Not only did we dodge this bullet, but we created another one. According to some estimates, we produce 3000 kCal of food/day/person globally, which is about a third more than what we actually need. So while we talk about how overpopulation is horrible and we can't feed enough people, we could currently feed 12 billion if the distribution was fair. (Although from an environmental point of view, I think it would make much more sense to produce less food, but that's another topic.)
"before we are in the grip of actual dearth the chemist will step in and postpone the day of famine to so distant a period that we and our sons and grandsons may legitimately live without undue solicitude for the future."
Chemical fertilizers and improved cultivars did indeed postpone the day of famine such that the grandchildren could legitimately live without undue solicitude for their own children (Boomers) and grandchildren (Millennials).
And during this time, the long-term solution has appeared, fertility decline so that the projected 7 billion in 2000 and its extrapolation to 50 billion in 2100 did not materialize. It now looks like population will peak at less than 20% higher than today's level in the second half of the century.
Famine avoided.
When I was a kid in the early seventies I thought we might go through a sticky bit around 2010, but by the time I was in my 20's I had learned about the Green Revolution and the demographic transition and no longer thought that.
Wendell Berry mentions in his book "The Unsettling of America" that small farms that usually don't use synthetic fertizer actually create more food per acre.the industrial farms produce more food per farmer. I know families that feed themselves and others off a couple acres.
It seems that we only have a food crisis as the one you described if we want to keep measuring our advancement in how few farmers we have, but otherwise. Chris Smaje talks about this in his book "Small Farm Future". Any thoughts?
I think it's be better to have more farmers than email optimizers. I'd certainly rather be growing food for my community than staring at a screen all day and I'm notwhere near the only person to express this sentiment.
ChatGPT makes me a more productive coder, but I don't think it makes me more happy. I don't really like talking to a thing that pretends it's a person and I really enjoyed the craft of coding before it became arguing with a robot. Sure, it's not all bad, I don't have to go to stack overflow, but I'd say it made me enjoy coding less.
It seems to me the connection with community and nature is more important than efficiency. It also helps increase your freedom since you're not beholden to corporate or governmental system that may not have your best interest in mind.
This disagreement you express here I think is the key disagreement I have with the techno folks. I used to be a techno folk myself until I realized how many things the infinite march of progress has ruined. Trading efficiency for a true pursuit of happiness, which may come at the cost of some efficiency.
> … if you personally feel that your soul would be nourished by a job that takes you out into nature—you can still do those jobs! They have not gone away; indeed they have proliferated: you can be a park ranger, or a ski instructor, or even a farm worker, as over 1% of the workforce still chooses to be. And you can enjoy the outdoors with much less physical burden, such as by riding a tractor instead of hoeing or reaping by hand.
> If your true calling is as a master craftsman, making things with your hands—those jobs still exist as well! Artisans are at work today at Emerson Creek Pottery in Bedford, Virginia; Town Cutler Knives in Reno, Nevada; Odin Leather Goods in Lewisville, Texas; and Copeland Furniture in Bradford, Vermont. Copeland has a job application form on their website, and I won’t blame you if you stop reading now in order to apply. Or if quilting is more your thing, look up Bluebird Gardens Quilts in Roola, Missouri and read their guide to starting your own quilt business.
> And if, after thinking it over, you decide that you would prefer to sit in a cushioned chair in an air-conditioned room behind plate glass windows and earn a living by talking and typing—whether as an insurance actuary or a video game animator—then reflect on what your revealed preferences are telling you, and on the benefits of having choices.
---
Why aren't you working on a farm, if that's what you'd rather do?
Oh because I need thousands of dollars to do it. I need land and equipment and whatnot and I'm collecting money to hopefully be able to break away from a society I see poisoned by this technocratic thinking. I certainly wouldn't do it the industrial way. It used to be common for everyone to have some sort of subsistence farm before the British industrial revolution and the ensuing enclosure movements.
Im not a liberal so I'm not just concerned with myself. I'm concerned with society. If I was only concerned for myself I would likely just go make a lot of money and live in a cabin in the woods. Sounds great. I'm upset that our traditional ways of life has been destroyed and I'm upset that we feel alienated from our work as we do. I see us working towards meaningless ends where we could be working towards something greater.
So, I very well may start a farm and escape from it all, but I'd still feel an obligation to share my perspective and even try to convince the people like you that perhaps the technocratic paradigm isn't very helpful.
I'm trying to understand what your ideal is, and whether it is something real or a kind of romanticized vision. You say you'd rather not be staring at a screen all day, but you won't take an outdoors job, not even on a modern farm. You say you want to live like a subsistence farmer, which means being very poor, but you also say you need a lot of money.
Frankly, it sounds as if what you are envisioning is a kind of fantasy life that doesn't actually exist anywhere in reality, can't exist, and has never existed: one where you enjoy the comforts of a modern standard of living without any of the technology or infrastructure that makes it possible.
