Feasibility of Hydroponics

[Norade]

I had a big long post typed up, but my PC crashed and ate it so here's the short version.

Probably for the best anyway, since if it's like your other posts it's just more of the same technowanking.

This tech is going to be important if we ever manage to move into space. This planet is already groaning under our weight and we're not getting much better so the best bet is to start moving off of this rock and I'd rather sacrifices be made to do so sooner rather than later.

I've never lived there and from the sounds of it the city is just a bunch of poor crooks. I'd love to say I have faith that we can, in a reasonable timescale, educate kids that might otherwise go towards gangs enough that they get jobs instead, but I doubt that's realistic.

Crime rate in Detroit has actually been going down over the past few years. Possibly because the gang bangers were too efficient at killing each other. Possibly because there is little left to steal. Possibly for other reasons that aren't clear.

That's great. Let me know when it actually becomes safe to walk around unarmed at any time of day in any neighborhood.

I'd much rather see Detroit used as a testbed city for future technologies and city planning so that other worthwhile places can benefit. Frankly though I know that others think of the people that are suffering in Detroit and care, I don't.

In other words, you're saying you'd quite happily obliterate everyone currently living in the city to serve your fucked up techno-fantasies and masturbation?

You DO realize you're talking about human beings, yes?

I'd happily do more than just one city. If I had my way we'd be cutting population numbers and aiming to get to say three billion people by 2050 instead of ten billion as projected. I'd also love to see carbon emissions slashed by passing laws that force carpooling and ban driving to anyplace under a mile away.

Instead I see a city where 1/3 are on welfare and many of those have no hope of upwards mobility

No, you ignorant moron - it's 1/3 below the poverty line. You can be below that line and still NOT qualify for welfare. In fact, welfare barely exists anymore in this country. Only people with dependent children can collect welfare, and that for only five years per child. That's IT. That's lifetime limit. After that you're cut off regardless of your situation. Food stamps are the only benefit that you can get outside of that, but it won't pay your rent, won't even buy toilet paper.

So no, 1/3 of the city of Detroit is NOT on welfare. That is not what that statistic means. Educate yourself, asshat.

I'm used to a system that works. In Canada damn near everyone of that third would be on some kind of social assistance dependents or not. It never even occurred to me that the US could have fallen to such lows as to not support those people.

Of course I'd like to see welfare numbers decreased here as well, too many people that aren't even looking for work get it. Of course, in a perfect world, you'd need jobs or someway of getting these people education before you could call them too lazy for welfare.

a city where crime is off the charts,

Based on FBI crime statistics:

St. Louis, Missouri actually has a higher violent crime rate per thousand than Detroit.

St. Louis, Missouri and New Orleans, Louisiana both have higher murder rates per thousand than Detroit.

There are 34 cities with higher rates of rape per thousand than Detroit.

5 cities have higher robbery rates than Detroit (Cleveland, Ohio; St. Louis, Missouri; Oakland, California; Cincinnati, Ohio; and Washington, DC)

I could go on, really, but the point here is that while Detroit sucks as a place to live it is NOT, in fact, the most dangerous city in the nation. Unless you're willing to flush St. Louis down the toilet along with Detroit, and maybe New Orleans, a couple cities in Ohio, and so forth your position is unjustified and based on ignorance of the actual facts.

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

and a city decaying so fast that even the core is likely only marginally worth saving.

Actually, the core is pretty dead, it's the margins and the east side that are still viable. Again, you display your ignorance.

I'm now supposed to care enough to look? The city is a shit hole, most places aren't worth saving. Seems like maybe just razing the entire thing and being able to start from scratch would be even better than shrinking it. That way at least you get a nice easy to expand layout and modern infrastructure.

What are these people doing for the rest of the world, and for the future?

What are you doing, other than costing your parents the money they spend on food and occupying space in mama's basement?

You assume I live at home. I'm actually going to college and living with a roomate right now. My Mom does help me more than I'd like her to have to, but at least I'm working towards helping humanity as a whole. You help a person or two, you're a human interest story, you help the race by allowing machines to do more and more hard jobs and you make front page.

Why shouldn't the city start to slowly switch from coal and oil to nuclear power one small plant at a time until the technology gets cheap?

Because they haven't go the money to do this.

You are also apparently unaware that Detroit (actually, the greater South East Michigan area, also known as "Metro Detroit" encompassing the suburbs) gets 15% of its power from nuclear energy right now, from the Enrico Fermi nuclear power plant located near Monroe, Michigan. In 2008 the facility applied to build a third nuclear generation plant on the site. In other words, they're already doing it, which you'd know if you took ANY trouble to research reality at all.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

Because they'll have to tax the already poor and make their lives less than a dollar a month less rich, I'm sorry I just can't bring myself to care.

I got a better idea. How about we strip you of money and assets. I mean, if it's THAT important to you won't mind throwing all your resources towards it, right? By the way - Detroits's Eastern Market is about the only place to buy actual food in the city, and they do accept foodstamps. This will be important, since all your money will be going to your scheme and thus you will have no means purchase food other than foodstamps.

Paying more taxes =/= to losing everything. Besides, even being penniless, I'll still take my nice city of Kelowna over Detroit.

If Detroit pioneers small reactors and hydroponic farms at least they're giving back to the rest of the state and country and putting out a bit less carbon.

How fucking much carbon do you think they're putting out now?

And no, they are not "giving back to the rest of the state", by depriving them of what little they still have left via taxing them for a non-viable business scheme what you're really proposing is exploiting the poor to benefit your own petty schemes and interests. You're justifying it by regarding them as less than yourself, and therefore not deserving of what little they have. You're advocating robbing the poor to amuse the rich.

I'm advocating fucking the already fucked a little more so the rest of us can eventually get off of this rock. Just because you care about the individual doesn't mean I should. I'm looking big picture and want at least some of us living full time off of this rock and I'd prefer it done yesterday.

If they make a huge mass of farmland for cash crops, or even just for wheat, beef, and corn they add nothing.

On the other hand, if they can feed themselves they also take less. Hell, the might even become self-sufficient. A state you are apparently unacquainted with.

Sorry, but telling me to worry about self sufficiency when my nation is exporting resources and power to the States if a joke right? BC is nearly 100% carbon free power and we're looking to make more so Washington state can stop polluting us and buy our power.

For a start on reading about my Province's power generation.

Sure a few more people have jobs and gang violence lessens, but what does that do for anybody else and how does it begin to pay for the money dumped into the city that went towards just keeping these people alive?

I'm not sure how you translate "jobs" into "gang violence" lessons. Perhaps you're just stupid rather than ignorant.

I'm also sure it escapes your pea brain that if 1/3 of the city is below the poverty line that logically it follows that two thirds of the city is ABOVE the poverty line - in other words, self-sufficient, employed people who are NOT sucking money from anyone else. But, apparently, you are willing to destroy 2/3 of the city to punish the impoverished bottom third because... well, I don't understand why that is necessary. I have never understood the rather vindictive attitudes that exist towards the poor.

I was saying that more jobs should equal less violence - note lessen not lesson. As to why I hate the American poor, that's easy, they're choosing to be violent idiots that reject education. Look at the bottom third in Canada and see the difference in gang violence. Compare Toronto to any US city in crime rates and living conditions and you'll see why I want US cities put to the torch.

Now before you ask, what have you done for the world, I'll have you know I keep my carbon footprint low by not driving and using the most energy efficient appliances I can afford and that I'm going into the field of robotics after I'm done school with the goal of replacing construction workers with robots within my lifetime. What are you doing?

I take mass transit wherever feasible.

When I must drive I use a car that gets 40 mpg in the city and 48 on the freeway, which is the best gas mileage I can obtain at the moment.

I grow a significant portion (1/2 to 3/4) of the vegetable food I eat, rather than depending on commercial produce that requires long distance transportation to reach me. I also have a compost heap for natural fertilizer.

Other than a refrigerator and a stove, and using a commercial laundromat, I pretty much have NO appliances. No dishwasher, for example - washing dishes by hand has a much smaller carbon footprint than any "efficient" dishwasher.

I recycle. In fact, I not only recycle edible kitchen scrap into compost, I also recycle aluminum and steel, usually 20-50 pounds at a time, about every other month.

Replaced all the lightbulbs in the home with CFL's - which, of course, have a small disposal problem (I drop them off at the monthly hazardous home waste collection event held by my county). Next time we need to buy new lights we'll be getting LED's - we've already replace three CFL's with those.

I give my unwanted good clothes to charity. I buy many of my "new" clothes from second-hand stores - because I'm reusing clothes I don't increase resource use. (I do have to buy my shoes new, however, as I just plain wear them out). As a bonus, I save a shitload of money.

That's just off the top of my head.

Good to hear. I'm actually damn happy to see that and I wish I could follow suit on the gardening end, but a planter will have to do for my apartment. I'll replace my bulbs as they burn out, my old place was all energy saving bulbs, my new apartment isn't and I lack the funds to do a mass swap. Thankfully the apartment's layout means that the living room, kitchen, and dining area can all be lit by a single cluster of bulbs. I tend not to go for used clothes, though I do wear my stuff right through from new so it could be worse.

In all, I'm glad to hear that we're both doing our part to save the Earth.

[Simon_Jester]

This tech is going to be important if we ever manage to move into space. This planet is already groaning under our weight and we're not getting much better so the best bet is to start moving off of this rock and I'd rather sacrifices be made to do so sooner rather than later.

Norade, this is silly.

No space colonization program is going to be viable without a sustainable Earth to base from, not for centuries. You want self-contained cities on the Moon, fine- how long is it going to be before they can make their own microchips? Until then, no we should not be thinking in terms of sacrificing entire cities' economies just on the off chance of developing technology useful for space applications.

And by that point, it will no longer be even vaguely helpful to do so.

If you want to promote advanced technology with applications to space travel, fine. But be realistic about where you're going to find the venture capital and the location. Don't act like you can just plunk down a high-tech sector in the middle of some random wasteland and have it thrive.

In other words, you're saying you'd quite happily obliterate everyone currently living in the city to serve your fucked up techno-fantasies and masturbation?
You DO realize you're talking about human beings, yes?

I'd happily do more than just one city. If I had my way we'd be cutting population numbers and aiming to get to say three billion people by 2050 instead of ten billion as projected. I'd also love to see carbon emissions slashed by passing laws that force carpooling and ban driving to anyplace under a mile away.

Have you done the math on how fucked up the results will be? Is it that you'd rather civilization just implode now, rather than later?

This sounds like you want a drastic solution because it's drastic, not because it will work.

Even ignoring the moral factor, that's important: this does not work. People do not lie down and die so you can get the things you think will grant you your fantasy world of resorts on Mars. If you try to make them, you can bet you'll fuck up on the road to your fantasy world, too- you'll wind up killing people you needed, but were too stupid and blood-crazed to realize you needed.

I'm used to a system that works. In Canada damn near everyone of that third would be on some kind of social assistance dependents or not. It never even occurred to me that the US could have fallen to such lows as to not support those people.

Of course I'd like to see welfare numbers decreased here as well, too many people that aren't even looking for work get it. Of course, in a perfect world, you'd need jobs or someway of getting these people education before you could call them too lazy for welfare.

That's not only monstrous, it's self-contradictory. The US has "fallen to such lows as to not support those people." But on the other hand, it would be better not to support such people.

If this is trolling, it's very bad trolling. If it isn't, then you should probably have shut up about social policy twenty-four hours ago, before people heard all your stupid and evil notions about them.

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

Do you really think you can "flush" cities without repercussions? Without destroying whatever fantasy of the Apotheosis of the Nerds you harbor in place of a goal for how society might actually work?

I'm now supposed to care enough to look? The city is a shit hole, most places aren't worth saving. Seems like maybe just razing the entire thing and being able to start from scratch would be even better than shrinking it. That way at least you get a nice easy to expand layout and modern infrastructure.

No one comes back when you do that: you just get a wave of homeless people spreading out in all directions because you just destroyed the economy they made a living in. Those people become a burden on the surrounding economies, where there is no housing for them and very probably no jobs.

It takes massive external aid to restore a city when that sort of thing happens to it due to natural disasters, and it is... black-comedic to hear someone who claims to know what's best "for the race" propose such a monstrous, murderous waste as if this were somehow an improvement.

What are these people doing for the rest of the world, and for the future?

What are you doing, other than costing your parents the money they spend on food and occupying space in mama's basement?

You assume I live at home. I'm actually going to college and living with a roomate right now. My Mom does help me more than I'd like her to have to, but at least I'm working towards helping humanity as a whole.

