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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 21, 2020 14:31:34 GMT -5
Slowpocalypse wise these annual reductions in yield worry me. I feel like that means that somewhere there's already people going hungry for want of food that's being fed to cattle or hogs when maybe the ethical thing to do would be to start putting limits on how much human edible grain can be fed to stock or turned into ethanol. Starvation has lost its "newsworthyness" it seems.. Look up what is happening in Yemen as a start. The thing is, as was dramatically demonstrated a few years ago, the food goes to people with money, either as food or as ethanol for vehicles whoever pays better. Starving people rarely have much money. So there you are. As a politician was reported to have said the other day, "If they can't afford (food/Medicine) then I guess they just have to die. "
THAT I found very sad and very depressing.
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Post by blueadzuki on Feb 21, 2020 19:30:46 GMT -5
I think it could get even grimmer. If the rich and powerful see signs of the poor getting desperate enough to rise up, they may go proactive about "eliminating the problem" (and I don't mean through assistance).
There are already poor people in the third world auctioning off their organs for money. How long before someone starts deciding your extra organs are profitable assets and DEMANDING they be sold before allowing for financial assistance (or being confiscateable when you have debts).
Or a return to slave labor just for a tiny amount of food.
The rich only want the poor so long as they can either get resources out of them (goods/labor) or can use them as a market to get money (which is ultimately just another kind of goods). The moment you don't have anything they'd be happier if you weren't there. And automation keeps getting better and cheaper so the "labor" part is getting to be a weaker and weaker bargaining chip.
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Post by flowerbug on Feb 22, 2020 13:53:15 GMT -5
Umm, YUM, crispy roast duck and mile high duck egg cakes, heaven:) you make 'em i'd surely eat 'em!
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Post by flowerbug on Feb 22, 2020 14:08:17 GMT -5
that is why i'm glad we are not too close to the bigger cities in the area. by the time the worst of whatever is over we can work with the neighbors to get gardens going. i have a very large collection of beans to work with and other things too. beans store well through the winter or the years as dried feed that can be cooked. wood fires are not easy to do for us, but we'd manage if we had to. same for what we can to put up. i'm not really worried about us, i'm more worried about the wildlife and diversity of other species which are our support network which makes our lives possible. people don't seem to understand the web of life concepts which underpin the productivity of the soil, plants, fruits, etc. you don't get much energy transport from plants alone, but also all the bugs too and those bugs feed so many other creatures. night lights are killing way too many bugs, same with poisons used for various crops and sprays (mosquito spray included). what makes people think they can get away with spraying poisons and not reap some rather bad results? the lack of diversity and cover crops also mean that much land is barren for long periods of time, open to the winds and rains. nutrients are leached off quickly because of various poor decisions in agriculture which doesn't value the topsoil. every agricultural area in the world through time has destroyed their topsoil. guess what? we've not learned enough yet either and are doing the same thing... only a few people seem to understand how important it is to have plants growing, the soil covered, diversity in plants and animals... to encourage life in all forms. to learn how to work around pests and work with nature. it isn't impossible. i've been doing it for years. just have to find enough other people who value that same thing and somehow protect a big enough chunk of land that the surrounding negative effects are not always drifting in. even our little plot here in the middle of farmlands has a ton more life going on than the surrounding fields. so much so that we are a target for various creatures who come to hunt. if i had to trap small game for meat i could easily do that several times a month. i'm actually not that much of a meat eater so it isn't important to me... still the option is there if calories are needed and the choice is between that and starvation. i cannot trap all the raccoons here. they keep making more as fast as i can trap them. same with rabbits. deer i wouldn't bother with. i can't trap them and have no desire to hunt them otherwise. i'd let the neighbors do that and barter for deer sausage in trade if i wanted some.
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 22, 2020 15:24:22 GMT -5
I think it could get even grimmer. If the rich and powerful see signs of the poor getting desperate enough to rise up, they may go proactive about "eliminating the problem" (and I don't mean through assistance). There are already poor people in the third world auctioning off their organs for money. How long before someone starts deciding your extra organs are profitable assets and DEMANDING they be sold before allowing for financial assistance (or being confiscateable when you have debts). Or a return to slave labor just for a tiny amount of food. The rich only want the poor so long as they can either get resources out of them (goods/labor) or can use them as a market to get money (which is ultimately just another kind of goods). The moment you don't have anything they'd be happier if you weren't there. And automation keeps getting better and cheaper so the "labor" part is getting to be a weaker and weaker bargaining chip. Agree, sadly. The other thing though, is that many of the rich are like many of the "highly educated" who have never actually DONE anything, they are living in a bubble and really have no idea how that bubble is supported. And, as some labour leader remarked when being toured through a newly roboticised automobile factory, who is going to buy these cars if nobody has a job? So where is the "new" wealth going to come from and who are they going to impress? Robots are amazing for many things, but they cannot be impressed or intimidated and adulation is not so far programable as far as I know...and likely to be unsatisfactory if it ever was. People don't look to their cars to make them feel superior, it's the reaction of "lesser" people to their cars. I think. Perhaps I'm wrong. It occurs to me to think that your scenario is already being played out in the US (and other places, but most vigorously in the US atm) with support being withdrawn from the poor and disenfranchised.. the theory being heavilly promoted is that there are too many people in the world and so the population must be thinned out..and obviously the poor, the handicapped, the old, the infirm, anyone "other" in fact, can be the most easilly dispensed with.
