Scavenger Worlds only work on the very short term. Like, a generation or less. After that, thing just simply fall apart so there's nothing salvagable left to scavenge. NBC warfare could theoretically knock the world back to a pre-industrial standard of living, but only by killing so many people that there are no longer enough workers to sustain a modern society. (A 75% die-off might do this; I'm not sure.) This would mean that most of the survivors revert back to subsistance farming (or hunter-gathering, in areas where agriculture is unsustainable without modern technology). However, it's important to note that even getting thrown back to Stone Age technology wouldn't mean getting thrown back to Stone Age standard of living. The amount of knowledge that an average person alive today has is leaps and bounds past... uh, the past. I'm not even talking about advanced sciences like rockets or anything. Take the simple fact that most people alive today know that disease is caused by bacteria, which can be killed via soap/water, alcohol, heat, etc. That alone gives us a huge advantage.
Another thing to watch out for is More Criminals Than Targets. If you have bandits, then there will be very few of them compared to the rest of civilization. Bandits are essentially parasitic — they don't actually produce anything, so if there are too many, then then bandits eventually starve from lack of stuff to steal, or else start farming stuff for themselves (at which point they're no longer bandits).
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.That's a good point. Scavenger World resources don't provide for the basics: there's plenty of ammunition, tools, electronics, fabric goods etc, but that's all a moot point without food. The way I imagine it, this world is just settling in to the Iron Age lifestyle. There are farmers who raise food and workers who run the machines to purify water, small towns and checkpoints where goods are distributed and scavengers who specialize in drudging up valuables that can't be produced yet. These scavengers trade useful tools, medicines and machines for food and water. The population drop, being partly the result of war but mostly that of contamination, was enough to cause most governments to loose their sovereignty and reduce society to townships and compounds. Traveling tribes or families of scavengers or traders are not uncommon. Leftover technology has been the savior of this world, with working vehicles and electronics as precious commodities. A trader might rank his family's wealth in terms of the number of bikes and cars he owns, just like a rancher goes by the size of his herd.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)The problem is that most of those things (vehicles, electronics, medicine) will be worthless within a few decades on the outside. Medicine has a shelf life; it will probably be the first to go. Electronics are fairly delicate and near-impossible to repair without a tech base sophisticated enough to build new electronics. Vehicles need replacement parts and, perhaps more importantly, fuel. Keeping any of those in usable conditions using Iron Age technology (even with modern knowledge) will be effectively impossible.
What will be useful would be raw materials. By now, we've already mined out all the easy-to-get-at ores. Hell, certain types of iron-rich ore effectively no longer exist because we've mined it all out. Salvage will be useful for getting metals, primarily; iron/steel, copper, alumnimum. Steel will be especially difficult to come by because it rusts (though you can take rusty steel and reforge it to get rid of the rusty bits). Recycled alumnimum will also be valuable for anything were low weight is desireable, because the stuff is damn near impossible to get out of its ore without massive amounts of electricity.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.Ancient Conspiracy to preserve pre-Apocalypse knowledge.
Eventually, the Conspiracy becomes a religion dedicated to keeping heretics out of the Sacred library.
Interesting idea, Dago. There are several such societies in the world, many based out of the remnants of colleges or laboratories. There's also plenty of religious organizations, some strictly following their books and others having evolved into something seemingly unrelated to the original. Cults or systems that border on them are not uncommon.
An important thing to remember is that this is not a distant future: it's probably about thirty or forty years from the 'modern' world. The protagonist is 19, and neither he nor his mother have ever seen the world before the drop off, but his grandparents were alive when it all happened. Lifespans are shorter in this era due to pollution-based illnesses, which I confess is partly a justification for the whole Conveniently an Orphan trope.
But wouldn't you think that a few vehicles and electronics could survive three or four decades, as long as they were unused but sealed away safely in garages or plastic packages? I really want to get some Schizo Tech going here, but not to an unbelievable extent. Raw materials would certainly be a valuable resource, and scavengers make their living based off the fact that the best loot is usually in the most dangerous places. They venture into contaminated zones to salvage useful metals, commodities like books and CDs etc, usually wearing some kind of protective gear. Scavengers can live pretty comfortably by the era's standards, but they compromise their health in doing so.
For reference, here are a couple of pictures from the story set in this world. The first
features our protagonist, Del, and the second has his whole 'pack' together.
edited 11th Mar '11 9:31:47 PM by Takwin
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)Actually, being sealed away unused is going to make the decay worse, not better, because all the moving parts are going to rust/corrode/break, as compared to a regularly used machine which is going to be maintained precisely because it gets regular use. The left-alone vehicle might just about be worth breaking down for parts, but then it might not either.
Then you have a problem and a rather extreme one at that. Unless the depopulation has let the tropical rainforests bounce back there are going to be long term viability issues for almost the entire eco-sphere. Plants, especially in large concentrations, are vitally important in the atmosphere's oxygen cycle.
I also feel I should point out that unless the nukes are enough to 'glass' an area they might bounce back faster than you think. I mean look at Chernobyl
. While there are debates about the long term viability the removal of human activity has actually caused some endangered species to increase in number.
edited 12th Mar '11 7:04:24 PM by KnightofLsama
Interesting point Matt. This is exactly why I made this topic: to check the facts and look for weak spots. I would think that, just considering the sheer number of vehicles lying around, a few would still be usable by this period, especially the ones that had been deliberately maintained or well-made in the first place. We know from real life that, with a little work, a vintage car that's been lying around the scrapyard for years can usually be salvaged, right? The main cast lives out of a clunky, semi-customized RV, with an owner who's had it most of her life and has become a fairly good mechanic. Is this plausible?
You're making me rethink this quite a bit, Knight. I suppose I should rephrase that foliage comment: plant life is sparse in areas that were once heavily populated by humans. The remains of cities and battlegrounds are bare of all the hardiest plants due to weaponized chemical agents leftover from the war. Places like New York and Baltimore are deserts in this era, while rainforests have mostly been on the rise. Acid rain is a serious problem in this setting, but the lack of active human destruction for the past forty years has given nature a chance to regroup. Thank you for bringing up Chernobyl; I never knew that plant and animal life had regrown so well in the exclusion zone.
After some examination, I realize that pollution and chemical warfare may not be the best explanation for this setting. Here are the parts that are plot-significant:
- I need something that could take a society-ending chunk out of the human population.
- It must be at least partially intentional or deliberately caused; a war effort that got out of hand.
- I don't want to get any Unobtainium or Magitek involved.
- Ideally, this scenario would give me plenty of excuses to draw gas masks.
- And most importantly, it must be something which a genetic immunity could make someone resistant to.
Biological, chemical and nuclear weapons of various degrees and applications are roughly what I've had in mind.
The main character is a scavenger named Del who originally lived with his mother on the edge of the wasteland, bartering the valuables he rooted from the deserted city for a living. In his scrounging he discovered something bizarre: a child, picking through the contaminated zone, hungry and dirty but apparently unharmed. By all logic she should have died days prior, but there she was. Del took her back to his mother to ask her advice on the strange predicament, and she concluded that this girl, Farren, may be the carrier of a unique genetic mutation that makes her immune to the toxins. From there it turns into a Walk the Earth story, with Del, Farren and the allies they accumulate traveling across the landscape to search for someone with the knowledge and technology to decode her ability, for better or worse. If they're lucky, she could be the key to salvation for the human species, carrying an antibody or immunological quirk that protects her from the contaminated wasteland.
edited 12th Mar '11 10:46:13 PM by Takwin
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)Matt is right, a car will last longer if it’s actually used than if it just sits. That said, you can keep an old car going a really long time. Aren’t people in Cuba still mostly driving like 50 year old cars?
The bigger issue w/ cares is fuel. Where are you going to get gasoline? In my setting, the few vehicles all run on ethanol, because you can make it anywhere from almost anything. If society has collapsed I think you’d have to go either ethanol or biodiesel.
A good, well maintained bike can last several lifetimes, though eventually finding tires would get problematic. Someone would probably eventually come up with a substitute for rubber tires.
I used a disease to depopulate the planet because it would have very little environmental impact (and it’s a find the cure type story).
What’s the state of the ocean? Something like half our oxygen comes from algae and aquatic plants.
The right geeks could build something useful of 40 year old electronic parts. Not an iPhone but probably a decent radio.
You need to consider what "having electronics" benefits them by, when there are no supporting parts-makers. Radios, yes—radios are probably one of the most important relatively simple technologies of late.
But what do you use a computer for in this setting? You don't have corporate industry yet, so bookkeeping and spreadsheets are not much more useful than doing it on paper—and without supporting parts-makers, even if it were faster it's a lot more volatile as data can be destroyed much faster on computers if there's no efficient way to make multiple backups. This might be doable, but certainly non-solid-state backing up would have to be the norm for several decades so long as computers were rare—and they'd subsequently be very expensive so long as they have to be scavenged and not produced.
A lot of computer parts are not useful without the hardware they can subsequently run. Writing something useful (not bookkeeping) into a computer has no purpose with no printer (and even if there were printers, it'd be more efficient to use the paper for other things). You can't call someone without a satellite and a receiver.
You might be able to scrounge up geniuses to get computers to do things with the hardware they DO have—what sorts of things could a computer automate a radio to do, for instance, that is not generally considered/only novelties on modern earth because radios have been outstepped by other technologies?
On the subject of knowing about technologies and science, such as germ theory. There's a lot to be said for knowing a thing is even POSSIBLE. Even if you have no understanding of aeronautics, you will likely know the general shape of how man-powered flight works, compared to in the past when it had never been observed before.
EDIT: ANOTHER something to consider: the reason for shift from hunting/gathering to farming is due to matters of population. Hunting/gathering in a natural, normal temperate climate will sustain about 1 person per square mile. Horticulture (part farming, mostly being nomadic) could support 3 to 4 people per square mile. Ancient agriculture could support 750 people per square mile. Not to mention it's less dangerous to have 'home turf' which you can use to build up protections from the environment.
Also, social implications: a lot of people assume that the world would become more corrupt after the end. I think it would become less corrupt socially, but have a lot more warring—because there's a lot more important matters to war ABOUT. Social corruption in a small population is not about superstition. Superstition would arise from observing bad thing happening without exactly having a name for them, and then strongly warning future generations who subsequently have no knowledge of them. But if some wandering nomad came around and gave a disease to every farmer's daughter, you'd be SURE to be outraged because he didn't just create a minor nuisance, he effectively trashed a goodly part of the economy all for his own pleasure.
edited 19th Mar '11 10:48:38 AM by RickGriffin
Your disease idea is probably the most practical route, HM, but not quite as epic as I'd like. Gas masks are a major artistic motif for me, and uninhabitable contaminated zones are a serious issue in the story. Disease may have played a part in the depopulation, but it's not the entirety of it. There are some sizable environmental consequences of the 'drop-off;' enough to accommodate a healthy serving of Scenery Gorn but not quite an "ending all life on Earth"-level disaster. I'm probably going to summarize it as a big combination of factors: disease, radioactive contamination, chemical warfare, pollution and other modes of man-made destruction have all accumulated to push past the point of no return, the drop-off.
The ocean is definitely still hurting. Man-made catastrophes like the Pacific Garbage Patch
are still taking their toll, but marine life hasn't shut down completely. It will probably take centuries for the sea of this world to return to normal, and several species were likely lost altogether, but it's not unsalvageable.
Fuel is definitely a big problem. I guess the issue is whether or not gasoline has a shelf life. There's massive stockpiles of fuel and tires in warehouses all over the country: it's just a matter of finding and utilizing them. I imagine traders and scavengers would hoard this stuff like gold, while others are gingerly experimenting with ethanol and other bio-fuels in attempt to fill the gap.
Computers and microchips are irrelevant in this setting: the only working ones are rare artifacts carefully maintained by a few devoted nerds. Radios and possible telephones/telegraphs provide valuable but unreliable long-distance communication, and the most advanced electronics that are still used are simple tape decks, CD players and possibly some TV/VCR sets. The main characters have all heard music and watched a few films, (Ripley more than others,) and occasionally make reference to the old but not forgotten art forms.
Corruption is, naturally, a major issue in this world. Constant power struggles, mutated variations of 'pre-world' religion and conflict between different groups ensure that there's no shortage of violence. Everyone seems to carry a gun and trust between strangers is very thin. That's all pretty typical for this kind of setting.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)First off, I love the idea of a few aging nerds carefully maintaining the last computers with the semi-religious reverence of archeologist/curator marinating a priceless cultural treasure.
I have no clue if gas has a shelf life, but I know tires do. The tires on my grandfather’s car dry-rotted in the 5 years between the time he stopped using it and the time my aunt inherited it. It’s bad for cars to sit. It took a lot of work to get that thing running again.
Disease works in my setting, because nature is wild and hostile but also green and fertile. My characters spend much of there time tramping about the woods of New England. I completely agree to achieve your setting you need something more.
Not only are the aging nerds taking care of their machines, they've been teaching their descendants/apprentices to do the same. These vaults of all-but-forgotten technology are usually the ruins of colleges and laboratories, and at one point in the story the protagonist is sorely tempted to join them. He's a serious, bookwormish type who's been aching for a sense of purpose, but he ultimately has to deny their offer in the name of The Quest.
That's good to know. I wonder how you keep tires from going bad? Chemical treatments? The people of this world may be just finding ways to restore old tires, or to substitute them.
My world's nature is wild and hostile, but a lot of the settings in this story are also the remains of human settlements and the rudiments of new ones. I picture a lot of Chernobyl-type scenes: places with plant life thriving, overgrowing the old man-made structures, but still too contaminated to be safe for larger lifeforms. There's also quite a few radioactively or chemically sterilized areas, deserts that were once cities. Like I said, the setting is just toxic enough to justify gas masks in some occasions, but not so much as to be completely hopeless.
The MacGuffin Girl, Farren, is unique because she is unaffected by the chemical agents that killed so many people before her. She's not invulnerable, certainly, just more resilient than the norm. What would be lethal dosage to most humans is only enough to cause minor, acute poisoning to her. I'm thinking that she probably has a mutant immune system; perhaps some modified platelets that attach to contaminants instead of wounds and neutralize them, much as swallowing charcoal can neutralize toxins in the stomach. That's just a rough, unscientific idea, though.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)It's not impossible to clean up a radiation-heavy zone. You just need Geiger counters, rad suits, somewhere to throw away the little radioactive bits, and a lot of patience—but it is a LOT of patience, and I suppose with so few people around there might just be better options elsewhere.
Chemical sterilization—what sorts of chemicals would actually sterilize the environment that weather wouldn't eventually wash out? For something like the Danakil, the only reason it continues to be a chemical swamp is that it's over a natural volcanic vent.
I like the mutant immune system thing. However, I work with blood and I think modified White Cells would be better than modified platelets. People w/ platelet mutations have a nasty tendency to bleed to death.
Btw I happened across some Gas Mask photos on the cheezburger network thought you may be interested:
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<a href='http://cheezburger.com/View/4557753344
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<a href='http://cheezburger.com/Arianak/lolz/View/4335334656
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edited 24th Mar '11 6:57:44 PM by HistoryMaker
That's a good point, Rick. No matter how bad, radioactive pollution can be usually cleaned up. But the population and spotty technology of this world mean that it's usually more practical just to avoid the contaminated areas than to try and restore them. The only people who go into the really hazardous zones are scavengers, and they're all decked out in as much protective gear as they can find. A lot of townships and organizations are built around freeways, in the empty travel routes between what were once chief cities. People still refer to regions and locals by what were once the capital cities, (as in "Dallas-area" or "Boston-area,") while the names of states and their borders are still sometimes acknowledged but falling out of use. Travelers of this era think of most of the country as uncivilized between settlements; the dangerous wasteland and the uncontaminated wilderness.
Another good question is how the chemical agents are still affecting certain areas. This world was torn apart by war, and a lot of the chemicals released into the environment were made with maximum casualties in mind. There's herbicides that stripped some places of plant life, (originally intended to get rid of cover for enemy soldiers and starve the locals out of the area,) that have created dust-bowl type deserts. Often, the complete lack of plant life and the degradation of soil is enough to make an area uninhabitable for some time. There were also plenty of corrosives, toxins and irritants, made to incapacitate or kill enemies. Near the end of the war stockpiles of these weapons, as well as industrial and nuclear plants, were attacked in hopes of causing lethal contamination. Apparently it worked, and this is why the ruins of cities are often the most dangerous places for any form of life. It's true that it would take a constant supply of poison to keep a region inhospitable to life, but would slowly leaking bombs/reactors/chemical vats do the trick? Finally, the chemical agents that killed humans and animals have worn off in a lot of places, and life has crept back into them. The rate of mutations and birth defects is unsurprisingly high, but nature has begun to recover some of the territory ruined by humans.
When I think of white blood cells, I think of phagocytes, and I don't know if a normal immune system could afford to sacrifice them. Perhaps it's not a known type of blood cell at all but a unique protein that binds to hazardous material. If that were the case, Farren's ability could be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, she's resistant to many of this world's more common toxic pollutants, but these proteins could also spell trouble if allowed to build up in joints or organs, (anywhere really.) Perhaps she actually needs some degree of exposure to the chemical agents in order to stay healthy.
Also, those are some great photos. I'm working on a picture right now that features horses in gas masks
◊. Who knew they even made these things?
The protein idea is cool it’s kinda like a horseshoe crab’s immune system (the don’t have blood cells).
The Biology nerd in me has to tell you that a normal human as many different classes of White Blood Cells including but not limited to Neutrophils, Macrophages, T-cells, B-cell, Natural Killer Cells (no not kidding) and Eosinophils. Some are phagocytes, some make antibodies, some do other stuff. Most of these cells are short lived and constantly being produced. The numbers of any given type of blood cell can increase as the body has need of them. End geeking out.
Gas masks for animals, that’s awesome.
edited 25th Mar '11 4:33:59 PM by HistoryMaker
Now that is interesting. I knew horseshoe crabs have some wonky biology, but I didn't know they lacked blood cells. Talk about living fossils. Thanks for mentioning that; I need to research them now.
That's true, I was just saying that each of these cell types fills a biological niche, and sacrificing any one of them entirely could prove problematic. Besides, changing the entire structure and behavior of any cell group that dramatically within one generation seems a bit too far-fetched. I'll probably stick with the protein idea, as it's specific enough to seem founded but vague enough to avoid getting me in trouble with the specifics.
What about the long-term effects of chemical exposure? Since several weaponized compounds can also be teratogens, carcinogens or mutagens, I imagine that the rate of birth defects and cell-growth related disorders (such as cancer and sickle cell disease) would be much higher than normal. I've already got plans for a very minor Team Pet character who's a hideously disfigured yet lovable dog named Blinky. Blinky may have an extra eye, some excess digits/limbs and no determinate gender, but he's still treated as the adorable mascot of the series. The rate of illness, and therefore the life expectancy, of humans is also obviously affected by this environment. What am I leaving out? Should there be other dangers besides the contaminated zones and birth defects?
Also, more plot than science related: I need a way to separate the MacGuffin Girl from her parents. They started off stationary, and i haven't worked out too much detail about them as the whole story takes place after their deaths, but I still need to decide how they died and how their ten year old daughter survived without them. It's likely that at least one of them succumbed to gradual poisoning; which is one of the most common deaths for people in this world.
edited 28th Mar '11 8:59:28 AM by Takwin
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)Definitely more cancer, but I doubt there would be an increase in sickle cell disease. I’d go w/ aplastic anemia instead. It’s kinda the opposite of cancer, the body produces too few new blood cell and eventually you die from either anima, or a compromised immune system, or you bleed to death from lack of platelets. Aplastic anemia can be brought on by radiation, some chemicals, and a some viruses.
