Re: 20160208 Vision Author Culture on Knowledge Forum
20170520 The element from Reference #1 for focus today is Paragraph 2 on page 14
Before addressing Paragraph 2, I'd like to call attention to a surprise intake of water at the Svalgard Seed Bank, as mentioned in "The Knowledge" on Page 55.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... rost-melts
According to Damian Carrington's report, no seeds were damaged, but global warming has revealed deficiencies in the original design for the seed repository.
While the custodians of the vault are addressing the immediate problem of melting permafrost, I hope they will pay attention to the quite reasonable prospect that all ice on the planet will melt.
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magaz ... line-maps/
It seems to me that wisdom would suggest relocating the repository to an elevation 216 feet (66 meters) higher than at present, or building a hill of 216 feet elevation around the existing location.
At issue in Paragraph 2 is the infrastructure that is needed for a particular technology to be realized. Dr. Dartnell cites the example of Leonardo Da Vinci, who conceived of and even designed a number of systems which he could not build for lack of the tools and materials and human skills needed.
Dr. Dartnell points out that Da Vinci lacked a means of generating the required power for flight, as well as the means of building a suitable air frame.
In paragraph 3 of the current page, Dr. Dartnell is going to introduce the concept of a "sweet-spot" of technology, which might be achievable by persons with limited resources, skills and knowledge in a hypothetical future. I remain concerned that the vast majority of human beings living on Earth in 2017 would not be able to achieve even the most limited expression of technology.
To explore this concern, I tried a Google search for the string "what children should learn in school"
While most of the 271 million results will be irrelevant, the first page of results seem reasonably well related to the question.
A friend is an working engineer, with experience in a wide variety of fields. When I asked recently about suggestions for spectrum analysis of a device which created noise in the radio frequency bands, he responded that while my existing book on FFT mathematics might be helpful, it would be more helpful to have a foundation in communications theory.
My point here is that even an individual in 2017 will inevitably find that there exists a foundation of knowledge and practice and skill that would help with any task that might be undertaken.
Any compendium that might be prepared for a possible reader in a distant future after a regression of civilization ought to be quite useful in 2017, in all parts of the world, because there is a new generation of ignorant human beings who will remain ignorant and potentially easily misled if they are not caught up on some sort of education.
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Speaking of regression of civilization .... The current (May/June 2017) issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact contains a short story by Igor Teper that seems quite appropriate for mention in Dr. Dartnell's forum:
"The speed of Faith in Vacuum".
Igor Teper supports a web site: igorteper.com
The story is set on a planetary surface, where 311 human beings survive after centuries of struggle. They have moved into caves which are sealed against biological life that is native to the planet, and which causes a rapid and disagreeable death if introduced into the human body. The survivors are kept in a hopeful frame of mind by the periodic visits of a space ship that checks in on scattered Earth colonies every few hundred years.
Mr. (?Dr?) Teper provides a scenario of disaster, struggle and the use of technology to survive against the pressures of the Universe. His scope includes the planet bound contingent, but extends to the space vehicle and the crew which is itself engaged in a centuries long struggle against entropy.
While the loss of the entire Earth is assumed for this story, I came away with a faint sense of hope that the few surviving Earth colonies might pull out of the regression which (I presume from context) each of them has endured, and that the cycling space ship might survive as well, until (optimist that I am) it might be rebuilt by graduates of institutions of higher education that would have to have been build up essentially from scratch in at least one of the colonies.
For the link to scenarios imaged in "The Knowledge", I like Igor Teper's vision of a travelling pocket/packet of advanced knowledge to visit small groups of survivors, trying to help them appropriately to the stage of regression (or eventually progression) where they are.
(th)