If a disaster left us with pre-industrial technology, could we become advanced again?

[jwenting]

Interestingly, all US marines are required to stay qualified on the service rifle, even paper pushers. pilots, and generals. Not sure what IPAC is though, and a quick googling wasn't enlightening.

Not the civilian base staff, which that lady paper pusher would likely fall under.

And being barred from carrying weapons on military bases (even troops can't carry a weapon on base unless they're on guard duty or on their way to a firing range) they probably don't have much interest in learning to shoot either.

[Red Iron Crown]

I'll trade you 1 155mm high explosive shell for 2 cases of .303?

Heh, no way, the .303 is waaay more useful. I also expect hand reloading to be one of those suddenly in high demand skills.

Not the civilian base staff, which that lady paper pusher would likely fall under.

And being barred from carrying weapons on military bases (even troops can't carry a weapon on base unless they're on guard duty or on their way to a firing range) they probably don't have much interest in learning to shoot either.

Ah, didn't think of the civilians on base.

[shynung]

I'll trade you 1 155mm high explosive shell for 2 cases of .303?

It'll probably net you a few dozens of .303s, for the high explosives alone. They may not be the perfect material for all purposes, but dynamite sticks can be used for various things.

[vger]

Now you're going to have to hope someone has a text book on metalurgy that hasn't burned, rotted, or was otherwise destroyed and he'll let you read it.

That might give you some information on making the easier steel alloys.

You're also going to have to reinvent electricity, pumps, the works.

And the further along we get to putting everything in electronic storage on computers rather than on paper the harder that will all become.

Random thought, has nobody actually thought of building 'indestructible' archives of knowledge in the event of an electronic catastrophe?

There's that "Noah's Ark" bunker full of seeds just in case some major disaster happens and we need to start over. A Hall of Records for teaching people how to quickly redevelop should be a no-brainer. Unless it's assumed that the information would be useless because language may change too drastically by the time anyone has to go read it.

[Red Iron Crown]

Random thought, has nobody actually thought of building 'indestructible' archives of knowledge in the event of an electronic catastrophe?

There's that "Noah's Ark" bunker full of seeds just in case some major disaster happens and we need to start over. A Hall of Records for teaching people how to quickly redevelop should be a no-brainer. Unless it's assumed that the information would be useless because language may change too drastically by the time anyone has to go read it.

The Long Now.

[linkxsc]

Well some additional thoughts to throw out there. many have argued the difficulty of fletching as a skill. Well honestly thats 1 of those that I gave a try to in my life before too, and to get good quality arrows is a rather notable skill. But if you're good enough to get within 100-200ft of your target, even crappily fletched arrows would work (from experience, although I wasn't the hunter shooting them)

Instead of arrows though, the difficult to make thing would be bows themselves. Modern nylon bowstrings can last for several years, but when they break, where are you gonna get new 1s? Also most of the wood around is garbage for bows. It would take a good bit of work to find a good sapling that can be used as even a 40lb bow. Although there are guides out there about using a few PVC pipes to make a bow, and they do work kinda well, but they don't last long.

Also lacking the ability to fletch a good arrow, why not crossbows? A good Cbow can be made easily of wood and scrap metal, and sprigns if they can be found. And nominally, their bolts are just highly straightened sharpened pieces of wood with a notch at the back.

Also there are always high quality steel and aluminum arrows we have now that can be shot thousands of times without them getting damaged. And remember, arrows are retrievable, unlike bullets.

But forgoing all that jazz, its not like fletching or bows would be important for the first several years because there are guns and bullets everywhere. Hunting would probably be big the first couple years as agriculture needs time to expandand ramp up (I'm from New Hampshire. We probably couldn't survive on existing farmland, and clearing out forests to make farmland woudl take time. Assumign you don't try to level towns because well, there would be so much more time spent jsut trying to break up foundations, although everyone could help out by throwing a garden in their yard).

