I once read Battlefield Earth. It was awful. Predictable, far too easy solutions, and just plain hokey. But still, I read it because I wanted to see humankind survive.
One thing I liked about the book was that since disaster (the arrival of aliens) struck suddenly, there were lots of stuff laying around. No one knew how to use them or what they were for, but there they were. About the only good thing about the book was how the author described the humans trying to figure out what things were.
When I was in college, oh so long ago, a professor read an anthropologist’s report. It described the bizarre ritualistic behavior of the humanoids in that culture. It wasn’t until the end that the listener figured out that the behavior was what most of us were doing every morning. Bathing, grooming, using mirrors, using cosmetics and perfumes, etc.
Another time, I can’t remember where or when, I read an article where they pretend to have unearthed a motel. It is far in the future and no one knows what a motel is. So they try and figure out what everything was for. The concluded that it was a burial ground. The toilet seat was a crown for some deity called “Sanitizedforyourprotection”. They had the bed, the remote, the television, etc. It was quite interesting.
All this leads to something, honest.
I just read an article over at Wired News about Norway’s proposed ultimate seed vault: “Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a fortress for up to 3 million seed varieties on a remote island 600 miles from the North Pole. It is an interesting concept, albeit a scary one. We are fucking up our world so bad that we are having to put plant seeds under heavy guard to protect our future. How sad is that?
The project is the first comprehensive effort to protect the world’s agricultural gene pool. Some 1,400 seed repositories throughout the world safeguard roughly 1.5 million varieties against crop failure and serve researchers hoping to breed desired traits. But these collections are fragmentary and loosely organized. Many are vulnerable to threats like floods, civil strife, and simple mismanagement. The Svalbard facility will be a backup to the backups, preserving the DNA of every crop on the planet along with wild relatives. Once the doors open, seeds will be released only if every other source has been depleted or destroyed.
The short article ends with a quote:
“This vault is not a time capsule,” Fowler says. “It’s a living institution.” And while it lives, so will the crops that mankind relies on to survive.
For science fiction writers, this is, pun intended, seeds for thought. With no way to read the codes on the vaults, and perhaps no electricity, how would our future selves be able to understand what was in there? What would happen if the vault were to be lost then found again? What if global disaster did strike? Would that place become humankind’s mecca? Would the person with the key become the world leader?
Linkage:
The Global Crop Diversity Trust | Svalbard Global Seed Vault
BBCNews: Work begins on Arctic seed vault
Live Science: Norway to House Seeds in Doomsday Vault (from 6/06)