Has science betrayed us?

By Sarah Mock and Alison Grantham

Alright folks, I know this feels like it’s lost all sense of meaning or structure, and just a reminder here, that we’re following the structure *line by line* of an essay that an industry leader described as “brilliant.” In case anyone is wondering how “climate smart ag” is going.

Were the world nothing more than a giant spreadsheet that only needs to be balanced correctly, my first question would be… how do you balance a spreadsheet? Are you confusing spreadsheets with a checkbook? And after this cute but silly little (inexplicably in quotes?) metaphor, we have just the faintest hint of the quiet part said out loud.

“So we can go about business-as-usual without the methane or carbon.”

See, that’s where it becomes clear that this essay doesn’t actually know the first thing about the arguments people are actually making about methane.

Because if you think scientists are calling for methane reductions in furtherance of “business-as-usual,” then you have never met a scientist. We don’t care where you look, from mainstream climate reporting to the footnotes of IPCC reports, the one thing that’s absolutely clear is that real solutions don’t involve going about business-as-usual. This essay does seem to be arguing for business-as-usual in the livestock sector, however. But they’re on their own there. That’s not the goal of people who care about measuring methane.

In one paragraph, we get references to “technocratic ‘solutioneering,’” “disenfranchisement from life,” “cogs in a machine of promissory innovation,” and some absolutely next-level defense of the inherent infallibility of farmers.

The essay cites Paul Kingsnorth to explain that those who don’t read “peer-reviewed science,” are “intimidated into fearful silence by those who can, or claim they can,” painting science as a hoity-toity snake oil and astrology racket. And who is perpetuating this? The “green ‘thought leaders’” drawn uniformly from “the upper strata of society,” who are framed as eager to destroy those they perceive as lesser. Their plan is to drive all regular people like animals to slaughter.

Source: USDA Economic Research Service

Perhaps we love beef so much because they generate the highest gross receipts of all commodities? This graph was inspired by a Farm Bureau infographic about why beef was king of American ag. I went and pulled the data to confirm. Turns out it was true.

Notably, the cattle and calves claim the biggest share of cash receipts in the US ag economy, only once briefly surpassed by corn. They’ve also been long controlled by a highly consolidated meat packing industry run by Cargill, Tyson, and JBS who collectively did almost $300B in sales last year. And companies aren’t the only billionaires at the beef party. Cattle ranches are billionaires’ favorite conspicuous consumption.

Here are a few of our favorites on billionaires' obsession not just with with cropland as an investment vehicle (and collecting subsidies on it), but with ranchland in particular:

But, we digress.

Back to our essay, we’ll land on this spectacular phrase:

“Because we tend to view our world through the scientific method alone”

We couldn’t think of anyone, not even scientists, who view their whole world through the scientific method alone. This straw man assertion is utter nonsense.

Of course we humans are in relation with the world around us. We often refuse to admit it, the essay is right about that. Some people who come to mind as those who refuse to admit it – farmers. A lot of farmers in the US right now sure act like their actions have no impact on the water, air, and landscapes beyond their farm fields or livestock pens. But they do have an impact. And we should hold them responsible for those impacts.

The leap of this wider sentence is bonkers (“because we see our world through the scientific method doesn’t mean… we can eliminate cattle…”) but I’m going to skip the English/logic lesson to beg for an explanation of how “cattle are critical to some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on the planet.” Cattle are a domestic species that originated in the swamps and forests of Eastern Europe. [Note: we have had an internal debate around the geography of cattle domestication and recognize there is evidence of multiple instances of domestication in Asia, Africa, and Europe, but the point remains: Cattle are not the best-adapted native ungulate globally, particularly not in the Americas. Thank you, European colonialism, and please go check out a photo of the Indonesian wild bovid, the Anoa, which we both agree is our favorite.]

Despite hundreds of years of domestication, cattle still *very much* carry on the traits born of their native landscape – they loaf around (and damage) water ways, they tend to be picky eaters on the landscape (and thus alter native plant communities by decimating some and allowing others to dominate), they do not naturally migrate, and between their biology and instincts, they usually do not do well in very extreme climatic conditions. For example, they like to lay down in draws during blizzards, where they freeze in place and die. That last bit was from the Wyoming half of this authorship and the Californian half would like to note they also lay down and die in the heat.

