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Page added on February 18, 2018
Prepping for Death
Once you become fully aware of collapse, it tends to make you a little crazy. There is nobody I have come across in the collapse blogosphere who isn’t somewhat nuts. Mind you, this definition of “nuts” is being measured against what is considered normal inside an insane society, so in reality it may not be nuts at all.
The insanity exhibited by Kollapsniks comes in many forms, and the symptoms and behaviors that result also vary widely. The most common probably is depression, you see that in posting of all kinds on many websites. Talk of suicide among these people is fairly common. Some websites like Nature Bats Last & Reddit r/collapse and have such a severe problem with this they need to have Suicide Prevention Hotlines posted on the sidebar of the Homepage. Denialism is another form of insanity that is prevalent. There are numerous people who haunt collapse websites simply to try and refute any claim that Collapse is actually in progress. They are obviously fully aware of it, but the coping mechanism here is just to deny every piece of evidence that becomes manifest.
There are other more subtle forms of insanity though also. Many Kollapsniks become obsessive on certain topics, Renewable Energy, Bankster Corruption, Political Corruption, Geopolitical Conflict, Conspiracy Theory are a few examples of topics a given poster might obsess over. Some obsess over more finely honed topics, like Precious Metals, the Stock Market, Marijuana Legalization or LGBTQ issues. By focusing on a given area, this defense mechanism allows the person to “wall off” many of the other areas of collapse that would otherwise preoccupy them. It is relatively lightweight insanity though, since it doesn’t prevent the person from pursuing normal daily tasks, and they otherwise seem pretty normal.
Religion also is a form of insanity people will retreat into in one form or another as a means to cope with Collapse. You get your Born Again Fundy Christians, Astrology believers, Radical Muslims, Buddhists, Druids, New Age Atheists and many more systems of belief to latch onto. If you are perturbed about Collapse Issues, there’s a Religion out there for you to believe in that will salve your wounded soul! Some of these religions are pretty innocuous, others are quite dangerous overall to the rest of society functioning around them. They also come into conflict with each other, which can be a problem and makes things worse than they already are. A mass psychosis takes over and any sort of reasonable dialogue between groups of believers becomes impossible.
The insanity can also take some very intense and dangerous forms as well, in the form of the Shoot-em-Ups and Postal events we see in ever increasing frequency. The biggest EVAH here in the FSoA was the Vegas shooting, where as of last count close to 60 were DEAD and more than 400 wounded. This shooter had a LOT of ammo! He also planned well and put himself in a spot where he would be hard to take out, so he had a good hour’s worth of shooting Ducks in a Pond. So far, no motive for this insanity has been elucidated. He was financially well to do, he was white and he was older in his 60s. Not the typical demographic of a poor, brown young guy out spraying the bullets in the typical shoot-em-up. Why did he SNAP?
Backing off the more dangerous types of insanity that can crop up, much more common and benign is Prepper Insanity. You see this all over the Survivalist websites and Doomsteading Websites, where Kollapsniks cope with oncoming Collapse by either collecting and hoarding preps and/or moving “off-grid” onto a rural Doomstead to try and be ready to survive TEOTWAWKI. These folks don’t see themselves as NUTS, they see themselves as having a sane reaction to the insane world they are immersed in, but all their friends think they are nuts. “WHAT!?!? You’re giving up a 6 figure job as an IT Manager to live on a subsistence permaculture farm in rural Maine?!?!?!”
I fit into this last category of people who have been driven insane by my knowledge of collapse. It doesn’t depress me, I have no issues there. Shit in the world has always been fucked up for as long as I have been alive, this is just another Monkey Wrench (Spanner for you Brits) thrown into the works here you have to deal with if you want to stay alive and put food in your mouth for another day. So in 2008 when I became “Collapse Aware” I became an Insane Prepper. For a good 5 years straight, I bought just about every device and long term storable food you can dream up, and my digs are STUFFED with this supply. My goal with this was to be able to survive what I call the “Zero Point”, when everything crashes, the ATMs go down, JIT trucking fails, etc. I figured if I could make it for a couple of years out in the bush and wait it out, most of the population would die off and then I could possibly hook up with other survivors to do a reboot. Back then, I was a healthier specimen as a Homo Sap meat package.
Unfortunately, the last decade has seen an extreme decline in my health, and the possibility I could even survive a month out in the bush even with all my preps gets smaller by the day. So about a year ago, my Prepping to survive collapse STOPPED. I don’t prep for that anymore, because it’s a waste of good prepping time, not to mention money. However, I am still insane, and still a Prepper. So instead of Prepping on how I would LIVE through collapse, now I have been planning how to DIE during collapse. Not sure exactly when this crossing over to the Great Beyond will occur, just as I am not sure precisely when SHTF Day will come to my neighborhood. But as with trying to LIVE, in preparing to DIE I don’t want to be caught with my pants down unprepared.
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After my accident, I realized quickly how woefully unprepared I was to die. I had no Last Will & Testament, and while I am by no means rich, I do have quite a few assets and ZERO debt. I own several carz which while all old are also in good working order. I don’t use them much, but I have them. I have a supply of Preps any prepper would salivate over. They won’t keep you going forever, but if you were on Puerto Rico with them you could go at least a year. I also have some MONEY. I won my Workman’s Compensation case and got a decent settlement out of that. I have my own savings and small inheritances I got when my parents went to the Great Beyond. I spent some of this of course during periods of low income or unemployment, but most of it I still have. I am a pretty penurious person overall so I don’t waste my money too fast usually.
