Science is trying to develop new ways to industrialize farming because otherwise it's doubtful that we will be able to feed the world population in the future.
Not because current techniques don't work, but because at the current rates new people are going into agriculture, there won't be enough farmers.
And the smartest, most knowledgeable guy i know is a farmer. All of the new research that scientists are desperately trying to get policymakers to acknowledge? This guy has known about that stuff for ages and is incorporating it into his practices. Promoting mycorrhizal networks, encouraging beneficial insects, no-till farming methods, using plants toxic to pathogens to eliminate them. He basically planted his own little forest and has collected most of our native tree species, and has the most foolproof tree-transplanting methods. Sure, he's exhausted and broke, but who isn't
Living in close relationship with the earth and its plants and creatures can develop a human into a gold mine of ecological wisdom and technological innovation. There's a reason it's traditional, locally practiced farming techniques that are at the cutting edge of agricultural science—they came from people spending their whole lives in a ceaseless cycle of experimentation and observation.
And meanwhile I'm still struggling to even process how dramatically I expanded as a person over a single year of...devoting my brain to plants.
What I wish to put in words is how ridiculously within reach the power to transform the world for the better is. Because the world doesn't need more sophisticated expertise or more money as much as it needs more love.
I keep trying to imagine going back in time and telling myself, two years ago, "Yeah in 2 years you'll be leading a native plant gardening/no-lawns organization, spearheading a restoration project for a keystone species that has almost no existing conservation projects for it, and growing and handing out hundreds of trees like some kind of 21st century Johnny Appleseed."
And past!Spacey is like "Um??? What the fuck happened to?? getting my masters' and becoming a historian??? I can't even take care of a houseplant??? Do I still live in Kentucky? Am I in a STEM field??? WHY DO I HAVE HUNDREDS OF TREES??" And I'm just like "Well, you had a mental breakdown and lowkey experienced ego death, and then there were these bryozoans..."
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