The End of the World: Planning Ahead
Nerds never get tired of discussing the End of the World. The question of what the rest of us would do if some significant portion of the population was ‘gone’ (abducted by aliens, turned into zombies, killed by a plague, wiped out in a war, etc.) is one of the most popular themes in science fiction. For good reason, since it allows us to explore interesting questions about our own nature. How would I respond to a crisis? Would I survive the zombie apocalypse? Pretty much every nerd I know has a Zombie Attack Plan and has assessed their home for the level of protection it would provide against the Horde.
The speculation is half the fun, really. No one knows how the world will end. There may be an invasion of robotic vikings from Omicron Persei VII next February. Things may continue on without a hitch until about four billion years from now when our sun expands enough to vaporize the planet. If anything does go down though, the nerds will be ready. We’ve practically been preparing for it our whole lives. In case of zombies, we all have our weapon of choice picked out and probably within easy reach. At the first signs of global pandemic, we’ll all move to Madagascar. Whatever the scenario, we have a plan in mind. We just ask what Batman would do.
Imagining the worst and preparing for it mentally, even if it’s all in fun, is what really gives us the edge. I recommend picking your favorite disaster scenario and preparing for it as thoroughly as possible. You’d be surprised how much overlap there is between, say zombie and earthquake preparedness. Of course, survival in the long term in case some major disaster actually does cause society to collapse is a bit tougher to plan for. As a microbiologist, I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that in a post-apocalyptic society I will have very few marketable skills. What about you? When society collapses, will you still be able to hold your own? Or will you end up a walking plot device waiting to be rescued by the main characters? How secure would you be in the event of a zombie attack?
Given how close I live to the sea, and how close I live to a nuclear plant, and how far I live from rural areas… I’m a ststistical casualty, depending on the type of apocalypse imagined.
However, if we take location out of the equation (even though ‘location is everything’), I am personally well-suited to dealing with disaster. I’ve been in crisis situations before, so I have practice keeping calm under pressure. I know first aid and CPR, so people around me have a good reason to keep me around, ha. And I’m a good shot.
But one thing most of us speculators forget about is how little of disaster survival is determined by self-reliance. The present situation in Japan should inform our future plans and our future fiction: Because the Japanese prepare for disasters together, as communities and as a society, individual survival in Japan is far likelier than it would be in places where everyone is left to their own devices and where ‘every man for himself’ is touted like wisdom.
In short, the best resources we have in a disaster scenario are human resources.
In a survival situation you can’t count on your mind to pull you through, there will be so much adrenaline and emotion running through you the right decisions will not be made. Muscle memory, actions done automatically with no dedicated thought, are what will, in a clinch moment, pull you through. Take for example a complex attack I survived in Afghanistan. I was sound asleep in my bed, the incoming alarm went off, before I was even mentally alert I had my body armor and boots on, weapons in hand, and I was yelling incoming. The first rounds hit my building, blowing out the wall to my room. If I had to think about what I was doing at the time, I probably wouldn’t be writing this now.
The ensuing fire fight further demonstrated the need for muscle memory. Without even thinking, drawing entirely from training rehearsed countless time, and in complete darkness every man who had to scramble to a fighting position was able to mount, prepare, load, and charge an M2 machine gun to provide accurate fires on hostile targets. This is no easy task considering the amount skill it takes to put the barrel of an M2 on. Once again, anyone had had to stop and think about what they where doing, they’d have been killed.
Muscle memory should be counted as one of the greatest tools in the survivalists arsenal. Split second action could have saved countless B-movie action hero rejects!
I can raise food, preserve food, identify over a thousand species of plants and have a good idea of which are edible and/or medicinal, spin fiber into yarn and weave it into cloth, and so on.
Being a professional botanist, a medieval recreationist and a devoted craftswoman means I have quite a few useful skills and plenty of equipment. I wouldn’t want to have to practice any of them on a survival basis, but it does make planning for the Zombie Contingency more interesting. I live in a good area for anticipating survival, unlike Kay, and it’s fun to develop plans.