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> Now there's growing interest in the lessons their methods may hold for societies today I don't know how to tell this without being condescending, but do you

> Now there's growing interest in the lessons their methods may hold for societies today I don't know how to tell this without being condescending, but do you guys even understand how farming works? The fertile soil is a result of a long process of bringing organic material and ash and depositing it on the field. Exactly the opposite of what we are doing today When they lived in the rainforest, they would gather whatever leftovers from eating, possibly their feces, decaying matter, and deposit it all on the field. They would keep hunting, they would keep gathering, and all that hunted and gathered material would end up on the field. Maybe they would compost it separately and then drop it on the field, maybe they would drop it on the field and the field would be in effect the composting area. Over hundreds or thousands of years this would create those amazingly fertile fields. It is very easy to see how this developed. They probably have noticed that if they keep throwing their leftovers or feces in a particular area, everything starts growing better there. The same if you throw out ash. Which they had lots of beacuse they were burning a lot of wood every day, living in the rainforest and not facing energy price hikes. If you have a village and you hunt and gather every day, if you constantly keep burning wood fire and spread it all around your village for thousands of years -- guess what -- whether you planned it or not you will create those fields because I bet nobody would be trucking the garbage far from the village. The problem is we do not live in the rainforest and we do not have so much organic matter to cover our fields. And the leftovers from what we eat we dump mostly into landfills. Our feces are also escaping the system and are not providing matter back to our fields.

boffinAudio 3y ago
Did you miss the key fact that this Amazon miracle earth spreads itself when it is dug into other soils?
samcheng 3y ago
In California, at least, yard waste and kitchen waste are diverted to composting facilities by law, and over half of biosolids (feces) are composted as well. I imagine (hope!) that the rest of the world will follow. And it's not only about soil fertility. If this waste decomposes in a landfill, it becomes a major producer of methane, which is a potent greenhouse gas. https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/SLCP/collection/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/SLCP/collection/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/Biosolids/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/Biosolids/
- patall 3y ago
  > imagine (hope!) that the rest of the world will follow. Which world? The rest of the US? Composting and waste separation is common everywhere in the world. Sewage waste is more problematic as it contains heavy metals and microplastics, but at least in most developt countries very few of that reaches the ocean.
- cassepipe 3y ago
  I am totally in favor of collecting organic matter separately and use it in agriculture but one thing I don't understand is this : Whether it's in a landfill or a field, won't it produce methane just the same when it decomposes ?
  - dgacmu 3y ago
    No - anaerobic digestion produces more methane; aerobic digestion (lots of air mixed in) favors more CO2 and less methane. Typically, if you have a deliberately anaerobic industrial composting operation, you capture the methane and produce a small amount of power from it. But aerobic digestion is faster and is what I believe most big facilities use. There's still some methane but much less than if you threw the stuff in a landfill.
    - cassepipe 3y ago
      Thanks !
fergie 3y ago
Mate, "muck spreading" is still totally a thing.
TotoHorner 3y ago
> I don't know how to tell this without being condescending, but do you guys even understand how farming works? Not sure why you're being condescending when you're totally uninformed & wrong lol. > The fertile soil is a result of a long process of bringing organic material and ash and depositing it on the field. Exactly the opposite of what we are doing today 2 minutes of research would tell you that the Terra Preta soil consists of - tiny, broken pottery shards - weathered charcoal - bones/compost/manure > It is very easy to see how this developed. They probably have noticed that if they keep throwing their leftovers or feces in a particular area, everything starts growing better there. The same if you throw out ash. Which they had lots of beacuse they were burning a lot of wood every day, living in the rainforest and not facing energy price hikes. If you have a village and you hunt and gather every day, if you constantly keep burning wood fire and spread it all around your village for thousands of years -- guess what -- whether you planned it or not you will create those fields because I bet nobody would be trucking the garbage far from the village. The fact that you keep referring to them as hunter-gatherers when they've clearly developed an advanced fertilizer is hilariously absurd. They were clearly advanced at farming.
- onetimeuse92304 3y ago
  I think it would be better if you just red my comment more carefully. Nowhere I called them "hunter-gatherers". That's something YOU wrote. You took words "hunter" and "gathered" and created in your mind "hunter-gatherer" which is completely different because it has a specific meaning. People are still hunting and still gathering to this day. This does not make them hunter-gatherers. Hunter-gatherers describe a civilisation that is primarily concerned with hunting because they do not farm anything. These people were clearly farming, but farming does not exclude hunting or gathering. The pottery, bones, compost and manure do not indicate advanced knowledge of farming. This just describes a dumping ground of a pre-industrial civilisation. That's pretty much all of the garbage they had. And they had to throw it somewhere and that somewhere was around them where the fields were. I am not saying they didn't have any knowledge, but saying they had advanced knowledge is just jumping to conclusions.
  - yetihehe 3y ago

