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We already can do all of that, we don't need robots. Most farms have been no till for years now, the idea that fields are plowed is an anachronism. This is mo

We already can do all of that, we don't need robots. Most farms have been no till for years now, the idea that fields are plowed is an anachronism. This is more tech wankery, people with a particular technology trying to shoehorn it into being the "solution" to problems that are already solved easier and cheaper.

ska 8y ago
[...More diverse crops, less pesticides, less damage to soil, less energy use, mixed instead of mono cultures.] We already can do all of that, we don't need.. Question: If we can do all of that already, why isn't it being done (edit: assuming it isn't) ?
- JoeAltmaier 8y ago
  Its being done all over. The biggest ecologists were always farmers, who pay the first cost of soil erosion, soil damage and energy. They fail only on the mono-culture front, though its extremely common to mix crops in hilly ground but that's for erosion control. And now the potential to use less chemicals with robotic application is taking off even with large farm equipment. Cameras identify a plant off-row as the tractor traverses the field, and either plucks it or spritzes it with a microdose of herbicide.
  - ska 8y ago
    Fair enough, I should have worded more carefully - it's an area I'm largely uninformed in and should have worded it more as a question; re-reading it sounds like an assertion so i added a tweak. It makes sense to me that farmers are best placed to optimize for current outputs (and probably poorly placed to optimize outputs).
- deialtrous 8y ago
  Small amounts of it are being done, most farms have been no till for years for example, cover crops are the norm now instead of some weird fringe thing, stuff like that. It is not done to a greater extent for two reasons. One is because it is a business and the primary (often sole) concern is making money, so anything that isn't the normal way of doing things is avoided. There are serious financial incentives to not try anything better. In order to actually get a pay out on your crop insurance if your crop fails, you have to have followed all the "approved practices" to the letter. So if it says "spray your potatoes with fungicide every 5 days" and you can't prove that you did, you lose a few hundred thousand dollars this year. This sort of thing makes it hard to change even if you want to. Second, there's active intent to prevent people from knowing how to do things better. Almost all agricultural inputs are produced by a small number of large corporations. If farmers knew they could cut their fertilizer to 10% of what they buy now, stop buying pesticides, and spend less on fuel those corporations would lose a lot of business. So they pay "agronomists" and "soil scientists" to mislead farmers and keep them on the treadmill. There's lots of very deliberate FUD about organic agriculture, permaculture, etc, and when you've got millions of dollars invested in land and equipment, a little doubt goes a long way.

ska 8y ago

[...More diverse crops, less pesticides, less damage to soil, less energy use, mixed instead of mono cultures.] We already can do all of that, we don't need.. Question: If we can do all of that already, why isn't it being done (edit: assuming it isn't) ?

JoeAltmaier 8y ago
Its being done all over. The biggest ecologists were always farmers, who pay the first cost of soil erosion, soil damage and energy. They fail only on the mono-culture front, though its extremely common to mix crops in hilly ground but that's for erosion control. And now the potential to use less chemicals with robotic application is taking off even with large farm equipment. Cameras identify a plant off-row as the tractor traverses the field, and either plucks it or spritzes it with a microdose of herbicide.
- ska 8y ago
  Fair enough, I should have worded more carefully - it's an area I'm largely uninformed in and should have worded it more as a question; re-reading it sounds like an assertion so i added a tweak. It makes sense to me that farmers are best placed to optimize for current outputs (and probably poorly placed to optimize outputs).
deialtrous 8y ago
Small amounts of it are being done, most farms have been no till for years for example, cover crops are the norm now instead of some weird fringe thing, stuff like that. It is not done to a greater extent for two reasons. One is because it is a business and the primary (often sole) concern is making money, so anything that isn't the normal way of doing things is avoided. There are serious financial incentives to not try anything better. In order to actually get a pay out on your crop insurance if your crop fails, you have to have followed all the "approved practices" to the letter. So if it says "spray your potatoes with fungicide every 5 days" and you can't prove that you did, you lose a few hundred thousand dollars this year. This sort of thing makes it hard to change even if you want to. Second, there's active intent to prevent people from knowing how to do things better. Almost all agricultural inputs are produced by a small number of large corporations. If farmers knew they could cut their fertilizer to 10% of what they buy now, stop buying pesticides, and spend less on fuel those corporations would lose a lot of business. So they pay "agronomists" and "soil scientists" to mislead farmers and keep them on the treadmill. There's lots of very deliberate FUD about organic agriculture, permaculture, etc, and when you've got millions of dollars invested in land and equipment, a little doubt goes a long way.