The Permaculture Fail

Discussion in 'The big picture' started by 9anda1f, Aug 24, 2014.

  1. 9anda1f

    9anda1f Administrator Staff Member

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    https://www.resilience.org/stories/2014-08-21/the-permaculture-fail

    I think that many of the comments to this article strike to the core of the author's unrealistic expectations. For instance:

    What do you think about the author's premise?
     
  2. mischief

    mischief Senior Member

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    I'm coming to the conclusion that there is a missed point in all of this.
    We concern ourselves too much with what we need and want and how each of us is right in our beliefs.
    The missed point is what does the future need ....from us.
     
  3. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    I think he has no idea wtf he is talking about, and it reminds me of the bullshit NY Times article about a "Permaculture Farm" in Pennsylvania that had NOTHING to do with Permaculture.
     
  4. matto

    matto Junior Member

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    Hopefully you listened to the podcast before slinging shit.



    "I am arguing for us to build economies of scale around permaculture. This isn't the only solution, and it isn't perfect, and it's not sufficient, but it has several features that are interesting. 1. It is perfectly under our control to do. There is no law, no regulation, no cultural norm, that is stopping us. We don't need to ask permission, or wait for the government to fund our grant proposal. All we have to do is organize and do it. Our somewhat market economy is fairly well-suited for it, in fact. 2. We don't have to adopt all the unappealing aspects of corporations. We can care for land and people, share ownership in our business ventures, and vote democratically on our leadership and management decisions".

    His follow up podcast https://agroinnovations.com/blog/2014/08/20/understanding-economies-of-scale/
     
  5. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    Not at all.

    It was asked of us, what I thought of his premise, I find it flawed on a lot of ways that would have me speaking a lot of latin. For example:



    Lastly False Analogy, I have to make $90,000 (or more) to be successful.


    That is why I did not go further, I am going to drink some red wine and think of Markos. I miss him.
     
  6. 9anda1f

    9anda1f Administrator Staff Member

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    Thank you for your comments ... here is one key aspect I'm taking exception to:

    The basis of the author's premise is that folks using Pc to design their lives aren't making a living wage. But this is in the face of our energy slaves (oil based machinery) which are able to produce enormous quantities of mono-crop foods at an apparently "cheap" price, a result of the economies of scale mentioned in Matto's quote from the podcast. In other words, it seems to me the author is arguing that for Permaculture to "succeed", we must "grow into" large scale enterprises that can compete within the existing international economy ... I'm keying on the growth, compete, and (existing) economy aspects of his argument. This is, countering the thought from Albert Einstein, the path of using the mindset that created the problem to solve the problem.

    I would propose that we (Permaculturists) are not here to compete within the existing system, rather design the foundations of a new system that changes the entire paradigm from "separate and at war with nature" to "integrated and in-concert with nature". The existing system is based upon competition ... we are looking to move towards cooperation. These changes cannot come from the top-down. Each individual must at a personal level awaken and adopt a life-path aligned with the planetary systems within which we exist, which defines a bottom-up "movement". The one overarching principle behind this is that we, as a species, must consciously change the ways we operate on our planet, which can only happen one individual at a time. Given the success of Geoff Lawton's general outreach and PDC instruction I would suggest that Permaculture is, in fact, succeeding at a phenomenal pace!
     
  7. eco4560

    eco4560 New Member

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    Obviously they didn't get to the social and financial models chapter of the Designers manual before they gave up….
     
  8. matto

    matto Junior Member

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    Another podcast from Frank Aragona to keep the conversation going, https://agroinnovations.com/blog/2014/08/22/just-wait-for-the-collapse/

    "What I am proposing, however, are permaculture enterprises that are scalable based on pooled efforts and resources. As I have already said, economies of scale are basically natural law. Failure to execute is our own fault. Lack of good business and economic data, our own fault. A scarcity of polyculture input-ouput models, our own fault. Undercapitalized permaculture enterprises…yeah, that’s partly our fault too" Unless we want to see permaculture as fringe philosophy.

    I will endeavour to listen to his latest podcasts and see where he is coming from, and give a better response here.

    Frank himself responded that his title of Permaculture Fail was intentional to create a response. His podcasts have given me some good insights, well worth subscribing to. Darrens talk on Regenerative Permaculture is just one of them, and Frank has been heavily involved with Holistic Management and the larger scale food production systems, so this might indicate the scale he is working at.

    Such an amazing resource is the Agroinnovations podcast.... https://agroinnovations.com/podcast/2009/08/31/episode-62-whole-systems-design-with-ben-falk/
    his thinking is not a stand alone system but part of a whole, try Ghandian Economics for an elaboration on earlier thinking and a nod to what I believe is permaculture economics as much as what Markos was looking towards a government for permaculture communities, where the philosophy should be imbedded in the greater whole
    ...
    https://agroinnovations.com/podcast...gandhian-economics-with-george-mokray-part-i/
     
  9. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    He missed the nation building portion of his PDC.

     
  10. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    Permaculture doesn't fail people, people fail at Permaculture. :(
     

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