Collapse
The Gun Guy links to and tends to agree with this notion that there is a pending social and infrastructure collapse coming. Go read then come back.
I have heard this mentioned quite a bit by otherwise reasonable people (i.e., not the end of the world or black helicopter people). I wonder why people think this? Then I wonder if it’s really a possibility. Sure, the US is probably one terror attack or natural disaster away from a regional collapse but I don’t see a national collapse unless there is just a failure of gigantic proportions at fed .gov level. Then what?
I was on a flight last month and the guy next to me struck up a conversation. Turns out, he was a pilot for the airline we were flying on. The conversation basically turned into him telling that he thought there would be a huge social/governmental collapse in our lifetime. He was serious and reasoned that it was only a matter of time before some terror attack did a profound amount of damage on US soil.
Then, another guy I know in a professional capacity told me he wasn’t too concerned about social security because he planned on being raptured in the next few years anyway. I asked if he had a date because we’ve got some cash tied up in investments for Junior’s college fun and wedding.
Is this end of the world type stuff cyclical or does everyone know something I don’t? And, more importantly, if such an even occurred (well, except the rapture, I suppose), what happens next? We Americans can’t live without our Coca Cola and MTV.
What do you think?
October 31st, 2005 at 11:01 am
That’s partially the reason I emailed you last week.
October 31st, 2005 at 11:12 am
Hmm…dunno about a total collapse, but there have been some economists (Harry Dent, Jr. for one) who believe that there is a fairly large depression on the near horizon (within the next 10 years…possibly by 2012). This would be partially due to the large number of baby boomers that will be leaving the workforce and going into retirement (of course, there are a lot of other problems we already know about related to that anyway) along with several other factors.
A large depression in of itself could cause other problems as well.
October 31st, 2005 at 11:22 am
My aunt Nina in Georgia says we’re living in the end times. ‘Course, she’s been saying that for 20 years.
The environmentalists are saying we’re all doomed. ‘Course, they’ve been saying that for 40 years.
You should read Richard Feynman’s Surely You Must Be Joking, Mr. Feynman. For lots of reasons, but there’s a section that touches on this. Feynman was one of the physicists who worked on the Manhattan Project. He watched the first atomic bomb test in the desert. He recalls sitting in a restaurant in New York after the war, wondering why anyone would plan anything when it was all pointless because atomic bombs were going to destroy the world. Later he was glad that other people kept on planning for the future.
Everyone thinks they’re going to have front row seats to the end of the world.
October 31st, 2005 at 11:29 am
“Rapture” is really just a particularly egotistical version of the concept of Armageddon that has dominated human cultures for centuries.
Actual scientific evidence for global crisis is similarly hype-driven. A good recap can be found here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0192805711/qid=1128783148/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-5383081-4531252?v=glance&s=books&n=507846
October 31st, 2005 at 12:11 pm
Lets take a look at things that we know are a good possiblity (by that I mean the most likely things that could happen, though the events are not likely theirselves).
Housing market (bust or deflate)
Major Terror attack (a nuke in one of our cities)
Major Eathquake in CA
Major Earthquake in west TN\notheast AR area.
Major Hurricane
Tusnami on east coast
Bird flu
What would it take for the US to experince a major decilne comparable to the Depression?
How would the US fair if another depression stuck? Remember that many people do not farm anymore (nor do they know how), many more live in cities. Also incredibly long supply lines. Just think about what it takes to make one can of soup, and where all of the different matertials come from: metal (where was it mined and refined), noodles(eggs, flour), chicken), and general interdependance of our econmy?
most thoughts and information are from this site: http://www.survivalblog.com/
America would not fair well if another depression stuck, because of the more urban nature of the US compared to the early 20th centry.
October 31st, 2005 at 1:30 pm
By the way…semi-on-topic, but I was wondering before this post as well. Anybody have a good place to buy boxes of MRE’s at a decent price?
October 31st, 2005 at 1:50 pm
I have faith in the American people being the most adaptible, innovative, diverse and resiliant creatures on the Earth. No matter what happens we will survive, trimuiph and come out stronger in the end. The “wet-their-pants” fear mongering, the sky is falling alway ignore or underestimate the strenght of the common American citizen.
