Capitalism: the cause of and solution to all life's problems

[Nachtswalbe]

The capital costs of vegan meat and discrimination against pastoralist peoples who live in arid environments (Köppen B)
https://newsocialist.org.uk/red-vegans- ... ljFFx4acFU

[Nachtswalbe]

Unfotrunately, using land more efficiently and concentrating production locally are opposites. If you want to grow rice in France instead of shipping it in from Thailand, you have to use more resources, not less. And industry that repeats itself across the landscape will never compete with industry that concentrates in one area while letting the others decay.

Or just eat more barley in France and more rice in Thailand etc?

The above option reminds me of wartime rationing of tropical fruits, rubber etc. due to blockades, a sort of eco-austerity conbined with “Eat Local”.

An alternative is to transfer crops from different countries in the same climatic zone, e.g North Indian and Indochinese crops to the American South, or camels and goats to the Southwest for pastoralism

Especially as the South becomes tropical and your south semidesert

I ask if this applies to resources besides food - petroleum is often shipped from thousands of miles away, and solar is not as relatively useful in all climates even with overnight heattrapping through molten salts. Fully transitioning to local renewables and nuclear is difficult even discounting anti-nuclear opposition

[Nachtswalbe]

Really has any community tried to sort of “rationing” described?

[MacAnDàil]

To clarify, I did not intend rationing, 'just' a shift in the model to focus more, not necessarily entirely, on local food.

Nuclear has millenial waste, and Chernobyl could have been a lot more dangerous had the firefighters got in there and courageously risked their lives.

Indeed, waste is a major problem as far as I'm concerned, as I've mentioned earlier in the thread: if we reduce waste significantly, net gain is not lost, but net negative consequences can be drastically reduced. If we take into account all the lights on when noone's around, the packaging noone wants, the bullshit jobs noone wants to do etc, we could actually be happier, produce less and destroy the planet less.

[Travis B.]

Nuclear has millenial waste, but only very small quantities of it in the bigger scheme of things, while the full lifecycle of solar power generates far more waste all things considered, solar uses massive quantities of land, solar is only feasible in some kinds of environments, and solar does not generate power at night, wind uses massive amounts of space too, wind likewise is only feasible in some environments, and wind kills birds, and hydro destroys massive amounts of habitat. All in all, I find Greens' opposition to nuclear highly misguided, and does nothing to help climate change since it necessarily lends itself to the use of coal and natural gas in practice.

[Ares Land]

The problem with nuclear in my view is that while the risk of accident is low, the potential damage is gigantic.

As a result, security costs are horribly high. Ditto with waste -- there may not be that much in terms of mass, but handling it is complex and expensive.

[Travis B.]

The problem with nuclear in my view is that while the risk of accident is low, the potential damage is gigantic.

As a result, security costs are horribly high. Ditto with waste -- there may not be that much in terms of mass, but handling it is complex and expensive.

To me at least, the risks of nuclear can be mitigated with more modern reactor designs, but (ironically) due to the overwhelming conservatism of the nuclear industry combined with misplaced nuclear proliferation concerns, such more modern reactor designs get nowhere in practice.

[MacAnDàil]

Staircase time!

Also, assuming you’re the government and you try to use eminent domain to seize a quarter of the country’s private land to build farms and small towns to redistribute urbanites to, what steps can you do to 1) prevent the formation of an aggrieved landowner class 2) convince most urbanites that life in the New Towns and farms is … worth it.

Also where does the heavy industry go?

Finally, how do you divide land? Is it owned communally by the local town or individually?

I think this was in response to me mentioning redistribution of land, but I may be wrong.
Some of those questions I do not yet have answers to, but
0° I envisage the possibility that it could be a form of tax, not necessarily eminent domain.
1° It's OK for 1% elites to be aggrieved if it improves the lot of the rest of the rest of the population and their losses are only relative anyway.
2° redistribution of land does not necessarily need to be rural.
3° There is too much heavy industry.
4° Both are possibilities. It could be for public services, or for unhoused people for example.

