sturgeon" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 5 Aug 2006 19:02:58 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:


"Robert Sturgeon" wrote in message
.. .
On 5 Aug 2006 09:30:43 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

I think you have a good point Robert.

In my opinion the more technologically advanced a society is, the more
"fragile" it becomes.

A miracle! We agree on something. Great.

I think the reverse is true. Technological advancement gives a society
options, redundancies, flexibility and the ability to assess and
remediate
problems.

Perhaps. I don't know. I was thinking the other day of
what would happen to the metropolitan area just to the
northwest of where I live -- millions of people who are
primarily living in the symbolic economy -- in the event of
a societal collapse caused by, say, a series of nuclear
detonations in 5 or 6 of our major financial and
governmental centers: say, DC, NYC, LA, Chicago, Seattle,
etc. People smarter than me have estimated that even such
"limited" destruction would inevitably cause the collapse of
the U.S. economy and society. I don't see these millions of
symbolic workers being able to survive a return to a more
material economy.

My (possibly wrong) conclusion is that the post-modern
symbolic economy/society is much more fragile than the
industrial economy/society it replaced. Too many of us are
no longer able to create goods, including food, and instead
are now only able to engage in symbol manipulation -- the
information/entertainment economy, a.k.a the post-modern
economy. Lawyers, data entry clerks, web masters, writers,
actors, singers, photographers, programmers, personal
trainers, relationship counselors, what have you. Can any
of them put actual food on an actual table? What happens to
them if their post-modern services are no longer in demand?
And that ignores entirely those dependent on
"entitlements"...

I don't see redundancy and flexibility -- to the contrary, I
see fragility and extreme vulnerability. But I could be
wrong.

Societal collapse is a macro-scale event. What happens to individuals
within that society are micro-level events. Individuals win and lose all
the time, even in a thriving society. Whole groups have been caused to
suffer many times by rapid changes within a complex society, yet the society
as a whole endures.

It sucked to be a technology worker during the dot-com bust or an
aeronautical engineer when we retreated from manned space exploration. It
also sucked to be a buggy whip maker during the advent of the automobile.

Jeff

"Leon" wrote in message
news

"Jeff McCann" wrote in message
.. .

You mean like it did here after the last hurricane? No problem; my
generator worked fine.

Jeff


But you were referring to society. Did all of your neighbors have
generators also?

Many did, others didn't. Many an extension cord snaked it's way over a
neighbor's fence. Life went on. We improvised, adapted and overcame. It
was rougher for some than for others, but the local economy is booming, tax
coffers are swelling, and local unemployment is below 3%.

Jeff

"Too_Many_Tools" wrote in message
ups.com...
| It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
| skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
| you get the idea...there are basic skills that one needs to deal with
| the world we live in. Well this article shows what that lack of
| training, due to whatever reason, means as they get older.
|
| When I drive through a neighborhood, it is a rare garage that has
| anything like a workshop within it anymore....a reflection of the lack
| of interest or knowledge of the homeowner to work with their hands?
|
| Do your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews, the generation who
| is succeeding us, have the basic skills that are needed in the world
| today?
|
| TMT

The first thing that came to my mind was: You usually don't have to.

That brings us to my second point: If you don't have to, you'll never
learn how. If you have to a lot, you'll even get good at it.

When I took driver's ed back in the 80's (okay, that puts me squarely in
the middle of most of my peers nowadays, its seems) we had actual cutaway
car components in the classroom. I had grown up sort of out in the country,
so doing mechanical things weren't out of the ordinary for me, but my dad
never taught me much, or not at least actual instruction that I recall. I
think he was satisfied with me taking all kinds of stuff apart and figuring
out how it worked, and even getting lucky in getting it back together again.
If it worked afterwards, that was always a bonus. I think I just had the
knack for things like that, and eventually wound up working on electronics
in the service, where I had some problems with a used car I had. Took it to
a mechanic, since I had no tools or skills, and got my own spark plugs back
for ten bucks, in a car that only ran slightly better. That made me mad, so
I got a manual and started collecting tools. Eventually solved the problem
myself. That kinda told me that I could do whatever I set my mind to.
Nowadays I have a small fleet of cars for my family and little time, or
money, to maintain them all properly. If I would have had newer vehicles, I
likely wouldn't have had to work on them as much, so whether that would have
been better for me financially or not still remains to be seen. Folks used
to ask me if I liked working on cars. "Only when I don't have to." is my
usual response.
Once my family and financial situation settled down, I got my piece of
the American dream and bought a home. I used to be a whole lot better at
this kind of thing, and could do a good job, but recently have started to
try and balance what I can do, what I could do, what I'll really do, and
it's really something I could do better. Having a major unfinished,
unscheduled major home repair (rotted kitchen subfloor. Overhauled the
cabinets since replacing them with equivalent quality was cost prohibitive,
laid down new sub floor and underlay, but have temporary vinyl tile on the
floor and counters now) I'm to the point where I have to come to grips with
my abilities versus my time, and the cost of the two. I think many people
are in that sort of situation, but for some, money is easier to throw at a
situation, and for some, money is the thing they have the least, so they
have to do it themselves, albeit poorly.
I used to have a job that didn't stimulate me much mentally, so there
was plenty of time to ponder things I wanted to do and so on. I have a very
cool new job that sends me home wiped out mentally, so I rarely feel
inclined to deal with that list of things to do. Haven't touched it in
weeks. Gotta figure out where I can find the round tuits now that I used to
have. I'm starting to have some sympathy with those folks, and I don't
really have a single thing to blame it on. Sort of how things have turned
out.

