For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact • Hacker News Board

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#241

Post by grecy » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 4:43 PM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #179

grecy wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever experienced it yourself? My first summer up here it was a beautiful sunny day and my friends were telling me about how people die in the lake every year. Being a very strong swimmer and from Australia, I didn't believe them. They bet me $1000 I couldn't stay in the water 5 minutes, which I thought I would have a good go at. I've swum in water below 40F before. I honestly didn't last 30 seconds before I…

I didn't say people don't die. They most definitely do, and I gave several pathways. That said: if you are acclimated to the shock (and possibly have a genetic propensity to survive colder water), it's definitely survivable. Capsizing a kayak is something you need to know how to deal with to execute properly anyhow, and yes, cold water makes appropriate response and motor control much more challenging. I've done exte…

There is one very shallow lake here in town that touches 50F on the hottest days. We swim in it for hours, happily.

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#242

Post by arethuza » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 4:55 PM UTC

grecy wrote: post #240

arethuza wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I'd rather camp at -35C than at 2C with driving rain and wind - which is far more likely here in Scotland! (-35C is about the coldest I've experienced at altitude in the Alps).

2C with driving wind and rain is fine once you get in your tent. -35C, not so much. One of the hardest things to deal with is condensation and sweat - anything even remotely damp (socks, sleeping bag, boots, gloves) will be frozen rock solid in the morning.

I stand corrected!

I have no experience of camping in temperatures as low as -35C. However, I have found that camping in Scottish mountains it is much more pleasant when it is in the range 0 to -10C than just above freezing.

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#243

Post by dalke » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 5:19 PM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #219

dalke wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SS Empire Howard, though it was after they fell asleep. See http://books.google.se/books?id=2Zc9AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA73&#38... . The story you read was likely from Bill Bryson's book "A Walk in the Woods", which talks about 12 Danish fishermen, but that story doesn't seem to be correct in its details.

Looks to be a different case. The mention was in the following article "The Cold, Hard Facts of Freezing to Death" which was posted to HN recently. I cannot find a more detailed source: http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/As-Freezing-P... In fact, many hypothermia victims die each year in the process of being rescued. In "rewarming shock," the constricted capillaries reopen almost all at once, causing a su…

I mentioned two reports, related by the Captain of the SS Empire Howard and the other the Danish fishermen story related by Bill Bryson. I personally believe, like the author of the reddit link you gave, that Bryson's tale is a corruption of the former. That is, there is only one report here.

Having read several of Bryson's entertaining works, I know that he is not a rigorous researcher of the details.

The link I gave was to "Hypothermia and Cold Stress" by Evan L. Lloyd, 1986. It shows a citation to Lee and Lee 1971. I am unable to track down that reference based just on free internet searches. According to Lloyd's recounting, the rescuees did drink some alcohol. I can see how upon retelling that might be turned into a "hot drink."

I am quite willing to say that the previous poster heard about the Bryson story and the false details from that. However, I would rather state that the details of the story - that being of Danish fishermen - were wrong rather than the point of the story, which is the death of people after they have been rescued. In any case, the parent poster said nothing about Danish fishermen.

Even if "Lee and Lee 1971" citation I pointed to is too vague of a confirmation for you, the HSE report gives many examples of "post-rescue collapse and death" from both Allied and Axis sources, including from ship-wreck survivors (Critchley 1943).

I think it's unsafe describe the situation in a way that could be described as implying an urban legend, which is why I've specifically said that the details are wrong, and pointed to places where the details are correct. (To be sure, you are not doing that. I write this to explain why I wrote it as I did.)

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#244

Post by ahoyhere » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 5:29 PM UTC

dalke wrote: post #186

ahoyhere wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My husband & I lived in Vienna and we were the only people who spoke out loud to each other on a daily basis (especially in English), and we understand each other very very well in any case, and we got the point where we often didn't even speak in complete sentences over a mere matter of months. When we traveled abroad for a month in an English-speaking country, it took me several days to feel like I was making sense…

I found that my own English changed after being in Sweden for a few months. I learned to pronounce 'r's and 't's and make a few other changes so that local people could understand my American accent better. Then upon returning to the US I had to unlearn those habits.

Me too. It's amazing what you do to get by. You probably simplified your vocabulary some too, I expect? I know I did. Living in Austria was hell on my previously prodigious vocab!

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#245

Post by astral303 » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 5:29 PM UTC

Aramgutang wrote: post #226

astral303 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a Google translation and one cannot extract any fine meaning from its results, this being a case in point. I read the Russian original post and the following is my translation of the excerpt from her letter: "... I bow to you down to the raw Earth and wish unto you from God good health, the most spiritual salvation and all sorts of good luck, and let God save the sacred [several kinds of] Church until the end…

I have made an attempt at a more accurate translation: """ I bow to the ground before you and wish you in the name of the Lord good health, above all salvation and well-being, and may God save the fatherly Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church till the end of time from discord and herecies, the devious webs of enemies... I bow before all with a great big request: I need someone to be my helper, I cannot survive alone,…

You're totally right on "сырая земля", that was a tougher one. Perhaps "bare earth"? Anyway, thanks for the alternate translation and the perspective!

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#246

Post by ahoyhere » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 5:34 PM UTC

Evbn wrote: post #119

ahoyhere wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My husband & I lived in Vienna and we were the only people who spoke out loud to each other on a daily basis (especially in English), and we understand each other very very well in any case, and we got the point where we often didn't even speak in complete sentences over a mere matter of months. When we traveled abroad for a month in an English-speaking country, it took me several days to feel like I was making sense…

Were you in a few monastery?

Haha, no. But the Viennese are not a very welcoming people and it was hard to make friends, and my husband and I ran a company together so it was very easy to be just by ourselves. Vienna is not a place where you can chitchat with your waiters or the people on the bus. It's considered rude.

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#247

Post by Lexarius » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 6:06 PM UTC

pkulak wrote: post #182

georgecmu wrote: post #4

Lacking guns and even bows, they could hunt only by digging traps or pursuing prey across the mountains until the animals collapsed from exhaustion. It's interesting that they stumbled on the persistence hunting technique so naturally. Indirect evidence to support the Endurance running hypothesis ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endurance_running_hypothesis ).

I'm shocked that this could work on the Tundra. It was always my understanding that endurance running required a hot climate so that humans' superior cooling system could win out.

Animals on the tundra would probably have thick coats or other insulation and might be able to overheat themselves in the right conditions. A human could shed its clothing to cool down.

It's also possible that potential prey in this area is not well adapted for outrunning endurance hunters, which might make them easier to run down than animals that have been hunted by runners for thousands of years.

Re: For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

#248

Post by arbuge » Wed, Jan 30, 2013, 6:19 PM UTC

One thing you learn from these people is that there certainly is another way besides the rat race... I mean, for 40 years they had zero income in conventional terms and survived, if not very comfortably.

ps. YMMV. You could call withdrawal from the rat race a comfort that makes the lack of physical comforts seem small in proportion.