October 31st, 2005 at 2:01 pm
For all the hype that these other things get, what really worries me is that foreign investors (most notably China) will lose confidence in the US and stop loaning us money, and that we default on the national debt. Of course, that wouldn’t result in a national economic crisis, but a global one.
I hope it’s all doom-and-gloom, but our economy is almost entirely debt-based, and I wonder how long it can last.
cube:
Isn’t a tsunami on the west coast far more likely?
October 31st, 2005 at 5:59 pm
I like to call it ‘Societal De-Evolution’. It started with the Boomer generation and their lifelong asscoiation with the socialism-lite that FDR introduced America to.
The WWII generation had to cover their own asses and they knew it and they cared. The Boomers however, have grown up with the gov’t being there as a buffer for their welfare.
Some people, when they don’t have to plan for absolutes like destitution because a ‘higher power’ (aka gov’t) will catch them if they fall, they don’t plan and they get more apathetic for things that are not in their immediate surroundings. That number gets bigger with every generation.
Societal evolution reaches its peak when each person or family unit can survice on its own, either by creating what they need or by trading freely for it. Socialism makes this impossible and therefore retards the evolution.
October 31st, 2005 at 6:36 pm
tgirsch,
I could’t think of anything for the east cost so i just picked somthing out of the air. I would say while it is more likley in the west coast, i would think the east cost could get hit harder with a smaller earthquake because the Alantic is so small, though I have never read anything to back that up.
“I hope it’s all doom-and-gloom, but our economy is almost entirely debt-based, and I wonder how long it can last.”
As to that particlar fear, here is a good post with numbers on the debt.
http://www.optimist123.com/optimist/2005/10/heres_who_owns_.html
Most of the debt is owned by american either directly or in social insurance funds. China actually owns less of the debt that Japan, but you never hear anything about Japan. Seconldy, the debt as a ratio to our GDP is not that bad, though I could be better.
October 31st, 2005 at 6:40 pm
though *it* could be better (ie as in lower)
October 31st, 2005 at 10:05 pm
National Collapse just Ain’t Gonna Happen by any of the conventional means. Regional disasters, possibly, National…No. There is nothing on the horizon, military or economic, that can destroy the United States…give pain – yes, destroy – no.
A asteroid strike* or a world-wide pandemic of overwhelming proportions would do it, but even so, we’re better prepared than any other society to survive it. The only non-natural disaster that has a chance is the old saw….”democracies destroy themselves from the inside”.
All SHTF situations are local. The United States of America will not last forever, but when the rest of the world is ready, I hope to see a soft landing into a type of global government.
*We really, really, need to spread off this planet.
November 1st, 2005 at 1:40 am
cube:
I just re-watched a Nova special on the Indian Ocean tsunami, and according to it, there’s a fault off the coast of the Pacific Northwest — the Cascadia fault — that’s virtually identical to the one off the coast of Sumatra that triggered that tsunami. There’s evidence that a tsunami hit the west coast about 300 years ago, and to make you feel warm and fuzzy, that they happen roughly 300 to 1000 years apart. So we may be due.
If you get a chance to see the show, you should. Looks like it’s next scheduled to re-air on December 27.
November 1st, 2005 at 8:01 am
A regional thing I could understand, especially if triggered by a natural disaster. We can deal with a Katrina, but if we had a 10-state Katrina (or, even a really BIG one-state Katrina, and I’m thinking California here) from something like major earthquakes (I don’t think even a very large tsunami would be big enough; the effects, though certainly dramatic, probably wouldn’t extend more than several miles from the coast. Which, in places like California and Florida, is where people and industry are concentrated), or perhaps a significant meteor strike, that might cause enough disruption to have a very substantial national impact.
Of course, if the US collapses to the degree predicted (or presumed), given our position in the world economy, everyone else would be sliding down the chute right behind us. Given Americans’ results-oriented predilection for tackling and solving problems, I think we’d still rise to the top.
Outside of huge natural disasters (like meteors), it seems to me the greatest threat to destruction or collapse of the US is Democcrats, and that’s a solvable problem.
November 1st, 2005 at 9:40 am
[…] Sort of related to my discussion of Collapse, the Geek notes: As I was showering this morning, I stood gobsmacked, when I realized that I could not name a single work of science fiction written in the last 20 or 30 years that stipulated a free, vibrant, healthy America that you and I would recognize and be interested in living in. […]