RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice • Hacker News Board

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#101

Post by jessaustin » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

naasking wrote: post #94

jessaustin wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That will be a great argument when one of these new varieties is, say 5% of world cultivation of any particular crop. We are decades away from that circumstance. This isn't even a slippery slope argument; it's more of a "moderately smooth horizontal plane" argument. Given the challenges that humanity currently faces, these sorts of low-effort Chicken Little objections would endanger millions of human lives, if anyone…

Producing enough food is not a challenge humanity faces. We have more than enough food. Distribution is the problem. Monocultural has also been a problem many times in the past, so calling it a "chicken little" objection is disingenuous.

There are lots of hungry people, in lots of places. Please have some sympathy for their plight. Capitalists tell us that they can properly distribute the food produced in a few nations to everywhere, but they have so far largely failed to do so. Invariably capitalists and their useful idiots invoke "market failures" as reasons for capitalist-owned politicians to take even more freedoms from producers and consumers than they've already taken. It beggars belief to complain about a strictly hypothetical "monoculture" (resulting from new crop varieties!) when giant firms like Cargill, Tyson, JBS, etc. control so much of our society.

It has in most cases been far more reliable, resilient, nutritious, environmentally benign, and just to produce and consume food locally, rather than burning fuel to ship it around the world while it's still edible. We put up with lots of externalities from agriculture, because it's important that humans have food to eat. We can't dismiss completely benign ag tech out of hand, for essentially religious reasons. I make no particular claim for these particular crop varieties, but your objections are ridiculous.

You're simply wrong about this, and it's not "disingenuous" to say so.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#102

Post by baybal2 » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 4:58 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #99

necovek wrote: post #21

While I see people worry about the nutrient content in the resulting food, I wonder more about the nutrient content of the soil after a few years of such products. While we fertilize the soil, the mention of "longer and deeper roots" means that such plants will take out more from the ground, making ground less usable for future farming. Basically, as others have said, there is an evolutionary reason plants do not nat…

It makes me wonder if we aren't using human waste properly. I'm being serious. We don't absorb all of the nutrients and calories that we consume, partly because we are overnourished (our bodies might spontaneously combust if we utilized every single calorie we ate), so there's plenty of leftovers in our feces. Does it ever get recycled for use in agriculture in "developed" nations? (I can't think of a word for that w…

> It makes me wonder if we aren't using human waste properly. I'm being serious.

Such "Organic Farming" been taking lives of millions from communicable diseases every year in South Asia in China until the advent of synthetic fertilisers.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#103

Post by a9h74j » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 4:59 PM UTC

Props to everyone here wondering about soil.

Speaking from the old school where fossil fuel, aquifer, and soil depletion are certain to kick in at scale within this century.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#104

Post by edflsafoiewq » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:00 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #99

necovek wrote: post #21

While I see people worry about the nutrient content in the resulting food, I wonder more about the nutrient content of the soil after a few years of such products. While we fertilize the soil, the mention of "longer and deeper roots" means that such plants will take out more from the ground, making ground less usable for future farming. Basically, as others have said, there is an evolutionary reason plants do not nat…

It makes me wonder if we aren't using human waste properly. I'm being serious. We don't absorb all of the nutrients and calories that we consume, partly because we are overnourished (our bodies might spontaneously combust if we utilized every single calorie we ate), so there's plenty of leftovers in our feces. Does it ever get recycled for use in agriculture in "developed" nations? (I can't think of a word for that w…

Yes it does.

> Biosolids are solid organic matter recovered from a sewage treatment process and used as fertilizer. [...] In the United States, as of 2013 about 55% of sewage solids are turned into fertilizer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosolids

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#105

Post by ravenstine » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:01 PM UTC

edflsafoiewq wrote: post #104

ravenstine wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes me wonder if we aren't using human waste properly. I'm being serious. We don't absorb all of the nutrients and calories that we consume, partly because we are overnourished (our bodies might spontaneously combust if we utilized every single calorie we ate), so there's plenty of leftovers in our feces. Does it ever get recycled for use in agriculture in "developed" nations? (I can't think of a word for that w…

Yes it does. > Biosolids are solid organic matter recovered from a sewage treatment process and used as fertilizer. [...] In the United States, as of 2013 about 55% of sewage solids are turned into fertilizer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosolids

I guess I was using the wrong keyword. That's pretty amazing!

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#106

Post by baybal2 » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:03 PM UTC

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #61

necovek wrote: post #21

While I see people worry about the nutrient content in the resulting food, I wonder more about the nutrient content of the soil after a few years of such products. While we fertilize the soil, the mention of "longer and deeper roots" means that such plants will take out more from the ground, making ground less usable for future farming. Basically, as others have said, there is an evolutionary reason plants do not nat…

Not to mention we don't need it. We don't have a problem with producing food, but with distributing it. The result here would be only more profit for some players, it's not going to help with world hunger. It's not going to take prices down (potatoes/rice price is not a blocker, but margin is nice). But it certainly will have a systemic cost that we will all share for a gain we will not. Problems we do have but that…

> - weak nutritional content of our food;

Today we have the most nutritious foods in history. Don't make things up.

