Timeline for How can an advanced civilization forget how to manufacture its technology?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
7 events
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| Jul 14, 2019 at 14:34 | comment | added | DrMcCleod | Relevant lore link: warhammer40k.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_Age_of_Technology | |
| Jul 14, 2019 at 10:57 | comment | added | Ash | @RutherRendommeleigh Oddly enough being able to store masses of information can lead to the loss of important information just as much as direct loss of storage, when you store everything finding the important bits slowly becomes harder, eventually reaching the point where no-one has time to find important information in whole databases anymore because of the clutter. | |
| Jul 12, 2019 at 21:48 | comment | added | cmaster - reinstate monica |
Which is one more reason why it's so crucial that we have open source software. With the source code, you can at least try to understand what is going on, bit by bit. With the history of the source code, as recorded in the git repositories of open source software, you have tons of clues what changed in which order and why it changed. If you rely on Windows alone, and do faith based engineering assuming you'll always have a working Windows on all your machines, you are doomed if Microsoft shuts down.
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| Jul 12, 2019 at 16:30 | comment | added | Tezra | @RutherRendommeleigh Like I said, as our knowledge base grows, it becomes harder to manage and it becomes easier to lose important information over time. Similar to how all records of how to make roman concrete where lost. So we can patch it, but not replace it (it has properties that make it superior in neche cases). Aslo, knowing how a computer chip works does not mean you understand how to safely operate/maintain the industrial high-precision machines used to make them. And there is no way you are getting chips of that quality without those machines. | |
| Jul 12, 2019 at 15:37 | comment | added | Draco18s no longer trusts SE | @RutherRendommeleigh What happens to all of those manuals and communication channels if "all computers everywhere" suddenly fail? Most people wouldn't even be able to get to the local library if that happened. | |
| Jul 12, 2019 at 15:16 | comment | added | Ruther Rendommeleigh | +1 for the premise, but wouldn't you think that our ability to store, share and search for information also grows? I'm pretty sure that I know more about chip design and the underlying physics now than I (or my peers) did 30 years ago, when there were printed manuals instead of Wikipedia etc., even though the work I'm doing today is higher level / more abstract. | |
| Jul 12, 2019 at 13:32 | history | answered | Tezra | CC BY-SA 4.0 |