Will a second Dark Age happen?

Sn1p3r187

Sn1p3r187

Carolinian Shaolin Monk
I got this from Above Top Secret

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread586477/pg1

From a nuclear war, natural disaster, biological contamination, chemical warfare, you name it. From what I know, the Dark Age happened from a mass loss of information available to the public and everyone else. But t happened over time as one person here said. It didn't happen because Rome fell, of course it eventually fell due to foreign invasion and trouble from within but it happened over time and it gave in and then the public lost a lot of access to public information such as books since many libraries were sacked and burned and they weren't being made like they used to. I can only see another Dark Age happening here if we completely digitize our information and get rid of printing presses and physical copies of books and info. Which may happen but it's unlikely since we know our surrounding and we're more aware of what happens in a situation like this, so there will always be a physical copy of something. In the Fallout world, I don't think they ever entered a Dark Age since they have printing presses and local area networks that function like Intranet hotspots in a community like Vault City or NCR. The Dark Age in Europe ended because of the printing press. What do you think? Do you think another Dark Age will come and this time blackout the Western world, or all of it?
 
A second dark age?

You mean there was ever a first dark age?

That's not even debatable, it's plain false. The fall of the roman empire didn't lead into any "darker" an age than the one lived in the classical epoque, and for many people, there was actually and increase in the quality of life, particularly in the western and northern parts of Europe. That time is sometimes called as the "dark" age because we don't know as much of what was going on as we did of what went on during the Roman Empire, not because it was somehow worse.

More to the point of the original post though, I believe, historically speaking, there are plenty of examples where localized acts of war led to more or less widespread misery and a decline in quality of life and progress. But to say that such an event could happen in the whole world is missing the reason why such events have only been witness in localized areas: because people move around, and sure, thousands may suffer, but there will always be those who don't, no matter how catastrophic whatever happens is, and those who don't, will carry the world forward.

Case in point:
- technology kept improving after the fall of the roman empire, and actually saw a big burst in the 800s, the 1000s, the 1100s and from then on. Mostly on farming and building technology, but that's what we're dealing with in that time
- culture, science and education boomed after the black death (or whatever you call it)
- the second world war and the cold war were responsible for much of the technology we have today, directly or indirectly, despite the millions that died and the widespread destruction

But anyway, just my two cents.

:EDIT:
By the way, another point about the fall of the Roman empire and how it wasn't the dark age at all.

Do you know when "History" started? When people started writing about what was going on at the time, right? That's accepted by all and known by most, right?
Ok.
So you can understand that, in the places where there was no writing (or little), like, for example, the Americas, "History" didn't start until a LOT later than the Roman Empire, right?
And do you know what we historians call what the western and northern regions of Europe were living during the roman empire?
It's called protohistory.

It's not prehistory, because that's before there was any writing at all, but it's protohistory because somebody ELSE wrote about what was going on in the western and northern regions of Europe.
Do you know what happened when the Roman empire fell?

Yeah.

Those regions entered "History".

Slowly at first, for many, but surely.

That's a lot better than what was going on before. Over here in Portugal we have crappy "extended family" settlements as late as the fourth century AC, so go figure. Sure, we had second century AC roman cities, but that doesn't mean their "birght" age extended to everyone.
It didn't.

But after they fell, things changed for the better for many people. The Hibernian peninsula, in Portugal's case, saw a complete turn around in the political situation, which eventually led to the map we have today. Sure, it took more than a millenium, but that's still less that what it took Italy to become what it is today.

But anyway, just wanted to try and dispel that myth. Not sure I've been successful. But anyway.
 
Last edited:
Eh... the post in the link doesn't even make any sense, and shows little understanding of global political events.

Al qaeda? Seriously? What can they do? Behead people? How will that somehow destroy all of modern society, on a world wide scale?

As for the actual proposition, nope, the whole world will never collectively agree to un-know cars and modern technology, it simply does not make any sense.

And still lolling at Al Qaeda, if anybody a coalition of Russia America and China would go together, and use their collective force to destroy all libraries in the world, and belly-laugh together afterwards, but even that would be very difficult for them.

It's kindov like trying to destroy humanity - it's not that easy once you try!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top