So the first thing that needed to get done was to write a Will and get it Notarized and Legal, which I did. That made me feel a lot better. Then I had to get my Executor familiar with all my stuff and where it is and how to distribute it properly after I croak. This took a while to do, mainly because although I had people who agreed to execute the Will, most of them would not be able to get to Alaska to do the job and moreover they needed to get here first to go over everything, also something nobody has time for or wants to do really. It’s kind of depressing and morbid of course. However, eventually I did get this done with a friend from my coaching years who is responsible and dependable, so I am confident the Will will be executed properly.
The next big worry for me as I contemplated oncoming DEATH was my Intellectual Property, of which there is a LOT more than my physical property. I have been writing on the net for over 20 years, long predating my obsession with Doom. The Diner by itself is a database currently approaching 5GB in size. 100s of 1000’s if not 10*6 pages of text material. After spending basically a lifetime putting together this material, do I want to see it vanish from the face of the earth the day I Buy My Ticket to the Great Beyond? Of course not! Even if my material is only appreciated by a few people now, I could become FAMOUS after I am DEAD! lol. So I wanted to insure that all my intellectual material isn’t lost the day I Kick the Bucket, Buy the Farm, Push up Daisies, Take a Dirt Nap, Permanent Vacation…etc.
Figuring out how to do this has been a Work in Progress over the last 3 years. The main body of work is here on the Doomstead Diner, so preserving that was my first concern. However, the Diner is on a for pay server, so once the hosting company stops receiving money, the Diner gets shut down. My quicky solution was to create a “DoomsteadDinerBeta” site on FREE WordPress space. To that space I copied most of my articles through 2016 or so. I haven’t been updating it lately though. This insures that the material is up for reading somewhere on the internet, until the Internet Goes Dark. Which probably isn’t that far off, IMHO the MOST would be 50 years, but I bet it’s under 20.
Another solution for longer term storage would have been to print it all out on acid-free paper and store that somehow. However, it’s ridiculous and impossible logistically for many reasons. The cost in paper and ink would have been ENORMOUS. Then where to store all that paper while I still am alive? I would need a whole new storage unit for that. Then those boxes of paper would likely end up in landfill after I croak and all the paper chewed up by various microorganisms. Paper books that did survive like the Bible did so not in their original manuscript, but in copies made over the millenia. The oldest Bible we have still in existence is the Codex Sinaiticus, dated to the 4th Century AD. That makes it 1700 years old. It only lasted that long because it’s been carefully preserved through the centuries. So paper was not a choice here, at least not for everything.
Another issue is all my material is not text, there’s a lot of Audio & Video in there also. You can’t print that out on paper. I put a lot of time & energy into that stuff, I don’t want it all POOF disappearing either when I am pushing up daisies. Another means had to be found.
The SOLUTION here was the latest in solid state data storage, Micro SD Cards. One of these tiny suckers can store up to 128 Gigs of information if you buy an expensive one. The Diner Database itself is only 5 Gigs! Even adding in a good size sampling of my A&V, the file still only came up to 13 GB, so a 16 GB card was sufficient to store my entire life’s work of intellectual property! 16 GB cards are down to $10 a pop. That is well within the budget of even a Poor Person like myself! So I set about the task of getting the material packaged up into a file to copy onto SD Cards for preservation.
There is a PROBLEM here of course. This digital media can be ZAPPED by an EMP, which if it doesn’t come from a Nuke being dropped in the local vicinity will at some point come from the SUN☼ pitching out a nice Solar Flare directed straight at the earth, frying any microelectronics still floating around on the planet after the Age of Industrialization comes to a close. So to protect them from that, I needed some sort of Faraday Cage. What I got for that purpose were Aluminum Pill Capsules, designed to keep your medicines high and dry if you are white-water kayaking or doing some other adventure where important stuff you don’t want to get dunked needs to be protected.
A second major issue cropped up in researching how long data will last on and SD Card. Not long, according to the geeks, maybe 10-20 years. I’m not entirely convinced of that though, since I have some very old SD cards I can still read off of. Anyhow, since nobody is ever going to read the data anyhow, this doesn’t much matter. The last imprint on these cards before they randomize to oblivion will be the data I drop on them. I also hope in the event Alien Archaeologists do locate the capsule, they will have technology that allows them to retrieve the last stored data on the card.
Nevertheless, to resolve this problem and get more data into the final package, I went back to the old standby of data storage, PAPER & INK. The small capsule doesn’t have room for more paper though, so I determined I would need a BIGGER BOAT! For this purpose, I purchased Stainless Steel Double-Walled Hot Food Thermoses. I would have prefered Aluminum, but I couldn’t find the right size container in aluminum, so I had to go with Stainless Steel. It should still be OK though, since it will be coated several layers thick in Polyurethane, then further in concrete and stone. More on that later in capsule preparation. This container gives me room for more like 20-30 pages of printed text (estimate, haven’t worked this one out yet in finalization), which is still not a lot but I can detail a lot more than I did on the one page I got to squeeze into the smaller capsule!
This now is where we move from being semi-normal and merely wishing to preserve your Life’s Work to getting flat out INSANE.
After the Will though was the issue of my Corporeal Remains, AKA my CORPSE.
Even prior to considering how I might preserve my Intellectual Property, I started worrying about what would be done with my Corporeal Remains? Buried or Cremated? Where to drop the Corpse or Ashes on the Planet to rest until the SUN goes Red Giant? In terms of location, I more or less settled on the cemetery where my mom is buried in Springfield, MO, although there are some caveats to this which I will get to later. I bought a plot there which cost me $1000, not too bad. For this price, I get stone placement (not the stone, gotta order that separate) and “perpetual care”. Which amounts I think to mowing the lawn around your stone and weeding, but I doubt either will be done after TSHTF. However, neither do I imagine the stone will be moved. Whatever population is left is unlikely to be messing around much in cemeteries.
