Charlie Stross <charlie@antipope.org> writes:
> On Fri, Jan 26, 2001 at 10:54:59AM -0500, Michael Lorrey wrote:
> >
> > A smart person would see that flooding Holland would result in many
> > thousands of hectares of valuable mariculture lagoons to raise seafood
> > for europe. Is mariculture more valuable a crop than tulips?
>
> If tulips were the main produce of Holland's polders, you'd be
> correct. Unfortunately, they aren't -- they're a trivial export
> market. More to the point, Holland is a *very* densely populated,
> industrialised modern country. Agricultural land there is put
> to whatever use gets the highest return on investment (modulo
> the idiocies of the CAP), but the important point is that you've
> got a technologically advanced nation of five or six million
> people -- all of whom live within about ten feet of sea level.
>
> I'd rate submerging airports, research labs, and factories and
> replacing them with mariculture ponds as a bad trade. (Tulip farms
> are another matter.)
Also, the dutch are more populous and wealthy than us swedes - they
are going to win the tug-o-war and then go on ski trips to the lovely
Stockholm glaciers :-)
On the other hand, I would not mind living in the Netherlands.
It is a lovely example of just how beautiful a human-created
environment can be. I love flying over it, seeing the polders,
channels and population centers as an intricate puzzle of human
ingenuity. I got the same feeling when I visited Venice, which is also
a good example of a highly artificial environment. Both places have
their problems and drawbacks, but they also show that humans can
create wonderful environments. It just takes time.
-- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Anders Sandberg Towards Ascension! asa@nada.kth.se http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/ GCS/M/S/O d++ -p+ c++++ !l u+ e++ m++ s+/+ n--- h+/* f+ g+ w++ t+ r+ !y
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