I also wouldn't say I want the modern comforts. I don't think I said that. Id happily walk to work in a world without cars and cancel my gym membership. Although cold showers would indeed suck.
Haha! Very good. I think you're making my point for me. The traditional, connected ways of living are expensive now when they used to be normal. Or at least they take initial investment.
For instance I would like to have a job where I can raise my family well and that used to be more easy. People used to have productive households so the husband and wife could be home and take care of their kids while providing for themselves.
These days, it's harder. I need money so I can afford to live in this system so my wife can spend more time at home with our family.
I figured you would bring up the nostalgia thing. People that are critical of technology always get called romantic, but the people calling for more tech to solve problems tech caused don't get called insane.
I'd rather not start a name game, but just because I want a society based on flourishing (and don't define flourishing as just wealth) doesn't make me romantic. There's crosses to bear in a subsistence farm. Weather really gets you. It's not ideal, but there's crosses with the technocratic.
The problem is the techno optimists act like there aren't any tradeoffs. They seem the romantic ones to me.
I'm not the only one that thinks this and I'm certainly.not the smartest. If you really care about where I'm coming from (fine if you don't you're a busy man) I'd recommend reading NewPolity or Wendell Berry, or skim through Against the Machine.
I’ve consistently been concerned about this “more” focus, especially in terms of growth and expansion. Why not more emotional maturity alongside technological/ agricultural growth? Why not more sustainable practices? More land for the wildlife we share this planet with? More recycling ♻️? More minimizing of our human footprint? 👣
Less human sprawl? Less human consumption? Less pollution?
I love solutions; I often ask if we have the right ones.
Wow, what a fascinating historical analysis! I had no idea a whole 1% of the world's energy usage is dedicated to producing fertilizer.
This "pessimism of the intellect" combined with "optimism of the will" is a perspective we desperately need right now. It's clear from your examples that we all owe our lives to a series of innovations without which the human race would have stagnated long ago. In the present time, it feels like pessimists are seen as highly intelligent, whereas optimists are seen as either ignorant or disingenuous. I wonder how historically widespread this general perception is, but it does seem like the solution is to abandon the false dichotomy of optimism vs. pessimism altogether.
Given how endemic that dichotomy has become among internet culture, do you have any potential solutions in mind for instilling "solutionism" into online discourse?
Not only did we dodge this bullet, but we created another one. According to some estimates, we produce 3000 kCal of food/day/person globally, which is about a third more than what we actually need. So while we talk about how overpopulation is horrible and we can't feed enough people, we could currently feed 12 billion if the distribution was fair. (Although from an environmental point of view, I think it would make much more sense to produce less food, but that's another topic.)
Crooke was right:
"before we are in the grip of actual dearth the chemist will step in and postpone the day of famine to so distant a period that we and our sons and grandsons may legitimately live without undue solicitude for the future."
Chemical fertilizers and improved cultivars did indeed postpone the day of famine such that the grandchildren could legitimately live without undue solicitude for their own children (Boomers) and grandchildren (Millennials).
And during this time, the long-term solution has appeared, fertility decline so that the projected 7 billion in 2000 and its extrapolation to 50 billion in 2100 did not materialize. It now looks like population will peak at less than 20% higher than today's level in the second half of the century.
Famine avoided.
When I was a kid in the early seventies I thought we might go through a sticky bit around 2010, but by the time I was in my 20's I had learned about the Green Revolution and the demographic transition and no longer thought that.
Wendell Berry mentions in his book "The Unsettling of America" that small farms that usually don't use synthetic fertizer actually create more food per acre.the industrial farms produce more food per farmer. I know families that feed themselves and others off a couple acres.
It seems that we only have a food crisis as the one you described if we want to keep measuring our advancement in how few farmers we have, but otherwise. Chris Smaje talks about this in his book "Small Farm Future". Any thoughts?
Isn't producing more food per farmer the most important metric? Labor productivity directly translates to standards of living.
I think it's be better to have more farmers than email optimizers. I'd certainly rather be growing food for my community than staring at a screen all day and I'm notwhere near the only person to express this sentiment.
ChatGPT makes me a more productive coder, but I don't think it makes me more happy. I don't really like talking to a thing that pretends it's a person and I really enjoyed the craft of coding before it became arguing with a robot. Sure, it's not all bad, I don't have to go to stack overflow, but I'd say it made me enjoy coding less.
It seems to me the connection with community and nature is more important than efficiency. It also helps increase your freedom since you're not beholden to corporate or governmental system that may not have your best interest in mind.
This disagreement you express here I think is the key disagreement I have with the techno folks. I used to be a techno folk myself until I realized how many things the infinite march of progress has ruined. Trading efficiency for a true pursuit of happiness, which may come at the cost of some efficiency.
