David Scott Moyerhttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/23/opinion/no-kings-trump-democrats.html
#NoKings #DavidBrooks #EJDionneJr #RobertSiegel #NoamComsky #OccupyWallStreet #NYT
My response:
Freekie@farbel As for vision, my suggestion would be to have a look at what's going on with #solarpunk , however their scope is wider.
As for me, I am interested in our money system and it's impact and also in complementary and alternative money systems and their possibilities, maybe also for housing.
As for housing, I would not be surprised if we would come to live in self-supporting communities, rather then in cities.
Investers will then of course have already sold their empty houses ðŸ¤
DoomsdaysCWYou know, I'm thinking you're right about that, @fdriesenaar . "As for housing, I would not be surprised if we would come to live in self-supporting communities, rather then in cities."
cc: @farbel
@DoomsdaysCW @fdriesenaar If we spread 10 billion people across the planet in small communities, where is the food grown? There is less than half an acre of arable land per person on the planet.
Good point. Obviously, those communities would have to have some population density. But perhaps those *cities* wouldn't be "concrete monstrocities," but places were folks would grow their own food -- balcony gardens, rooftop gardens, indoor greenhouses, food forests, etc. @farbel .
@DoomsdaysCW @fdriesenaar I might posit that cities as they exist now could be self-sustaining, with vertical agriculture and rooftoop gardens.
iwein@farbel
I hope that you don't mind me adding to the thread. I wrote about this recently and I think your .5 acre assumption is more constraining than reality.
There are three reasons to be more optimistic I think:
1. there's more agricultural land than arable land, which we can use much more effciently (Ëœx5),
2. there's a lot of surfaces we can use (>x2)
3. a hectare is two acres (x2)
Please correct me if I'm wrong!
@farbel
that brings us to a sustiainable ~80 billion #solarpunk vegans or so.
Then if we really go sci-fi, we could use the oceans for floating farms and add another 200M km² of useful surface to the mix before we need any investments to go to mars.
over 250 billion people could have a decent meal on this wonderful planet before we need to worry about overpopulation really.
I'm not sure if everyone can/should be vegan -- but anyone who isn't should at least cut down drastically on their meat consumption. Make it a special occasion, not an everyday occurrence. @iwein @farbel @fdriesenaar
@DoomsdaysCW @farbel @fdriesenaar
yeah exactly, I'm not here to argue about the ethics, but it is clear that if we cut animal protein consumption in half, we can almost double the nutrition value of the same area of land.
and luckily farming systems that are nicer to animals are also more productive, so there's plenty of room for more ethical behavior there.
Taran Rampersad@iwein @DoomsdaysCW @farbel @fdriesenaar I think it's fair to say that in the United States protein is over-marketed too.
I'm not vegan (please don't hurt me!) but in the same token, I probably have eaten more animal protein than I have used in my lifetime.
There is a way to strike a balance, I think, and maybe the center needs to be better seen by everyone.
I agree with you, @knowprose . And having known folks who have tried to grown their own soybeans (myself included), I know that it is not easy to grow enough to even make one block of tofu. If we want to be more self-sustaining, I think we need to be less fussy about food sources. Like even consider insects (wichety grubs are tasty and nutritious, for example). I'm not crazy about lab-grown meat though. There's a lot we don't know about how life is defined, and, well, having taken lives for food, I know it is not something that should be taken lightly, and done with as much respect as possible. Not in a factory.
@DoomsdaysCW I think, literally, everything is on the table.
Tracing my own dietary adventures over 54 years is a marvelous study in hardening arteries. I have references!
Growing up in the 70s in Ohio and Wisconsin, a steak dinner was the thing. It is in most of the world (except, notably, India). Now, after a heart attack, my diet has varied because I have, on my own, tried to do better. My doctor didn't tell me to.
My experience is anecdotal, but I'm certain I am not alone.
Oh yeah. Steak dinner, fast-food hamburgers. And daily even! The 70s was all about meat and potatoes, that's for sure, @knowprose ! I remember I tried to live on just fruit and nuts, and my grandmother looked at me like I was crazy. I've tried to eat a varied diet, though cheese is my weakness. And I'm sorry you had a heart attack, but glad that you are eating a more varied diet on your own! Hopefully, you will be on the mend. 🙂
@DoomsdaysCW Meh. the only people excited by my condition are the doctors. I take joy in breathing free and spending my time doing things I love.
My diet didn't change because of diet or screaming of outraged people. It changed because I decided to change.
Telling people what to do makes them defensive. Cooking a tasty meal without browbeating is completely different. :)