4 ms·

> 6 upvotes and no comments for the single most important story on HN for the year so far. I have nothing to say. I feel powerless and robbed of my own future

> 6 upvotes and no comments for the single most important story on HN for the year so far. I have nothing to say. I feel powerless and robbed of my own future by my parents' generation. Forget the dustbowl, if we can't pollinate crops, we will all either starve or kill each other long before the rest of the ecosystem collapses.

birdyrooster 4y ago
We mechanically pollinate plants all the time, it’s not the end of our ability to feed ourselves. I think people are ignorant to and are overestimating how difficult it is to make pollen blow in the air or transfer using mechanical means.
- stuven 4y ago
  ... how much are you willing to stake on that assumption?
  - birdyrooster 4y ago
    What other options are working? Geopolitics isn’t changing anytime soon.
- dumpsterlid 4y ago
  [dead]
- pseudolus 4y ago
  There have been stories documenting how the decline of bee populations has necessitated the introduction of hand-pollination. [0] Hand-pollination seems both tedious and difficult to scale. Mechanical pollination might be viable in some environments but basically it amounts to extensively paying for something that historically has been free. [0] https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/life-without-bees-hand-human-pollination-rural-chi/ https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/life-without-bees-h...
  - Kye 4y ago
    It costs money to rent or maintain bees used in agriculture, but it's probably still cheaper.
- tfourb 4y ago
  Please spend a few minutes researching pollination before just assuming that "technology" can solve a process that is handled by nature after billions of years of specialization by thousands of types of insects on thousands of different types of plants, trillions of times every year. Just hand waving some "mechanical means" is stuff that gets civilizations killed.
  - parthianshotgun 4y ago
    But but we're hackers! Surely we could tinker and hack our way to solving this, maybe with AI or crypto, or, now stay with me here, both!
    - jwozn 4y ago
      I was going to make a joke about bees on the blockchain, but it looks like it's actually a real idea... https://urbanbeelab.org/projects/the-future-of-food-saving-the-bees-with-blockchain/ https://urbanbeelab.org/projects/the-future-of-food-saving-t...
  - birdyrooster 4y ago
    It’s definitely a problem and we need to develop technical solutions as workarounds since there is an inability to get political traction to do the most optimal thing.
    - tfourb 4y ago
      How about we apply the effort and resources that a "technical solution" would require (which in this case would be massive because again, you are trying to replicate a highly complex natural phenomenon of which many components are barely or not at all understood) to get "political traction on the most optimal thing"?
rcme 4y ago
You can pollinate crops using bees kept in captivity. Many crops are pollinated this way.
- tfourb 4y ago
  Most crops are not. Many plants rely on specific insects for pollination. And domesticated honey bees can never hope to match the rest of the insect world in numbers.
  - rcme 4y ago
    You wouldn't need domesticated bees to match the rest of the insect world's numbers. You'd just need to enough to pollinate crops. And bees can pollinate many, many different types crops. Also, you can always pollinate by hand if need be, which is how vanilla in Madagascar is pollinated. I'm not saying declining insect numbers are good, I'm just saying worrying about a crop-apocalypse is probably unfounded.
    - morelisp 4y ago
      If every foodstuff costing as much per flower as vanilla - a spice usable in famously small quantities - isn't a crop-apocalypse, what is?
  - rch 4y ago
    Mason bees, for instance, do ~3x the pollination work per-bee, and are relatively easy to accommodate in any garden or yard: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mason_bee https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mason_bee This doesn't make the overall collapse in biodiversity and insect biomass any less serious.
- ambientenv 4y ago
  "You can pollinate crops using bees kept in captivity. Many crops are pollinated this way." ... as much as I may appreciate the sentiment, it seems to me that we - the global we - have become adept at finding band-aid solutions (especially when it involves technology) to symptoms but rarely address and attempt to fix the actual causal factors, i.e. the problem. I would hazard to guess this is for primarily two reasons. First and foremost, it requires grass roots and pervasive change - change in values, behaviours, beliefs - and change is often difficult. Second, there appears to exist a pervasive view that sees us humans as outside of nature rather than an integral and dependent part of the whole.
apocalypstyx 4y ago
> I have nothing to say. I feel powerless and robbed of my own future by my parents' generation. Beware, O Sinner, for Who Promises You a Tomorrow? --St. Alphonsus of Ligouri Just as we pretend the heat death of the universe shall never arrive and that time (billions upon billions of years is inconceivable to the human mind) we pretended it an infinity, never truly paying heed that there would be a last generation or that we might be among them.
hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago
> by my parents' generation This is at least unfair. Our parents were people just like us, trying to survive in this world, sometimes against all odds, having very limited information, and sacrifice a lot for their children. On the other hand, there were some very specific people who, through their greediness, and often in spite of the information they had, proceeded with their plans destroying Earth natural resources and so on. But these people can be found in every generation, not just in the one of our parents.
tracker1 4y ago
> I feel powerless and robbed of my own future by my parents' generation. And what are you actually doing differently? Are you shopping local coop markets for sustainable, local foods? Are you supporting restaurants that do likewise? And no, vegan really isn't the option, as organic farming really needs a combination of animal and veg in practice to support the soil. Your parents and grandparents are/were people, just like you are, and laying the blame at their feet does absolutely nothing to make anything better, and at worst will drive a political wedge that will result in even trying to make anything better that much harder.

