[Terrapreta] Re-mineralization and Ceramics

[Sean K. Barry]

Hey Lou,

"... we shift from a system of depletion and scarcity to one of restoration and abundance."

"Waste not, want not."

Without fear, you write like a speech writer for FDR.  Thanks!

SKB
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: lou gold<mailto:lou.gold at gmail.com> 
  To: Sean K. Barry<mailto:sean.barry at juno.com> ; Terrapreta at bioenergylists.org<mailto:Terrapreta at bioenergylists.org> 
  Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 1:37 PM
  Subject: Re: [Terrapreta] Re-mineralization and Ceramics


  Hi Sean and Wayne,

  Your responses and so much more that I've gleaned from this marvelous forum make me want to continue my unscientific speculations. 

  Perhaps the char and the pottery and the nutrients and the minerals were  part of a "compost soup" in the waste dumps at first and this "soup" created an especially rich soil which was later spread around to other areas, probably with more ground char. These "amendments" contained all the necessary ingredients -- structural, microbial, mineral, nutritional, etc and had a "life" which continued to grow (like a culture) wherever it was placed. 

  Thus, the lesson from the first Terra Preta peoples maybe cultural even more than technological -- we can solve many problems by understanding waste as resource and using it to restore the health of the earth. All consumption generates waste. Putting it in the wrong place is polluting and destructive; putting it in the right place is healing and productive. As production and waste are linked harmoniously, we shift from a system of depletion and scarcity to one of restoration and abundance. 

  Perhaps, the new paradigm can be expressed simply as "waste not, want not." Implementing it at every level of societal, economical, and technological organization becomes the work of our age. It could be a very good time. 

  Just speculating....

  lou





  On 8/30/07, Sean K. Barry < sean.barry at juno.com<mailto:sean.barry at juno.com>> wrote: 
    Hi Lou,

    Clay in pottery is primarily Aluminum Silicate-AlSO3.  I do not know what other minerals is contains, or in what amounts.  Clay was porbably taken from the very local soils to make the pottery.  It is very similar to the mostly Oxisol soil found in the tropics, which is not a particularly fertile and mineral rich medium for growing plants.  In the tropics plants get almost all of there minerals from the deadfall of the biomass above the ground around them.  At the same time, the soil under them is made almost devoid of mineral content by inexorable leaching away from the flow of water.  It is kind of a paradox how a verdant jungle can exist on tropical soils.

    Based on this, I think pottery shards are not related too much to "re-mineralization".  It might be worth testing, though, whether the pottery shards contain added minerals (in the clay or glazing?), making them different than the clay from the natural surroundings.
    There probably are easy ways to verify whether there was any value to the pottery shards found in TP, to be used as possible "re-mineralization" therapy for the soil, and which had been applied purposefully for that function by the Amazon people.

    Regards,

    SKB
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: lou gold<mailto:lou.gold at gmail.com> 
      To: Terrapreta at bioenergylists.org<mailto:Terrapreta at bioenergylists.org> 
      Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 1:47 AM
      Subject: [Terrapreta] Re-mineralization and Ceramics


      I know so little about soil chemistry, etc that this maybe be an odd question.

      Can the need for soil re-mineralization offer another possible explanation 
      for the function of the pottery found in the TP sites of the Amazon? 

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