Re:In Amish Country, the Future Is Calling
by tzs on Friday September 15, 2017 @10:06PM
(#15262395)
> The article mentions the Amish's occasional use of personal solar cells and batteries for household electricity despite a prohibition of connecting public utilities to a house
The Amish are not isolationists. They are fine with trading with non-Amish communities. They just want to preserve their communities and values, and believe that they may have trouble doing so if they become too dependent on non-Amish communities.
From what I've read, the reason most Amish communities do not connect to the public electrical grid is that they believe that would make them too dependent. In most places there is only one grid provider and so you are putting all your eggs in one basket if you become dependent on electricity and you get it from the grid.
If you use electricity but get it from solar cells or batteries or a gas/diesel/LNG/propane generator, you generally have multiple sources. It is still a dependency, but it is just a general trade dependency rather than a dependency on a single source.
> wouldn't it be more kosher to make the solar panels and batteries yourselves?
Amish generally are fine with using things that they did not make themselves. They use metal tools, but generally don't mine the metal themselves. They wear cotton clothes, but generally don't grow the cotton themselves or weave the fabric themselves.
For a good look at the Amish approach to technology, see the article "Amish Hackers" [1].
The Amish are not isolationists. They are fine with trading with non-Amish communities. They just want to preserve their communities and values, and believe that they may have trouble doing so if they become too dependent on non-Amish communities.
From what I've read, the reason most Amish communities do not connect to the public electrical grid is that they believe that would make them too dependent. In most places there is only one grid provider and so you are putting all your eggs in one basket if you become dependent on electricity and you get it from the grid.
If you use electricity but get it from solar cells or batteries or a gas/diesel/LNG/propane generator, you generally have multiple sources. It is still a dependency, but it is just a general trade dependency rather than a dependency on a single source.
> wouldn't it be more kosher to make the solar panels and batteries yourselves?
Amish generally are fine with using things that they did not make themselves. They use metal tools, but generally don't mine the metal themselves. They wear cotton clothes, but generally don't grow the cotton themselves or weave the fabric themselves.
For a good look at the Amish approach to technology, see the article "Amish Hackers" [1].
[1] http://kk.org/thetechnium/amish-hackers-a/