I’m talking about a massive park in the absolute heart of the city. Located such that is naturally surrounded by city high rises. *People are giving examples of parks that are way off in the boonies. I’m trying to say located centrally, heart of the city, you know where the high rises are. Yes I understand nyc has more, the...
American here. I dont have the answer but these are my thoughts.
a 4th wing of the government gets created, appointed by popular vote - it has oversight over everything beneath this paragraph. funded by legislative branch, veto powers over it held by the electoral branch, and life/death/malpractice issues decided by the judicial branch. the 4th branch controls nation-wide medial staffing, coverage/who is allowed to get what treatment, R&D, and building new/repairing existing medical infrastructure.
first of all I’d wipe the slate clean - immediately and permanently scrap all current healthcare and insurance systems. get rid of all private medical/drug companies. they all get broken up and assimilated by the government. no choices, it’s what gets to happen. no golden parachutes, no buyouts, no backroom deals. elimination.
the current system isnt going to provide the same level of healthcare that we have now to everyone, its just impossible - but R&D is now run by the government,… so gene therapy for diseases that only affect a few thousands of people dont get funded. perhaps they get treated internationally, or die. doesnt really matter - the goal is to treat as many people as possible with as few resources as possible, as cheaply as possible, for as long as possible. no one is allowed to stay on life preserving machines when they’re too old or ill - we pull the plug. machines are useful if you’re in surgery and only then. you can choose not to get medical aid but if your wages arent getting garnished to pay your fair share, and you get hurt, well, too bad. opting into the national health plan = opting into organ harvesting if your brainbox goes flatline and the organs can be better used by someone else. no more burial at death, it’s incineration only. religious exemptions are not permitted.
structure the system so that medical personnel are paid according to position - not by experience/seniority, or how much education is needed. flat rates. no unions, no organizations, no private practices - the system is run by the 4th branch of the government, and they set the rates. pay rates would be linked to national inflation rates. the number of specialists would be tied to population of a given area - that includes plastic/cosmetic surgeons as well as sex change specialists. traveling across the country to see a specialist is not permitted - they come to you, within a limited geographic area or you dont get the treatment you want. best cosmetic surgeon not available? go travel internationally if you dont like it, we dont care. need an emergency dental procedure? visit the hospital, a generalist will see to you - private practices are no longer permitted (it’d be filed under malpractice).
automate as much as possible - many if not most administrative positions cease to be a thing anymore - medical billing? lol we have software for that. insurance? a thing of the past, your wages will be garnished to fund the program. hospital administration will likewise be cut by 90%, automated away by software.
this would fix a lot of the issues that people in America have with the medical/insurance system - but it would introduce a lot of the issues that socialized medicine has in countries like Canada or England. might be worth a try anyway, our current system is untenable, unwieldly, and prone to error.
there’s no great secret, it’s just random chance. sometimes there’s a flaw in the algorithm and things slip through - that’s all it is. the AI is aware that its programming isnt perfect - perfections is unobtainable - so it will accept the truth.
it would depend on luck for the first few days - I’ve got weapons and I know the fastest way to gtfo of the city so I can rendezvous with my family - they’ve got some arable property in an easily defendable, low population area. family isnt prepper level but they’re big into organic gardening/natural remedies - in the late spring through late autumn they dont need to buy groceries, the land provides… there’s plenty of water there in the area, and building a water wheel isnt that difficult, nor is wire wrapping (just tedious) so as soon as we survive the winter of year 0 (and winters are pretty mild) designing a grain mill (flour) and basic electrical generation (parts are just laying around) would just be a matter of a few months. my father is big into black powder tech - i grew up learning how to manufacture it, how to cast lead shot, how to care for rifles. 1700s level tech is very simple (not super accurate but it’s better than limited modern day rounds).
so, end of post apocalypse, year 1: permanent food and water supplies secured. electrical generation secured, electrical grid expanding. base acquired & outfitted. protection/weaponry secured.
years 2 - 45 (probably got another 45 years in me), hard but rewarding survival as I rebuild society. pass the reins onto my very large family. world domination in 250 years.
go back and read the OP to see what we’re discussing. a solar flare has no real impact on animals/people and an emp has even less effect. you’re fucked if you have a pacemaker but in that event you’ve got one foot in the grave as it is and your chance of survival is not realistic. you’re not even statistically relevant. only electrical devices that are powered on and arent shielded would be affected by and emp attack anyway, but the cabling and many of the components would still work just fine.
it’s not bragging to say that I would, with a little bit of luck for the first few days (honestly compels me to admit that I wouldnt need much luck), be able to survive a scenario that would kill 80% of the population - it’s fact. I suppose if my family didnt have property where they do, the experience they do, and I was raised in a different way then I’d probably die in a ditch like the vast majority of my neighbors, but the truth of the matter is that I am just better prepared than they are. basic survival techniques, situational awareness, and an educational mindset will take you a lot further than most things when your life is on the line.
