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Comment by dirktheman | Hacker News Reader

Surviving in the wilderness for prolonged time is really, really hard. Even more so in a cold place like Siberia. Shows like Bear Grills are fun entertainment, but have little to do with actual survival. The show 'Alone' paints a more realistic picture: most contestants are airlifted because of medical reasons, and the winners end up emanciated in less than 3 months. And bear in mind that these are trained survivalists.

EDIT Also reminds me of the story of Hiroo Onoda, a Japanese soldier that hid in the Phillipine jungle for 30 years after WWII, not knowing Japan had surrendered. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiroo_Onoda

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A big part of that is because we evolved to be social animals. A single man alone in the Amazonian jungle would have a hard time surviving for an extended amount of time. A tribe, though, would have better prospects. If you are alone in the wilderness, you're presented all the time with insurmountable trade-offs: Build shelter and you won't be procuring food, prioritize food and then you won't have a shelter to protect yourself. Working in a team means bigger projects can be tackled, that different needed things can be done in the same time. And this is one of most important things for the evolution of humans, not only the intelligence, or the ability to make and use tools, but also the ability to live in society, to communicate and build a culture.

The homo sapiens is indeed a remarkable species. But what really make us what we are is not the individual per-se, but our society. Homo is great, for sure, but what is really impressive is not the individual Homo, but humanity.

The only way to actually survive is to hunt big game. Fish is too lean. Vegetables have no calories. Small rodents have very few calories. Fatty meat is a necessity.

In alone, they are forced to transport heavy camera equipment. They start out right before winter. The local laws prevent them from actually hunting. The show is a joke. There is no surviving actually done. Just enduring starvation. The optimal way to win is to select fatty food as many of your 10 items as possible, make a shelter, and expend as few calories as possible. But that isn't entertaining to watch, so they won't select you to be on the show.

> Vegetables have no calories.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staple_food

"Typical examples include tubers and roots, grains, legumes, and seeds."

Yeah, don't go scarfing iceberg lettuce when stuck in the woods, but we've been finding and eating starchy root vegetables for probably millions of years.

We've also spend a tens of thousands of years selectively breeding plants to produce more calories. You won't find such calorie rich wild plants. Foraging for plants is really hard.

We started breeding them presumably because they offered clear nutritional benefits. That we made them better doesn't change this.

Not to say there isn't nutritional benefits to wild wheat and carrots and whatever (I've no idea to be honest), but I don't think the nutritional value was at the front of their mind when our ancestors began understanding agriculture. If it stopped them being hungry I think that's all that mattered, because it was the wilderness and that's basically all wild animals think about. I can definitely see it being a supplement to hunting initially, in order to reduce the number of hunts required, and only afterwards as we made improvements to our techniques and crops would the nutritional requirements from the crops become a focus point.

I don't know shit about this topic though, I'm just trying to put myself in their shoes (or feet as the case would be).

> The only way to actually survive is to hunt big game.

The article suggests the family did not hunt big game for the first 20+ years:

> It was not until the late 1950s, when Dmitry reached manhood, that they first trapped animals for their meat and skins

So they apparenrly survived for 20+ years without hunting

I think optimal strategy was to be overweight to start, and to have a good mental plan to persevere.

The Patagonia season made it apparent that people were finally preparing mentally to stick it out. And what happened? 2 contestants removed for being to skinny, and the chunkiest guy won. I really liked him, not knocking him, but if they were all the same body fat % to start I'm not sure he'd have been the winner. The girl who got 2nd was absolutely not prepared to quit.

> most contestants are airlifted because of medical reasons

I've watched the first 4 seasons, I think? And I would say this absolutely was not the case. Most contestants just tapped out. Nearly all of them. Some contestants were pulled out for medical reasons (too skinny because no calories), but not "airlifted" as in "emergency medical."

One guy broke his ankle or something, as far as I remember he was the most urgent medical case.

> And bear in mind that these are trained survivalists.

This part is also blatantly wrong. The vast majority of the contestants were not "trained survivalists." I think the closest to that were some who taught some bushcrafting classes--and those people fared pretty well on average, just tapped out for mental reasons.

I agree with your overall point. Surviving in the wild is incredibly difficult and virtually none of us have the required skill set anymore. Including nearly everyone on the Alone show.

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