boffinAudio 3y ago

Did you miss the key fact that this Amazon miracle earth spreads itself when it is dug into other soils?

samcheng 3y ago

In California, at least, yard waste and kitchen waste are diverted to composting facilities by law, and over half of biosolids (feces) are composted as well. I imagine (hope!) that the rest of the world will follow. And it's not only about soil fertility. If this waste decomposes in a landfill, it becomes a major producer of methane, which is a potent greenhouse gas. https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/SLCP/collection/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/SLCP/collection/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/Biosolids/ https://calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/Biosolids/

patall 3y ago
> imagine (hope!) that the rest of the world will follow. Which world? The rest of the US? Composting and waste separation is common everywhere in the world. Sewage waste is more problematic as it contains heavy metals and microplastics, but at least in most developt countries very few of that reaches the ocean.
cassepipe 3y ago
I am totally in favor of collecting organic matter separately and use it in agriculture but one thing I don't understand is this : Whether it's in a landfill or a field, won't it produce methane just the same when it decomposes ?
- dgacmu 3y ago
  No - anaerobic digestion produces more methane; aerobic digestion (lots of air mixed in) favors more CO2 and less methane. Typically, if you have a deliberately anaerobic industrial composting operation, you capture the methane and produce a small amount of power from it. But aerobic digestion is faster and is what I believe most big facilities use. There's still some methane but much less than if you threw the stuff in a landfill.
  - cassepipe 3y ago
    Thanks !

fergie 3y ago

Mate, "muck spreading" is still totally a thing.

TotoHorner 3y ago

> I don't know how to tell this without being condescending, but do you guys even understand how farming works? Not sure why you're being condescending when you're totally uninformed & wrong lol. > The fertile soil is a result of a long process of bringing organic material and ash and depositing it on the field. Exactly the opposite of what we are doing today 2 minutes of research would tell you that the Terra Preta soil consists of - tiny, broken pottery shards - weathered charcoal - bones/compost/manure > It is very easy to see how this developed. They probably have noticed that if they keep throwing their leftovers or feces in a particular area, everything starts growing better there. The same if you throw out ash. Which they had lots of beacuse they were burning a lot of wood every day, living in the rainforest and not facing energy price hikes. If you have a village and you hunt and gather every day, if you constantly keep burning wood fire and spread it all around your village for thousands of years -- guess what -- whether you planned it or not you will create those fields because I bet nobody would be trucking the garbage far from the village. The fact that you keep referring to them as hunter-gatherers when they've clearly developed an advanced fertilizer is hilariously absurd. They were clearly advanced at farming.

onetimeuse92304 3y ago
I think it would be better if you just red my comment more carefully. Nowhere I called them "hunter-gatherers". That's something YOU wrote. You took words "hunter" and "gathered" and created in your mind "hunter-gatherer" which is completely different because it has a specific meaning. People are still hunting and still gathering to this day. This does not make them hunter-gatherers. Hunter-gatherers describe a civilisation that is primarily concerned with hunting because they do not farm anything. These people were clearly farming, but farming does not exclude hunting or gathering. The pottery, bones, compost and manure do not indicate advanced knowledge of farming. This just describes a dumping ground of a pre-industrial civilisation. That's pretty much all of the garbage they had. And they had to throw it somewhere and that somewhere was around them where the fields were. I am not saying they didn't have any knowledge, but saying they had advanced knowledge is just jumping to conclusions.
- yetihehe 3y ago