The Automation of Agriculture and Modernity

[rousseau]

Some time ago I read a book called The Agrarian History of Western Europe, 500 - 1850, which had an interesting statistic in it along the lines of how many people were farmers before the industrial revolution. I had trouble tracking down the stat in the book this morning, but found a link that provides a small idea of the change that industrialization brought to agriculture:

Farmers Do a Lot More than Just Drive Tractors

This summer we were given the opportunity to intern with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and throughout our experiences we have learned a lot about the agricultural industry and rural America. Today, agriculture plays a huge role in driving the rural economy and the American economy at large...

www.usda.gov

Much of the exhibit focused on the ability of American ingenuity to triumph over struggles and obstacles across sectors and throughout history--American agriculture included. One of the major changes in agriculture that the exhibit documents is technological advancement, with exhibits and examples from every era of American history. In the 1700s nearly 80% of the population were farmers but by the 1900s the number was halved to just 40% of the population. Today, the percent of American farmers in our country has decreased to less than 2%, indicating the increasing efficiency of the agricultural industry. The efficiency increase can be credited in part to the tools and resources that have become available over the years. From horses to horse power; from Eli Whitney’s cotton gin and the McCormick binder to the Fordson tractor, the country has seen substantial technological change over a short period of time.

This got me thinking about how much of a shit show the world is today, and how many people are basically working poor, and I wondered: how much of this can be attributed to agricultural productivity? A few hundred years ago producing or finding food was the main concern of almost every person. But today almost no one farms. Which raises the question of: how much important and high value work still exists for people in many communities? And also, cognitively, were we meant to live in a simpler world where we did simpler tasks, and didn't have to worry about the extreme financialization of the economy?

I guess what I'm proposing is that we tend to think of automation as a more recent phenomenon, but my thinking is that changes in agriculture have, ultimately, been the most disruptive to our way of life. The scale of change in the past few centuries is absolutely massive, and I'm wondering if the following is now true:

1) High value work is now very hard to come by
2) People aren't equipped to thrive in the highly mathematical world we live in now

And a lot of it boils down to the important stuff (food) being taken care of for us.

 

[steve_bank]

Only the few are 'mathematical'. I think it is over hyped that everyone needs to be mathematical and scientific as well.

Ancient Egypt had efficient large scale food production.

As the industrial revolution professed less percentage of population is needed to supply essential goods ad services. Hence the 'consumer economy', an economy based on producing a loot of stuff that nobody really needs. Large scale decadence for the masses.

19th century America had working poor. The western migration

Industrialization has led to AI which can put people out of work.

More food meant more people and economic growth.

The quetion nobody is asking in polics is if the system is viable. I don't tink it is. Income disprity is growng.

Over here the NFL quarterback Russel Wilson was traded to the Steelers form the Broncos. He will be paid $35 million dollars in salary owed by his contract with the Broncos. 35 million for 3 years worth of playing a game throwing a football.

A system that paces such a value on that and struggles to pay teachers and build schools is destined to fail.

Without industrialized agriculture pro sports as it is would not exist.

 

[thebeave]

Some time ago I read a book called The Agrarian History of Western Europe, 500 - 1850, which had an interesting statistic in it along the lines of how many people were farmers before the industrial revolution. I had trouble tracking down the stat in the book this morning, but found a link that provides a small idea of the change that industrialization brought to agriculture:

Farmers Do a Lot More than Just Drive Tractors

This summer we were given the opportunity to intern with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and throughout our experiences we have learned a lot about the agricultural industry and rural America. Today, agriculture plays a huge role in driving the rural economy and the American economy at large...

www.usda.gov

Much of the exhibit focused on the ability of American ingenuity to triumph over struggles and obstacles across sectors and throughout history--American agriculture included. One of the major changes in agriculture that the exhibit documents is technological advancement, with exhibits and examples from every era of American history. In the 1700s nearly 80% of the population were farmers but by the 1900s the number was halved to just 40% of the population. Today, the percent of American farmers in our country has decreased to less than 2%, indicating the increasing efficiency of the agricultural industry. The efficiency increase can be credited in part to the tools and resources that have become available over the years. From horses to horse power; from Eli Whitney’s cotton gin and the McCormick binder to the Fordson tractor, the country has seen substantial technological change over a short period of time.

