There’s no reason to believe gold would be valuable in a post-civ society. It’s not that rare, it’s not that useful, and plenty of other metals look just as nice. It might be surging in value against the dollar, but gold just isn’t practical from a survivalist standpoint.
Are you kidding??? After civ’s collapse a means of exchange will develop naturally and there’s no reason to think it wouldn’t naturally be gold or some other precious metal.
Eventually, maybe. If gold were the only type of money used though, we would run into an immediate monetary crisis. Not to mention that there would be much more pressing necessity for acutely useful commodities, such as bullets, chickens, etc.
Freedom4me, could you provide a useful definition civilization collapse? Your videos were unhelpful.
Resources drying up, peak oil, soil failing out after having to deal w/ ag for centuries, massive overpopulation, gov. becoming way too tyrannical, infrastructure breaking apart.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Societal_collapse
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risks_to_civilization,_humans_and_planet_Earth
This thread is fun. 
“Are you kidding??? After civ’s collapse a means of exchange will develop naturally and there’s no reason to think it wouldn’t naturally be gold or some other precious metal.”
Really? After a collapse in civilization why would precious metals be valuable? This thread is about hunting and gathering. Assuming that’s what you’re picturing post-civ life as being, there is no reason metal would be of any use. Is anyone going to have the means to process gold in your post-civ world? And why would people value it in a situation where survival is the most present goal? Gold is heavy, and not really good for anything other than looking at.
Other metals are better for tools and weapons, and gold has almost always been something to denote status. Unless we’re going to rebuild temples and start giving libations, gold is going to be pretty useless. Barter is more convenient, doesn’t weigh you down, and doesn’t require mining. Is there going to be mining in your post-civ world?
and start giving libations
You’re giving the answer yourself. If we are going primitive, booze will be primo. If I am wearing a loin cloth with a thick beard how in the hell do you expect me to drink my meade? From a goat bladder wine sack, not likely! This is about primitivism, not barbarism.
Well, I’m not drinking from gold now, and I expect my socio-economic status to drop in a post-civ world. Call me a pessimist.
Well, if we’re in the world Freedom4Me spells out where it’s good to have gold, be a capitalist, want civ to topple down, and not want to associate with anybody…it may be a world where you have no gold cups today to a gold cup tommorow, I see no contraindication otherwise. I mean I really don’t know the rules and what I can or can’t say in this world, so what the hell.
All I know is, if I live in his world and I have to grow a giant beard and wear animal hides - I want to be drinking my libations from a gold goblet. What else would I have to do?
Maybe F4M has confused this with a LARPing site?
I’d like to know F4M’s definition of civilization.
The common definition (that I have trouble with) is society dependent upon importation. Where the line between import and trade is troubles me.
So the next (and better) is society that is dependent on resources outside of its bioregion. Seeing as how F4M rarely if ever talks about ecology, that’s probably not their definition.
Whatever their definition, apparently mining and metal processing isn’t a mark of civilization.
Apparently he wants to return to a way of living that’s actually backwards in technological progress which hinders other fields. To actually return to a way of living where this conversation itself through modern technology and communication would not be able to take place (he’s for a way of life that’s against the means of him communicating to return to that way of life - it’s like using the capitalist modes of production to publish copies of Das Kapital). We’re not just talking about a way of living 2,000 years ago, I’m sure even Plato and Aristotle lived most luxuriously for their times, but a way of living that’s lower in standards itself. Somehow this is “better” because there’s no “collective” (god forbid, a collective!). What if I want to live in some sort of social collective? Y’know, a large community with people who have like minded views on culture, etc?
Cooperation is actually quite useful.
There might be more to voluntary simplicity than the “capitalists” on this site seem to be willing to grant. Civilization brought us the state too, after all. It’s really a matter of what one’s goals are.
It sounds lke civ already has collapsed, according to you…
It sounds lke civ already has collapsed, according to you…
Its on its way to collapse. It WILL happen in the future. Probably sooner then later since the state is wreaking havoc on the earth more then we’d know.
Ok, what is the difference between the world outside your bedroom window today, and civ collapse?
Ok, what is the difference between the world outside your bedroom window today, and civ collapse?
This is what a civ collapse will most likely look like:
Drying up of natural resources (water, oil, arable land)
Economic collapse
Overpopulation
Increased wars
Extremely complex societies (see Joseph Tainter and Jared Diamond)
Disease outbreaks
#1 is the biggest factor in all of this. With natural resources drying up the state could enforce some kind of neo-feudalism or neo-communism where it takes sole ownership of all the land under the guise of “sustainability.”
Also along w/ disease outbreaks: the number of mental illness (esp. autism) going way up. It used to be one in 100000 kids had autism now I hear it’s anywhere from 1 in 100 to 1 in 30. The number of other mental illness and mental conditions are going up aswell. Makes sense once you know what’s in the food and vax but it’s a sign we’re leading towards a collapse.
All of that is already the case, look outside your bedroom window. What is the difference between the world today (increasingly scarce natural resources, economic collapse, population pressures, global war, complex societies, and the evolution and invention of increasingly deadly and robust micro-organisms) and “civ collapse” (increasingly scarce natural resources, economic collapse, population pressures, global war, complex societies, and the evolution and invention of increasingly deadly and robust micro-organisms)?