birdyrooster 4y ago

We mechanically pollinate plants all the time, it’s not the end of our ability to feed ourselves. I think people are ignorant to and are overestimating how difficult it is to make pollen blow in the air or transfer using mechanical means.

stuven 4y ago
... how much are you willing to stake on that assumption?
- birdyrooster 4y ago
  What other options are working? Geopolitics isn’t changing anytime soon.
dumpsterlid 4y ago
[dead]
pseudolus 4y ago
There have been stories documenting how the decline of bee populations has necessitated the introduction of hand-pollination. [0] Hand-pollination seems both tedious and difficult to scale. Mechanical pollination might be viable in some environments but basically it amounts to extensively paying for something that historically has been free. [0] https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/life-without-bees-hand-human-pollination-rural-chi/ https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/life-without-bees-h...
- Kye 4y ago
  It costs money to rent or maintain bees used in agriculture, but it's probably still cheaper.
tfourb 4y ago
Please spend a few minutes researching pollination before just assuming that "technology" can solve a process that is handled by nature after billions of years of specialization by thousands of types of insects on thousands of different types of plants, trillions of times every year. Just hand waving some "mechanical means" is stuff that gets civilizations killed.
- parthianshotgun 4y ago
  But but we're hackers! Surely we could tinker and hack our way to solving this, maybe with AI or crypto, or, now stay with me here, both!
  - jwozn 4y ago
    I was going to make a joke about bees on the blockchain, but it looks like it's actually a real idea... https://urbanbeelab.org/projects/the-future-of-food-saving-the-bees-with-blockchain/ https://urbanbeelab.org/projects/the-future-of-food-saving-t...
- birdyrooster 4y ago
  It’s definitely a problem and we need to develop technical solutions as workarounds since there is an inability to get political traction to do the most optimal thing.
  - tfourb 4y ago
    How about we apply the effort and resources that a "technical solution" would require (which in this case would be massive because again, you are trying to replicate a highly complex natural phenomenon of which many components are barely or not at all understood) to get "political traction on the most optimal thing"?

rcme 4y ago

You can pollinate crops using bees kept in captivity. Many crops are pollinated this way.

tfourb 4y ago
Most crops are not. Many plants rely on specific insects for pollination. And domesticated honey bees can never hope to match the rest of the insect world in numbers.
- rcme 4y ago
  You wouldn't need domesticated bees to match the rest of the insect world's numbers. You'd just need to enough to pollinate crops. And bees can pollinate many, many different types crops. Also, you can always pollinate by hand if need be, which is how vanilla in Madagascar is pollinated. I'm not saying declining insect numbers are good, I'm just saying worrying about a crop-apocalypse is probably unfounded.
  - morelisp 4y ago
    If every foodstuff costing as much per flower as vanilla - a spice usable in famously small quantities - isn't a crop-apocalypse, what is?
- rch 4y ago
  Mason bees, for instance, do ~3x the pollination work per-bee, and are relatively easy to accommodate in any garden or yard: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mason_bee https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mason_bee This doesn't make the overall collapse in biodiversity and insect biomass any less serious.
ambientenv 4y ago
"You can pollinate crops using bees kept in captivity. Many crops are pollinated this way." ... as much as I may appreciate the sentiment, it seems to me that we - the global we - have become adept at finding band-aid solutions (especially when it involves technology) to symptoms but rarely address and attempt to fix the actual causal factors, i.e. the problem. I would hazard to guess this is for primarily two reasons. First and foremost, it requires grass roots and pervasive change - change in values, behaviours, beliefs - and change is often difficult. Second, there appears to exist a pervasive view that sees us humans as outside of nature rather than an integral and dependent part of the whole.

apocalypstyx 4y ago

> I have nothing to say. I feel powerless and robbed of my own future by my parents' generation. Beware, O Sinner, for Who Promises You a Tomorrow? --St. Alphonsus of Ligouri Just as we pretend the heat death of the universe shall never arrive and that time (billions upon billions of years is inconceivable to the human mind) we pretended it an infinity, never truly paying heed that there would be a last generation or that we might be among them.

hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago

> by my parents' generation This is at least unfair. Our parents were people just like us, trying to survive in this world, sometimes against all odds, having very limited information, and sacrifice a lot for their children. On the other hand, there were some very specific people who, through their greediness, and often in spite of the information they had, proceeded with their plans destroying Earth natural resources and so on. But these people can be found in every generation, not just in the one of our parents.

tracker1 4y ago

> I feel powerless and robbed of my own future by my parents' generation. And what are you actually doing differently? Are you shopping local coop markets for sustainable, local foods? Are you supporting restaurants that do likewise? And no, vegan really isn't the option, as organic farming really needs a combination of animal and veg in practice to support the soil. Your parents and grandparents are/were people, just like you are, and laying the blame at their feet does absolutely nothing to make anything better, and at worst will drive a political wedge that will result in even trying to make anything better that much harder.