-- Posted by TheIntellect at 8:08 pm on Feb. 18, 2008 The other thread asked whether or not our grades would be effected. No disrespect to that thread, but I think the real question is: Do you think the Western World can live successfully if the Internet went down one day for eternity? Now, of course we CAN live and survive without the  internet, we have done (circa) pre-1998 But look how relient are now on it It provides us with constant news. We can do our shopping. We talk to friends in other parts of the state/country/world. We conduct business meetings and E-mails. And many other things I'm sure I'm forgetting. What's more, what if all our media (Internet, TV, and Radio) was knocked out? To me, that's the worst possible scenario - and would be the worst terrorist attack actually. Think about the chaos. No news of anything. It's scary to think how relient we are on technology. Cause, despite how great it is, it's not reliable. Technology wears out, (or can be taken down through means such as a terrorist attack), and that would leave us INCREDIBLY vulnerable. So what do you reckon? Is the internet the be-all and end-all of today's society? Can our western society thrive if one day we wake up and realize all technology is down and not working, or would that thrust us all into a complete state of anarchy? It's weird to think about because we would still have food, life technically could still go on. Many parts of the world live decently without such technology, and our western society obviously did too hundreds of years ago. But have we just simply become too dependent on it? (What's more, as the years go by, with technology increasing at an exponential rate, we're only going to become even more dependent on technology in the future....) -- Posted by airemaye at 8:18 pm on Feb. 18, 2008 I think it would be crazy for awhile, but then people would begin to adjust. It might be hard for some younger people, who can't remember a time before the internet, but for the older people, it wouldn't be so hard. I think our society could benefit from a bit of back-to-basics, actually. We've gotten so far off track from what really matters, and concentrate all our attention on materialistic things and instant gratification. We'd still have the media, though. Newspapers, the radio, television (or would television be wiped out as well?), etc. We managed to survive for centuries without even plumbing or electricity. I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard for us to live without the internet. It would change our culture, yeah, and send us back a couple decades, but still. It wouldn't knock us back to the stong age.