As you may or may not know, Butler hosts a lecture series every semester where they bring in a person of scientific knowledge to give as a 1.5 hour talk about some important issue. I remember freshmen year learning about robots. It was really interesting. There was a graph that depicted realism vs creepiness in terms of humanoid things (robots, dolls, puppets, zombies) and it was amazing.

I redrew it in my notebook, and I would love to put it here, except I can’t find it. Sorry, friends.

Last night I saw Wes Jackson. He runs The Land Institute and his deal is the total revolution of world agriculture. Now, I’m not really an expert on agriculture. The most I know is that Britain’s agricultural revolution freed up workers to start the Industrial Revolution, and that’s why it started in Britain. WHAT NOW, 3 EUROPEAN HISTORY CLASSES? I still remember stuff.

Now, my interest in various educational topics are usually based on how relatable to Hogwarts classes they are. Pharmacy is just Potions class, so I’m good there. Plants should be like Herbology, but real plants aren’t as cool as Hogwarts plants because real plants don’t scream and kill you (see: mandrake) or blow fire out of them and whatnot. (Actually, to be clear, real plants are really cool Just not as cool.)

So Dr. Jackson’s talk was still really interesting. There was a lot of history and politics involved with how our farming system is what it is today (ie, ALL CORN AND SOYBEANS with too much nitrogen). His theory is that agriculture needs to go back to “what it was”–using more traditional techniques and keeping nature on our side instead of working against it.

I don’t exactly understand what it means, but The Land Institute is breeding perennial grains and things as opposed to annual grains (which is 80% of what we grow). I don’t know what that means though. I just know that tulips are my favorite.

Here’s a picture of space because I didn’t take a picture at the lecture last night.