Looking at an iowa website, tells me that 1 acre of corn turns out ~150bushels (without the husks, thats just kernals) and 1 of those bushels is ~56 lbs. Japan has a unit of a "koku" back in the day, which was about the amount of rice needed to feed 1 person for 1 year, and I believe it was about 300-350lbs of rice. Ofcourse you couldn't live on jsut corn or rice, but assuming the numbers balance out somewhat similar. 1 acre would turn out ~8400lbs of corn (perhaps more considering if youre starving, those husks start looking plenty edible) so 1 acre in a good harvest could provide baseline food for ~30 people a year. AN acre is only about the size of a football field.

Other info, glancing around, in Vermont a site claims that 1/8th acre of winter wheat, planting 30 lbs of it, netted them 250lbs of grain at the end of its growth somewhere in July. Ofcourse, vary your crops and have something growing throughout the whole year.

I guess what can be taken away from that, Surviving off of some subsistence farming, is actually kinda legit.

Assuming my area, houses around in New Hampshire are usually built on ~1.5 acres, farming that (which could be handled by running out there with hand tools. And really wouldn't be a hard job aside from during the planting and harvesting times. I mean, when my mom decided she wanted a garden, it ended up being ~ 1/8th acre, and we tilled that out with just myself and my friend Steve over the course of a morning) Yeah we might see an influx of people storming up here from areas around Boston. But if the situation was known, and a nice town meeting laid down the fact that if you don't work, you're gonna die. I'm sure that given some time, and hard work, at least the food could be gotten back on track.

[Seret]

A lot - and I mean: A LOT - would depend on who gets in power - but if lead wisely, promoting people with knowledge (instead of warriors), we could progress extremely rapidly.

It's a cliche to imagine the two are mutually exclusive. Plenty of people in the military are highly intelligent. In addition they're trained in a highly flexible form of leadership from a very junior level, have experience dealing with adverse conditions (often including disaster relief), and are generally of a very practical bent. Even in a completely peaceful situation many of our military personnel would make excellent leaders. The stereotypes of military personnel that the media project are just that: stereotypes.

Bullets.

I don't think so, for a couple of reasons:

1) A currency is (by definition) something which has a value agreed to by all parties. Everybody agrees 1USD is worth 1USD. Your 7mm Rem ammo is worthless to me if I only have a .308.

2) You're arguing for bullets based on their utility. That's not currency, that's barter. In a barter economy (which I agree would naturally arise once central organisation fails) many things would have value. Yes bullets, but also food, medicine, fuel, generators, books and maps, tools, etc. A currency would only become useful once a degree of central government had been re-established and once you're at that point there's no reason not to use a fiat currency like we have currently.

Even an IPAC paper-pusher lady on an USMC base has probably heard a few things about surviving in the field (if only from the grunts complaining ) and fired a rifle at least once,

I don't know what IPAC is either, but if you're talking about a civilian clerk instead of a uniformed one then it's highly unlikely they would have every fired a weapon. All military personnel qualify on personal weapons as part of their basic training, but from my experience the levels of ongoing refresher training are spotty. Standards vary between countries and services, but from what I've seen it's not unusual for non-combattant personnel to have very limited contact with small arms in peace time. People are busy doing other things, and units often only send a percentage of their people for annual qualification shoots. Obviously everybody has to go qualify before any deployments, and combat trades will obviously be continuously qualified. But I wouldn't necessarily expect a cook or a storeman in every military to have fired a weapon in years.

[Brethern]

You all should remember that it's very hard to remove/destroy guns, and they'd almost certainly survive in a decent number. More advanced military equipment might not, but an M-16/AK-47 and derivatives, as well as many older weapons, are relatively simple and robust. They're perfect for hunting (no need to make arrows if you have a rifle) and for defense as well. As such, "strongest" would mean "with the largest amount of guns".

If the worst happens The first thing I'm going to be doing is scrapping the M 16 in order to build snares.

