Óleo de girassol misturado com óleo mineral

Despacho n.º 1 do GPP
3 de Junho de 2008
Na sequência da entrada no espaço comunitário, incluindo Portugal, de óleo de girassol proveniente da Ucrânia, contaminado com óleo mineral, a Comissão europeia recomendou às autoridades dos Estados–membros, como medida de precaução, que o referido óleo, ou mistura deste com outros óleos, fosse objecto de recolha do mercado.
De acordo com a avaliação do risco realizada pela EFSA (autoridade europeia para a segurança alimentar), tendo por base os dados analíticos disponíveis até á data, tudo indica tratar-se de óleo mineral de alta viscosidade e consequentemente com baixo nível de toxicidade. Face ao exposto, a Comissão Europeia alterou os termos da recomendação, no sentido de permitir a colocação no mercado de géneros alimentícios que contenham ou tenham sido produzidos a partir do óleo contaminado, desde que cumpram determinados requisitos de forma a não acarretarem qualquer risco para a saúde humana, tendo em conta as considerações da EFSA para os riscos toxicológicos relacionados com a contaminação do óleo de girassol com óleo mineral.

http://www.gppaa.min-agricultura.pt/pbl/Oleo_girassol_despacho.pdf

Erithacus canis lupus

Ecological Knowledge is Lost in Wealthier Communities and Countries

Environ. Sci. Technol., 42 (4), 1004–1009, 2008. American Chemical Society

Ecological Knowledge is Lost in Wealthier Communities and Countries
Sarah E. Pilgrim, Leanne C. Cullen, David J. Smith, and Jules Pretty*
Department of Biological Sciences, University of Essex, Colchester CO4 3SQ, UK

Abstract:
Accumulated knowledge about nature is an important part of people’s capacity to manage and conserve the environment. But this ecological knowledge is now being increasingly lost. There have been few cross-cultural and quantitative studies to describe the phenomenon of its loss. Here we show a strong inverse correlation between ecological knowledge and income levels in and among India, Indonesia, and the UK (n = 1095 interviews). Knowledge acquisition and subsequent saturation occurs at an early age in the most resource-dependent communities, but not in the UK, where knowledge levels are low and acquisition is slow. Knowledge variance within communities increases in association with ecological knowledge decline and a scale of progressive knowledge loss was revealed with the most rapid rates of loss in industrialized regions. Various studies have described the mutually exclusive relationship between economic growth and environmental conservation; however this is the first to consider the association between economic growth and social capacity to manage the environment. Understanding ecological knowledge loss is important to understanding the declining capacities of communities undergoing economic development to manage their natural resources and the future of ecosystem diversity in the light of current patterns of economic growth.

Download the full text: PDF HTML

I'm so proud of Sarah! :-)

Verkündigung : Die Worte des Engels

Du bist nicht näher an Gott als wir;
wir sind ihm alle weit.
Aber wunderbar sind dir
die Hände benedeit.
So reifen sie bei keiner Frau,
so schimmernd aus dem Saum:
ich bin der Tag,
ich bin der Tau,
du aber bist der Baum.

Ich bin jetzt matt,
mein Weg war weit,
vergieb mir,
ich vergaß,
was Er, der groß in Goldgeschmeid
wie in der Sonne saß,
dir künden ließ, du Sinnende,
(verwirrt hat mich der Raum).
Sieh: ich bin das Beginnende,
du aber bist der Baum.

Ich spannte meine Schwingen aus
und wurde seltsam weit;
jetzt überfließt dein kleines Haus
von meinem großen Kleid.
Und dennoch bist du so allein
wie nie und schaust mich kaum;
das macht: ich bin ein Hauch im Hain,
du aber bist der Baum.

Die Engel alle bangen so,
lassen einander los:
noch nie war das Verlangen so,
so ungewiss und groß.
Vielleicht, dass Etwas bald geschieht,
das du im Traum begreifst.
Gegrüßt sei, meine Seele sieht:
du bist bereit und reifst.
Du bist ein großes, hohes Tor,
und aufgehn wirst du bald.
Du, meines Liedes liebstes Ohr,
jetzt fühle ich:
mein Wort verlor
sich in dir wie im Wald.