Today's potatoes are 4-6 times bigger than 19th century ones. Tomatoes 3-5 times. Most fruits, got just enormous.

Even "watery" leafy greens are actually getting more meatier, and starchy, and with more folates as everybody seem to be crazy about them.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#107

Post by baybal2 » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:07 PM UTC

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #71

pharke wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this process is simple to scale then we absolutely do need it. There is little chance of us fixing our food waste problem and increasing the efficiency of foreign aid in a timely manner. If more and larger crops could be grown on even more marginal land closer to where people desperately need the food then it is a solution we should use. I'm assuming that we'd aim for making these modified plants easily available…

> If more and larger crops could be grown on even more marginal land closer to where people desperately need the food then it is a solution we should use. That's not going to happen. People that desperately need the food don't have a problem of not growing enough rice or potatoes because of the nature of the crop. It's not why they are hungry. It's any other reason, politics, weather, logistics, economics, you name i…

> Yield increase is not really a winner if you have no water, if you are at war, if you don't have money/land, or if corporations own your society.

Very much true. We eliminate the global hunger if we can eliminate food wastage in US supermarkets alone.

US supermarkets literally throw away enough food to feed all of famine struck countries, and probably even twice.

> We reached a state in humanity development where any improvement in agricultural yield for basic food is not only unnecessary, but will lead to more problems than solution.

I push for an idea of unification of the world under a single global democratic government.

The solution to the global problems, must be global.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#108

Post by jessaustin » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:12 PM UTC

Nicksil wrote: post #75

imwillofficial wrote: post #69

And there will be no downstream consequences we discover 59 years from now… Like monasto pesticides causing cancer.

>Like monasto pesticides causing cancer. Has this been determined?

Not conclusively. Some studies find that glyphosate causes increased incidence of non-Hodgkin lymphoma [0], although most environment regulators have minimized these results. Anecdotally, in my hometown, of the two men who over the last several decades personally have applied the most glyphosate (although, to be fair, most other herbicides as well), one is already dead before his time from cancer and the other's health is failing. Humans shouldn't die painfully in their 50s.

[0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S138357421...

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#109

Post by ben_w » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:14 PM UTC

baybal2 wrote: post #106

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention we don't need it. We don't have a problem with producing food, but with distributing it. The result here would be only more profit for some players, it's not going to help with world hunger. It's not going to take prices down (potatoes/rice price is not a blocker, but margin is nice). But it certainly will have a systemic cost that we will all share for a gain we will not. Problems we do have but that…

> - weak nutritional content of our food; Today we have the most nutritious foods in history. Don't make things up. Today's potatoes are 4-6 times bigger than 19th century ones. Tomatoes 3-5 times. Most fruits, got just enormous. Even "watery" leafy greens are actually getting more meatier, and starchy, and with more folates as everybody seem to be crazy about them.

“The plants are bigger” isn’t evidence either pro or con, nutrition is about what’s in the plants rather than their raw mass — they might be more nutritious, or less, or even both at the same time because the balance of proteins, sugars, fats, vitamins, and minerals shifted.

Re: RNA breakthrough creates crops that can grow 50 percent more potatoes, rice

#110

Post by RosanaAnaDana » Fri, Sep 03, 2021, 5:16 PM UTC

foxyv wrote: post #40

necovek wrote: post #21

While I see people worry about the nutrient content in the resulting food, I wonder more about the nutrient content of the soil after a few years of such products. While we fertilize the soil, the mention of "longer and deeper roots" means that such plants will take out more from the ground, making ground less usable for future farming. Basically, as others have said, there is an evolutionary reason plants do not nat…

Deeper roots tend to make for healthier soil. This is why dandelions are such a boon for someone with poor soil. Their deep roots break up poorly aerated soil allowing aerobic bacteria to produce nutrients for plants. Modern farmers are keenly aware of soil quality and spend a lot of time and money to keep their farms running at top efficiency. The thing that worries me the most about modern farming is the use of pet…

>Modern farmers are keenly aware of soil quality and spend a lot of time and money to keep their farms running at top efficiency.

You sure about that? When I was ARS, sure there were 3-4 farmers I met who took SOC and and soil health seriously; individuals who wanted to think about their soil as an ecosystem and grow their soils as they did their crops. Then there were the other 96-97 farmers you would meet who could give two wiffs of stinky piss about doing anything other than extracting as much value off their land as quickly as possible. This was typically done with high degrees of tillage, large quantities of fertilizer, and significant doses of herbicide. If there SOC levels dropped below 5%, they would just buy in lime and lime the shit out of the fields. Rinse, wash hands, repeat.

Its purely anecdotal, but the *vast* majority of farmers I had the opportunity were not good farmers and not interested in any kind of longer term relationship with their soils. Most seems like they were trying to extract maybe 5-15 more years of growth out of their soils before they were completely depleted of SOC and basically not usable as farm-able land. We're talking about a region that prior to cultivation had SOC levels in the 30-40s; most of the soils there now are down at below 10%, many as low as 5%, which is borderline being able to grow anything at all.