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Darwinism is the least likely explanation of evolution. Randomness? Take a look at how some species evolved in parallel to similar organisms; one was extremely unlikely, two or more is impossible. Darwin was quite foolish, but he had friends in the right places. Just another flat-earth belief.

As for the DMT, there's only one way to find out. One grain of pure DMT in a pipe and get your answers.


Perpetual motion machines. We heard it before. Controlled fusion, free energy, bla bla bla, bullshit, more bullshit, and a bit mor bullshit. Ohh look! The Santa Claus !


Could you please not post like this? We're here for thoughtful and informative discussion.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html


> I wonder where everything went so wrong.

Easiest question in the world: monopoly (goes under the name 'intellectual property.)


> I wouldn't worry about this one -- unless foreign investors have a means to enforce physical security of their ownership claims, there's always the option of the government with control over the physical assets to expropriate them

That isn't a good scenario. Foreign? There were no white men in america, no black men either, so everyone is a foreigner, and the natives should expropriate them all? Dangerous ideas. That's how a war turns into a nightmare.


I believe it isn't a good scenario for precisely the opposite reasons.


Exactly, we are eating oil and gas. Once the spigot slows down, things get ugly real fast. This is going to make the great depression and ww2 look small in comparison. Buckle your seat belt, and grow unusual edible species. I don't even eat grains, humans aren't equipped to eat that.


Humans are very much equipped to eat grains, we built agriculture, and thus the whole of civilization, on top of cereal grains like rice, wheat, and corn. Grains are the staples of most cultures.

What are you talking about? Some hand-wavy paleo theory that isn't scalable?


Eh, some folks sincerely believe that grains need to be consumed as sprouts or (some other mitigating form) because the phytic acid or whatever is hard on the digestive tract.

I wouldn't go so far as to say they're not edible, but criticism of grains doesn't seem like outright crazy talk either.


"Some folks" sincerely believe vaccines cause autism. "Some folks" believe the earth is flat.

I don't care what "some folks" beliefs are, I care about the ground truth.

It doesn't take a lot of equipment to deduce that billions of people eating grains consistently over the course of millenia means that people are in fact well equipped to eat grains.


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4809873/

"Bread and Other Edible Agents of Mental Disease

how cereal grains—the world’s most abundant food source—can affect human behavior and mental health. We present the implications for the psychological sciences of the findings that, in all of us, bread (1) makes the gut more permeable and can thus encourage the migration of food particles to sites where they are not expected, prompting the immune system to attack both these particles and brain-relevant substances that resemble them, and (2) releases opioid-like compounds, capable of causing mental derangement if they make it to the brain. A grain-free diet, although difficult to maintain (especially for those that need it the most), could improve the mental health of many and be a complete cure for others."


The truth is we are only just now beginning to understand the impact of food on health and we have tons more to learn.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semmelweis_reflex

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis


I provided some evidence (billions of people have been eating many kinds of grains since the dawn of agriculture).

The Semmelweis effect is regarding rejecting new evidence -- and yet you provide no evidence, while dismissing mine.

Perhaps you should question your beliefs.


One counter-argument to agriculture is Jared Diamond's classic article: "The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race"

http://discovermagazine.com/1987/may/02-the-worst-mistake-in...


His counterpoint appears to apply only to individuals and small bands; without density we never achieve industry, which brings us, well, the modern world and all its medicine, internet, refrigeration ... satellite-based forewarning of enormous storms and time to prepare against those and other existential threats to large areas.

People live to be 100 and happy and productive on largely grain-based diets, not thanks to the grain, but thanks to the modern world it allows. Pre-grain, we didn't live so long.

On balance I think grains are a no-brainer. Maybe there is some extraordinarily minor benefit to the individual not to eat grains, but, obviously, in light of the past 10,000 years of history, grains are fine for you and will keep you both alive and happy.


All of the massive 'at scale' operations are going to turn into dust bowls. 'Small operations' will mean those people do not starve to death. Vegetable prices will make gold look cheap. Grow food anywhere you can, we all have to become farmers now to avoid a very bad situation, where the only thing to eat is other people.


Grow food anywhere you can

I have been wondering why there isn't a mandate that every tree on public land must be food-producing. In a day I must pass hundreds if not thousands of non-edible trees and shrubs just lining pavements, dotted about on business parks, on little bits of nowhere-ville grassland.

If they can grow so readily, why couldn't food producing plants grow like that, in their millions all over the country?


Not quite; the greatest crisis humanity has ever faced is upon us. Trickles down into farming, and everything else. We are just getting started.


This sort non-evidence-based apocalypse talking, fear mongering isn't my favorite part of HN. I wish you could base your claims to some links, or books.


Yep. All public property and govt granted leases forego capital depreciation. Since most of the planet falls in this category, it is being plundered while only accounting for the sale of the bounty, without considering the loss of real capital (old forest, clean river/ocean/lake, etc). And a dollar/franc/baht/pound is a mass measure unit of gold. And a BTC is debt (promise of future computation) without a creditor, which ultimately means it is worth nothing, when the price forbids the ponzi from going on.


Typo: debt without a debtor.


Emitting toxic gases into the atmosphere is a crime against others. Therefore, using (most) internal combustion engines is a crime. We have a lot of criminals today.


The 'Dune' series by F.Herbert, and continuation by his son. God emperor of dune is definitely worth reading up to.


I started "Dune" in January and am now nearing the end of "Chapterhouse: Dune". The series as a whole is so chock full of amazing wisdom and meditations on what it means to be human and how far we can stretch humanity until it becomes unrecognizable, but it gets there so slowly that the teachings kind of creep up on you in the end.

Cannot recommend the series enough. So sad that I'm reaching the end of Frank Herbert's part of the legacy, interested to see how Brian Herbert continued it.


Totally agree. Also recommend the audiobooks, which I've been listening to for these summer road trips!


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