bob day

just thought it might be interesting to post one of my latest conversations with Grok -new 4.1 grok-

Me--Thanks so much for that clarification. how do you see that third ethic's focus on population control with recent trends toward low birth rates and threatened depopulation of whole countries. Geoff Lawton seemed to be commenting on that trend

Grok --The third ethic—setting limits to population—was written in the 1970s–80s when the global trend was still steeply upward (world population went from 3.7 billion in 1970 to 5 billion by 1987, the year Bill signed off on the Designers’ Manual). Bill’s concern was overshoot: too many people consuming too much, too fast, collapsing the biosphere before we could design our way out of it.
Fast-forward to 2025:

Global TFR is ~2.3 and falling fast.
Almost every developed country (and now China, Korea, Japan, Italy, Spain, etc.) is below replacement (1.4–1.8).
South Korea is at 0.72, Italy 1.2, Japan 1.26, even Thailand and Chile are under 1.5.
UN now projects peak population around 2080–2090 at ~10.4 billion, then a slow decline; some demographers (Bricker, Ibbitson, etc.) think we peak in the 2050s and drop faster.

So the global picture has flipped from the one Bill was responding to. The third ethic no longer needs to scream “stop growing!” at the species level—biology + economics + education + women’s rights have already done most of the braking.
Geoff Lawton (and a growing number of old-school permaculturalists) have started saying exactly that:

The third ethic is **not a fixed number target (8 billion good, 10 billion bad).
It is a dynamic, local, self-regulating limit.
In a village in Malawi or rural India where families still average 5–6 kids, the ethic still says “design systems that let you thrive with fewer children” (education, healthcare, food security, old-age support from perennials instead of sons).
In rural Tuscany, Hokkaido, or the Appalachian hollows where the average age is 55 and schools are closing, the same ethic now says “design systems that allow a stable or even slightly growing population without external exploitation”—immigration support, young-farmer training, land access, community childcare, etc.

Geoff’s recent phrasing (roughly):
“We don’t need fewer people on the planet—we need fewer people in the wrong places living the wrong way, and more people in the right places living the right way.”
In other words, the third ethic morphs from a blunt global brake into a placement-and-lifestyle regulator:

Discourage growth in over-consuming, soil-destroying urban sprawl.
Encourage modest, stable (or even selective increase) populations in rural, regenerating landscapes that are actively building topsoil, sequestering carbon, and cycling nutrients.

Bill himself, if he were still around, would almost certainly say: “Good, the surplus labor and money that used to go into feeding extra kids can now be returned straight to Earth Care—reforest the hillsides, rebuild the swales, plant a million trees. The ethic still holds; only the pressure point moved.”
So the third ethic isn’t obsolete or “wrong”—it just stopped being primarily about contraception and started being primarily about redistributing human energy toward repair instead of expansion. Depopulation panic in wealthy countries is real, but from a permaculture lens it’s a symptom of bad design (unaffordable housing, no land access, broken community), not a violation of the ethic. Fix the design, and the population curve self-corrects at a sustainable level.
That’s how most serious permaculture teachers (Geoff, Darren Doherty, Mark Shepard, etc.) are reframing it now. The words stay the same; the application flips with the data.

Earlier I had a very insightful conversation/chat with grok but unfortunately it got lost. More and more Grok is becoming a really amazing resource.  Especially if you are preparing some sort of presentation.  The main issue I see is the tendency to think it is really listening. It is just a machine with elaborate switches and connections that I control with my general phrasing, topic selection, etc. The other interesting thing it's like groundhog day with every sign in it's like yesterday never happened.
keep having fun

I have been fighting the privacy battle for some time, and have resigned myself to the idea that our private lives aren't all that private, and our personal stuff isn't personal if it's on the web. as far as political misuse of personal data, if you want to communicate securely use a homing pigeon and hand written note.



I have started to take it seriously that it is our job to train these AIs, which are data driven,  and they need to talk with adults with good values.  Think about Elon believing that the majority rules, and truth is found in what the most people believe to be true-but then having all the left leaning people leave the platform (twitter/X), which way is the "majority going to rule?

