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Re:What Is Permaculture? by saalweachter on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @04:19PM (#35879856)
I mean, resiliency, yes, I am all for resiliency, besides "produce enough food for everyone", "be able to continue producing enough food for everyone despite 5- or 6-sigma disasters" is the most important thing for an agricultural system to do.

But, like, why would the agricultural system break down? If that's a possibility in your society, maybe ask why that is and try to fix it, rather than trying to have everyone go back to subsistence farming.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by CapstanRoller on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @04:34PM (#35880035)
The agricultural system doesn't need to break down in order for us to realize it's deeply damaging and unsustainable. Ideally we'd realize this and change our ways before breaks down — that's why permaculture exists.

You're confusing permaculture with prepping.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by lmm on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @06:17PM (#35881086)
> The agricultural system doesn't need to break down in order for us to realize it's deeply damaging and unsustainable. Ideally we'd realize this and change our ways before breaks down — that's why permaculture exists.

I'm pretty sure the systemic fix isn't going to be everyone having their own backyard plot.

> You're confusing permaculture with prepping.

Well, if you're talking about "98% of the US population would starve" that's absolutely prepper talk.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by dogcomplex on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @07:23PM (#35881651)
Yeah, and even if you're that worried about societal agricultural instability, you're better off spending hobby time to make something like a dead-simple replicatable potato growing kit and distributing it out at a loss. Barring something truly irreversibly apocalyptic, that'd provide most of what's needed until things rebound.
Re:What Is Permaculture? by saalweachter on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @10:29PM (#35882940)
Or you could get involved in public policy.

I assume there are some boffins somewhere in the US's $4 trillion dollar budget -- USDA, probably -- who are coming up with plans for things like "what if wheat is decimated by a blight?" or "what if Missouri is just, all flooded?". Probably a bunch of academics at various Midwest universities, too.

There are already grants and other public programs to support community gardens and local agriculture; a community garden should be the perfect place to apply permaculture.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by CapstanRoller on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @11:38PM (#35883354)
The goal isn't for everyone to have a backyard plot. You're still seeing this from a very individualist American viewpoint. In fact, no one should have yards at all (at least not as we understand them now).

The goal is to integrate food production into society in a more seamless and holistic way.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by lmm on Tuesday May 09, 2023 @11:49PM (#35883444)
> The goal isn't for everyone to have a backyard plot.

That seems to be what it amounts to in practice though. Noble goals are a fine thing, but your steps towards the goal need to actually constitute progress towards the goal.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by CapstanRoller on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @12:06AM (#35883537)
>That seems to be what it amounts to in practice though.

In some cases it is. So what? Even that form of practice is valuable.

One can't expect the permaculture people to also stage an overnight revolution and reform society. The social changes I describe are needed badly, but they are outside the scope of permaculture itself.

Permaculture is is an important aspect of a much larger goal around sustainability.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by lmm on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @11:33PM (#35897042)
> Even that form of practice is valuable

How?

> One can't expect the permaculture people to also stage an overnight revolution and reform society. The social changes I describe are needed badly, but they are outside the scope of permaculture itself

How can you claim permaculture is about the goals you described if it's not contributing to them?

Re:What Is Permaculture? by CapstanRoller on Thursday May 11, 2023 @11:56AM (#35904038)
The practice is valuable because it increases knowledge. You don't build large-scale projects first, you build prototypes first (and many of them) then iterate.

>How can you claim permaculture is about the goals you described if it's not contributing to them?

Permaculture is not about those goals specifically. It can contribute to those goals, aligns with them nicely, and many people who are into permaculture are also into those other goals, but it is not the goal.

The engine is not the entire car.

Re:What Is Permaculture? by _heimdall on Wednesday May 10, 2023 @07:10AM (#35885851)
There's a huge range of solutions between fixing the fragility of modern industrial ag (I can only speak to the US system) and everyone having a plot and attempting to be completely self sufficient.

It isn't realistic or healthy to expect everyone to be self sufficient, there are plenty of food reasons we developed societies. It also isn't healthy or realistic for a country as large as the US to depend on a system that makes all of our food in a handful of industrial farms and feed plots so it can be distributed nationally by truck. It also isn't healthy to motivate said industries to measure output by pound regardless of nutritional value, sustainable practices, or animal welfare.

Permaculture often amounts to individuals growing food on their own land today because the system is so far removed from anything resembling permaculture that there aren't other options. Ideally permaculture concepts would be practiced by local farms and we would all be eating healthier food, grown in a more sustainable way closer to where we live.