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[Lagslayer]

I'm not saying we are incapable of working with nature, but doing so suppresses our spiritual needs. Our instinctual need to expand our influence and power is in direct conflict with most multi-cellular lifeforms, because they can't keep up.

People will only take so much suppression before the system explodes. This is why we either need to replace or improve nature rather than work with it in it's current form.

Wait a sec, didn't we have this conversation on another thread?

[Sheb]

What? Most people I know would say their spiritual need a much more fullfilled working with nature than trying to work without it.

[Lagslayer]

And yet we continue to choose the convenience of our technology over living a more "natural" life. Technology is winning.

Theoretically, bioengineering new life forms could be the best of both worlds. Or we could take it as an abomination and kill it with fire.

[penguinofhonor]

Why does it have to be technology versus nature? Why can't I support advancement of technology and better treatment of animals? Why can't I support more efficiency so we don't have to invade nature to get our resources?

Heck, coexisting with nature could mean entirely separating ourselves from it through technology so we don't hurt it. That's not what I want, but this is far more complex than choosing technology or nature. I'd like to choose both.

[Sheb]

Actually, nature ceased to exist roughly 12,000 years ago, when humans arrived on the last untouched continent.

What you think of as "nature" (The Great Plains and their bisons herd for exemple) are actually landscape that have been so shaped by humans that you could call them artificial. "Pulling out of nature" mean we stop playing our role in the ecosystem, and that damage it greatly. Just look at all those natural parks that are dying from not enough disturbance in the form of fire and grazing.

We are part of nature, no matter what we choose to do. We just need to learn to be a constructive part of it.

[Urist Imiknorris]

We hit Antarctica twelve millenia ago?

[Sheb]

Okay, you got me there. :p Well, we also colonized a few pacific islands in the last millenium, but my point stand. Most of what we think of as "natural" has been shaped by humans.

[Lagslayer]

Why does it have to be technology versus nature? Why can't I support advancement of technology and better treatment of animals? Why can't I support more efficiency so we don't have to invade nature to get our resources?

Heck, coexisting with nature could mean entirely separating ourselves from it through technology so we don't hurt it. That's not what I want, but this is far more complex than choosing technology or nature. I'd like to choose both.

For the purposes of this argument, let's assume "nature" refers to life forms excluding humans.

Even at perfect efficiency and 100% recycling with no waste, 1g of iron will never be any more than that. Efficiency has a hard cap. If you want to expand, you need more resources. Efficiency is all well and fine, but more is going to be needed.

Technology = fast, Nature = slow. Even under ideal conditions, nature will still move only so fast on it's own. We are a notable exception. Not only does nature develop more slowly, but it will reach it's theoretical limit far before our technology does, and it will just end up holding us back. So you have to ask yourself, "At what point is it not worth saving anymore?". How much does it have to get in the way of our own development before enough is enough? The vast majority of people aren't content with developmental stasis, otherwise we would still be living in straw huts and dying at the age of 40.

In order for them to mesh like you want, we would basically just be building around nature. People don't like it when nature "gets in the way", if it can be avoided. Plus, to protect nature means spending resources on it, or just isolating ourselves from those resources in the first place, hurting our development.

To live totally separately (or as much as possible anyways) means isolating ourselves from a vast number of resources, grinding our development to a near halt.

This is why I suggested bioengineering as an alternative. While not strictly "natural", it would still allow for various plants and critters which have developed alongside us.




In short, we can live alongside unmodified nature, but it comes at a steep price.

[Rose]

Thing is, in regards to things like forest fires, we managed it badly, because we didn't know what we were doing, and ended up ruining the forests by not letting them burn when they needed to.

[Karakzon]

Bio and genetic engineering will be the way forward, current resistance or no. as it is, we need to make new crop types just to feed the population.
Coupled with more advanced farming methods, this should help allot. Personally ide want to go about making a DNA databank of every species i can lay my hands on. All the DNA of every organism on the planet stored in one place. Would be the first step towards a genesis device for when/if we move off world.

[Sheb]

Well, that databank already exist.

Now, in the short term, new crops alone won't solve the problem. We just cannot continue to manage agriculture like an industry, using the soil as a simple support for monocultures. The great progress will come from ecological engineering rather than genetic engineering. Crops are living being, and we should manage them as such, by integreting them in a food-producing ecosystem (Agroforestry, Holistic Management, permaculture are all exemple of that).

[SalmonGod]

And of course.... we could bury the world in food and it wouldn't matter if there are still people who can't pay for it.  So long as food is only obtainable through an economic system where all wealth accumulates upward, there will be starving people regardless of the amount of food available.  While population growth is a serious problem for environmental stability, broken economics are the more immediate threat to human lives.

Now this is something interesting.... I never heard of Cryptocat before.

[Karakzon]

Well, that databank already exist.

Now, in the short term, new crops alone won't solve the problem. We just cannot continue to manage agriculture like an industry, using the soil as a simple support for monocultures. The great progress will come from ecological engineering rather than genetic engineering. Crops are living being, and we should manage them as such, by integreting them in a food-producing ecosystem (Agroforestry, Holistic Management, permaculture are all exemple of that).

To change the ecosystem you have to change the conditions or the organisms. better tech = better conditions, better genetics = better organisms. and thanks for the link Whats really interesting in that is all the coded for proteins contained in the database.

[SalmonGod]

An update on John Pike, the infamous UC Davis pepper spray gardener.

[alway]

An update on John Pike, the infamous UC Davis pepper spray gardener.

Heh, 17000 emails and 10000 text messages.