YouTube Channels where you can actually learn real-world skills

[Metis]

Farmers and ranchers put in long hours, this is true. When I was working on a farm, I usually put in 11 hours a day. The farm owner was usually at work when I showed up and was still there when I got off. These are long hours. However, I'd say many the law firm associate or investment banker works similar hours. I guess it is all about need and passion. I've worked almost non-stop for weeks a time doing genetic research because it was just so darned interesting. I couldn't wait to see what the result of the next gel would be and what new alleles I might find.

[Dolan]

@Dolan

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No one can deny things are changing, and some of the foundations of society are being brought into question. But when hasn't that been the case?

During the post-WW2 era, during peacetime historical periods, before the French Revolution, before the Reformation took place, during the Byzantine empire, during the rule of the Roman Empire, the Sassanid empire, etc. If you read what they were concerned about during those times, they weren't thinking of redefining the world order or reconsidering the foundations of society/economics/politics.

That's exactly my point. A lot of small effects, and you only notice them if you're paying close attention. If you took any year in relatively recent history and paid as close attention to it as you are to 2016, odds are you'd notice comparable effects. I'll admit though that considering globalization and the way we are all connected, the scale of change is bigger and the pace faster.

Levi-Strauss: [...] the density of human beings has become so great, if I can say so, that they have begun to poison themselves.

[Vinyanyérë]

lol sorry @Metis

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it turns out these skills are pretty useful. Any other channels you'd recommend? I'm particularly interested in wilderness survival as well as any tips you have for dealing with nuclear fallout.

[Goodspeed]

Lol

[iNcog]

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[Dolan]

If there is a small nuclear war there won't be much nuclear fallout. It was theorised you need like 300 bombs the same power as those of Hiroshima dropped in the same region to get nuclear fallout. That would be like 300 * 0.015 megatons = 4.5 megatons.

But that's probably false, since both the US and Russia have tested nukes with higher yield than that: Castle Bravo (15 megatons) and Tsar bomba (50 megaton).

So you'd probably need to drop more than 300 Hiroshimas to get nuclear fallout in a region.

[iNcog]

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[Dolan]

It's more about how much blast yield they can cause. And, of course, how much nuclear material they can spread with that blast.
The most destructive part of a nuke is not the explosion, it's how much radiation it can spread.

[iNcog]

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[Metis]

I simply love the outdoors and have spent much of my life in it, but I realize it's not everyone's cup of tea. It remains curious to me though how many here lambaste survival skills as having no use whatever in the modern world. Remember that those of us in the military and civilian emergency services can't always be there in an instant to help you -- you have to learn to do some things for yourself. For instance, I once revived a baby who had drowned in her parents' swimming pool. The mother thanked us effusively for saving her baby. I told her that she also was to thank because when we showed up she was performing excellent CPR, having taken a class when they put in the pool.

You don't learn to deal with emergency situations because you face them in your day-to-day life, you learn them for, well, emergencies. You may never have to find water and food, start a fire without matches, build a shelter or find your direction home using no more than what you have in your pockets and the knowledge in your brain. However, you never know when such skills might come in handy. I've known of quite a few people who died or almost did because they didn't know the slightest thing about outdoors survival.

My platoon once came upon a man who had stuck his car in the sand and then had gotten lost in the desert trying to find the main road. He was almost ready to die of dehydration and heat exhaustion and was lucky that someone found him (and even luckier that they had a medic with them). Unbeknownst to him, he was walking the wrong way. If we had not found him he would have hiked for over a hundred miles before finding any civilization.

Several years later, I met an old man, a Hopi indian, walking in the middle of the desert. I asked him if he wanted a ride and he said that he'd take one if it wasn't out of my way but that it wasn't necessary -- he walked the 60 miles about once a month to see his daughter in the city. I took him to his daughter's place and then headed back out into the desert (I was spending that year touring all of the American deserts and studying their biota). Do you think that the second man perhaps knew a bit about wilderness survival?

[Laurence Drake]

lol sorry @Metis

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it turns out these skills are pretty useful. Any other channels you'd recommend? I'm particularly interested in wilderness survival as well as any tips you have for dealing with nuclear fallout.

have you tried playing fallout 4?

[Gendarme]

any tips you have for dealing with nuclear fallout.

Try to not be made of flesh.

[Metis]

lol sorry @Metis

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it turns out these skills are pretty useful. Any other channels you'd recommend? I'm particularly interested in wilderness survival as well as any tips you have for dealing with nuclear fallout.

Most would agree that a nuclear war between the nuclear powers is unlikely. However, it is possible that a terrorist might steal or construct a nuclear device. What is even more likely is that some individual or group would steal research or medical radiological materials and create a dirty bomb. Then, there is always the chance of an accident at a nuclear facility or with a transport carrying radiological material. Therefore, a little knowledge is worth having.

As an Army medic assigned to a nuclear-capable unit, I underwent radiological training. I also had similar training as a civilian paramedic. As an undergraduate when the Cold War was warming up the threat of a nuclear attack was considered real. Therefore, I took courses on the effects of thermonuclear war and in radiation biology. I'm not per se an expert but I do know a few things.

In the event of an attack or accident, the first thing you should do is to assess which way the wind is blowing and try to get out of the potential fallout area. If you can't do this, then plan to "hunker down" until authorities can direct you to safety. The idea is to limit your exposure as much as possible. Therefore, a rapid exit through a highly contaminated area may be preferable to spending more time in a less contaminated one.

There is not much you can do about a gamma ray burst; by the time you see the flash you have already been exposed. Also, you would have to be in a lead-lined vault to be totally safe from a local gamma emitter. However, you can take steps to lesson the effects of alpha and beta emissions from fallout.

Alpha particles can be stopped by a sheet of paper. However, they are deadly if the Alpha emitter gets into your body. This is why you will want to plan to have a clean supply of food and water and also a good particulate filter mask so you don't breathe in, drink or eat any contaminated material.

Beta particles and gamma rays are more energetic and it takes more material to stop them. Pitching a tent in the vicinity of a beta emitter isn't going to cut it but going to a basement or interior room of a concrete building will protect you.

Remember that your clothing and hair will harbor possibly radioactive particles. Therefore, when you reach safety, bag all of the clothing you were wearing and put on new clothing. If you wore a mask, also bag the filters and wash the mask. Obtain new food and water from outside the contaminated area. If food and water are scarce and you must consume your emergency supplies, then thoroughly wash any cans and bottles before opening them. Do not consume anything that was open in the fallout area.

[Metis]

This book is somewhat dated now but it's free and is the one that was used in one of the courses I took.

http://atomicarchive.com/Docs/pdfs/7906.pdf

[Vinyanyérë]

I was mostly shitposting in response to the Trump victory but for real thank you for the information; it's very interesting.

[JakeyBoyTH]

I like how people are making nuclear fallout memes, but in reality Trump was for peace with Russia, the opposite of what Clinton wanted. Other nuclear capable nations, apart from China, aren't capable with war with the US.