Getting the stone I WANT has proven to be the biggest obstacle so far, and I am still working on that one. I don’t want one of those typical gravestone markers, I want something unique and distinctive. I have a few different designs I have drawn up, but finding someone to cut the stones and then getting them to Missouri for placement is the real bear. I’ll update on the stones when I finally get them ordered and I know what I will be getting. There is about a 4 month lag time also from when you order to when the stones are shipped out of the quarry, so if I want to actually see them I will have to stay alive long enough for that. lol.
At the beginning, all I was going to drop in the capsules was my Intellectual Property on the Micro-SD Card and samples of my own DNA from hair clippings. However the more spacious Burial Chamber of the larger capsules gave me room to think about more things I should try to preserve for All Eternity.
The first thing that I added were 4 Scrolls on Acid Free 100% Cotton paper which give a Reader’s Digest history of the existence of Homo Sap on Earth, from the beginning of life until the End of the Age of Oil. I did this on paper just in case if the capsules are ever found in the distant future and the finders do not have access to computers, they will have some idea of what the contents of the capsule contain. Of course, they will also need to be able to decode and read English. lol. The reason this information comes in Scroll form is this is the best way to pack it in the Capsules. You roll up the scroll, then when you insert into the capsule it automatically expands to the internal diameter of the capsule with no wasted space. I found I could fit 4 of them in and still have room down the center for all the rest of the stuff I wanted to include.
The scrolls are cut from typical 8.5 X 11″ paper, each one 2″ wide. Each page will make 3 scrolls. So I had to get the entire History of Life on Planet Earth down to ONE PAGE of prose! That’s some serious Reader’s Digest work there! lol I reduced the size of the font to the minimum my computer offers up, 6pt. After printing, I need my Reading Glasses to be able to make it out, it’s like the tiny instructions booklets you get with electronics these days. The 4th Scroll is on Photographic paper, same dimensions and has 4 pics on it of…ME! This so that in case the Alien Archaeologists of the future can’t read the SD Card they will be able to see what a Homo Sap looked like. The card holds many more pics of life at the End of the Age of Oil on Planet Earth for them to peruse.
As mentioned above, I added to the original capsule arrangement a larger arrangement to contain more scrolls. This container is still a work in progress and the total amount of word content on acid-free paper yet to be determined. I want to get the small capsules finished before I embark on trying to edit up and format text-on-paper that is supposed to last for All Eternity.
However, TONS of room is still available even in the small capsule after the SD Card, the DNA container and the 3 Scrolls were placed, so what to add to it to fill up the space?
Here I decided to add stuff to help preserve Life on Earth in the future. I added small capsules with heirloom seeds and edible mushroom spores in them. I ordered Tardigrades from Carolina Biological Supply, dessicated them and dropped them in another capsule. Tardigrades were the best option for trying to preserve animal life since they can survive temperatures close to Absolute Zero and radiation levels in the 1000s of roentgens. They won’t survive being roasted when the SUN goes Red Giant though.
All of these items I am carefully packaging up to last as long as possible in my lifetime “Treasure Chest”, which gets buried with my casket and my meat package remains in a reinforced concrete vault chamber 6 feet under my Tombstone marker. Why am I putting all this time and effort into trying to preserve this stuff?
Well, if this stuff is ever to be found, it’s likely to be a long time between the time it gets buried and the time it gets dug up. Who will dig it up? IMHO, only two possibilities exist for this, either it will be Alien Archaeologists in the far future doing research on failed civilizations or it will be a NEW SPECIES of the Genus Homo, which I have labelled “Homo Dinerus”. This species will evolve from the remnants of the current human population after the Dieoff levels out, with maybe 10,000 Human Souls or 1000 Breeding Pairs left alive after all the nuclear bombs are detonated and all the coastal cities are under 30m of seawater.
I consider both of these outcomes to be low probability events though, after the chest goes in the ground with my meat package I don’t expect it will ever be read by ANYBODY. Sort of like old blogs, which are all up here on the net at the moment but nobody ever reads them. lol. So what’s the POINT?
The point is that the organization of data from your mind, unlike your corporeal remains is eternal, at least if you can find something long lasting to store it on and then periodically re-copy it onto new media. It symbolizes your unique existence here on Earth at one brief interval in the space-time continuum. In terms of my own Spiritual Beliefs, I believe keeping all the intellectual material together will help my Immortal Soul maintain its integrity when I leave my corporeal shell and cross the Great Divide. When I am reincarnated, I will have a greater memory for the things that occured during this iteration of my immortal soul on Earth. At least that is how my Theology works. If I am right, I gain a lot from this, if I am wrong I lose nothing. So it’s worth the effort, even if it seems NUTS to all my friends.
Next week I hope to be ordering the first of several stones that will serve as marker and monument for my Eternal Resting Place. Of all the media I have available to me, Granite is the most long lasting of all, so with my marker I sought also to deliver a message across the ages. Of necessity since the total surface area is not that large, the information needs to be conveyed in a symbological form rather than with Words, although I do have a decent number of words inscribed on the stones along with the symbols. In my next installment of this series, I will Unveil the Tombstone, which is an homage to Civilizations of the Past and the Eternal Beauty of Mathematics.
57 Comments on "Prepping for Death"
diemos on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 9:18 pm
The End of the World is coming for everyone sooner or later, not as a widescreen michael bey epic with loads of cool cgi but with a whimper.
MASTERMIND on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 9:39 pm
Denialism is another form of insanity that is prevalent. There are numerous people who haunt collapse websites simply to try and refute any claim that Collapse is actually in progress. They are obviously fully aware of it, but the coping mechanism here is just to deny every piece of evidence that becomes manifest.
