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Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

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Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#71

Post by Alex3917 »

blahshaw wrote: post #52
Alex3917 wrote: post #37

So this is actually something I've thought a lot about, in terms of whether it's actually rational to be a prepper or if it's just a fun hobby. In nominal terms, your risk of dying in a society-wide collapse is actually larger than your risk of dying in a car accident.[1] So if you wouldn't think twice about taking basic steps to lower your chances of vehicle death (e.g. wearing a seatbelt) then it's absolutely ratio…

I'm really curious what those guidelines are. I don't see them listed in that link.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/243071.php

That's the tl;dr version. For each of those bullet points there is obviously some nuance, e.g. knowing how much exercise counts as being physically active.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#72

Post by fallingfrog »

How many paid people does it take to maintain these huge compounds?? These people don't seem to understand that all of their wealth and possessions only belong to them because there is a big organized power system that says so, with lawyers and cops with guns and people that are required to obtain cash money every month. 5 seconds after things go south, that helicopter belongs to the pilot, not to you. That land you're buying belongs to the person standing on it. If you're really afraid of the apocalypse, then stock up on the only things that will matter afterwards: friends and family, real relationships not based on money. That and some hand tools and guns.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#73

Post by JoeAltmaier »

woofyman wrote: post #53
nickff wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Envy does not justify murder. Most modern philosophers have taken the view that envy itself is immoral.

>Envy does not justify murder In a post apocalyptic society it's kill or be killed.

In a sense. The size of the group matters - inside the group you have trusted allies. Two foragers are safer than one; three are safer than two. And so one.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#74

Post by maxerickson »

jly wrote: post #56
dmode wrote: post #46

Having grown up in poverty in a third world country that is extremely chaotic, the doomsday obsession in America is laughable and a little disturbing at the same time. Society doesn't break down like that. Can someone explain why is there such paranoia in the US about societal collapse ? It it video games, movies, media frenzy, hyper partisan politics ? All of it ? I know people who have created bunkers and stock pil…

We have an even-increasing supply of dangerous nuclear weapons on this planet, and no short supply of individuals who may want to use them. I can envision a lot of scenarios from that which could lead to societal breakdown.

The number of nuclear weapons peaked ~30 years ago and has declined precipitously since then:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:US_and_USSR_nuclear_...

(that other countries now have warheads doesn't make up much of the difference: http://www.icanw.org/the-facts/nuclear-arsenals/ )

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#75

Post by jandrewrogers »

blhack wrote: post #14
throwaway2016a wrote: post #10

> To protect his wife and daughter, he said, “I don’t have guns, but I have a lot of other weaponry. I took classes in archery.” This whole article reads like some surreal parody of what eccentric SV mil/billionaires would do. Although I suppose there is probably some truth that in a post apocalyptic / post rule of law world... the person in the big house with the expensive stuff to loot probably has a huge target on…

I mean...I guess arrows are reusable and much more easily created by hand than bullets? I guess?

The reality is that there are enough firearm cartridges in the world, and particularly in the US, to last a very, very long time without manufacturing any more. Americans currently buy more than 10 billion cartridges per year and cartridges have an extremely long shelf life, upwards of a century if stored properly.

Given that there are probably a thousand cartridges for every man, woman, and child in the US today, it would take at least a decade to burn through the available supply, particularly if people were not profligate with their expenditure (which I imagine would be the case in a post-apocalyptic world).

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#76

Post by usrusr »

mywittyname wrote: post #15
cafebabbe wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha, "completely immune". Good luck accessing your wallet without power plants...

Or internet access. It seems like you could commit fraud by traveling to regions without a means to communicate with one-another online and selling them BTCs that were already spent on another network. I bet two people pull that off before those communities ban BTC.

On the other hand, as long as those communication islands don't reconnect, all those double-spent BTC will be just as good/bad as homemade dollar bills.

Bitcoin might be postapocalyptically valuable if the apocalypse in question has hyperinflation at its core, but in a scenario without that it will be inferior even to vintage paper money. The true availability of BTC within a given community is just too much of an uncertainty. What could be a sizable fraction of the amount in active circulation one day could be completely devalued due some early adopter backup going live a day later.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#77

Post by halomru »

cafebabbe wrote: post #11
halomru wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin behaves rather badly under global scale network partitions, or if your global network has a latency of over an hour. But on the other hand it is completely immune to collapse of governments

Ha, "completely immune". Good luck accessing your wallet without power plants...

"collapse of government" doesn't have to mean total collapse of infrastructure. Providing infrastructure is harder without government, but if you charge for the infrastructure anyway, you can just increase prices.

It's of course a problem for low income workers, but here we are talking about the super rich.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#78

Post by VLM »

dmode wrote: post #46

Having grown up in poverty in a third world country that is extremely chaotic, the doomsday obsession in America is laughable and a little disturbing at the same time. Society doesn't break down like that. Can someone explain why is there such paranoia in the US about societal collapse ? It it video games, movies, media frenzy, hyper partisan politics ? All of it ? I know people who have created bunkers and stock pil…

The topic is example number 258726 of the most photogenic controversial clickbait not really having much to do with the reality of anything.

"Society doesn't break down like that."

Unfortunately it does, in the USA. See the aftermath of hurricane Katrina for an example of how well we get along when things are temporarily bad.

Also the geography of the USA frankly sucks. We're rich and its not because our weather is unusually calm. I live on the border of tornado alley (if you stretch the definition a thousand miles) and if you don't have something heavy to sit under in the basement you're a fool. I've had coworkers houses destroyed by tornado. Closest hit to my house is about two miles in the last decade. Another thing that sucks is we get paralyzing blizzards and occasional ice storms knock out power for days, every couple years. You can prepare for it and frankly relax and enjoy a couple days off work, or you can prepare to suffer greatly. So everyone here has a "bunker" and stockpiled food. Its called "living" not prepping.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#79

Post by Nokinside »

Super-rich don't seem to understand that if the society collapses, only individualism that exists is rugged individualism. Hiding int he bunker might work for some time, but it would be life of fear.

Individuals don't survive alone. It's the tribe, village and family that ensures survival. Best way to survive would be to connect into some tight knit community, where people who know and trust other take care of each other. If you have plenty and someone is starving, you share and bond or you fight.

Here is better survival strategy for Silicon Valley billionaire:

Build hidden storage bunker in the middle of Amish country. Fill it with all the community needs in doomsday, medicine, spare parts, tools and simple food. When doomsday happens, invite all your neighbors to share while you study bible and become important member in your community.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#80

Post by floatboth »

> “If I had a billion dollars, I wouldn’t buy a bunker,” Elli Kaplan, the C.E.O. of the digital health startup Neurotrack, told me. “I would reinvest in civil society and civil innovation. My view is you figure out even smarter ways to make sure that something terrible doesn’t happen.”

At least there's one reasonable person in this circus.

Also: https://youtu.be/XanyPq5BcoA?t=52m18s

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