What basic skills is society losing? (tractor, light, rake, gas)
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I thought this forum would be the most appropriate place to put this.
I've noticed a couple things lately people have seemingly completely forgotten. I'm no expert in self-sufficiency, but some of the things I see out there are just mind-boggling.
Biggest thing I've noticed day to day is horrible tie-downs in pickups, or no tie downs at all. I saw a portable basketball goal recently upright in a small pickup, going to topple over at any time. I've seen so many items hanging loose out of beds, not tied off, or tied up poorly that this seems to have been forgotten.
I'm not an expert vegetable gardener, but have done about ten years worth of it until the last several years and I'm amazed at the number of people who don't know how to tie support for tomatoes or bean varieties that need it, have never canned or frozen anything, and let a garden basically go to waste.
Tying various knots with common garden twine, ropes, etc., seems to be a lost art. Again, no expert but I can keep things secure.
Any sort of plant/tree identification seems to be long gone. I met a woman in a park in Indiana earlier this year who didn't know a wild blackberry.
What skills are you noticing that seem to be dying off?
I do think identification of one's local animals and plants is becoming lost. When I was a kid, my Dad would point out the differences in the types of barks and leaves to identify trees and show us the different types of birds. We were in a leafy suburb that still had some woods around.
Our state bird (NJ) is the American Goldfinch (was called an Eastern Goldfinch when I was a kid). Because goldfinches breed in the autumn rather than the spring, there are few of them following years with harsh winters because the fledglings don't survive. For some time you didn't see a lot of them, then we had a few mild winters and they were everywhere.
A woman my age said, "There are these pretty yellow birds at my birdfeeder. I wonder what they are called." I was a little shocked because she was my age and I just assumed she would know what goldfinches were and that they were our state bird, but apparently not everybody had a father like mine. I've had people ask me how do I know that tree is a maple. Seriously? I mean, I can't tell you every variety of maple or oak there is, but I learned what a maple tree's leaves look like so young that I don't remember learning. These are people who grew up in the same area as I did. I could understand people from the city not knowing.
I took my daughter out when she was little and showed her different types of trees and the differences in the bark and whatnot. I wonder now how much of that she remembers.
We had a huge flock of robins this spring in the grassy field across the street from the condos where I live. One of my neighbors asked me if they were robins. I was a little amused because I thought of all birds, EVERYBODY knows what a robin looks like from elementary school, but at least she had the curiosity to ask.
On the other hand, I've never canned food and don't know how. I keep a small garden out back in my patio area that produces tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers, as well as herbs, and I buy other things from a local farm and freeze them, but I've never canned. My sister, who lives in a more rural area, has a huge garden and she cans things every year. She brings these great homemade pickles to the family at the holidays.
People's inability to carry on a phone conversation TALKING... not texting.
Another weird thing I've noticed lately is...reading. People don't read. I don't mean just books or full-length articles, which I've noticed for a long time now and makes me sorta sad.
It's that they don't read the damn emails anymore, either. For business, I take great pains to keep emails as short as possible but include all the necessary facts and information. Then I get responses that clearly indicate that the person didn't read beyond the first sentence before hitting Reply. I have noticed an increase in this over the past two or three years. I then have to reply that the information is already in the previous email, look at the second paragraph. I try very hard to be polite, lol.
Is technology shortening our attention spans or something?
Seems many people do not realize that Global Positioning System ("GPS") depends on a constellation of man-made satellites that were launched, and are maintained, by the US Department of Defense. GPS was intended as a navigation aid for US armed forces, not the public.
Many also do not know that it can be made inaccurate by X degrees in one dimension, and Y degrees in another, at the whim of the military, to confuse the enermy. Of course, their equipment can be programmed to operate with it in "degraded mode", but ours cannot, as we wouldn't know the degree of inaccuracy.
They can also turn it off altogether.
If there ever is a World War III, a lot of people had better learn to use paper maps!
I have always loved maps since childhood and was always perplexed by comedians who made fun of women for not being able to read maps. I could, and still do like to look at them, even though I use my GPS for driving.