We sort of went through this awhile back. Americans existed happily on
the east coast, crowded into cramped cities, when the US government started
offering free land west of the Mississippi. I'm sure each family that
headed out had a book or two that explained how to make a living in the
middle of nowhere with little more than what you could have carried with you
in a wagon. Likely even explained what to bring in the wagon, too.

Sort of got me thinking about a series of how-to books for stuff, but
most of that is on the web now, since that's the first place most folks go
for information, even if it's really generic and useless to the rest of us.
Perhaps what needs to be out there is a non-condescending tome about how to
find/acquire the core skills that most of us take for granted when we tackle
a new task, such as righty tighty, doing a visual, gathering information
first, and so on. That bit is missing from every book I've ever read on how
to do stuff, but how to approach such a subject is actually a whole lot
harder than it sounds.

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 07:47:01 GMT, Lobby Dosser
wrote:

I think the reverse is true. Technological advancement gives a
society options, redundancies, flexibility and the ability to assess
and remediate problems.
====================
While increasing technologies may indeed provide options,
redundancies, etc, these are of use only if people know (1) they
are available, and (2) how to use them.

While increasing societal "complexity" is a separate issue, the
rapidil accelerating decline in trust and trustworthiness is not
and it is THE critical and most problematic in the so-called
symbolic manipulation [interesting word choice] areas such as
stocks, bonds, pensions, insurance, and currency trading.




Unka George
(George McDuffee)

....and at the end of the fight is a tombstone white
with the name of the late deceased, and
the epitaph drear:
“A Fool lies here, who tried to hustle the East.”

Rudyard Kipling The Naulahka, ch. 5, heading (1892).

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 11:00:43 GMT, Glen
wrote:

F. George McDuffee wrote:
On 5 Aug 2006 07:27:58 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:


SNIP

In
addition to creating a generation that has no knowledge of how
things work, the abolition of the vocational classes has lead to
a huge upsurge in male dropouts who were attending school only
for the vocational classes.

SNIP

Oh my God! Does this mean all my woodshop classes for next year
(2006-07) at the high school where I teach have been dropped? Does this
mean I am now out of work? Are my fellow IA teachers who teach masonry,
auto shop and computer repair also out of work? Do we now hold our
department meetings at the unemployment office?

The scenario you present might be true in some places, but not in all.
I have been asked (along with a few of my cohorts)to work on a funding
grant to expand our vocational offerings in our school, and maybe the
district as a whole.

Glen
=======================
You are very fortunate in that your schools appear to be run by
educators and not administrators. The students and community are
fortunate in that the board members are acting in the best
interest of the majory of the students and community and not
responding to the latest fad or buzz-word.

My guess is that you leadership is very senior and approaching
retirement. When your educators are replaced with administrators
that conduct per pupil class cost evaluations, legal risk
evaluation of possible injury, and avoidance of things that make
noise or a mess, your vocational programs will die the death of
1,000 cuts. I note in passing that far more students are injured
and injured more seriously in contact sports than vocational
education.

Most universities have dropped their Industrial Arts teachining
options because of the falling demand for their graduates.

Fearless forecast -- as your vocational programs are scaled back,
your student retention and completion problems will increase.
Following normal administrator logic, additional vocational
programs will be eliminated to make funds available for
retention/completion activities and remedial education that are
then required to keep the now totally academic programs filled.


Unka George
(George McDuffee)

....and at the end of the fight is a tombstone white
with the name of the late deceased, and
the epitaph drear:
“A Fool lies here, who tried to hustle the East.”

Rudyard Kipling The Naulahka, ch. 5, heading (1892).