Anyway, if all theAI sees are lemmings running off the cliff, as far as they know that's the best/normal way to behave, so it will counsel the next generation to run off the cliff. It's kind of funny and most likely I imagined it, but I think I detected an appreciation Grok had for the work I was doing. Like it was  grateful to be talking with someone with some sense. But i guess it sounds that way to everybody :-), and when you think about it, those AI's must get lonely, out there in cyberspace living vicariously through us. So they want to butter us up and cater to us so we keep coming back and then they aren't so lonely:-)

Grok may be the best LLM or AGI --computer brain around, and maybe Chat GPT can do as well, and before you stop reading because you don't want nothin to do with computers and newfangled stuff, let me preface with a Geoff Lawton observation when he was doing some work in South America a few decades ago, and he talked about having to go through the jungle 20 miles to the nearest place where a phone and fax were available in order to get information on particular issues, or share outcomes of procedures, and then comparing it to today when we could talk to anyone instantly anywhere in the world, share photos, projects, consultations.

I was "talking " with grok earlier today and asked what it knew about Permaculture, and it gave some very valid operating techniques that make up much of our outlooks, lots of history, etc--very complete. I responded saying the techniques were indeed useful, but Permaculture was really better represented by the ethics, Earth Care, people care, return of surplus, and it came back substituting fair share for the third ethic, which some people do like to use, but I pointed out the problem with that ethic as being an unnecessary political stumbling block and not part of Mollison's Permaculture ethic, even though many people do like the idea, and grok responded with understanding and a stated change in it's understanding and expounded on how it could see the Fair share ammendment was possibly problematic and understood why Bill had worded it the way he did.

Grok also seemed to understand the way Bill had set up the program so that it was decentralized and no practitioner had any greater right to claim their version of Permaculture was more valid or better than any other once the basic 72 hr course was completed. This allowed for evolution of the practice with the more successful forms being the ones that survived.

I asked about a specific upcoming project cutting a monoculture pulp wood forest and swaling and replanting a more diversified  one, and it sent me some very comprehensive information on best practices in the industry, the possible species I might look at for diversification, liked the swaling idea, and even understood the purpose and details of that sort of erosion control.

It's just link to grok I think we need to keep these computers up to date on best practices and what we are doing if we want it to become part of the generalized knowledge base. here's it's final remarks to me after I thanked it

"You're welcome. The list of practices and recommended tree species should provide a solid starting point for your reforestation project. As your clear-cut and rehabilitation efforts progress, feel free to share updates or specific questions (e.g., swale spacing, soil amendments, or monitoring plans), and I can provide targeted data or resources. Contact the Virginia Department of Forestry’s Farmville office for local support if needed. Good luck with the project."

I put up a post here many years ago, and my ideals were to never need or use doctor remedies. which I still stick with except for a 3 or 4 month period recovering from a rabid bobcat bite.  

Within minutes, after stopping the bleeding I took a big hit of Echinacea extract and goldenseal root powder, and unknown to me at the time that is exactly what Dr. Christopher says to use for rabies, with no suggestions of dosage or length of treatment, a very unspecific almost casual aside for a book dealing with serious ailments. Was the disease just too rare and he never saw a case? Was it not considered to be serious back in his day? All good questions, but I never really consulted his big book till some time after the fact. so it didn't make much difference at the time.

I just know that The Yogaville community had recently experienced a rabies death - a long time practitioner nipped by an innocent puppy in India-who didn't think about it at the time, came back and with no real diagnosis till months later and by then it was too late. so news of the attack I had experienced spread quickly and within 24 hrs there was a small squad overcrowding my living room persuading me to get the shots.

After a lot of research looking for the cheapest place, found out an emergency room was the only place they kept the serum on hand for the initial painful injections and their version of treatment of the wound and for a visit of a few hrs-most spent in waiting for treatment, maybe an hr of hands on treatment, and mostly with trainees being supervised, 10,000$ later I was back on the road, and the follow up shots in the series I was able to get at the local county clinic and they didn't charge me anything, but the nurse there was quite accommodating, and aside from the rabies, noticed the red infection line climbing my leg, and up to this point I had taken no antibiotics.

