The cheer up thread.

[Haighus]

Speaking of pigs, they are actually an excellent way of converting inedible vegetable waste to edible meat, so any genuinely sustainable food plan should include them. This is the main problem I have with the whole 'meat isn't sustainable argument', like yes in some cases it is very true, especially where animals are being grazed on arable farmland or fed with grains that are fit for human consumption. But that is not universal or even necessary in some cases.

I was wondering about their use as a kind of compost heap, which is how people used to keep pigs, but you raise a good point about them being able to digest food that is otherwise just waste. Are they more efficient than just composting the stuff and spreading it on fields though?

[CoffeeGrunt]

They'd probably digest it quicker than it would compost, and the manure might be usable as compost itself.

However, it's not the case that livestock is only raised on otherwise unusable land, though. Just outside of town we have fields that are kept aside for rearing sheep that would be usable for crop growing. Mainly because the fields right next to them actively grow crops.

Either way, I was just saying that I understand the vegetarian argument when viewed from an ecological standpoint in the long term, rather than the emotional argument of, "think of the little babies we're guilting you with!"

It's not a clear-cut argument either way, but it's pretty possible that a fair amount of livestock farmland would be usable for other purposes. Plus it's easier to get inventive and efficient about growing crops than it is about growing animals. Animals need space, even a minimum, and free range demands a lot of it. Hydroponics and the like, conversely, allow space to be used far more efficiently, and there's no ethical quandaries about it. Crops can be more easily modified to adapt to different environments, and irrigation allows them to be grown even in the desert.

[URL="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/nov/24/growing-food-in-the-desert-crisis"]You can even grow vegetables from sal****er, sunlight and a little ingenuity.[/URL] Can't do that with sheep, cows or pigs.

I mean, I f*cking love eating meat. Bacon, steak and ale pie, bit of roast lamb, you name it. It's not efficient, but for the time being, I can afford it.

[Haighus]

Oh, I agree that the ecological argument is sound in general and most livestock areas would be much more efficient as arable land (much of the pastures of England for example), but there are definitely environments and areas that would remain suited to livestock farming, and that these areas would largely be the areas that traditionally farmed livestock throughout farming history. Many areas that could only support animals in the past undoubtedly can be converted to arable farming with modern technology, but I doubt anyone is gonna grow wheat on top of Snowdon, whereas the sheep are grazing there happily.

I think you raise a valid point with pigs too- they may be less efficient in terms of energy gained from the waste, but if they use up less space because they essentially 'compost' quicker then that could end up being more efficient than having spaces of land being used for composters in the long run.

[Erik Setzer]

This is the "Cheer Up" thread, eh? Seems like the perfect place to post this. (Um... sort of spoiler-ish for GoT, I guess, if you haven't watched it in the last few days.)

[url]http://uproxx.com/tv/hodor-doorstop-hold-the-door-game-of-thrones/5/[/url]

[Psychosplodge]

[url]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-36385839[/url]

See skynet can't happen yet, at least till they upgrade, then we're all ****ed by rogue Ai hiding on the internet when some bright spark decides not to leave it as a closed system.

[Psychosplodge]

Good news everybody!

Consider:

Victorian England: 1867-1901
American Old West: 1803-1912
Meiji Restoration: 1868-1912
French privateering in the Gulf of Mexico: ended circa 1830

Conclusion: an adventuring party consisting of a Victorian gentleman thief, an Old West gunslinger, a disgraced former samurai, and an elderly French pirate is actually 100% historically plausible.

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

Well, if you want a gunslinger, samurai and thief - you got Lupin III at least.

[Tyrendian]

I'm missing a pretty obvious reference here I'm sure... halp?

[Mr Mystery]

Good news everybody!

Twaddle. The Victorian Gent would clearly be trying to off the Johnny Foreigners from the get go. Probably starting with the Frenchman.

[Psychosplodge]

No Mystery eccentric Victorian gentlemen collected foreign type hangers on in their search to conveniently relocate anything worth looking at to the British museum.
Though the french would probably be a rival to fallout with it at somepoint.

Tyr I'm missing the reference too, unless its a gunslinger samurai thief I'm not aware of.