It fires a small round and is useless for hunting, no to mention it's a PITA to take care of. No it's not internet rage directed at it, the rifle really is that bad.

Me I'm going to stick with any turn of the century bolt action rifles. Their maintenance requirements are low I have a lee enfield that was last cleaned sometime in the past and it works great. It also fires a bullet big enough to kill anything in north america.

The only thing I'm going to say is that if we do really get blasted back to pre industrial tech, allot more people than you think are going to die.

[linkxsc]

If the worst happens The first thing I'm going to be doing is scrapping the M 16 in order to build snares.

It fires a small round and is useless for hunting, no to mention it's a PITA to take care of. No it's not internet rage directed at it, the rifle really is that bad.

Me I'm going to stick with any turn of the century bolt action rifles. Their maintenance requirements are low I have a lee enfield that was last cleaned sometime in the past and it works great. It also fires a bullet big enough to kill anything in north america.

The only thing I'm going to say is that if we do really get blasted back to pre industrial tech, allot more people than you think are going to die.

Why scrap it, I'm sure you'd be better foraging around for scrap springs (perhaps out of the hood mechanism of a car) to use in the construction of your traps. Honestly can't think of any part of an M-16 or any gun that would be good for building any kind of snare. Now trading the gun is something you could do just fine, you might not want it, but someone else will. And you can certainly take down deer and elk with .223, I've seen people come back with deer when all they brought with them was .22lr.

Also we've never clarified the rules of "how many people die". surely the deathtoll for citydwellers would be in the upper percents, well over 80%, just because they wouldn't be able to find enough food, and theres too many others around to kill them. In the midwest, and rural areas away from major cities though, yeah there would be some violence, but starvation would be more likely the killer. Deathtolls would be far lower in these regions.

[Seret]

Brethren is right, assault rifles aren't the best choice for hunting. I'd go for a nice study bolt action for most game over most terrain too.

Snares are just about the most energy efficient way to get calories in a survival situation though, assuming there's plenty of small game.

Edited August 2, 2014 by Seret

[Brethern]

Why scrap it, I'm sure you'd be better foraging around for scrap springs (perhaps out of the hood mechanism of a car) to use in the construction of your traps. Honestly can't think of any part of an M-16 or any gun that would be good for building any kind of snare. Now trading the gun is something you could do just fine, you might not want it, but someone else will. And you can certainly take down deer and elk with .223, I've seen people come back with deer when all they brought with them was .22lr.

Also we've never clarified the rules of "how many people die". surely the deathtoll for citydwellers would be in the upper percents, well over 80%, just because they wouldn't be able to find enough food, and theres too many others around to kill them. In the midwest, and rural areas away from major cities though, yeah there would be some violence, but starvation would be more likely the killer. Deathtolls would be far lower in these regions.

And what about people who can't fend for themselves? How long could you last without running water or electricity? Or a computer, cellphone xbox whatever?

Have you ever fired an M16 or any of it's variants? The maintenance requirements of it would cause it to fail shortly after you ran out of gun oil. A good bolt action could be cleaned by pretty much any oil or fat you can get your hands on.

[Seret]

Have you ever fired an M16 or any of it's variants? The maintenance requirements of it would cause it to fail shortly after you ran out of gun oil. A good bolt action could be cleaned by pretty much any oil or fat you can get your hands on.

An M16 is a particularly bad example though. The way it's built (close tolerances, idiotic lack of return rods, etc) mean it does have to be kept clean. Now an AK...

[linkxsc]

Yes I have fired several thousand rounds through AR-15s, also through an M-14, M1 garand, AR-10, few hundred down a cheap Mosin Nagant bought off a pawn shop for $80, complete with 2ft bayonet, and a few hundred more through a Remington 700 patterned .25-06 rifle. Thats not including all my time shooting .22lr, 9mm, .45, and misc other rifles, pistols or shotguns that I really shouldn't need to get into explanation of.