"Glen" wrote in message
.net...
|
| Oh my God! Does this mean all my woodshop classes for next year
| (2006-07) at the high school where I teach have been dropped? Does this
| mean I am now out of work? Are my fellow IA teachers who teach masonry,
| auto shop and computer repair also out of work? Do we now hold our
| department meetings at the unemployment office?
|
| The scenario you present might be true in some places, but not in all.
| I have been asked (along with a few of my cohorts)to work on a funding
| grant to expand our vocational offerings in our school, and maybe the
| district as a whole.
|
| Glen

In the Seattle area, the aerospace community has been complaining for
several years about just that, and it isn't until the concrete heads in the
legislature realized they were chasing all the skilled labor and shops out
of state have they realized what a skill shortage there is. A day late and
a dollar short, but better late than never. Unfortunately, when I hired on
at Boeing, with a million others barely able to breathe, they trained me on
company time. Got a whole lot of useless folks in the process. This time,
they're training the new hires on their time, for two weeks. A coworker of
mine got hit in the head by a fast moving rivet die. Seems the gal she was
teaching thought it was okay to put the die in the gun while holding the
trigger down. Absent the retainer spring, of course. As soon as she did it
the second time, just minutes later, they told her to take a hike. That's
why they're doing it differently this time around, as the dead wood gets
weeded out quickly. They aren't kicking people out for not having the
skills, they're removing them for not having a trainable attitude.

I recently got a very cool new job. One of the reasons I got the job
was the last line on my resume: "With the right attitude all skill deficits
can be overcome." That impresses the hell out of folks, especially when
your attitude seems to match the resume. (I once had the honor of bringing
onto my crew an older Greek lady who had no skills but just the exact
attitude I wanted. She worked her ass off and made the folks who had been
around for years look like amateurs once I taught her what she needed to
know.) I had also showed them pictures of some machines I had recently
built, which the interviewers (a structured interview with several folks
there) were almost fighting over. They wanted someone who could "do things"
instead of just talking about stuff. My fingernails being a bit chewed up
and slightly dirty helped a bit, I suspect.

In article ,
Mark Trudgill wrote:

The message
from John Husvar contains these words:

In article ,
Mark Trudgill wrote:


Those I used to butcher as beef and bone them out as if not you'd end up
with pork chops nearly 2" thick and weighing about 40oz each!!

Ummmm.

Pray tell: What is the downside here.

John, lover of _thick_ pork chops; seared, then slow grilled.

The thing is you and I may be greedy *******s, and my do they eat well.

Yes we may and that they do. Guilty as charged!

But the wife and kids couldn't eat one of these in a month of sundays so
you end up throwing most of it away!!

's OK, I'll handle the leftovers.
Cholesterol on the hoof, but what a way to go!

And for the organ meat crowd: Smithville Restaurant in Smithville, OH,
not far from here, makes a serving of seasoned, breaded, deep fried
chicken livers that melts in your mouth and tastes like heaven on a
fork. At least they do if they're still in business.

Coronary Artery Disease on the hoof -- or wing as the case may be --
but, again, what a way to go!

That was one place one could go and suddenly realize that every stick of
wood in the building was American Chestnut, wall paneling included. The
doorjambs, window sashes and frames were probably worth than my whole
house.

--
Bring back, Oh bring back
Oh, bring back that old continuity.
Bring back, oh, bring back
Oh, bring back Clerk Maxwell to me.

"Jeff McCann" wrote:


"Lobby Dosser" wrote in message
news:V7hBg.2535$7m5.1154@trnddc05...
"Jeff McCann" wrote:


"Robert Sturgeon" wrote in message
...
On 5 Aug 2006 09:30:43 -0700, "Too_Many_Tools"
wrote:

I think you have a good point Robert.

In my opinion the more technologically advanced a society is, the
more "fragile" it becomes.

A miracle! We agree on something. Great.

I think the reverse is true. Technological advancement gives a
society options, redundancies, flexibility and the ability to
assess and remediate problems.

Jeff




And if the electricity goes out for six months or even six weeks?

You mean like it did here after the last hurricane? No problem; my
generator worked fine.

Jeff



Was the electricity out for six months? Nation wide? It is possible.

steve wrote:


TV's can't be repaired

now it's cheaper to buy a new lawnmower then to fix one (due to China
the price of a new one is less now then 25 years ago, and our income
has gone way up, the cost of parts, however, has stayed the same)

car's rarely break now, and they need very little mainteance (tune
ups), yes you still can and need to change your brakes, alternators,
starters but it simply doesn't justify the cost of a well appointed
home mechanics workshop, like it did before when the typical repair
list was twice as long and 5 times more frequent


TV's can be repaired, but it probably not cost effective unless you
enjoy puzzles. My wife does crossword puzzles, I do different kinds of
puzzles. Yesterday I repaired the dishwasher. One of the hinges had
fatigued and failed. It was less work to remove the door and hinge,
weld the hinge, and reassemble than it would have been to go buy
another dishwasher and install it.

