There is a universe beneath our feet – billions of micro-organisms in a teaspoon full of healthy, organic soil. Fungi, earthworms, bacteria, nematodes, and other organisms, arranging themselves in a constantly changing world of death and live, dormancy and decay – all doing their part to make plants grow.
Scientists believe that there is more biological life in a shoe-box full of healthy soil than on the entire surface of the continental United States.
While this world that we call dirt could teach us amazing things, only a tiny fraction of these micro-organisms have been studied, much less their relationship to each other.
It’s beautiful to see how far we have come as a society, and that we are able to reach the moon, and even further. Yet it is amazingly surprising that we don’t understand the very soil we are launching our truly brilliant technology from.
As a society, our well-being is dependent on our relationship to the earth.
Any future must be grounded in a deeply rooted understanding of ecology. Soil – soil that one day we will turn back into – is a study of relationships that is missing in this society.
Relationships between us as a people, our natural environment, our food, and ultimately ourselves, are all connected in the web of life. The carrot we eat is the result of billions of relationships underneath the surface, plus hundreds of relationships above it.
Life is the result of relationships. Soil teaches us about our interdependencies between one another if we look closely enough.
Originally posted 2018-08-23 09:04:58.
Hi
I was just listening to your podcast with Dr Stephen Andrews and one of you had done a study on how what we eat and what minerals we are lacking in our diet affects our health and you related this to seven diseases.
Is that study available to read and have you got more information in this area. Can you recommend any websites and further reading.
Cheers
Julie