4 ms·

I suspect there's trade-offs that aren't being thoroughly considered in this equation. That's the case in every full-on 'everything we're doing is wrong, and th

I suspect there's trade-offs that aren't being thoroughly considered in this equation. That's the case in every full-on 'everything we're doing is wrong, and there's a perfect solution' claim.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
carapace 5y ago
Nope, in this case it's just science. Specifically ecology. It turns out that when we understand what the plants and animals are doing in detail (through science) we can arrange them in time and space in ways that are vastly more efficient than what we've been doing these last ~12k years. Think about it, if it wasn't so that would mean that our ancestors discovered optimal farming in antiquity, eh? Just think: we used to burn chaff rather than composting it. It turns out that that is not a good idea. It's that sort of thing that I'm thinking of when I call ag "the dumbest way" to grow food.
- Aardwolf 5y ago
  > Think about it, if it wasn't so that would mean that our ancestors discovered optimal farming in antiquity, eh? Farming has undergone several fundamental changes throughout history after that though, notably in medieval times and then everything industrialization brought
  - tremon 5y ago
    Farming has undergone several fundamental changes Can you name some that can't be reduced to "but on a [insert new machine]"? The only one I can think of is artificial fertilizer, which isn't a sustainable practice in the long run either.
    - ajuc 5y ago
      Bosh-Haber process increased food supply several times in less than a decade. There was no starvation in a developed country ever since it got adopted on mass scale. It happened less than 100 years ago. Compared to that every other revolution in farming was insignificant.
      - mistrial9 5y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process
    - saalweachter 5y ago
      US Corn Grain Yield Trends Since 1866: https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn/news/timeless/images/US_Corn_Yld_Trend.png https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn/news/timeless/images/US... It may take years for new practices to be widespread and accepted, but I assure you, if you can make that chart continue to go up, ~every grain farmer in the US will happily be on board. There is a certain world-view and a romanticizing to farming, but at the end of the day, farmers are businessmen who just want to grow as much food as possible, as cheaply as possible. They may grumble as much as a software developer when forced to learn new tools, and they won't drop everything for an unproven promise, but they'll happily abandon their old ways in favor of new ones once they're proven.
    - ravi-delia 5y ago
      Crop rotation replacing leaving fields fallow was a huge leap, as was the first really heavily selected strain of wheat.
- bch 5y ago
  > It turns out that when we understand what the plants and animals are doing in detail (through science) we can arrange them in time and space in ways that are vastly more efficient than what we've been doing these last ~12k years. This assumes both systems are optimizing for the same thing.
  - carapace 5y ago
    Excellent point! We know that evolution is optimizing for continuation or duration (technically "evolution" isn't a thing, it's a non-volitional chemical tautology with no purpose or intrinsic meaning so "it" cannot optimize, however, in practice, life is optimizing for more and continued life, overcoming radiation, impacts, and it's own consequences (like the advent of oxygen and aerobic metabolism)) so what is the other system optimizing for? (As an aside, is "life is optimizing for more and continued life" a definition for "life"?)
oceanplexian 5y ago
The difference is between hobbyist agriculture and commercial agriculture. In the latter, consistency, pests and disease become more complex issues to deal with. IMHO there are a lot of analogies to software engineering. Small projects can engage in practices that don't scale, like skipping QA, not adequately testing, inconsistent coding standards. In large farms, seeds are mass produced, engineered, and go through a QA and testing process to prevent certain diseases. There are many good reasons, BTW, why farms don't grow perennials and engage in mono-cropping, or use herbicides and genetically engineered crops instead of no-till. The trade-off in abandoning these practices almost always involves sacrificing yields and the mechanization of labor.
- derefr 5y ago
  Orchards of fruit/nut trees are both commercial agriculture, and centered around perennials. Are industrial orchards less productive than industrial farms? Or how about vineyards?
  - skj 5y ago
    The limit there is likely that no one has figured out how to make an annual fruit or nut tree.
  - tbihl 5y ago
    Thinking about the cost per calorie of apples versus oats, to pick an example that works for me, I would say the answer is very much yes. And ultimately, from the plant's perspective productivity should be a question of efficiently storing energy.
- abeppu 5y ago
  > In the latter, consistency, pests and disease become more complex issues to deal with. > There are many good reasons, BTW, why farms don't grow perennials and engage in mono-cropping, or use herbicides and genetically engineered crops instead of no-till. But sometimes the pests and disease are caused by these same practices, right? Like, I'm aware the Cavendish banana we all eat is very susceptible to a fungal disease that is slowly spreading around the world. Because we produce so much of a single variety, where all plants are clones, a single disease can be highly disruptive. If production was evenly distributed over many varieties, and if plantations had banana plants separated by other useful crops, the whole system might be more resilient.

