archiving as opposed to backing up

From: Teo Zenios <teoz_at_neo.rr.com>
Date: Thu Sep 23 03:00:33 2004

----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Merchberger" <zmerch_at_30below.com>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2004 3:11 AM
Subject: Re: archiving as opposed to backing up


> Rumor has it that Teo Zenios may have mentioned these words:
> >[snip]
> >...People today have no reason to build
> >egyptian type pyramids, and we can build them if we wanted to with our
> >present technology.
>
> But not with our present labor force. A *lot* of slaves were needed to
> build the pyramids, great wall of China, etc.
>

The people who built the Pyramids and the Great Wall were not slaves, but
citizens fullfilling their "tax" for the ruling party. If we threw the same
amount of cash as we have dumped into the Iraq war we could build the
specialized equipment needed to create the great pyramids and hire the
smaller labor force needed to complete it, technology isn't the problem just
logistics and money and carefull planning would take care of that.


> > The Egyptians did leave alot of records on how they were
> >built and organised but archeologists are still not 100% sure how
everything
> >was done and spend time and effort figuring it out and quite a few people
> >like reading about the finds and new ideas on how things were done. Our
> >computers are going to be the pyramids of the 3000's, not needed for
their
> >society (in our crude forms)...
>
> Says who? If an global EMP pops all of the 486+ machines, but the older
> tech survives, it would be a lot more important for people to not have to
> take an extra 50 years to figure it out again.

A Global EMP would shut down the entire industrial world, everything of
importance is powered buy chips faster then a 486 at some critical point in
the system. Where would you even start rebuilding and would it be built the
same way it was?

> Do I have a historical reference to this? Sure.
>
> Over 2000 years ago, the ancient Romans & Greeks *knew* the Earth was
round
> and orbited the sun. However, it seems all references to that knowledge
was
> unavailable by the 1st millennium, when people once again thought the
world
> was flat, and stayed that way for over 500 years. Had they access to the
> Roman and Greek libraries (assuming they existed, but I'd bet they kept
> their written documents somewhere) who knows what tech. advances (or wars
> averted) would have been possible.

The Roman world collapsed because of barbarian invasion and the aftermath of
100's of years of illiterates running their small chunk of land followed by
religion as government (burning people as heretics if they even mentioned
the world was flat). That is a problem with society and the role of
religion, not with archives (same church that doesn't believe in evolution
TODAY).


> > but a few people will be putting the puzzle
> >together just to see what we did and why and alot of people will be
> >interested in reading and contemplating the archeologists findings. It
> >doesn't have to be intentional. Some of the most basic things we do in
life
> >that are so obvious to us and never documented will puzzle the hell out
of
> >people 1000 years from now.
>
> Yea, and if (once again) they think the world is flat & the moon is made
of
> green cheese, it'll be one hell of a step *backwards* for mankind! Why
> should we relegate our progeny to generations of ignorance due to our lack
> of planning?

Who says its not going to happen anyway, you think after a global nuclear
war or large asteroid explosion (back to the EMP wave you were talking
about) we will start making iPods and PS2's again like nothing ever
happened?


> Laterz,
> Roger "Merch" Merchberger
>
> --
> Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- sysadmin, Iceberg Computers
> zmerch_at_30below.com
Received on Thu Sep 23 2004 - 03:00:33 BST