Busted Clogg…LOL this is the perfect description of him…LOL
Outcast_Searcher on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 10:54 pm
MM: of course, if anyone, like say a moderate, doesn’t fall for the constantly wrong in our face doom forecasts of the reality challenged folks (based on your posts over time) like you, then, OF COURSE, “THEY” must be insane.
LOL. Hey, whatever makes you and zerohedge, etc. feel good about your constantly wrong predictions.
MASTERMIND on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 11:02 pm
Outcast
What forecast have I been wrong about? And I have never posted one article from zerohedge? I use peer reviewed scholarly references.
Peer Reviewed Study: Society Could Collapse In A Decade, Predicts Historian (Turchin, 2010)
https://www.nature.com/articles/463608a
NASA Peer Reviewed Study: Industrial Civilization is Headed for Irreversible Collapse (Motesharrei, 2014)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800914000615
The Royal Society: Peer Reviewed Study, Now for the First Time A Global Collapse Appears Likely (Ehrlich, 2013)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3574335/
Peer Reviewed Study: Limits to Growth was Right. Research Shows We’re Nearing Global Collapse (Turner, 2014)
http://sustainable.unimelb.edu.au/sites/default/files/docs/MSSI-ResearchPaper-4_Turner_2014.pdf
Peer Reviewed Study: Financial System Supply-Chain Cross-Contagion: Global Systemic Collapse (Korowicz, 2012)
http://www.feasta.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Trade-Off1.pdf
MASTERMIND on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 11:04 pm
Outcast_Searcher
Existing oil reserves are scheduled to begin a catastrophic crash within 1 to 3 years. When it hits the economic and social damage will be catastrophic. The end of Western Civilization, from China to Europe, to the US, will not occur when oil runs out. The economic and social chaos will occur when supplies are merely reduced sufficiently….
https://imgur.com/a/6dEDt
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v481/n7382/full/481433a.html
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421509001281
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030142151300342X
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016236114010254
http://www.geo.cornell.edu/eas/energy/the_challenges/peak_oil.html
http://www.energybulletin.net/sites/default/files/Peak%20Oil_Study%20EN.pdf
http://www.scribd.com/document/367688629/HSBC-Peak-Oil-Report-2017
MASTERMIND on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 11:05 pm
The End of the Oil Age is Imminent!
Recently, the HSBC oil report stated that 80% of conventional oil fields were declining at a rate of 5-7% per year. This means that there will be an oil shortage of ~30 million barrels per day by 2030 and ~40 million barrels per day by 2040.
http://www.scribd.com/document/367688629/HSBC-Peak-Oil-Report-2017
What is mentioned far less often is that annual oil discoveries have lagged annual production since the 1980s.
https://imgur.com/a/6dEDt
Now, this problem has nothing to do with the recent decline in the oil price, which started in 2014. This has been an on-going problem for the past 30 years. Now, the IEA is predicting oil shortages by ~2020 due to declining exploration.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/iea-says-global-oil-discoveries-at-record-low-in-2016-1493244000
Here, the IEA blames this problem on the low oil price. But, this problem started in the 1980s. The problem is geological: we are running out of conventional cheap oil. Shale and tar sands are not the answer, either. Those resources are far too expensive, compared to conventional oil, because the global economy is based on cheap conventional oil. Expensive oil is not a replacement for cheap oil.
Based upon the HSBC report and the IEA, the End of Oil Age will start around ~2020: there will be a dramatic economic depression due to exhaustion of cheap oil. This will cause a global economic collapse.
MASTERMIND on Sun, 18th Feb 2018 11:06 pm
As M. King Hubbert (1956) shows, peak oil is about discovering less oil, and eventually producing less oil due to lack of discovery.
https://imgur.com/a/6dEDt
IEA Chief warns of world oil shortages by 2020 as discoveries fall to record lows
https://www.wsj.com/articles/iea-says-global-oil-discoveries-at-record-low-in-2016-1493244000
Saudi Aramco CEO sees oil shortage coming as investments, oil discoveries drop
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-aramco-oil/aramco-ceo-sees-oil-supply-shortage-as-investments-discoveries-drop-idUSKBN19V0KR
Peak Oil Vindicated by the IEA and Saudi Arabia
deadly on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 5:42 am
Just as long as the trucks heading east from the west coast continue to roll, there is nothing to worry about.
When you get to Iowa, trucks never speed, costs too much to stop after being stopped, you go the speed limit. It is much easier to do. The traffic is constant from the Nebraska border all the way to Illinois. Gawd awful at times. If you do what the truckers do, not speed, you’ll be OK.
You can prep for death, I’ll wait until after I’m dead to prepare for being dead.
Staying alive has more importance. Prepping to stay alive is tough enough to do. prepping for death is just too much.
I won’t be getting in line, sorry.
I can wait, no need to be ready.
Davy on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 6:32 am
Death is something we are in denial of even in the best of times. Many of man’s dysfunctions are related to the denial and fear of death. It is a product of an isolated ego that is projected on the social narrative. Religions have been corrupted by it. The real meaning of the myth underlying Christianity has been bastardized by our denial and fear of death. This is not confined to Christianity it is just manifested so well through Christian history.
This is a human predicament both of the individual and our civilization. It is what happens when the linear meets the nonlinear. There is no transcending this condition but there is a transformation that comes with the humility of acceptance. Whatever that is because this is an individual reality. In the case of a civilization it can never face death. Civilizations by their nature grow until they can’t. This means we should not find our foundational meaning through civilization even though civilization is required to find meaning. Ultimately we must loose ourselves to find ourselves which is an abstract form of death.
