I have to say that after reading this thread (not that it was the only thing to motivate me, but it was the catalyst) i started buying tomatoes in stead of frozen lasanas and apples and oranges in stead of frozen fried chips and I started eating alot more soup in stead of beef in addition to other changes i implemented in my life a few months back when i was 'awakened'.
I'm no tree hugger but it makes me sad that no one cares for our home and that people close to me won't even consider going to work by foot.
Sorry for the offtopic but i just had to let it out.

I think the bottom line is, we can all make an effort to "get back to our roots". It's not going to happen overnight, because the dependent state that the human race is in right now did not happen overnight. We are spoiled by modern, man-made creations, but WE are the ones who created them!

We all need to make an effort to get back to depending on Mother Earth (or whatever) to provide for us, and that also includes providing for Mother Earth--by not taking advantage of and destroying the planet we live on.

I'm a strong proponent of "every little bit helps". If we all do a little bit, like riding a bike to work, growing our own foods organically, using less fossil fuels, etc., we can make a strong push towards treating ourselves, our fellow creatures, and our planet better.

Sirnex I'm sad to see you have left this thread as i was hoping you would post more of what you know / think about ways to live without damaging the planet so much.
Also, I'm interested in learning more from you about farming in an appartmant / little house.

This is why i think money is important.

i think the idea of money if for trading purposes. we NEED things that are not readily available to use so we must trade. well barting works fine if you find someone that needs something you have (saying you have anything at all) but monetary systems allow you to not produce anything and still barter. I need water but i live 30 miles away from a water source. I live that far because the area around the water source is already over populated but i do have access to salt(vital for a healthy human and food preservation) well i could trade salt for water with someone who can get to salt. maybe i cannot get access to anything because it is all claimed by someone. but i can do something. well i could provide a service to someone ( say one person who can get a lot of stuff) but that would be servitude(kings and stuff) or i could provide my service to a lot of people. but working for what they have could be limited especially since they dont have everything i need. well in a monetary system i could do the work for something that is universally exchangeable and get stuff i think i need.

In cultures like ours where we have more money than needs then we have the opportunity to purchase items we dont need and sometimes dont want. It also allows us to over populate areas because if people only offer services they have no need for a lot of space that is necessary to produce things or gather things for trade.

the monetary system was instilled a long time ago and i believe we are too entrenched in it to get out now. I am a student and i believe that without the monetary system i would not be in school today. my family owns no land and produces nothing. we have always been a services family as far back as i know of. we are not wealthy in-fact i would say we are borderline poverty and without the monetary system we would be nothing more than vagabonds and indentured servants.


In Conclusion:
No the monetary is not the perfect system. but like everything i think it has is goods and its bads. i just hope the goods will outweigh the bads in the end.

kr0ss--No problem. I haven't tried it, but I've read a lot about it (Window Farms). It just seems like a really great way to grow hydroponically when you don't have a lot of space. I have space, so I wouldn't necessarily have to use a system like this, but I think it's really great for people who live in crowed cities, in tiny apartments, but still want to grow their own foods.