Now, if what you mean is that hoofed ungulates are a critical part of biodiverse ecosystems in some parts of the world – absolutely! A bunch of critical wild species were listed for potential annihilation in this essay. But as mentioned, hoofed ungulates =! (that means “does not equal” for everyone who’s not an elitist science scumbag like me) modern cattle production. Modern cattle production is in many, many, many landscapes, and is simply not sustainable because cattle are not native to the whole world. #SupportYourLocalUngulates

Back to it:

“We can continue to advance science; we can continue measuring things, but we have to acknowledge how our ‘datafication’ can reduce our worldview. These tools and metrics represent one part of our story, not the story.

Yes, very true! It is one part of the story, just as methane is one part of a climate story. And yet, this essay has in no way internalized the fact that methane is one metric, one aspect, of a broad climate perspective that serious people take.

"While we can’t “peer-review” our intuition and sense of belonging to the world, we also can’t continue to use our addiction to facts and figures and numbers as a shield from our discomfort with complexity, uncertainty, and worst of all, complicity. Livestock can go beyond methane and help regenerate livelihoods, local economies, and restore and maintain optimal health, biodiversity, and carbon sequestration of our agro-ecosystems."

Some points:

Never before I read this essay have I come across the idea that "peer review" is the essence, or the pinnacle, of all knowledge. This is both reductionist and a straw man.
What part of this article even spoke to "intuition and sense of belonging in the world?" No part of the methane discussion, on a scientific level, ever questions the human level "sense of belonging to the world.” And is the implication that "cattle deserve a privileged place on Earth" is "intuitive?" To everyone?
Who is "addicted to facts and figures and numbers?" Americans, generally, abhor facts and figures and numbers, because most people are all about feeling their way to conclusions. If Americans were "addicted" to facts, we'd live in a very different country.
Feelings, stories, and think-pieces are a much more common shield from "complexity, uncertainty, and complicity” than numbers are. Which is why after you read this, you should go draw your own conclusions.
What the hell does “livestock can go beyond methane” even mean? I never heard anyone say that livestock is only the sum total of their emissions and nothing more.
*Perhaps* "livestock can help…" but they haven’t changed much yet. There are more than 1.5 billion cattle on Earth as of 2021, up 62% over the last 60 years, and guess how much good all of those domesticated European swamp-dwellers have done towards regenerating "livelihoods, local economies, and restoring and maintaining optimal health, biodiversity, and carbon sequestration?" Even Will Harris, the veritable king of American regen beef, recently noted he’s struggling financially.

We can and should amplify solutions to climate change that help reduce atmospheric greenhouse gasses, methane in particular, and pollution in general, and ones that recouple humans to landscapes as participants, not as lords (or stewards) tinkering with the land like god-the-watchmaker. We like how Daniel Sarewitz put it in his insightful Frontiers of Illusion, our biggest remaining challenge both with science and society in general is “to understand humanity’s place in the environment.”

Source: Source: USDA-NASS (2022)

Over the last 50 years, dairy production in the US has moved to warmer climates and more concentrated production models, driving increases in emissions, even as the overall sector shrank.

Which brings us back around to the beginning, where we have to acknowledge that it’s not impossible to measure a coastline. It’s not only possible to measure coastlines, it’s possible to specifically and accurately measure methane emissions from central California cows. And we know with confidence that even with fewer cows, we have managed to increase methane production; by moving them to hotter places and managing their manure in big, hot pools instead of having the animals distribute it on pastures (Source: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine).

This essay entirely missed the point of the coastline paradox, of fractals and the way they help us understand the world and ourselves. We shouldn’t have read past the logical fallacies of the opening paragraphs. But we did read on, to see this writer utterly mischaracterize the problem with methane, the reality of modern livestock production, current scientific and technical capacity, and the alternatives that are on the table.

In the end, we are grateful that we did read on because it led us to read, re-read, listen to, and discuss a whole bunch of great sources on not only the science, but also the policy and philosophy around climate, methane, and cattle. We’ve ruminated on those sources and our response to the original blog for the last 2 months, debating ourselves and each other on the merits of sharing this with the world.

Ultimately, we decided to share both our thoughts (above) and our reading list (below) in hopes that it can help spark some deeper conversations and engagement with science, nuance, and uncertainty that drives a much needed evolution of our food system.

Our Reading List

Chaos by James Gleick
Frontiers of Illusion: Science, Technology, and the Politics of Progress By Daniel Sarewitz

“In a fundamental sense, the vision of Bacon and Descartes was wrong: facts can be gathered, natural laws discovered, but these cannot necessarily be assembled to yield a true picture of nature. Thus the momentum of much research - basic research especially - may be headed in precisely the opposite direction from that needed to understand humanity’s place in the environment.” p. 108