Is another 'Dark Age' possible?
Discuss the merits and deficiencies of political theories and philosophical questions.
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?I think that a 'dark age' could be the result of a prolonged exchange of nuclear weaponry in a world war. The scale of damage could take anywhere from decades to centuries to recover from. Unfortunately, there are many potential triggers for a world war - tensions between the US and Russia or China, religious terrorism, anti-west middle eastern nations, or continued conflict between Israel and Palestine. A new dark age would depend on the severity of the warfare.
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?Wait for the Internet to become even more hegemonic then pull the plug on that. An incredible amount of knowledge would be lost because people won't have been keeping much in the way of offline records.
I think we'd be all right if it went off now though, though obviously knowledge sharing would be harder to do. -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?I suppose I mean, will we ever be forced to revert back to a way of life similar to that of the Dark Ages? And by this, I mean a time characterised by life threatening epidemics, lack of technology, and even anti-heretical religion?(Original post by TurboCretin)
Depends on whether you're talking about it in the sense of a period of intellectual stagnation or a period from which no historic records survive.
Like, for instance, if an astrological event severely disrupted communications, from cell phones to wireless to internet to satellite coverage, our ability to unify and collaborate to form a plan would be extremely difficult, potentially leading to uprisings, to communities that are set to defend ourselves.
Would something like this ever happen? -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?Possible.......for example we are running out of fossil fuels etc blah blah blah and we could soon kind of reset and go back in time to cavemen times woo. For example have a look at the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusian_catastrophe
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?It's worth pointing out that there were significant advances made in the world from 1912 to 1952 despite two world wars, depressions in the world's major economies, a killer epidemic and a significant portion of the world being taken over by Stalinists. I that the only way there could be a dark age is if the world was taken over by totalitarians.
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?Well there's no way I can answer that question, but there's nothing to rule it out. The emergence of superbugs, exhaustion of fossil fuels and rising extremism in some parts of the world are all modern concerns. It's also possible that a solar flare could knock out our telecommunications. But I find it pretty unlikely that the entire globe will revert to a pre-enlightenment sort of state.(Original post by Belowski)
I suppose I mean, will we ever be forced to revert back to a way of life similar to that of the Dark Ages? And by this, I mean a time characterised by life threatening epidemics, lack of technology, and even anti-heretical religion?
Like, for instance, if an astrological event severely disrupted communications, from cell phones to wireless to internet to satellite coverage, our ability to unify and collaborate to form a plan would be extremely difficult, potentially leading to uprisings, to communities that are set to defend ourselves.
Would something like this ever happen? -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?I know, you may be right. I wasn't sure where this thread would belong, so I just stuck it in here. I thought it had a certain philosophical element to it, though.(Original post by RamocitoMorales)
Wouldn't this be more suited to the History forum? -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?That doesn't really make sense. Everything on the internet is stored on a hard disk somewhere, it doesn't just float in the aether. To remove all the information would require you to destroy all the servers housing said information.(Original post by Arekkusu)
Wait for the Internet to become even more hegemonic then pull the plug on that. An incredible amount of knowledge would be lost because people won't have been keeping much in the way of offline records.
I think we'd be all right if it went off now though, though obviously knowledge sharing would be harder to do.
Regarding your question OP, short of near extinction I don't think this is possible. Technological communication is the key here, and we've come too far in that regard. While it's possible some parts of the world will experience technological stagnation the world as a whole will continue to progress. As someone pointed out previously, even during times of war & depression technology still increased at an exponential rate... See below for what I mean...
Really, it's just not possible, we've come too far to regress in the same way now.Last edited by Ewan; 04-05-2012 at 18:43. -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?The recession is short lived & isn't hampering technological progress. Plus it's only the west which is hurting, other economies around the world are booming. Decreased intelligence? Education is improving at an alarming rate throughout the world. Even in the UK education is getting much better over time.(Original post by david2457)
In my opinion we are already starting to deceased into a dark age, recession, decreasing moral values and intelligence, constant imperialism from the west, soon we will be in big troubles I think
You guys should have a gander over here & here. The news is always telling us everything is going downhill, so I'm not surprised people have this opinion. But it's not true, do some research & you'll find prospects are so much better now than they were in the past, in all areas of life. -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?Not if we're discussing the future.(Original post by RamocitoMorales)
Wouldn't this be more suited to the History forum? -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?That's completely unfounded, and completely historically inconsiderate. In the last century there were economic downturns of such unbelievable magnitude that ours would hang its head in shame. With those came loss of moral values so vast that the century was the bloodiest that humanity has ever witnessed, with hundreds of millions dying in the name of ideology. If 4 years of mild (comparatively) economic difficulty and people being a bit more slutty than they used to be means that we are heading for a dark age, then the horrific human failings of the 20th century would surely have spelled utter annihilation for the entire human race - which they very nearly did, admittedly.(Original post by david2457)
In my opinion we are already starting to deceased into a dark age, recession, decreasing moral values and intelligence, constant imperialism from the west, soon we will be in big troubles I think
My point, to summarise, is that you're over reacting massively to things that have been monumentally worse in the past which we have recovered from within decades. Of course we're not heading for a new dark age, it would take an unparalleled global catastrophe to cause that. -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?Anything is possible.
It would take a catastrophe for it to occur though. I think when the Roman Empire fell, there was no follow-up to it, and no other advanced culture in the known world to succeed it. At least when the Hellenistic period ended, Rome could quickly take over. -
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Re: Is another 'Dark Age' possible?But where in Europe could rival ancient Rome at the time? From around the 5th century to the High Middle Ages, European knowledge stood still. Yes, the Middle East and China were advanced, but the Dark Ages generally refers to Europe.