I see no evidence for this. I don't think you'd be much of a net positive for anyone given your mindset. The problem is that you seem to be rather bad at utilitarian calculations on the mid-scale, when populations of thousands are at stake. That doesn't speak well for your ability to figure out what the right thing to do is when billions are at stake.

If your moral reasoning is always this bad, the only way you're going to be a productive member of civilization is to shut up and do what someone else who can think ethically tells you... in which case you might as well do that in this case too.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

So your answer to "Do your research, you idiot" is "Oh, hey, my nonsense claims about the place I don't know anything about were wrong? Meh. I'll just keep mocking the place because I can."

I could swear I remember you being better than this at some point.

I'm advocating fucking the already fucked a little more so the rest of us can eventually get off of this rock. Just because you care about the individual doesn't mean I should. I'm looking big picture and want at least some of us living full time off of this rock and I'd prefer it done yesterday.

You're not looking big picture; you're being an idiot who doesn't understand economics or, more impressively, people.

"Big picture" does not mean having a plan that takes the form:

1. Create horrific dystopia, make existing dystopias worse.
2. A miracle happens.
3. Terraformed Mars colonies!

"Big picture" means understanding the time scale of the things you want to accomplish. Understanding that there are places it cannot be done, where "harsh measures" will not make it more doable. Understanding that if you try to do all this without taking into account the many, many human beings who have as much right to keep breathing as you, they will (perhaps literally) rip you to pieces. And you'll deserve it.

In a society where the kinds of things you dream of doing were possible, you would be supremely unqualified to order them done, because you wouldn't notice the consequences until they'd already dragged your ambitions down into the horrors you'd created.

If they make a huge mass of farmland for cash crops, or even just for wheat, beef, and corn they add nothing.

On the other hand, if they can feed themselves they also take less. Hell, the might even become self-sufficient. A state you are apparently unacquainted with.

Sorry, but telling me to worry about self sufficiency when my nation is exporting resources and power to the States if a joke right? BC is nearly 100% carbon free power and we're looking to make more so Washington state can stop polluting us and buy our power.

I don't think she's talking about Canada, or any province thereof. I think she's talking about you, specifically and personally. You, specifically and personally, show an amazing level of detachment from the practical realities of the human condition, one that strongly suggests that you are not self-sufficient: that you do not produce anything that outweighs what you consume.

That's inevitable given the way life works; some people do not or cannot make up for what it takes to keep them alive in the style they're accustomed to- temporarily or permanently. But it's best for them to show a little humility about it.

I was saying that more jobs should equal less violence - note lessen not lesson. As to why I hate the American poor, that's easy, they're choosing to be violent idiots that reject education. Look at the bottom third in Canada and see the difference in gang violence. Compare Toronto to any US city in crime rates and living conditions and you'll see why I want US cities put to the torch.

Again, aside from the whole "mass-scale sociopathy" thing, how do you think this actually works? Do you think you get a better organized society by burning down huge chunks of the existing one? Can you point to a place where that actually worked, without the whole process being a massive, horrid, senseless waste?

[Uncluttered]

Ok. The topic looks split, so I think It's safe to post.

Instead of Hydroponics Vs. Dirt. Can we also compare Aquaponics?

I have a little aquaponics system, and when Winter is over, I plan on enlarging it and also put it in a polytunnel.

Presently, I have a 50 Gallon tank with about 30 goldfish, and a single catfish. Their poop is growing about 75 cubic feet of lettuce, basil, red peppers, peas, and a pumpkin. in peastone beds.

The beds also have redworms wiggling through them, helping to clean up solids. Periodically, I dump the peastone out through a filter, and remove and roots.

The fish are fed with duckweed, which I grow in shallow trays, worms, and zapped bugs. The catsfish eats table scraps, and goldfish.

Once I scale up, I'm going to add some Tilapea, which can also eat algea.

[Broomstick]

Regarding Hydroponics for Technowankers – Some Practical Points Actually Rooted in Reality

You're missing the point. The point is to get this method of farming down and to get the small sized reactors to a perfected science for use in places that have no soil such as spaceships, Mars, and Antarctica.

What the fuck are you actually studying in school? Because you're awful damn ignorant about a lot of things.

First of all, Antarctica does, in fact, have perfectly serviceable soil. It even has ecosystems, albeit the plant life tends to be microscopic, and some of isn't, strictly speaking, plants at all but algae and lichen (which are only half plant). The limiting factor in Antarctica is lack of water, followed by lack of heat. Apply water and heat and you can grow stuff there. There is no reason, other than lack of funds and power limitations, that Antarctica couldn't have greenhouses growing food down there.

In fact, there IS a greenhouse at McMurdo base, about 200 square meters, that not only provides fresh food for those wintering over but also valuable psychological benefits because, believe it or not Norade, human beings do have psychological needs they aren't just meat robots. As it happens, because the base operators are concerned about contaminating the local environment, they do in fact grow everything hydroponically. The South Pole station also has a 30 square meter greenhouse, also providing fresh food. These operations have been underway for years and are relied upon for supplementing food shipments and stored food, including delays in receiving shipments. In other words, some of the technology you want was developed YEARS ago. We don't need to use the land in Detroit to develop technology to grow food in Antarctica it's already been done.

As Mars is presumed to have some similar characteristics to the Antarctic environment experimentation for Mars food production is being done there, not in temperate climates. Mars has “dirt”, but whether it is chemically compatible with Earth life is questionable, as well as what would need to be done to it to make it suitable so almost certainly Mars food will be grown hydroponically, at least at first, using techniques already developed here on Earth.

Spaceships present a different problem from a purely mechanical aspect – there's no gravity. This makes pumping fluids and gases about a different problem than on Earth where many systems we make rely on gravity to make things work. The environment in and around Detroit of course has gravity, so it's not practical to work the bugs out of such systems there.

In other words, for your hydroponic project Detroit is either not needed (for those technologies already up and working) or completely unsuitable.

Wow, you are a total case of “did not do the research”.

I have also asked if anyone here has actual experience in growing things hydroponically other than myself and have heard only resounding silence.

I've grown food both with hydroponics and in a normal dirt garden. I'll take soil-gardening any damned day of the week. Hydroponics are just too damned finicky on anything but an industrial scale -- the exact opposite of the situation in Detroit and Norade's demented fantasy.

Are you suggesting that soil farming will work places like space or Mars? Or that Detroit wouldn't benefit from industrial scale hydroponics?

Detroit will benefit MORE from dirt farming as the capital costs are considerably cheaper, the ongoing energy input is free solar (not even requiring man-made collectors) which, being free, will ALWAYS be cheaper than anything man-made, the water input is free (rain), and it will employ more of the local population, which desperately needs jobs.

Assuming you wish to spend the money and energy on altering the soil chemistry on Mars to suit Earth life there is, actually, no reason dirt farming couldn't be done there. You'd still have to supply water and atmosphere, but you'd have to do that anyway. As hydro/aeroponics is less water intensive than dirt farming it still might make more sense to do it without soil but really, if you ignore economics, you certainly could dirt farm on Mars.

In space, again, you could dirt farm if you wanted to, but you'd have to import the dirt, which is bulky and costs money and energy. So, again, hydro/aeroponics makes MORE sense, but dirt farming isn't impossible, just impracticable.

[Broomstick]

For Our Local Psychopoath

This tech is going to be important if we ever manage to move into space.

The problem with your stance is NOT “we'll need this technology in space” but rather two-fold

1) Those aspects that could be developed on Earth already have been. You are IGNORANT of your topic, apparently not even bothering to use something as easy as Wikipedia to investigate the matters at hand. You clearly are masturbating in the privacy of your own room rather than actually finding out what has been done in the real world.

2) Those aspects of “space agriculture” that remain to be developed can not be done on Earth as the mechanical aspects, as well as growth problems that might be encountered in microgravity, have to be done OFF planet.

This planet is already groaning under our weight and we're not getting much better so the best bet is to start moving off of this rock and I'd rather sacrifices be made to do so sooner rather than later.

It is generally seen as wrong to sacrifice poor people in other countries for fantastical purposes. The fact that some of your schemes are completely unnecessary to advance human knowledge and technology just makes them that much more repugnant.

That's great. Let me know when it actually becomes safe to walk around unarmed at any time of day in any neighborhood.

East side has always been generally considered safe. The Renaissance Center/Hart Plaza areas likewise. I'm sorry if it disrupts your fantasies, but the entire city is not, and never has been, a hell hole. The purpose of the consolidation scheme is to bring people into the viable and safer neighborhoods, allowing the desolate areas to be repurposed.

Again, you did not do the research. Keep this up and I'll be asking the mods to give you that as a custom title.

In other words, you're saying you'd quite happily obliterate everyone currently living in the city to serve your fucked up techno-fantasies and masturbation?

You DO realize you're talking about human beings, yes?

I'd happily do more than just one city. If I had my way we'd be cutting population numbers and aiming to get to say three billion people by 2050 instead of ten billion as projected. I'd also love to see carbon emissions slashed by passing laws that force carpooling and ban driving to anyplace under a mile away.

In other words you're advocating mass murder on a scale never seen before and which dwarfs such 20th Century genocides as the Nazis, Pol Pot, Mao, and Stalin. In fact, I think you're proposing mass-murder on scale that dwarfs those parties totals combined

Are you even aware that you're advocating a crime against humanity?

And then you follow it up with a non-sequitor like “ban driving to anywhere less than a mile away”.

You are just completely lacking in any sort of ethics or morals, aren't you?

Instead I see a city where 1/3 are on welfare and many of those have no hope of upwards mobility

No, you ignorant moron - it's 1/3 below the poverty line. You can be below that line and still NOT qualify for welfare. In fact, welfare barely exists anymore in this country. Only people with dependent children can collect welfare, and that for only five years per child. That's IT. That's lifetime limit. After that you're cut off regardless of your situation. Food stamps are the only benefit that you can get outside of that, but it won't pay your rent, won't even buy toilet paper.

So no, 1/3 of the city of Detroit is NOT on welfare. That is not what that statistic means. Educate yourself, asshat.

I'm used to a system that works. In Canada damn near everyone of that third would be on some kind of social assistance dependents or not. It never even occurred to me that the US could have fallen to such lows as to not support those people.

Of course I'd like to see welfare numbers decreased here as well, too many people that aren't even looking for work get it. Of course, in a perfect world, you'd need jobs or someway of getting these people education before you could call them too lazy for welfare.

Again – You Did Not Do The Research. It's usually the Americans who are accused of assuming everyone else is exactly like where they are, but presumably you're Canadian – so what's your excuse?

Let me point out AGAIN why poverty is so entrenched in Detroit:

10% of the population is elderly, that is, too old to work and on fixed incomes, and thus likely to be impoverished with no real way out.

Most of those who COULD leave DID – so many of those that remain are disabled in some manner and thus unable to work, or lack education which problem can't be corrected without money which does not exist. Their primary education was underfunded, through no fault of their own, which cut them off from higher education, and they lack funds for remedial training.

Many are children still being educated and thus are excused from work in any civilized society.

Many of the remainder CAN NOT FIND WORK. It's not that they're lazy, it's that THERE ARE NO JOBS. Detroit has NO industry left within its borders. It doesn't even have any fucking grocery stores. If you need a job you must go outside the city (barring police, fire, city services, and politics) and guess what, employers sometimes give preference to those living closer to work, or are bigots, both of which puts Detroit residents at a disadvantage.

Bring JOBS back to that city that will immediately start to reduce poverty.

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

I believe, seeing as you've already expressed a desire to murder 2/3 of the planet for your wanked-out fantasies.

Actually, the core is pretty dead, it's the margins and the east side that are still viable. Again, you display your ignorance.

I'm now supposed to care enough to look?

Yes. If you're going to discuss a topic YES YOU HAVE TO CARE ENOUGH TO LOOK. Unless you don't mind looking like an unethical, psychopathic murdering piece of shit whose only redeeming quality is such epic laziness that you are unlikely to ever actually be a threat to anyone.

What are you doing, other than costing your parents the money they spend on food and occupying space in mama's basement?

You assume I live at home. I'm actually going to college and living with a roomate right now.

By my second year of college I not only was off the parental tit I was living in my own place without needing a roommate. What the fuck is wrong with you? Oh, right, you're incredibly fucking lazy.

My Mom does help me more than I'd like her to have to, but at least I'm working towards helping humanity as a whole. You help a person or two, you're a human interest story, you help the race by allowing machines to do more and more hard jobs and you make front page.