To me the best approach would be to focus not on degrowth but rather on more intensive urbanization, (re)industrialization (in a more local fashion), and agriculture (also in a more local fashion) to use less land more efficiently and to concentrate production locally, as opposed to the current suburbanization (which is very wasteful of land, and requires heavy use of personal transportation in practice), exporting industry (which results in goods having to be transported long distances in practice), and growing crops far away (which results in food having to be transported long distances to market). Cities are better for the environment than sprawl or rural development, whatever land is used for growing food is land not available to the natural environment (and if it is used less efficiently more of it will necessarily be used), and transporting goods wastes energy and contributes to their carbon footprint.

Things should be more local, yes. But, on (re-) industrialisation helping to solve the ecological crises: It was industrialisation that was a major factor in getting us into the current mess. It’s unlikely to get us out of it. It’s perhaps comparable to the ‘hair of the dog’: people claiming they need to drink more alcohol to get over the hangover. Maybe humanity needs to cut the addiction to industrialisation.

And from a cultural perspective, people who are usually on the left but dislike cities look pretty contradictory to me. I mean, I strongly disagree with right-wingers who dislike cities, but at least they have a certain internal consistency on that matter. People who are usually on the left but dislike cities, on the other hand, are basically saying that everyone should live in small, tight-knit communities, but somehow, in some way that they never bother to explain, people should not have the culturally very conservative mindsets that people in small, tight-knit communities have usually had in most places throughout most of known history.

This appears to have been alluding to urban–rural political divide and I get the divide’s existence. However, Edinburgh’s as if not more left/liberal than London. The same goes for Grenoble and Paris for example. Same goes for several other small cities which are to the left of larger cities. What if a greater correlation was with education level, especially higher education? Or that the correlation with urbanity just reaches a limit or a peak at some point? In any case, it remains a correlation.

Also, the open-mindedness divide in politics seems to be a relatively new one, having long focussed on social class.

[Nachtswalbe]

Baron PA is a firm which specializes in helping corporations battle anti-trust legislation.
Here is an article calling the anti-trust legislation emotional and irrational
Another condemning soda-tax advocates

[Travis B.]

To me the best approach would be to focus not on degrowth but rather on more intensive urbanization, (re)industrialization (in a more local fashion), and agriculture (also in a more local fashion) to use less land more efficiently and to concentrate production locally, as opposed to the current suburbanization (which is very wasteful of land, and requires heavy use of personal transportation in practice), exporting industry (which results in goods having to be transported long distances in practice), and growing crops far away (which results in food having to be transported long distances to market). Cities are better for the environment than sprawl or rural development, whatever land is used for growing food is land not available to the natural environment (and if it is used less efficiently more of it will necessarily be used), and transporting goods wastes energy and contributes to their carbon footprint.

Things should be more local, yes. But, on (re-) industrialisation helping to solve the ecological crises: It was industrialisation that was a major factor in getting us into the current mess. It’s unlikely to get us out of it. It’s perhaps comparable to the ‘hair of the dog’: people claiming they need to drink more alcohol to get over the hangover. Maybe humanity needs to cut the addiction to industrialisation.

To me the key thing is using as many natural resources as efficiently as possible. Part of the reason why the Earth supports so many people today is specifically because of industrialization and intensive agriculture. Actual generalized deindustrialization and elimination of intensive agriculture would result in using more natural resources, not less, to support the same number of people and thus would result in more ecological harm. On the other hand, though, exporting production results in often-unnecessary waste because products have to be transported long distances, and thus, when possible, localizing production has net benefits (unless a given product can be made more efficiently elsewhere to the point that making it elsewhere is more efficient than making it locally even when one takes into account the impact of its transportation). Of course, this is not to say that there are not areas where improvements can be made, e.g. cutting carbon emissions drastically through the replacing of fossil fuels with nuclear, solar, and wind energy production (I exclude hydro here because it is very destructive to natural habitats), banning the expansion of palm oil plantations, and cracking down hard on illegal logging.

[MacAnDàil]

To me the key thing is using as many natural resources as efficiently as possible.

Yes, and that is far from what is currently being done, with massive amounts of waste and overproduction.

Of course, this is not to say that there are not areas where improvements can be made, e.g. cutting carbon emissions drastically through the replacing of fossil fuels with nuclear, solar, and wind energy production (I exclude hydro here because it is very destructive to natural habitats), banning the expansion of palm oil plantations, and cracking down hard on illegal logging.

