[benchmarkist]

Yet another instance of how people view the biosphere as a resource to be exploited for their own monetary profit and short-term benefit. That type of logic and thinking is a dead end. I've never had a silk robe and I doubt I would be any better off if I did have one. I'd much prefer clean air, water, and unpoisoned land for growing nutritious food.

[MrMcCall]

Well said, friend. That is an important aspect of the Way. We must be gentle with our mother Earth in order to compassionately harmonize with future generations' happiness.

But what I really, really want is hemp clothing. When I was in Atlanta in the 90s, there was a hemp shop, where I bought the best jeans, shorts, and hats I've ever had. They got nothing but more comfortable over time, breathed excellently and never molded (not that I tried). I could imagine that they would've lasted my lifetime, or even more.

Sadly, they shrunk terribly over time, and by that I mean I "grew" out of them :-)

Now, all I've seen on the net are 60%-40% cotton blends, IIRC, not the 100% hemp that was available back then. It doesn't look like the new cannabis acceptance here in America has produced hemp cloth, but I could be wrong. I imagine that growers are more focused on the likely more lucrative drug version of the plant. That said, it's been years since I searched the net for sellers, but my daughter has the skills and the 503a to make me a sweet kilt and jumpsuit and long-sleeve long-hanging shirt, should the funds come through.

"Hemp for victory!" --WWII American poster slogan

[wellix]

Could it be that it is more sustainable to have them as blends?

[throw939494]

Silk worm industry is the definition of long-term sustainable exploitation of biosphere. It was done for thousand years, with minimal resources, no polution, it captures CO2... It only takes a few worms and some leafs! Chemical alternatives are poluting and poising, land air and waters!

[aziaziazi]

It takes a few worms and lots of leafs. Got a friend in that industry and the partnership with Brazil is flourishing.

[benchmarkist]

How about we leave the silk worms alone.

[exe34]

we use people as machines to move stuff around and make new stuff. humans are the only creatures that have to pay to live on this planet, if they don't pay, they can't have food/shelter/etc.

[smt88]

With the context that "payment" is a way to make labor fungible and labor is expenditure of calories, every creature has to pay to live.

Humans probably spend fewer calories on survival (with better results) and more calories on pleasure than any other species. This is partly thanks to society.

So humans probably "pay" the least of any species just to exist.

[ponector]

And we use people as sex machines, unfortunately.

[0_____0]

If squirrels could figure out how to make money I'm sure someone would be happy to charge them rent

[evoke4908]

Counterpoint: being useful to a more successful species is a staggeringly effective evolutionary strategy. Nature is chock full of symbiotic relationships and it's a perfectly valid ecological niche. Symbionts exist whether or not the host is capable of feeling bad about it.

By becoming attached to such a successful species as humans, any symbiont species has an extremely good chance of surviving for as long as the host species. Including long after they'd have gone extinct naturally.

Most species that humans like or find useful will eventually end up colonizing entire star systems along with us. Those species will continue to live on in their evolutionary descendants long after the sun exapnds and earth becomes inhospitable.

Personally I call that a successful species.

Or we could just leave the worms alone and let them be hunted to extinction by predators or die out in natural climate or ecological shifts over time. I guess that's nicer than species continuity into galactic time scales.

[aziaziazi]

Very interesting take. However there’s some important difference between the species that express this behavior in the wild, free world (think pilot fish) and those that are breed, used, breed again then killed -all while in forced captivity.

I doubt the livestock would define itself as a "successful” if it could use language.