Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

newyorker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–185 of 185 posts

Re: Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

#181

Post by cryptonector »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #178
tptacek wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really have a problem with backyard beekeepers; it's just in the US, they've become emblematic of a kind of evangelical and ill-informed faux-environmentalism and I'm fond of pointing out that, here at least, they're essentially the battery-farmed hogs of the insect world. Also I'm scared of them. I like a mason bee. Docile and fuzzy, those guys.

I wish we were closer geographically - would love to invite you out to connect with our local beekeepers and share a frosty beverage as it sounds like it would be a positive exchange. I can't speak for those in urban areas - I can imagine the type you are describing though and I can see how that would be grating. Here in the middle of nowhere, I think many are aware that we are fundamentally keeping livestock that ar…

And commercial honey producers also see no romance in what they do.

We're switching to top-bar hives, and after that it will be comb honey only, because I don't want to bother extracting honey if it's not in Langstroth frames, and I don't want any more Langstroth. I'm thinking I'll still have some Langstroth supers because, well, I don't kill bees when inspecting supers or harvesting, it's when I get into the deeps that killing bees becomes almost impossible to avoid, and if that works out I think that will yield better-looking comb honey. I'm done with plastic foundation, too, and therefore also with centrifugal extractors.

Re: Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

#182

Post by defrost »

bborud wrote: post #179
defrost wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, really? How do you explain wild feral cattle thriving in the Kimberley, Arnhem Land, etc. then? https://news.csu.edu.au/feature/are-feral-cattle-the-brumbie... https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/offtrack/the-banteng-... http://www.windyhills.com.au/wild-cattle/

I don't think you appreciate quite how many heads of cattle exist compared to comparable mammals that live in nature, and what it would look like if the world's cattle population was "free range". The way we raise cattle is extremely efficient. Not least in terms of space.

> I don't think you appreciate quite how many heads of cattle

Born and raised on a cattle station with multiple STEM degrees and decades mapping the world (large scale geophysical land and ocean survey) behind me ..

I don't think you appreciate how laughably condescending you come across.

Points being:

* I understand the total number of cattle under direct human management,

* I know that cattle can survive just fine without human management .. even in urban environments (ever seen free range unowned cattle in India?),

* I've already linked to what feral cattle look like and the damage they do.

Re: Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

#183

Post by tptacek »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #178
tptacek wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really have a problem with backyard beekeepers; it's just in the US, they've become emblematic of a kind of evangelical and ill-informed faux-environmentalism and I'm fond of pointing out that, here at least, they're essentially the battery-farmed hogs of the insect world. Also I'm scared of them. I like a mason bee. Docile and fuzzy, those guys.

I wish we were closer geographically - would love to invite you out to connect with our local beekeepers and share a frosty beverage as it sounds like it would be a positive exchange. I can't speak for those in urban areas - I can imagine the type you are describing though and I can see how that would be grating. Here in the middle of nowhere, I think many are aware that we are fundamentally keeping livestock that ar…

That sounds fun! I'm only like 60% serious about my anti-bee-agenda, though. :)

Re: Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

#184

Post by strken »

BagelGuy wrote: post #177
strken wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most dairy farmers I've met in Australia care about their herds emotionally. Even though they send old cows and bobby calves to the knackers, they still build relationships with individual animals. It can seem paradoxical to anyone who hasn't watched them. If it helps, consider a farmer with a tractor. The tractor is a beloved tool that's integrated into daily life, and yet it's going to end up as scrap metal when it…

and there's no cognitive dissonance There is but I've grown tired about arguing this on the internet. Once you dive deep enough there aren't a whole lot of logically sound ethical theories that allow for one to systematically imprison, enslave, and murder these beings without allowing us to do the same to less intelligent humans (which most agree is horrifying). It's a horrible thing that humans subject these beings…

I would argue that veganism and vegetarianism due to a belief that keeping livestock is wrong come about from either disgust at the process of butchery, or a modern alienation from the way your food is produced, and that neither of those are morally consistent.

In a mouse plague, there's a sowing of grain, which becomes edible; it is eaten by a burgeoning wave of mice; following that, there's a smaller wave of rats, which feed on the mice; and according to urban legend, in really bad years there's an increase in the number of snakes. When you eat a bagel, there's a strong possibility it was made from grain grown by farmers who put buckets of water under the legs of their beds to drown the mice and rats that try to climb on them in the night. It is not clear to me that the "enslavement" of a somewhat-happy herd of cows that all end up slaughtered is worse than this boom/bust famine cycle where the rodents spend a substantial fraction of their lives starving and either die from that or from getting ripped apart/swallowed whole by predators.

You can track the deaths per calorie, in fact: https://www.animalvisuals.org/projects/1mc/. It's slightly higher for dairy than for grain, and much higher for meat[0], but deaths are an unavoidable part of human agriculture. If you genuinely believe the lives of mammals are morally equivalent to human lives, where does that leave you, with regard to cognitive dissonance?

[0] Arguably not so high for pasture-fed beef and dairy! This applies to most Australian cattle. Some of the year they'll be eating silage or hay, or fattened in feeding lots that provide death-inefficient grain calories, but it's still a big factor.

Re: Natural beekeepers are the radical dissenters of apiculture

#185

Post by BagelGuy »

strken wrote: post #184
BagelGuy wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and there's no cognitive dissonance There is but I've grown tired about arguing this on the internet. Once you dive deep enough there aren't a whole lot of logically sound ethical theories that allow for one to systematically imprison, enslave, and murder these beings without allowing us to do the same to less intelligent humans (which most agree is horrifying). It's a horrible thing that humans subject these beings…

I would argue that veganism and vegetarianism due to a belief that keeping livestock is wrong come about from either disgust at the process of butchery, or a modern alienation from the way your food is produced, and that neither of those are morally consistent. In a mouse plague, there's a sowing of grain, which becomes edible; it is eaten by a burgeoning wave of mice; following that, there's a smaller wave of rats,…

"If you genuinely believe the lives of mammals are morally equivalent to human lives"

I didn't say this ;)

Of course all human agriculture leads to animal suffering.

A more pertinent (and difficult to measure) metric would be suffering per calorie. Industrialized dairy is brutal. Momma cow is forcefully impregnated and separated from her baby so you can have that baby's milk in your coffee.

One could also argue that you have a higher moral obligations to a cow that you are exploiting than a mouse attempting to eat your grain.

Post reply on HN