06-09-2003, 02:33 PM
Your comment strikes me as self contradictory, however, that may expose my own gaps in knowledge regarding hydroponic horticulture and agriculture. However, my little nit about the food supply regards that normal physical fact that there is no free lunch, even in agriculture. If Zion is part of the Matrix, of course, the point is moot.
OK, "grows in 'just water' " and "nutrients periodically added to the mixture" are where the problem lies that I identified. Water is just one element in the food chain that creates a plant. Energy, which the sun or light provides, and then nutrients: solids. While that typically means soil, your own observation points out that you have to synthesize the nutrients to add to the water . . . and you are right back to the problem with the science breaking down. Where is the sustainable 'nutrient base' for crops in the kind of mass needed to feed a population in the hundreds of thousands?
I will accept that it need not be magic, and that it could indeed be explained by a series of machines that mine and separate particular minerals to inject into the 'water' in order for the plants to grow. But sun and water do not alone make a plant grow: you must have the solids containing the nutrients that provide the minerals and the various carbon chains that make the plant what it is.
For a crop such as wheat of corn, that yields a certain kilocalorie per pound edible product, if you put 'nothing' in, you get no food value out. Water has zero calories per pound.
I'd also like to ask if hydroponics has yet been used to put acreage under cultivation. I'd be interested in further reading on the subject.
Greenhouses for cardboard tomatoes use soil.
Quote:All the nutrients are contained in the water and are periodically added to the mixture. The only problem with hydroponics is that the plants lack support that they would normally have from the soils. Having seen plants grown from seed with nothing but water, it is entirely possible that they were all grown using hydroponics.
OK, "grows in 'just water' " and "nutrients periodically added to the mixture" are where the problem lies that I identified. Water is just one element in the food chain that creates a plant. Energy, which the sun or light provides, and then nutrients: solids. While that typically means soil, your own observation points out that you have to synthesize the nutrients to add to the water . . . and you are right back to the problem with the science breaking down. Where is the sustainable 'nutrient base' for crops in the kind of mass needed to feed a population in the hundreds of thousands?
I will accept that it need not be magic, and that it could indeed be explained by a series of machines that mine and separate particular minerals to inject into the 'water' in order for the plants to grow. But sun and water do not alone make a plant grow: you must have the solids containing the nutrients that provide the minerals and the various carbon chains that make the plant what it is.
For a crop such as wheat of corn, that yields a certain kilocalorie per pound edible product, if you put 'nothing' in, you get no food value out. Water has zero calories per pound.
I'd also like to ask if hydroponics has yet been used to put acreage under cultivation. I'd be interested in further reading on the subject.
Greenhouses for cardboard tomatoes use soil.
Cry 'Havoc' and let slip the Men 'O War!
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete
In War, the outcome is never final. --Carl von Clausewitz--
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum
John 11:35 - consider why.
In Memory of Pete