Sure, you'll make the front page as the man who created near-universal UNemployment. People need jobs, too, not just robots.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

Incorrect. It is not “my” energy production, it is DETROIT's energy production. I do not live in Detroit, in fact, I left it 30 years ago.

In MY area 45% of power is nuclear generated. In fact, the Chicago area generates 1/10 of the total nuclear power produced in the US.

As for your “clean power generation” - 85% of it is generated by hydroelectric dams which, although “clean” in one sense still destroys arable land, completely fucks up/destroys fish spawning grounds, fucks up local ecosystems where it doesn't outright destroy them, plant life in areas flooded by dam reservoirs produces methane gas as it decays which is a potent greenhouse gas and contributes to global warming. So get off your fucking high horse about it, because hydroelectric power has its downsides as well as its upsides. Again, You Did Not Do The Research.

I'm advocating fucking the already fucked a little more so the rest of us can eventually get off of this rock.

No sir, you are advocating killing in cold blood 6 billion people because you seem to think it would somehow make real your non-researched fantasies of Cities in Space.

On the other hand, if they can feed themselves they also take less. Hell, the might even become self-sufficient. A state you are apparently unacquainted with.

Sorry, but telling me to worry about self sufficiency when my nation is exporting resources and power to the States if a joke right? BC is nearly 100% carbon free power and we're looking to make more so Washington state can stop polluting us and buy our power.

Bullshit. You still burn natural gas for 15% of your power in British Columbia, “carbon free” my ass – not to mention the damage done by your hydroelectric dam projects.

And, again, you're being not just ignorant but STUPID – you're bitching about people buying your resources, yet you're opposed to them becoming even a little more self-sufficient? You're just looking for an excuse to justify the mass-murder you are proposing.

Besides which, as pointed out -

I don't think she's talking about Canada, or any province thereof. I think she's talking about you, specifically and personally. You, specifically and personally, show an amazing level of detachment from the practical realities of the human condition, one that strongly suggests that you are not self-sufficient: that you do not produce anything that outweighs what you consume.

THAT is what I was actually talking about – YOU are not self-sufficient. You are still dependent on mommy. Call me back when you're weaned, then, maybe, you'll be worth the toilet paper that wipes your ass.

On the other hand, I am not only supporting myself but other human beings as well. Until you are at least supporting yourself your statement about such matters are laughable in the extreme.

I was saying that more jobs should equal less violence - note lessen not lesson.

Learn to fucking spell, then, as your typo turned your sentence into nonsense. Preview is your friend, use it.

As to why I hate the American poor, that's easy, they're choosing to be violent idiots that reject education. Look at the bottom third in Canada and see the difference in gang violence.

Of course, the fact that Canadian poor are provided housing, food, and other assistance whereas America's poor are not has nothing to do with this... At a certain point people will steal rather than starve. Give those people a means to survive without crime and crime will drop. Way to blame the victim, but then what do we expect from a would-be exterminator of 2/3 of the human race?

Good to hear. I'm actually damn happy to see that and I wish I could follow suit on the gardening end, but a planter will have to do for my apartment.

Here, fucking educate yourself: Aerogarden, your own private little non-soil plant production system. Yes, it's a bit pricey but all the kinks have been worked out for you in advance. Buy one, grow some food, learn something about the technology you spank your monkey while thinking about.

I'll replace my bulbs as they burn out, my old place was all energy saving bulbs, my new apartment isn't and I lack the funds to do a mass swap.

Poverty is no excuse, asshole – stop being so fucking lazy and get a better job so you can save the planet. But why should I care about you, shitstain, you're “just” an individual, I've got my eye on the big picture. How about we levy a $10 a month tax on your inefficient bulbs until you wise up and fork out the money for proper, “green” lighting technology? That will teach to rent inefficient apartments!

[Broomstick]

This Post is Actually About Hydroponics and Non-Soil Growing Systems

On the tangent of Hydroponics versus dirt farming, is there any significant difference on the enviromental impact up the chain e.g. for the manufacture of the fertilizer and chemicals needed? Is hydroponics superior, equal or worse in that regard?

The answer is “it depends”.

Specifically, it depends on where you're planning to grow things. Assuming you have naturally occurring fertile soil, adequate rainfall, and a reasonably long growing season hydroponics can't compete. If the growth medium is free, the water is free, and the energy is free, well, anything man-made is just going to be cost-inefficient in comparison.

So, to start with, you have to consider hydroponics, or more accurately, non-soil agriculture, in those contexts where dirt farming has some complication. In Antarctica, for example, there is an extreme lack of water, half the year there is insufficient or no natural sunlight, and all habitats have to be heated. As hydroponics uses significantly less water, and you'd have to supply heat all year round and light for the winter months, in that specific context hydroponics is competitive. Given that space is limited in Antarctic habitats, and that hydroponics can be done in considerably less space than dirt farming, hydroponics wins in that circumstance.

Which didn't exactly answer what you asked – don't worry, I'm getting there.

When it comes to environmental impact you again have to consider context. Is water a scare resource? Then non-soil agriculture is more positive. How is power produced? It is possible to have a hydroponics set up that doesn't not need electricity, but then you'll need sufficient natural light – do you have that? If not, then something has to generate the electricity and is that a “green” power generation or not? Most set ups use power for pumps at the vary least, but there may also be sensors and computer controls, all which use power, all of which take power to produce, and some of which may not be good for the environment either during production or after they're no longer working.

As for the chemicals – again, that depends. I adjust pH using vinegar and baking soda, neither of which is particularly toxic. I use hydrogen peroxide for pathogen control, which is horrific stuff when concentrated but I start with a relatively benign 3% solution and dilute it further. Of course, how such things are produced may or may not be toxic. As for the rest of the chemicals involved – these are plant nutrients. They are required in soil. You eat them every day in food. The “green” rating results from how they are made and refined, not from what they are.

So – in sum, non-soil agriculture CAN be as environmentally friendly as dirt farming, or even better (because some forms of dirt farming are pretty non-green) or worse. It's not a simple yes or no because you need to know how everything involved in the process is produced.

FYI, dirt growing works in space too. Hydroponics really aren't necessary.

True. However, hydroponics involves significantly less water and space to produce the same quantity of food, and both water and space are at a premium in space right now (and probably for the foreseeable future). That is why non-soil food production is the first choice for space, not because dirt won't work up there.

In fact, water is at such a premium NASA has been research “aeroponics”, which requires even less water than hydroponics.

Instead of Hydroponics Vs. Dirt. Can we also compare Aquaponics?

Sure, why not?

I have a little aquaponics system, and when Winter is over, I plan on enlarging it and also put it in a polytunnel.

Presently, I have a 50 Gallon tank with about 30 goldfish, and a single catfish. Their poop is growing about 75 cubic feet of lettuce, basil, red peppers, peas, and a pumpkin. in peastone beds.

The beds also have redworms wiggling through them, helping to clean up solids. Periodically, I dump the peastone out through a filter, and remove and roots.

The fish are fed with duckweed, which I grow in shallow trays, worms, and zapped bugs. The catsfish eats table scraps, and goldfish.

Once I scale up, I'm going to add some Tilapea, which can also eat algea.

Question – how do you clean the peastone? (I think around here your “peastone” is called “pea gravel”, which is what I'm using for my set up). I keep looking for more efficient means of doing this. Fortunately, for us water is “free” (we have a well, so it's just the cost of pumping it out of the ground) but it can be messy, particularly in quantity. Also, because we don't need roots going down our septic system we have to do this outside, which involves hauling all that rock around. I keep looking for better ways to do this.

I was wondering what you were feeding the fish. You've got quite a little ecology going there, haven't you? Are you planning to eat the catfish and tilapia, too?

[Norade]

This tech is going to be important if we ever manage to move into space. This planet is already groaning under our weight and we're not getting much better so the best bet is to start moving off of this rock and I'd rather sacrifices be made to do so sooner rather than later.

Norade, this is silly.

No space colonization program is going to be viable without a sustainable Earth to base from, not for centuries. You want self-contained cities on the Moon, fine- how long is it going to be before they can make their own microchips? Until then, no we should not be thinking in terms of sacrificing entire cities' economies just on the off chance of developing technology useful for space applications.

And by that point, it will no longer be even vaguely helpful to do so.

If you want to promote advanced technology with applications to space travel, fine. But be realistic about where you're going to find the venture capital and the location. Don't act like you can just plunk down a high-tech sector in the middle of some random wasteland and have it thrive.

The idea was originally because nuclear power might actually be viable near the freshly bulldozed parts of Detroit. You'll also note that I have since retracted the bit about hydroponics after having heard why they aren't viable. I just figured if you were doing one then you could do both, create some jobs, and test new technology all in one. If some other city suddenly opens up low value land away from people and wants to try this great, but without that how many cities would this actually have a chance in?

This sounds like you want a drastic solution because it's drastic, not because it will work.

Even ignoring the moral factor, that's important: this does not work. People do not lie down and die so you can get the things you think will grant you your fantasy world of resorts on Mars. If you try to make them, you can bet you'll fuck up on the road to your fantasy world, too- you'll wind up killing people you needed, but were too stupid and blood-crazed to realize you needed.

So where do we find ways to cut the population drastically then? The people in Africa and India aren't slowing down on popping out new kids anytime soon and it's just as bad to say that because they never had a chance to reach our level of development that they should be the ones to go. I'm all for the first world reducing carbon and eating less, but if we just replace what we cut with more people in the third world and more people in inner cities not actually doing anything but surviving the world is still fucked long term.

I'm used to a system that works. In Canada damn near everyone of that third would be on some kind of social assistance dependents or not. It never even occurred to me that the US could have fallen to such lows as to not support those people.

Of course I'd like to see welfare numbers decreased here as well, too many people that aren't even looking for work get it. Of course, in a perfect world, you'd need jobs or someway of getting these people education before you could call them too lazy for welfare.

That's not only monstrous, it's self-contradictory. The US has "fallen to such lows as to not support those people." But on the other hand, it would be better not to support such people.

If this is trolling, it's very bad trolling. If it isn't, then you should probably have shut up about social policy twenty-four hours ago, before people heard all your stupid and evil notions about them.

I know I sounded a bit wishy washy there but it boils down to this. I'd love to be able to cull welfare lists, but without having the right systems in place it would be needlessly harsh. What we should be doing is forcing all welfare recipients that qualify to volunteer or train them at substantial subsidy so they can actually find work. Once we do that we can take care of the percentage that there is simply no work for.

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

Do you really think you can "flush" cities without repercussions? Without destroying whatever fantasy of the Apotheosis of the Nerds you harbor in place of a goal for how society might actually work?

Of course you can't just flush a city it's why nobody would ever do it. However answer me this, if you could, with repercussions, cull 3 billion from this planet based on whatever criteria you like (you can even include me if you'd like). Would you?

I'm now supposed to care enough to look? The city is a shit hole, most places aren't worth saving. Seems like maybe just razing the entire thing and being able to start from scratch would be even better than shrinking it. That way at least you get a nice easy to expand layout and modern infrastructure.

No one comes back when you do that: you just get a wave of homeless people spreading out in all directions because you just destroyed the economy they made a living in. Those people become a burden on the surrounding economies, where there is no housing for them and very probably no jobs.

It takes massive external aid to restore a city when that sort of thing happens to it due to natural disasters, and it is... black-comedic to hear someone who claims to know what's best "for the race" propose such a monstrous, murderous waste as if this were somehow an improvement.

How else will cities get less congested easily? People won't stop driving, cities are often poorly laid out because city planning is anything but. How much nicer and more efficient would an entirely new city being built in Detroit's stead be? I'd guess a lot, I also know that while it's not cheap you could cut military funding and have it started and ended pretty quickly. Plus razing and rebuilding an entire city is sure to create jobs on a massive scale.

I see no evidence for this. I don't think you'd be much of a net positive for anyone given your mindset. The problem is that you seem to be rather bad at utilitarian calculations on the mid-scale, when populations of thousands are at stake. That doesn't speak well for your ability to figure out what the right thing to do is when billions are at stake.

If your moral reasoning is always this bad, the only way you're going to be a productive member of civilization is to shut up and do what someone else who can think ethically tells you... in which case you might as well do that in this case too.

What does intercity kid 13 wearing gang colors and barely able to read or do math do for anybody? How is he not always going to be a net negative for himself and everybody around him? What about irredeemable crack head number 54 what's he doing? If it weren't for us caring just because their human than losing these types of people would be a net gain for everybody.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

So your answer to "Do your research, you idiot" is "Oh, hey, my nonsense claims about the place I don't know anything about were wrong? Meh. I'll just keep mocking the place because I can."