Society cannot and will not embrace death which in society’s case are limits and ends. You can only do this as individuals and small communities so you must yield to society’s narrative. You must live with this dysfunction to leave it. This is important at this time and place in civilization’s history because we are in the vicinity of limits and threshold breaks. Civilization is nearing its end and time is speeding up as it does for old people. Civilization is experiencing turbulence as it nears a phase change. We are turning over from growth to decline. For humans who live in the unreality of a personal history this is deceptive. The reality is this is a global process that is human and planetary. It is above what individuals can accommodate into their life system. This is then what is responsible for so many psychological issues today. We no longer have myths that offer meaning. Our lives are dominated by consumeristic pursuit of affluence that is little more than an elaborate denial of death. This is now our god and it is an empty god of physical comforts and pleasures not hard reality of pain and suffering.
Dooming and prepping should deal with death. In fact it should be an integral part of the higher stages of dooming and prepping. One should train for death as part of one’s education. We are going into a time where deaths will outnumber births. Economic activity will decline in a type of death. Planetary systems are in a kind of death at least in regards to life. Advanced life is being degraded in a type of death. This means to properly prepare for what is ahead death must be part of it.
I like the idea of lifeboats and hospices. I think McPherson coined the idea. While I am not as extreme as he is I do believe the process is heading in that direction of an end of the world as we know it. This might be a Kunstler long emergency or it might be a mad max end. There is no way to know which and this is why extremist of either position are delusional. It will likely be both at work at the same time in a mixture that equals one big process of growth and decline. Currently it appears we are in an undulating plateau of both but I suspect it won’t be long before decline overpowers growth. This is human because the planet is doing what it has always done and that is evolve. The planet could give a shit about humans.
Lifeboats are the yielding to decline and decay. Yielding means not fighting it but embracing it. It will assist you if you embrace it. It means adapting and mitigating decline. It means collapsing in place and attempting to downsize with dignity. There is plenty of low hanging fruit that affluent people like most of us can pick in this process. It is those who don’t embrace the process that will one day find themselves naked psychologically and physically. Those who embrace decline then will also embrace the idea of hospices. The reason for this is ultimately downsizing and collapsing in place is a response to death. Hospices are a place to physically and spiritually embrace death. It offers the living a chance to properly face this dramatic change to life. If is a place where dignity can be maintained for both the dying and their love ones. It is a place of honesty because nothing is more honest than death.
Dooming and prepping is not for everyone it is just for the spiritually honest and advanced. The reason life offers denial strategies is because it is human nature to deny death. The honesty of death is too much for many individuals. This is not a statement of better or worse. It is a reality of condition and ascending levels of understanding. There are no values to place on this. This is a deeper level beyond judgment. Society is all about living and growing. The universe is infinite and timeless. So the individual is caught in the dysfunction that occurs in between these states. Some are not capable of being exposed to this existential darkness. It is only for some to embrace this way of life. It is a place for wisdom because ultimately death drives wisdom. Embracing death is the prerequisite of wisdom.
Darrell Cloud on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 7:18 am
Death is inevitable. If you have ever passed out you learned one of two things happen. Everything goes black and then you come back or everything stays black and somebody else has to clean up the mess. Either way death is not to be feared. The process of dying holds many a fear. Will you go out with a sigh or will you go out screaming? That is the question. Get out of your house and travel a bit. Climb the pyramids in Central America. Walk through the streets of Athens; look at the Roman ruins in the south of France. Understand that all systems go through a cycle, they are born, they grow up, they age and then they die. Such is the nature of things. We are all variations of one of two things. We are self-centered all about ourselves and nothing to others or we are marathon runners who endeavor to pass what we have learned and acquire on to others. We die either way. You choose.
Dredd on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 7:54 am
Of 26 civilizations at the time of his book, all but a few committed “suicide” … those few were murdered.
The genes in those civilizations are still around (The “Genes” of Culture In Civilizations – 2).
onlooker on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 9:03 am
I think that as the signs of Collapse become ever more evident and undeniable, some will evidence signs of insanity as they will have a very difficult time dealing with it. So I think this topic is highly pertinent for anybody and everybody. Beyond the fact that we all must deal with our eventual demise, we must deal with the helplessness of global demise leading to our own premature demise. Some can deal with it, some will not be able too. It is the nature of the makeup of certain people as opposed to others. It reminds of what I heard about fear. Overcoming fear is not about ignoring it or downplaying it but confronting it and overcoming it.
Cloggie on Mon, 19th Feb 2018 12:33 pm
Prepping in Germany: AfD now 2nd party in the polls.
http://www.pi-news.net/2018/02/rechts-vor-links-afd-ueberholt-erstmals-die-spd-bundesweit/
In France and Holland the socialists hardly exist any longer. Won’t be different in Germany.
AfD openly defends Russian Crimea annexation and wants to see sanctions lifted:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ko9gUV3mSk8
German foreign minister Gabriel (SPD) also wants to see the sanctions gradually lifted, much to the chagrin of the SED-witch Merkel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VRRWyVpkCo
Kat C on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 4:39 am
When I discovered Peak Oil back in 2001 I was momentarily depressed. Then I realized that everyone alive was going to die anyway. What changed with collapse and now climate change is the when, the how and whether or not you pass on any genes. In collapse death might be quicker and therefore easier than without collapse. Long years suffering from cancer, or warehoused in a nursing home seem worse than being offed by a person trying to steal your stuff. When doesn’t matter once you are dead, it is only thinking about plans for the future that make us think when matters. And while we care about children and grandchildren, do we really care about the few our or personal genes still persisting 10 generations hence? The plus of extinction if the planet rids itself of humans is that it ends death of humans. The unborn never die. Every day 300,000 humans are born who then have to die. The sooner collapse comes the less humans ever have to die. I find that a comforting thought. And if you like sleeping and hate to wake up, meditate on that and the idea of being dead becomes less of a problem
bobinget on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 11:56 am
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/world-news/683260/Iran-Israel-War-Drone-F-16-Middle-East-Evacuation-Drills-Syria-Schools-IRGC-Netanyahu
Sergio on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 12:40 pm
This is my first post hier. I’ve been reading this blog for two or three years. Sorry for my bad english.
