Skepticism, Optimism and Magnanimity
One of Wendell Berry’s 11 points in his definition of agrarianism deals with equipment and technology — which is the focus of this issue of Acres U.S.A. He writes that agrarians rightly express “A lively suspicion of anything new. This contradicts the ethos of consumerism and the cult of celebrity. It is not inherently cranky or unreasonable.”
It is right to be skeptical of new technology. There are many in our own community who have spent centuries thinking about and trying to prudently apply the ideal of self- (or community-) imposed limits on what we should adopt.
In my opinion piece in this issue, I share some of my thoughts on why it is self-evidently correct — and important — to distrust that which is novel.
However, in this short space, I’d like to focus on the last few words in Berry’s statement: that agrarians (those of us in the regenerative agriculture space) are not “inherently cranky or unreasonable.”
Contra what you will (hopefully!) read in the opinion section this month, I’m actually quite a techno-optimist when it comes to a number of different issues. See, for example, this month’s eco-update, where we report on new technologies that allow researchers and growers to measure living things in real time. Particularly exciting, I believe, is the field of dendrology, which allows the instant measurement of trees or fruits down the micrometer level. This may enable growers, for just a few hundred dollars, to easily monitor the effects of weather and of their foliar inputs and irrigation.
On a much larger scale, I’m on the side of the spectrum that believes that the way to combat climate change is not by trying to convince (or force) everyone to emit less CO2. Like agrarianism, this is an idea that I personally adhere to and that I try to influence others to adopt, but I don’t have any expectation that more than a small remnant of people will ever do so. It is far more likely that a solution will come from technological innovation.
Consider just two of the nine innovations we discuss in this month’s feature article: sulfur burners and reverse osmosis systems. Each acts to reduce water hardness (sulfur burners for irrigation water and RO for foliar feeding) and can dramatically improve the effectiveness of fertilizer inputs. These innovations thus reduce the need for additional inputs, which will in turn reduce CO2 output.
On an even larger scale, technologies that seem extremely complex can play a key role in both climate efforts and in building national resiliency. Here I have in mind nuclear energy. If we want to get to zero carbon, and if we want to maintain energy resilience — consider right now the situation of France, which produces 70 percent of its power via nuclear, compared to Germany, which foolishly chose to become reliant on Russia for natural gas — then it’s not “inherently cranky or unreasonable” to keep nuclear on the table.
Back to farming: whether you farm one acre or 10,000 — or if you work with or for government to develop agricultural policy — the way you think about technology has never been more important. Be simultaneously skeptical, optimistic and magnanimous (the opposite of cranky!).
And that’s the view from the country.