I visited a store that has sea-related paintings and old maps in Old Town Alexandria, VA, and I got chatting with the owner about how I love maps and that I worked in NYC, etc., and she said, "Then I've got something you'd like to see." She put on gloves and opened a drawer to display a map of Manhattan from the 17th century. The place names were in Dutch, but many were still identifiable because the names haven't changed and/or the spelling was just Anglicized. It was amazing, and it was for sale--$17,000. Not in my price range, lol, but it was so cool to see.
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nor'Eastah
Yes, that IS unfortunate!
Seems many people do not realize that Global Positioning System ("GPS") depends on a constellation of man-made satellites that were launched, and are maintained, by the US Department of Defense. GPS was intended as a navigation aid for US armed forces, not the public.
Many also do not know that it can be made inaccurate by X degrees in one dimension, and Y degrees in another, at the whim of the military, to confuse the enermy. Of course, their equipment can be programmed to operate with it in "degraded mode", but ours cannot, as we wouldn't know the degree of inaccuracy.
They can also turn it off altogether.
If there ever is a World War III, a lot of people had better learn to use paper maps!
People also get lost when they're on a hike and they can't get a signal.
I've also totally realized my sense of direction has declined with my reliance on GPS.
I took an orienteering class and mapmaking class in undergrad, I loved it. The ROTC instructors taught the orienteering portion of it. I really should try to find a group or a meet up and get back into it. I don't even remember how to read the declination on a 7.5' topo and adjust my compass any longer.
Also, I loved gardening and making pickles, canning beans, etc. I still have the big pot to boil/seal them in. Unfortunately, even community garden plots are hard to get (and small) and there are no yards around here in anyplace I've lived.
I feel like the inability to detect early warnings in the weather (without the NWS or TWC) is becoming very common.
Those very small things that give you the most time to prepare.
Like in my area; on the foothills of the Rocky's, people learn fairly quickly that gathering gloom over Pikes Peak does not bode well. But they DON'T seem to notice that when clouds push in from the South; it will be worse.
Or if those darn wasps are actually NOT driving you crazy; something is coming ... they know it & their absence is telling.
I teach electrochemistry and analytical chemistry (I guess I am one of those clueless PhD's) and I am shocked at how little my students, who are typically junior and senior science majors, know about electricity.
I have students that have never heard of the word "fuse" , and several students thought that they could be electrocuted by touching the pins on the plug for a hotplate when it wasn't even plugged in. Only one student in a class of 24 had ever used jumper cables before, and that student indicated that he had only attempted to jumpstart a car once and that it hadn't worked.
The population shift from rural farms to cities has resulted in the loss of many basic skills for a lot of people. I know how to clean a fish and pluck a chicken, but I have no idea how to butcher a hog or a cow, something that my grandparents did all of the time. I also think that firearm related skills , mostly marksmanship and safe handling, are being lost.
Many of my students are also embarrassingly bad at throwing things. When I was in school, all of the boys played baseball and football around the playground, and even the unathletic kids could throw smoothly and accurately. Among my students, there are a few athletes that throw and catch very well, but the average 18-21 year old college guy throws in a manner that would have gotten him teased for throwing like a girl when I was 12. I am sure that they could smoke me in Pokemon, though.
I feel like the inability to detect early warnings in the weather (without the NWS or TWC) is becoming very common.
Those very small things that give you the most time to prepare.
Like in my area; on the foothills of the Rocky's, people learn fairly quickly that gathering gloom over Pikes Peak does not bode well. But they DON'T seem to notice that when clouds push in from the South; it will be worse.
Or if those darn wasps are actually NOT driving you crazy; something is coming ... they know it & their absence is telling.
The Indians knew (and presumably still know) how all this worked. They didn't have or need a smart phone to know when it was time to park for the day and get ready for some rough weather.
Familiarity with animals, poultry, livestock ( even the smaller ones like goats and sheep and rabbits),
I know it's a lot of factory farming these days but I do think there is an art in knowing how to wrangle / handle animals....
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