I’m sure we’re going to collapse as a civilization although I’m not a prepper. I don’t have money enough to be one. So I’ve psychologically prepping to die on the collapse process.
That’s what I think the article was about when I read the title. I was mistaked. The author is just prepping a Will and some others issues.
I’d like to read an article about how to prepare to accept death. I’m not talking about suicide, just accept death when it comes as a consequence of collapse.
fmr-paultard on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 12:48 pm
@dredd
waxing poetically doesn’t absolve you from punishment of death either.
Muhammad also ordered the death of an elderly man named Abu Afak. This occurred less than two years after he had arrived at Medina. Abu Afak was said to be 120 years old. His “crime” was to compose satirical poetry about Muhammad in protest of the many assassinations that the prophet of Islam had ordered.
https://www.thereligionofpeace.com/pages/muhammad/elderly-kill.aspx
Davy on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 1:03 pm
Sergio, we appreciate you visiting and if you have any doom and prep question or concerns I am very happy to reply. Tonight I will address your question on how I see possible preparation for death in a collapse situation. I am of course no expert but I have thought about the issue in regards to my doom and prep efforts.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 1:05 pm
Sergio
I have a great article about that subject with several studies on that topic.
What It’s Like to Learn You’re Going to Die
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/11/the-existential-slap/544790/?utm_source=atltw
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 2:00 pm
“I’d like to read an article about how to prepare to accept death. I’m not talking about suicide, just accept death when it comes as a consequence of collapse.”
There are plenty of ways to avoid dying as a result of economic or societal collapse Sergio. Dying period, not so much. Whether one chooses to accept it or not, nobody gets out alive.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 3:20 pm
Greg
There are plenty of ways to avoid dying as a result of economic or societal collapse.
Too many “if’s”…You are totally outnumbered and without the rule of law you will be toast.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 3:27 pm
Dow closes 254 points lower as Walmart posts worst day since January 1988
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/20/us-stock-futures-dow-data-earnings-and-politics.html
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 3:55 pm
“Too many “if’s”…You are totally outnumbered and without the rule of law you will be toast.”
Civilizations have collapsed before, and they’ll likely collapse again. Mankind will survive, unless we trigger an environmental collapse, then our species will be toast.
The longer we keep destroying the natural environment, the greater the odds are of that happening. Modern industrial society is presently the greatest threat to mankind’s long term existence. The sooner it comes to an end, the better.
We will be just fine here. There is zero crime, and a very low population density. You, on the other hand, are in for extremely troubling times ahead. Glad I’m not in your shoes. Good luck to you.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 4:03 pm
And MM,
“The more you know, the more you know you don’t know.”
― Aristotle
You might figure it out sooner or later. You’re obviously a very slow learner.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 6:28 pm
Greg
I have no way to move out into the country side. Nor do I want to as well. If my country and society collapses I want to go down with my people…I just wish I had another twenty years..that’s all…
Kat C on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 6:40 pm
Greg T we have already triggered environmental collapse…the positive feedbacks of climate change are in place and it cannot be stopped. But even collapse does us in as once the grid fails all 400+ nuclear power plants in the world go Fukushima, fires burn without anyone to put them out, they burn over nuclear and chemical dumps and towns and cities. Anyone who might survive for a while will wish they hadn’t.
fmr-paultard on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 6:49 pm
I’m the hyphenated fmr-paultard I’m a libtard and I hated the Donald but I developed a soft spot for president Trump because he left my luke 22:36 alone
That and giving Jerusalem to Israel made me misty in the eyes
fmr-paultard on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 6:55 pm
K I just read daily mail traitor p*ssy grabber Donald gonna go after Luke 22:36
Fking coward draft dodger
Davy on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 7:02 pm
Sergio, In regards to the collapse process and mortality one needs to realize the variability of collapse. This is going to scale by location, temporally and by the condition. Degree and duration will make a big difference and it will likely strike locals unprepared. Locations in overshoot to reasonable carrying capacity are disadvantaged from the get go. The scenarios are many and varied so predictions are difficult. We have dispersed risk globally and created many new risk we did not have in the past. Yet, technology has allowed greater risk management. Technology along with good behavior will assist in mitigating these dangers to some extent. At this time I am not sure if it is worth it to stress out over a possible collapse. There are plenty of other dangers in life statistically.
I am a doomer and prepper who lives the life. It is a way of life for me. I am a student of this way of life. It is academic for me but also personal. I enjoy the study of it. I enjoy the way of life. For others they do not have time to get as in-depth as I am. Some don’t deal with it at all. I would say the important point to those who are not well educated to the collapse process is to avoid letting your imagination get out of control. Too often people scream mad max and terrible immediate doom which is just not the case. It may be happening somewhere like Syria or Venezuela but globally we are still stable. It can happen and increasingly is likely but that does not mean it will happen like we see in the movies. I would also hedge this with a warning to the cavalier among us who ignore collapse. Do so at your own risk. There are some smart action one can take that can make a big difference. The problem with this is it requires people to make some sacrifices with time and money. Humans are good with putting these sacrifices off to another day and before you know it something happens and they are not prepared.
