Reply To: The recent "discovery" of Dark Matter

[Rezwan]

Warwick wrote: …but it’s never going to replace what we basically need – soil-grown crops, grown organically and sustainably.

I’d love to see more acreage given over to organic farming, and also to gratuitous growing of heirloom plants with no consumption value. Pure biodiversity exercises.

However, I don’t know that I equate “organically grown” with basic human food needs or even sustainability. “Sustainable” being defined as something you can keep doing in perpetuity. I think with the numbers of people involved, and nitrogen fixing limitations or un-fertilized soil, you’d get more bang for your buck with food sky scrapers replacing soil farms. Artificial, sure, but productive and meeting most basic food requirements rather cheaply. The bulk of soil farming today is mono-cropping that destroys soil, so you may as well figure out the issues of the hydroponic farms and do the same thing with less land.

So you’d have a mixed portfolio of the cheap, mass produced stuff, and more land being diverted to higher end organic stuff.

Have you read “Omnivore’s Dilemma?”

Have you driven by Harris ranch on the 5 freeway?