In terms of doing the work of rebuilding civilization, I bet that you have under-rated the role of organized superstition. At the very least, it seems to play the role of superego for the group, and thereby it can prevent incessant bickering and can guide group efforts.

But it seems that we (in the West) are spending a ton of our time bickering over modern superstitions.

oh for sure, but to be effective it would need to be a planned or at least guided superstition and not the horrible random hodge-podge of legacy nonsense we are stuck with now

Yes, it helps when explaining rules to persnickety and unrepentant knaves that they should do what you say or they'll face supernatural terror.

Another way to look at it is that the bickering is not just between people but also internal bickering. Having "superstitious" beliefs allows people to receive sublime commands but also gives them sublime permission.

How would we know? Has this ever been tested?

Or is it just an instance of: “this is the status quo, accept it”.

I'm not an anthropologist, but I think the effectiveness of groups like the Freemasons indicates the power of myth and superstitious belief.

> Also, it seems like just knowing some of the dead ends would be a huge step up.

This makes me think, how Knowledge in a post-apocalyptic society would really work. Some fundamental and comparatively easy technologies might not need to be rediscovered (directly jump to iron and omit bronze). But more advanced Knowledge needs a lot of special training, dedicated institutions, etc. And even if they had access to tales from the Ancients, they would still have to distinguish between valid and invalid information. Otherwise, we could end up with a culture of Flat Earthers.

You wouldn't just have access to the knowledge via tales, but the world around you.

You want to say the earth is flat? Why did the ancients have globes, then?

You want to say man made flight is impossible? Here is an airport with planes. Sure we have never gotten them running but what else could they do except fly?

Granted... Never underestimate the willful ignorance of the masses I suppose.

I wanted to emphasis the necessity to re-establish a scientific culture. Knowledge without experience and only from lore would be no real knowledge. Without a collective scientific practice there would be no ground to destinguish between true and false lore. They need to discover science for themselves again. It might be a bit easier and faster though, considering all the hints they would have, as you described it.

I hope they realize that synthetic fertilizers are a dead end.

They only fed billions? Enabled 98% of humanity to leave farming and invent civilization?