Electricity

Yesterday I read a post from a friend. It was named "13 Skills Your Grandparents Had That You Don’t".
It was funny, but sad to realize that we have lost so much in so little time. And when you start thinking about it more deeply, how much we have lost of what our race has achieved and passed down for centuries.
Maybe our parents were right when they called us generation X, but our parents are also to blame for not passing down (because they themselves didn't value) the things they learned from their parents.

I started thinking about this when we had that killer Halloween storm 2 years ago and people were freaking out - most of us didn't know how to live without electricity - those who did did it kicking and screaming, not worried about expressing their anger.

It is scary to admit that but the countries like America (and countries like Brazil to a lesser degree) have lost the ability to live without electricity. Seriously - if, like  in the shows Revolution and American Blackout, suddenly power went out, and no one knew how to bring it back on - how many of us would have no idea of what to do?
To start with, most of our data - the kind we know how to use - would be gone. Most of our menial daily activities would not be able to be performed. Most of our food would rot. How many of us would survive?

The simple population that lives in the wilderness would. Those of us, city dwellers, so full of our arrogance and our progress, would probably all be dead in a few weeks - of exposure, starvation or just violence that would sprung from our own despair.

Isn't it sad how much of 5 millenia of progress we have lost (or abandoned) in less than 2 centuries of electricity?