So kam ich und vollendete
dir tausendeinen Traum.
Gott sah mich an;
er blendete...
Du aber bist der Baum.

Rainer Maria Rilke, 21.7.1899, Berlin-Schmargendorf

Inspired

Long live my supervisor! He managed to inspire me once more and to set my feet on the Earth again.

Industry lobbying

"O ambiente social e político em que hoje vive a indústria, tem vindo a justificar a necessidade de reforço de estruturas colectivas, representativas de interesses económicos específicos e gerais, como forma de garantir a intervenção da indústria nos processos de decisão que podem resultar em constrangimentos para o seu desenvolvimento sustentado."

Quite bluntly: we (Portguese agro-food industry) unite to lobby for our economic interests. This is the first sentence on their home page: http://www.fipa.pt/ I like it when they are straight forward. :-)

Farmers get squeezed

"Most of what we spend on food—in fact, nearly all—goes to nonfarmers. This means that
while there’s plenty of cash moving through the global food system, the money available
for farmers keeps getting squeezed."
http://www.grassorganic.com/files/Where_Have_All_the_Farms_Gone.pdf

Ai de vocês se pensam!

Mudando de assunto, qual é a posição da CAP sobre os organismos geneticamente modificados (OGM)?
João Machado (presidente da CAP): "O que a CAP diz e tem defendido, e eu próprio, que sou administrador da Autoridade da Segurança Alimentar Europeia – a autoridade que diz se são perigosos ou não os OGM –, é o seguinte: os agricultores portugueses, e os europeus (porque isto são directivas comunitárias), não são cientistas. Não se têm que pronunciar sobre se é um perigo para a biodiversidade, para a saúde humana, para o que quer que seja. Para isso, existe uma Autoridade da Segurança Alimentar, que diz se é perigoso ou não."

http://www.mundoportugues.org/content/1/2789/joao-machado-ministro-agricultura-prefere-devolver-verbas-bruxelas/

Acho extremamente asquerosa esta maneira autoritária e pretenciosa de falar. Ele é que sabe e que diz, e ponto final. Ninguêm tem mais nada a dizer. Os valores e as preocupações dos outros não contam. Cala-te se não levas um pontapé debaixo da mesa. É esta maneira de forçar as suas próprias agendas sobre os outros que domina no meio político e autárquico português. Valores democráticos? Onde?

Local currencies, references

Douthwhaites' "Short Circuit": http://www.feasta.org/documents/shortcircuit/contents.html

Silvio Gesell's "The natural Economic order": http://www.ces.org.za/docs/Gesell/en/neo/index.htm

International Journal on Community Currency Research: http://www.uea.ac.uk/env/ijccr/index.html

The LETS design manual: http://www.gmlets.u-net.com/

German speaking: http://www.regiogeld.de/

Found out

By the way, I've been found out, or so believed that guy. I introduced the concept of alternative monetary systems and local currencies to these economics students, who strangely enough, had never ever heard about it. They found it completely insane and shouted and laughed at the thought of it. I explained and defended the idea as well as I could. As an ecologist it's hard to talk to economists, as everybody in the world does know. The split between the disciplines is bigger than the split originated at Babel. After a while one of the economics students said something that meant "Ah, I think now I know what sort of person you are: you are one of these completely radical fundamentalist sectarians". Me, in response, I tried to smile like an angel.

Peter, would you please explain these guys?...

Fanatics

I read Steiners decription of what a fanatic is. I burst out in laughter as I so often do when I grasp something he says. He said a fanatic is someone who thinks he is right and wants to convince others immediately of his believes. When others do not thoughtlessly accept what the fanatic has to say, the fanatic get's upset and even agressive.

But then there's the quetsion: do you prefer a fanatic or a sponge like chamaleon? I'd rather marry a fanatic.

Gesang der Geister über dem Wasser

Des Menschen Seele
Gleicht dem Wasser:
Vom Himmel kommt es,
Zum Himmel steigt es,
Und wieder nieder
Zur Erde muß es.
Ewig wechselnd.

Strömt von der hohen,
Steilen Felsenwand
Der reine Strahl,
Dann stäubt er lieblich
In Wolkenwellen
Zum glatten Fels,
Und, leicht empfangen,
Wallt er verschleiernd,
Leisrauschend
Zur Tiefe nieder.

