Comments on: Agriculture or Permaculture: Why Words Matter

By: Snippets on Enclosure « Rugged Indoorsman

Snippets on Enclosure « Rugged Indoorsman — Sun, 04 May 2008 01:49:05 +0000

[…] In other words, we’ll never know if it was sustainable because it was superseded so quickly by the patently unsustainable methods that have just about taken us into the twenty-first century. But here’s where we point out that ’sustainable agriculture’ is a contradiction in terms, and something Toby’s People never tire of reminding us: that organic farmers created the sand-blasted wasteland of the Middle East all the way to the Dust Bowl in 1930’s America, and that monocropping agriculture is a recipe for soil exhaustion like running a car engine in a garage is a recipe for carbon monoxide poisoning (read Agriculture or Permaculture: Why Words Matter) […]

By: Terms of Subsistence | Urban Scout: Rewilding Cascadia

Terms of Subsistence | Urban Scout: Rewilding Cascadia — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 01:39:04 +0000

[…] Jason wrote an article on the subject, and now I completely understand Jasons frustration with the impressions about […]

By: The Edge of Grace » The Ecology of Success

The Edge of Grace » The Ecology of Success — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 02:04:47 +0000

[…] meant by agriculture versus other forms of cultivation. Jason Godesky of Anthropik illustrates it thus: A few years ago, my mother began gardening in her backyard. She grows tomatoes, zucchini, and […]

By: The Edge of Grace » The Ecology of Success

The Edge of Grace » The Ecology of Success — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 02:04:47 +0000

By: Urban Scout: Rewilding Cascadia » Blog Archive » Agriculture Vs. Rewilding

Thu, 06 Dec 2007 07:56:08 +0000

[…] have written about it in a way that I don’t feel needs improvement, most notably my friend Jason Godesky from the Tribe of Anthropik. Though I see the value of writing something “in my own […]

By: The Anthropik Network » A Short History of Western Civilization

The Anthropik Network » A Short History of Western Civilization — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 18:18:02 +0000

[…] can hardly escape the unsustainability of agriculture, cultivation by means of catastrophe. Tilling, the act from which the word “agriculture” etymologically derives, acts as an […]

By: The Anthropik Network » The Nature of Cities

The Anthropik Network » The Nature of Cities — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 15:44:48 +0000

[…] A crucial distinction divides agriculture from permaculture, namely, the kind of change they effect on their environments. Agriculture cultivates by means of catastrophe, while permaculture (or horticulture) cultivates by means of succession. We can see the clearest difference in their ecological impacts: the first farmers turned the vast cedar forests of Iraq into the desert wasteland we know today, while Indian permaculturalists created the Amazon rainforest and the Great Plains. We can see examples of Indian civilizations, such as the Mexica (Aztec) already mentioned in the quote from Derrick Jensen. But notably, those civilizations did not take part in the great ecological terraforming projects that their tribal, permacultural neighbors undertook. They, like civilizations in the Old World, also created deserts. Why do we find this consistent behavior? […]

By: Jason Godesky

Jason Godesky — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 13:48:24 +0000

I know what you were referring to, that was obvious. And no, I haven’t found much on the internet about them, either. But Quinn deals with very general concepts. He doesn’t deal with exceptions or many nuances, and as an anthropologist, he often confuses things a lot more than are necessary (e.g., “totalitarian agriculture,” as above).

By: Taylor

Taylor — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 02:22:47 +0000

I was referring to the reference Daniel Quinn about the Gebusi that he discusses in the “Story of B.” I won’t argue with you about the Gebusi–I haven’t been able to find much on the Internet about them.

By: Jason Godesky

Jason Godesky — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 03:38:41 +0000

Quinn, in general, is a lousy anthropologist, and New Guinea is a very varied place. You have out-and-out hunter-gatherers in New Guinea, like the Fore, and you have agricultural people, like you find in the highlands, and everything in between. The Gebusi, if I recall correctly, are actually hunter-gatherers. They don’t keep livestock, or do much horticulture at all.