I agree, except that I find hydro just often badly put into place, whereas nuclear has inherent defects. Hydroelectric should, it seems, be on a smaller scale to avoid its potential defects.

Part of the reason why the Earth supports so many people today is specifically because of industrialization and intensive agriculture. Actual generalized deindustrialization and elimination of intensive agriculture would result in using more natural resources, not less, to support the same number of people and thus would result in more ecological harm.

While there certainly never was so many people before industrialisation, there is a difference between reduction and elimination and I do not see any proof that less industrialisation would use more resources.

Although it is possible that definitions may clarify the situation: what do we actually mean by industrialisation and intensive agriculture?

[rotting bones]

Although it is possible that definitions may clarify the situation: what do we actually mean by industrialisation and intensive agriculture?

My understanding is that industralization refers to mass production as opposed to artisanal production. Unless you're talking about something else, your metaphors don't apply to the subject being discussed. Societies aren't organisms, and can't be "addicted" to anything. The relevant point is that artisanal products are expensive. If you don't have mass production, then people won't be able to afford the products they need to survive. Your plan will precipitate a genocide. Mentally associating deindustrialization with virtue doesn't change anything.

[Travis B.]

Although it is possible that definitions may clarify the situation: what do we actually mean by industrialisation and intensive agriculture?

My understanding is that industralization refers to mass production as opposed to artisanal production. Unless you're talking about something else, your metaphors don't apply to the subject being discussed. Societies aren't organisms, and can't be "addicted" to anything. The relevant point is that artisanal products are expensive. If you don't have mass production, then people won't be able to afford the products they need to survive. Your plan will precipitate a genocide. Mentally associating deindustrialization with virtue doesn't change anything.

The relevant point is that artisanal products require more resources to support the same number of people - there is no way we can practically reduce the population to preindustrial levels without the likes of nuclear war or Black Death-esque contagion, and these would in themselves drastically harm the environment - and more resources needed means more harm to the environment. One can mentally associate "industrialization" with negative connotations, but the matter is that deindustrialization will harm the environment more without a genocidal reduction in the human population like none we have seen in history at the same time.

[Ares Land]

This seems awfully black and white!

There's a whole spectrum of options between subsistence agriculture and factory farms!
Different options will be suitable in different ecosystems. Not everything has to be produced artisanally; industrial products can be mass produced and more durable; production processes can be less wasteful.

Some issues right now are waste, quick obsolescence of consumer products, farming destroying the ecosystem. Solving these problems does not mean going back to the Dark Ages.

[rotting bones]

This seems awfully black and white!

There's a whole spectrum of options between subsistence agriculture and factory farms!
Different options will be suitable in different ecosystems. Not everything has to be produced artisanally; industrial products can be mass produced and more durable; production processes can be less wasteful.

Some issues right now are waste, quick obsolescence of consumer products, farming destroying the ecosystem. Solving these problems does not mean going back to the Dark Ages.

In the context of this discussion, the black and white question is not whether to have only mass production or only artisanal production. The black and white question is whether to allow any mass production at all, or whether to wean society off it.

[Travis B.]

This seems awfully black and white!

There's a whole spectrum of options between subsistence agriculture and factory farms!
Different options will be suitable in different ecosystems. Not everything has to be produced artisanally; industrial products can be mass produced and more durable; production processes can be less wasteful.

Some issues right now are waste, quick obsolescence of consumer products, farming destroying the ecosystem. Solving these problems does not mean going back to the Dark Ages.

Oh I agree there are things that can be done to improve things - e.g., as you mention, eliminating planned obsolescence, restricting the expansion of farmland/palm oil plantations/slash-and-burn agriculture, etc. About factory farms, though, the issue I have is that we should favor what will produce the most food for the most people with the least land usage with the least transportation from farm to table. "Factory farm" has a negative ring to it, but unless more artisanal food production than produce food more efficiently, I must support factory farms.

[MacAnDàil]

This seems awfully black and white!

There's a whole spectrum of options between subsistence agriculture and factory farms!
Different options will be suitable in different ecosystems. Not everything has to be produced artisanally; industrial products can be mass produced and more durable; production processes can be less wasteful.