Ragen Klippen
Dem Sturz entgegen,
Schäumt er unmutig
Stufenweise
Zum Abgrund.

Im flachen Bette
Schleicht er das Wiesental hin,
Und in dem glatten See
Weiden ihr Antlitz
Alle Gestirne.
Wind ist der Welle
Lieblicher Buhler;
Wind rauscht von Grund aus
Schäumende Wogen.

Seele des Menschen
Wie gleichst du dem Wasser!
Schicksal des Menschen,
Wie gleichst du dem Wind!

J.W. Goethe

Song of the spirits over the waters

The soul of man
Is like the water:
It comes from heaven,
It returns to heaven,
And down again
To earth must go,
Ever changing.

When from the high,
Sheer wall of rock
The pure stream gushes,
It sprays its lovely vapor
In billowing clouds
Towards the smooth rock,
And lightly received,
It goes enshrouded,
Softly hissing
Down to the deep.

Cliffs tower,
Opposing its fall.
Annoyed, it foams
Step by step
Into the abyss.

In a flat bed
It slinks down the grassy vale,
And in the waveless lake
All the stars
Feast on their likeness.

Wind is the wave's
Handsome suitor;
Wind stirs up from the depths
Foaming billows.

Soul of man,
How like to the water!
Fate of man,
How like to the wind!

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Geschichterl

Als wir als Kinder Internat gespielt haben (ich war Jahrelang stolz das Spiel ausgedacht zu haben) hat meine Schwester die Rollen der Lehrer und der Internat Direktorin uebernommen. Den Geschichte Unterricht plante sie sehr detailliert, das weiss ich noch genau. Sie hatte Seitenlange Notizen ueber wie die Germanen gegen die Firlefaxe eine Schlacht fuehrten und dabei von den West-Ost Visigoden unterstuetzt wurden. Das war im Jahre 1635, ca. 100 Jahre nach der Indo-Germanischen Invasion von West-Afrika. Leider konnte ich mir die Details nicht bis heute merken, aber ich muss sagen, die Geschichte die meine Schwester da erfunden hat war total konsistent und intern koeherent.

Wenn ich jetzt ein Wirtschaftstextbuch in die Hand bekomme habe ich das gleiche Gefuehl: das Zeug hat einen Logischen Zusammenhang und ist darum Glaubwuerdig. Aber es hat mit der Realitaet nix zu tun.

Nem pensar

How ridiculous can it get?

"Portugal thinks the World Bank is well
positioned to play a key role in these countries and to make a
difference due to its adaptability character and by making quick
disbursements.
Portugal urges the international community to make a
renewed effort to achieve a successful closing of the Doha
Development Round.
Portugal believes that the private sector development plays a crucial
role in the fight against poverty."

(October 22, 2007 -- Statement by the Hon. Fernando Teixeira dos Santos, Governor of the World Bank Group for Portugal, at the Joint Annual Discussion.)

Portugal thinks, urges and believes.
Dear Fernando Teixeira dos Santos, do you really think you personify Portugal?! Aren't you a bit inflated?
As far as I can tell you are talking scrap anyways.

Where's hope left?

"When the gnomes come out of the woodwork at night and you direct the torch on them they explode. For they cannot stand the light."

Told by a nordic Hans met a few years ago. I think he was talking about pig factory farms and how they were polluting the streams and the sea and the interest keeping the facts hidden. His hope was if he put the torch on the infractors they would have to stop their destructive activities. I wish to think it was like that. Some crime is discovered and you "just" have to bring it to light. But I'm afraid that's naive... So much crime and shame standing there in front of everyone's eyes. We shout and are convinced it will collapse by itself. And 50 years are over and it is still there.

"denn ueber allem herscht GEWALT!"/ for above everything rules violence (Carl Orff, Die Kluge)

Fast food - newest development

"Os ingleses estao a desenvolver um tipo de comida embalada que ja pode vir mastigada.

E cuja embalagem se pode comer tambem. Vem tudo mastigadinho, e so por goela abaixo, como os passaros.

