belief that something like present technological advancement could continue after a cataclysmic collapse boggles my mind.
It could—and most probably would—rise up again, eventually. Rising up from the half-buried wreckage of modern civilization is easier than building it from scratch.
But I don’t go as far as Vladimir and say it’s virtually guaranteed. One scenario is that the survivors could all fall to a new religion that preached that technology itself was evil. This religion might suppress technological development for longer than Christianity suppressed it in the dark ages—which was 1000 years. I still think it is likely that technology would eventually make it through, but perhaps it would be used to create a global totalitarian state?
It could—and most probably would—rise up again, eventually. Rising up from the half-buried wreckage of modern civilization is easier than building it from scratch.
Not necessarily. To be blunt, we’ve basically exhausted practically all the useful non-renewal natural resources (ores, etc.) that a civilization could access with 1200s-level technology. They’d have to mine our ruins for metals and such—and much of it is going to be locked up in forms that are completely useless.
Of course it’s nowhere near the guaranteed—notice, for example, that I excluded all other catastrophic risks from consideration in that scenario, such as crazy wars for scraps, only looking at the effects of shortage of resources stopping much of the industry, because of dependencies that weren’t ensured.
It could—and most probably would—rise up again, eventually. Rising up from the half-buried wreckage of modern civilization is easier than building it from scratch.
But I don’t go as far as Vladimir and say it’s virtually guaranteed. One scenario is that the survivors could all fall to a new religion that preached that technology itself was evil. This religion might suppress technological development for longer than Christianity suppressed it in the dark ages—which was 1000 years. I still think it is likely that technology would eventually make it through, but perhaps it would be used to create a global totalitarian state?
Not necessarily. To be blunt, we’ve basically exhausted practically all the useful non-renewal natural resources (ores, etc.) that a civilization could access with 1200s-level technology. They’d have to mine our ruins for metals and such—and much of it is going to be locked up in forms that are completely useless.
Of course it’s nowhere near the guaranteed—notice, for example, that I excluded all other catastrophic risks from consideration in that scenario, such as crazy wars for scraps, only looking at the effects of shortage of resources stopping much of the industry, because of dependencies that weren’t ensured.