This got me thinking about how much of a shit show the world is today, and how many people are basically working poor, and I wondered: how much of this can be attributed to agricultural productivity? A few hundred years ago producing or finding food was the main concern of almost every person. But today almost no one farms. Which raises the question of: how much important and high value work still exists for people in many communities? And also, cognitively, were we meant to live in a simpler world where we did simpler tasks, and didn't have to worry about the extreme financialization of the economy?

I guess what I'm proposing is that we tend to think of automation as a more recent phenomenon, but my thinking is that changes in agriculture have, ultimately, been the most disruptive to our way of life. The scale of change in the past few centuries is absolutely massive, and I'm wondering if the following is now true:

1) High value work is now very hard to come by
2) People aren't equipped to thrive in the highly mathematical world we live in now

And a lot of it boils down to the important stuff (food) being taken care of for us.

I think you should count your blessings that you are living in the age we are now, despite you thinking its a shit show. If you think its a shit show now, try to imagine living hundreds of years ago with its mass starvation, extreme poverty, non-existent health care & knowledge, no anesthetics or vaccines, horrific wars and battles. There is no better time in history to be alive than right now. The agricultural revolution is due a lot of credit for us being able to live a much more pleasant life.

 

[bilby]

1) High value work is now very hard to come by

That depends on your use of a very strange definition for "high value".

From context, it seems that you mean "critical to personal survival"; Certainly if you were using the more common "able to earn more money", your claim would be the opposite of the case - highly lucrative work is hard to come by now, but nevertheless easier to come by than at any time in the past.

I am guessing you mean something more like "survival critical work"; And I would suggest that the difficulty in finding oneself forced to work or die (or watch ones family die) is not, on the whole, a bad thing.

Lots of people do "bullshit jobs" - jobs where if they didn't show up, nothing bad would happen other than them losing their paychecks (or where the job gives them that impression, rightly or wrongly). That's psychologically problematic; But, I would suggest, less so than watching your children starve to death.

 

[rousseau]

1) High value work is now very hard to come by

That depends on your use of a very strange definition for "high value".

From context, it seems that you mean "critical to personal survival"; Certainly if you were using the more common "able to earn more money", your claim would be the opposite of the case - highly lucrative work is hard to come by now, but nevertheless easier to come by than at any time in the past.

I am guessing you mean something more like "survival critical work"; And I would suggest that the difficulty in finding oneself forced to work or die (or watch ones family die) is not, on the whole, a bad thing.

Lots of people do "bullshit jobs" - jobs where if they didn't show up, nothing bad would happen other than them losing their paychecks (or where the job gives them that impression, rightly or wrongly). That's psychologically problematic; But, I would suggest, less so than watching your children starve to death.

I guess the crux of what I'm getting at is that industrialization completely changed our way of life, and now there is limited work available that provides any value within the context of the society we currently live. Before industrialization you farmed because that was what you had to do, and our lifestyle was predicated on a system of farming. With industrialization we've created a society with a whole whack of people, and not much for them to actually do, where the productivity gains go to these people in only a very limited extent.

Without getting too deep into the argument of whether our current age is better or worse than the past, I'd argue that our current age has very serious problems, and they're only going to get worse in the next century. There are quite a few people alive today who are living pretty shoddy lives for the aforementioned reasons, so I don't think it's really a universal that we're living in a better age. It's better depending on who you are and what your economic status is.

 

[bilby]

I guess the crux of what I'm getting at is that industrialization completely changed our way of life, and now there is limited work available that provides any value within the context of the society we currently live.

I still don't quite grasp what you mean by "value" here.