If you are looking for lawn mower parts, look on Ebay. Lots of places
that sell things as pistons and rings at reasonable prices.

Cars may not break as often, but they do still have problems. I need
to pull the gasolene tank on my truck and fix the fuel gauge sensor.
It won't take a well appointed home mechanic workshop to do most of it.
Fixing the sensor might. Have not seen what the problem is.

But are these basic skills in todays world. To me basic skills today
are more about how to determine who is a good dentist, auto mechanic,
plumber, etc. How to use Ebay and Craigslist, to find the things you
want and need. Figuring out what stocks to buy is more important than
being able to create you own well. Knowing how to find information
when you need it is a basic skill.

Dan

DaddyMonkey wrote:
PLEASE excuse me for not reading ALL of the thread in this post (It's
now kind of long).

Here in central VA (Centerville, Va) We have what is called "Field Days
of the Past". It's like a local Fair/Carnival.

Although, It DOES have a great deal of old/antique farm equipment... it
totally blows my mind that we once, 100 years ago, had washing machines
that were kept outside and had to be started with a pull rope (just like
a lawnmower) because they were gasoline powered. We had rock crushers
that turned watermellon sized stones into gravel (gas/steam powered) and
all wicker baskets were local made (not from China at Pier1)

If we go back 100 years from THAT (1806), Saw mills were just two men
working a HUGE hand saw back and forth to saw the logs into planks.
I even heard stories of people moving away from their houses and then
burning- down their house, just to re-collect the nails. (They were
expensive to produce)
WOW!

Let's push forward to today.
What would happen if we were faced with a natural catastrophe? Could I
hunt/fish?
Could I build a fire? Basic shelter?
It makes me think!

Great Post!!!
Dave

I don't now, but I have hunted and fished, I can build a fire from
scratch, I can toss together basic shelter in a rush, but if it comes
to the point we need to do something like this, even in a rural area
like mine, where do, for example, the 98,000 residents of Roanoke and
the 65,000 people in Lynchburg go to nail a deer (or turkey, or,
failing all else, a possum), grub up some branches and get a fire
going, rip the branches off cedars and pines, and dig slit trenches,
but...the sanitary arrangements alone for today's population in central
and southern and western Virginia would be a major feat that probably
cannot be accomplished without technology. The same holds true for
clean drinking water when the wells go out. My county has 754 square
miles, but also about 60,000 residents now, many of whom are true city
boys and girls who never spent day one in the military, either. They're
living their rural dream in their McMansions, but that dream of theirs
may become a nightmare for all of us, unless things keep ticking over
in the current kindly manner.

And this would probably be one of the better areas in the east, should
a catastrophe occur.

"Jeff McCann" wrote in message
...

Many did, others didn't. Many an extension cord snaked it's way over a
neighbor's fence. Life went on. We improvised, adapted and overcame. It
was rougher for some than for others, but the local economy is booming,
tax
coffers are swelling, and local unemployment is below 3%.

Jeff


Now consider yourself being without fuel for 3 or 4 months or much longer.
You merely made best of a minor inconvenience. If real trouble came that
shut down fuel production for months you too would soon feel the effects.

"Leon" wrote in message
m...

"Jeff McCann" wrote in message
...

Many did, others didn't. Many an extension cord snaked it's way over a
neighbor's fence. Life went on. We improvised, adapted and overcame.
It
was rougher for some than for others, but the local economy is booming,
tax
coffers are swelling, and local unemployment is below 3%.

Jeff


Now consider yourself being without fuel for 3 or 4 months or much longer.
You merely made best of a minor inconvenience. If real trouble came that
shut down fuel production for months you too would soon feel the effects.

"Leon" wrote in message
m...

"Jeff McCann" wrote in message
...

Many did, others didn't. Many an extension cord snaked it's way over a
neighbor's fence. Life went on. We improvised, adapted and overcame.
It
was rougher for some than for others, but the local economy is booming,
tax
coffers are swelling, and local unemployment is below 3%.

Jeff


Now consider yourself being without fuel for 3 or 4 months or much longer.
You merely made best of a minor inconvenience. If real trouble came that
shut down fuel production for months you too would soon feel the effects.

