[ExI] Regulation vs. Freedom

Technotranscendence neptune at superlink.net
Mon Jul 16 10:15:48 UTC 2007


On Sunday, July 15, 2007 6:11 PM Damien Broderick thespike at satx.rr.com
wrote:
>> I am interested in what happens when the recycling
>> promoters become aware that watering lawns actually
>> saves water, or more precisely, recycles water.  If we
>> pull water out of wells and the river, irrigate lawns and fill
>> swimming pools, the water evaporates, then goes into
>> the atmosphere to fall again, thus being recycled using
>> nature's tools: sunlight and plants.  What do we tell the
>> children, who have been indoctrinated that watering lawns
>> hurts Mother Earth?
>
> You're being a bit naughty here, Spike. Extensive
> monocropping is not a great idea anyway, and besides
> the water has often been gathered at considerable cost--
> building dams, pipes, pumps, powering it all, venting heat
> and pollutants, etc; yes, the water evaporates and falls, but
> often not where it's needed; more importantly if the water's
> coming from an ancient aquifer, you're also wasting your
> birthright on a mess of boring foliage.

Partly agreed.  The real problem is that water collection and
distribution is either a public utility or heavily regulated.  If people
experienced the true costs of water-usage -- e.g., in the US, farming in
the Southwest is so intensive mostly because of massive federal
subsidies for water reclamation -- they would likely use it more
frugally...  Or, if they were willing to pay the costs, this would spur
on better methods of collection and distribution.  (E.g., in the
California, much of the water for farming is shipped around in open air
canals -- meaning a huge amount of it evaporates.  If the subsidy
disappeared, maybe farming would shift to other locations or maybe
people would start economizing on how to ship it around to avoid
evaporation.  (And evaporation loss here means more water must be sent
than is received, putting more pressure on, e.g., rivers, lakes, and
aquifers.))

In the end, as always, the solution is clear: dismantle all governments.
:)

Regards,

Dan




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