S.M Stirling (Santa Fe based, prolific Science Fiction author) addresses
this to some extent in his series (first was /Dies the Fire/) set in a
post apocalyptic world.
The Apocalypse was simply the supposition that the solar system moved
(whatever this means physically is hard to figure but bear with him)
into a region of the universe where the rules of physics changed just
subtly enough to make all electronics and all high-energetic systems
(internal combustion, dynamite, gunpowder, C4, etc) fail to work,
throwing the world into an artifact and material rich, energy-poor
world. The next 3 or 4 novels explores, in fact, the
fuedal-agricultural world (set primarily in the Pacific Northwest) that
emerges in the wake of "the Change".
The main antagonist relation was between those who chose to respond by
trying to figure out how to create a sane and self-supporting culture on
top of this plethora of artifacts but without any obvious source of
concentrated energy beyond human and animal and those who chose to be
parasitically violent, subjugating the former wherever they could.
Stirling is a gifted world-builder/storyteller and a great read if you
happen to be into post-apocalyptic epics... He's also an interesting
person in-person.
In this case, the lack of fossil fuels is their lack of efficacy, not
their literal lack of availability (though the refineries would
presumably fail quickly anyway). There might have been mention that
steam-power was still likely possible, but i can't remember.
A friend of mine happens to own what might be the oldest known steam
automobile... it is a 189? Locomobile, the very one in fact used in the
most recent making of HG Well's Time machine. For what it is worth, he
told me the story (as he was building steam to give me a ride) of how
much new tech was required to make a steam auto possible. A liquid-fuel
burner had to be developed (including the system now used in "coleman
stoves") which is primed by pressurizing the tank, but then uses the
heat of the flame to maintain the pressure. The "boiler" was equally
problematic as anyone working with steam knows, it is easy to
over-pressure and cause a catastrophic explosion. The solution used
canon-building technology... a cored steel cylinder *wrapped* in piano
wire to make it stronger. Even this could be overpressured, so the
*ends* were capped with steel plates drilled with a multitude of holes,
copper tubing inserted through the holes (and the vessel) and *swaged*
onto these ends. The result was dozens of parallel tubes which the
flame/exhaust could be routed through to transfer heat to the boiler
water/steam but which if overpressured would gently pull the tubes out
of their swaged holes and release the pressure fairly gently...
something important since the boiler could not be removed from the
driver and passenger far enough to be otherwise safe. Also, I believe
this might have been when the modern "differential" was developed. The
Locomobile still steered with a "tiller" but soon after, automobiles
started sporting "steering wheels".
An early motorist (or pilot) had to at least be their own mechanic if
not practically a full-fledged engineer just to use and keep operating a
simple automobile. Getting from steam trains and traction engines to
the automobile as a non-trivial step, complicating the matter you bring up.
As a (sad?) corrolary, it is possible that large scale urbanization and
agriculture could never have emerged without an effective slave class.
If we fell back into pre-agriculture and pre-urban circumstances, we
might have to drop our current social mores to climb back up out of
hunger-gatherer or herd-follower?
At the risk of hijacking the thread... I liked the comment on the
ycombinator:
PeterisP
There exists a viewpoint that in case of a cataclysm (which would
involve man-made objects disappearing*) we would never, ever
progress past 18th century tech again.
The argument is that getting from animal-powered devices to
solar/nuclear/whatever powered devices while at the same time
switching from 90%-agricultural workforce to anything more
progressive can happen only if there is a cheap source of energy
available - and we already have mined and spent all of easily
available fossil fuels.
Even if all kinds of fancy devices are available and constructed
by rich enthusiasts, the lack of cheap steam power ensures lack of
cheap steel/etc, and all the technologies don't get the mass
adoption required for their improvements, there are almost no
advantages for industrialization, so the world gets stuck in
feudal-agriculture systems as the local optimum.
which suggests the Knowledge Ark
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_ark> would be largely a waste
of time.
* refers to a preceding comment.
Robert C
On 3/21/13 11:00 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:
From HN, a pointer to a delightfully clever essay that would be loved
by Nick and others who are often bewildered by the hacker alphabet
soup of acronyms and buzz words.
Well, what _does_ happen when you got to a web page?
https://plus.google.com/112218872649456413744/posts/dfydM2Cnepe
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5408597
This has the possibility of a new book that somehow makes it all
reasonably clear. Maybe.
-- Owen
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribehttp://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