Yes, I would. But would it mean the end of American society? I don't think
so. I know how to do for myself without many things. Moreover, I've seen
many a disaster come and go, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, 9/11, etc, up
close and personal. It's my job. One thing I have learned is that our
society's coping mechanisms are quite robust.

Jeff

On Sun, 6 Aug 2006 14:57:09 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:

(snips)

Societal collapse is a macro-scale event. What happens to individuals
within that society are micro-level events. Individuals win and lose all
the time, even in a thriving society. Whole groups have been caused to
suffer many times by rapid changes within a complex society, yet the society
as a whole endures.

Sometimes it doesn't. At the height of the Roman Empire,
Rome had a population of around 1,000,000. By the late
Middle Ages, that was down to less than 10,000, and wolves
were roaming the streets. Various other societies have gone
through collapses that were as bad, if not worse. Contrary
to what we like to think, things can, in fact, go Very
Badly. There is no reason to suppose that we are somehow
immune.

It sucked to be a technology worker during the dot-com bust or an
aeronautical engineer when we retreated from manned space exploration. It
also sucked to be a buggy whip maker during the advent of the automobile.

I'm not talking about going through an economic shift, but
an economic/societal collapse. Different story...

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 10:26:19 -0700, Tim May
wrote:

In article , Robert
Sturgeon wrote:

Steve wrote, "No, its just the workshop has changed, it can
live in a computer, for instance, workshops are alive and
well, they are just different, today's workshop can involved
hooking up a wireless router to a wired LAN that supports
Appletalk, before your time it was thatching a roof"

A wired LAN is an artifact of the symbolic economy. It is a
Good Thing, right now. But if what you need is a new roof,
and there is no longer much demand for wireless routers,
LANs, Appletalk, etc., (as would be the case in a post-SHTF
scenario) then being able to mess with LANs and such, but
not roofs, leaves you out.


There are plenty of roofers and roofing companies in my area. When I
needed a roof replacement several years ago, they did it in a tiny
fraction of the time (and effort) it would have taken me to figure out
how to do it, how to order the materials, how to fix the mistakes I
would inevitably make, how to finish the job.

Should I learn roofing now? Not hardly, as my own roof will likely not
need patching in the decades ahead of me. And I have no desire to make
it a career.

I didn't mean to be specific about roofing, or any other
particular skill.

Ditto for welding, horseshoeing, logging, midwifing, and all sorts of
other jobs which some/many think will be up-n-coming career options in
the Post-Industrial Economy. ("You, too, can become a farrier. Just
call 1-800-HOR-SHOE for information on our study at home course!")

I expect that the "symbolic economy," as you call it, will become even
more important after a Big Event (SHTF, TEOTWAWKI, whatever). Wireless
networks, even over radio (and satellites, which will remain largely
unaffected) will be used to trade options and access to things.

Consider the rise of cellphones in Mogadishu after the civil war.

E-Bay and services of that sort will become MORE important, not LESS
important. Think about it. Combine online barter and sales with
jitney-type delivery services and new payment approaches and one has a
vibrant sub-economy.

(And vehicles will still be running. This is separate subject, but
there are many, many options for fueling. NG will not vanish, biofuels
are readily made, and even all-electric vehicles are here....one of my
neighbors has a large photovoltaic installation sufficient to charge up
his fleet of vehicles....a few entrepreneurs like this, mediating
trades via satphones and Mobile WiMax, could do quite well trading the
already-extant supply of tools, materials, and forms of money.)

Look to Hong Kong for one example, to Mogadishu for the other extreme.
Both remain heavily "symbolic."

You could be right. I just don't see wireless routers and
such as being critical parts of the post-post-modern
economy. I hope we don't find out.

--
Robert Sturgeon
Summum ius summa inuria.
http://www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/

"Robert Sturgeon" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 6 Aug 2006 14:57:09 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:

(snips)

Societal collapse is a macro-scale event. What happens to individuals
within that society are micro-level events. Individuals win and lose all
the time, even in a thriving society. Whole groups have been caused to
suffer many times by rapid changes within a complex society, yet the
society
as a whole endures.

Sometimes it doesn't. At the height of the Roman Empire,
Rome had a population of around 1,000,000. By the late
Middle Ages, that was down to less than 10,000, and wolves
were roaming the streets. Various other societies have gone
through collapses that were as bad, if not worse. Contrary
to what we like to think, things can, in fact, go Very
Badly. There is no reason to suppose that we are somehow
immune.