I could swear I remember you being better than this at some point.

I did fail big time at doing my research on Detroit, my main source of info are people that left because the union construction companies hired cops and goons to trash their construction sites and steal or destroy their equipment. That and the popular images of a decaying, polluted, and rotting city.

I'm advocating fucking the already fucked a little more so the rest of us can eventually get off of this rock. Just because you care about the individual doesn't mean I should. I'm looking big picture and want at least some of us living full time off of this rock and I'd prefer it done yesterday.

You're not looking big picture; you're being an idiot who doesn't understand economics or, more impressively, people.

"Big picture" does not mean having a plan that takes the form:

1. Create horrific dystopia, make existing dystopias worse.
2. A miracle happens.
3. Terraformed Mars colonies!

"Big picture" means understanding the time scale of the things you want to accomplish. Understanding that there are places it cannot be done, where "harsh measures" will not make it more doable. Understanding that if you try to do all this without taking into account the many, many human beings who have as much right to keep breathing as you, they will (perhaps literally) rip you to pieces. And you'll deserve it.

In a society where the kinds of things you dream of doing were possible, you would be supremely unqualified to order them done, because you wouldn't notice the consequences until they'd already dragged your ambitions down into the horrors you'd created.

How is an extra $10 per year making anybody's life so much worse that it creates a distopia? That was where this started, this tangent grew out of me saying that no, I wouldn't care if the bottom third of each city that aren't simply cash starved college students suddenly went poof.

Sorry, but telling me to worry about self sufficiency when my nation is exporting resources and power to the States if a joke right? BC is nearly 100% carbon free power and we're looking to make more so Washington state can stop polluting us and buy our power.

I don't think she's talking about Canada, or any province thereof. I think she's talking about you, specifically and personally. You, specifically and personally, show an amazing level of detachment from the practical realities of the human condition, one that strongly suggests that you are not self-sufficient: that you do not produce anything that outweighs what you consume.

That's inevitable given the way life works; some people do not or cannot make up for what it takes to keep them alive in the style they're accustomed to- temporarily or permanently. But it's best for them to show a little humility about it.

No, I'm not self sufficient yet, but my hope is that with my career choice that I can help advance robotics enough that I made up my part. If not I'd be happy enough trying to start a commune built around our own mini reactor where we grow our own food. Hell maybe we can even have robots do some of the most tedious work for us and have it even better.

I was saying that more jobs should equal less violence - note lessen not lesson. As to why I hate the American poor, that's easy, they're choosing to be violent idiots that reject education. Look at the bottom third in Canada and see the difference in gang violence. Compare Toronto to any US city in crime rates and living conditions and you'll see why I want US cities put to the torch.

Again, aside from the whole "mass-scale sociopathy" thing, how do you think this actually works? Do you think you get a better organized society by burning down huge chunks of the existing one? Can you point to a place where that actually worked, without the whole process being a massive, horrid, senseless waste?

Can you see a way to fix the situation in the worst shit holes in the US? I sure as fuck don't see much working short term, nor do I see why the US needs to be such a shit hole compared to Canada and other nations that are peers to the states. How did these barbaric conditions not develop in the cities in Canada when they did just a few miles south?

You also mistake wishing these people would vanish with me actually believing that what I'm saying here is some great idea. I know damned well that it won't help much, but at this stage some places do so little for me that I'd be willing to try something drastic in hopes of it starting to fix things.

[Norade]

This tech is going to be important if we ever manage to move into space.

The problem with your stance is NOT “we'll need this technology in space” but rather two-fold

1) Those aspects that could be developed on Earth already have been. You are IGNORANT of your topic, apparently not even bothering to use something as easy as Wikipedia to investigate the matters at hand. You clearly are masturbating in the privacy of your own room rather than actually finding out what has been done in the real world.

2) Those aspects of “space agriculture” that remain to be developed can not be done on Earth as the mechanical aspects, as well as growth problems that might be encountered in microgravity, have to be done OFF planet.

1) Simply running large scale hydroponics will lead people to find ways to do it better because more people will be thinking on the issue than otherwise might. When a business wants to run a high profit due to their large scale investment in a technology you can be damned sure they will see what advances they can happen.

2) Of course, doesn't stop us from getting what we can on Earth down as well as we have dirt farming down.

This planet is already groaning under our weight and we're not getting much better so the best bet is to start moving off of this rock and I'd rather sacrifices be made to do so sooner rather than later.

It is generally seen as wrong to sacrifice poor people in other countries for fantastical purposes. The fact that some of your schemes are completely unnecessary to advance human knowledge and technology just makes them that much more repugnant.

So the world is doing just fine with 6 billion people then? If we were to try to cut 3 billion from the planet who should be the ones to go?

That's great. Let me know when it actually becomes safe to walk around unarmed at any time of day in any neighborhood.

East side has always been generally considered safe. The Renaissance Center/Hart Plaza areas likewise. I'm sorry if it disrupts your fantasies, but the entire city is not, and never has been, a hell hole. The purpose of the consolidation scheme is to bring people into the viable and safer neighborhoods, allowing the desolate areas to be repurposed.

Again, you did not do the research. Keep this up and I'll be asking the mods to give you that as a custom title.

Yet there are still many more places than note where wandering unarmed at 3am has a high likely hood of getting you in trouble. Though I'm glad that crime is dropping some, Detroit is still nowhere near safe and moving more dangerous people together might not be the way to make it get drastically safer.

In other words you're advocating mass murder on a scale never seen before and which dwarfs such 20th Century genocides as the Nazis, Pol Pot, Mao, and Stalin. In fact, I think you're proposing mass-murder on scale that dwarfs those parties totals combined

Are you even aware that you're advocating a crime against humanity?

And then you follow it up with a non-sequitor like “ban driving to anywhere less than a mile away”.

You are just completely lacking in any sort of ethics or morals, aren't you?

So what's the realistic way to get human population numbers to the point where the planet can support them properly? I want a ton of people gone so that my kids and their kids can see it in better shape than I am. Is it selfish, yeah, but though I use more I hope to actually contribute to making life better through robotics. hat does random illiterate ganger number 7 do for the world? Well I guess he does reduce population numbers...

I'm used to a system that works. In Canada damn near everyone of that third would be on some kind of social assistance dependents or not. It never even occurred to me that the US could have fallen to such lows as to not support those people.

Of course I'd like to see welfare numbers decreased here as well, too many people that aren't even looking for work get it. Of course, in a perfect world, you'd need jobs or someway of getting these people education before you could call them too lazy for welfare.

Again – You Did Not Do The Research. It's usually the Americans who are accused of assuming everyone else is exactly like where they are, but presumably you're Canadian – so what's your excuse?

Let me point out AGAIN why poverty is so entrenched in Detroit:

10% of the population is elderly, that is, too old to work and on fixed incomes, and thus likely to be impoverished with no real way out.

Most of those who COULD leave DID – so many of those that remain are disabled in some manner and thus unable to work, or lack education which problem can't be corrected without money which does not exist. Their primary education was underfunded, through no fault of their own, which cut them off from higher education, and they lack funds for remedial training.

Many are children still being educated and thus are excused from work in any civilized society.

Many of the remainder CAN NOT FIND WORK. It's not that they're lazy, it's that THERE ARE NO JOBS. Detroit has NO industry left within its borders. It doesn't even have any fucking grocery stores. If you need a job you must go outside the city (barring police, fire, city services, and politics) and guess what, employers sometimes give preference to those living closer to work, or are bigots, both of which puts Detroit residents at a disadvantage.

Bring JOBS back to that city that will immediately start to reduce poverty.

Sorry, I'd rather not look to closely at the sad state of the US.

So 10% of them were old people that couldn't save enough to get by. That sucks for them, I hope I manage to save enough that I can retire and not be a burden.

It also sucks to be disabled, thankfully I'm not. As sad as it is, these people are a burden and are lucky they were born now and not a few hundred years ago. Also, before you think of tossing out Hawking he's contributing in ways that able bodied people couldn't hope to so I can't count him as a burden.

As for education, the money does exist, maybe the people in the city should actually get out and vote in somebody who'll give a damn and fight to get them a slice of the funds needed to help out. Even so, funding isn't everything, there is still a large gap between African Americans and whites in test scores within the same schools and socioeconomic strata. When we have a significant percentage preforming so badly for no biological reason (there are many social issues that muddy the waters, but I'm sure as hell not making some cultural groups more likely to join gangs).

The jobs situation sucks as well, but the crime is part of the reason there is less work. These people are at this point often fucking themselves out of chances. As long as blacks are seen as more likely to be in gangs and commit violent crime it'll remain harder for them to get into the better jobs and social circles. I'm really glad that the situation is better where I am.

[quote

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

I believe, seeing as you've already expressed a desire to murder 2/3 of the planet for your wanked-out fantasies.[/quote]

Once again, is the world really so well of at 6 billion people?

Actually, the core is pretty dead, it's the margins and the east side that are still viable. Again, you display your ignorance.

I'm now supposed to care enough to look?

Yes. If you're going to discuss a topic YES YOU HAVE TO CARE ENOUGH TO LOOK. Unless you don't mind looking like an unethical, psychopathic murdering piece of shit whose only redeeming quality is such epic laziness that you are unlikely to ever actually be a threat to anyone.[/quote]

Well, I'm sorry that other concerns like dealing with school are occupying more of my time. Thank you for providing me with the info I didn't look up.

What are you doing, other than costing your parents the money they spend on food and occupying space in mama's basement?

You assume I live at home. I'm actually going to college and living with a roomate right now.

By my second year of college I not only was off the parental tit I was living in my own place without needing a roommate. What the fuck is wrong with you? Oh, right, you're incredibly fucking lazy.[/quote]

Great, I'm still in my first year so you can't play all high and might with me.

As for the roommate situation Kelowna has crazy housing costs relative to wages - BC has the lowest minimum wage in Canada, and as a student not yet out of first year I really don't even get a sniff at higher wages right now - and the roommate is a long time friend who also needed a place that was affordable. So go fuck yourself on this point.

My Mom does help me more than I'd like her to have to, but at least I'm working towards helping humanity as a whole. You help a person or two, you're a human interest story, you help the race by allowing machines to do more and more hard jobs and you make front page.

Sure, you'll make the front page as the man who created near-universal UNemployment. People need jobs, too, not just robots.

If society can't adapt then we're fucked anyway.

Besides, why should some thirty year old woman bag my groceries when the entire store could be a giant vending machine that has my order ready when I walk in the door? Why should we employee people to lay sidewalks when soon a robot might do the job cheaper and faster?

The transition will suck, but hopefully we'll come out the other side better for it. If we're really so bad that we can't then maybe we don't deserve what we have anyway.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

Incorrect. It is not “my” energy production, it is DETROIT's energy production. I do not live in Detroit, in fact, I left it 30 years ago.

In MY area 45% of power is nuclear generated. In fact, the Chicago area generates 1/10 of the total nuclear power produced in the US.

As for your “clean power generation” - 85% of it is generated by hydroelectric dams which, although “clean” in one sense still destroys arable land, completely fucks up/destroys fish spawning grounds, fucks up local ecosystems where it doesn't outright destroy them, plant life in areas flooded by dam reservoirs produces methane gas as it decays which is a potent greenhouse gas and contributes to global warming. So get off your fucking high horse about it, because hydroelectric power has its downsides as well as its upsides. Again, You Did Not Do The Research.

Good on you for making the smart choice, still, call me when any state in the US even gets close. The best you have now is 75% compared to BC with 85 to 90% of power being generated cleanly.

That's great for Chicago. More places ought to follow suit.

No shit, I see news about the issues of creating more dams simply to export power due to the damage it causes. However, I'm on the side that thinks that if we can see a little 'cleaner' power to the states and save a coal or oil fired plant going up then it's the better option.

I'm advocating fucking the already fucked a little more so the rest of us can eventually get off of this rock.

No sir, you are advocating killing in cold blood 6 billion people because you seem to think it would somehow make real your non-researched fantasies of Cities in Space.

No, I'd like the people gone so that future children have a world worth living on.

On the other hand, if they can feed themselves they also take less. Hell, the might even become self-sufficient. A state you are apparently unacquainted with.

Sorry, but telling me to worry about self sufficiency when my nation is exporting resources and power to the States if a joke right? BC is nearly 100% carbon free power and we're looking to make more so Washington state can stop polluting us and buy our power.

