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Long Live Microbiomes

blogs.scientificamerican.com

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Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#41

Post by meerita »

fny wrote: post #12

Just a question for those in the know: is regenerative farming even scalable to meet the needs of a booming population? Can grow enough food without current industrial agriculture?

Have in mind, animal products are our natural diet. the amount of nutrients per gr is way higher. 200g of liber is way more nutritive than 10kg of tomatoes, avocados, and other vegetables all together. And you can eat (as i do) local meat, which is eco friendly. Most of the vegetables you eat are overseas or from neighbour countries. Check the labels, you will be surprised.

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#42

Post by sjeohp »

sarah180 wrote: post #31
organicdude wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you use a small set of scientific studies to prove one is better? Studies are reductionist, which is a very powerful and useful perspective...but not as useful when you have to measure a dynamic living system that can be optimized along maybe 100 dimensions or more? Worse, what is the funding source of these studies, and what incentives are tied to it? So you have many different types of soils, and that will p…

You do this with a proper understanding of statistical power, and you report "no conclusion" when you don't have studies of adequate power. This is not actually a terribly difficult problem with a proper understanding of Bayesian statistics, it just doesn't lead to good headlines, because a lot of the time the answer is "the study couldn't really provide an answer."

I'm not saying you're wrong but doesn't that inherently favour the side claiming "there is no problem because you can't prove there's a problem." Until by the time someone can prove there's a problem we already have a generation with lead poisoning or a collapsed ecosystem or whatever it may be.

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#43

Post by Havoc »

hanniabu wrote: post #36
newsbinator wrote: post #24

> An individual today would need to consume twice as much meat, three times as much fruit, and four to five times as many vegetables to obtain the same amount of minerals and trace elements available in those same foods in 1940. Wait, really?

If so that's pretty upsetting and impossible unless you're a super athlete taking in 5x calories a day.

Trace minerals not calories

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#44

Post by cheeseprocedure »

bardworx wrote: post #10
scribu wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd probably be ok, if you only ate the veggies you grew yourself. But what about meat, dairy and other animal products? What about bread, rice and other cereals?

I have a friend who is incredibly conscious about such things and they convinced a farmer to raise chickens on non-gmo, organic feed; chickens are free range, and treated humanely. They called it the “holy grail” chicken. Yes, they did inspect the chicken, feed, etc. Total cost to purchase is $20/lb. majority of the cost coming from feed. Regardless if you can pick apart my story or how honest the entire process is,…

It’s possible to raise chickens as part of a broader regenerative system where much of the feed is an output from elsewhere in that system. This has been done profitably by folks like Joel Salatin, but it has its own constraints (for example, availability of pasture land).

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#45

Post by wollstonecraft »

carapace wrote: post #26
fny wrote: post #12

Just a question for those in the know: is regenerative farming even scalable to meet the needs of a booming population? Can grow enough food without current industrial agriculture?

First, population is leveling off, not booming. Second, yes, by definition regenerative agriculture is scalable. It might require as much as double the labor requirements (so 3% of the population rather than 1.5%) but it's likely that automation will amortize that. See "How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20537409 which describes some aspects of China…

Municipal wastewater treatment does not use expensive treatment or chemicals. It is a huge bioreactor where the only input is aeration and stirring.

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#46

Post by zaat »

newsbinator wrote: post #24

> An individual today would need to consume twice as much meat, three times as much fruit, and four to five times as many vegetables to obtain the same amount of minerals and trace elements available in those same foods in 1940. Wait, really?

> available in those same foods in 1940.

I guess most people today eat much more than five times the amount commonly available to people in the bloody days of WWII.

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#47

Post by [deleted] »

fny wrote: post #12

Just a question for those in the know: is regenerative farming even scalable to meet the needs of a booming population? Can grow enough food without current industrial agriculture?

[deleted]

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#48

Post by LMYahooTFY »

sarah180 wrote: post #28

Scientific American should be embarrassed to have published this. This is textbook pseudoscience: cherry-picking evidence to support a position that you're already predisposed to believe. This doesn't mean it's necessarily wrong, just that it is not even remotely a scientific perspective on the situation. Its "USDA citation" is to what amounts to a marketing-focused whitepaper.

>Its "USDA citation" is to what amounts to a marketing-focused whitepaper.

Can you elaborate on this point?

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#49

Post by hanniabu »

Havoc wrote: post #43
hanniabu wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If so that's pretty upsetting and impossible unless you're a super athlete taking in 5x calories a day.

Trace minerals not calories

In order to take in those minerals you'd need to eat more, which equals more calories

Re: Long Live Microbiomes

#50

Post by carapace »

wollstonecraft wrote: post #45
carapace wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, population is leveling off, not booming. Second, yes, by definition regenerative agriculture is scalable. It might require as much as double the labor requirements (so 3% of the population rather than 1.5%) but it's likely that automation will amortize that. See "How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20537409 which describes some aspects of China…

Municipal wastewater treatment does not use expensive treatment or chemicals. It is a huge bioreactor where the only input is aeration and stirring.

Okay but it's still gonna be cheaper to poop into a bucket of worms. Grosser, but cheaper. ;-)
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