I would say we are heading into a period of more deaths than births. When this shift occurs is not the point so much as it is the direction. It’s coming and we are in the vicinity of a die down. With that in mind one needs only to read 18th and 19th century novels and non-fiction to understand what increased deaths mean. We are not acclimated to these conditions anywhere in the world really. War zones are different because they generally stabilize eventually. This will be a new reality. Yet, it was an old reality we will revisit.
The fear of dying is a good motivator. What one wants to avoid is the dysfunctional fears that result from denial and bargaining with death and dying. The best policy is to face pain, suffering, and less affluence with as much dignity as one can muster. It will likely be a time of increased living because of all the dying. The best and worst of human nature comes out when man faces crisis. Try to draw on your higher strengths. Try to seek wisdom and avoid the pitfalls of hubris and selfishness. Not so much because of a code of morality but because it will be those who find common goals in community that will survive. Survival is ultimately about community. Short term one can prep all he likes but longer term the functionality of a community arrangement is paramount.
makati1 on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 7:04 pm
MM, you may have another 20 – 40 years, if you are lucky and don’t do anything stupid. They will just not be years like your past or even present. Survival will be number one. And hard physical labor.
Granted a world war, especially nuclear, will likely end it for all of us. Be glad you got the years already in your past. My newest great grandson will not even have those.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 7:27 pm
Kat C,
It may very well be that we have already triggered a runaway greenhouse event, maybe not. The best thing to do would be to stop burning fossil fuels now, but no doubt, we will not.
“But even collapse does us in as once the grid fails all 400+ nuclear power plants in the world go Fukushima, fires burn without anyone to put them out, they burn over nuclear and chemical dumps and towns and cities. Anyone who might survive for a while will wish they hadn’t.”
The grid isn’t going to go down due to economic collapse. That’s just silly talk. There are far more than enough fossil fuels remaining to maintain BAU for the upper echelons of society for a very long time to come. Those in power aren’t going to give it up simply because the bottom falls out of society. They’ll still be playing with their armies, cruising in their yachts, and jet setting to their retreats in the Bahamas. Same as it ever was.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 7:44 pm
I might add,
If we have triggered a runaway event, expect more of the same as we’ve already seen, only more often, and more widespread. Stuck weather patterns, floods, drought, wildfires, and bigger storms. The catastrophic consequences of a runaway event are not likely to occur until the third quarter of this century, or later.
Some people, (one in particular on this board) are constantly shouting the end of the world due to Peak Oil. Also nonsense. Peak Oil is the moment in time when mankind will be producing the most fossil fuels ever, not the least. When oil shortages become problematic, forget about the drive shop consume lifestyle. Standards of living will drop considerably, especially here in the first world, where we have much farther to fall.
Oil shortages are easily manageable, people will simply need to learn to get by with much less, like billions around the world already do.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 7:57 pm
“Granted a world war, especially nuclear, will likely end it for all of us.”
This is the most likely near term threat facing humanity. IMO. There is one country in particular, that has made itself very clear, that it’s way of life is non-negotiable. I would expect the resource wars to escalate, even though the end result of a much lower standard of living is assured.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 8:44 pm
MM,
“If my country and society collapses I want to go down with my people”
It isn’t your country, and they aren’t your people. When TS gets bad, your tax farmers would just as soon blow your brains out, as your neighbours would have you for dinner.
Don’t kid yourself buddy, nobody gives a shit about you. You’re on your own, especially in a capitalist dog eat dog society.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:14 pm
Peak Tight Oil By 2022? EIA Thinks It’s Possible, Without Even Accounting For This Risk
https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2018/02/20/is-peak-oil-possible-in-four-years/#5cfaa76352b6
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:21 pm
Those EIA projections all show the US producing copious amounts of oil through 2050 MM. The lowest projection shows ~7 Mbpd. The high projection shows ~18 Mbpd.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:40 pm
Greg
I know, I just shared the article. Rapier is a fellow Peak Oiler..He is in the Peak Oil group on FB..He told me that when he talks to oil executives and talks about peak oil. They usually think he is nuts…LOL
MASTERMIND on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:43 pm
Applebee’s closed 99 locations last year — and it’s about to close dozens more
https://www.chron.com/technology/businessinsider/article/Applebee-s-closed-99-locations-last-year-after-12627682.php
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:48 pm
“It is difficult get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
-Upton Sinclair
My brother in law is an oil exec MM. I get exactly the same response from him. There’s no point in even bringing the subject up.
GregT on Tue, 20th Feb 2018 10:50 pm
“Applebee’s closed 99 locations last year — and it’s about to close dozens more.”
Not surprising. Their food sucks.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 12:57 am
Top Economist: America: the future looks broke
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018632011/america-the-future-looks-broke
Kat C on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 3:39 am
Greg T, the grid is a massive piece of infrastructure requiring much investment and many people to keep it functioning. Even if the wealthy still have money for their lifestyle after collapse, the fact that they are the 1% or .1% means that they can’t be everywhere. How do they keep the grid going and run the power plants in the face of societal anarchy. They will be using their money and guns just to control people. How will they put out the ever increasing forest fires that not only threaten houses, but also chemical and nuclear dumps, power plants, and even the homes of the wealthy? How will they protect the nuclear power plants at oceans edges or sitting on rivers below aging dams? You have no idea what you are talking about because you don’t see the interactions that have been hidden but are slowly being revealed. Climate change, nuclear power plants, the economy, infrastructure, etc are all intertwined. The elite cannot begin to deal with what is coming. And the stupid idiots buy their weapons but don’t upgrade the grid or defend it against solar flares or EMP
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/a-future-space-weather-catastrophe–a-disturbing-possibility.html
http://www.businessinsider.com/replacing-the-us-electric-grid-could-cost-5-trillion-2017-3
The question is not if but when the grid comes down.
