Active New Top (30 days) Compact Card Going Off-Road, money does not equate to common sense Bill Masen - November 16, 2021 A good example of ” All The Gear, But No Idea” Big expensive truck based overland 4×4 expedition vehicle, and they chose to go cross country in the rainy season. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-59301237 Read More 5 2 MetaNews Book Review: “The Black Swan”, by Nassim Taleb brownfox-ffContributor - November 15, 2021 (image credit: “Black swan” by Emiliana Borruto is licensed under Creative Commons – CC BY 2.0 ) In “The Black Swan”, Nassim Taleb discusses probability and the impact of unlikely but extreme events. He argues that we have a hard time understanding impacts and probabilities that are very large or very small. That what we do not know can be much more meaningful than anything we do know. Taleb argues that most of the course of human history has been dominated by extreme, unexpected, improbable events. And that human society will become more so in the future. Taleb argues that we would benefit from improving how we think about unlikely, impactful events, and offers several tips for doing this. In this review I will outline the book itself, and then collect and present a summary of tips. ### What is a Black Swan? A Black Swan event has three properties: Unexpected. Nobody saw it coming. Impactful. Causes a big change. Explained after the fact. We look back and invent an explanation for it, even though we didn’t know it would happen. Taleb lists the Internet, the laser, and the start of World War One as examples of Black Swan events. Black Swans can be either negative (like a sudden war) or positive (like discovering a new drug or invention – like penicillin). Throughout his book, Taleb argues that history moves in large leaps and bounds, not small steps. Most of the big changes in human history come from Black Swans. Taleb believes we should work to make our lives and society more robust to Black Swans. Understand them better. Become less surprised by them. And be more ready, so we aren’t as impacted. “The surprising part is not our bad errors, or even how bad they are, but that we are not aware of them”. ### Mediocristan and Extremistan Taleb distinguishes between two types of random probability and events – “mild” randomness with slight variations vs “wild” randomness with extremely impactful events. He calls these “Mediocristan” and “Extremistan”. In Mediocristan – all of the events and data are about average. No single event or person greatly changes the total. Imagine gathering 1,000 people into a stadium, and comparing their weight. Even if you have one person with a very small weight (perhaps a baby) or a very large weight (the heaviest possible human) – they will not make up much of the total weight in the entire stadium. Examples of data or events in Mediocristan: height, weight, calorie consumption, income for a baker; gambling profits in a casino; car accidents, mortality rates. In Extremistan you have a collection of “dwarfs” and “giants”. Some data points or events can be very small, and others hugely, massively out of scale, taking up most of the data. Imagine gathering 1,000 people into a stadium, and comparing their net worth. The numbers could vary much more than weight. If you happen to get Bill Gates in the stadium, he becomes worth 99.99% of the total data. None of the rest really matters. You would never see a human who weighed several thousand tons. Examples of data or events in Extremistan: wealth; income; book sales per author; name recognition as a “celebrity”; number of hits in Google; populations of cities; numbers of speakers per language; damage caused by earthquakes; deaths in a war; sizes of planets; sizes of companies; stock ownership; commodity prices; inflation rates; economic data. One of Taleb’s central points is: mathematical models based on the Bell Curve can help a lot when explaining events or data in Mediocristan. But they do not work at all when dealing with complicated events or data in Extremistan. Mediocristan usually involves ‘biological’ data – physical measurements, or things present in the real world, where physical limits prevent them from getting out of hand. In Extremistan, we can never be sure of the data. Because one single person, point, or observation could suddenly dwarf the rest (imagine: measuring the net worth of everyone else, and then suddenly discovering Bill Gates). One measurement could suddenly invalidate all of our previous conclusions. So we need to proceed much more cautiously. When measuring events or taking action in Extremistan, it is often the cumulative impact that is important. It doesn’t only matter if you were right or wrong; it matters *how* correct or incorrect you are. Being “right” about a danger causing one death, vs being “wrong” about a danger that causes 10 million deaths are quite different. We tend to “focus on the grass and miss the trees”. The goal is to “be less surprised”, or “avoid being a sucker” about crazy, wild events that impact us. ### Part 1: Where and Why Brains Fail Human brains are just not great at understanding some parts of the world. Especially risk and probability with very large or very small numbers. Internal brain problems: 1) Narrative bias: Human brains love to invent and create stories, even and especially when no story or pattern exists. We do this unconsciously all of the time It takes mental effort to *not* create a story, or to *not* form an opinion Thus, humans can look at any set of totally unrelated data and *invent* a story about them. We think this helps us to understand the world better, but we are often wrong. See “Thinking Fast and Slow”, by Daniel Kahneman.We have a “System 1” part of our brain – fast, intuitive, emotional, “gut feeling”.We have a “System 2” part of our brain – slower, more logical, critical thinking.It takes active effort and energy to do System 2 thinking. So it is harder. 2) Confirmation bias: We cherry-pick examples and data that support our story, and ignore evidence that goes against it. We also do this when predicting the future – we ignore times when we were wrong and only count the times we were right. It may only take one counter-example to prove an assumption is incorrect, so it may be faster and easier to disprove an idea. Other thinking problems: 3) Silent evidence, a.k.a. Survivorship bias. It’s hard to keep in mind all of the data that we *don’t* see. For any problem or group of people, there may be a much larger group that we don’t know about, and don’t have evidence for. For example: There was an ancient civilization called the Phoenecians. They wrote on papyrus, which does not last long. Their papyrus writings rotted and decayed. So we didn’t have a record of much of their writing. It was easy to assume they did not write at all. Until we discovered their writing on other materials. For every person that “prayed to be saved” and survived, there are many that prayed but died. Only the people who made it are able to tell their stories. In World War II, the US military was trying to figure out how to protect more planes from getting shot down. They initially wanted to add armor to the locations with the most bullet holes. But Abraham Wald figured out: every place with a bullet hole was a location where the plane could sustain a hit, *and still survive*. He advocated the opposite – adding armor to the locations with *no* bullet holes. Because no planes that were shot in those locations made it back. [ Image: Bullet hole damage in WWII airplanes. Add armor to where there are *no* bullet holes, to increase survivability. Image By Martin Grandjean (vector), McGeddon (picture), Cameron Moll (concept) – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0 ] Ignoring “silent evidence” causes us to massively underestimate or mis-understand the real situation and real risk or probability, because we don’t know the whole story.We have to continually be careful to not assume we really understand how the world works, and make dangerous assumptions. 4) The Ludic Fallacy: We may think we understand the world, but often we don’t. Real life is messier, stranger, and more complicated than we learn in the classroom or in constrained environments. You have to be open to crazy wild events that are “against the rules”. e.g. someone pulling a gun in a martial arts tournament. This is high-level “thinking outside the box” Taleb calls it “a-Platonic” thinking – not trying to stuff reality into tidy-but-incorrect categories Thinking we understand reality when we do not is what causes many Black Swan events, and is dangerous. An example of the world being more complex than we think: A casino has a reputation for being a place of gambling and chance. But casinos actually have very strict controls on the size of bets you can place, the possible payouts, watching for people cheating, etc. It is a controlled environment. The casino will never pay out 100 billion times your bet, or change the rules of the game mid-game. But real life might do something similar. By contrast – One casino’s biggest risks and losses came from sources entirely outside of the expected: A tiger attacked their star performer (Roy Horn of Seigfried & Roy). They were not insured for such an event, as they did not consider it a possibility. This ended their profitable best act. A disgruntled worker tried to dynamite the building. An employee had not been submitting the correct IRS tax forms, for multiple years. They simply put them into a drawer under their desk. The casino had to pay large amounts of penalties and back fees for not filing its taxes. It risked losing its license entirely and going out of business. A kidnapping attempt against the business owner’s daughter. None of these risks or events were inside the casino’s business model or model of risk. They were entirely “outside the box”, and unexpected. Their cost was far greater than any on-model or expected risks or costs. ### Part 2: We Can’t Predict Taleb spends several chapters showing how humans are bad at predicting. We can’t know the future and everybody gets it wrong. We fall victim to tunnel vision – ignoring possibilities outside of what we think will happen. We overestimate what we know, and underestimate uncertainty. The more information you give someone, the more they try to interpret, and the more hypotheses they will form along the way. We see random noise and mistake it for information. Our ideas are “sticky” – once we form a theory, we are not likely to change our minds. So delaying developing your theories makes you better off Developing an opinion based on weak evidence makes it more difficult to change “Reading a summary magazine once a week is better for you than listening to the news every hour”. The longer interval lets you filter the info a bit. Small errors in measurement or a model can lead to drastically different outcomes It doesn’t matter how often you are right; what’s important is your cumulative error number E.g. one big event can throw you way off Or missing one prediction [ Image: Stock Market total returns over 50 years. Including and excluding the Best 10 days. Note that excluding these 10 days (the lower, darker line) cuts the total value of the stock market as a whole in half. Traditional economic models treat these types of jumps as too extreme to ever happen. Yet here they have obviously happened several times. Image copyright Taleb; used only for review purposes. ] One example – for the entire stock market, over a period of 50 years – fully half of the total value of all stocks was created during only ten days. Out of a period of 50 years. Using current economics models and claims, these types of events should be nearly impossible. Yet