Let's Say You Wanted to Back Up the Internet Archive

Suppose (for the sake of a philosophical discussion) that the Internet must shrink to 10% of its storage capacity for whatever reason (Zombie Apocalypse, War, Societal Instability, Natural Disaster, etc.).

If that's the case, then which websites and content do you keep, and which do you throw away?

Now, if you can answer that -- then re-ask the same question, but with 10% of that 10%... 1%... what do you keep and what do you throw away?

Now, follow this line of thought to its natural limit, that is, given a computer which can store only 64K on a floppy disk, and given that all other content is going to be deleted, what content do you choose to preserve on that 64K floppy disk?

?

One answer might be the knowledge of how to build that computer, and that floppy storage device... (We'll assume that if it doesn't fit exactly, then we could have a little bit more space, like 170K or what have you...)

This line of philosophical questioning could even be taken a step further and that is, ignoring technology altogether, we apply this line of inquiry to books...

So our question then looks like:

"What is the most important information that one, single, solitary, finite book should contain -- given the near-infinite amount of information out there?"

My answer to this, is, that that book should contain the knowledge of how to produce paper, how to make books, maybe even how to create a printing press and inks (if space permits).

That is, a book -- which contains the knowledge of how to make other books... that is, how to replicate itself (well, with human intervention!)...

That would be my answer -- as an amateur philosopher...

Other answers might be, and probably will be, different...

But, I think it's a very interesting philosophical question...