Sempre pode ajudar esta rapaziada tao atarefadinha a poupar mais uns segundos na hora da refeicao."

Mensagem encontrada no Forum da Comunidade Portuguesa no Reino Unido: Tugas.co.uk

This guy argues that the English are developing ready chewed food to spare even more time.

Im Wagen stehende Schieber

"Vieles von dem, was im Leben vor sich geht, wuerde ganz anders vor sich gehen, wenn die Menschen nicht solche im Wagen stehende Schieber waeren."
(many things that happen in life would not be that way if humans were not such in-the-coach-standing-pushers)
R. Steiner, 1909

Rebecca

My sister's painting, isn't it beautiful?

John van Kesteren - Der Mond by Carl Orff

Do you know how it came that the moon was hung up in the sky?

Underdeveloped & backward USA

About 12% of all US households are food insecure. (Gorman et al., 2006)

Lucifer and Erosfire

No, I'm not talking about sinful temptations or anything the like. These are the names of 2 research projects about fire in Portugal:
Lucifer is the working name for "Land use change interactions with fire in Mediterranean landscapes" and Erosfire is a study on the relation bewteen fire and soil erosion from the University of Aveiro...

Hm...how should I call my project?

EC accession of Pt and Spain...

"One substantial budgetary repercussion has already been seen with the adoption of the controversial Integrated Mediterranean Program[38]In order to appease Greek concerns over the entry of Spain and Portugal, the Community agreed to an aid package which included $4.4 billion over seven years for Greek, French, and Italian farmers who were threatened by competition from Spain and Portugal. Of that total, Greece was to receive $1.4 billion and agreed in return not to veto the accession. Thus, even before Spain and Portugal's accession in 1986, their entry was costing the Community.

Added products from Spain and Portugal also mean a further drain on the Community budget. Spain's excess of olive oil alone doubles the cost of supporting olive growers[40] Spain and Portugal's addition to the existing wine, fruit, and vegetable surpluses (especially wine) means added storage and destruction costs as well as added price support and export subsidy costs."

Jensen, Christian Henri
Source:Brigham Young University Law Review; 1990, Issue 4

Small is bountiful

Peasant farmers offer the best chance of feeding the world. So why do we treat them with contempt?

