Conversation
Notices
-
It's interesting to think that we think of farming as more of a masculine job, but that was mostly because of the technology advances during the industrial revolution during the Victorian times. Before then, there were more hands involved and both men and women got involved. It wouldn't surprise me if children were involved too.
During the harvest time, men would cut the crops in the fields and the women would gather the crops together and tie it together. I'm not using the actual technical terms here but that is basically it. It provided work for them.
It's sad to think that so many people starved when the threshing machines came into use, because they couldn't work to afford to eat in the winter. All so that there was more production... the countryside people suffered so the people of the cities and towns were fed. We don't think of this very often. I think this drove more people to the towns/cities too.
- Disinformation Purveyor :verified_think: likes this.
-
Makes me wonder what we do now. Who suffers so that we can live the lifestyle that we live now? Perhaps we suffer ourselves for it too, especially with certain advances in technology. Not all progress is good for us.
-
@sim mechanized farming has done so much damage to the farmland too. I think having an animal pull a plow you probably dont end up with nearly as much organic material lost as you do with giant machines. IG also encouraged large monocultures that deplete resources in the soil.
-
@thatguyoverthere I think you would be right there about animal plowing vs machines. I think soil depletion really has been a problem, especially with bad farming practices. Just growing the one thing doesn't help. I imagine that a farm trying to feed a small village would have more diversity within it. Rather than what we have now where it's like they are trying to feed the world or meet some quota.
-
@sim yeah I for one question the concept of "economies of scale". This idea that bigger is always better and there is no tradeoff is bogus IMO. For one thing it's essentially unfalsifiable. You can't compare them because one is more of a closed system with far less external inputs, and the other isn't even possible without going into debt.
Waste is a write off in this model and subsidized farmers have even been paid to let their food rot. It's likely the total volume of food grown exceeds the capacity of smaller less mechanized farms, but I also think a farm that can't rely on free gibs is more likely to do what they can to reduce waste.
-
@sim you might even say our subsidized farming model is a lot like our economy in that we borrow from the future for better production now, but much of what is produced ends up being waste. The farm land will not be able to sustain the current methods, but instead of dialing it back and returning to smarter farm practices, we are pushing for even more insane solutions like lab grown meat.
sim
Disinformation Purveyor :verified_think:
All ０７６萌ＳＮＳ content and data are available under the