Gene Pool

@Rockhead,

Rockhead wrote:

my first headquarters would be the public library.

my thoughts exactly.

but....church?
I was hoping to avoid that.

1 Reply

@chai2,

starting out with 10 people in Texas, and you think you can skip religion?

I don't think so, Willis...

1 Reply

@Rockhead,

Rockhead wrote:

starting out with 10 people in Texas, and you think you can skip religion?

I don't think so, Willis...

But we're talking about Austin, where when you stand on the Capitol steps, you can look all around you and see Texas in the far distance.

I'm telling the truth, there is not one church goer on my block, and we're talking both sides of the street.

1 Reply

@chai2,

I'll give you a pass on it, but I bet you live on Hades Lane...

back to electricity.

you can't give it up and go back the the 1870's...

1 Reply

If it were Robert Heinlein, all the dogs and fat chicks would die off, and the remaining babes would be forced by the disease to walk around nekkid.

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@Setanta,

Yeah, and they would always be dropping things and bending over to pick whatever it was up.

http://www.badgerflats.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/bend_over_2.jpg

1 Reply

@chai2,

That's Heinlein . . . to a T . . .

1 Reply

@Rockhead,

Rockhead wrote:

I'll give you a pass on it, but I bet you live on Hades Lane...

back to electricity.

you can't give it up and go back the the 1870's...

here's where I'm stupid.
if you had solar panels, wouldn't that make that electrifical type of stuff?

yeah, before coming up with the book idea, the life guard was saying he was praying for rain.

like God was all of a sudden going to up and say "Crap! I better send some rain clouds to floating over there, to shut that lifeguard brandon up."

2 Replies

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

That's Heinlein . . . to a T . . .

yuck, I just looked up his pitcher.

pencil thin mustached perve.

0 Replies

@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

like God was all of a sudden going to up and say "Crap! I better send some rain clouds to floating over there, to shut that lifeguard brandon up."

Actually, that might be a good way to keep people in line. If they start going beau coup dinky dau you tell them they have to go over an pray with brandon for awhile.

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@chai2,

only if you have a guy that knows how to convert it and store it.

your gasoline starts going rancid within a year or so.

there are prolly some big diesel generators in town, and a giant repair shop near a salvage facility would be nice.

how close is the nearest real farm, and how does the irrigation system power up?

1 Reply

@Rockhead,

Rockhead wrote:

how close is the nearest real farm, and how does the irrigation system power up?

uh......

You know, you should have been at the pool yesterday. This would be a lot smoother.

and farmerman.

plus, you 2 would have had first dibs on the asian chick.

3 Replies

@chai2,

I kinda wondered about starting a society from people that spend their day at the pool, but it's your alternate dimension exercise...

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@chai2,

where is the closest natural spring?

drinking water only lasts so long in the bottles before it is not safe. 5 years mebbe...

without a definite disaster scenario, there is no real challenge for resources.

why these folks are the only ones left is critical to the challenges to be overcome...

1 Reply

@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

The 69 year old may or may not be able to father a child, but his heritage is just as important to be attempted to be included.

you don't want that 69 year old sperm in the mix

too much likelihood of birth defects - you got a disabled kid, the human resources you need to do the farming are going to be cut back

I don't think you've got enough people to do the hard work to get things going again - mebbe check out the minimum numbers in kibbutz to figure out what's feasible

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@chai2,

response to a typical Hardy Weinberg expansion. Hardy Weinberg calculates the diversity index by looking at the gene pool alleles. In the case here.
GENERATION 1--all the people who interbreed are either half parents (mDNA would be immediately fixed becasuse mother is the same)
or GENERATION1--all others would be half brothers and sisters-(see above)

The alleles would be super ready for any genetic disease or recessive trait just boiling up. (Impossible to predict)
However, with the only woman being the entrie mDNA donor (and half the diversity which would be ZERO. i dont like long term prognosis unless you want this to be a horror story.

Just my two bits. I aint gonna do an HW expansion for say HOx or AP, or alpha/beta globin,EBA's, NANOG (theres a gazillion loci where **** happens, bad ****). When diversity decreases (and in our case its GONE, the expressions of certain disastrous effect cand occur like blood clotting, and organ failures , and most scary are genetic disorders that take the indivdual OUT of the breed pool.

I like horror. Im a sucker for the slimy headed mutant hillbilly movies where the mutant hillbillies are all wearing bib overalls and have eyes that arent symmetrically placed in the head. They sorta look like flounder people.

1 Reply

@chai2,

I really enjoyed Darwin's Radio (there is a sequel if you are interested), but White Plague is completely different. Women are dying off in droves completely changing the male/female dynamic. Women are too precious to risk, the male to female ratio skyrockets (which is where I saw similarity to your story), society is turned on it's head.

1 Reply

@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

engineer - How do you know there aren't any doctors or nurses or midwives in the group? I know an ER doctor that comes there regularly. He's over 55, in great shape (so he'll be around for the next 20 years) and knows his business. He'll give the woman any necessary C-sections. He can train others in the art of medicine.

You don't think amongst the 12 of us we could plant a decent plot of land? We'd have all the information that we don't know in books, and lots of people have food gardening experience.
There's plenty of animal life, like deer around, and fish. I don't think we'd wither away from not having cans of food. We have pecan trees here, berries, and access to all kinds of seeds.
Technology? What, like a hoe or plough?

Not slamming your starter group, but we are all more dependent on technology than we like to think. I think adding a doctor would be important, but a midwife or boy scout might be a good add. Assuming you are in a city, you will need to get out to a farm where you can find plows and hoes, but you need to keep access to that library with the books. I know from personal experience that it is one thing to read a book discussing theory and another to actually do what it says. Plowing land without tractors is hard work and requires some know-how. When the insects come, will we know how to stop them? When do we harvest? While I understand the basics of farming, I would be hard pressed to actually plant a field and take it to harvest plus I'd be useless with tractors and gins. I guess I'm projecting my ignorance onto the general population. (At this point I should add that it took my wife and I three years to get anything to grow in our own garden that was not ravaged by the local insects and critters. Our local rabbits were very happy though.) I'll bet I could figure out how to cook an animal with enough practice.

When I talk about losing technology, things like refrigeration, lighting, easy information access all go away in a short period of time. Can you find the books you need if there are no longer card catalogs in your library? Of course solving these problems could drive the plot.

1 Reply

@engineer,

I didn't take it as slamming engineer.

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@Rockhead,

Rockhead wrote:

where is the closest natural spring?

No problem there sir.

This pool's source of water IS a natural spring. They just add some chlorine.
Barton Springs is maybe a mile and a half away from that.

Big Stacy...

http://alt.coxnewsweb.com/shared-blogs/austin/fitcity/upload/2008/10/im_injured_and_aqua_jogging/aquajogging.JPG

Barton Springs...

0 Replies

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