By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 10th June 2008

I suggest you sit down before you read this. Robert Mugabe is right. At last week’s global food summit he was the only leader to speak of “the importance … of land in agricultural production and food security”.(1) Countries should follow Zimbabwe’s lead, he said, in democratising ownership.
Of course the old bastard has done just the opposite. He has evicted his opponents and given land to his supporters. He has failed to support the new settlements with credit or expertise, with the result that farming in Zimbabwe has collapsed. The country was in desperate need of land reform when Mugabe became president. It remains in desperate need of land reform today.
But he is right in theory. Though the rich world’s governments won’t hear it, the issue of whether or not the world will be fed is partly a function of ownership. This reflects an unexpected discovery. It was first made in 1962 by the Nobel economist Amartya Sen(2), and has since been confirmed by dozens of further studies. There is an inverse relationship between the size of farms and the amount of crops they produce per hectare. The smaller they are, the greater the yield.
In some cases, the difference is enormous. A recent study of farming in Turkey, for example, found that farms of less than one hectare are twenty times as productive as farms of over ten hectares(3). Sen’s observation has been tested in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Malaysia, Thailand, Java, the Phillippines, Brazil, Colombia and Paraguay. It appears to hold almost everywhere.
The finding would be surprising in any industry, as we have come to associate efficiency with scale. In farming, it seems particularly odd, because small producers are less likely to own machinery, less likely to have capital or access to credit, and less likely to know about the latest techniques.
There’s a good deal of controversy about why this relationship exists. Some researchers argued that it was the result of a statistical artefact: fertile soils support higher populations than barren lands, so farm size could be a result of productivity, rather than the other way around. But further studies have shown that the inverse relationship holds across an area of fertile land. Moreover, it works even in countries like Brazil, where the biggest farmers have grabbed the best land(4).
The most plausible explanation is that small farmers use more labour per hectare than big farmers(5). Their workforce largely consists of members of their own families, which means that labour costs are lower than on large farms (they don’t have to spend money recruiting or supervising workers), while the quality of the work is higher. With more labour, farmers can cultivate their land more intensively: they spend more time terracing and building irrigation systems; they sow again immediately after the harvest; they might grow several different crops in the same field.
In the early days of the Green Revolution, this relationship seemed to go into reverse: the bigger farms, with access to credit, were able to invest in new varieties and boost their yields. But as the new varieties have spread to smaller farmers, the inverse relationship has reasserted itself(6). If governments are serious about feeding the world, they should be breaking up large landholdings, redistributing them to the poor and concentrating their research and their funding on supporting small farms.
There are plenty of other reasons for defending small farmers in poor countries. The economic miracles in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan arose from their land reform programmes. Peasant farmers used the cash they made to build small businesses. The same thing seems to have happened in China, though it was delayed for 40 years by collectivisation and the Great Leap Backwards: the economic benefits of the redistribution that began in 1949 were not felt until the early 80s(7). Growth based on small farms tends to be more equitable than growth built around capital-intensive industries(8). Though their land is used intensively, the total ecological impact of smallholdings is lower. When small farms are bought up by big ones, the displaced workers move into new land to try to scratch out a living. I once followed evicted peasants from the Brazilian state of Maranhao 2000 miles across the Amazon to the land of the Yanomami Indians, then watched them rip it apart.
But the prejudice against small farmers is unshakeable. It gives rise to the oddest insult in the English language: when you call someone a peasant, you are accusing them of being self-reliant and productive. Peasants are detested by capitalists and communists alike. Both have sought to seize their land, and have a powerful vested interest in demeaning and demonising them. In its profile of Turkey, the country whose small farmers are 20 times more productive than its large ones, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation states that, as a result of small landholdings, “farm output … remains low.”(9) The OECD states that “stopping land fragmentation” in Turkey “and consolidating the highly fragmented land is indispensable for raising agricultural productivity.”(10) Neither body provides any supporting evidence. A rootless, half-starved labouring class suits capital very well.
Like Mugabe, the donor countries and the big international bodies loudly demand that small farmers be supported, while quietly shafting them. Last week’s food summit agreed “to help farmers, particularly small-scale producers, increase production and integrate with local, regional, and international markets.”(11) But when, earlier this year, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge proposed a means of doing just this, the US, Australia and Canada refused to endorse it as it offended big business(12), while the United Kingdom remains the only country that won’t reveal whether or not it supports the study(13).
Big business is killing small farming. By extending intellectual property rights over every aspect of production; by developing plants which either won’t breed true or which don’t reproduce at all(14), it ensures that only those with access to capital can cultivate. As it captures both the wholesale and retail markets, it seeks to reduce its transaction costs by engaging only with major sellers. If you think that supermarkets are giving farmers in the UK a hard time, you should see what they are doing to growers in the poor world. As developing countries sweep away street markets and hawkers’ stalls and replace them with superstores and glossy malls, the most productive farmers lose their customers and are forced to sell up. The rich nations support this process by demanding access for their companies. Their agricultural subsidies still help their own, large farmers to compete unfairly with the small producers of the poor world.
This leads to an interesting conclusion. For many years, well-meaning liberals have supported the fair trade movement because of the benefits it delivers directly to the people it buys from. But the structure of the global food market is changing so rapidly that fair trade is now becoming one of the few means by which small farmers in poor nations might survive. A shift from small to large farms will cause a major decline in global production, just as food supplies become tight. Fair trade might now be necessary not only as a means of redistributing income, but also to feed the world.
http://www.monbiot.com/