Bullshit. You still burn natural gas for 15% of your power in British Columbia, “carbon free” my ass – not to mention the damage done by your hydroelectric dam projects.

And, again, you're being not just ignorant but STUPID – you're bitching about people buying your resources, yet you're opposed to them becoming even a little more self-sufficient? You're just looking for an excuse to justify the mass-murder you are proposing.[/quote]

15% is still better than damn near any other place in North America and dams still hurt the world less than another coal fired plant would. I'd much prefer nuclear, but while hydroelectric is still good enough for our needs that won't happen.

Yes, growing more corn and raising more cattle will be oh so lovely for the world...

Besides which, as pointed out -

I don't think she's talking about Canada, or any province thereof. I think she's talking about you, specifically and personally. You, specifically and personally, show an amazing level of detachment from the practical realities of the human condition, one that strongly suggests that you are not self-sufficient: that you do not produce anything that outweighs what you consume.

THAT is what I was actually talking about – YOU are not self-sufficient. You are still dependent on mommy. Call me back when you're weaned, then, maybe, you'll be worth the toilet paper that wipes your ass.

On the other hand, I am not only supporting myself but other human beings as well. Until you are at least supporting yourself your statement about such matters are laughable in the extreme.

You said yourself that you weren't weaned in your first year of school either so why not take a look at how much longer you've had to get into your lifestyle and in doing so go fuck yourself.

I was saying that more jobs should equal less violence - note lessen not lesson.

Learn to fucking spell, then, as your typo turned your sentence into nonsense. Preview is your friend, use it.

I typed lessen in you retard. You're the one who typed lesson.

As to why I hate the American poor, that's easy, they're choosing to be violent idiots that reject education. Look at the bottom third in Canada and see the difference in gang violence.

Of course, the fact that Canadian poor are provided housing, food, and other assistance whereas America's poor are not has nothing to do with this... At a certain point people will steal rather than starve. Give those people a means to survive without crime and crime will drop. Way to blame the victim, but then what do we expect from a would-be exterminator of 2/3 of the human race?

How is it my fault that the US is backassward and retarded? The US has had just as much time as Canada and we keep coming out ahead on damn near everything. If it weren't for the food you produce for the world and the protection you grant us I'd wonder if the entire nation was doing any good for anybody.

Good to hear. I'm actually damn happy to see that and I wish I could follow suit on the gardening end, but a planter will have to do for my apartment.

Here, fucking educate yourself: Aerogarden, your own private little non-soil plant production system. Yes, it's a bit pricey but all the kinks have been worked out for you in advance. Buy one, grow some food, learn something about the technology you spank your monkey while thinking about.

I think I'll get my education taken care of first and devote my effort and money towards that.

I'll replace my bulbs as they burn out, my old place was all energy saving bulbs, my new apartment isn't and I lack the funds to do a mass swap.

Poverty is no excuse, asshole – stop being so fucking lazy and get a better job so you can save the planet. But why should I care about you, shitstain, you're “just” an individual, I've got my eye on the big picture. How about we levy a $10 a month tax on your inefficient bulbs until you wise up and fork out the money for proper, “green” lighting technology? That will teach to rent inefficient apartments!

Ignoring that due to the poor insulation on my old house due to the landlord being a cheap asshole, this is an energy use upgrade over the last place even without a light swap. I'd support a tax on old bulbs. Were such a tax in place I'd surely replace them all asap.

[Simon_Jester]

So where do we find ways to cut the population drastically then? The people in Africa and India aren't slowing down on popping out new kids anytime soon and it's just as bad to say that because they never had a chance to reach our level of development that they should be the ones to go. I'm all for the first world reducing carbon and eating less, but if we just replace what we cut with more people in the third world and more people in inner cities not actually doing anything but surviving the world is still fucked long term.

When Alyrium Denyrle talks about this I respect his opinion, because he does the math, knows what's necessary and what isn't, and doesn't get all self-congratulatory about how much the 21st century is liable to suck because of overpopulation.

You, on the other hand, fail all these criteria. Badly. As far as I can tell, you have latched onto overpopulation and "get off this rock" as your excuse to propose horrors for shock value, and not much more. If you understood the scope of the problem, you wouldn't be so blithe about trying to solve it by killing people. If you had any historical perspective, or any grasp of human nature, ditto.

If you must ape your betters, don't try to look righteous by aping the ones trying to solve long term problems. It makes the people who actually have a shot of fixing them look bad.

Yeah, I'd flush those cities as well.

Do you really think you can "flush" cities without repercussions? Without destroying whatever fantasy of the Apotheosis of the Nerds you harbor in place of a goal for how society might actually work?

Of course you can't just flush a city it's why nobody would ever do it. However answer me this, if you could, with repercussions, cull 3 billion from this planet based on whatever criteria you like (you can even include me if you'd like). Would you?

Hell, no. I'm not a murderer by inclination.

How else will cities get less congested easily? People won't stop driving, cities are often poorly laid out because city planning is anything but. How much nicer and more efficient would an entirely new city being built in Detroit's stead be? I'd guess a lot, I also know that while it's not cheap you could cut military funding and have it started and ended pretty quickly. Plus razing and rebuilding an entire city is sure to create jobs on a massive scale.

When has this been tried? When has it succeeded?

What does intercity kid 13 wearing gang colors and barely able to read or do math do for anybody? How is he not always going to be a net negative for himself and everybody around him? What about irredeemable crack head number 54 what's he doing? If it weren't for us caring just because their human than losing these types of people would be a net gain for everybody.

To be blunt, Norade, I don't trust your ability to figure out what a net negative for humanity looks like, because I'm not sure you understand humans well enough to have a right to form opinions on them.

That's great 15% of your energy is green. *Golf clap* Call me when you get to BC's level of clean power generation.

So your answer to "Do your research, you idiot" is "Oh, hey, my nonsense claims about the place I don't know anything about were wrong? Meh. I'll just keep mocking the place because I can."
I could swear I remember you being better than this at some point.

I did fail big time at doing my research on Detroit, my main source of info are people that left because the union construction companies hired cops and goons to trash their construction sites and steal or destroy their equipment. That and the popular images of a decaying, polluted, and rotting city.

So... you'd kill thousands of people based on ill-informed media impressions of what the place they live in is like?

How is an extra $10 per year making anybody's life so much worse that it creates a distopia? That was where this started, this tangent grew out of me saying that no, I wouldn't care if the bottom third of each city that aren't simply cash starved college students suddenly went poof.

..."Went poof?" How antiseptic.

No, what you were saying was that you wouldn't mind millions of deaths, because you've concluded that they are poor and therefore useless subhumans.

Yes, when you kill lots of people it makes a dystopia worse. All this talk about "culling" makes it very obvious what you're talking about, and no one sane would trust your judgement on the issue after you've thrown the concept around so lightly and in combination with so much ignorance about the basic realities of the places and people you want to murder.

I agree with Broomstick; your main mitigating virtue is that you most likely lack the competence to get into a position where your lack of ethics and comprehension of society will matter.

No, I'm not self sufficient yet, but my hope is that with my career choice that I can help advance robotics enough that I made up my part. If not I'd be happy enough trying to start a commune built around our own mini reactor where we grow our own food. Hell maybe we can even have robots do some of the most tedious work for us and have it even better.

Until you understand the realities of self-sufficiency, and of basic humanity, you would be well advised to be humble about the things you do not know. And to hesitate before proposing radical solutions.

If I don't know anything about medicine, I'm going to hesitate before proposing that someone do surgery using high explosives, even if I think it's a good idea- as well I should, because that would be stupid and evil. You would have done well to hesitate yourself, before proposing stupid and evil ideas when you're incapable of perceiving stupidity and evil because of your ignorance.

Can you see a way to fix the situation in the worst shit holes in the US? I sure as fuck don't see much working short term, nor do I see why the US needs to be such a shit hole compared to Canada and other nations that are peers to the states. How did these barbaric conditions not develop in the cities in Canada when they did just a few miles south?

Barbaric isn't "mass poverty." Barbaric is what you get when lunatics start killing people because they don't see a use for those people in their fantasy schemes of building towers to heaven or cities on the moon or bigger palaces for themselves.

You are poorly qualified to condemn barbarism. Civilization would die if the people responsible for running it thought like you.

You also mistake wishing these people would vanish with me actually believing that what I'm saying here is some great idea. I know damned well that it won't help much, but at this stage some places do so little for me that I'd be willing to try something drastic in hopes of it starting to fix things.

This, by itself, is proof that you don't know how to fix things: you are judging thousands by their worth to one person- you.

[Broomstick]

In fact, water is at such a premium NASA has been research “aeroponics”, which requires even less water than hydroponics.

Aye, among several other advantages for the space environment like ease of control, efficiency in other nutrient use, and more resistance to disease.

Yes and no about disease. While hydroponic set ups typically being enclosed tends to keep things out from rodents and insects to viruses and fungus, when something does get into the system it is a disaster. The nutrient fluid (or mist for aeroponics) is, after all, food. The system is interconnected, so if a virus or fungus gets into one plant it gets into everything that's linked to the system, with no counter-pathogen to eat the thing that got loose (unlike natural soil, which is full of things that eat other things) the disease or whatever takes over rapidly. Sometimes use you can nip it in the bud (that's what I use a peroxide “shock” for) but usually you can't. That means not only losing the entire crop but also that you have to take the whole damn thing apart and sanitize everything, and replace what can't be adequately cleaned.

Hydroponic setups can be sub-divided into separate units to help contain potential outbreaks (we're planning to expand our garden at my place – we'll be having a separate reservoir, plumbing system, and pump for the new tray for that very reason). It's still a pain in the ass to have to periodically clean things.

Likewise, aeroponics can also result in mold and other fungal growth. Prevention goes a long way to avoiding problems but realistically this will always be a problem. If I recall Mir had a mold and mildew problem after a few years, and one of the Apollo Moon landings recovered microbes from equipment from a prior mission. It's safe to assume the one-cells will be along for the ride when we go into space.

When we get larger and longer term space habitats I wouldn't be surprised if insects and rodents become problems, as they've followed us everywhere else we've gone so far.

From what I've read about it, it's all around better than hydroponics for NASA's particular use cases. I haven't read about comparisons on the ground, though I suspect some of the aeroponic equipment and training adds cost that isn't really worth it down here, similarly to how hydroponics tend to do poorly when directly competing with traditional soil growing as a general rule.

Aeroponics is less mass and less water – two huge pluses for NASA . In comparison, my current set up weighs 300 pounds / 135 kg and takes 12 gallons / 45 liters of water due to plumbing and need to keep our particular variety of pump submerged. Well, fine – adding mass to supporting structures is no big deal on the ground. Water is cheap, and our well water, through good fortune, is sufficiently abundant in some minerals that we can get that from the water rather than the nutrient “soup”, and we don't have to launch any of that out of a gravity well into space. Even better, I don't have to import my atmosphere, I get it for free and in a large enough system I don't have to monitor and adjust it all the time. It isn't until you start setting up an ecology in space that you realize how much we get for free living here on the planet. All that said, there's no reason not to do aeroponics here on the ground, and there are people who do exactly that for reasons ranging from research to a hobby. It's just another system. There are several non-soil systems - aeroponics, Uncluttered's aquaponics, my ebb-and-flow set up in an unused apartment in my building, and several others that I'm aware and quite likely some I'm not. All have good points and bad points.

If properly done, aeroponics produces more plant mass per cubic volume on less water and nutrients than any other system yet devised. It's also more expensive due to all the monitoring and mechanical costs. One advantage is that it truly does let you optimize conditions not only to agriculture but also to particular species and varieties, and even maximize nutritional content (or pharmaceutical content, as marijuana growers using non-soil systems do, or really any plant characteristic altered by growing conditions). Really fanatical practitioners of this form of growing stuff vary nutrients based on the point in the lifecycle, adjusting from seed to sprout to promoting vegetation or flowering or fruiting. They also adjust the intensity, spectrum, and length of lighting. But the more you push these limits the more knowledge you need, the more human input the system needs (even if it's just to program a computer, the human still has to at some point input the parameters), and the more power consumed by all the control systems.

A lot of it comes down to priorities. If your priority is to produce maximum food with minimal space and mass requirements NASA's version of aeroponics is the best. If you desire to produce food year round but at a cost competitive with importing dirt-farmed food from another part of the globe in the off-season then some other system will probably be better if it requires less capital to start up and less energy to run.

