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> "Rendering our food supply more brittle, because we've created plants which need a very precise, artificial environment filled with external inputs." Well ye
by sampo 13y ago
> "Rendering our food supply more brittle, because we've created plants which need a very precise, artificial environment filled with external inputs."
Well yes, the farmer takes on some energy costs from the plant, by e.g. providing nutrients and protection from pests. In exchange to these external inputs, the plant provides us more food.
The alternative would be more diverse, less efficient crops, and 1–2 billion less people.
You may sound nice when you talk against fertilizers and pesticides, but if you rephrase and say that those 1–2 billion people should have never existed, you'll sound much darker.
- dredmorbius 13y agoIn a population overshoot scenario, the greater the population overshoot, the harder the crash. So, dark or not, yes, peaking world population well below present levels would put us in a much better position. Allowing more people to live endangers the future of technological civilization, if not the species. Sometimes a really long term vision is useful to contemplate: http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-next-ten-billion-years.html http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-next-ten-...