References:
1. http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/foodclimate/statements/zwe_mugabe.pdf
2. Amartya Sen, 1962. An Aspect of Indian Agriculture. Economic Weekly, Vol. 14.
3. Fatma Gül Ünal, October 2006. Small Is Beautiful: Evidence Of Inverse Size YieldRelationship In Rural Turkey. Policy Innovations. http://www.policyinnovations.org/ideas/policy_library/data/01382
4. Giovanni Cornia, 1985. Farm Size, Land Yields and the Agricultural Production function: ananalysis for fifteen Developing Countries. World Development. Vol. 13, pp. 513-34.
5. Eg Peter Hazell, January 2005. Is there a future for small farms? Agricultural Economics, Vol. 32, pp93-101. doi:10.1111/j.0169-5150.2004.00016.x
6. Rasmus Heltberg, October 1998. Rural market imperfections and the farm size— productivity relationship: Evidence from Pakistan. World Development. Vol 26, pp 1807-1826. doi:10.1016/S0305-750X(98)00084-9
7. See Shenggen Fan and Connie Chan-Kang , 2005. Is Small Beautiful?: Farm Size, Productivity and Poverty in Asian Agriculture. Agricultural Economics, Vol. 32, pp135-146.
8. Peter Hazell, ibid.
9. http://www.new-agri.co.uk/00-3/countryp.html
10. OECD Economic Surveys: Turkey - Volume 2006 Issue 15, p186.This is available online as a Google book.
I was led to refs 9 and 10 via Fatma Gül Ünal, ibid.
11. http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/foodclimate/HLCdocs/declaration-E.pdf
12. International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), 2008. Global Summary for Decision Makers. www.agassessment.org
13. IAASTD, viewed 9th June 2008. Frequently Asked Questions. www.agassessment.org
14. Eg Terminator seeds.

Note

(a propria falta de estilo do relatorio revela mediocricidade na sua concepcao, nao tem titulo, nem data nem autor…)

This is a note I wrote some time ago about a report I had to read.

Afastamento da realidade

"As pessoas, e sobretudo muitos políticos, não sabem quanto custa uma carcaça."

disse Jaime Silva, o Ministro da Agricultura numa entrevista. Acredito que seja verdade, e mais uma vez se descortina a desligação dos políticos com a realidade que prtendem administrar... Como então desenhar a política agrícola e económica de modo a não espezinhar os pastores que praticam transhumância, se eles não estão presentes sequer no imaginário dos decisores políticos?


Goethe, vem de volta:
"Ah! when one with such love of study's haunted,
And scarcely sees the world on holidays,
And takes a spy-glass, as it were, to read it,
How can one by persuasion hope to lead it?"

(Goethe, Faust I)

Empty life

(Add of a retail company. I hope they sell Soma.)

Richterstimmung

Richterstimmung hat jemand der meint mit seinem Verstand, anhand aeusseren Manifestationen, objetiv Urteilen zu koennen - und das auch staendig tut.

Complexity

This graph beautifully illustrates the complexity of the issues I'm dealing with. Do you understand it? Neither do I. (I don't think it means anything.)

Prémio Quercus 2008

"Dr. José Cardoso da Rocha, reputado Cirurgião-Pediatra, foi, a título póstumo, distinguido com o Prémio Quercus 2008 por ter sido um dos pioneiros da Agricultura Biológica em Portugal. Foi o primeiro produtor português de vinho em Agricultura Biológica e dedicou-se com extremo afinco ao tema da agricultura sustentável, à preservação de espécies autóctones e à protecção da biodiversidade em meio agrícola. Proprietário da Quinta da Comenda, em S. Pedro do Sul, desde 1984, foi responsável pela sua conversão integral à Agricultura Biológica. Ao longo de 23 anos de trabalho e de um forte investimento por parte do Dr. José Cardoso da Rocha, e de toda a sua família, esta Quinta tornou-se numa unidade-modelo e pioneira de um tipo de agricultura perfeitamente compatível com a defesa dos recursos naturais. Assumiu-se também como uma referência no sector do agro-bio-turismo (Turismo de Habitação numa propriedade com Agricultura Biológica), aproximando assim, de uma forma sustentável, o Homem à Terra e à Natureza."

Parabéns, tanto à Quercus pela escolha como à Quinta da Comenda.

Timo faz ano

Prefácio à trimembração social - utopismo e realidade

As tarefas sociais contemporâneas são tais que não podem ser resolvidas se são enfrentadas com utopismos. A crença que algum programa prescrito e fixo possa resolver os problems sociais da actualidade não avança a sua resoulção. È possível falar muito sobre como alguma estratégia seria tão adequada em satisfazer a humanidade, mas essa conversa tende de perder de vista a praticabilidade, perdendo a relação com a realidade.