In my case, we wanted to be able to grow vegetables during the winter in a climate not conducive to doing so outside. Last winter I performed some experiments in growing plants in dirt in pots in the same room we're currently using. During November and February there is only sufficient natural light penetrating the room (which faces south, and thus gets maximal sunlight) to maintain a plant, during those months they do not grow at all. From December to January there is not even sufficient light for that, and pretty much everything died with the exception of chard which is a ridiculously hardy plant (fortunately, it's also a favorite of the two humans involved in this project).

Our priorities were thus supplementing our diets using a low cost system as we just don't have a lot of money. Thus, we wanted a system that used minimal energy to run. Now, when my dad and I had done hydroponics back in the 1970's we have a system that relied on gravity and human muscle power to work (we used small pots and small reservoirs, small enough that they could be physically lifted above the plants to drain into the growing pots, then lifted and set below the plants to drain out again). However, such a system requires human intervention 4-8 times a day. We wanted something which we could safely “neglect” for a few days at a time without everything dying. So, some minimal automation.

As it happens, my partner in all this is a general contractor and was able either recycle items to use in the set up (one of the supporting tables for one of our trays is a an old door, for example, which is no longer useful as a door but makes a utilitarian table top, supported by battered but still serviceable saw horses.) or obtain items cheaply (200 pounds of pea gravel wholesale – did I mention we have a fairly large growing tray?). We also have tools and know-how to do our own labor.

I believe the only thing purchased, other than what we used to make the nutrient fluid, were the timers for the lights and pumps (the plumbing was recycled from my partner's old beer-brewing equipment) The power drain is about that of a room light and an electric clock radio. We positioned the plants so they would get natural AND artificial grow lights, so some of the lighting is free (the supplement provided by the artificial light is necessary, though, for the plants to grow at all right now) Are we going to get maximal food production? No, we're not. Truthfully, we just don't monitor and adjust the nutrients that closely. However, we ARE getting more than the backyard garden is at the moment.

We also managed to lose everything after the first two weeks due to a malfunction in the system. That, of course, is one reason we started relatively small (my partner would have cheerfully installed a dozen trays in the room but I cautioned him about that). Since we were designing a system and not using one out of a box there was a need for fine-tuning. It cost us a lot less money, but more in our own thinking, effort, and time. We were aiming for a relatively low-tech, low cost system. We got that, but the tradeoff is less efficiency. Come spring I'll be planting in dirt again (while maintaining the hydroponics) because, during growing season, my backyard is far more productive.

So really, you have to look at your priorities. Is it water conservation? Space considerations? Maximal food production? Nutrition? (By adjusting plant nutrients you can significantly alter the nutritional profile of produced foods)

[Broomstick]

For Those of You Reading for Actual Information

Assuming more people are reading than participating, and some of them might not be clear on all the terminology, here's a brief overview of non-soil agricultural techniques.

Hydroponics 101
First, there are two broad divisions: solution culture and medium culture.

Medium culture is when the plants are grown in a non-soil but solid culture. The sub-categories of this are referred to by the medium used, i.e. “gravel culture”, “sand culture”, “rockwool culture”, etc. as well as by the technique used to get the nutrients through the medium, such as “ebb-and-flow gravel culture”

Solution culture is when there is no solid medium for the roots, just the nutrient solution. The main sub-divisions here are static solution, continuous flow, and aeroponics.

And while technically the proper term is “non-soil growing” a lot of people lump all this under “hydroponics”.

Non-Soil Agriculture 201: Medium Culture
As mentioned, medium culture is often referred to as the medium used for growing, such as “gravel culture”. Some typical/common media are: diahydro, using sedimentary rock composed primarily of diatoms shells; ex-clay or expanded clay pebbles; rockwool, like that used for insulation in buildings and composed of molten rock spun into fibers often described as “cotton candy-like” (though just using building insulation is not advised as it may contain things you don't want in your garden); coir, which is a material derived from coconut fiber; perlite, which is a glassy volcanic rock produced by gassy lava so it's low density, and it's commonly used as an additive in soil agriculture; vermiculite, another light-weight mineral medium; sand, which is just what it sounds like; gravel, which is also just what it sounds like; polystyrene packing peanuts; shards of ceramic and/or brick, and wood fiber.

All of these media have trade-offs. Some are easy to sterilize if needed, some are impossible. Some can be recycled – rock wool, for instance, can be re-made into new rock wool, or bricks, or incorporated into soil as the residual growth solution contains many nutrients and it can function as a fertilizer and mineral supplement. Some – like gravel and sand – are heavy but cheap and commonly available. Some are light-weight, like perlite, vermiculite, and ex-clay, but may have other issues, like ex-clay being hard to completely clean and perlite being prone to float on top of a solution rather than be immersed in it.

In medium culture hydroponics how you get the nutrients to the plants is the other half of the equation. We will now look at the various methods in use.

Passive Irrigation: basically, the plants are rooted in a porous medium sitting in nutrient solution that uses capillary action to transport nutrients upward to the plants. This is particularly suited ot epiphytic plants such as orchids and bromeliads, but not every species does well with this technique.

Ebb and flow/flood and drain: in this method the plants are rooted in a tray of substrate. The nutrient reservoir sits beneath it. Periodically, nutrient fluid is pumped up into the tray (the flow or flood), then allowed to drain back via gravity into the reservoir (the ebb or drain). This needs to be repeated multiple times per day. This is probably one of the more common beginning techniques, and mechanically simple to set up. In theory, you can do this one entirely without electricity – make the trays and reservoirs small enough you can lift the reservoirs above the trays, letting gravity flood the trays, then put the reservoirs beneath the trays and use gravity to drain them. Put this next to a window or other source of natural light and you have a hydroponic system powered by nothing but muscles and gravity. More commonly, though, pumps and timers are used.

Run to waste is somewhat similar to ebb and flow in that nutrient is applied to the media surface periodically, but avoids the flooding aspect for a lighter application, and any excess gathered. Excess can be re-used in the system, particularly if wastes are filtered and nutrients added as needed. Another popular technique for commercial use.

Non-Soil Agriculture 202: Solution Culture
As already mentioned, there are three sub-types of solution culture: static, continuous flow, and aeroponics.

For static solution, the plants are grown in some sort of container which contains the fluid. This is usually aerated to make sure adequate oxygen reaches the roots (yes, plants need oxygen as well as carbon dioxide. They are net producers of oxygen, but they do utilize some of the oxygen photosynthesis generates for their own needs). If the solution is not aerated then the plants have to be supported somewhat above the solution so some of the root are exposed to air, allowing adequate gas exchange. This is somewhat like putting a cutting of a plant (like a philodendron) into water to allow it to root, but a more sophisticated (and healthier for the plant) technique that allows for healthy, long-term growth. However, one of the features of this sort of system is that the nutrient fluid stays put in the same container as the plant. It will need to be changed out periodically, such as when nutrient levels drop. Sub-types include “deep water” culture, where plants are suspended above a large reservoir, and “bubbleponics”, which is similar but an “airstone” pump to oxygenate the water, which generates lots of bubbles (as in an aquarium), hence the name.

In continuous flow solution culture the solution is pumped or passed continuously (hence the name) past the plant roots in a closed-loops system. This is seen in some commercial operations where a large reservoir or tank can serve thousands of plants and sampling and monitoring of the nutrients is largely automated. This is great if you have the capital for all that, which commercial operations do, and it can scale up nicely for mass production, but isn't always the best choice for small scale or home use.

Aeroponics is the technique where, instead of being rooted in a solid material or suspended in fluid plant roots are suspended in air and kept wet with a fine mist of nutrient fluids. This uses up to 65% less water than other hydroponic technique, which use less water than conventional dirt farming. So really, if you're worried about conserving water you want to look at this technique. Another advantage is that apparently any species of plant can be grown with this technique provided you fine-tune it for the species, unlike other hydroponic techniques as some plants just can't tolerate having their roots soaking wet all the time. NASA likes it not only because of the low mass and water requirements, but also because (apparently) it's easier to handle a mist in zero-g than liquids, at least for the purpose of growing stuff. The downside is the cost of the hardware both to support the plant stems (necessary even in microgravity to hold plants in place rather than floating all about, and on the ground to support them against gravity) and to atomize and handle the nutrient mist. As it happens, there is a commercially available aeroponic/hydroponic system (linked to earlier in this thread) for home use.

Non-Soil Agriculture 203: Aquaponics
Aquaponics combines hydroponics and fish farming. Basically, instead of mixing up chemicals to feed the plants you use fish poo as fertilizer. It is not, however, as simple as simply dumping fish poo into a hydroponic fluid. The system uses natural biological means (bacteria) to break down fish waste into a form more readily usable by the plants, which absorb what they need, which makes the water better for the fish to use. In other words, you're starting to replicate an ecosystem here. The fish can, if well selected, eat some of the plants for food, as well as human food waste (that's table scraps, not poo) while providing animal protein for the humans.

The fish part of the system, as noted, uses biological filtration and processing. I am guessing this is related to the biologically driven systems now quite common in fish tanks for the pet trade. The hydroponic portion can use any of a variety of techniques, such as ebb-and-flow, bubbleponics, and so forth.

This is a link to Growing Power, a aquaponics project in Milwaukee that has multiple goals, from employing and encouraging inner city youth to sustainable agriculture to local food production – in other words, exactly the sort of techno-agro project some people in this thread have advocated, but in a more positive way. The project provides both produce and fish to local restaurants and markets, which drives the choice of tilapia and perch as those are varieties not only suited to such a system but also commercially marketable. The hydroponics end is apparently passive irrigation coir and compost culture (compost being used to supplement what's produced from fish poo), but with some run-to-waste features in the poo-processing part. I note their fish do eat worms – I have to wonder if the worms are produced in compost, but they don't say. There is a commercial worm-farming niche in agriculture, have to wonder if they're incorporating worm farming into all this.

Anyhow, that should round out the basic tour. If I missed something feel free to mention it, or to ask questions.

[Zaune]

Can you recommend any good how-to guides for home hydro/aqua/aeroponics? I, ahem, know a guy who would really appreciate the help.

[Broomstick]

There's quite a bit out there, but I find a lot of it often pushes pre-made "systems" that are over-priced. On the other hand, starting with pre-mix nutrient is quite a bit easier than doing it yourself, if you have the money.

Would this guy have a particular direction in mind? Hobby? Food supply supplement? Does he have a budget? Space considerations? Small scale or large?

One complication is that all my information and sources are US based. I wouldn't know where to go to get supplies in the UK. I would advice avoiding the websites geared to growing marijuana hydroponically as that tends to attract the sort of attention I know I wouldn't like. You can get a start by googling a particular hydroponic technique, like "continuous flow perlite" or whatever. One thing's for sure, any web search will generate a lot of hits, the big problem is sifting through them all for quality information.

I am most familiar with ebb-and-flow gravel culture myself, because that's what I've done. Wouldn't mind trying other systems, but I don't have the capital.

[Norade]

When Alyrium Denyrle talks about this I respect his opinion, because he does the math, knows what's necessary and what isn't, and doesn't get all self-congratulatory about how much the 21st century is liable to suck because of overpopulation.

You, on the other hand, fail all these criteria. Badly. As far as I can tell, you have latched onto overpopulation and "get off this rock" as your excuse to propose horrors for shock value, and not much more. If you understood the scope of the problem, you wouldn't be so blithe about trying to solve it by killing people. If you had any historical perspective, or any grasp of human nature, ditto.

If you must ape your betters, don't try to look righteous by aping the ones trying to solve long term problems. It makes the people who actually have a shot of fixing them look bad.

He's also in a better position than I am to do that research and do that math. However it's obvious that both consumption and population must both decrease and both fairly sharply if we're to have a hope of fixing things.

Hell, no. I'm not a murderer by inclination.

I'd do it, it'd be tough and my criteria would likely not spare myself either, but 'd do it.

How else will cities get less congested easily? People won't stop driving, cities are often poorly laid out because city planning is anything but. How much nicer and more efficient would an entirely new city being built in Detroit's stead be? I'd guess a lot, I also know that while it's not cheap you could cut military funding and have it started and ended pretty quickly. Plus razing and rebuilding an entire city is sure to create jobs on a massive scale.

When has this been tried? When has it succeeded?

I'm not sure if it has ever been tried, but with even a fraction of the military's budget it should be possible. It might mean tent cities or the like for a while, but I think it could be done.

This is one that I actually care enough to do research on.