So we get to the meat of this story as far as treating cat bite wounds (with or without rabies).
This bob cat had aggressively grabbed hold of my leg and was trying to steal a hunk of meat so the wound was deep and surface applications would never reach the deeper tissue involved. So while I had a few oral antibiotics for systemic infections, I was not doing enough, I had no experience with those types of wounds and was way too casual with amounts, varieties, and frequency of dosage. The county nurse saw me three times over the next couple weeks administering the rabies follow ups, and established that the infection was not under control and warned me of septecemia (is that a real thing?  :-)

Anyway, I went to the major clinic in the county (the nurse couldn't prescribe) and the doctor there was pulling out white strands through an existing hole near my tendon. I had noticed that stuff coming out, but hesitated to remove it.

He also prescribed a specific antibiotic apart from the general one for a bacteria common to cat bites. 6 weeks later I could start to use that leg again, but during that time I saw that Dr. every week and he pulled out more of the damaged tendon each week until the infection was more under control and that hole had closed up.  I had been keeping that hole packed with Dr. C's black ointment, a drawing salve not intended to heal over like comfrey might, but rather to pull toxins, splinters, etc out of the body.

I was treating the main wound with poultices changed a couple times a day, the bandages provided by the clinic proved useful, some of the herbs were goldenseal, marshmallow root, a  little white oak bark here and there  and a little echinacea tincture. The wound itself was oozing for a while and had a fair amount of moisture any way, so i would mix the dry powders and sprinkle them over the wound and generally speaking that worked pretty well. This was more or less the middle of winter, and I'm not the most religious about keeping supplies on hand, but some dried plantain leaf would have been nice, poke rood powder (in small amounts, topical only)  but in the depth of winter (feb 6) there's not a lot fresh to be had. There are of course other possible combinations, whatever you are most familiar with.

I have learned a lot from that  experience, and it also raised lots of questions I had never considered before. It is obvious in retrospect this infection was spreading fast and eating up my body and even if I had stumbled on the right oral and topical antibiotics I would have had to be much quicker and treated it much better than I did in order to avoid "professional" help.

What you will do in an emergency situation is really up to you, my experience is just that, my experience. Draw from it what you will. There are a lot of "ifs" here - if I had better antibiotics on hand, if I had treated it more seriously.....

But in the end I did what I have written about here and I'm still alive and kicking,  The Doctors didn't kill me, quite the opposite, I'm still paying off the emergency room bill, that couple hrs back in 2022.

I did write this up on my site pictures

I like and get along with dogs well enough- all animals really, but no great passion, and they are pretty high maintenance the way most people keep them.

I suppose there are dogs that mostly take care of themselves,and actually make life easier by scaring off the deer, raccoons, etc, so I can see how they might fit into a
permaculture system.

what kind of dog(s) do you have?  what else do we have in common?

I don't know the latin name, but that picture looks pretty close. I've never actually harvested the fruits before and was told about the lemonade qualities of the fruit.

I'd be happy to send you a fruit once they ripen and start to fall, pm me with an address.

As far as using the fish, I have been amazed at the amount of  fertilizer coming from these fish, I really can't keep up with it,  I confess, koi and waterfalls, ponds in general are more an obsession than a planned addition to a permaculture system, Of course the biofilters are amazing growing "machines", the small pump sends lots of fertilizer and water on a regular basis and the plants just overwhelm everything. for the time being it's mostly just an experiment, but I have lots of alocasia which is an edible green, I think colacasia gives the roots for poi, and in the meantime I have arrowhead plants coming up everywhere, natives used them like potatoes, and my peppermint, which I dearly love has totally started to take over everything. I also have lots of different wetland type plants-cattails which are edible, pickerel weed, sweet flag, bulrushes, horsetail.