here they are. Taleb uses this as an example disproving the claim of Bell Curve economic models and disproving economists’ ability to predict. Taleb discusses “Retrospective Distortion”: History seems more clear and organized when we look back than it actually was for people going through it at the time. ### Part 3 and 4 – Technical Details Parts 3 and 4 delve into technical details on how exactly many so-called “experts” are wrong, and advice on how to minimize damage from Black Swans. Taleb argues that the world is moving more into Extremistan over time. As technology and society become more complex, it is even more difficult to predict. The world is more complicated than many so-called “experts” and economists believe or tell you. The Bell Curve doesn’t actually work for most models; it can only be used to predict normal, boring events and data in Mediocristan. For any events in Extremistan – that includes most societal, cultural, and world events or data – the Bell Curve is a lie and *does not work at all*. This is a central point that Taleb emphasizes repeatedly. By assuming the world is more complex than we realize by default, we can improve some events – “Turn Black Swans into Grey”. We are less surprised if we remain open to wild, impactful, unexpected events. ### What To Do About It There are many interesting perspectives and advice that can be taken from the book. The most relevant areas are Chapter 13, “What to do if you cannot predict”; and Appendix 6 and 7 on The Fourth Quadrant – how to think about different types of risk, and mitigate them. 1. Look for counter-examples to check if you’re wrong Because of confirmation bias, and because events in Extremistan can appear to be stable and normal for long periods, it is easy to find examples that reinforce any claim. That doesn’t mean we are right. If you have lunch with someone for an hour, and they don’t murder anyone for the entire hour, that doesn’t guarantee they are not a murderer. It is faster and more effective to look for counter-examples that prove we are *wrong*. Ask “if this were not true, what would that look like?”. 2. Ask “Where did I get lucky?” Examine past events. When you prepare a retrospective or After Action Report, ask “where did I get lucky?”. What events just happened to go well? From that list, what could you improve for next time, to improve your odds? You see this in post mortems from organizations like the Google Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team. They ask: “What went well? What needs to be improved? And where did we get lucky?”. By considering events where we got lucky but it could have been worse, we can improve our robustness and preparations for next time. 3. Consider the consequences, or outcomes, and prepare for those > “I don’t know the odds of an earthquake, but I can imagine how San Francisco (or any other place) might be affected by one” The odds of some event may be unknowable, and no amount of modeling could figure it out. But I can guess pretty well how an earthquake or other event might *affect* me and my surroundings. And I can take steps to prepare for *that*. If you lose power or water to your home, you don’t care as much about what caused it. You care more about how you can deal with it, and prevent it or make it easier. Taleb’s advice is to focus on the *consequences* of some outcomes, and take steps to be ready for them. If we prepare for e.g. an earthquake, epidemic, financial crash, or other event, then it doesn’t matter so much about the odds of it happening; we can be ready regardless. “Rank beliefs by the harm they might cause”. “Invest in preparedness, not prediction”. This matches advice from security expert Bruce Schneier, who advocates investing in intelligence gathering and emergency response: > “Large-scale terrorist attacks and natural disasters differ in cause, but they’re very similar in aftermath.” > The problem is that we can’t guess correctly. “Fund security that doesn’t rely on guessing”. This leads to advice like: Keep an emergency fund, to help you deal with outcomes, whatever they are. Buy insurance to cover and mitigate your losses for bad outcomes. 4. Cover your basics; keep an open mind We can’t know what the future holds. But if you allow for the possibility of unexpected, impactful events, you won’t be as surprised if or when they happen. By keeping an open mind about the possibility, you’re already better prepared. By covering our basics; accepting that we might be wrong; and having flexible preparations; we can adapt to events as needed. 5. Beware people selling you a solution >“Avoid taking advice from someone unless they have a penalty for bad advice”. Human brains have a harder time with ‘negative’ advice about what *not* to do. It is easier for us to look for or invent a solution. This is exploited by many frauds and scams – trying to sell you a solution that won’t actually work. Choosing to do nothing is itself a valid action and choice. “Don’t just do something – sit there!”. Other Tips Consume less media and news. Lowers anxiety Avoids anchoring our thoughts to random data, which may cause worse decisions Do not listen to economic forecasters or predictors in social science. Don’t go deeply into debt. Don’t overspecialize. Learn some skills and/or have a job that can be transferrable or used for more than one type of work. Avoid optimization. Learn to love redundancy. The knowledge we get from tinkering and experimenting is better than just thinking and reasoning. The Barbell Strategy: Be both hyper-conservative and hyper-aggressive, with different things, at the same time. Taleb discusses his days as a financial stock trader. Since we can’t know whether anything is “risky” or not, it is impossible to build a portfolio that is “medium risk”. He suggests: Put 80-90% of your investments into ‘likely safe’ vehicles, such as bonds or Treasury Bills; put the rest into extremely speculative bets – such as Venture Capital investments in research & development, or startups. This limits your maximum losses while gaining you exposure to potentially lucky, positive outcomes. Note: This is *not* financial advice. Please don’t make large adjustments to your personal finances based on a book summary you read on the internet. ### Positive Black Swans Black Swan events are unexpected, and impactful. But they can be both positive and negative. Positive Black Swan events include discovering a new, beneficial medicine, or inventions such as the laser and the Internet. Taleb’s Tips For Finding + Benefiting From Positive Black Swans Live in a city or hub of activity with an intermingling of people and ideas Go to parties Strike up random conversations with people at parties Invest in as many things as you can Keep an open mind. Good fortune could come from anywhere. Seize any opportunity, or anything that looks like an opportunity. Maximize your exposure to as many potential opportunities as you can. Put yourself into situations where favourable consequences are much larger than unfavourable ones. You can decide how many of those you want to apply in your own life. ### Tips for a More Black Swan-Robust Community Avoid externalities. People who make decisions should have some stake in the outcome, or some consequences from the results of those decisions. No gambling with other people’s money. Build in some slack and redundancy. This is how complex systems survive. Start with small experiments. Test out small ideas first to see if they work or fail. Build and improve on the ones that work. If something will fail, finding out sooner is better than finding out later. Don’t take on large amounts of debt. I have heavily adapted and synthesized this list from Taleb’s essay Ten Principles for a Black Swan-Robust Society. This essay is included at the end of the book. In his essay, Taleb uses the term “society”. I am reframing a few of his ideas as: how could they apply to your local group or community? Not many of us are world leaders. But some of us may have positions of leadership in our own community, or could step up to lead. I believe the world is better if everyone is more prepared. If people all over the planet take one step or keep this in mind to work toward a more resilient planet, we all benefit. Read More 17 3 Advice Navigating and estimating time using the sun Robert LarsonContributor - November 15, 2021 Two little tricks I learned in Boy Scouts have stuck with me and I use quite often to help me gain my bearings and know how much sunlight is left in the day. For navigation, if you live in the northern hemisphere, point the hour hand of your watch at the sun. Then figure out the halfway point between the hour hand and 12:00, that is South. The opposite then is North. If you are in the southern hemisphere, you point the 12:00 at the sun and half way between that and the hour hand is North. If you have digital watch or just your cell phone with the time, note what time it is and imagine you are wearing an analog watch and then do the above calculations. This won’t be very accurate for orienteering, but it can help you at least know which direction you need to go in. For example if your friend says to meet them on the west side of the building and you don’t know where west is, this will help you. Picture taken from this website. The next little trick is how to tell how much sunlight is left in the day. This will help if you are needing to know how much time you have left to build a shelter, find food, or gather firewood by before it gets dark. Or even in our every day lives of when it will get dark and you should start heading home. You stretch your hand out in front of you and place the sun at the top of your index finger. Every width of finger is going to be 15 minutes of sunlight. So if the sun is only two fingers away from the horizon, you have 30 minutes before it goes below that. Chubby or skinny fingers may add or minus a few minutes 😉 Picture taken from this site. I hope these two little tricks will help you in your everyday life and also as you are camping, bugging out, or surviving. What other sun tricks do you know about? Did you know about either of these? Read More 10 3 Skills Site Censoring Illini Warrior - November 14, 2021 Either this is a free & open site to post opinions or it’s not – the Americans here value their 1st Amendment Right – the rest take your lumps without the protection … Refuse the posting – delete it ENTIRELY – but I for one don’t allow someone to self editorialize THEIR opinion using my name …. Bill Mason posts elsewhere on other prepper forums – doesn’t expect to be censored – don’t appreciate that double-standard …. Read More -5 26 These pants aren’t chainsaw proof but pretty close Conrad B - November 14, 2021 Found this video of Husqvarna’s chainsaw pants and thought it was pretty impressive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYrKrF5eMRQ I went to the website and there are two kinds, Technical or Classic. They both have the same rating (ASTM F1897) but a pretty big price difference. https://www.husqvarna.com/us/accessories/personal-protective-equipment/ Read More 11 6 Gear Changing how and what vegetables I’m growing next year JennyWren - November 11, 2021 My allotment was vandalised a couple of weeks ago. They smashed my winter squash and the shelling beans were strewn hither and yon, winter greens were pulled up and the little store box was set alight. I’m done with it. Add to that a Rabbit infestation that the council are not keen to deal with, I have decided to give up the allotment and make more of the space I have at home. Our yard is small, barely 30′ x 18′. Half of the yard is spoken for, so that leave me a space 8′ x 20′. I have worked out that will give me 4 4’x8′ raised