I suspect there's trade-offs that aren't being thoroughly considered in this equation. That's the case in every full-on 'everything we're doing is wrong, and there's a perfect solution' claim.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

carapace 5y ago

Nope, in this case it's just science. Specifically ecology. It turns out that when we understand what the plants and animals are doing in detail (through science) we can arrange them in time and space in ways that are vastly more efficient than what we've been doing these last ~12k years. Think about it, if it wasn't so that would mean that our ancestors discovered optimal farming in antiquity, eh? Just think: we used to burn chaff rather than composting it. It turns out that that is not a good idea. It's that sort of thing that I'm thinking of when I call ag "the dumbest way" to grow food.

Aardwolf 5y ago
> Think about it, if it wasn't so that would mean that our ancestors discovered optimal farming in antiquity, eh? Farming has undergone several fundamental changes throughout history after that though, notably in medieval times and then everything industrialization brought
- tremon 5y ago
  Farming has undergone several fundamental changes Can you name some that can't be reduced to "but on a [insert new machine]"? The only one I can think of is artificial fertilizer, which isn't a sustainable practice in the long run either.
  - ajuc 5y ago
    Bosh-Haber process increased food supply several times in less than a decade. There was no starvation in a developed country ever since it got adopted on mass scale. It happened less than 100 years ago. Compared to that every other revolution in farming was insignificant.
    - mistrial9 5y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process
  - saalweachter 5y ago
    US Corn Grain Yield Trends Since 1866: https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn/news/timeless/images/US_Corn_Yld_Trend.png https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn/news/timeless/images/US... It may take years for new practices to be widespread and accepted, but I assure you, if you can make that chart continue to go up, ~every grain farmer in the US will happily be on board. There is a certain world-view and a romanticizing to farming, but at the end of the day, farmers are businessmen who just want to grow as much food as possible, as cheaply as possible. They may grumble as much as a software developer when forced to learn new tools, and they won't drop everything for an unproven promise, but they'll happily abandon their old ways in favor of new ones once they're proven.
  - ravi-delia 5y ago
    Crop rotation replacing leaving fields fallow was a huge leap, as was the first really heavily selected strain of wheat.
bch 5y ago
> It turns out that when we understand what the plants and animals are doing in detail (through science) we can arrange them in time and space in ways that are vastly more efficient than what we've been doing these last ~12k years. This assumes both systems are optimizing for the same thing.
- carapace 5y ago
  Excellent point! We know that evolution is optimizing for continuation or duration (technically "evolution" isn't a thing, it's a non-volitional chemical tautology with no purpose or intrinsic meaning so "it" cannot optimize, however, in practice, life is optimizing for more and continued life, overcoming radiation, impacts, and it's own consequences (like the advent of oxygen and aerobic metabolism)) so what is the other system optimizing for? (As an aside, is "life is optimizing for more and continued life" a definition for "life"?)

oceanplexian 5y ago

The difference is between hobbyist agriculture and commercial agriculture. In the latter, consistency, pests and disease become more complex issues to deal with. IMHO there are a lot of analogies to software engineering. Small projects can engage in practices that don't scale, like skipping QA, not adequately testing, inconsistent coding standards. In large farms, seeds are mass produced, engineered, and go through a QA and testing process to prevent certain diseases. There are many good reasons, BTW, why farms don't grow perennials and engage in mono-cropping, or use herbicides and genetically engineered crops instead of no-till. The trade-off in abandoning these practices almost always involves sacrificing yields and the mechanization of labor.

derefr 5y ago
Orchards of fruit/nut trees are both commercial agriculture, and centered around perennials. Are industrial orchards less productive than industrial farms? Or how about vineyards?
- skj 5y ago
  The limit there is likely that no one has figured out how to make an annual fruit or nut tree.
- tbihl 5y ago
  Thinking about the cost per calorie of apples versus oats, to pick an example that works for me, I would say the answer is very much yes. And ultimately, from the plant's perspective productivity should be a question of efficiently storing energy.
abeppu 5y ago
> In the latter, consistency, pests and disease become more complex issues to deal with. > There are many good reasons, BTW, why farms don't grow perennials and engage in mono-cropping, or use herbicides and genetically engineered crops instead of no-till. But sometimes the pests and disease are caused by these same practices, right? Like, I'm aware the Cavendish banana we all eat is very susceptible to a fungal disease that is slowly spreading around the world. Because we produce so much of a single variety, where all plants are clones, a single disease can be highly disruptive. If production was evenly distributed over many varieties, and if plantations had banana plants separated by other useful crops, the whole system might be more resilient.