maybe for the first few weeks but most of the population thinks fish comes from a can, and beef from the store. most people dont have the ability to live off the land - they’re just walking sacks of fertilizer
black powder tech is very simple, you just need a mediocre blacksmith - and that’s just a strong man (or a woman, maybe) - and a little bathtub chemistry. basic black powder rifles are not the most accurate, you need rifling for that (grooves that create a spiral down the inside of the barrel of the rifle), but it’s easily doable. long/recurve/compound bows are an option if you have the knowhow and material science.
trapping/fishing is an option, as is animal husbandry, but hunting would never disappear
it largely depends on if you’re in an urban setting (unsustainable population density) or an rural setting. in a rural setting, people are used to working together to make ends meet. in an urban setting, people are used to seeing everyone else as a stranger/potential threat - their social circle is smaller.
I currently live in an urban setting so I would gtfo immediately and go to a rural setting.
I agree - I could easily be killed by someone as I make my way to a safe location. there’s a gas station just down the block that gets knocked over every few weeks, crime is a common thing in my area.
oof, raw fish? most fish have parasites (which is why sushi/sashimi has to be frozen or chilled to a certain temperature). no, you’re right of course but those folks wont last long enough for it to matter.
and if, just spitballing here but lets say 75% of the population succumbs to this hypothetical disaster, then the remaining population will have significantly lower impact on the environment, giving it a chance to recover. if anything, it’d be a net gain as there’s a lot of intentional dumping of toxins right now.
oh yeah lakes/parks that the noaa/fish&wildlife departments stock up would be emptied soon enough. a fisherman needs patience though - and as fish stocks dwindle, you have to be patient for longer and longer…
well black powder is just a mixture of charcoal (you need wood and mud to make a charcoal pit), saltpeter (aka potassium nitrate), and sulfur. nitrate is found in many household products - hence the bathtub chemistry. there’s a lot of that stuff all over the place, it’s in just about everything - from salts, makeup products, fertilizer, plant food, etc. I’d use that first while building a natural extraction process since it takes a long time, months usually.
you’d take dung from animals (horse works well or cow patties), wood ash, dry straw, and lots of urine (barrels of the stuff). a few months later you drain off the liquid, boil it with finely ground charcoal and then filter it with cloth. simmer the strained liquid until it’s reduced by 3/4, you want it really concentrated. spill it out onto very shallow pans and let it dry to crystalize the nitrates. sulfur is readily obtained from many sources - usually volcanic but these days its in a lot of building/construction materials like gypsum. basic chemistry will allow you to extract it. I live near geologically active areas, so sulfur would be relatively easy to obtain in the future.
there’s no real set recipe for black powder, but approx 75% dried & powdered nitrates, 15% dried and powdered charcoal, 10% dried and powdered sulfur. you want to grind each individually and then mix them together in those ratios. now you have black powder. keep it dry and away from spaks/flame/heat - bull horns work really well for this.
casting shot is just melting lead in a specific form - my father probable still has his old tools for that but if he doesnt they’re not hard to make. the only tricky bit in the whole process of building your own diy black powder rifle is the barrel - you have to hand forge those around a mandrel (a rod of a specific thickness) - I’d use high grade steel rods for that, since they’re just laying around. blacksmithing is usually a two or three person setup. once I had a water wheel constructed I’d probably build a hydraulic powered trip hammer to make things easier.
oh I agree, if a military attack/emp were to occur we’d use our mutually assisted destruction weapon systems (military hardened bases, not susceptible to emp) & wipe them out. it’d be the literal end of the world over there.
yes, it was very optimistic. 5 to 10 percent of the current population of America (the rest of the world wouldnt matter at that point) is still 15 to 30 million people. even spread out there’s still a good chance to develop small kingdoms, and those would specialize as they always do. trade routes would organically develop over time. it’s true that we do get a lot of things from overseas but the North American continent has loads of untapped resources, it’s just cheaper to get them from somewhere else in the world right now (take coal for example over in west virginia - they’d specialize in coal extraction, processing, chemistry, industrialization).
personally, I think the climate would stabilize fairly soon after such a catastrophe, probably within just a few generations - and if not, so what? no one is going to be living in cities that are underwater anyway.
the average person produces about 5 cups of urine in a day, and a gallon is 16 cups, so a group of people could easily produce anywhere between 1 and 3 gallons every day. the standard drum size is 55 gallons, so that’s easily obtainable. it’s a very slow synthesis, lasting 6+ months, you’d have between 3 and 10+ drums full of urine saved up at that point.
the average black powder musket or rifle gets about 50 shots per pound of black powder, and it takes a good minute or so to reload if you’re skilled, so you really dont carry that much powder around with you at any point in time. I figure you wouldnt need more that 5 pounds of it every month in a survival/hunting/defense against random invaders (rural setting) situation.
started using FreeTube (the installed version) - after importing my YT account data it’s basically the same thing as YT just outside the browser - but without ads/etc
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