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John_Maxwell_IV comments on Don't Build Fallout Shelters - Less Wrong
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This might make sense for an individual, but on a civilization level, I like the idea of there being crazy survivalists to keep humanity going if something bad happens.
Maybe the crazy survivalists like the idea, too. Hypothesis: Some reasonable portion of the people who build shelters aren't buying nuclear-war insurance; they're buying the fantasy of being the romantic postapocalyptic survivor. Like buying the fantasy of being rich via lottery tickets, or the fantasy of being fit and pretty via exercise machines.
What's your estimate of how much more likely a crazy survivalist is to survive something bad than a non-(crazy survivalist)? Or, put slightly differently: supposing that something bad happens and only N humans survive, what's your estimate of how many of N are crazy survivalists?
It would seem that a crazy survivalist would be less likely to survive a catastrophe that would require his or her rationale than a non-crazy survivalist. Seems redundant to have to articulate.
UN says 1.4B people don't use electricity. What happens in "modern" world doesn't affect them much. Reproduction rate for many animals is faster than cancer rate in Chyernoble from what I remember; so, even nukes might not really destroy those folks. Plus, many are outside the realms of major effect. So, clearly, North Americans who do not prep will be in trouble (just as non-NAZI's in Germany); but, aboriginees probably don't need to prep. I'd say a prepper in USA has a 75% chance of survival whereas a non-prepper a 0.5%. (Given my expectation that on-the-ground war is most probable outcome in next 0.1 to 10 years). For other scenarios such as a comet, overly strong solar flare, massive pandemic, or such, preppers have maybe a 95% chance and non-preppers have maybe a 20% chance. The probability of those happening is probably 1% in our lifespan but could be as high as 20% for specific locations.
OK.
So on your account it follows that if N% of the U.S. population comprises preppers, then after a nuclear event we should expect to see ~1.4B "non-modern" people, (.005*[1-N]*us_pop) non-prepping USAers, and (.75*N*us_pop) prepping USAers, among others. After some other scenarios we should expect to see ~1.4B "non-modern" people, (.2*[1-N]*us_pop) non-prepping USAers, and (.95*N*us_pop) prepping USAers, among others.
Yes?
So, OK. If us_pop is 315486161 and N is 0% then in the first scenario we expect the survivors to include (.005*1*315486161=) ~1.6 million USAers and in the second scenario we expect the survivors to include (.2*1*315486161=) 63 million USAers.
At the other extreme, if N is 100%, then in the first scenario we expect the survivors to include (.75*1*us_pop=) 237 million USAers and in the second scenario we expect the survivors to include (.95*1*us_pop) 300 million USAers.
In all of these scenarios we also expect the survivors to include ~1.4B non-"modern" people, plus some modern survivors not from the U.S.
Yes?
Given those estimates, and assuming that the referents for your "prepper" and JMIV's "crazy survivalist" are roughly comparable, I don't find myself caring very much about Ns smaller than about 1%.