Still the argument stands though. Why scrap it when you could barter it for another weapon or use it until it breaks. In the average summer of shooting at ranges I probably put 2500 rounds through my 15, and i dismantle it and lube it twice a year, Spring before I go out and start hitting the ranges, and then usually somewhere in sept or oct when I put most of them away for the winter. Never had any problems in the 4 years I've had it, and I think if it were the only gun I had, my little can of oil would last me 40 years at the rate I'm going. Coincidentally, between myself, the 3 friends who are into guns with me, my father, and all his old man friends. When we all get together in spring or fall to go over our guns, we'll go through like 5 of the little cans bringing everyone's stuff up to snuff. Of course, I'm not dragging the AR through the mud or anything, it gets shot and then goes back into its case until the next weekend or whatever. So yes, AR-15s suck, we have established that, countless other semi-auto rifles that will serve you just fine. Now lets move onto the next problem.

Yes you can brag about how you'd WANT a bolt action when the apocalypse comes. But you might not have one, or be able to get your hands on one, or the one you have now might get stolen, you'll have to make do with what you have. I'd love to own a semi-auto AK74 IRL myself, but those are expensive as .... and I HIGHLY doubt I'd be able to find 1 around after the apoc.

And "people who can't fend for themselves," well, those are the ones who either starve, or group on with people who can fend for themselves. Its not hard to survive, really. Ever gone camping, it'll be like 1 of those trips... but forever, get used to it.

And even more, yall are so bent on this "hunting" gig. How long do you think the wild game supply would last trying to feed even 10% of the people from your area assuming that 90% were killed off in the first 2 weeks? Dunno where yall live, I'm from hampshire right up the road from several towns of around 50k, with some larger towns here and there. We'd maybe be able to make due assuming lots of those people took off and headed north to spread out. But just the hunting areas within 50-60mi of me now wouldn't be able to support that population for long. Also theres no refrigeration, all that meat would need to be smoked or dried, and stored somewhere safe. How will you haul it back to an area useful. Cars might be out, you might drag it with an ATV that has a pull start engine and thus immune to EMP kinds of apocs, but thats assuming you can get 1 of them. Odds are you'd have to drag all that stuff by had or wheelbarrow back.

Farming is a much better route, cause even if you could make do for the first year on hunting, the areas would be heavily depleted, are starving people going to... not shoot females and young? Even fishing wouldn't be able to support my area for long outside of spawning season.

[Seret]

I'd love to own a semi-auto AK74 IRL myself, but those are expensive as .... and I HIGHLY doubt I'd be able to find 1 around after the apoc.

Really depends where you are, some places they're dime-a-dozen. But like you said, you'd end up using whatever was available. I live in the UK these days, getting your hands on anything other than a shotgun here would be pretty unlikely. The only place you'd get an assault rifle is from the military, they don't exist in civilian hands here. Not entirely sure why civilians have them in the US tbh, besides plinking.

How long do you think the wild game supply would last trying to feed even 10% of the people from your area assuming that 90% were killed off in the first 2 weeks?

Once the human population crashed, animal populations would increase. Just look at things like the Chernobyl exclusion zone, it's a bonanza for wildlife. Who knows what you'd be hunting? Could be dogs if you were hungry and there were plenty of them (which there probably would be).

Farming is a much better route

Definitely, but farmers aren't averse to supplementing their diet with wild game. When harvests are bad you'd be scrounging for anything and everything edible within range. If you were hungry in the middle of winter and there were bunnies in the fields you'd grab your .22 and go pop a couple of them. Snares would be more efficient, but needs must.

[linkxsc]

Really depends where you are, some places they're dime-a-dozen. But like you said, you'd end up using whatever was available. I live in the UK these days, getting your hands on anything other than a shotgun here would be pretty unlikely. The only place you'd get an assault rifle is from the military, they don't exist in civilian hands here. Not entirely sure why civilians have them in the US tbh, besides plinking.