Some issues right now are waste, quick obsolescence of consumer products, farming destroying the ecosystem. Solving these problems does not mean going back to the Dark Ages.

Yes, you are right about bringing in nuance and the specific issues.

[MacAnDàil]

This seems awfully black and white!

There's a whole spectrum of options between subsistence agriculture and factory farms!
Different options will be suitable in different ecosystems. Not everything has to be produced artisanally; industrial products can be mass produced and more durable; production processes can be less wasteful.

Some issues right now are waste, quick obsolescence of consumer products, farming destroying the ecosystem. Solving these problems does not mean going back to the Dark Ages.

In the context of this discussion, the black and white question is not whether to have only mass production or only artisanal production. The black and white question is whether to allow any mass production at all, or whether to wean society off it.

I disagree. I got that the discussion was about whether to increase industrialisation, to leave the same or to reduce it.

[Torco]

Historically, communists have always been strongly pro-industrialization: it means the same things can be produced with less work, which means we all get to sleep in more, or do better things with our time. In another thread I said that we could make a healthy cheeto, and we should! cheetos are excellent! so are condoms (inadvisable to produce artisanally), medicines (please let's not go back to scraping penicilin off bread, I like this new lab stuff, it's cleaner), computers (no CPU made by hand is going to run Crysis), and cars (the horror).

Anticapitalists tend to rightly adore artisinal production under capitalism, cause it's more independent of capital and thus gives people many of the freedoms and comforts capitalism denies other workers: they get to set their hours and keep their profits and work in the manner they choose, which often means more safely and better, where otherwise they'd be exploited by a capitalist and made to work in the manner that they choose, no matter if it makes them less happy. But if we abolished the capitalist class and we could just make the economy what we wanted it to be, democratically, enterprises would be run a lot more ethically for sure. coops already are.

That being said, we could have no factory farms: that'd be a political issue. maybe we all want to be small farmers, enough of us want to -I know I'd enjoy it, at least part-time- that we could all just get a nice plot of land, have a lot of forest and virgin wetlands and whatever inbetween each of them, cover, I don't know, 50% of the earth in this nice and cool, chill plantation, we could each get a modest harvest, keep what we need and put the rest into trucks which take it to the rest of you! figuring out who gets what would not be a hard thing to code, I bet you can run such an app on a smartphone for a pretty big town. small scale, low capital farming technology is pretty advanced, and with not that much fertilizers and pesticides, a tractor, a drone, modest water rights and a computer single man or woman can make something like 30 hectares produce, being extremely conservative, 200 TONS OF ONIONS every season or so. That's as many onions as A LOT of people need in one season, I'm quite happy with like... 16 of those? you get similar productivities with corn or eggs or chicken, we certainly don't *need* to have factory farms if we don't want to, and I think if it was up to people, many would choose such a life. And small, highly diversified artisanal-style farms are amazing for the environment: they conserve a lot of biodiversity, they pollute very little, they regulate the climate, are great for soil conservation, make better quality product, they're great for innovation, since everyone is trying new things and probably posting about them on insta... the only limiting factor would be how many people actually want to engage in that kind of labour. but that's what robots are for, for the least pleasant tasks. And the rest of society have an incentive for voting in more humanoid androids for the farmers, so that they can be growing delicious delicious mangos instead of having to grow all that rice we need. Anyway, yeah, the problem with factories is the profit thing.

[Ares Land]

This is a local issue if there ever was one -- factory farming or organic farming are matters that can only be decided at the national level, ideally even more locally.

France is mostly prime agricultural land and can most certainly produce more than enough food to feed its population without recourse to more intensive methods. Perhaps more importantly, this is likely to remain true even taking global warming into question. The situation may well be different elsewhere; I know nothing about agriculture in, say, China, and wouldn't presume to comment on what they should do.

One problem with intensive agriculture is the huge cost to the local biosphere and very high fossil fuel use; another is damage to soil and the water table, yet another is quality. What's the point of mass-producing tomatoes when the end result is tasteless balls of water? Again, I'm talking about a rich farming country when producing enough food is a non-issue.