Yep. No society is immune from collapse. My point is only that
technologically advanced societies are much less so. So, do you think
anyone alive at the height of the Roman Empire was still alive to see those
wolves roaming the streets? No. It took a very long time indeed, for Roman
society to decline and fall. It didn't suddenly collapse within a portion
of a single lifetime, like, say, the Incan Empire.

It sucked to be a technology worker during the dot-com bust or an
aeronautical engineer when we retreated from manned space exploration.
It
also sucked to be a buggy whip maker during the advent of the automobile.

I'm not talking about going through an economic shift, but
an economic/societal collapse. Different story...

Time to define our terms, I think. So, what does an economic/societal
collapse mean to you?

Personally, I expect American society to die with a whimper, not a bang,
over a span of many generations, in a way that is not readily apparent to
many who are living through it.

Jeff

Problem with a sow that big is they will run you down if they want.
Mom once kicked a big sow and it charged here. Grandma had to come
and run it off. Since the sow grew from a piglet under the slop bucket
from Grandma.

So don't wish for the biggest.

Martin

Martin H. Eastburn
@ home at Lions' Lair with our computer lionslair at consolidated dot net
NRA LOH & Endowment Member
NRA Second Amendment Task Force Charter Founder
IHMSA and NRA Metallic Silhouette maker & member
http://lufkinced.com/



John Husvar wrote:
In article ,
Mark Trudgill wrote:



Those I used to butcher as beef and bone them out as if not you'd end up
with pork chops nearly 2" thick and weighing about 40oz each!!


Ummmm.

Pray tell: What is the downside here.

John, lover of _thick_ pork chops; seared, then slow grilled.


----== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com - Unlimited-Unrestricted-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 120,000+ Newsgroups
----= East and West-Coast Server Farms - Total Privacy via Encryption =----

"F. George McDuffee" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 6 Aug 2006 18:26:33 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:

It's my job. One thing I have learned is that our
society's coping mechanisms are quite robust.
=================================
In academic terms this is called an error of composition.
Society is not a monolith, and is becoming less so all the time.

Do follow along. My point is that primitive societies tend to be more
monolithic than more technologically advanced ones. This makes them more
vulnerable to sudden collapse from a single or cluster of just a few
factors, internal or external.

Some segments of society and areas of the country may well be
able to "cope," but these will *NOT* be the same for all
problems. It is well to remember in this context "cope" does not
mean a continuation of the current soccer-mom "high conspicuous
consumption / air conditioned" life-style to which they are
accustomed, but rather survival as in "staying alive."

Very good. Now, see if you can figure out what types of societies are best
equipped to make major adjustments to drastically changed circumstances.

Historically, there were two successive and compounding errors
that produced national disasters on this scale.

#1 the failure to accurately and timely identify the problem(s);
and
#2 was the incorrect identification of the causes (there may well
be several).

And #3, resistance to, or inability to, make the necessary adaptations,
often led by those who are profiteering off the collapse or the conditions
leading to it. Sound familiar?

Minority groups have always been popular scape goats, but
ignoring the moral factors, punitive actions / pogroms have
never cured anything, and have generally made the problems worse
by diverting time/effort/attention away from the real
problems/causes.

Yep.

Jeff

On Sun, 6 Aug 2006 18:26:33 -0500, "Jeff McCann"
wrote:

It's my job. One thing I have learned is that our
society's coping mechanisms are quite robust.
=================================
In academic terms this is called an error of composition.
Society is not a monolith, and is becoming less so all the time.

Some segments of society and areas of the country may well be
able to "cope," but these will *NOT* be the same for all
problems. It is well to remember in this context "cope" does not
mean a continuation of the current soccer-mom "high conspicuous
consumption / air conditioned" life-style to which they are
accustomed, but rather survival as in "staying alive."

Historically, there were two successive and compounding errors
that produced national disasters on this scale.

#1 the failure to accurately and timely identify the problem(s);
and
#2 was the incorrect identification of the causes (there may well
be several).

Minority groups have always been popular scape goats, but
ignoring the moral factors, punitive actions / pogroms have
never cured anything, and have generally made the problems worse
by diverting time/effort/attention away from the real
problems/causes.


Unka George
(George McDuffee)

....and at the end of the fight is a tombstone white
with the name of the late deceased, and
the epitaph drear:
“A Fool lies here, who tried to hustle the East.”

Rudyard Kipling The Naulahka, ch. 5, heading (1892).