beds. I was surprised how much space there actually was. I have used the raised bed method before, with great success so with careful choice of vegetable types and varieties, I am looking forward to growing a substantial amount of our vegetables (we are a family of 2). I’m going to incorporate the square foot growing method as well as catch cropping and anything else I can think of. This garden probably won’t provide sufficient produce for preserving for the winter, but I hope with judicious planting to have enough space to keep a winter garden as well as the flourishing summer garden. I hope to keep you appraised so that those who have little space and experience can hopefully learn something from my experiences. So watch this space! Read More 12 31 US inflation at 31 year high Bill Masen - November 10, 2021 U.S. inflation up 6.2% in October versus a year ago – the highest inflation since 1990. Inflation was up 0.9% in Oct. alone, a much higher increase than 0.4% in Sept. and 0.3% in August These sort of figures cause preppers to look much closer at their supply and equipment levels, as well as their savings and investments. Read More 7 1 News What should I add to my altoids EDC tin? Gideon ParkerStaff - November 9, 2021 I’ll have to make an altoids survival tin sometime that could help me survive a night in the woods with just what is in the tin, but I do have an altoids EDC tin that I use almost everyday. Take a look at it and let me know if there is something I should add. What would your altoids EDC tin look like? Try making one and share it on here using the kit builder! Read More 13 16 AdviceGear Has anyone else heard of wool knops? LBV - November 9, 2021 During our most recent lockdown I discovered a product called wool knops. They are springy, can be compressed and bounce back, stick to each other. I am planning on using them to fill my sleeping bag, as well as a puffer jacket. Their texture and form means they hold a good deal of air so to me they could be a better alternative to both polyester and down – warmth, water resistant as well as fire resistant. Is anyone else familiar with these? Read More 12 18 Gear Fine line between prepping and hoarding, regarding household capacity CR - November 8, 2021 Let me start by stating I don’t mean panic buying etc. I’m a longtime Realtor, and have worked with a number of hoarder clients, prepper clients and a family member’s epic sized hoard. It’s a sad fact that many members of the Greatest Generation who lived through World Wars and the Great Depression are inundated with stuff & unable to let go, largely due to their past experiences of scarcity. A recent elderly client clung to his hoard so fiercely that he had a screaming match in my office with his daughter who had come from out of state to move him near her. She went home without him, declaring she was done. Sad and avoidable, a priceless relationship in tatters over stuff. My topic aims to open a dialogue on how we all can deal healthily with hanging onto and adding to stuff in relation to its actual value in a potentially worsening scenario. We likely all have a ton of preps that we have collected and are certain will save the day when needed. Me too, I’ll state right now. However, often we hang onto other crap that has no realistic future use, and just clutters up our living and storage spaces. I’ve had to deal with some bizarre stuff in my job, plus clearing relative’s homes. One prepper I worked with had buried 150 pounds of silver in his shop, after his son told him he shouldn’t leave it in the attic! One property I sold had 5 acres full of rusted junk, including 2 chicken barns a tornado had totaled. I had to argue with the buyer to retrieve my sign that he had already gleefully added to his newly purchased hoard and hidden in a shed. I am really trying to downsize my own (and hubby’s!) useless junk so we have reasonable room for and can organize what will actually be useful if things go badly. My current strategy to help let things go, and what I advise clients is to ask yourself if you would buy that item again. In the case of sentimental things (tougher, certainly) it can often work to take some good pics to remember it, and pass the item along to someone who can make good use of it, or toss out as appropriate. I’ve had so many clients that like their own homes much better after clearing & decluttering them to get ready to sell. Let’s try to do that ongoing, so we can enjoy and use our spaces efficiently now, instead of allowing stuff to crowd us out of our own homes, or trap us in them as I’ve also seen. Our kids will thank us someday too, instead of screaming in frustration like my recent client’s daughter. Read More 20 61 Advice New and looking for constructive criticism on my bug out plan LaurenZ - November 7, 2021 Hey, some recent life situations have made me have to rethink my entire bug out plan and I just want you guys to poke as many holes in my plan as you can so I can make it as airtight as possible. Any help is incredibly appreciated. Some background: We recently moved my husband’s ailing parents in with us and then I was diagnosed with stage 3 lymphoma. My family now consists of me, my husband, my toddler, and my in-laws. I am currently undergoing chemo; my father in law has dementia, mobility issues and parkinsons; my mother in law also has mobility issues and must be attached to an oxygen tank all day. Neither of them can get very far without a walker or motorized scooter. We are not going to be hiking miles to a destination and will most likely be sheltering at home. My home is ready for this and it is not what I’m worried about. What I need help with: I like the tiered system that was discussed and have tweaked it to what I think may fit my needs. Level 1 bags will be what I need to get to a friend or relatives house. Each person’s bag will have a boo boo kit instead of a full FAK, a couple basic snacks, water, toothbrush, important documents, clothes, cash, charging cords and plugs, a multi tool, paracord, maps, personal medications/oxygen/dentures/diapers (for the toddler and in-laws), and will look more like a heavy EDC rather than a proper BOB. Level 2 will be for hotels and will include all level 1 plus a flat of water, security/defense items, some food, a real FAK, radio, can opener, eating utensils, paper plates and cups, and kid friendly distractions. Level 3 would be for shelters if we couldn’t get anywhere else and would be level 2 plus personal care and hygiene items, sleeping bags, power banks, ear plugs, eye masks, garbage bags and locks to keep our crap safe. These are not the full lists, as adding every tiny item would be really long, but it’s a decent representation. I am aware that all of this requires a car to get to these destinations and that a car may experience situations that would make us have to abandon it. My car is ready with more food, water, ways to procure more water, ways to make that water potable, ways to make fire, ways to make shelter, ways to signal for help, ways to defend, kid distractions, and additional first aid supplies. The plan is that either my husband or I would use the car’s GHB to find help while the other sets up a camp and tends to the rest of the family. It’s not ideal, and would really suck, but we wouldn’t die. As I stated earlier, sheltering in place looks like my family’s best option and will most likely be what we do for as long as we safely can. Please let me know what you think and if there is anything I should consider adding, removing, or if there is anything I hadn’t even thought of. If anyone has experience in bugging out with the elderly and disabled, I would appreciate any feedback or ideas you might have. I’m really not sure what to do to keep them safe if we were to have to go anywhere on foot. Should I keep a type of generator in my car so that we can power the portable oxygen tank? Should I bring their walkers or just craft a badass walking stick from zombie skulls and tears of the unicorns? I truly have no clue how to do this with them. Thank you in advance for all your help! Read More 14 26 AdviceScenarios Alaska facing record 12 feet of snow in 48 hours Bill Masen - November 7, 2021 https://www.foxweather.com/weather-news/alaskans-brace-for-a-record-12-feet-of-snow-in-two-days For those of us who experience true bad winters at times, this freak of nature could be worth watching and learning from as one POSSIBLE consequence of climate change Read More 4 1 News How do you stack your firewood? Bark up, or bark down? Jay ValenciaContributor - November 7, 2021 The people of Norway are serious about their firewood. So much so that Solid Wood by Lars Mytting (title changed for English release) spent more than a year on the nonfiction best-seller list in Norway. The book even sparked a 12 hour long television program about wood in which 20% of the population tuned in. During this 12 hour show, people started texting in complaining about how the wood was stacked in the program. What they found was that about 50 percent of people preferred to have the wood stacked with the bark facing up to protect the wood from rain and snow, and the other 50 percent preferred the wood stacked with the bark facing down to protect the wood from moisture on the ground. (best picture I could find of this) This even turned into a joke on the Disney movie Frozen where two citizens argue about which way the wood should be facing, which is where I learned about all this while watching with my daughter. Some people even turn wood stacking into an art form. Think this is all absurd? Read this New York Times article about it https://archive.md/nfaFd So what is the proper way to store firewood? Well, in my opinion, I think bark side up is correct. If stored outside it will act like shingles and keep the wood dry from rain, also if you had the bark facing down, the U shape of the bark would trap moisture and encourage decaying. Having proper airflow and spaces in between your wood is the most important factor however to allow drying. How do you store your firewood? Bark up, or bark down? Exposed to the sky and ground or lifted up off the ground and covered? Indoors or outdoors? Stored in a circle or tower? Facing north, east, south, or west? Does any of this even matter? Read More 11 7 Advice Austin,Texas DHS plan worth studying Bob - November 6, 2021 https://www.governing.com/community/report-identifies-issues-in-austins-disaster-preparedness Good morning, Austin, Texas developed a plan that addresses the deep freeze and lose of much infrastructure. Austin’s DHS and a consultant (Why the need for a consulting firm ?!) made some recommendations well worth studying. Note “no crew members … knew how to operate a gear switch”. Before a prepper buys anything, do think of the required support system: basic field expedient repairs (even if used at home and not in field), spare parts (consider the spares as “merely” a cost of the main gadget, eg generator, being purchased) and tools/lubercants/related. Under section titled “Shelters”, note “staffing shortfalls and availability of volunteers”. I’m posting this link not to single out and focus on Austin, Texas … it’s about the same here for private citizens … Note recommendation: “identity a list of medical shelters and general shelters with durable infrastructure”. All wheel drive emergency vehicles are far from being economical for year-round use. This specific subject is really a “it takes a village”. Where do the Austin, Texas taxes go to ? Please be reminded by me this this link if from “governing.org” ! Does not * Hagerty Consulting* firm serve as a huge flare indicating the problem ?! …… Would never have guessed roads could become useless without support. Read More 3 4 News A British prepper supply store Bob - November 6, 2021 https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/gallery/meet-cornwalls-survivalist-prepping-nation-6093283 Good morning, Above article is about a prepper store. Article has link to this store named “Prepper Shop UK”, owned and managed by Lincoln Miles. At the store link’s section titled “Urban Essentials”, I have a copy of the Field Manual “First Aid For Soldiers”. This FM is somewhat outdated. The best book IMO featured is prepper medical care is Dr William Forgery, M.D.’s “The Prepper Medical Handbook”. Might still have a copy here. Of course, regardless of my opinion, Dr Forgery’s book is also somewhat outdated when focused to the current US medical scene. I take due note that the Brit’s 50 cal ammo cans feature the newer HAZMAT label with number. This replaces the older “class C” label for small arms ammo (In US the 50 cal is still “small arms”). I do recommend Lincoln Miles get some fire extinguishers for his inventories. The prices appear to be real good. Read More 5 10 News Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders Bill Masen - November 6, 2021 Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders (msn.com) Russia deploying large military forces to its western borders and has cut essential natural gas supplies to Europe. Basically Putin holds all the aces and the knock on effects could be catastrophic for Europe this winter. Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders (telegraph.co.uk) Read More 4 9 News Middle Kingdom making itself a prepper nation Bob - November 5, 2021 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-59133027 Good afternoon, This short article tells of China wanting families to stockpile some foods. Of course some Chinese have always been preppers. Read More 8 8 News UK media focusing on pan US shortages in stores Bill Masen - November 5, 2021 Please ignore anything political in the DM article and focus on the logistical issues. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10094485/Biden-ridiculed-online-EmptyShelvesJoe-frustrated-shoppers-complain-shortages.html EG this sort of detail rather than the political sniping. Read More 5 6 News Fear, scary movies, our evolution; values to a prepper Bob - November 3, 2021 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/fear-can-be-fun-and-it-might-even-be-good-for-you Good morning, Had thought I posted this article several weeks ago. Apparently not. Redundancy better than neglect. Some forum member might need this info now. Note: “When the fear subsides, … pleasure”. Note: “stress hormones”. Did not know about Oxytocin and hugging. Note Dr Mendez’s “Risk takers … “. Note: “., short-term fear can have psychological benefits … to practice controlling”. Read More 5 4 News The need for insecticides in your survival garden RedneckContributor - November 1, 2021 I’m a long time gardener that has a small vegetable garden, that provides lots of great food for my wife & myself, plus we have a rather large orchard (over 150 trees). As a prepper, I plan for an extreme scenario, where possibly for a year or more, we might have to become self sufficient to survive. Obviously, to rapidly become self sufficient, the number one thing you need is lots of garden seed, so I keep several hundred pounds in cool storage and add approximately 50lbs per year. Most seed will become much less viable after 3-5 years, so it is important to add new seed to your stores each year. Sounds great, but there is something many preppers don’t plan on… battling insects when you just might need every plant to survive. My many years of gardening has taught me one thing and that is, at least where I live, there is no such thing as organic growing for many foods. This year has been especially bad for critters wanting to eat up my garden. Beetles of all sorts have been especially bad from the tiny ones you can barely see to the big ones. Squash bugs will kill any squash (or similar) within a few weeks. Now we have army worms attacking the grass all around this whole area. Picture this. We have a crisis & all good preppers pull out their hoes & seed & put in a nice, big garden. The plants start off great, but then your squash starts dying and most of your other plants’ leaves start looking like swiss cheese… full of holes. What good are those seeds & implements if you can’t control the bugs? My solution is insecticides. Yes they have all sorts of bad connotations, but if you really want to protect you food, and possibly your life, you will need them. Some insecticides are much safer than others. Spinosad is my go to insecticide, as it is one of the safest & some folks consider it organic. If applied properly, around dusk when the pollinators have left, it will only kill insects that bite into the plant… the bad guys. Once dry, it doesn’t harm the other insects & pollinators… the good guys. I purchase a quart of Conserve SC, which has a very concentrated amount of Spinosad for under $200. 1 oz of that makes 10 gallons, so that single quart can make over 300 gallons of insecticide. Another rather safe insecticide is Cypermethrin, is a very concentrated synthetic pyrethroid that kills insects on contact. It is considered very safe & safe around animals. That same chemical is used in my fly spray system in my horse barn. I’ll be spraying that tomorrow on my grass to kill the army worms. It only takes 3 oz per acre. Another contact killer I use in my garden is BioAdvanced Vegetable and Garden Insect Spray Concentrate. I use this as little as possible. My point is not to push any specific insecticide. I too keep lots of insecticide soaps & oils, such as Neem oil. I’m just letting you know some of what I use. My point is to remind any prepper that plans on growing their own food, that they really need to have insecticides on hand… and a lot of it. Besides having it on hand, it would be nice if you have some experience using it prior to a crisis, where a mistake can mean you and yours going hungry. I’ve found soaps & oils can be effective but sometimes you need something a bit stronger, at least IMO. Read More 18 65 Advice Specialized prepper multitool for food preparation Bob - November 1, 2021 This multi-tool is for preppers – food preppers that is Good morning, It’s about a gadget for food preparation when out in the field and this multitool is the de factor kitvhen drawer of gadgets. It’s approximately configured like a Swiss Army Knife. It has a cheese grater, inter alia – amongst other things. Not familiar with “Zester”. One thing I’m sure the gadget cannot do is open Brazil nuts. My method requires use of a crash ax and multitool with a vice grip. Most definitely carry the needed cleaning products along with this field expedient kitchen tool(s). Otherwise the bugs / animals will follow. Read More 4 5 Gear Avoiding a Halloween disaster Jay ValenciaContributor - November 1, 2021 With Halloween right around the corner, I wanted to share some of the safety tips that I have used over the years. Maybe it’s a bit overkill, but I haven’t lost a child to Halloween yet. There are tips that all can benefit from, those with children and those who will just stay home. Take your children trick or treating to known houses of people you trust. Check the sex offender registry and avoid those houses when trick or treating. Download the NSOPW app from your app store to see a map of houses to avoid wherever you go. Go out early and go home early. As the night goes on, people get drunk, it gets darker, and the older kids are out and about pulling tricks. Tell people which routes you will be walking and when you will be home. Inspect candy for any that have been tampered with by squeezing the packaging. If there isn’t a little bubble of air, it might have been opened. Look for any candy that your child may have a food allergy. One of the biggest dangers during Halloween is cars. If your three year old is running around in a black gorilla suit, it will be hard for a car to see them. Make safety fun for them by buying glow in the dark paint, using reflective tape, create a costume with LED lights, or a cheap option is buying packs of glow stick bracelets and necklaces from the dollar store. Make your children as visible as possible. If possible, avoid wearing masks that can obscure your vision. Drive slow and have your lights on as you are going around the next few days. Charge up and bring a headlight or flashlight when going around with your children. Print off your contact information and pin it to the inside of your child’s treat bag and costume. If they get lost, they can show that to someone to help reunite you. Before going out, make sure your and your child’s cell phones are completely charged and you have settings like Find My iPhone turned on. Take pictures of your children with and without their costumes on right before they go out, this can be used to show people or the police a description of your child if they get lost. Don’t make it scary for them and tell them it’s in case they get lost, just mention how you want it as memory. Do the same for your teenagers, no matter how much they complain and whine. Things happen unfortunately. If you are handing out candy, have some pepper spray close by the door in case you have some drunk teenagers come by that try and cause trouble and enter your house. Again, things happen, be prepared. Pull the jack o lanterns in when you are done handing out candy for the night and you turn your porch light off. Unless you want to pick up pumpkin guts from teenagers going around pumpkin smashing. Make sure any security cameras and home alarm systems are armed are working properly a couple days before and after Halloween. Do an extra security sweep around your property and house. Make sure all windows, doors, and padlocks are secured. People are just out and about looking for trouble. Bring a small first aid kit with you when trick or treating, running around in the dark can lead to some injuries. Have it nearby as well when carving pumpkins. If you are sick or think you have COVID, please do not go out trick or treating or hand out candy. There will be many more holidays you can enjoy, take it easy and watch a scary movie at home. Read More 9 6 AdviceScenarios Were preppers RIGHT? BBC sounds revisit Bill Masen - November 1, 2021 Read More 2 1 News Brit article on Brit preppers Bob - November 1, 2021 [Edit of article link by Gideon:] https://todayuknews.com/uk-news/uk-preppers-always-ready-for-armageddon-dismissed-as-paranoid-then-covid-hit/ Good morning, Per title, article tells of more acceptance of prepping after BREXIT. Article mentions Mathias, West Virginia. This place next to Virginia and just north of George Washington National Forest. Since the forest is Federal land, it can be readily packed with Fed LEOs. The mentioned 50 cal machine gun is something “frowned upon”. Reminder to forum members of the American upstart colonies: “torch” means in American English “flashlight”. Read More 2 7 News < Prev 1 2 3 … 30 31 32 … 58 59 60 Next > Recently Active Altoids First Aid Kit - 2 days agoIs a portable solar-powered generator practical for powering my home? - 2 days agoLahaina Fire: Deadliest US Fire in a Century - 3 days agoYou are stranded on a deserted island, you can choose four items… - 3 days agoNews for the week of 2024-05-13 - 6 days ago RULES This forum is heavily moderated to keep things valuable to as many people as possible. Full community policies are here. The basics: 1. Be nice to each other. 2. Stay focused on prepping. 3. Avoid politics, religion, and other arguments. 4. No unfounded conspiracies, fake news, etc. 5. Debate ideas, not people. FILTER Show all Advice Gear Meta News Scenarios Skills