What does intercity kid 13 wearing gang colors and barely able to read or do math do for anybody? How is he not always going to be a net negative for himself and everybody around him? What about irredeemable crack head number 54 what's he doing? If it weren't for us caring just because their human than losing these types of people would be a net gain for everybody.

To be blunt, Norade, I don't trust your ability to figure out what a net negative for humanity looks like, because I'm not sure you understand humans well enough to have a right to form opinions on them.

Perhaps I don't, but tell me, who's adding more to society a college educated person who's trying to do good through robotics, or somebody peddling and smoking crack?

So... you'd kill thousands of people based on ill-informed media impressions of what the place they live in is like?

That and first hand accounts from people I know who got the hell out.

How is an extra $10 per year making anybody's life so much worse that it creates a distopia? That was where this started, this tangent grew out of me saying that no, I wouldn't care if the bottom third of each city that aren't simply cash starved college students suddenly went poof.

..."Went poof?" How antiseptic.

No, what you were saying was that you wouldn't mind millions of deaths, because you've concluded that they are poor and therefore useless subhumans.

Yes, when you kill lots of people it makes a dystopia worse. All this talk about "culling" makes it very obvious what you're talking about, and no one sane would trust your judgement on the issue after you've thrown the concept around so lightly and in combination with so much ignorance about the basic realities of the places and people you want to murder.

I'm not seeing a way to make things any better faster, though wealth redistribution from the mega rich would also likely be a good start and I've advocated that in the past as well. Frankly, I know that any quick fix is a pipe dream, but it doesn't mean it isn't worth talking about. I wasn't inclined to do research into this topic before this debate and now I'm actually interested to do so and see what a real solution might be like.

No, I'm not self sufficient yet, but my hope is that with my career choice that I can help advance robotics enough that I made up my part. If not I'd be happy enough trying to start a commune built around our own mini reactor where we grow our own food. Hell maybe we can even have robots do some of the most tedious work for us and have it even better.

Until you understand the realities of self-sufficiency, and of basic humanity, you would be well advised to be humble about the things you do not know. And to hesitate before proposing radical solutions.

If I don't know anything about medicine, I'm going to hesitate before proposing that someone do surgery using high explosives, even if I think it's a good idea- as well I should, because that would be stupid and evil. You would have done well to hesitate yourself, before proposing stupid and evil ideas when you're incapable of perceiving stupidity and evil because of your ignorance.

As much as I would push a button and make people go poof, I'd never actually get the chance to do it because, outside of nukes, no such button exists and any real means would fuck the world over. You act as if I don't know this because I think that there are a ton of worthless people in this world. I'd currently tag myself as one though I'm trying to get into a position to do some good in the world.

Can you see a way to fix the situation in the worst shit holes in the US? I sure as fuck don't see much working short term, nor do I see why the US needs to be such a shit hole compared to Canada and other nations that are peers to the states. How did these barbaric conditions not develop in the cities in Canada when they did just a few miles south?

Barbaric isn't "mass poverty." Barbaric is what you get when lunatics start killing people because they don't see a use for those people in their fantasy schemes of building towers to heaven or cities on the moon or bigger palaces for themselves.

You are poorly qualified to condemn barbarism. Civilization would die if the people responsible for running it thought like you.

What if instead I was less politically correct than usual and said Africa, India, and the Mid east was all that went poof? I bet we could resettle the land quickly enough to avoid anything like a societal collapse. Though it would need to be done in a way that the oil infrastructure stayed running through out.

You also mistake wishing these people would vanish with me actually believing that what I'm saying here is some great idea. I know damned well that it won't help much, but at this stage some places do so little for me that I'd be willing to try something drastic in hopes of it starting to fix things.

This, by itself, is proof that you don't know how to fix things: you are judging thousands by their worth to one person- you.

Notice that I've actually been asking how others would set the criteria yet nobody has set forth anything.

[Norade]

Anyway, it's clear that subdebate isn't going anywhere and is detracting from the actual discussion so I'm done with it

[Alyeska]

You rile people up and then leave when things get hot? Remember Norade, your on my watch list. Tread careful.

[Simon_Jester]

He's also in a better position than I am to do that research and do that math. However it's obvious that both consumption and population must both decrease and both fairly sharply if we're to have a hope of fixing things.

And you believe that you have standing to propose solutions to these problems, even knowing, even outright SAYING that you don't understand them?

Where else do you breezily suggest solutions to problems you don't understand? Surgery? Engineering? Art? Physics?

Hell, no. I'm not a murderer by inclination.

I'd do it, it'd be tough and my criteria would likely not spare myself either, but 'd do it.

And you call that virtue?

You lack the qualifications to do such a thing correctly, which means you shouldn't even consider doing it at all. And if you had the qualifications- again, a basic grasp of human nature and the way real societies work is a starting point... you wouldn't even consider doing it.

Because it can't be done correctly- the entire premise of "save civilization by killing billions of Designated Useless People" is wrong. You just haven't figured it out, and it's depressing that you even need to think about the question at all.

How else will cities get less congested easily? People won't stop driving, cities are often poorly laid out because city planning is anything but. How much nicer and more efficient would an entirely new city being built in Detroit's stead be? I'd guess a lot, I also know that while it's not cheap you could cut military funding and have it started and ended pretty quickly. Plus razing and rebuilding an entire city is sure to create jobs on a massive scale.

When has this been tried? When has it succeeded?

I'm not sure if it has ever been tried, but with even a fraction of the military's budget it should be possible. It might mean tent cities or the like for a while, but I think it could be done.

This is one that I actually care enough to do research on.

First look for evidence that it would be constructive; when you don't find it, that's the place to stop.

Don't look for evidence that it would be possible and then decide that it should be done. Your greatest weakness in social policy does not lie in your detachment from the realities of what can be done. It lies in your detachment from the realities of what will help solve the problems you think are so important.

What does intercity kid 13 wearing gang colors and barely able to read or do math do for anybody? How is he not always going to be a net negative for himself and everybody around him? What about irredeemable crack head number 54 what's he doing? If it weren't for us caring just because their human than losing these types of people would be a net gain for everybody.

To be blunt, Norade, I don't trust your ability to figure out what a net negative for humanity looks like, because I'm not sure you understand humans well enough to have a right to form opinions on them.

Perhaps I don't, but tell me, who's adding more to society a college educated person who's trying to do good through robotics, or somebody peddling and smoking crack?

Dunno. If the robotics buff is a sociopathic fool but is bright enough to shut up and follow the orders of other people who can figure out what a constructive role in society looks like... well, if he takes the right orders, he's contributing.

If the robotics buff then decides that the drug dealer is "expendable" because said drug dealer is not contributing... well, the robotics buff has stepped outside the bounds of the areas where they can contribute to civilization. Their (hypothetical) skill at designing automated systems does not translate into skill at social engineering, especially not if they are a sociopathic fool who doesn't see any importance in doing research before proposing to kill people and raze cities.

So... you'd kill thousands of people based on ill-informed media impressions of what the place they live in is like?

That and first hand accounts from people I know who got the hell out.

Have you actually asked any of them if it would be a good idea to kill all the people who didn't get the hell out?

Have any of them slapped you yet?

I'm not seeing a way to make things any better faster, though wealth redistribution from the mega rich would also likely be a good start and I've advocated that in the past as well. Frankly, I know that any quick fix is a pipe dream, but it doesn't mean it isn't worth talking about. I wasn't inclined to do research into this topic before this debate and now I'm actually interested to do so and see what a real solution might be like.

Hint: start by understanding human reactions. Then start trying to figure out large scale social behavior. The fact that you still think you can massacre your way to a better world is a sign that you don't understand the nature of humanity. And therefore you are not yet in a position to understand the nature of its problems, OR the nature of the solutions.

You cannot compare the solutions if you can't measure the cost-benefit figures... which you can't, because you do not understand humanity.

It may be the study of a lifetime to understand human behavior for you, with no chance to then move on to the broader fields of social engineering. If so, you would be wise to accept this gladly, for you will have at least learned something that improves the lives of you and those around you. Whereas if you go off half-cocked and try to figure out how to do social engineering when you don't understand the material you propose to engineer... that is foolish. You will learn something that you will predictably misapply if given the power to do so, and cause nothing but harm for anyone you touch.

In that case, the only saving grace is the low probability that you will manage to touch anyone.

As much as I would push a button and make people go poof, I'd never actually get the chance to do it because, outside of nukes, no such button exists and any real means would fuck the world over. You act as if I don't know this because I think that there are a ton of worthless people in this world. I'd currently tag myself as one though I'm trying to get into a position to do some good in the world.

It is a GOOD THING that you cannot push such a button, precisely because you are a sociopathic fool, who does not understand the consequences (because he is a sociopath), and is unable to realize that his ignorance is a problem (because he is a fool).

Barbaric isn't "mass poverty." Barbaric is what you get when lunatics start killing people because they don't see a use for those people in their fantasy schemes of building towers to heaven or cities on the moon or bigger palaces for themselves.

You are poorly qualified to condemn barbarism. Civilization would die if the people responsible for running it thought like you.

What if instead I was less politically correct than usual and said Africa, India, and the Mid east was all that went poof? I bet we could resettle the land quickly enough to avoid anything like a societal collapse. Though it would need to be done in a way that the oil infrastructure stayed running through out.

You're still wrong, and you're still detached from reality.

It's as if you were proposing to take up carpentry without knowing what wood is.

You also mistake wishing these people would vanish with me actually believing that what I'm saying here is some great idea. I know damned well that it won't help much, but at this stage some places do so little for me that I'd be willing to try something drastic in hopes of it starting to fix things.

This, by itself, is proof that you don't know how to fix things: you are judging thousands by their worth to one person- you.

Notice that I've actually been asking how others would set the criteria yet nobody has set forth anything.

You know why? Because this is not an easy question.

Ignoring the constant and powerful moral revulsion I get from what you're saying, it still seems pathetically naive that you would think people could just supply you with a set of criteria that could tell you which people deserve to live. Constructing such a set is not something everyone is qualified to do, and certainly not on the fly for the benefit of a random fool.

Indeed, I'd argue that it's not something anyone is qualified to do: no human being can fully appreciate which people are important, or the costs incurred when we start trying to divide humanity into worthy and unworthy groups.

But some of us are less flagrantly unqualified than others. As a rule, the more inclined someone is to commit mass murder, the less competent they prove to be at figuring out who to kill.

The people I'd trust with the lives of thousands are, as a rule, the ones who WOULDN'T decide to kill those people.

[Norade]

You rile people up and then leave when things get hot? Remember Norade, your on my watch list. Tread careful.

Would continuing to respond actually change anything or make this a better thread?

[madd0ct0r]

Thanks to Broomstick for the multi-ponics information. not something I've really thought about before, and now I'm wondering if i should get a fishtank for my back garden.

mmm, fresh fish.


Can anybody suggest a good reading primer for Norade? 'Herding Cats, Helping Humanity' or something similar.
The guy clearly wants to help, but is approaching the problem like he would, well, robots.

[Uncluttered]

Question – how do you clean the peastone? (I think around here your “peastone” is called “pea gravel”, which is what I'm using for my set up). I keep looking for more efficient means of doing this. Fortunately, for us water is “free” (we have a well, so it's just the cost of pumping it out of the ground) but it can be messy, particularly in quantity. Also, because we don't need roots going down our septic system we have to do this outside, which involves hauling all that rock around. I keep looking for better ways to do this.

I was wondering what you were feeding the fish. You've got quite a little ecology going there, haven't you? Are you planning to eat the catfish and tilapia, too?

Peastone, peagravel, potato, potAto. It looks like we are using the exact same growth medium.
My grow beds are made of 1/2 barrels. In other words, I slice a barrel, top to bottom.
The beds are in wooden cradles lying on saw horses.
I use a flood and drain system, because I think Nutrient film is too much work.
Also, deep flood and drain allows redworms.
The timing of the flood and drain is through a bell siphon.

I don't have to clean the gravel very often. That is the function of the redworms.
In fact, I have a pvc tube filled with compost sticking out of each bed to keep them active, and to add nutrients that fishpoop lacks.
You are right in saying it's an eco system. If I had a hydroponic system, I would have to periodically flush and sterilize nasty bacterial growth.
With an aquaponics system, the bacteria is constantly at war with other bacteria, and as long as you control oxygen, PH and nutrients, it's not a problem.
In fact the bacteria is essential to break down the fish poop into plant food.
Since I use peagravel, PH is also normalized. It's like the chiptanks in my labs.
Basically, the beds get cleaned when I move them, because I have to empty them into smaller containers to move them.

