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Soil: The world beneath our feet

theguardian.com

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Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#51

Post by oh_sigh »

cato_the_elder wrote: post #43
seanwilson wrote: post #32

> We face what could be the greatest predicament humankind has ever encountered: feeding the world without devouring the planet. Already, farming is the world’s greatest cause of habitat destruction, the greatest cause of the global loss of wildlife and the greatest cause of the global extinction crisis. It’s responsible for about 80% of the deforestation that’s happened this century. Of 28,000 species known to be at…

> "eat less meat" isn't entertained as a serious option It's simply baffling that this always gets brought up without stating the obvious fact that many people love to eat meat, and have no obligation to put up with the boring diet these policies would impose on them. And I think this is yet another reason that the naive libertarian attitude of "I just wanna grill" (which I am also guilty of subscribing to until a fe…

You can love to eat meat, but still eat less of it. Many Americans are eating meat for literally every meal of the day, 7 days a week. That's complete overkill and one may even get more enjoyment out of meat by cutting back slightly on consumption. And I'm not sure where you get that "eat less meat" would be imposed on people, as opposed to individuals just choosing to eat less meat(like I have).

The "I need to eat meat every meal" crowd reminds me of a morbidly-obese person saying "I just like food more than you do". Maybe in limited circumstances it is true, but for the most part it seems more like a pathological dependence rather than harmless desire.

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#52

Post by janj »

oh_sigh wrote: post #48
throwaway1777 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the difference between composting in the yard and composting in a landfill?

If you do it wrong - nothing. As others have responded though, oxygen is the difference, and that is why you need to "turn" your compost every couple of days. If you don't, it will start to get very stinky - if you're doing aerobic composting shouldn't really have a smell, maybe something slightly earthy but that is it.

I’ve been composing for years without turning and without the stinky issue. My compost is connected to the chicken coop, they always have full access to the compost, maybe that has something to do with it. All year I add everything, yard and kitchen waste, without turning. I stop adding beginning of spring, towards end of spring I dig it out for the garden. Easiest method of composting I’ve come up with, no fuss, great soil. Just wanted to put out there there’s an easier way to compost.

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#53

Post by smileysteve »

cato_the_elder wrote: post #43
seanwilson wrote: post #32

> We face what could be the greatest predicament humankind has ever encountered: feeding the world without devouring the planet. Already, farming is the world’s greatest cause of habitat destruction, the greatest cause of the global loss of wildlife and the greatest cause of the global extinction crisis. It’s responsible for about 80% of the deforestation that’s happened this century. Of 28,000 species known to be at…

> "eat less meat" isn't entertained as a serious option It's simply baffling that this always gets brought up without stating the obvious fact that many people love to eat meat, and have no obligation to put up with the boring diet these policies would impose on them. And I think this is yet another reason that the naive libertarian attitude of "I just wanna grill" (which I am also guilty of subscribing to until a fe…

The no true Scotsman of grilling meat as a libertarian (to not be impacting other's freedoms)

1. You raise the cow (on a non corn diet that you grow)

2. You harvest the methane from the cow (crop waste, maybe even your own waste)

3. You use the harvested methane from crop, cow, and self waste to grill

Otherwise, you're not accounting for your externalities (unless you pay for the same)

4. You replenish the soil to repeat

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#54

Post by joeman1000 »

Soil is incredibly ‘underrated’, this is a great article. It:

+ filters contaminants in the groundwater

+ stores water for later use

+ hosts the nutrients for plant growth and therefore human life

+ dampens the effect of massive rainfall events by being porous and soaking up surface runoff

We are doing so many bad things to our soil.

+ We’re leaching all the nutrients out of it without replacement

+ we compact the hell out of it, reducing permeability and the benefits I mentioned above

+ we cover it in concrete, meaning groundwater recharge is decreased and more rainfall becomes surface runoff, resulting in flooding

+ we let it erode due to this higher surface runoff

The erosion rate is higher than the rate at which it is replaced as well. We have a few meters of topsoil at any given point on earth, minus oceans and deserts and now urban centres. We absolutely are not treating this vital part of our life correctly.

It’s easy to write it off as nothing. I did the same until I was forced to learn about soil in so many different contexts as a civil engineer. Luckily curriculum nowadays teaches more sustainable practices in soil hydrology and the design of urban drainage networks. The old ways still linger though, which just treat it as an infinitely available engineering material.

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#55

Post by docmechanic »

These two stats took the top of my head off:

"Only 29% of the weight of birds on Earth consists of wild species: the rest is poultry. Just 4% of the world’s mammals, by weight, are wild; humans account for 36%, and livestock for the remaining 60%."

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#57

Post by jacobolus »

boredumb wrote: post #5

Everyone should invest in a decent microscope. Whether it's some soil or a drop of pond water there is an absolutely insane amount of life that escapes the naked eye. Easily one of the best couple hundred dollars I've spent in my life.

And if you want to be inspired (whether or not you own a microscope) take a look at Journey to the Microcosmos on YouTube https://youtube.com/c/microcosmos/

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#58

Post by nyokodo »

carapace wrote: post #21
photochemsyn wrote: post #6

Closed-system farming, where basically everything is recycled - nutrients, water, biomass (except what goes onto people's tables) - is theoretically possible and this article describes what looks like a successful system. This is also the kind of thing you'd need on a large spaceship or Martian colony (where human feces/urine would also need to be recycled). However, the increase in labor needed shouldn't be underest…

> However, the increase in labor needed shouldn't be underestimated. Some automation is likely possible with advanced robots, but this would mean a much larger fraction of the population would be involved in agriculture, perhaps as much as 10X as are currently employed. I don't think it would be so radical. For one thing, only about 1% of us work in agriculture now, so even if it takes 10x that's still only 10%.

> so even if it takes 10x that's still only 10%

“Only 10%?” That is a massive shift in labor allocation that would be enormously disruptive if it were feasible which it likely isn’t at least in the medium term.

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#59

Post by hetspookjee »

floren wrote: post #13
photochemsyn wrote: post #6

Closed-system farming, where basically everything is recycled - nutrients, water, biomass (except what goes onto people's tables) - is theoretically possible and this article describes what looks like a successful system. This is also the kind of thing you'd need on a large spaceship or Martian colony (where human feces/urine would also need to be recycled). However, the increase in labor needed shouldn't be underest…

I think about farming a lot these days, especially when I'm reading about startups on HN. Our culture has spent decades putting down agriculture as the lowest work, worse than waiting tables or running a cash register. Hell, I grew up on a farm and I still looked down on it. When I compare it to building CRUD apps because a VC wants another unicorn, though, it seems pretty attractive. The work is hard, but the result…

The ecological field is in high need of people with coding skills, so to some extend you can do both! I also believe there are unicorn apps waiting to happen in the field of agriculture as the current approach is just horrible outdated and continues to fight a uphill battle.

Re: Soil: The world beneath our feet

#60

Post by hetspookjee »

boredumb wrote: post #5

Everyone should invest in a decent microscope. Whether it's some soil or a drop of pond water there is an absolutely insane amount of life that escapes the naked eye. Easily one of the best couple hundred dollars I've spent in my life.

The LIDL sold me one 70euro a few years ago and it works marvels.
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