On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 17:52:56 -0700, Robert Sturgeon
wrote:


Sometimes it doesn't. At the height of the Roman Empire,
Rome had a population of around 1,000,000. By the late
Middle Ages, that was down to less than 10,000, and wolves
were roaming the streets. Various other societies have gone
through collapses that were as bad, if not worse. Contrary
to what we like to think, things can, in fact, go Very
Badly. There is no reason to suppose that we are somehow
immune.
========================
This was addressed at some length in my dissertation in Appendix
A -- THE LINEAR AND ACCRETION MODELS OF ECONOMIC EVOLUTION

I attach the section on empire below as the most applicable,
however W. W. Rostow's observations/comments about "Newtonian
Science" in Stage VI --Renaissance also directly apply.

Note the [short] discussion where technical methodology is
regarded as magic [symbolic manipulation?] and the bad effects
this produced.

If you want to see the entire thing, or scan excerpts goto
http://www.mcduffee-associates.us

references cited are in the bibliography

Enjoy

Stage IV -- Empires
There is no sharp dividing line between a large city state and an
empire, however it can be posited that when a city state begins
to impose its rule on other linguistic and ethnic groups,
especially if it imposes taxes for this "service," it has become
an empire. This stage tends to produce large entities such as
the Akkadian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Egyptian, Roman and Chinese,
possibly because of the existence of well-trained and efficient
specialists in governance / administration and military science.
It appears that the policy makers of a stage 4 society tended to
engage in and promote activities which cause their society to
become too centralized, too specialized and too highly
concentrated to be sustainable.
Generally considerable technical progress is made in the
pragmatic sense. That is that while certain procedures were
known to produce certain effects, these are regarded more as
magic spells or procedures than as a cause-effect relationship
which can be systematized or integrated. Examples of this are
the conversion of iron into steel and the tempering of the steel
to provide sharp, durable weapons. A major contributing factor to
the decline and destruction of a specific empire may have been
the tendency to regard any technical knowledge as a family or
guild "trade secret" which was to be protected to maximize
profit. Thus while a family or guild knowledge of pragmatic
procedures may allow the production of complex and sophisticated
products, it also tended to restrict the diffusion of such
procedures and products into other areas and thus limit the rate
of change and improvement.
It is unfortunate that in many cases moral and ethical
considerations have been introduced into this discussion as these
tend to produce considerably more heat than light. (For example
Rousseau 1712-1778 and Gibbons 1737-1794 )
What seems to be the general case is that all cultures are
subject to random stresses. These stresses can be an invasion,
an internal revolution, a famine, a plague, a new social theory,
a new religion, etc. Cumulative environmental effects also
appear to be important. For example, some writers have posited
that a major contributor to the decline in some stage III
societies was the depletion of available natural resources such
as arable land for food and timber for building ships and
fortifications. The less developed transportation systems and
technologies would have caused societies in this stage to be more
vulnerable than would societies in the later stages. There
appears to have been little realization of the importance of
using sustainable agricultural techniques, reforestation and the
productivity of and thus the need for the protection of wetlands.
Indeed, some of the major "public works" of antiquity and the
medieval period was specifically the draining of swamps and
marshes. Long term climatic changes could also have a similar
decisive effect.[Wright, K.] Additionally, geographic changes
such as the shifting of the course of a river or the silting of a
harbor are also known to have caused the abrupt economic decline
if not collapse of ancient city-states.
It also seems apparent that the more perfectly an organism, and
by extension a society or culture, is adapted to one set of
conditions the less well it will be adapted to a new or changed
set of circumstances, and it is observed that the older an
organization the less "flexible" it is. A further consideration
is that most societies in stage III historically tend to engage
in behaviors which cause extensive amounts of animosity and
resentment. These animosities include but are not limited to
envy of their flaunted wealth, hatred of their affectation of
political and intellectual superiority or simply a desire for
revenge for military defeat.
While the historical record is not completely clear on this
point, it appears that most stage IV societies succumb, not to a
single factor but rather a combination of simultaneous factors.
That is to say that while an empire may have successfully coped
with famines, plagues, invasions and internal revolutions in the
past, they are unable to cope with all of these at the same time.
This is especially true if their nominal allies and vassals have
been biding their time for the proper moment to obtain revenge.
Each of the characteristics that helped create an empire then
becomes a characteristic that assists in its downfall. The
concentration of governance and military science into the hands
of a few, albeit highly talented, specialists means that if
these few people can be isolated or incapacitated then the entire
society is paralyzed. The specialization by large numbers of the
population in specific trades means that they are extremely
vulnerable if the demand for their specific knowledge/skill no
longer exists as they no longer have the means or knowledge to
feed themselves and their families in the sense of subsistence
agriculture or hunting. Economic devastation of large numbers of
people, what ever the cause, generally results in revolution.
Responsible or not, the existing social structure and leaders are
held answerable for the disaster. The concentration of people
into large cities, while promoting trade and generally improving
the perceived quality of life means that to control the city, all
that must be done is to control the food (or water) supply and as
there is no need to breach the fortifications, advanced
technologies such as siege engines and catapults are not required
for their capture. This means that a stage IV society or economy
is vulnerable to organized and warlike peoples such as the Huns,
Goths and Mongols even though they may lack "technology" or
"culture." The separation between the "thinking" and "doing"
classes tended to grow more pronounced over time. In most
empires slave holding tended to become more pronounced, thus
further debasing the status of labor, gainful employment and
useful physical (other than military and sports) activity.
Another factor may also be that the specialization of occupations
has resulted in the development of a large mass of people with no
more military capability or "will to resist" than a flock of
sheep. Slaves, almost by definition, are forbidden to own arms
or even learn the "arts of war ," thus making this segment of the
population useless in the military sense. This means that as
soon as the "professional" military segment of the culture is no
longer available, for what ever reason, the culture is instantly
vulnerable to even small para-military groups, even if these are
not particularly well armed, trained, or led.

