I'm a relative newcomer to the Fallout universe (started with NV, playing FO3 for the first time) and I'm curious about how common knowledge is in the Wasteland. I've been reading a lot of articles on the Wiki and I was wondering about a few things:

1. Do people know that the Vaults were largely amoral social experiments?

2. How widespread is technical know-how? Could cars (apparently nuclear-powered) ever become common again? It's confusing because most people seem to walk and carry cargo with brahmins, and the NCR can maintain and operate at least one vertibird.

I know that I had more questions, but these are the only ones that I can remember at the moment. Thanks in advance for your replies!

1. The people that went into the Vaults weren't aware of what was being done to them. Whether it eventually became well known isn't really addressed in the games.

2. Despite the names for some of the technology (ie Micro Fusion Cells) it would appear that most of that was brand names not actual nuclear reactors in cars. As for how wide spread technology is it seems to vary. Practical applications like repairing generators and gunpowder weaponry seems to be fairly common while more advanced energy weapon designs seems to be more hit or miss. There are a few surviving pieces of old world/Enclave technology like the verti-birds around but they seem to be dependant on supplies of spare parts that can't be reproduced with the NCR's current technological base. Once the stockpile of parts are used up the assorted pieces of tech stop moving.

For the Western United States, people have survived and are using accumulated knowledge still kept safe and circulated since the end of the Great War. The Followers of the Apocalypse is a prime example of this.

The people of the East Coast as shown by Bethesda for the most are much different. Besides a few individuals, they barely know anything, still do ridiculously unwise things, and in general backwards and useless.

1. They probably don't care, they just stripped the vaults for their tech.

2. Depends. Lore-Wise cars probably are still working somewhere but it wouldn't work in game. NCR doesn't have that many vertibirds either, basically just the one or two they got from Navarro.

Well, most of the people living in their own homes seem to have some passing knowledge of reading and writing. At least most (alot) of them keep books. So the skill of reading and writing hasnt gone [censored] up except perhaps for raiders, fiends and others ignoramusi.

As Sinclair pointed out above there seems to be regional differences too. Perhaps one can attribute that to being hit harder with nukes or to a greater concentration of people needing shelter (if your kids cry because its cold, you will burn a gutenberg bible to keep them warm). But the east seems to be in a very poor state when it comes to tech and learninng. The west is in some areas almost up to "normal", with infrastructure and sanitation as we would know it.

Concerning the Vaults... Im pretty sure that they are more or less regarded as "taboo". As dungeons of a time past where only the most adventeurous scavangers or kids venture. Considering their reputation and that some people have escaped from them (and what they have (de)volved into), Vaults are not a place I'd go unless I was armed to the teeth, and then Id still prefer the open land where I can run, hide and dont end up cornered by beasts I cant possibly harm with my puny handguns. Infront of those that are still locked up and sealed off (and likely infront of those that are not), there could be bones aplenty from people trying to get in.... and bones in most earthly cultures signify taboo. Whatever knowledge is in those vaults would likely be hoarded by brave individuals or powerfull groups such as NCR and BoS Scavenger/recon units.

Just as now, knowledge is power in the wasteland, so I would be surprised to meet anyone who was a specialist in any given field outside of major urban hubs.