Going Off-Road, money does not equate to common sense

Bill Masen - November 16, 2021

A good example of ” All The Gear, But No Idea”   Big expensive truck based overland 4×4 expedition vehicle, and they chose to go cross country in the rainy season.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-59301237

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Book Review: “The Black Swan”, by Nassim Taleb

brownfox-ffContributor - November 15, 2021

(image credit: “Black swan”  by Emiliana Borruto is licensed under Creative Commons – CC BY 2.0 )

In “The Black Swan”, Nassim Taleb discusses probability and the impact of unlikely but extreme events. He argues that we have a hard time understanding impacts and probabilities that are very large or very small. That what we do not know can be much more meaningful than anything we do know. Taleb argues that most of the course of human history has been dominated by extreme, unexpected, improbable events. And that human society will become more so in the future.

Taleb argues that we would benefit from improving how we think about unlikely, impactful events, and offers several tips for doing this. In this review I will outline the book itself, and then collect and present a summary of tips.

### What is a Black Swan?

A Black Swan event has three properties:

Unexpected. Nobody saw it coming. Impactful. Causes a big change. Explained after the fact. We look back and invent an explanation for it, even though we didn’t know it would happen.

Taleb lists the Internet, the laser, and the start of World War One as examples of Black Swan events. Black Swans can be either negative (like a sudden war) or positive (like discovering a new drug or invention – like penicillin).

Throughout his book, Taleb argues that history moves in large leaps and bounds, not small steps. Most of the big changes in human history come from Black Swans.

Taleb believes we should work to make our lives and society more robust to Black Swans. Understand them better. Become less surprised by them. And be more ready, so we aren’t as impacted. “The surprising part is not our bad errors, or even how bad they are, but that we are not aware of them”.

### Mediocristan and Extremistan

Taleb distinguishes between two types of random probability and events – “mild” randomness with slight variations vs “wild” randomness with extremely impactful events. He calls these “Mediocristan” and “Extremistan”.

In Mediocristan – all of the events and data are about average. No single event or person greatly changes the total.

Imagine gathering 1,000 people into a stadium, and comparing their weight. Even if you have one person with a very small weight (perhaps a baby) or a very large weight (the heaviest possible human) – they will not make up much of the total weight in the entire stadium. Examples of data or events in Mediocristan: height, weight, calorie consumption, income for a baker; gambling profits in a casino; car accidents, mortality rates.

In Extremistan you have a collection of “dwarfs” and “giants”. Some data points or events can be very small, and others hugely, massively out of scale, taking up most of the data.

Imagine gathering 1,000 people into a stadium, and comparing their net worth. The numbers could vary much more than weight. If you happen to get Bill Gates in the stadium, he becomes worth 99.99% of the total data. None of the rest really matters. You would never see a human who weighed several thousand tons. Examples of data or events in Extremistan: wealth; income; book sales per author; name recognition as a “celebrity”; number of hits in Google; populations of cities; numbers of speakers per language; damage caused by earthquakes; deaths in a war; sizes of planets; sizes of companies; stock ownership; commodity prices; inflation rates; economic data.

One of Taleb’s central points is: mathematical models based on the Bell Curve can help a lot when explaining events or data in Mediocristan. But they do not work at all when dealing with complicated events or data in Extremistan.

Mediocristan usually involves ‘biological’ data – physical measurements, or things present in the real world, where physical limits prevent them from getting out of hand. In Extremistan, we can never be sure of the data. Because one single person, point, or observation could suddenly dwarf the rest (imagine: measuring the net worth of everyone else, and then suddenly discovering Bill Gates). One measurement could suddenly invalidate all of our previous conclusions. So we need to proceed much more cautiously.

When measuring events or taking action in Extremistan, it is often the cumulative impact that is important. It doesn’t only matter if you were right or wrong; it matters *how* correct or incorrect you are. Being “right” about a danger causing one death, vs being “wrong” about a danger that causes 10 million deaths are quite different. We tend to “focus on the grass and miss the trees”.

The goal is to “be less surprised”, or “avoid being a sucker” about crazy, wild events that impact us.

### Part 1: Where and Why Brains Fail

Human brains are just not great at understanding some parts of the world. Especially risk and probability with very large or very small numbers.

Internal brain problems:

1) Narrative bias: Human brains love to invent and create stories, even and especially when no story or pattern exists. We do this unconsciously all of the time It takes mental effort to *not* create a story, or to *not* form an opinion Thus, humans can look at any set of totally unrelated data and *invent* a story about them. We think this helps us to understand the world better, but we are often wrong.

See “Thinking Fast and Slow”, by Daniel Kahneman.We have a “System 1” part of our brain – fast, intuitive, emotional, “gut feeling”.We have a “System 2” part of our brain – slower, more logical, critical thinking.It takes active effort and energy to do System 2 thinking. So it is harder.

2) Confirmation bias: We cherry-pick examples and data that support our story, and ignore evidence that goes against it. We also do this when predicting the future – we ignore times when we were wrong and only count the times we were right. It may only take one counter-example to prove an assumption is incorrect, so it may be faster and easier to disprove an idea.

Other thinking problems:

3) Silent evidence, a.k.a. Survivorship bias. It’s hard to keep in mind all of the data that we *don’t* see. For any problem or group of people, there may be a much larger group that we don’t know about, and don’t have evidence for. For example: There was an ancient civilization called the Phoenecians. They wrote on papyrus, which does not last long. Their papyrus writings rotted and decayed. So we didn’t have a record of much of their writing. It was easy to assume they did not write at all. Until we discovered their writing on other materials. For every person that “prayed to be saved” and survived, there are many that prayed but died. Only the people who made it are able to tell their stories. In World War II, the US military was trying to figure out how to protect more planes from getting shot down. They initially wanted to add armor to the locations with the most bullet holes. But Abraham Wald figured out: every place with a bullet hole was a location where the plane could sustain a hit, *and still survive*. He advocated the opposite – adding armor to the locations with *no* bullet holes. Because no planes that were shot in those locations made it back.

[ Image: Bullet hole damage in WWII airplanes. Add armor to where there are *no* bullet holes, to increase survivability. Image By Martin Grandjean (vector), McGeddon (picture), Cameron Moll (concept) – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0 ]

Ignoring “silent evidence” causes us to massively underestimate or mis-understand the real situation and real risk or probability, because we don’t know the whole story.We have to continually be careful to not assume we really understand how the world works, and make dangerous assumptions.

4) The Ludic Fallacy: We may think we understand the world, but often we don’t. Real life is messier, stranger, and more complicated than we learn in the classroom or in constrained environments. You have to be open to crazy wild events that are “against the rules”. e.g. someone pulling a gun in a martial arts tournament. This is high-level “thinking outside the box” Taleb calls it “a-Platonic” thinking – not trying to stuff reality into tidy-but-incorrect categories Thinking we understand reality when we do not is what causes many Black Swan events, and is dangerous.

An example of the world being more complex than we think: A casino has a reputation for being a place of gambling and chance. But casinos actually have very strict controls on the size of bets you can place, the possible payouts, watching for people cheating, etc. It is a controlled environment. The casino will never pay out 100 billion times your bet, or change the rules of the game mid-game. But real life might do something similar.

By contrast – One casino’s biggest risks and losses came from sources entirely outside of the expected:

A tiger attacked their star performer (Roy Horn of Seigfried & Roy). They were not insured for such an event, as they did not consider it a possibility. This ended their profitable best act. A disgruntled worker tried to dynamite the building. An employee had not been submitting the correct IRS tax forms, for multiple years. They simply put them into a drawer under their desk. The casino had to pay large amounts of penalties and back fees for not filing its taxes. It risked losing its license entirely and going out of business. A kidnapping attempt against the business owner’s daughter.

None of these risks or events were inside the casino’s business model or model of risk. They were entirely “outside the box”, and unexpected. Their cost was far greater than any on-model or expected risks or costs.

### Part 2: We Can’t Predict

Taleb spends several chapters showing how humans are bad at predicting. We can’t know the future and everybody gets it wrong.

We fall victim to tunnel vision – ignoring possibilities outside of what we think will happen. We overestimate what we know, and underestimate uncertainty. The more information you give someone, the more they try to interpret, and the more hypotheses they will form along the way. We see random noise and mistake it for information. Our ideas are “sticky” – once we form a theory, we are not likely to change our minds. So delaying developing your theories makes you better off Developing an opinion based on weak evidence makes it more difficult to change “Reading a summary magazine once a week is better for you than listening to the news every hour”. The longer interval lets you filter the info a bit. Small errors in measurement or a model can lead to drastically different outcomes It doesn’t matter how often you are right; what’s important is your cumulative error number E.g. one big event can throw you way off Or missing one prediction

[ Image: Stock Market total returns over 50 years. Including and excluding the Best 10 days. Note that excluding these 10 days (the lower, darker line) cuts the total value of the stock market as a whole in half. Traditional economic models treat these types of jumps as too extreme to ever happen. Yet here they have obviously happened several times. Image copyright Taleb; used only for review purposes. ]

One example – for the entire stock market, over a period of 50 years – fully half of the total value of all stocks was created during only ten days. Out of a period of 50 years. Using current economics models and claims, these types of events should be nearly impossible. Yet here they are. Taleb uses this as an example disproving the claim of Bell Curve economic models and disproving economists’ ability to predict.

