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The Coming Food Catastrophe

economist.com

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Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#571

Post by willcipriano »

morsch wrote: post #539
Guthur wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If everyone is so united in opposition why are they still buying the oil and gas (paying in Rubles)? If they're so together why did Turkey block Sweden and Finland joining Nato. If the unifying petrodollar still binds us all why is Saudi considering Yuan. If they had any sort of plan that would save Ukrainians why is it taking months to enact?

If everyone is so united in opposition why are they still buying the oil and gas (paying in Rubles)? Because we are dependent on it and despite opposition to Russia's war, our solidarity has limits. Limits which are a subject to internal debate and strive. Obviously you know this, which explains the other posters incredulity at the question, which is bound to be in bad faith. If they're so together why did Turkey blo…

> our solidarity has limits.

That's more like flexabiledarity than solidarity.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#572

Post by spywaregorilla »

giantg2 wrote: post #345
spywaregorilla wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They threaten everyone and change their mind all the time. It's mostly irrelevant to what they actually do.

The question was would they really "say" it.

It felt pretty clear to me the intention was saying it "to themselves" and following up with actual action. Nobody cares if they say things aloud.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#573

Post by bryanlarsen »

paganel wrote: post #162
bryanlarsen wrote: post #144

The article actually has four solutions at the bottom. Compared to the severity of the problem, all four solutions are surprisingly simple. Not necessarily easy, but simple and straightforward. 1. Stop using so much corn to make ethanol. 2. Stop using so much seed oil to make biodiesel. 3. Stop feeding so much food to livestock. Bonus: reducing the livestock population provides short term calories! 4. Break the Black…

Re 4., that's doable if the West renounces some of its existing economic sanctions against Russia, the Russians themselves have said as much recently. It probably won't happen because the West doesn't like to see itself as being involved in the war (in a way similar to what Russia thinks about itself) and will try to resort to "Russia should unlock the blockade purely on humanitarian grounds!", which, of course, is t…

Running the blockade doesn't necessarily require Russian cooperation in advance. All that's required is a minesweeper, and some commanders and captains with giant balls.

Run some ships under a NATO flag to Odessa, fill them up and run them back. Russia will bluster and threaten, but I doubt they'll actually do anything. Russia is not in a strong enough position to be able to escalate. I'm not anywhere close to sure of that, Putin is definitely not completely rational. I do think it's a risk worth taking.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#574

Post by Tao332 »

dang wrote: post #526
Tao332 wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, "passive-aggressive stealth edit"? You got what you wanted. They took out the mean word. Don't get pissy about it and start gaslighting people.

Editing a comment after the fact in a way that deprives a reply of its original context and makes it look stupid is, in most cases, a dick move. I think most users understand that. It doesn't make a difference whether the reply was by a moderator or not.

- Accusing a user of using a slur

- Getting snarky because they did the reasonable thing and got rid of the slur after it was pointed out

- Calling said user a dick. If Karen is a misogynistic slur, How is dick not moreso misandristic? I realize you said "dick move", but that's functionally the same. Saying something was a "c?nt move" or a "n????r move" would be tantamount to calling someone a c?nt or n????r.

- Because maybe it made your comment "look stupid"

Jawdropping desecration of the guidelines. You need a vacation.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#575

Post by SkyMarshal »

Jensson wrote: post #552
SkyMarshal wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The eggs don't hatch right away, can take months or years, but most people buy rice to eat right now, not to stockpile, so it's mostly consumed before the weevils hatch. And when they do, it's just a known nuisance, not worth reporting.

I cannot find anyone talking about rice weevils in my language online, so I really doubt finding them is a common thing everywhere. If it is that impossible to get rid of them then it is probably a climate thing, they are common in your climate but not in my climate. So the advice would be to look at local pests and how to avoid having those in your storage. We still have other kinds of weevils but they are not every…

What’s your climate? If it’s a colder one then that would make sense.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#576

Post by FpUser »

geoka9 wrote: post #527
FpUser wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia" That was the statement. I replied to. By taking Crimea Putin had taken a great deal more than "an inch" >"Nobody believed it was happening," Nobody believed the Crimea was taken?

> Nobody believed the Crimea was taken? Nobody in Crimea believed it was being taken, until it was. By that time, the Ukranian government was beheaded, whatever left of the army was demoralized. There was literally a few thousand dollars in the state's coffers. Insurgency in the east was ramping up; a few volunteer battalions were formed overnight, financed by neighborhood donations, and sent off to fight the (covert…

It's been 8 years since and no fight for Crimea. This still contradicts the original statement: "as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia".

And I am far from blaming Ukrainians. Their government luckily had enough brain cells and had voted not to attack what Russia considers their territory and not to vaporize their nation for the sake of some hot heads's stance.

Had they decided to do so on their own before Russia's invasion then there would be no support from the West. The chance of them succeeding militarily in Crimea in that case I think would have been big fat zero.

So no, in general I do not think want people to get vaporized en masse just because somebody believes they should.

Also we might just have a case of keyboard warriors here. It is easy to be brave / stupid sitting in a safe place in front of computer screen.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#577

Post by dredmorbius »

coryrc wrote: post #433
dredmorbius wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point. Though my understanding is that ethanol as a fuel additive is largely an anti-knock lead substitute. Alcohol was the originally-proposed solution, before the creation and adoption of tetraethyl lead. Apparent cost advantages drove the adoption of the latter. True costs proved somewhat greater. My read is that the "biofuel" branding of fuel ethanol is actually a misdirection, though I don't have a good sou…

We put in more ethanol than necessary to replace MTBE

Any specific references you'd have on that?

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#578

Post by nisegami »

silversmith wrote: post #550
karaterobot wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Russia have played this very very well as the west followed their own play book to the letter and the russians had counters planned for years, hording gold, setting up non USD financial systems. First round of The Game goes to Russia imo. I find this very hard to believe. Things are much worse in Russia and for Russia than they are in Europe or the United States right now, with the future looking bleak.

While the quoted poster appears to be getting their news straight from Kremlin, there is something to consider: the average russian is VERY experienced in taking abuse. We're talking about a country where around fifth of the population does not have access to indoor plumbing. Only couple of the largest cities there have living standards comparable to what average HN poster would consider livable. This whole thing is…

>I want my kids to worry about global warming, not global warming and when's the next time the neighbours re-discover their imperial ambitions.

I just can't fathom why people bring children into this world knowing they will face existential crises.

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#579

Post by trasz »

postalrat wrote: post #217
UnFleshedOne wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another option for #4 is supplying enough long range anti-ship rockets to sink whole russian fleet in black sea. They can't bring in more ships, because turkey is blocking the entrance.

Triggering world war 3 would also help reduce the population which could reduce co2 emissions and food requirements. Killing a few birds with one stone.

We are talking about a country that can’t even supply proper boots to its troops. Why believe that the nuclear weapons they inherited from USSR still work?

Re: The Coming Food Catastrophe

#580

Post by morsch »

willcipriano wrote: post #571
morsch wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If everyone is so united in opposition why are they still buying the oil and gas (paying in Rubles)? Because we are dependent on it and despite opposition to Russia's war, our solidarity has limits. Limits which are a subject to internal debate and strive. Obviously you know this, which explains the other posters incredulity at the question, which is bound to be in bad faith. If they're so together why did Turkey blo…

> our solidarity has limits. That's more like flexabiledarity than solidarity.

Ok? That's not a word? I'm not saying the current politics are good, but that's what they are. You don't debate them by feigning ignorance like Guthur did. Pithy neologisms don't add much, either.
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