Just 1 of those things, though most are really "battle rifles" not "assault rifles" assault rifle is just a media sensationalism term. Although there are special licenses that allow fully automatic weapons (why waste the ammo, when hunting you generally want to try and get them with the first shot, none of this spray and pray BS)

Once the human population crashed, animal populations would increase. Just look at things like the Chernobyl exclusion zone, it's a bonanza for wildlife. Who knows what you'd be hunting? Could be dogs if you were hungry and there were plenty of them (which there probably would be).

Yes but given the rampant hunting for the first months, that would severely deplete the populations. Given a few years go by, yes pops could explode, but thats a few years down the road, the hardest part would be the time immediately after the boom, whatever the boom may be.

Definitely, but farmers aren't averse to supplementing their diet with wild game. When harvests are bad you'd be scrounging for anything and everything edible within range. If you were hungry in the middle of winter and there were bunnies in the fields you'd grab your .22 and go pop a couple of them. Snares would be more efficient, but needs must.

Actually what you said jsut reminded me of another point. Perhaps farming might not be your thing, and you may go and try for trapping. But what about live capture?

I don't know the whole list of wildlife that you have around in the UK, I know where I live theres a few rabbits, small birds and rodents, deer, occasional moose, and lots and LOTs of turkeys. I know that there are guneafowl in the wild in the UK, don't knwo how catchable they are.

But say I go out with a group to hunt/trap some things. Our group of 4-6 people come across a flock of 8-12 wild turkeys (everywhere in new hampshire) do we

A, kill them and eat them now?

B, catch them and attempt to raise them for a time?

Most I'm sure would go straight for the kill and eat, afterall we are possibly starving here. But I'd personally be more for the attempted capture. Oak leaves are edible, and you can make boil acorns and eat them just fine. And given that we forgo eating good for a day or 2. We raise them, months or a year goes by, now we have more birds (also could always catch them all, and eat a couple but save the rest for trying to raise)

You mentioned rabbits, they're another point, they're much harder to catch than turkeys. But if you found one in a snare, and evidence that there are others around. Do you go for the fast money or the long dollar? Or if you had a group of them frequently hanging around your field. Rig up some snares that aren't quite so lethal. After all, even if you do catch them and keep them alive, you'll have them around to eat later as needed.

Larger animals though would be much more difficult, though being smart about these things could pay off. Perhaps a group could catch themselves and try to semi-domesticate some deer (I know they've done it in some areas) or other critters. I say go for the birds and small critters first because they're the easiest to catch and feed.

[Seret]

Just 1 of those things, though most are really "battle rifles" not "assault rifles" assault rifle is just a media sensationalism term.

Well, a rose by any other name and all that, but to me a battle rifle is the old-style large-bore weapons like the M1, FAL and G3. They're not around so much any more. Assault rifles are the ones using the smaller calibres or cut-down versions of the big cartidges (eg: M16, AKs in both 7.62x39 and 5.45mm, etc). That's pretty much what everybody carries these days.

[Brethern]

Yes I have fired several thousand rounds through AR-15s, also through an M-14, M1 garand, AR-10, few hundred down a cheap Mosin Nagant bought off a pawn shop for $80, complete with 2ft bayonet, and a few hundred more through a Remington 700 patterned .25-06 rifle. Thats not including all my time shooting .22lr, 9mm, .45, and misc other rifles, pistols or shotguns that I really shouldn't need to get into explanation of.