Unka George
(George McDuffee)

....and at the end of the fight is a tombstone white
with the name of the late deceased, and
the epitaph drear:
“A Fool lies here, who tried to hustle the East.”

Rudyard Kipling The Naulahka, ch. 5, heading (1892).

"F. George McDuffee" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 06 Aug 2006 17:52:56 -0700, Robert Sturgeon
wrote:


Sometimes it doesn't. At the height of the Roman Empire,
Rome had a population of around 1,000,000. By the late
Middle Ages, that was down to less than 10,000, and wolves
were roaming the streets. Various other societies have gone
through collapses that were as bad, if not worse. Contrary
to what we like to think, things can, in fact, go Very
Badly. There is no reason to suppose that we are somehow
immune.
========================
This was addressed at some length in my dissertation in Appendix
A -- THE LINEAR AND ACCRETION MODELS OF ECONOMIC EVOLUTION

[snip]
(For example
Rousseau 1712-1778 and Gibbons 1737-1794 )[snip]

How did your dissertation advisor feel about such obvious proofing errors?
What was your dissertation for, and when and where was it accepted?
Published? Just curious.

Jeff

Too_Many_Tools wrote:

It has always concerned me when the young amoung us are not taugh basic
skills such as how to change a tire, how to use a saw, how to...well
you get the idea...there are basic skills that one needs to deal with
the world we live in.

You can learn a lot about someone by handing them a simple tool like a
ratcheting socket wrench, especially to assemble something. The
inexperienced try to tighten the still loose bolt holding the end of
the ratchet handle and of course have it always falling off the nut...
the experienced finger tighten, palm the ratchet mechanism, and only
shift down to the end of the handle for the last little bit. Of course
we haven't thought about that since we were 8 or so... which is why
it's so shocking to see how a newbie treats the tool!

John Husvar wrote:

And for the organ meat crowd: Smithville Restaurant in Smithville, OH,
not far from here, makes a serving of seasoned, breaded, deep fried
chicken livers that melts in your mouth and tastes like heaven on a
fork. At least they do if they're still in business.

You mean that place is still in business?

I knew it as "The Smithville Inn", home of the chicken dinner, served
family style.

Amish country is less than 10 miles away, so you can guess what the
quality and taste of the food is/was.

Haven't been in the place since 1955.

Lew

Ace wrote:

Guess it would be nice to see their basements, or even a workshop ????


Workshop? I already have three, and it's taking over the house, too.
;-)

Sure, I've had to make some adjustments now that I'm disabled, but i
still spend what time I can in the shops. Some modifications help, like
the foot switches on the drill press, and some other tools. Since I can
no longer do the micro electronics I did for a living I am concentrating
un finishing my main shop, and my non profit efforts to collect and
refurbish computers for other disabled Veterans in my area. A basic
computer system is given free to Veterans in need, and the only cost
incurred is if they want something we have to purchase wholesale. The
work is done by me, and a couple part time volunteers. I also have a
lot of older PC parts, from the original PC on up. If anyone needs
older parts, let me know. Most of the stuff can be had for the cost of
shipping, and a little, for what i paid for it, plus shipping. I have
piles of good XT, 286, 386, 486 and early Pentium motherboards that are
not usable for the computer project, but I don't want to toss them.
Plenty of video cards, I/O cards and other odds and ends, including
early SIMM and DIMM memory are floating around on the different
motherboards. XT and AT powers supplies, if you need them, along with
mini tower type supplies. I will use some of it for my projects, but I
can't use it all.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida