A post nuclear conworld - decades and centuries afterwards

[Otto Kretschmer]

Ok...

No idea whether it should be here or in off topic subforum

Let's say that at some point between 1980 and 1985 a worst case scenario nuclear war breaks out between the West and East. Vast majority of Europe, North America, East Asia (China, Japan, Koreas, Taiwan) are devastated by an almost unimaginable nuclear war. Israel and oil rich Gulf countries are possibly targeted as well.

How harsh would the nuclear winter actually be? What about other environmental effects like toxic rain?

How do you imagine the world to look like decades and centuries afterwards with all it's aspects (politics, economy, culture, environment etc.)?

[Ketsuban]

You might be interested in this timeline of a nuclear exchange in the late 1980s. The author notes it is "in some ways a worst-case scenario (total numbers of strategic warheads deployed by the superpowers peaked about this time; the scenario implies a greater level of military readiness; and impact on global climate and crop yields are greatest for a war in August)", so a war in the early 1980s should be at least nominally less destructive.

[Torco]

this is of course speculative, but I think even a very strong nuclear war would not wipe off the world. even if you have a very low survival rate say half of a percent (which is veeeery low) people are hardy, and there's a lot of 'em. (of 'us? I would not likely survive, myself lmao) and those survivors are probably going to be speaking the same languages, holding the same political and religious ideas and all the rest of it as their predecessors. in a way, it's likely that the survivors would be rather more conservative than the mean inhabitant of the relevant territory pre-nukes, since because the bombs would fall in cities the set of survivors would have a robust amount of rural people and people in the business of transportation, and because the conditions after the bombs fall would be physically demanding, you'd of course get a set that's more biased towards young people, people in physical labour, and armed forces personnel, etcetera. the religious would be more represented, as they tend to have more community bonds and those are pretty important for survival in such circumstances.

another interesting thing is that the nukes would not fall uniformly, so new york would be a lot more affected than, say, la paz. I'd expect more survivorship in latin america, africa, new guinea, tuvalu etcetera and a lot less in the states, china, russia, india and whoever else was involved in the world war three. the subsequent nuclear winter would probably make it a lot harder to survive in finland, and somewhat less hard in paraguay. radiation would probably spread far and wide, though, and cancer would become a lot more common that it is, not that it's rare these days.

ultimately what society will look like is going to be dependent on where we're talking about. paraguay would probably look a lot nicer to stay in than moscow, but it's fairly likely that we'd see a lot more features we generally associate with premodern societies: very rural, many people involved in agriculture, high infant mortality coupled with high fertility. then again, it's very likely industrial civilization would not cease, like, people wouldn't become medieval: people have a lot of knowledge about many modern technologies, you'd probably still have some electricity generation in some places, radios, guns (it's not that hard to make shitty-but-serviceable gunpowder... or black powder, anyway).

cars would become a lot less valuable, though big organizations, governments or warlords or whatever, would probably still be able to run a small fleet of them on alcohol or wood gas, and i wouldn't be surprised if steam technology made a comeback, since it's relatively easier to build a basic steam engine that it is to build a working ICE. fishing would become a much better idea: at least in the pacific historical accounts suggests stuff like edible shellfish just strewn across beaches as late as the 1960s and current fisheries are suuper depleted, but they'd likely come back despite the ecological impact of the bombs. there'd be a hell of a lot more bugs and animals around. If enough people buy the farm, so to speak, I'm betting we'd see a lot of forests and wetlands return, and a rollback of the world's deserts, and wild animals would probably become a decent source of mortality again.... mostly feral dogs, which would survive a lot better than people do. (no, for real, dogs are extremely hardy animals, and can breed super fast) but also possibly bears in the regions where there are some, cougars etcetera.

then again, maybe you'd get a lot of new religions and social systems emerge: weird forms of governance, new religious movements, local anarcho-communist communes fighting over who is the least dengist or whatever else... I want to say catholicism would probably collapse, being relatively centralized as far as religions go, and a lot less... social? like, at least here catholics are indistinguishable from non-catholics except they have icons in their houses and go to church when someone marries. protestants would come to inherit christianity, at least here in latin america (i don't know much about the religious landscape elsewhere to say), as being a protestant is a lot more involved.

[Otto Kretschmer]

Of course I don't want humanity to go extinct, by no means!

By the way - politics, religion (or at least the way it's implemented), culture etc. - are largely products of material conditions of specific time and place. Western liberalism (democracy, individualism etc.) are a byproduct of the Industrial Revolution and the struggle of the Bourgeoisie to replace pro-feudal absolute monarchs as the ruling elite. A devastating nuclear war would reshape global order in such a drastic ways that the fall of WRE would look like a minor footnote compared to it - and if the world recovers fully to pre-cataclysm levels, it won't look precisely like our world - history is under no obligation to repeat itself.

Edit: In such a war biological weapons would almost certainly be used - even if nuclear winter somehow turns out to not be that drastic (very unrealistic, AFAIk newer simulations confirm that nuclear winter would be catastrophic), massive epidemics would devastate populations worldwide and they would be exceberated by cessation of global supply chains.

[zompist]

The assumption in (say) the Fallout video games is that devastation turns people into savages and cannibals, and you should put all your skill points into Guns.

Very likely this is completely wrong. In a crisis situation, people are more cooperative, not less. I read an fascinating account from a survivor of the Sarajevo bombings. The hoarders and preppers are better equipped at first... but they run out of supplies and sheepishly start working with the community. People share what they have.

I suspect that the bunkers of the super-rich would either not protect against bombs and fallout, or would fail as communities. (E.g. if there's guns, the owner ends up shot by his bodyguards. And then everyone starves because no one knows how to grow food and the fields are radioactive.)

I expect the people best positioned to survive and grow are a) in the global South which has less targets; b) already living in small farming communities. 'Primitive' communities are usually pretty good at punishing freeloaders and troublemakers... by killing or expelling them. In general despotism comes with kingdom-level states.

Or to put it another way: could an armed gang terrorize the new agriculturalists? One: depends on the crop; you can steal the wheat from a granary, you can't steal potatoes from the ground. (They rot.) Two: in any predator-prey relationship, the predators can't outnumber or exterminate the prey. Three: how long do those guns stay functional? Four: the communities most likely to be functional are also most likely to resist. E.g. native Caribbeans simply refused to work for the conquistadores— they'd rather die than be slaves.)

[Otto Kretschmer]

@zompist:

The problem is that when social order breaks down, antisocial elements benefit the most. In normal conditions these individuals are kept on a short leash by the law enforcement but during anarchy they are free to realize their "potential".

Although that's probably how the state originated - not via some BS "social contract" but from bands of pretty disagreeable warriors agreeing to protect the private property of some local richer than average individual in exchange for benefits.

[hwhatting]

Or to put it another way: could an armed gang terrorize the new agriculturalists? One: depends on the crop; you can steal the wheat from a granary, you can't steal potatoes from the ground. (They rot.) Two: in any predator-prey relationship, the predators can't outnumber or exterminate the prey. Three: how long do those guns stay functional? Four: the communities most likely to be functional are also most likely to resist. E.g. native Caribbeans simply refused to work for the conquistadores— they'd rather die than be slaves.)

Brett Deveraux on guns in the post-Apocalypse. It looks like that in the longer term, the only option for the raiders to stay on top is to stop raiding and to conquer and set themselves up as rulers as long as their putative ownership of guns and ammo gives them an advantage, and then to control the production of weaponry.

[zompist]

Or to put it another way: could an armed gang terrorize the new agriculturalists? One: depends on the crop; you can steal the wheat from a granary, you can't steal potatoes from the ground. (They rot.) Two: in any predator-prey relationship, the predators can't outnumber or exterminate the prey. Three: how long do those guns stay functional? Four: the communities most likely to be functional are also most likely to resist. E.g. native Caribbeans simply refused to work for the conquistadores— they'd rather die than be slaves.)

Brett Deveraux on guns in the post-Apocalypse. It looks like that in the longer term, the only option for the raiders to stay on top is to stop raiding and to conquer and set themselves up as rulers as long as their putative ownership of guns and ammo gives them an advantage, and then to control the production of weaponry.

Devereaux is always worth reading. To (over)summarize: to keep your reign of terror going you need a chemistry lab, not for the bullets but for propellant and primer. Black powder is fairly easy to make but will foul a modern gun very quickly.

If anything I think he could have gone farther. E.g. he points out that 19th century labs, just like today, could just order the chemicals they needed. How does Mr. Post-Apocalypse produce large and safe quantities of sulfuric acid? It's worth remembering that the chemist who knows how to make it also knows how to make an explosive that will blow up the whole lab.

Then you get the problems of fuel. Modern society is built on the movement of petrochemicals: once you've drained the local gas station dry, what do you do next? Walk a thousand miles to the port, with every other raider, to raid the oil tankers? Then walk back to terrorize the farmers? And then what, since the pipelines dried up and no new ships are coming?

The problem is that when social order breaks down, antisocial elements benefit the most. In normal conditions these individuals are kept on a short leash by the law enforcement but during anarchy they are free to realize their "potential".

I don't know about that. Civilization to some extent enables the sociopaths.You can't terrorize hunter-gatherers: they just move off into the wilds. Can you terrorize farmers? Sure, if you have working guns (see above) and they're growing grain and they're not organized and have no defenses and you don't wipe them out. Do sociopaths have the patience to become rulers dependent on taxation? Will they protect their new charges against other raiders? Can they do anything about the inevitable famines and floods?

Assume the worst about human nature (which you shouldn't, but never mind that for now): an oversupply of predators cannot last. They'll turn on each other, or starve. Meanwhile, the low-stakes farmers in New Guinea or Botswana will stick with the small-agriculturalist lifestyle that's lasted for millennia.

[Otto Kretschmer]

@zompist:
If you look at, say, homicide rates - they are significantly higher in poor countries with weak (underfunded, corrupt etc.) law enforcement.

Now imagine that your country (US?) goes back to basically medieval level of development - what happens?

Also remember that you don't need to be a psychopath to be an asshole - people with below average empathy/altruism make up some 50% of the population since personality traits follow Gaussian distribution.

(My understanding of human nature is dialectical BTW)

[zompist]

@zompist:
If you look at, say, homicide rates - they are significantly higher in poor countries with weak (underfunded, corrupt etc.) law enforcement.

OK, here's are some countries which have a lower homicide rate than the US: Kenya, Zambia, Mozambique, Angola, Turkey, India, Bangladesh, Azerbaijan, Syria, Cambodia.

Admittedly the US has problems. But jeez, what is happening in Liechtenstein, which is almost as bad?

Now imagine that your country (US?) goes back to basically medieval level of development - what happens?

Well, that's the first question: does it go back to medieval? That is, stable agriculture where leaders understand that the peasants can't all be murdered? Is the radiation, or the nuclear winter, even going to allow agriculture?

Life was pretty miserable for peasants all over... though again, this varies by culture. You were better off if the region was relatively land-rich, or if what you grow is hard to steal, or you can easily melt away into difficult terrain. (Again, few bandits are going to have the patience or time to dig up your potatoes.)

[malloc]

Admittedly the US has problems. But jeez, what is happening in Liechtenstein, which is almost as bad?

It has quite a small population so presumably it only takes a few extra murders to drive up its homicide rate noticeably.

[Raphael]

@zompist:
If you look at, say, homicide rates - they are significantly higher in poor countries with weak (underfunded, corrupt etc.) law enforcement.

OK, here's are some countries which have a lower homicide rate than the US: Kenya, Zambia, Mozambique, Angola, Turkey, India, Bangladesh, Azerbaijan, Syria, Cambodia.

I remember one of the other posters in this very thread telling me, during a real-life ZBB meetup where we met, that when he lived in Lebanon for a while as an executive for a Western corporation, he found that, while some parts of the country were pretty rough, there were apparently other parts of the country where it basically made the news when a car got broken into. And Lebanon is not exactly known as a very peaceful or wealthy country.

[Travis B.]

Admittedly the US has problems. But jeez, what is happening in Liechtenstein, which is almost as bad?

It has quite a small population so presumably it only takes a few extra murders to drive up its homicide rate noticeably.

One thing that got me is that St. Pierre and Miquelon had a higher murder rate than... Iraq... because it had one murder in the year for which the statistic was recorded.

[Otto Kretschmer]

@zompist:
One thing that the US has to a higher degree than Europe is income inequality. GINI coefficient for the US is 0.42 while it's 0.36 in China and 0.29 in Germany.

As for the Middle Ages - crime rates were very high back then. IIRC murder rates were in the range of 20-50 per 100,000 while today they can be below 1 per 100,000 in the safest countries.

As for post-nuclear world - keep in mind that crime wouldn't be the only issue. Warlordism would be rampant after the situation stabilizes a bit after several decades Of course warlords won't be killing people at random but wars will be everpresent even without firearms.

[zompist]

As for post-nuclear world - keep in mind that crime wouldn't be the only issue. Warlordism would be rampant after the situation stabilizes a bit after several decades Of course warlords won't be killing people at random but wars will be everpresent even without firearms.

You asked a question in the original post, but it seems you only want one kind of answer. Fine, everyone can have their own conworld, have fun.

[Otto Kretschmer]

@zompist
What's so controversial about my views?

I do believe that stable societies will emerge - this will take time. Over a century IMHO.

[hwhatting]

I remember one of the other posters in this very thread telling me, during a real-life ZBB meetup where we met, that when he lived in Lebanon for a while as an executive for a Western corporation, he found that, while some parts of the country were pretty rough, there were apparently other parts of the country where it basically made the news when a car got broken into. And Lebanon is not exactly known as a very peaceful or wealthy country.

That was me, nice that you still remember that. It's what, 15 years ago?
The two phenomena are conncected. Lebanon has very tightly knit community neighbourhoods, where people look out for one another and people interfere when others break the rules in their area (the "grannies watch from windows and alert the young men" security system), but the clannishness is also responsible for its dysfunctional politics and corruption, and easily blows up into inter-communal conflict.

[zompist]

@zompist
What's so controversial about my views?

Quite the opposite, they are conventional. It seems you want to redo every other apocalyptic story-- Fallout, Mad Max, etc. And you can! But why start by asking questions when you don't want to hear answers?

[Otto Kretschmer]

I do want to hear answers then!

[Raphael]

That was me, nice that you still remember that. It's what, 15 years ago?

18 years, IIRC.