From: beast@netcom.com (J. Kintscher)
Subject: Re: Sustainable lifestyles
Organization: Belle & Philippe, Pty. Ltd.
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 22:51:19 GMT

In article <1992Oct12.194732.25893@beaver.cs.washington.edu> pauld@cs.washington.edu (Paul Barton-Davis) writes:
>In article <1992Oct10.075735.8668@netcom.com> beast@netcom.com (Master) writes:
>>I agree.  The thing that really gets me about these people who want us to
>>make as many of the things we use as possible (including growing our own
>>food) is that they don't seem to realize just how much time we would actually
>>spend doing these things.  
>
>Do you ? Do you know that I can grow 80% of my summer diet and about
>30% of a winter one on 300 square feet with less than 10 hours of work
>a week ? 

More power to you.  Personally, I'd rather spend those ten hours doing
other things (eg intellectual pursuits and entertainment, which are not
mutually exclusive).  Also, you presuppose that everyone has 300 sq. ft. to
use for gardening.

>Proponents, such as myself, of a more agrarian society, are not
>advocating a general return to the conditions endured by farm laborers
>before the industrial revolution hit US farms. Instead, we observe
>that the knowledge that we (and other countries & cultures) have
>acquired about farming and nutrition can be put to much better use
>than it is by current typical US farm and eating habits. 

I'll agree with you here.  Most US farmers are rooted in old farming
practices that should be modernized.  One of my pet peeves with farmers is
their dispicably wasteful irrigation methods.  There's a local farmer here
who's land has been completely surrounded by the city (he's rumored to say
no before developer's even open their mouths).During the height of the
drought (1987-92) you could see his sprinklers watering the crops in the
middle of the day while we cityfolk are told to water our lawns at night
and can get fined for getting the sidewalk too wet.  (I'd better stop
before I start raving about rice patties in arid areas and the lack of use
of drip irrigation and root feed systems).

>  However, I think that I can make a productive contribution to
>my own sustenance by spending a mere fraction of my time doing such
>things in the much more efficient ways that we are now aware of.


Yes, but why should I spend the time when I can use a fraction of my income
to pay someone else to do it for me?  (I'm referring to staples, not all of
the preprocessed junk sold in stores).

>			    I have better things to do than spend time
>>sewing clothes, growing food, etc., when there are other people willing to
>>do it for me (for a price, of course).  
>
>Why are they so willing ? There is a history to how the US moved away
>from Jefferson's ideal of an agrarian society and became the
>industrial system it is today. Some parts of that history are
>admirable, creative, ingenious, brilliant. Others are deceptive, short
>sighted and ultimately foolish. Ignoring the history, ignoring the
>question of why so many people believe that life should be spent doing
>one thing for 8 hours a day in order earn the currency needed to
>enable them to stay alive is self-deception, IMHO.

Ahh, you miss my point (which may be my fault). I agree with your
statement.  The people I was referring to are entrepeneurs.  They start
businesses because they see a service or product they can provide.  Profit
is their motive for providing these things.  I'm not in any way claiming
the grunts who work for them are doing it because they want to.

>					 The more labor intensive day-to-day
>>survival is, the lower the standard of living is.
>
>Ridiculous, unless your only measure of standard-of-living is based
>around material goods. 
 
My measure of standard of living is how much leisure time one has when
compared to how much time is spent on day-to-day survival.
 
>			Machinery has made our lives immeasurably more
>comfortable, and we would be fools to do without it completely. But it
>has also made many of our lives suffer the absence of satisfaction for
>a good part of each day.

What "satisfaction" is that?

>However, I believe that the knowledge we find around us today can be
>used, not to go backwards, but to combine elements of less machinized
>societies with the relative comfort we enjoy. Such a life might not be
>rich in electronic widgets, but I suspect that it would be healthier,
>more full of laughter, wine, food, friendships, travels, reading,
>writing, art, and perhaps even speculative engineering. In short, it
>would be focus on more of things most human beings want in their lives
>without disconnecting them from the things they can never escape.

How is this mutually exclusive with "electronic widgets"?  We are
performing intellectual discourse using some fairly complex "electronic
widgets".  These "electronic widgets" give me acess to a whole world of
people to discuss ideas with I wouldn't otherwise have acess to.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey A. Kintscher	 | "Now, my suspicion is that the universe is not only
beast@netcom.com     	 |  queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can
			 |  suppose. . . . I suspect that there are more things
"No matter where you go, |  in heaven and earth than are dreamed of,  in any
 there you are."	 |  philosophy."
			 |				J. B. S.  Haldane
	Buckaroo Bonzai	 |				Possible Worlds
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