The whole book is informative and very depressing at the same time. However, I think we need to face reality and stop denying the wrongness of today's meat processing practices (at least those of factory farming).
As Paul McCartney puts it: "If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian."
Maybe I missed the point, but I thought that McCartney's point had to do with witnessing the distress (and the killing) of the animals, not with the specific practices.
So I thought that if you're willing to kill the animal yourself, then maybe you're able to condone the slaughterhouses even if you see them through a glass wall
(maybe it will diminish your appetite, though :P - I wouldn't want to see it while eating!).
You are forgetting the huge subsidies that further hide the real cost of meat from the consumer.
Raising animals is such an inefficiant way to farm food, people seldom question this. Unless you can't use the land for anything else. There simply isn't enough land to go around.
Agreed, and such subsidies tend to prop up factory farming operations, not small operations. In fact, the government makes life quite difficult for small farmers (again, read Salatin).
I know this is the situation in some fertile & densely populated countries, such as the Netherlands.
In other places, such as here in Austria for example, nobody is going to use the alpine pastures that cows graze on for growing anything else.
I am pretty sure it is the same in Switzerland and Bavaria, and probably other mountainous regions such as in Japan and Greece (although the grazing livestock in these places might not be cattle).
Said alpine pastures don't allow for a large quantity of cows, though.
And you Austrians really have to care for the cows in winter (prepare some sheltered and warm barns, with feed - I've been there, and was surprised at how easy we Uruguayans have it with our cows)
It's what they don't deny that still worries me. I was hoping that the family being consumed by the lagoon was a non truth. I read it as tragic comedy (shame on me)
It shows you how big operations can go wrong, if safeguards are not put in place. The numbers here are mind numbing, this is collossal murder.
There has been a series of programmes on industrial modern farming on the bbc recently in the UK. Which focussed on the best parts of technological innovation in farming. Whereas this article exposes all that's wrong with factory farming.
As an Englishman I find it hard to comprehend the scale of things in the states. It horrifies me. The London circular felt huge to me, until I witnessed a freeway. Now it appears small and the cars look like toys.
We had the BSE outbreak in the UK, which has led to a change in consumer opinion. BSE was reportedly a result of canibalism. Recyling your outputs to inputs is a nice idea, but it's risky practice.
There's no mention of the quality of life these pigs are living. My uncle used to run a small factory pig farm in the UK and that was horrendous enough. That put me off of pork. Later working at an egg farm ensured that, I no longer ate eggs or chicken. There is something incredibly powerful about seeing things first hand. Animals deserve a better life than that, they surely deserve to see daylight.
The computer industry, has it's own issues with energy usage and pollution. The silicon valleys are known for poisoning rivers. There are parallels here. Consumeres need to be aware, to put pressure on industry. We can be ethical consumers, we can vote with our wallets. We can speak out, against injustices and barbaric practices.
Hacker news is full of talk about start ups and web entrapaneurs. Money is not the be all and end all. There is a social and environmental dimension to every business.
If the article does not shock you, or fill you with bile, then alas I feel there is something inherently wrong with you.
I do not delight in discovering injustices, whether it's Ethiopian farmers getting ripped off for the price of coffee or animals suffering. And I have a compulsion to put these injustices right, if I can. Though sometimes our impulses can blind our moral judgement.
I read a book that was published over a decade ago, that reported that every one of North America's great lakes had been overly polluted. A lot of the world's seas have been overfished, there are many dead zones, look on Google Earth.
You'd hope that with the advancement of science and the freedom of knowledge we could become a better race of people. This really saddens me. I believe the hacker spirit, is one that aims for solutions (possibly perfection), and I hope that that same spirit is well concidered and respectful.
> I read a book that was published over a decade ago, that reported that every one of North America's great lakes had been overly polluted.
Things change in a decade.
> The silicon valleys are known for poisoning rivers.
While fabs are full of toxic things and some of the disposal early on was suboptimal (I'm still waiting for the Sunnyvale city govt to create its own Love Canal by grabbing some of this land for housing), "silicon valleys" have not poisoned rivers.
And no, that's not a metaphor. A metaphor is an analogy between thoughts, ideas, or things.
If you're not correct on the details that I can check/know personally ....
> Some pollution or environmental damage takes years or centuries to recover from. Desertification and top soil erosion for example.
Whether or not that's true, your claim was about the great lakes.
> What are you arguing?
I'm pointing out that your claims have been false. When someone points that out, you respond with different claims as if that somehow justifies things. It doesn't. (Neither does good intentions.)
> My point was that electronic waste has a high environmental cost, probably more so than farming.
One can make that point without engaging in falsehoods. You didn't bother and don't seem to understand why that's relevant. You don't even seem to care about getting things right.
Water pollution is defined as a change in the chemical, physical and biological health of a waterway due to human activity.
I do not think I have stated any falsehoods. If I have supply counter evidence, rather than just poo pooing me.
The reference to the great lakes was that it was a classic and very well known example of human pollution. And that was a main theme of the article.
The Silicon valley reference was to highlight the huge environmental impact of the high tech industry. That may be in North America, or India. If they have cleaned up the industry in recent times, then that is great, have they?
> Water pollution is defined as a change in the chemical, physical and biological health of a waterway due to human activity.
True, but that doesn't make your claim about the Great Lakes true.
> The Silicon valley reference was to highlight the huge environmental impact of the high tech industry.
Silicon Valley isn't the high tech industry. It is a specific place in California.
As I suggested you're arguing "the truth of my claims doesn't matter because I mean well." That's both wrong and counter-productive for both your credibility and your cause.
> That may be in North America, or India.
In other words, you have no idea if it actually happened.
Why do people comment? Perhaps it's because they can. People can say what they like. But I still have to filter it. And that wastes my time.
I like threads and tree like comments as it can be interesting to see the ideas and feedback at play. But sometimes I think it would be far better if the comments remained completely on topic.
The problem is good jeurnalism is inherently difficult. I resist writing blog posts because I'd spend too long on a post. As a teacher I'd spend a day at least on a hand out. And a post requires listening to feedback and fine tuning it. That's great if you have an informed receptive audience.
If I do ever bother with a blog, I think I'd ask for my desired feedback. I'd like users to submit links to relavant associated content.
I do enjoy a 'good' article about programming, I specifically like to hear about people's mistakes.
Is this what the up arrow is for? I'd rather, insightful, funny, factual. Posting for consensus is pretty pointless in my opinion. Not that it's particularly obvious what that arrow is for in the first place.
Great article. Reminds me of the dogs in Sri Lanka. What I couldn't work out - was whether they were being looked after and by whom. I don't think they were aggressive though.
It has been haphazard up till now version to version. And the themes never feel totally cohesive.
Why have different logos for xubuntu and edubuntu etc, why the different names? Why not have Ubuntu education edition. Or Ubuntu light instead?
Perhaps they should have poured money into gnome instead. And concentrated on the logo.
Instead it looks, as other people have commented, like a bastard child of OSX and windows.
Just pay a good designer. And keep it simple.