this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2025
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Scenario: this island is cut off from the rest of humanity (magic, war, space alien zoo, etc)

Which island is in the best position to maintain its civilization? Industry? Technology?

top 36 comments
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[–] ironhydroxide@sh.itjust.works 9 points 11 hours ago

North Sentinel Island

[–] Bonifratz@sh.itjust.works 58 points 21 hours ago (1 children)
[–] cm0002@lemmy.world 15 points 20 hours ago

Yea, they basically already self isolate sooo it'd just be another Tuesday for them lmao

[–] frenchfryenjoyer@lemmings.world 8 points 15 hours ago (2 children)
[–] anachrohack@lemmy.world 2 points 9 hours ago

Is it self sufficient? From what I understand they're pretty reliant on imports for a lot of things, including agriculture

[–] Chocrates@lemmy.world 6 points 14 hours ago

Was gonna say Australia too

[–] Saucepain@lemmy.world 33 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

Ireland isn't bad from a basic survival perspective - massive food surplus and plenty of water - but if we wanted to maintain current living standards, I think we would fall down on power as it stands currently. Plenty of natural wind and tidal power resources that are underutilised.

[–] Oisteink@feddit.nl 22 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

Just make sure those pesky British stay out of your potatoes

[–] Saucepain@lemmy.world 3 points 11 hours ago

It was our grain that they were taking. The potatoes were attacked by fungus.

[–] khannie@lemmy.world 5 points 18 hours ago

I'd say we'd need to make a bunch of biofuels to fill the immediate shortfall to keep tractors moving but as you say we've plenty of really good quality land, water, wind. Lots of chemical and medical processing capability once we have the raw ingredients for medicines etc.

Main medium term issue would be mineral and metal mining and processing as we're short on that but yeah overall think we'd be basically fine.

[–] Tracaine@lemmy.world 7 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

Define island. Contiinents are just big islands.

[–] Chocrates@lemmy.world 4 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

a piece of land surrounded by water.

The first definition.

I guess that means continents are islands.

Does that mean now that we have the Panama canal that North and South America are separate islands?

[–] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 hours ago

a piece of land surrounded by water.

In that case, it would be Africa, Europe, and Asia, since it's all connected.

[–] 5too@lemmy.world 2 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

The canal's above sea level, isn't it? Wouldn't that just make it a river that goes over the continental divide?

[–] Chocrates@lemmy.world 2 points 6 hours ago

Depends how pedantic we want to be with the definition I guess.

[–] Grimy@lemmy.world 10 points 17 hours ago

In such scenarios, distance is probably an advantage so I would go with Hawaii if it is an option. There's good diving too.

[–] Asfalttikyntaja@sopuli.xyz 8 points 18 hours ago (1 children)
[–] myrmidex@belgae.social 4 points 17 hours ago

Outstanding reference. Meanwhile, the rest of us are still on islands where people argue about whether helping each other is economically feasible.

[–] Kidplayer_666@lemm.ee 18 points 21 hours ago (1 children)
[–] Aussiemandeus@aussie.zone 13 points 19 hours ago
[–] remon@ani.social 17 points 21 hours ago (1 children)
[–] jet@hackertalks.com 8 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (1 children)

Ah yes. This island earth.

What's the smallest section of earth you would think could thrive in this scenario?

[–] remon@ani.social 7 points 21 hours ago

I don't know enough small islands. Something with a population of at least 5000 and a fishing-based economy is probably a good start.

[–] kreskin@lemmy.world 4 points 17 hours ago (1 children)
[–] Denjin@lemmings.world 12 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

1 - England is not an island, you mean Great Britain.

2 - Almost half the food eaten in the UK has been imported from overseas.

3 - A large proportion (it's difficult to get exact figures and it fluctuates) of energy is imported from abroad in the forms of oil and gas.

Great Britain, and the wider UK, has not been self sufficient for ~600 years relying on colonialism and a maritime empire to meet its needs and trade since it collapsed. If it had to rely on resources available within the island it would collapse in days.

[–] DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 8 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

This Island - Very difficult for an invading military to find you. Just don't forget to press the numbers... or else...

[–] jet@hackertalks.com 10 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

I think Iceland is a strong choice. It has power and rare earth resources

[–] plyth@feddit.org 16 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

How much grain imports, how much petrol for fishing boats?

[–] ThePowerOfGeek@lemmy.world 8 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (2 children)

They could probably use some of that thermal energy to power lighting that would grow some veggies and other low-resource plants. Although they probably aren't set up for that today.

ETA: Turns out they are set up to use thermal energy to generate their own food, which actually makes a lot of sense given how resourceful they are as a people.

[–] Chozo@fedia.io 8 points 20 hours ago

Saving this thread to my "just in case" list.

[–] Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org 5 points 20 hours ago

Galapagos (without humans, of course!)

[–] MuskyMelon@lemmy.world 3 points 19 hours ago

Borneo. Still mostly agricultural but from a survivability POV, even though it would be blasted back to before the Industrial revolution, it's got everything needed.