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Post by blueadzuki on Feb 22, 2020 16:35:17 GMT -5
Which is one of the problems you run into when trying to suggest something logical to decrease the population, like limits on family size. Once the number of permitted children drops below one per family (and most people think it has to drop much faster than halving every generation) you really can't go any smaller without talking eugenics. If not everyone can have kids then the question of WHO gets to comes into play.
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 22, 2020 21:51:25 GMT -5
well, everything I have ever learned in sociology course or from things like the TED talks, food is NOT the problem and never has been, it's the distribution. Also, as the standard of living rises, the number of kids in a family drops (as a societal marker) as two things come into play. The increase in income and societal safety nets like OAP means that parents don't HAVE to have a dozen kids in the hope that at least one or two will both live to adulthood and care enough to look after them when they get old. www.businessinsider.com/10-countries-at-risk-of-becoming-demographic-time-bombs-2018-8 Aside from that, several scientists have been shrieking the alarm that the incidence of autism is continuing to increase exponentially and by 2030 one in every two boys born will be on the spectrum and that will lead to collapse as those who are severely affected are highly unlikely to have families. Even if they are only 50% correct and it's 1 in 3 it will create a very dramatic and sudden drop in births. Combine that with suicide in teenage populations and the prediction that the current young adult generation will be the first not to live as long or longer than their parents and we really don't need to "cull" anyone.
It's an interesting time to be alive, n'est-ce pas?
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Post by blueadzuki on Feb 22, 2020 23:00:17 GMT -5
Actually, the number's could get even lower. Since girls ALREADY outnumber boys at least 2:1 halving the number of available boys would mean that something like 75% of women won't be able to find a man (though given the decrease in emphasis on both marriage and monogamy, this number might not mean as much as it sounds)
The real question of course, is can we keep the planet in decent enough shape that there's still something left when our population begins to drop?
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 22, 2020 23:57:42 GMT -5
well there are autistic girls as well, but for some reason it is more prevalent in males. Supposedly every man's dream to have a harem! lol Another thing is this www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/health-and-wellness-articles/dont-make-the-mistake-of-letting-a-diet-kill-sperm Maybe females will develop the capacity to manage parthenogenesis. I read somewhere a while back that every species gives rise to its own replacement; the theory was that robots would be our replacement. Since they are now self learning, self repairing, and really no longer restricted in any way by physical limitations thanks to the militarization of robots bounding through woods or climbing stairs etc..hard not to think perhaps they are right. but just in case that's a premature conclusion the question is indeed what is going to be left for even the next
generation.
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Post by blueadzuki on Feb 23, 2020 0:30:52 GMT -5
Well, some lizards and reptiles manage it, but we're probably too complex. Plus you get an offspring with identical genes (barring swaps and mutations). And while XO is VIABLE it's also STERILE.
And if the robots are our successors let's hope they will be kinder to their ancestors than we were.
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Post by jocelyn on Feb 23, 2020 6:55:36 GMT -5
Thinking back to tales of the dirty thirties, the little iceage, and now, climate change and economic downturns...... we'll manage. Folks will rip up some of the lawn for potatoes, perhaps plant fruit or nut trees instead of ornamental shade trees. It may even become cool to garden. In Canada, about 80 percent of us live in cities, and they had better learn to garden. Urban planning is not presently helpfull for gardening, but it might change if the necessity is there. City lots are large enough for dwarf apples and other fruits, probably not for nut trees though. There needs to be a culture shift, and I think it's just starting. Not there yet, but starting.