I address this Chapter 4: https://newsletter.rootsofprogress.org/p/the-life-well-lived-part-2
> … if you personally feel that your soul would be nourished by a job that takes you out into nature—you can still do those jobs! They have not gone away; indeed they have proliferated: you can be a park ranger, or a ski instructor, or even a farm worker, as over 1% of the workforce still chooses to be. And you can enjoy the outdoors with much less physical burden, such as by riding a tractor instead of hoeing or reaping by hand.
> If your true calling is as a master craftsman, making things with your hands—those jobs still exist as well! Artisans are at work today at Emerson Creek Pottery in Bedford, Virginia; Town Cutler Knives in Reno, Nevada; Odin Leather Goods in Lewisville, Texas; and Copeland Furniture in Bradford, Vermont. Copeland has a job application form on their website, and I won’t blame you if you stop reading now in order to apply. Or if quilting is more your thing, look up Bluebird Gardens Quilts in Roola, Missouri and read their guide to starting your own quilt business.
> And if, after thinking it over, you decide that you would prefer to sit in a cushioned chair in an air-conditioned room behind plate glass windows and earn a living by talking and typing—whether as an insurance actuary or a video game animator—then reflect on what your revealed preferences are telling you, and on the benefits of having choices.
---
Why aren't you working on a farm, if that's what you'd rather do?
Oh because I need thousands of dollars to do it. I need land and equipment and whatnot and I'm collecting money to hopefully be able to break away from a society I see poisoned by this technocratic thinking. I certainly wouldn't do it the industrial way. It used to be common for everyone to have some sort of subsistence farm before the British industrial revolution and the ensuing enclosure movements.
Im not a liberal so I'm not just concerned with myself. I'm concerned with society. If I was only concerned for myself I would likely just go make a lot of money and live in a cabin in the woods. Sounds great. I'm upset that our traditional ways of life has been destroyed and I'm upset that we feel alienated from our work as we do. I see us working towards meaningless ends where we could be working towards something greater.
So, I very well may start a farm and escape from it all, but I'd still feel an obligation to share my perspective and even try to convince the people like you that perhaps the technocratic paradigm isn't very helpful.
I'm trying to understand what your ideal is, and whether it is something real or a kind of romanticized vision. You say you'd rather not be staring at a screen all day, but you won't take an outdoors job, not even on a modern farm. You say you want to live like a subsistence farmer, which means being very poor, but you also say you need a lot of money.
Frankly, it sounds as if what you are envisioning is a kind of fantasy life that doesn't actually exist anywhere in reality, can't exist, and has never existed: one where you enjoy the comforts of a modern standard of living without any of the technology or infrastructure that makes it possible.
I also wouldn't say I want the modern comforts. I don't think I said that. Id happily walk to work in a world without cars and cancel my gym membership. Although cold showers would indeed suck.
Haha! Very good. I think you're making my point for me. The traditional, connected ways of living are expensive now when they used to be normal. Or at least they take initial investment.
For instance I would like to have a job where I can raise my family well and that used to be more easy. People used to have productive households so the husband and wife could be home and take care of their kids while providing for themselves.
These days, it's harder. I need money so I can afford to live in this system so my wife can spend more time at home with our family.
I figured you would bring up the nostalgia thing. People that are critical of technology always get called romantic, but the people calling for more tech to solve problems tech caused don't get called insane.
I'd rather not start a name game, but just because I want a society based on flourishing (and don't define flourishing as just wealth) doesn't make me romantic. There's crosses to bear in a subsistence farm. Weather really gets you. It's not ideal, but there's crosses with the technocratic.
The problem is the techno optimists act like there aren't any tradeoffs. They seem the romantic ones to me.
I'm not the only one that thinks this and I'm certainly.not the smartest. If you really care about where I'm coming from (fine if you don't you're a busy man) I'd recommend reading NewPolity or Wendell Berry, or skim through Against the Machine.
I’ve consistently been concerned about this “more” focus, especially in terms of growth and expansion. Why not more emotional maturity alongside technological/ agricultural growth? Why not more sustainable practices? More land for the wildlife we share this planet with? More recycling ♻️? More minimizing of our human footprint? 👣
Less human sprawl? Less human consumption? Less pollution?
I love solutions; I often ask if we have the right ones.
Wow, what a fascinating historical analysis! I had no idea a whole 1% of the world's energy usage is dedicated to producing fertilizer.
This "pessimism of the intellect" combined with "optimism of the will" is a perspective we desperately need right now. It's clear from your examples that we all owe our lives to a series of innovations without which the human race would have stagnated long ago. In the present time, it feels like pessimists are seen as highly intelligent, whereas optimists are seen as either ignorant or disingenuous. I wonder how historically widespread this general perception is, but it does seem like the solution is to abandon the false dichotomy of optimism vs. pessimism altogether.
Given how endemic that dichotomy has become among internet culture, do you have any potential solutions in mind for instilling "solutionism" into online discourse?
https://youtu.be/5VrbA1zzRSo?si=DqKSXKE3rWWlmUDZ
You might want to check this jason