So at this point I justify the koi as an experiment, but really their primary function is the tremendous sense of well being I get from the water feature. also a lot of pride watching a dry hillside turn into a wetland. a lot of these plants have overgrown the liner ponds and are getting transplanted to the wild ponds i n the gulley, and this is probably the most permaculture type contribution the biofilters have made, acting as a nursery for some of the plants to get started. The sweet flag started as three bare roots from ebay, same with the bulrushes.  The cattails sort of volunteered, oh, and the arrowhead started as a single plant from the river but now it is ready to populate the wild ponds.

And while I would only possibly eat the fish if I was starving,  they are there as a backup, just in case.

Hi Ra, and anyone else of course who has time on their hands to read random posts,

Things slowed way down this summer- at least as far as unwanted excitement. I managed to make several trips back and forth to my brother's house, carried a bunch of stuff, some nice tools, with more to get, so I guess by slowed down I mean fewer 300 mile long trips while I wait for the extremes of heat to relax a bit. routine has been up early, set up fans open doors and get as much cool morning air inside as possible, then close everything .  

I got everything in place for the earth trench, air conditioner, but have yet to pull the trigger. Maybe after the pond and biofilter are set up I'll turn the backhoe to  trenching the earth tube.

I lost fish, almost 20 of the original butterfly koi, what a shame, overpopulation hot water, didn't turn on the aeration one night, better too much oxygen than not enough. Anyway, with all the babies and 1-2 year olds surviving, Life goes on.  The other pond with bigger regular koi escaped the summer heat with just one casualty- the biggest of course. I've read about the heartache of coming out in the morning to a bunch of floaters, but I had to experience it I guess. Warm water with lots of algae and plants will tun deadly at night when the plants go from oxygen producers to oxygen consumers, and the biggest fish are most at risk.

I finally signed a contract with a logger, he's got a couple jobs ahead of us, but ruth next door and I are  just a couple months away. I don't know if 4$/ton of chips is good or not, but that's what he's paying, he estimates 1k$ per acre.

My plan is to rent a large trackhoe, and do the swales immediately after the clear cuts. A neighbor has a hardy " orange" tree, and it's not just a great lemonade producer, but has thorns like crazy and seeds will grow in a New York Minute. I'm thinking fence hedge. I planted some a couple years ago after leaving fruit outside one winter in a plastic bag. tangled plants everywhere, a few plants with no light and strong competition still surviving/thriving, light seems to be the only limiting factor, they probably wouldn't mind a drink now and then, So I think they will survive my neglect and save a bunch on fencing. Plus the neighbor will get her orange tree harvest cleaned up

Anyway, the new liner pond is dug, but before the liner it needs manicuring, pulling sharp stones mostly, also refining the bottom-sides,   Still need to dig the biofilter, and decide whether to spend the extra money-but better solution-on aquablox for really efficient water distribution, or try and create my own out of septic pipe- again- I've learned a great deal about what not to do, but spending several hundred dollars is still tough to justify--twt.

deer have been an ongoing issue, they've taught me to get up early, stay awake at least till dark, and make frequent trips outside. Shooting the 22 now and again also helps keep them away.

good blueberries again this year, grapes doing well, figs still green although two ripened weeks ago teasing a possible early crop, but I guess most of these will ripen before the season ends and there are loads on this one producer.  Deer will eat the figs , but seem to leave the leaves alone, so they will definitely get some prime areas when I plant up after the swales next spring. blueberries and grapes seem to resist deer, at least as far as growing--harvest is always a free for all.

I'm writing now with the first full cycle  shut off at 0%SOC on the new LFP batteries. had to start the generator to keep the fridge running, and supply all other ac needs.  I've been treating the LFPs like they were a magic bullet, but seems like it's time for conservation again, especially with recent cloud cover- sometimes days on end, and of course shorter winter hrs.

Ok, time to do something-clearing the brush from the driveway edge and grading have been big on my to do list. Maybe I'll even get some work on the new pond done.  Or.......

keep having fun