permaculture

[Ben Martin Horst <ben.martinhorst@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Oct 10, 2012 at 7:42 AM, Toby Hemenway 
<toby@patternliteracy.com>wrote:

> There is little that is "natural" about agriculture, either--we've just
> gotten used to it over 10,000 years. I can imagine the first response:
> "Wheat that doesn't lodge or shatter? Using a plow? That's not natural!"
> (we could segue here to the whole argument about domestic species having
> lower nutrition, but that's a condemnation of agriculture, not aquaponics).
>

And in fact that is precisely the sort of response that many
non-agricultural peoples have had to agricultural societies. Take, for
example, the Dreamer religion among indigenous peoples of the Pacific
Northwest in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Or the Paiute prophet
Wovoka, who inspired the Ghost Dance religious movement, who said, "You ask
me to plow the ground. Shall I take a knife and tear my mother's bosom?"

Anyway, it seems likely to me that few diets can be nutritionally ideal if
they come exclusively from agriculture, whether organic, biodynamic,
aquaponic, or otherwise. There are simply too many variables for humans to
understand and take into account in any agricultural system. Many
permaculture patterns, such as a focus on perennials and dynamic
accumulators, go a long way toward correcting the nutrient deficits of
agriculture, but in any truly healthy permacultural system, I think wild
food must be given a prominent place. One may get the bulk of their
calories and nutrients from an agricultural system, but I would advocate
foraging as an important element of balanced, complete nutrition. This is
not an argument against aquaponics or any other agricultural system, per
se, but a recognition that such systems are necessarily incomplete, and
must be supplemented with active engagement with more "wild" ecosystems.
Zone 5 should be included in our diets as well.

-Ben