Hey, great job 👍. If you want to protect again insect damage and prevent bolting, use row covers. Makes a huge difference for me.

Tech needs a union. Yes, tech workers get paid pretty well. But we really need more say in how the products of our labour are being used. I don't know how to work in this industry and be an ethical person anymore, and "change from within" doesn't work when you don't have a seat at the big boys' table.

When I started my career, I thought the internet would bring knowledge and enlightenment. It was a just cause. I guess I was just another brainwashed tech utopian. Now it's getting hard to find a job building something that isn't an obvious scam or a way to fuck over the working class.

Yes, very. It'll take over and shade out trees if you let it.

"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function" -Albert Barlett

So until ~2030 then? 😅

So full economic collapse then...

Can I just say... It is a joy to argue with you. I mean that sincerely.

Okay, I read up on what sentience actually is and a few studies on insect sentience, social lives and capacity for pain. Having spent a lot of time with the little critters, I can see their point. Like they're obviously social for one. Sometimes they really seem like they're thinking. I don't know.

Let's say in principle I agree with you. How am I supposed to not die of anemia from lack of vitamin B12? I didn't want to do laying hens for obvious reasons. Mushrooms have some B12 and I do grow them, but it's not gonna be enough to keep you healthy long term. And don't say supplements or fortified foods... I need something I can grow or forage locally.

What am I missing here?

PS. I dunno know about the taste buds thing, they're okay but not delicious 😅

I'm nice to my crickets though. You don't have to hurt them, you just place them into the freezer and they fall asleep like it's winter time. And then you roast them and mill them into flour. Okay that part does hurt them, but they're asleep. Seems kinda peaceful.

I get that hurting a mammal with complex emotions is very unethical, but where's the limit?

What about fermented food? Tiny bacteria are alive when you eat them. They probably don't feel pain but I can't imagine they're thrilled to meet their doom.

How about mushrooms? They aren't plants, and they apparently communicate with the trees. How do you know they don't possess some kind of sentience?

What about harvesting plants? Everytime you run a combine through a field it's like an insect genocide. Even if you're only eating plants you're still eating insects because they get caught by the harvester and milled into the final product. The FDA allows up to 50 insect parts per 1/4 cup cornmeal.

What about hurting a tree? They're not sentient and cannot feel pain but I still believe it is unethical to harm a tree. Do they not deserve our empathy because they lack our human conception of sentience?

Being a good human is hard. I feel like in principle you're right but I don't know how to exist and not hurt anything ever. You're right, I don't know you. Maybe you're just a better person than I am.

I raise my own crickets on the farm and grow my own vegetables. It's basically a closed system, I compost everything. I add additional nutrients using seaweed.

How far do your plants have to travel to get to your plate? Last time I checked so-called modern farming uses a lot of petrochemicals. Organic farming isn't any better--they use so much plastic to block weeds and pests.

Also, most plant material I grow is not edible by humans. I cannot eat corn stalks. Maybe you can. It seems wasteful to compost all this biomass as there is still so much nutrition left over.

Sounds to me like your carbon footprint is higher than mine. Maybe you should try to create a farming system yourself. One that yields 100% of the daily nutrition humans require. It is not so easy.

I am glad you are vegan. Much better than eating cows. They drink too much water.

$250,000 a seat tourist submarine... The ocean can have them.

I get your point, but I think the image you have in your head of rustic countryside life, hard work and an honest living isn't the reality these child slaves are part of.

Seems a bit less terrible when you inherit the farm at some point, for one. Second, one would assume that parents would take steps to prioritize their child's health and safety and wow do they not do that on industrial farms. And third, can't be an honest living if you're not actually being paid, you know, a living.

I don't think both sides are experiencing cognitive dissonance. In practice, they both appear to be working against the interests of the working class.

The importance of mulch. The general utility of neem oil. That fish fertilizer works great and is very forgiving for the novice. How much difference picking the right cultivar for your bio-region can make.

I've only been gardening for 4 years and it feels like I've learned a lot, but that the plants have so much more to teach me.