Still the argument stands though. Why scrap it when you could barter it for another weapon or use it until it breaks. In the average summer of shooting at ranges I probably put 2500 rounds through my 15, and i dismantle it and lube it twice a year, Spring before I go out and start hitting the ranges, and then usually somewhere in sept or oct when I put most of them away for the winter. Never had any problems in the 4 years I've had it, and I think if it were the only gun I had, my little can of oil would last me 40 years at the rate I'm going. Coincidentally, between myself, the 3 friends who are into guns with me, my father, and all his old man friends. When we all get together in spring or fall to go over our guns, we'll go through like 5 of the little cans bringing everyone's stuff up to snuff. Of course, I'm not dragging the AR through the mud or anything, it gets shot and then goes back into its case until the next weekend or whatever. So yes, AR-15s suck, we have established that, countless other semi-auto rifles that will serve you just fine. Now lets move onto the next problem.

Yes you can brag about how you'd WANT a bolt action when the apocalypse comes. But you might not have one, or be able to get your hands on one, or the one you have now might get stolen, you'll have to make do with what you have. I'd love to own a semi-auto AK74 IRL myself, but those are expensive as .... and I HIGHLY doubt I'd be able to find 1 around after the apoc.

And "people who can't fend for themselves," well, those are the ones who either starve, or group on with people who can fend for themselves. Its not hard to survive, really. Ever gone camping, it'll be like 1 of those trips... but forever, get used to it.

And even more, yall are so bent on this "hunting" gig. How long do you think the wild game supply would last trying to feed even 10% of the people from your area assuming that 90% were killed off in the first 2 weeks? Dunno where yall live, I'm from hampshire right up the road from several towns of around 50k, with some larger towns here and there. We'd maybe be able to make due assuming lots of those people took off and headed north to spread out. But just the hunting areas within 50-60mi of me now wouldn't be able to support that population for long. Also theres no refrigeration, all that meat would need to be smoked or dried, and stored somewhere safe. How will you haul it back to an area useful. Cars might be out, you might drag it with an ATV that has a pull start engine and thus immune to EMP kinds of apocs, but thats assuming you can get 1 of them. Odds are you'd have to drag all that stuff by had or wheelbarrow back.

Farming is a much better route, cause even if you could make do for the first year on hunting, the areas would be heavily depleted, are starving people going to... not shoot females and young? Even fishing wouldn't be able to support my area for long outside of spawning season.

Preserving meat for a long term situation is easy, I can link you to several how to guides on how you can do it.

Bolt and lever action rifles are extremely common among hunters and tournament shooters. Due to them having better accuracy and muzzle velocity, getting one isn't a problem. If anything the go to firearm would be a muzzle loader due to their nature.

Also any diesel engine is going to be fine in an emp. They don't require fancy things to get started you can roll them over manually it just takes work.

This is all short term survival stuff, assuming the casualty rates at 90% there's also going to be a call for trades. Carpenters, plumbers, blacksmiths are all trades that are going to be needed. They are also the people who are going to be able to trade their skills for supplies.

Finally you mentioned the important part you're taking good care of that AR-15 I can assure you from personal experience that the moment you start neglecting it it's going to fail on you.

With a bolt action I can manually feed it ammo and whenever I pull that trigger I know it's going to fire. Semi's just are a liability.

[linkxsc]

Also any diesel engine is going to be fine in an emp. They don't require fancy things to get started you can roll them over manually it just takes work.

Well pull starting a diesel vehicle is all well and good... what about the power for the fuel pump? Yes you could jury rig up a new system, gravity feeding fuel or such, but most vehicles with remote fuel pumps running off power will be worthless. EMP kills battery, starter doesnt work without power, alternator voltage regulators would probably be burnt out by the EMP so you can't get the voltage for the pump there. Also a great many newer trucks have electronic fuel injection running off the computer, so well, those are out.

[Seret]

If anything the go to firearm would be a muzzle loader due to their nature.

Hell no. About the only possible advantage I could see with one of those is that you could cast your own bullets if you happened to have the moulds. That really doesn't make up for the many, many downsides IMO.

EMP kills battery

Lead acid starter batteries are tough as nails, starting an engine draws a fair wedge of current in a very short time. They're inherently resistant to transients.