Taleb discusses “Retrospective Distortion”: History seems more clear and organized when we look back than it actually was for people going through it at the time.

### Part 3 and 4 – Technical Details

Parts 3 and 4 delve into technical details on how exactly many so-called “experts” are wrong, and advice on how to minimize damage from Black Swans.

Taleb argues that the world is moving more into Extremistan over time. As technology and society become more complex, it is even more difficult to predict. The world is more complicated than many so-called “experts” and economists believe or tell you. The Bell Curve doesn’t actually work for most models; it can only be used to predict normal, boring events and data in Mediocristan. For any events in Extremistan – that includes most societal, cultural, and world events or data – the Bell Curve is a lie and *does not work at all*. This is a central point that Taleb emphasizes repeatedly.

By assuming the world is more complex than we realize by default, we can improve some events – “Turn Black Swans into Grey”. We are less surprised if we remain open to wild, impactful, unexpected events.

### What To Do About It

There are many interesting perspectives and advice that can be taken from the book. The most relevant areas are Chapter 13, “What to do if you cannot predict”; and Appendix 6 and 7 on The Fourth Quadrant – how to think about different types of risk, and mitigate them.

1. Look for counter-examples to check if you’re wrong

Because of confirmation bias, and because events in Extremistan can appear to be stable and normal for long periods, it is easy to find examples that reinforce any claim. That doesn’t mean we are right. If you have lunch with someone for an hour, and they don’t murder anyone for the entire hour, that doesn’t guarantee they are not a murderer.

It is faster and more effective to look for counter-examples that prove we are *wrong*. Ask “if this were not true, what would that look like?”.

2. Ask “Where did I get lucky?”

Examine past events. When you prepare a retrospective or After Action Report, ask “where did I get lucky?”. What events just happened to go well? From that list, what could you improve for next time, to improve your odds?

You see this in post mortems from organizations like the Google Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team. They ask: “What went well? What needs to be improved? And where did we get lucky?”.

By considering events where we got lucky but it could have been worse, we can improve our robustness and preparations for next time.

3. Consider the consequences, or outcomes, and prepare for those

> “I don’t know the odds of an earthquake, but I can imagine how San Francisco (or any other place) might be affected by one”

The odds of some event may be unknowable, and no amount of modeling could figure it out. But I can guess pretty well how an earthquake or other event might *affect* me and my surroundings. And I can take steps to prepare for *that*.

If you lose power or water to your home, you don’t care as much about what caused it. You care more about how you can deal with it, and prevent it or make it easier.

Taleb’s advice is to focus on the *consequences* of some outcomes, and take steps to be ready for them. If we prepare for e.g. an earthquake, epidemic, financial crash, or other event, then it doesn’t matter so much about the odds of it happening; we can be ready regardless. “Rank beliefs by the harm they might cause”. “Invest in preparedness, not prediction”.

This matches advice from security expert Bruce Schneier, who advocates investing in intelligence gathering and emergency response:

> “Large-scale terrorist attacks and natural disasters differ in cause, but they’re very similar in aftermath.”

> The problem is that we can’t guess correctly. “Fund security that doesn’t rely on guessing”.

This leads to advice like:

Keep an emergency fund, to help you deal with outcomes, whatever they are. Buy insurance to cover and mitigate your losses for bad outcomes.

4. Cover your basics; keep an open mind

We can’t know what the future holds. But if you allow for the possibility of unexpected, impactful events, you won’t be as surprised if or when they happen. By keeping an open mind about the possibility, you’re already better prepared. By covering our basics; accepting that we might be wrong; and having flexible preparations; we can adapt to events as needed.

5. Beware people selling you a solution

>“Avoid taking advice from someone unless they have a penalty for bad advice”.

Human brains have a harder time with ‘negative’ advice about what *not* to do. It is easier for us to look for or invent a solution. This is exploited by many frauds and scams – trying to sell you a solution that won’t actually work. Choosing to do nothing is itself a valid action and choice. “Don’t just do something – sit there!”.

Other Tips

Consume less media and news. Lowers anxiety Avoids anchoring our thoughts to random data, which may cause worse decisions Do not listen to economic forecasters or predictors in social science. Don’t go deeply into debt. Don’t overspecialize. Learn some skills and/or have a job that can be transferrable or used for more than one type of work. Avoid optimization. Learn to love redundancy. The knowledge we get from tinkering and experimenting is better than just thinking and reasoning.

The Barbell Strategy: Be both hyper-conservative and hyper-aggressive, with different things, at the same time.

Taleb discusses his days as a financial stock trader. Since we can’t know whether anything is “risky” or not, it is impossible to build a portfolio that is “medium risk”. He suggests: Put 80-90% of your investments into ‘likely safe’ vehicles, such as bonds or Treasury Bills; put the rest into extremely speculative bets – such as Venture Capital investments in research & development, or startups. This limits your maximum losses while gaining you exposure to potentially lucky, positive outcomes.

Note: This is *not* financial advice. Please don’t make large adjustments to your personal finances based on a book summary you read on the internet.

### Positive Black Swans

Black Swan events are unexpected, and impactful. But they can be both positive and negative. Positive Black Swan events include discovering a new, beneficial medicine, or inventions such as the laser and the Internet.

Taleb’s Tips For Finding + Benefiting From Positive Black Swans

Live in a city or hub of activity with an intermingling of people and ideas Go to parties Strike up random conversations with people at parties Invest in as many things as you can Keep an open mind. Good fortune could come from anywhere. Seize any opportunity, or anything that looks like an opportunity. Maximize your exposure to as many potential opportunities as you can. Put yourself into situations where favourable consequences are much larger than unfavourable ones.

You can decide how many of those you want to apply in your own life.

### Tips for a More Black Swan-Robust Community

Avoid externalities. People who make decisions should have some stake in the outcome, or some consequences from the results of those decisions. No gambling with other people’s money. Build in some slack and redundancy. This is how complex systems survive. Start with small experiments. Test out small ideas first to see if they work or fail. Build and improve on the ones that work. If something will fail, finding out sooner is better than finding out later. Don’t take on large amounts of debt.

I have heavily adapted and synthesized this list from Taleb’s essay Ten Principles for a Black Swan-Robust Society. This essay is included at the end of the book.

In his essay, Taleb uses the term “society”. I am reframing a few of his ideas as: how could they apply to your local group or community?

Not many of us are world leaders. But some of us may have positions of leadership in our own community, or could step up to lead.

I believe the world is better if everyone is more prepared. If people all over the planet take one step or keep this in mind to work toward a more resilient planet, we all benefit.

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Navigating and estimating time using the sun

Robert LarsonContributor - November 15, 2021

Two little tricks I learned in Boy Scouts have stuck with me and I use quite often to help me gain my bearings and know how much sunlight is left in the day.

For navigation, if you live in the northern hemisphere, point the hour hand of your watch at the sun. Then figure out the halfway point between the hour hand and 12:00, that is South. The opposite then is North.

If you are in the southern hemisphere, you point the 12:00 at the sun and half way between that and the hour hand is North.

If you have  digital watch or just your cell phone with the time, note what time it is and imagine you are wearing an analog watch and then do the above calculations. 

This won’t be very accurate for orienteering, but it can help you at least know which direction you need to go in. For example if your friend says to meet them on the west side of the building and you don’t know where west is, this will help you.

Picture taken from this website.

The next little trick is how to tell how much sunlight is left in the day. This will help if you are needing to know how much time you have left to build a shelter, find food, or gather firewood by before it gets dark. Or even in our every day lives of when it will get dark and you should start heading home.

You stretch your hand out in front of you and place the sun at the top of your index finger. Every width of finger is going to be 15 minutes of sunlight. So if the sun is only two fingers away from the horizon, you have 30 minutes before it goes below that. Chubby or skinny fingers may add or minus a few minutes 😉

Picture taken from this site.

I hope these two little tricks will help you in your everyday life and also as you are camping, bugging out, or surviving. 

What other sun tricks do you know about?

Did you know about either of these?

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Skills

Site Censoring

Illini Warrior - November 14, 2021

Either this is a free & open site to post opinions or it’s not – the Americans here value their 1st Amendment Right – the rest take your lumps without the protection …

Refuse the posting – delete it ENTIRELY – but I for one don’t allow someone to self editorialize THEIR opinion using my name ….

Bill Mason posts elsewhere on other prepper forums – doesn’t expect to be censored – don’t appreciate that double-standard ….

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These pants aren’t chainsaw proof but pretty close

Conrad B - November 14, 2021

Found this video of Husqvarna’s chainsaw pants and thought it was pretty impressive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYrKrF5eMRQ

I went to the website and there are two kinds, Technical or Classic. They both have the same rating (ASTM F1897) but a pretty big price difference.

https://www.husqvarna.com/us/accessories/personal-protective-equipment/

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Gear

Changing how and what vegetables I’m growing next year

JennyWren - November 11, 2021

My allotment was vandalised a couple of weeks ago. They smashed my winter squash and the shelling beans were strewn hither and yon, winter greens were pulled up and the little store box was set alight. I’m done with it. Add to that a Rabbit infestation that the council are not keen to deal with, I have decided to give up the allotment and make more of the space I have at home. Our yard is small, barely 30′ x 18′. Half of the yard is spoken for, so that leave me a space 8′ x 20′. I have worked out that will give me 4 4’x8′ raised beds. I was surprised how much space there actually was. I have used the raised bed method before, with great success so with careful choice of vegetable types and varieties, I am looking forward to growing a substantial amount of our vegetables (we are a family of 2).

