tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980951139270141970.post4851138884341797681..comments2023-11-30T10:43:33.130-06:00Comments on Reading Freely: One Second AfterStephenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15097908023032528200noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980951139270141970.post-24751687683909459032014-09-27T07:43:12.001-05:002014-09-27T07:43:12.001-05:00Oh, this follows the town a year into its life, so...Oh, this follows the town a year into its life, so the nastiest behavior -- the most desperate behavior -- doesn't surface for months. Some of the man-eating horde were escaped criminals, though the idea of a cannablistic mob was done MUCH better by Niven in "Lucifer's Hammer". There the mob's leaders instituted it deliberately, with ritual. They do it because they're Violent Criminals and that is what Violent Criminals do when there's no one to keep them in line.<br /><br />Jim Kunstler has just released another book in his disaster series -- from an interview I listened to last night, this one reveals what has happened to the US south. The upper south is called the Foxfire Republic and is ruled by a psychotic Sarah Palin expy, as far as I could tell. <br /><br />Stephenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15097908023032528200noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980951139270141970.post-87036232812518221132014-09-27T04:03:00.242-05:002014-09-27T04:03:00.242-05:00I've read a few of this kind of book and altho...I've read a few of this kind of book and although they're exciting and dramatic and stuff they also make me laugh. I really don't think that things are really that fragile for one thing. Of course we depend a great deal on our technology but civilisation would not completely collaspe without it. Likewise people would not become feral wolves 'fighting over the last tin of tuna fish' 24 or even 48 hours after things like this happened. Civilisation isn't that thin a layer spray-painted on to killer apes! We existed very well without modern technology and had world spanning empires. If something like this happened of course millions of people would die and things would get pretty bad until we adapted but we'd cope - that would actually be an interesting story! CyberKittenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06394155516712665665noreply@blogger.com