Edited August 3, 2014 by Seret

[linkxsc]

Lead acid starter batteries are tough as nails, starting an engine draws a fair wedge of current in a very short time. They're inherently resistant to transients.

Yeah but I've seen them get burnt out from feedback voltage spikes when dropping current on inductors... so who knows, I'm assuming worst case. Though the computers would still be dead so you'd be looking for a pre-90s vintage diesel vehicle.

And often they'll pull 150-200amps @12v-14v during a start. However its not the amperage that I'm afraid would kill the batteries, its the 30kv spike they could see that may last for some amount of time.

Had a relay 1 time on a test jig, that blew out from the voltage spike of taking a 5v/.5a current off of a transformer, later testing showed that at the moment of cutting power, the coil the relay was hooked to would shoot up to over 50kv for a fraction of a second. After blowing up 3 relays testing like 10 parts, we later built in a bleed off circuit to protect against that spike because before then as an intern I had never known that these voltage spikes could happen from that.

Its a major problem with controlling relays with microcontrollers, often its countered with capacitor setups or feedback protection diode circuits. Theres a bit about it if you look up "arduino" and relay circuits.

[Duxwing]

Just 1 of those things, though most are really "battle rifles" not "assault rifles" assault rifle is just a media sensationalism term. Although there are special licenses that allow fully automatic weapons

Battle rifles are combat rifles chambered for ~.30 inch rounds. Assault rifles are combat rifles chambered for such "intermediate" rounds as 5.56x45mm (AR-15) or 5.45x39mm (AK-74 and onward) and were named after the German Sturmgewer 44. That old weapon's transliterated name is "Storm Rifle," which idiomatically refers to 'storming,' or in modern parlance, 'assaulting,' enemy positions: hence the term "assault rifle". The "media sensationalism" I think you meant to refer to is "assault weapon"--like in the 2010 Federal Assault Weapons Ban.

(why waste the ammo, when hunting you generally want to try and get them with the first shot, none of this spray and pray BS)

Not having shot a gun, I can only estimate the following disagreement. The 'one shot, one kill' rule exists to prevent cruelty to game: shooting a deer with one assault rifle bullet will slow the animal enough to be shot again and so on until it dies.

Yes but given the rampant hunting for the first months, that would severely deplete the populations. Given a few years go by, yes pops could explode, but thats a few years down the road, the hardest part would be the time immediately after the boom, whatever the boom may be.

Hunting might not deplete game because it would be limited to competent people with enough ammo and appropriate weapons.

-snip-

Excellent point about live capture. Wild birds' eggs could be stolen from nests, the chicks fed scraps of meat and raised from eggs, feathers, sinew, and meat.

Larger animals though would be much more difficult, though being smart about these things could pay off. Perhaps a group could catch themselves and try to semi-domesticate some deer (I know they've done it in some areas) or other critters. I say go for the birds and small critters first because they're the easiest to catch and feed.

A net hanging from trees with bait under it could catch large animals, and with enough skill enough bears could be caught to enable their domestication. Imagine having bear cavalry or out-and-out attack bears!

-Duxwing

[linkxsc]

Not having shot a gun, I can only estimate the following disagreement. The 'one shot, one kill' rule exists to prevent cruelty to game: shooting a deer with one assault rifle bullet will slow the animal enough to be shot again and so on until it dies.

there is no 1 shot 1 kill rule in hunting that i know of, generally though at least when hunting in nh and maine forests though, if you dont hit them with the first shot, they bolt and often you wont get a second shot. Often even if you hit then they still bolt and you have to track them down. Yeah just go for getting them with the first shot. In the hills of the midwest though you might get second and third shots at them.

Hunting might not deplete game because it would be limited to competent people with enough ammo and appropriate weapons.

Guns be everywhere man. Though i can vouch for the competent people. First time i ever went shooting my dad took myself and 4 of my friends along. A few of us were airsoft players so basic aiming had already been learned. But srsly, from 100yds (little less then 100m) away my friend wes couldnt hit a 36in(little less than 1m) target... or the plywood board it was attached to, the first or second day with a scoped .22lr rifle. Same gun all us others shot with, all the while he was being instructed.