I’m going to incorporate the square foot growing method as well as catch cropping and anything else I can think of. 

This garden probably won’t provide sufficient produce for preserving for the winter, but I hope with judicious planting to have enough space to keep a winter garden as well as the flourishing summer garden. 

I hope to keep you appraised so that those who have little space and experience can hopefully learn something from my experiences.

So watch this space!

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US inflation at 31 year high

Bill Masen - November 10, 2021

U.S. inflation up 6.2% in October versus a year ago – the highest inflation since 1990. Inflation was up 0.9% in Oct. alone, a much higher increase than 0.4% in Sept. and 0.3% in August

These sort of figures cause preppers to look much closer at their supply and equipment levels, as well as their savings and investments.

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News

What should I add to my altoids EDC tin?

Gideon ParkerStaff - November 9, 2021

I’ll have to make an altoids survival tin sometime that could help me survive a night in the woods with just what is in the tin, but I do have an altoids EDC tin that I use almost everyday. Take a look at it and let me know if there is something I should add.

What would your altoids EDC tin look like? Try making one and share it on here using the kit builder!

 

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AdviceGear

Has anyone else heard of wool knops?

LBV - November 9, 2021

During our most recent lockdown I discovered a product called wool knops. They are springy, can be compressed and bounce back, stick to each other.

I am planning on using them to fill my sleeping bag, as well as a puffer jacket. Their texture and form means they hold a good deal of air so to me they could be a better alternative to both polyester and down – warmth, water resistant as well as fire resistant.  Is anyone else familiar with these?

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Gear

Fine line between prepping and hoarding, regarding household capacity

CR - November 8, 2021

Let me start by stating I don’t mean panic buying etc. I’m a longtime Realtor, and have worked with a number of hoarder clients, prepper clients and a family member’s epic sized hoard. It’s a sad fact that many members of the Greatest Generation who lived through World Wars and the Great Depression are inundated with stuff & unable to let go, largely due to their past experiences of scarcity. A recent elderly client clung to his hoard so fiercely that he had a screaming match in my office with his daughter who had come from out of state to move him near her. She went home without him, declaring she was done. Sad and avoidable, a priceless relationship in tatters over stuff.  

My topic aims to open a dialogue on how we all can deal healthily with hanging onto and adding to stuff in relation to its actual value in a potentially worsening scenario. We likely all have a ton of preps that we have collected and are certain will save the day when needed. Me too, I’ll state right now. However, often we hang onto other crap that has no realistic future use, and just clutters up our living and storage spaces. 

I’ve had to deal with some bizarre stuff in my job, plus clearing relative’s homes. One prepper I worked with had buried 150 pounds of silver in his shop, after his son told him he shouldn’t leave it in the attic! One property I sold had 5 acres full of rusted junk, including 2 chicken barns a tornado had totaled. I had to argue with the buyer to retrieve my sign that he had already gleefully added to his newly purchased hoard and hidden in a shed.

I am really trying to downsize my own (and hubby’s!) useless junk so we have reasonable room for and can organize what will actually be useful if things go badly. My current strategy to help let things go, and what I advise clients is to ask yourself if you would buy that item again. In the case of sentimental things (tougher, certainly) it can often work to take some good pics to remember it, and pass the item along to someone who can make good use of it, or toss out as appropriate. 

I’ve had so many clients that like their own homes much better after clearing & decluttering them to get ready to sell. Let’s try to do that ongoing, so we can enjoy and use our spaces efficiently now, instead of allowing stuff to crowd us out of our own homes, or trap us in them as I’ve also seen. Our kids will thank us someday too, instead of screaming in frustration like my recent client’s daughter. 

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Advice

New and looking for constructive criticism on my bug out plan

LaurenZ - November 7, 2021

Hey, some recent life situations have made me have to rethink my entire bug out plan and I just want you guys to poke as many holes in my plan as you can so I can make it as airtight as possible. Any help is incredibly appreciated.

Some background: We recently moved my husband’s ailing parents in with us and then I was diagnosed with stage 3 lymphoma. My family now consists of me, my husband, my toddler, and my in-laws. I am currently undergoing chemo; my father in law has dementia, mobility issues and parkinsons; my mother in law also has mobility issues and must be attached to an oxygen tank all day. Neither of them can get very far without a walker or motorized scooter. We are not going to be hiking miles to a destination and will most likely be sheltering at home. My home is ready for this and it is not what I’m worried about.

What I need help with: I like the tiered system that was discussed and have tweaked it to what I think may fit my needs. Level 1 bags will be what I need to get to a friend or relatives house. Each person’s bag will have a boo boo kit instead of a full FAK, a couple basic snacks, water, toothbrush, important documents, clothes, cash, charging cords and plugs, a multi tool, paracord, maps, personal medications/oxygen/dentures/diapers (for the toddler and in-laws), and will look more like a heavy EDC rather than a proper BOB. Level 2 will be for hotels and will include all level 1 plus a flat of water, security/defense items, some food, a real FAK, radio, can opener, eating utensils, paper plates and cups, and kid friendly distractions. Level 3 would be for shelters if we couldn’t get anywhere else and would be level 2 plus personal care and hygiene items, sleeping bags, power banks, ear plugs, eye masks, garbage bags and locks to keep our crap safe. These are not the full lists, as adding every tiny item would be really long, but it’s a decent representation.

I am aware that all of this requires a car to get to these destinations and that a car may experience situations that would make us have to abandon it. My car is ready with more food, water, ways to procure more water, ways to make that water potable, ways to make fire, ways to make shelter, ways to signal for help, ways to defend, kid distractions, and additional first aid supplies. The plan is that either my husband or I would use the car’s GHB to find help while the other sets up a camp and tends to the rest of the family. It’s not ideal, and would really suck, but we wouldn’t die. As I stated earlier, sheltering in place looks like my family’s best option and will most likely be what we do for as long as we safely can.

Please let me know what you think and if there is anything I should consider adding, removing, or if there is anything I hadn’t even thought of. If anyone has experience in bugging out with the elderly and disabled, I would appreciate any feedback or ideas you might have. I’m really not sure what to do to keep them safe if we were to have to go anywhere on foot. Should I keep a type of generator in my car so that we can power the portable oxygen tank? Should I bring their walkers or just craft a badass walking stick from zombie skulls and tears of the unicorns? I truly have no clue how to do this with them.

Thank you in advance for all your help!

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AdviceScenarios

Alaska facing record 12 feet of snow in 48 hours

Bill Masen - November 7, 2021

https://www.foxweather.com/weather-news/alaskans-brace-for-a-record-12-feet-of-snow-in-two-days

For those of us who experience true bad winters at times, this freak of nature could be worth watching and learning from as one POSSIBLE consequence of climate change

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News

How do you stack your firewood? Bark up, or bark down?

Jay ValenciaContributor - November 7, 2021

The people of Norway are serious about their firewood. So much so that Solid Wood by Lars Mytting (title changed for English release) spent more than a year on the nonfiction best-seller list in Norway. The book even sparked a 12 hour long television program about wood in which 20% of the population tuned in. During this 12 hour show, people started texting in complaining about how the wood was stacked in the program.

What they found was that about 50 percent of people preferred to have the wood stacked with the bark facing up to protect the wood from rain and snow,

and the other 50 percent preferred the wood stacked with the bark facing down to protect the wood from moisture on the ground.

(best picture I could find of this)

This even turned into a joke on the Disney movie Frozen where two citizens argue about which way the wood should be facing, which is where I learned about all this while watching with my daughter.

Some people even turn wood stacking into an art form.

Think this is all absurd? Read this New York Times article about it https://archive.md/nfaFd

So what is the proper way to store firewood? Well, in my opinion, I think bark side up is correct. If stored outside it will act like shingles and keep the wood dry from rain, also if you had the bark facing down, the U shape of the bark would trap moisture and encourage decaying.

Having proper airflow and spaces in between your wood is the most important factor however to allow drying.

How do you store your firewood? Bark up, or bark down? Exposed to the sky and ground or lifted up off the ground and covered? Indoors or outdoors? Stored in a circle or tower? Facing north, east, south, or west? Does any of this even matter? 

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Advice

Austin,Texas DHS plan worth studying

Bob - November 6, 2021

https://www.governing.com/community/report-identifies-issues-in-austins-disaster-preparedness

Good morning, 

Austin, Texas developed a plan that addresses the deep freeze and lose of much infrastructure.

Austin’s DHS and a consultant (Why the need for a consulting firm ?!) made some recommendations well worth studying.

Note “no crew members … knew how to operate a gear switch”. Before a prepper buys anything, do think of the required support system: basic field expedient repairs (even if used at home and not in field), spare parts (consider the spares as “merely” a cost of the main gadget, eg generator, being purchased) and tools/lubercants/related.

Under section titled “Shelters”, note “staffing shortfalls and availability of volunteers”. I’m posting this link not to single out and focus on Austin, Texas … it’s about the same here for private citizens …

Note recommendation: “identity a list of medical shelters and general shelters with durable infrastructure”. 

All wheel drive emergency vehicles are far from being economical for year-round use. This specific subject is really a “it takes a village”.

Where do the Austin, Texas taxes go to ? Please be reminded by me this this link if from “governing.org” !

Does not * Hagerty Consulting* firm serve as a huge flare indicating the problem ?!

……

Would never have guessed roads could become useless without support.

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News

A British prepper supply store

Bob - November 6, 2021

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/gallery/meet-cornwalls-survivalist-prepping-nation-6093283

Good morning,

Above article is about a prepper store.

Article has link to this store named “Prepper Shop UK”, owned and managed by Lincoln Miles.

At the store link’s section titled “Urban Essentials”, I have a copy of the Field Manual “First Aid For Soldiers”. This FM is somewhat outdated.  The best book IMO featured is prepper medical care is Dr William Forgery, M.D.’s “The Prepper Medical Handbook”. Might still have a copy here. Of course, regardless of my opinion, Dr Forgery’s book is also somewhat outdated when focused to the current US medical scene.

I take due note that the Brit’s 50 cal ammo cans feature the newer HAZMAT label with number. This replaces the older “class C” label for small arms ammo (In US the 50 cal is still “small arms”).

I do recommend Lincoln Miles get some fire extinguishers for his inventories.

The prices appear to be real good.  

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News

Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders

Bill Masen - November 6, 2021

Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders (msn.com)

Russia deploying large military forces to its western borders and has cut essential natural gas supplies to Europe.  Basically Putin holds all the aces and the knock on effects could be catastrophic for Europe this winter.

Russia cuts gas to Europe and amasses military on western borders (telegraph.co.uk)

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News

Middle Kingdom making itself a prepper nation

Bob - November 5, 2021

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-59133027

Good afternoon,

This short article tells of China wanting families to stockpile some foods.

Of course some Chinese have always been preppers.

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News

UK media focusing on pan US shortages in stores

Bill Masen - November 5, 2021

Please ignore anything political in the DM article and focus on the logistical issues.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10094485/Biden-ridiculed-online-EmptyShelvesJoe-frustrated-shoppers-complain-shortages.html

EG this sort of detail rather than the political sniping.

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News

Fear, scary movies, our evolution; values to a prepper

Bob - November 3, 2021

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/fear-can-be-fun-and-it-might-even-be-good-for-you

Good morning,

Had thought I posted this article several weeks ago.  Apparently not. Redundancy better than neglect.  Some forum member might need this info now.

Note:  “When the fear subsides, … pleasure”.

Note:  “stress hormones”.

Did not know about Oxytocin and hugging.

Note Dr Mendez’s “Risk takers … “.

Note:  “., short-term fear can have psychological benefits … to practice controlling”.

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News

The need for insecticides in your survival garden

RedneckContributor - November 1, 2021

I’m a long time gardener that has a small vegetable garden, that provides lots of great food for my wife & myself, plus we have a rather large orchard (over 150 trees).  As a prepper, I plan for an extreme scenario, where possibly for a year or more, we might have to become self sufficient to survive.  Obviously, to rapidly become self sufficient, the number one thing you need is lots of garden seed, so I keep several hundred pounds in cool storage and add approximately 50lbs per year.  Most seed will become much less viable after 3-5 years, so it is important to add new seed to your stores each year.

Sounds great, but there is something many preppers don’t plan on… battling insects when you just might need every plant to survive.  My many years of gardening has taught me one thing and that is, at least where I live, there is no such thing as organic growing for many foods.  This year has been especially bad for critters wanting to eat up my garden.  Beetles of all sorts have been especially bad from the tiny ones you can barely see to the big ones.  Squash bugs will kill any squash (or similar) within a few weeks.  Now we have army worms attacking the grass all around this whole area.

Picture this.  We have a crisis & all good preppers pull out their hoes & seed & put in a nice, big garden.  The plants start off great, but then your squash starts dying and most of your other plants’ leaves start looking like swiss cheese… full of holes.  What good are those seeds & implements if you can’t control the bugs?

My solution is insecticides.  Yes they have all sorts of bad connotations, but if you really want to protect you food, and possibly your life, you will need them.  Some insecticides are much safer than others.  Spinosad is my go to insecticide, as it is one of the safest & some folks consider it organic.  If applied properly, around dusk when the pollinators have left, it will only kill insects that bite into the plant… the bad guys.  Once dry, it doesn’t harm the other insects & pollinators… the good guys.  I purchase a quart of Conserve SC, which has a very concentrated amount of Spinosad for under $200.  1 oz of that makes 10 gallons, so that single quart can make over 300 gallons of insecticide.

Another rather safe insecticide is Cypermethrin, is a very concentrated synthetic pyrethroid that kills insects on contact.  It is considered very safe & safe around animals.  That same chemical is used in my fly spray system in my horse barn.  I’ll be spraying that tomorrow on my grass to kill the army worms.  It only takes 3 oz per acre.  Another contact killer I use in my garden is BioAdvanced Vegetable and Garden Insect Spray Concentrate.  I use this as little as possible.

My point is not to push any specific insecticide.  I too keep lots of insecticide soaps & oils, such as Neem oil.  I’m just letting you know some of what I use.  My point is to remind any prepper that plans on growing their own food, that they really need to have insecticides on hand… and a lot of it.  Besides having it on hand, it would be nice if you have some experience using it prior to a crisis, where a mistake can mean you and yours going hungry.  I’ve found soaps & oils can be effective but sometimes you need something a bit stronger, at least IMO.

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Advice

Specialized prepper multitool for food preparation

Bob - November 1, 2021

This multi-tool is for preppers – food preppers that is

Good morning,

It’s about a gadget for food preparation when out in the field and this multitool is the de factor kitvhen drawer of gadgets.

It’s approximately configured like a Swiss Army Knife.  It has a cheese grater, inter alia – amongst other things. Not familiar with “Zester”.

One thing I’m sure the gadget cannot do is open Brazil nuts. My method requires use of a crash ax and multitool with a vice grip.

Most definitely carry the needed cleaning products along with this field expedient kitchen tool(s).  Otherwise the bugs /  animals will follow.

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Gear

Avoiding a Halloween disaster

Jay ValenciaContributor - November 1, 2021

With Halloween right around the corner, I wanted to share some of the safety tips that I have used over the years. Maybe it’s a bit overkill, but I haven’t lost a child to Halloween yet. There are tips that all can benefit from, those with children and those who will just stay home.

Take your children trick or treating to known houses of people you trust. Check the sex offender registry and avoid those houses when trick or treating. Download the NSOPW app from your app store to see a map of houses to avoid wherever you go. Go out early and go home early. As the night goes on, people get drunk, it gets darker, and the older kids are out and about pulling tricks. Tell people which routes you will be walking and when you will be home. Inspect candy for any that have been tampered with by squeezing the packaging. If there isn’t a little bubble of air, it might have been opened. Look for any candy that your child may have a food allergy. One of the biggest dangers during Halloween is cars. If your three year old is running around in a black gorilla suit, it will be hard for a car to see them. Make safety fun for them by buying glow in the dark paint, using reflective tape, create a costume with LED lights, or a cheap option is buying packs of glow stick bracelets and necklaces from the dollar store. Make your children as visible as possible. If possible, avoid wearing masks that can obscure your vision. Drive slow and have your lights on as you are going around the next few days. Charge up and bring a headlight or flashlight when going around with your children. Print off your contact information and pin it to the inside of your child’s treat bag and costume. If they get lost, they can show that to someone to help reunite you. Before going out, make sure your and your child’s cell phones are completely charged and you have settings like Find My iPhone turned on. Take pictures of your children with and without their costumes on right before they go out, this can be used to show people or the police a description of your child if they get lost. Don’t make it scary for them and tell them it’s in case they get lost, just mention how you want it as memory. Do the same for your teenagers, no matter how much they complain and whine. Things happen unfortunately. If you are handing out candy, have some pepper spray close by the door in case you have some drunk teenagers come by that try and cause trouble and enter your house. Again, things happen, be prepared. Pull the jack o lanterns in when you are done handing out candy for the night and you turn your porch light off. Unless you want to pick up pumpkin guts from teenagers going around pumpkin smashing. Make sure any security cameras and home alarm systems are armed are working properly a couple days before and after Halloween. Do an extra security sweep around your property and house. Make sure all windows, doors, and padlocks are secured. People are just out and about looking for trouble. Bring a small first aid kit with you when trick or treating, running around in the dark can lead to some injuries. Have it nearby as well when carving pumpkins. If you are sick or think you have COVID, please do not go out trick or treating or hand out candy. There will be many more holidays you can enjoy, take it easy and watch a scary movie at home. Read More

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AdviceScenarios

Were preppers RIGHT? BBC sounds revisit

Bill Masen - November 1, 2021

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2

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News

Brit article on Brit preppers

Bob - November 1, 2021

[Edit of article link by Gideon:] https://todayuknews.com/uk-news/uk-preppers-always-ready-for-armageddon-dismissed-as-paranoid-then-covid-hit/

Good morning,

Per title, article tells of more acceptance of prepping after BREXIT.

Article mentions Mathias, West Virginia.  This place next to Virginia and just north of George Washington National Forest.  Since the forest is Federal land, it can be readily packed with Fed LEOs.  The mentioned 50 cal machine gun is something “frowned upon”.

Reminder to forum members of the American upstart colonies: “torch” means in American English “flashlight”.

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News