About conventional farming, poop and two philosophies of human health
August 11, 2021•332 words
I recently read a concept from an organic hydroponic startup that said the concept of organic farming is to fertilise the soil, whereas conventional farming fertilises the plant.
Conventional fertilisers contain the nutrients necessary to make the plant green, lush or fruiting, as the requirements might be.
Organic fertilising seeks to return the soil to its natural state. Which, I believe, is rich in poop or something. I don't know. I need to review the material.
Anyway.
Conventional fertilising requires that the nutrients be fed directly to each batch of plants, and it leaves the soil deprived of nutrients.
Organic fertilising just pumps poop into the soil (don't take my word for it) and then the plants extract what they need, generation after generation.
This struck me as parallel with the idea of human health.
On one hand, the philosophy is to see what lacks in the human body and then pump in the necessary nutrients or drugs as the need may be.
On the other hand, the philosophy is to provide the body with a rich mix of nutrients that it needs, and let the cells take what they need for the various growth and healing requirements.
The problem with the conventional approach is that we only know what we know, and we only know a bit of what we don't know (these are the areas of ongoing research).
We don't know what we don't know, and this is a huge blind spot to the "patch and repair" philosophy.
The more "organic" approach is to study healthy societies and see what they historically consumed. This leads to the "discovery" of superfoods and the like.
Although according to the conventional philosophy (which is maybe just a century old), it doesn't matter what you're eating as long as you get the right medicines and supplements, according to the organic philosophy (thousands of years old), it matters very much.
Are you eating well? What are you eating and why are you eating it?