Industrial Literacy
Yeah that&#x27;s chill but we should also recognize that our relative comfort today is borrowed from tomorrow, and deflecting any criticism of this with &quot;things were much worse before&quot; kind of misses the point.<p>Industrial literacy is understanding<p>* Synthetic fertilizers are hugely beneficial, but they are in part necessitated by, and directly enable (in a cycle, see), crop monocultures that don&#x27;t <i>allow</i> the soil to replenish its fertility.<p>* Housework was a full time job, and now it&#x27;s not. We have different full time jobs that aren&#x27;t that much more fun, but they&#x27;ve unlocked record levels of profits. We don&#x27;t have time or energy to maintain our bodies anymore. Wages haven&#x27;t gone up in decades.<p>* Plastic is an incredibly useful technology, and has saved the lives of those tortoises whose shells we once carved products from. These days, plastic particles drift across every mile of the ocean, and kills those tortoises a different way.<p>* Automobiles are a lifeline for people in rural and suburban areas, but it is a lifeline in the same way an abusive lover is a lifeline -- the centrality of the car made us build our communities and cities <i>around</i> the car. The car created a need and then filled it, and now we think ourselves lucky to have them.<p>Don&#x27;t take this as a call to return back to the age of riding horses and burning dung. It&#x27;s too late to go back, and in any case, we wouldn&#x27;t want to. I&#x27;m grateful to be alive during this period and to live among the small percentage of the population that gets to enjoy it. But recognize that everything contains the seeds of its own destruction.