I don't have to sterilize the medium.
What I do clean from peagravel, is plant roots. I have a simple system.
Each plant in the bed is actually growing in a 2 liter bottle filled with peagravel.
(The bottle is actually cut in half, but I place top as a cloche for the seedling. So for this infodump, I will be talking about the bottom half of a two liter bottle)
The half bottle has holes cut into it for worms/nutrients/bacteria/fishpoop/water to enter, but small enough to contain (most) of the gravel.

When I harvest a plant, Instead of just pulling it up, I actually take out the entire bottle.
I dump out the plant and gravel onto a screen.
The gravel and some worms immediately fall through into a bucket. These get reused.
Some worms get stuck on the screen. These are fed to the fish.
The roots get stuck on the screen and composted.
I could just use a big shovel, bit this way doesn't disrupt nearby plants as much.

You with me so far? Good.

Now, back to the bed, I have a hole in the gravel where I dug out a bottle.
Into the hole, goes a bottle with seedling. The top of the bottle is loosely placed over as a cloche. I live in a cold climate.

The seedlings are sprouted on paper towels and placed on the gravel when they start rooting in the moist towel.
Since my lettuce seedlings are total wimps, I have 3 seedlings of lettuce sprouting at a time. The strongest gets planted, and the week ones become compost. I plan to use a different breed next year.
I admit I suck at this part, and need a better way to sprout them.

I stagger the crop, so that I have a head of lettuce ready every week.
For those of you lurking, Lettuce takes at least 4 weeks to get ready. I usually harvest at 6 weeks, or whenever a head is looking good enough.
1 head each week means I have 6 heads growing in the bed, and some seedlings on a shelf.

The fish tank, is also a barrel. Though It is a single barrel with a window cut in the top.
I plan on eating the tilapia, but I actually have a hard time directly killing things, so that's why I haven't done it yet.
The catfish is a working fish. I might eat him one day, but right now he's more useful culling the herd of goldfish. If I don't check the goldfish, they will breed fast enough to overload my biofilter (grow beds).

It's winter here, so the factory is inside a garage, just maintaining. I'm only using one grow bed. Much of the fish poopy water is going through a bucket-o-sawdust filter, and straight into the compost heap.

The fish are currently being fed with Purina fish chow, which is a little salty for some reason. I've run out of duckweed and microwaved insects.

Next year, when I build the polytunnel enclosure, I will be using the compost piles to heat the water, by circulating the water hose from the sump through it. If it doesn't stink up the place too much, I might even try to use it to increase the CO2 count.

The greenhouse should allow me to scale up and also not have to use fish chow.

Labor. I experiment too much, but If I didn't I estimate I could spend a lot less time on this.
However, I don't spend time alone on this. I have a 3 year old son, and this is regarded as family-time.

But If I wanted to save time......
1. I'd look into more automation. Looking into Garden arduino, 'Garduino" pic controller.
2. Measure moisture level with Garduino
3. Get a real ORP sensor instead of using PH strips. Again, monitored by a Garduino.
4. More fish tanks. One tank for fingerlings, one for fish eggs, one for mature fish. The tank usage would be rotated like the seedlings are.
5. Auto harvest the duckweed. Preserve it with dessication. I wouldn't have to resort to fish chow if I preserved in better.
6. Automatic temperature control. The thermal mass of the system is enough to protect it from cold and heat snaps, but it would be nice to automatically re-route some water through hoses embedded in a heat source, like a compost heap.
7. Flood sensor. Right now my flood and drain is with a bell syphon, which can get clogged. When clogged, the beds still have secondary drains, but the cycle gets screwed up, and the plants get too wet. A flood sensor would alert me to this. (moisture sensor uses resistance, and might not be able to tell the difference between very moist, and flooded)
8. Web camera. So I can plan the menu at work.
9. LOTS more water and Duckweed.

Lastly.
I completely agree that Norade is a sociopath and or a troll.
I disagree that he needs a book.
He needs a gene therapy to grow some oxytocin receptors.
I remember reading about a clinical trial at Columbia university involving the use of MDMA on people like him.
The results were hopeful!
So.....the nicest thing I can say, is that he might not be a douche bag his whole life.

(Note: The clinical trial at Columbia was government sanctioned, and I am not advocating the illegal use of a schedule one narcotic, or back alley gene therapy on Norade)

[Zaune]

I'm going to plead the European Union equivalent of the 5th Amendment with regards to exactly why my friends might find this useful. Budget is... complicated, shall we say? Space limitations I'm honestly not sure about, but will make sure to ask.

[Spoonist]

@Uncluttered
Thanks for the info dump. Lots of good stuff there.

[Broomstick]

I'm going to plead the European Union equivalent of the 5th Amendment with regards to exactly why my friends might find this useful. Budget is... complicated, shall we say? Space limitations I'm honestly not sure about, but will make sure to ask.

Hmmm.... well, this page has some basic info organized into broad areas, and the site also sells ready-to-go systems. If your friend is interested in good results quickly, and if he has the money, one of these ready-to-go systems might be the ticket, except they're from over here and he's over there. It is likely, though, that similar systems are available in your area, which would save shipping costs.

If there are budget limitations you can build your own system from scratch of course. It just takes a little more planning and know-how.

[Skgoa]

This thread inspired me to try hydroponics. I have neither much spare money nor space nor time, but I would like to do it as a very small scale experiment/hobby. (Like many german kids, I grew herbs in cotton batting back in primary school. )

So, lets see if I got this right:
I need a growing medium (or just water or air for advanced applications...), a nutritional fluid, enclosures for those two, a mechanism to apply the fluid to the medium at specific intervals and a light source running at specific intervals?
Can this be done in my kitchen or even my bedroom? I.e. does it produce an "odor" or is it to susceptible to the environment? Does the whole setup have to be covered? Do I need a special light? How much do I have to worry about contamination? Do I just have to clean the system after every "round" or do I have to treat fungi and bacteria as infectious deseases and constantly battle against them with antibiotics? Do the plants grow faster than when planted in soil?

Upon me telling him about this idea, my father recomended a pepper plant he got for his birthday. Apparently those are sold for ~6 euro as an almost fully grown plant (including soil) and need only water and sunlight for a couple of weeks to start growing peppers.
My plan is to use such a plant as the starting point for an incremental build-up of the system and my know-how. I.e. I would start by adding an automatic lighting and watering system, before using the seeds to start the hydroponic operation.

So, what methods should I use? I don't plan on being cost effective or getting a high yield for now, I want to start with the "easiest"/least complex system. My natural tendency to tinker and my latent perfectionism will drive up quality once I have the basics down.

[Broomstick]

This thread inspired me to try hydroponics. I have neither much spare money nor space nor time, but I would like to do it as a very small scale experiment/hobby. (Like many german kids, I grew herbs in cotton batting back in primary school. )

Sounds like you might already have some experience, then!

I need a growing medium (or just water or air for advanced applications...), a nutritional fluid, enclosures for those two, a mechanism to apply the fluid to the medium at specific intervals and a light source running at specific intervals?

Correct.

Can this be done in my kitchen or even my bedroom? I.e. does it produce an "odor" or is it to susceptible to the environment? Does the whole setup have to be covered? Do I need a special light? How much do I have to worry about contamination? Do I just have to clean the system after every "round" or do I have to treat fungi and bacteria as infectious deseases and constantly battle against them with antibiotics? Do the plants grow faster than when planted in soil?

Yes, it can be done in a kitchen or bedroom. Assuming you don't have a fungus outbreak or something the odor is on par with potted houseplants or an aquarium. It's not that susceptible to the environment although nutrient fluid constantly exposed to light will grow algae so you'll want the reservoir either light proof or wrapped in something lightproof (I use aluminum foil to wrap mine).

You need either sunlight or a reasonable fascimile, preferably 12-16 hours a day. If you locate it near a window you can use natural light, but in winter you may need a supplemental full-spectrum light. These are readily available for indoor plants of all sorts.

You want to start off with everything clean, a lot of people sanitize the equipment with either bleach or hydrogen peroxide solutions. You're not going to keep everything completely sterile, so don't sweat too hard over it, especially since you're in the experimenting stage.

Upon me telling him about this idea, my father recomended a pepper plant he got for his birthday. Apparently those are sold for ~6 euro as an almost fully grown plant (including soil) and need only water and sunlight for a couple of weeks to start growing peppers.
My plan is to use such a plant as the starting point for an incremental build-up of the system and my know-how. I.e. I would start by adding an automatic lighting and watering system, before using the seeds to start the hydroponic operation.

In general, plants don't do well going from soil to hydroponics due to transplant shock, so if you're going to do a hydroponic set up best to start from seed. However, using a potted plant to work out an automatic watering system and lighting does have some merit. I will note, however, that hydroponic plants need to be watered several times a day at a minimum, whereas most potted plants do fine being watered every few days.

So, what methods should I use? I don't plan on being cost effective or getting a high yield for now, I want to start with the "easiest"/least complex system. My natural tendency to tinker and my latent perfectionism will drive up quality once I have the basics down.

If you want to really start slow and easy, start with just one plant. Get two containers, one to hold the growth medium and plant, the other to act as nutrient reservoir. You'll need some tubing to connect them, as well as gaskets and sealants. You'll need growth media, and nutrients. Also, unless you're home all the time, a timer and pump.

I've used container as small as 4 liter size plastic jugs, cut down to maybe 2 liter capacity. You can, if you want, start even smaller. You need something big enough to hold your plant, remembering that roots need some room, too, and maybe a couple cm deeper than that. You really don't want excessive depth, as it just requires you to fill it with more fluids. As a general rule of thumb, you want things that are either food grade or suitable for live animals, so find an aquarium supply store. You can obtain tubing, aquarium gravel, and a pump there (it may not be the absolute cheapest source, but it will all be in one place and the items won't be leaching poisons into the system). You can also obtain silicon aquarium sealant, again, compatible with living creatures (follows instructions - most require curing times before use of sealed item).

Make a hole just large enough for the tubing at the bottom of your plant container. Attach tubing and seal joint. Fill the container within 2-3 cm of the top with your gravel. If the seed you're using is fairly large you can just plant it in the gravel. If it's small you may want to sprout it first, then transfer it.

You will then need to figure out, based on what you have acquired, how the pump fits into the system and how it hooks up to everything. You will need the pump to send fluid from the reservoir, which is placed lower than the plant pot, up into the pot. You can fill it from the top (requiring a hose to go up there) and just let it passively drain from the bottom, or force fluid up from the bottom until it's full, then let it drain back.

Time you will have to work out - I've had set ups that only require twice a day cycles, and others that required more. Currently, mine requires 4 ebb-and-flow cycles per day. You don't want the plants to drown, and you don't want them to dry out, either. So that will require some experimenting on your part. Smaller pots might require more frequent cycles. Different growth media have different water retaining capabilities. This is one area where a pre-made system is easier because these details have already been worked out for you.

Now, for nutrients - you can buy commercial mix. That is the easiest method, and it is the one most likely to yield good results. It does tend to cost some money, though. Or, if you're me, you can use fertilizers like Miracle-Gro. The purists, of course, scream at that notion. Honestly, you will not get maximum yield from that sort of thing, it's not formulated for hydroponics, but the plants will grow. (I'm fortunate in that my well water supplies some minerals lacking in that formula, and it is possible to supplement further although there will be some things in it not usable by your plants because it relies on soil bacteria to make it bioavailable). Because of the inadequacies of the mix, and because I lack truly sophisticated testing equipment, I discard the nutrient fluid about every two weeks to eliminate waste products, minimize growth of bad stuff like unwanted algae and fungus, and to replenish the nutrient supply. It's not efficient but it works and it's relatively cheap. (If we expand and continue our current garden we will look into better alternatives, some of which only make sense if you need large quantities. The stuff does, after all, go bad if you leave it sit as stuff grows in it, since it's food)

Congratulations, you now have your very own ebb-and-flow gravel culture set up.

Start small, just one or a few plants, then expand if you enjoy it. Small systems require less capital and are easier to set up and/or dismantle. Don't be surprised if everything up and dies on you the first time you try to start such a system (usually, with these, it's because you're not cycling the fluid often enough and the plants die out). If you get fungus you'll need ot dismantle and sanitize everything. Otherwise, I'd dismantle and sanitize after harvest, also removing old roots and such. That's another reason for starting small - cleaning gravel isn't bad on a small scale, but it can rapidly become an exercise and strength in endurance when you're talking about significant quantities.