Let's say a bird flu pandemic occured (or any major worldwide loss of life). If we lost a huge number of our population including leaders, doctors, teachers and scientists is it possible that the knowledge we've amased as a species could be lost?

The majority of us are consumers and not producers, I know for a fact that I lack the most basic understanding of the things we take for granted. Could I make a lightbulb? I don't know how to make glass? If I did, could I make a generator to power the light bulb? Could I even make a candle? Maybe.

How bad could it get? Mad Max like? People living off the remains of what we used to know what to make?

 

Colin, I think that our generation is probably more skilled and knowledgeable about how to grow crops, build, etc. than the next. However, human beings are an ingenious lot and I believe we've preserved enough in books and on computers to be able to rebuild a reasonable civilization should a disease wipe out large numbers. I'm more concerned about whether the planet will survive since we occasionally concern ourselves about environmental rape, yet we continue to mine ores, drill gas and oil wells and use our natural resources without regard to how long it will take to replace any of them. We deal daily with the pollutants we've already imbedded into our environment, yet we fail miserably imho in seeking alternative means to provide power for everything we use.
With regard to global disease, you may enjoy reading John Barry's book, The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History. It is a bit of an eye opener and speaks not only to the resilience of our species, but also how little we've progressed with medical research. My dad remembered this epidemic quite well and often spoke of it when I was a child. It occurred, I believe, in 1918.

 

Certainly, I think another Dark Age is possible. Scary to think of, yes, but possible for sure.
If we were decimated (lost 90% of the population), it would set the species back for hundreds of years IMO.

 

Actually, "decimated" would imply losing 10% of the population -- but even that number (is ~600 million a good guesstimate?) would be quite a shock to the system.

The 1918 pandemic killed off something like 20 million people (I think -- please correct this if I'm wrong), but I don't know what overall percentage that was. In any case, we're still here and more technologically sophisticated than ever.

If 90% were killed off, well, there would certainly be an adjustment period. But I can see the possibility that, after that adjustment, things would return to a much better "normal." Most of the problems that Val mentioned are ultimately traceable to too many people. HPH

 

^ ah yes. Thanks for the correction.
I guess hundreds of years is overestimating. Perhaps decades...

 

A decimation of the species could happen (particularly if there were an "accident" in a genetics laboratory), but I still think we've left behind enough historical material to enable those remaining to continue to exist. I also think it is entirely possible (though not probable in our lifetime) that another ice age or catastrophic change in the environment could occur, but again, probably not in the forseeable future.

 

Maybe not. But you could certainly find a book that'd tell you how. (Unless an anti-knowledge/anti-science sentiment popped up, and anybody who used technology more advanced than what the Amish use is burned at a stake, in which case, yes, we'd be in a Dark Age.)

 

I don't mean to turn this political but my fear is less of a dark age than of a return of a reign of terror. I fear that another Nazi type party could rise again.

 

^^That probably is too political for discussion here, Ralper, but it would be a good political topic.

Edit: The above is just my opinion, but it would be a neat topic to discuss and if you start a thread, I'd like to hop on board.

 

True, but think of the technology you'd need to master, you'll need silicates for the glass, you'll need enough heat to make the glass. You'll need to learn how to blow glass (let's just assume you could scrounge up a pipe). You'll need to learn some metallurgy to make the filliment, and then the energy to light it up! Let's face it, we'd all go back to oil lamps!