Some news I just got from TwinEagles:

Inland Northwest Permaculture Convergence, Sept 13-15 Hayden Lake, Idaho

http://www.inlandnorthwestperm...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

It would be worth it to meet and hear Toby Hemenway speak.

I wonder if the issue of invasive species will be addressed. This has been an inflammatory issue on the net. Permaculturists have been called "unscientific" as well as "socialistic". As an archaeologist--a person who looks at cultures as adaptive systems of the past, I tend to side with Hemenway. Afterall what is a "native plant" anyway, what we really have are environments which include plant systems and human systems (and animal systems as well). And those from 500 A.D. are not the same as those from 2015 A.D. Invasive plants are 'pioneers' -- they have a job to do. Their job is to heal environmental damage, and then get out of the way to allow a new healthy ecosystem to develop. Some permaculture strategies would like to use invasives to help this process along.

One (of many) of many detractors from the permaculture perspective is Linda Chalker-Scott
https://sharepoint.cahnrs.wsu....

I think its an interesting debate.

And here is one example of Toby Hemenway's response.

http://www.patternliteracy.com...

TH. on the native plant argument:

http://www.patternliteracy.com...

Linda Chalker-Scott attacks Toby's credentials by pointing out he has "no formal training in biology past his bachelor’s degree", yet at the end she insults the reader by lecturing him that "arguments should contain content, not insults."

If this was a moderated debate I believe she would have lost points here.

I think so. But I do agree that the matter is best 'discussed', not viewed as an opportunity to exchange insults.

And from the perspective of the university system, I should think a bachelor's degree, especially a B.S. would be ample qualification to read a scientific paper. Some of the best ideas in history came from people who were not indoctrinated in the status quo.

hazelnut said:Some of the best ideas in history came from people who were not indoctrinated in the status quo.

It's one of the reasons I like Toby so much.

Its interesting to me how simple ideas--such as native plants--native to what??? can become so inflammatory. We do get attached to old ideas. And the notion that things (plants, animals, humans) exist only in systems has been a hard one to swallow.

Ill be looking forward to what he has to say at Hayden Lake. Do you plant to go? As for me, I wish I could but life is sort of hectic right now.

Not me, as much as I'd like to. I don't travel much.

Maybe there will be good reporting, so we all can know what happens.