Mesmo acreditando que alguêm esteja na posse de uma solução completa para os problemas sociais, seria muito imprático acreditar que basta convençer as pessoas certas para implementar a “soulção”. Nos tempos que correm não é possível intervir na sociedade deste modo. A disposição humana não é tal que se diria “está ali alguêm que sabe como as coisas devem ser feitas. Vamos seguir os seus concelhos e fazer tudo como ele diz.”

Este livro conta com esta relaidade. Aqueles que julgam que este texto tem um carácter utópico estão enganados, pois vêm nos outros as rotinas do seu próprio pensamento. Muitas pessoas com pensamento prático acreditam ainda que devem abordar outras pessoas com ideias utópicas, principalmente na área económica. Estas pessoas precisam de se convencer que a sua audiência não pode dar utilidade alguma às suas ideias utópicas.

Isto deve ser tratado como uma evidência. Pois indica um facto importante da vida pública contemporânea. Trata-se do facto de que ideias alienadas das necessidades práticas não podem contribuir para resolver situações problemáticas reais.

Este ponto de vista não pode ser muito popular, pois exige que se admita ou reconheca que se reflecte sobre os problemas reais da vida de uma forma pouco prática e alienada das necessidades reais. No entanto, este reconhecimento é importante, para que a aproximação realista às questões sociais seja possível.

Esta reflexão põe em questão a vida cultural e espiritual actual. A humanidade moderna desenvolveu uma vida cultural dependente de instituições estatais e de forças económicas. O Homem já em criança é integrado no ensino e na educação estatal. Por isso só pode ser educado consoante as condições económicas a que está exposto. Pode se acreditar que isto torne o ser humana bem adaptado às condições de vida em que se encontra, pois o estado tem a possibilidade de formar instuituições de educação que educem o ser humano de modo a que este possa servir da melhor maneira à sociedade. E também se pode acreditar facilmente que o ser humano se torna mais útil se for educado consoante as necessidades do sistema económico. No entanto, este texto tem que mostrar que a confusão que existe na vida pública e cultural actual resulta da dependência da esfera cultural do estado e da economia.

Deste modo este texto vira se contra enganos amplamente aceites. A regulação da educação pelo estado é vista há mutio tempo como algo positivo para a sociedade e pensadores socialistas não conseguem imaginar nada melhor do que o estado educar as pessoas de modo a que estas sirvam melhor os interesses do colectivo.

Não é fácil chegar à conclusão de que o que foi bom para a humanidade num certo tempo histórico possa deixar de o ser mais tarde. Para a evolução humana foi importante que a educação tenha sido subtraida das instituições que a administravam na época medieval para a integrar nas funções do estado. Mas a manutenção desta situação na actualidade é um erro.

Steiner, 1919
Traduzido do prefácio de "Die Kernpunkte der Sozialen Frage"

Mistake

I saw this baby eating a chocolate cookie. Do its parents believe this is food? Do they think they are doing something good for their baby or are they cruelly experimenting and researching about caries development on their own offspring? Why do they give such stuff to a child? Questions over questions...
white wheat flour + refined sugar + fat (+ chocolate)
To take a chocolate cookie for food is an unbelievable mistake. Food is something that is supposed to nourish our bodies and our health, not something that ruins it. I understand that the fact that the body is able to derive energy out of the chocolate cookie must be the reason why this mistake persists.
It's just the age of mechanisation that is even reducing our food to an "energy input", disregarding all the other visible and invisible and indivisible, interrelated ingredients of natural foods. It is this simplistic, reductionistic view: we need carbohidrates + proteins + fat + oh yeah...some vitamins and minerals of course. Let's throw some pure portions of all of this randomly together and it will be fine.

By the way: I like the taste and crunchyness of chocolate cookies and that's why I eat them, but I list them under the category of "consumables" and would n e v e r offer them to a defensless child. Do you understand now why, always when I enter a supermarket, I pray at the door "may I find something edible in here!"

11th Week

Es ist in dieser Sonnenstunde
An dir, die weise Kunde zu erkennen:
An Weltenschönheit hingegeben
In dir dich fühlend zu durchleben:
Verlieren kann das Menschen-Ich
Und finden sich im Welten-Ich.

Rudolf Steiner, Seelenkalender