Excellent point about live capture. Wild birds' eggs could be stolen from nests, the chicks fed scraps of meat and raised for eggs, feathers, sinew, and meat.

ty, though id try for the adults first before the eggs (might not be laying season anyways) also if any eggs are cracked and not gonna hatch, could boil them and use them for feed too.

A net hanging from trees with bait under it could catch large animals, and with enough skill enough bears could be caught to enable their domestication. Imagine having bear cavalry or out-and-out attack bears!

-Duxwing

Catching bears... need a pretty solid net. Although definite point. A salt lick with a triggerable net trap (or perhaps a leg grabber type rig) could easily attract deer and moose in my area. If 1 could get their hands on some tranquilizer to subdue them while you move them to a pen, itd probably work great. But youd need high fences to hol them. Those things make it over our 5ft fence all the time.

home actual comptuer, reformatted text to be... more correct.

Edited August 4, 2014 by linkxsc
reformatting text

[Brethern]

Battle rifles are combat rifles chambered for ~.30 inch rounds. Assault rifles are combat rifles chambered for such "intermediate" rounds as 5.56x45mm (AR-15) or 5.45x39mm (AK-74 and onward) and were named after the German Sturmgewer 44. That old weapon's transliterated name is "Storm Rifle," which idiomatically refers to 'storming,' or in modern parlance, 'assaulting,' enemy positions: hence the term "assault rifle". The "media sensationalism" I think you meant to refer to is "assault weapon"--like in the 2010 Federal Assault Weapons Ban.

Not having shot a gun, I can only estimate the following disagreement. The 'one shot, one kill' rule exists to prevent cruelty to game: shooting a deer with one assault rifle bullet will slow the animal enough to be shot again and so on until it dies.

Hunting might not deplete game because it would be limited to competent people with enough ammo and appropriate weapons.

Excellent point about live capture. Wild birds' eggs could be stolen from nests, the chicks fed scraps of meat and raised from eggs, feathers, sinew, and meat.

A net hanging from trees with bait under it could catch large animals, and with enough skill enough bears could be caught to enable their domestication. Imagine having bear cavalry or out-and-out attack bears!

-Duxwing

No, you kill an animal with one shot because the more shots you use the more meat is spoiled, not to mention the waste of ammunition.

[Seret]

Had a relay 1 time on a test jig, that blew out from the voltage spike of taking a 5v/.5a current off of a transformer, later testing showed that at the moment of cutting power, the coil the relay was hooked to would shoot up to over 50kv for a fraction of a second. After blowing up 3 relays testing like 10 parts, we later built in a bleed off circuit to protect against that spike because before then as an intern I had never known that these voltage spikes could happen from that.

Definitely, switching and transients go hand in hand. One system I've worked on was a 1970s era underground train. No power electronics there, the motors were controlled by vast armies of relays and contactors. Failure of suppression on one relay was enough to mess up the logic and cause some weird behaviour. Horrible old battleaxe of a machine, but quite fun to fault find on.

there is no 1 shot 1 kill rule in hunting that i know of

There pretty much is. Maybe not a "rule", but definitely an ethos.

Guns be everywhere man. .

Where you live maybe. In the rest of the world they're much less common, especially outside of rural areas. In some parts of the world most folks rarely even see guns, and would never have used one.

[Simon Ross]

In a word...NO

With most of the easily obtainable fossil fuels already gone, no way do we come back to even our present level.

It's why we are in such a tight corner now !

We have pretty much thrown away 50 years thanks to the anti nuclear Cassandra's.

By now, we could have pretty much been TOTALLY independent of fossil fuels for power generation.

You know you are in the s**t when even the anti nuclear brigade regard Fracking as a worse option then fission reactors !

Simon