I drove through 'snob hill', the well to do neighbourhood,one summer... where appearances are important and the neighbours will grumble at you if you do something to 'lower property values'. A house had blue potatoes up both side of the walk, blueish foliage, pale blue flowers, and red salvia and red petunias interplanted. I bet the neighbours thought they were flowers and the home owner got no flack. A bit more of that would go a long way:)
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 23, 2020 14:26:45 GMT -5
well all great thoughts and certainly very good things to think about. However, bad as the dirty thirties were, things are likely to be a tad more difficult even if drought was no worse. People don't know now what they knew then at least about where their food comes from. More than once I have seen serious posts from people saying things such as "I don't know why anyone has to kill animals, why don't they just go to the store and buy the meat?" And despite a plethora of cookbooks on bookstore and kitchen shelves, many many people now don't have the first clue how to cook anything that doesn't come with instructions and/or a special appliance. Aside from that..if the grid goes down for any length of time, who has any sort of water catchment? Or any way TO cook anything? or to store food? even if a freezer is full and covered with blankets, there is a limited time freezers can cope with no power. Canned goods in jars can explode if they freeze. Dehydrating with solar to salvage the food may not be an option in the middle of winter. All things that people can plan for themselves but very very few are even thinking about such things. Saw a post the other day on a homesteading forum of all places, which categorically insisted that horses are absolutely useless these days. I am considering getting a pony and cart for when fuel prices get a little higher, they're already tending to make the budget squeal for mercy and are unlikely to go down. I also know one cattleman who bought a team to haul hay in the winter to his cattle, saying he never had to worry about them starting when it was -45. But how many people now know even how to harness a horse much less drive one? (Or an ox, for that matter.) Or have a clue about what to look for if buying one? Someone near here paid $5000 for a very pretty horse a few years back, unfortunately the horse was permanently lame.(and a gelding, so couldn't even try to get a foal from it.) I'm not into relying on walking to get to a hospital many miles away e.g. if fuel is not available for whatever reason. Even a medium or big dog or two can be harnessed and trained to pull a cart or sled, doesn't need to be a team of huskies. That's been turned into a sport these days, as has dogs pulling a sort of ski/skateboard, more appropriate for agile young than the geriatric crowd.
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Post by blueadzuki on Feb 23, 2020 15:08:32 GMT -5
And that's not counting the fair number of survivalist type people whose plan for how to get food (as far as I can tell) is "Use my guns to take it away from someone else". I'm no fan of guns but even I can see that the "get rid of guns" argument sort of falls apart in a case where society has as well.
But beyond the question of how many people don't know how to shoot a gun, how many know how to shoot a bow and arrow (handy for when the bullets and gunpowder run out) How many people know how to MAKE a bow and arrows completely from scratch (and I mean literally from scratch down to knapping the arrowhead)
The problem with thinking "what if it all goes down" is you have to imagine what happens if it ALL goes down.
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Post by prairiegardens on Feb 23, 2020 18:20:01 GMT -5
gets pretty complicated pretty quickly doesn't it! William! You need to save some of your own seeds! For anyone interested who hasn't heard of them, rocket mass stoves and heaters CAN be made from (hopefully refractory) clay, although most are made of bricks and barrels. Concrete will not last long unless protected from the direct fire, people have used a slightly tweaked design to do foundry work. Some of them are really attractive, most of the basic ones are pretty funky. HIGHLY efficient and can be run on twigs, almost, someone once claimed to have heated his house all winter on junk mail. (I suspect he lived in Hawaii but no proof )If you don't get it right though, you get a whole lot of smoke, if you get it right, virtually none. Donkey, who runs the forums, has a very short video of making a core out of a cardboard box and clay mud but that was just to prove a point. Donkey32.proboards is a sister forums to this one and caters to the same range of people, some who build them professionally and are researching ways to refine and make them better/more efficient, pushing the boundaries, and some who have stumbled over the idea for the first time. Lots of You Tube videos out there but many of them have highly questionable advice. Permies.com also has a forum about them as Paul holds workshops pretty much yearly and involves many of the researchers from the Donkey site. I have been trying to wrap my mind around the various measurements and materials access for a while, this year MAY, hopefully, be the year it gets out of my mind and into reality. Recently they've come up with a slightly different design which looks more attainable to me. The guy who originally brought the concept to the U.S., Ianto Evans, actually managed to get one permitted, I believe in Oregon. Several restaurants have installed them here and there around the country. Evans has at least one book out about how to build the things. I have yet to meet anyone in real life who has ever heard of them or has any interest in learning anything about them. Which I find odd, but then I am used to being out of step with people. I can't imagine not having heat in a Prairie winter...and these days, you can't even count on winter staying within the confines of October through May. Or in traditionally cold areas.
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Post by flowerbug on Feb 24, 2020 13:50:30 GMT -5
for us the transition would be interesting but i think we could do it.
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