As for other medical issues you’d probably see lung diseased (asthma, COPD ect.) and sterility.
As for the parents, how about if one died gradual poisoning, the other could then become obsessed with teaching the kid how to survive. Then at some point the remaining parent dies suddenly (freak accident, or violence, or something). You’d still need a reason for the kid to leave where she was. It could be a sudden danger (fire, bandits, etc.) or just a desire (“I have cousins in Utah I’m going to Utah”).
I was just using sickle cell as a top-of-my-head example, but you're right in that it's a pretty poor one. What I meant to say was that the polluted environment would probably cause a higher risk of non-genetic congenital defects, like hydrocephaly, Conjoined Twins and cleft palate. Chances of sterility and miscarriage are also much higher, as are maternal and infant mortality rates. To their credit, the people of this world do know more about medicine than their ancient counterparts, which accounts for a lot of spared casualties. When you get to the point in a society where it's understood that microorganisms cause diseases and not evil spirits, your chances of survival increase notably even in lack of proper medical supplies.
Lung disease, perhaps gastrointestinal illness, and spontaneous mutations are big problems in this setting. The protagonist's mother, Maya, is eventually killed by her long-running battle with an unknown respiratory disorder; one that was likely the result of a lifetime of exposure to toxic fumes and polluted air.
That background for the girl, Farren, is pretty close to the idea I've been developing. Since I already have a couple of badass mothers in this story, I'll probably give the fearsome survivalist role to her father. How he dies is important, obviously, as it explains why she ended up alone in the wasteland. Farren's parents may or may not have been aware of her ability, since they lived in a relatively uncontaminated, rural area, and she might have wound up so close to the city by traveling with friends/relatives after her father's death.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)How about this: the girl her father (and a perhaps a few others) were out near in the wasteland because they are fleeing from a danger. When things get really desperate the father pulls a Heroic Sacrifice to end the danger. Bonus Tear Jerker if he knows he isn’t coming back but instead of saying goodbye he looks his daughter in the eye and says something like “remember everything I thought you”.
Not bad, but it feels a little too obvious. What danger would they face, coming from an isolated farmhouse? What would persuade dad to leave his relatively safe childhood home? He probably was killed in violence, but I don't know if they were abroad, and if so, why. I do like the 'remember all I taught you' idea, though; it adds an extra layer of conflict to an apparently weak and reliant kid. Farren's about 10 or 11 when she first meets the protagonist, Del, and she has only been alone briefly at that time.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)Good point. I really haven't worked this part out too well, which is embarrassing in hindsight... Perhaps their house was located along a trade/travel route? Sometimes scavengers will double as bandits when the pickings are slim. They might have come to the house looking for barters or handouts, gotten pushy after being turned down, then started a fight with dad that went further than expected.
What kind of condition do you think non-perishable goods, namely clothes and paper, would be in? Sure there would be a lot of water damage and moth-eaten wrecks, but some of this stuff must have survived, right? I need to justify my characters wearing scavenged clothes and carrying old, battered but still readable books.
edited 6th Apr '11 6:14:39 AM by Takwin
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)

Exactly what it sounds like: I'm working on a Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi right now, (pending title Cornix Mundus,) and I need a hand in working out the kinks and obvious falters. The climate of this world is a bit more extreme and temperamental than modern Earth, and the population has been cut by an estimated 66-75%. Most of the destruction was caused by chemical and biological warfare, leaving vast chunks of the landscape sterile and toxic. Plant life is sparse and precious, with most people living almost entirely off of scavenged goods. Nuclear warfare was also a factor, and there are plenty of off-limits radioactive wastelands. At the time of the drop-off, or the point where nations fell apart and lost contact, the technology level was roughly what we have today, and many mechanical devices can still be salvaged by sufficiently skilled individuals. The societies of this era are pretty standard post-apocalyptic fare, with small trade-based townships, religious sanctuaries and plenty of wandering scavengers, barterers and bandits.
This is a topic that will be continually expanded and updated, as I'm writing on a limited schedule.
I've returned from the depths to continue politely irritating the good people of Tv Tropes.(◕‿◕✿)