Before industrialization you farmed because that was what you had to do, and our lifestyle was predicated on a system of farming. With industrialization we've created a society with a whole whack of people, and not much for them to actually do, where the productivity gains go to these people in only a very limited extent.

I am absolutely certain that back when people were mostly farming, that was a society in which there were long periods with little for the mass of farm labourers to do, and that productivity gains went exclusively to the landowner class.

The demand for farm labour is highly seasonal; The peasants spent a lot of time not doing much work, and not having much to eat, interspersed with periods of doing huge amounts of back-braking work, while still not having much to eat.

I don't think much has changed for low-skilled labourers, other than that factory workers don't get wet when it rains.

Without getting too deep into the argument of whether our current age is better or worse than the past, I'd argue that our current age has very serious problems, and they're only going to get worse in the next century.

That's entirely up to us. The rules governing our economies are not laws of nature; We can adjust them as we choose. And in an industrialised democracy, that "we" is a lot more people than it was (and in some places still is) in agrarian economies.

There are quite a few people alive today who are living pretty shoddy lives for the aforementioned reasons, so I don't think it's really a universal that we're living in a better age.

Of course we are. Quite a few is demonstrably better than quite a lot.

It's better depending on who you are and what your economic status is.

And it always was.

Always.

 

[steve_bank]

Obviously the physical comfort for large numbers pf people on such a large scale is historic. Something the average person who grow up with modern supermarkets today does not grasp.

Widespread knowledge in low cost books. Books used to be something you saved up for. You built up library over time. I can get most any fact and information on science and math 24/7 on the net. When I was born in 51 that was science fiction stuff.

Instant global communications at low cost to all. Global travel. Low cost pnone and text is arud $25 a month and the phone around $50. National commutation 24/7.


Medical science.

The question is what we collectively do with all this capacity.

 

[thebeave]

Obviously the physical comfort for large numbers pf people on such a large scale is historic. Something the average person who grow up with modern supermarkets today does not grasp.

Widespread knowledge in low cost books. Books used to be something you saved up for. You built up library over time. I can get most any fact and information on science and math 24/7 on the net. When I was born in 51 that was science fiction stuff.

Instant global communications at low cost to all. Global travel. Low cost pnone and text is arud $25 a month and the phone around $50. National commutation 24/7.


Medical science.

The question is what we collectively do with all this capacity.

You forgot free porn.

 

[rousseau]

I guess the crux of what I'm getting at is that industrialization completely changed our way of life, and now there is limited work available that provides any value within the context of the society we currently live.

I still don't quite grasp what you mean by "value" here.

Before industrialization you farmed because that was what you had to do, and our lifestyle was predicated on a system of farming. With industrialization we've created a society with a whole whack of people, and not much for them to actually do, where the productivity gains go to these people in only a very limited extent.

I am absolutely certain that back when people were mostly farming, that was a society in which there were long periods with little for the mass of farm labourers to do, and that productivity gains went exclusively to the landowner class.

The demand for farm labour is highly seasonal; The peasants spent a lot of time not doing much work, and not having much to eat, interspersed with periods of doing huge amounts of back-braking work, while still not having much to eat.

I don't think much has changed for low-skilled labourers, other than that factory workers don't get wet when it rains.

Without getting too deep into the argument of whether our current age is better or worse than the past, I'd argue that our current age has very serious problems, and they're only going to get worse in the next century.

That's entirely up to us. The rules governing our economies are not laws of nature; We can adjust them as we choose. And in an industrialised democracy, that "we" is a lot more people than it was (and in some places still is) in agrarian economies.

There are quite a few people alive today who are living pretty shoddy lives for the aforementioned reasons, so I don't think it's really a universal that we're living in a better age.

Of course we are. Quite a few is demonstrably better than quite a lot.

It's better depending on who you are and what your economic status is.

And it always was.

Always.