GregT on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:28 am
Kat C,
“The question is not if but when the grid comes down.”
That would all depend on where you live, and how you define “the grid”. The entire world is not tied into the same electric power grid. Our ‘grid’ here, for example, is 100% hydro electric, and local.
“Even if the wealthy still have money for their lifestyle after collapse, the fact that they are the 1% or .1% means that they can’t be everywhere. How do they keep the grid going and run the power plants in the face of societal anarchy.”
If you were a member of the .1%, what would you do? Would you camp out in your mansion in an area of high population density in the center of societal anarchy, or would you relocate at a moments notice? I know what I would do.
“They will be using their money and guns just to control people.”
Assuming that money still has value.
I’m betting that at some point, it won’t. In a collapse scenario there would be more important needs, like food, water, shelter, security, and above all, energy. And what would be the point in trying to control people? Much easier to simply let them kill each other off.
“How will they put out the ever increasing forest fires that not only threaten houses, but also chemical and nuclear dumps, power plants, and even the homes of the wealthy? How will they protect the nuclear power plants at oceans edges or sitting on rivers below aging dams?”
Why would they bother? Much easier to simply relocate.
“You have no idea what you are talking about because you don’t see the interactions that have been hidden but are slowly being revealed.”
Absolutely I do. The very reason why I terminated my 32 year long career, and moved as far away from densely populated areas as possible. We spent over 3 years choosing our location, with all of your above points in mind.
“Climate change, nuclear power plants, the economy, infrastructure, etc are all intertwined. The elite cannot begin to deal with what is coming.”
Nuclear power plants are a threat to those who live in their immediate vicinities, and yes, if 400 nuke plants melted down globally, (not likely) the incidences of cancers would definitely increase. This would be a decadal long process however, and would not affect everybody.
Economies have crashed before. Nothing new under the sun. This would most likely be followed by a period of societal unrest, and a reduction in population numbers. I have no doubt that less civilized factions would gain control. The same as it ever was. Nothing new under the sun.
What we consider to be infrastructure today was always temporary, a one time shot, provided to us by cheap energy from fossil fuels. Which, BTW, there are still massive amounts left to exploit.
Climate change is the 5 ton elephant in the room. If a runaway greenhouse event is/or already has been, triggered, then all bets are off for the continuation of our species. If that is indeed the case, then enjoy your life to the fullest, and extend your best hand to all of those around you. There is no point in getting depressed over it.
I don’t buy into the binary all or nothing
GregT on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:33 am
I don’t buy into the binary all or nothing viewpoint. There are simply far too many variables to consider.
If you are concerned about your future, then turn it into something positive. After all, none of us gets out of this alive.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:46 am
Greg
The US and Canada share the same grid..There is an east and west grid..The only place that has their own grid is the state of Texas.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:50 am
Kat C you have it right..Don’t let the deniers on this board tell you otherwise.
Simple really….when the World Economy Collapses everything shuts down…the end… We’re talking about grids down all over the world and 7.5B people dropping like f*** flies in short order. The collapse will be absolutely horrible..There is no collapse or horror movie ever produced that has even come close to imagining what the collapse of BAU might look like. I’m talking about every corporation and every social program going bankrupt at once. I’m talking about people eating people. I’m talking about the Worst Catastrophe to ever happen in the history of mankind. Nothing has ever, or will ever come close….
GregT on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:50 am
“The US and Canada share the same grid..There is an east and west grid..The only place that has their own grid is the state of Texas.”
Thanks for the info MM. Our power grid here is 100% hydro, and local. We are not tied into the national grid.
MASTERMIND on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 10:54 am
Greg you might like this read..
Top Economist: America: the future looks broke
Professor Laurence Kotlikoff from the University of Boston is, according to The Economist, one of the 25 most influential economists in the world.
He says politicians in America have been running a type of intergenerational Ponzi scheme since the 1950s, and if future liabilities are accounted for on the nation’s books, it is effectively bankrupt.
The problem is the official debt is only the debts that politicians decide to put on to the books. Politicians are able and free to put whatever they want on to the books and keep other things off the books.”. What doesn’t get recorded is the value of all future government liabilities and the value of all future receipts, what he calls fiscal gap accounting.
Future liabilities would be social security benefits, pensions, health care benefits and defence. These liabilities minus future receipts gives the true picture, Kotlikoff says.
“For the US, the fiscal gap is not $US20 trillion, which is the size of the official debt, but it’s $US200 trillion, ten times larger.
“So we have a huge, massive insolvency problem in our country. It corresponds to 10 percent of GDP for ever. That’s what you would need to collect in additional receipts, or cut in spending every year into the future for ever, in order to come up with $US200 trillion in present value. So the country’s bankrupt.”
“Trump doesn’t know a thing about economics, he doesn’t understand long term fiscal problems, demographic problem. He doesn’t seem to care, he’s just trying to get himself re-elected – this is what you see in petty autocrats.”
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018632011/america-the-future-looks-broke
This top economist actually somewhat agrees with your tax farm theory..He calls it a ponzi scheme the government is running. I apologize for calling you a paranoid nutter..I stand corrected.
GregT on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 11:06 am
“This top economist actually somewhat agrees with your tax farm theory..He calls it a ponzi scheme the government is running.”
There is no good reason for it MM, other than to make a small handful of people filthy rich. At the root of that ponzi scheme is fiat money, loaned into existence, created out of thin air, with interest attached. Until that monetary system is abaondoned, or it collapses in on itself, (which it will eventually do) nothing will change.
Oh, and MM, the government isn’t running it.
GregT on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 11:08 am
The hand that gives, is always above the hand that receives.
Or more appropriately; The hand that lends, is always above the hand that borrows.