Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

permaculture - Re: [permaculture] Maintaining the standards of permaculture - important issues

permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: permaculture

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Nick Ritar <nick@milkwood.net>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Maintaining the standards of permaculture - important issues
  • Date: Fri, 4 May 2012 08:34:00 +1000

:)

Thank you for raising the standard Toby.

I would love you to restate Oystein's arguments in a more robust format
(particularly 3 & 4).

I agree completely with your rebuttals, but I think that the germ (pardon
the pun) behind the rejection of the sterile environment as a pathway to
health has value.

Super bugs, industrial food safety and pharmaceutical overreach have all
undermined peoples faith in germ theory as the dominant paradigm for
providing human health.

To me this argument has a lot of parallels to the weed debate and I would
appreciate your thoughts from the other direction.

Cheers
Nick


--
nick ritar
Milkwood Permaculture
Ph: 02 6373 7763 / 0412 714 884
<http://www.milkwoodpermaculture.com.au/courses>

Blog: http://Milkwood.net <http://milkwood.net/>
Courses:
http://MilkwoodPermaculture.com.au<http://milkwoodpermaculture.com.au/>

Facebook:http://Facebook.com/MilkwoodFarm <http://facebook.com/MilkwoodFarm>




On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 2:37 AM, Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com>wrote:

> On May 3, 2012, at 2:18 AM, Oystein Tandberg wrote:
>
> > I don't want to make this a long e-mail; so I'll just jump to the
> conclusions:
> >
> Sure, I'll fall for it. Anyone who reads my stuff knows I love ideas that
> overturn the conventional wisdom. And I've looked at all the evidence for
> these statements before, in detail, because I am naturally sympathetic to
> revisionism. They are each nonsense.
>
> > 1. Humans are not in charge of the climate (so the permaculture response
>
> While it is literally true that no one is in charge of the climate, those
> words are a soundbite straight from corporate-funded think tanks. Not being
> a climate scientist, I must rely on experts here, and I tend to side with
> 99% of the world's climate scientists rather than a handful of oil-company
> mouthpieces making zombie statements that will not die when disproved.
> Follow the money: the anti-climate-change propagandists work for the carbon
> industry.
>
> > 2. Exponential human growth (overpopulation) is a myth.
>
> The human population is doubling at decreasing intervals. That is, by
> definition, exponential growth, so this statement is mathematically
> ignorant. As for it being a problem, population growth is now being
> sustained by fossil fuel-based food. Maybe we'll find something else as oil
> runs out, but we are already seeing huge declines in food yields from
> overuse of soils (I did population genetics work for a while; I recognize
> the signs of overpopulation.) Maybe having one species use 40% of the
> Earth's annual production is sustainable, but if population doubles again,
> so does that number. Anyone who doesn't think human impact is a problem
> should start drinking from the nearest river, and see how long you live. I
> suggest a great video called "Arithmetic, Population, and Energy" as a good
> look at what population growth means.
>
> http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video1.html
>
> These last two are way off topic, but they are fun for me.
>
> > 3. Viruses, as infectious microorganisms, is a myth.
>
> Now we're in my field. I did immunology and genetics research for 15
> years. I have used viruses to cause infections in otherwise healthy
> organisms. Their entire genetic machinery is designed to infect; their
> genes have been independently used to cause infections, and to do
> everything needed to infect healthy organisms. They are little miracles,
> cleverly designed to cause infection because it they cannot reproduce
> without infecting a host; it's their raison d'etre. Also, it's difficult to
> explain how a killed virus can confer immunity against a live virus, even
> in very unhealthy people, without viruses being a cause of infection.
>
> > 4. Pasteur was wrong - an infection is always a secondary illness;
> infections arise after tissue has been damaged, by malnutrition or
> intoxication. (PR: enrich the blood for good health, like you would enrich
> the soil for good growth)
>
> People who say this have not read Pasteur. He was not "wrong." He knew
> that otherwise healthy organisms throw off infections much faster than sick
> ones. And I'd be careful with statements that include the word "always."
>
> I suggest getting into the best shape possible and then letting an
> Ebola-sick monkey spray blood on you, or stay in a room dusted with with
> hanta-virus mouse turds. It may change your mind about viruses.
>
> These arguments take advantage of the fact that most people have not been
> taught to do critical thought, and get sucked in by fallacious bits of
> sophistry that match their politics and temperament, since they don't have
> the mental tools to properly evaluate them. As Dick Cheney reportedly said,
> "you can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones
> we're looking for." Like I say, I love to upset the conventional wisdom,
> but promoting these dead-wrong, zombie arguments can do real harm to real
> people.
>
> Now back to the important stuff.
>
> Toby
> http://patternliteracy.com
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> permaculture mailing list
> permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
> subscribe/unsubscribe|user config|list info:
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/permaculture
> message archives: https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/permaculture/
> Google message archive search:
> site: lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/permaculture [searchstring]
> Avant Geared http://www.avantgeared.com
>




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page