Ok, I'll accept that on average those who've benefited from modernity are better off. To get there you do have to externalize global warming and the huge swaths of the world that have been destabilized by modernity. But honestly, I am trying to externalize that and just talk about agriculture, because I'm tired of thinking about global warming and the global south.

That being said, maybe we can forget about the dichotomy of past vs present, and ask ourselves whether the world as it is now is actually the pancaea it's made out to be, for some of the reasons mentioned in the OP. In other words, think about the problem being presented, rather than being self satisfied with 'it's slightly less shitty now'. And also include the entire world in our definition of world.

 

[steve_bank]

Obviously the physical comfort for large numbers pf people on such a large scale is historic. Something the average person who grow up with modern supermarkets today does not grasp.

Widespread knowledge in low cost books. Books used to be something you saved up for. You built up library over time. I can get most any fact and information on science and math 24/7 on the net. When I was born in 51 that was science fiction stuff.

Instant global communications at low cost to all. Global travel. Low cost pnone and text is arud $25 a month and the phone around $50. National commutation 24/7.


Medical science.

The question is what we collectively do with all this capacity.

You forgot free porn.

Crass is covered by the 1st Amendment.

 

[rousseau]

Only the few are 'mathematical'. I think it is over hyped that everyone needs to be mathematical and scientific as well.

My thinking is along the lines of people being poorly equipped to handle the basic operation of many corporations. Interest rates, mortgages, upgrading a vehicle, upgrading a phone, credit card debt, all very basic but legal aspects of the world that, let's face it, many people don't really understand, and get swindled by.

In Canada, considered one of the best places in the world to live, about 70% of people are in debt, and a lot of it is consumer debt. The boomers did reasonably well given the economy at the time, but for my and later generations there's going to be a reckoning when we reach retirement age. And a lot of it is that financial vehicles and money management are beyond many of us.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Ok, I'll accept that on average those who've benefited from modernity are better off. To get there you do have to externalize global warming and the huge swaths of the world that have been destabilized by modernity. But honestly, I am trying to externalize that and just talk about agriculture, because I'm tired of thinking about global warming and the global south.

And primitive groups don't have ecological impact?!

Stone age tools drove all the megafauna to extinction.

You can detect the effect of Columbus in the New World in the tree rings. His plagues were enough to greatly reduce the impact of the New Worlders.

 

[rousseau]

Ok, I'll accept that on average those who've benefited from modernity are better off. To get there you do have to externalize global warming and the huge swaths of the world that have been destabilized by modernity. But honestly, I am trying to externalize that and just talk about agriculture, because I'm tired of thinking about global warming and the global south.

And primitive groups don't have ecological impact?!

Stone age tools drove all the megafauna to extinction.

You can detect the effect of Columbus in the New World in the tree rings. His plagues were enough to greatly reduce the impact of the New Worlders.

My point wasn't so much about ecological impact, as it was the cause of our increase in efficiency. It's really easy to make a statement like - we're now seeing unprecedented levels of prosperity - in a vacuum. But a good brunt of that prosperity boils down to a heightened ability to extract energy from fossil fuels, as well as exploit the natural resources of regions around the world.

It was like a cheat code that helped us in the present, while externalizing what was going to happen to us in the future. So saying 'look how prosperous we are now' misses a good chunk of the story and what is actually happening.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Only the few are 'mathematical'. I think it is over hyped that everyone needs to be mathematical and scientific as well.

My thinking is along the lines of people being poorly equipped to handle the basic operation of many corporations. Interest rates, mortgages, upgrading a vehicle, upgrading a phone, credit card debt, all very basic but legal aspects of the world that, let's face it, many people don't really understand, and get swindled by.

In Canada, considered one of the best places in the world to live, about 70% of people are in debt, and a lot of it is consumer debt. The boomers did reasonably well given the economy at the time, but for my and later generations there's going to be a reckoning when we reach retirement age. And a lot of it is that financial vehicles and money management are beyond many of us.

Most people haven't lived through anything like the Depression. They see only good times and don't realize what retirement will bring.