re: weeds
Rex - because you regard weeds only as soil restoratives, you fail
to see that weeds can be allergens, toxic, etc., and the simple
reality that if you want a field that is a vegetable garden, rather
than weeds, you are forced to remove the weeds. Quite literally, you can't
see the "garden" for the "weeds". :-)
Describing certain weeds as pernicious is quite reasonable -- even if
that weed helps restore soil fertility.
I notice that people often get hung up on single words. I can probably
fix the situation simply by removing the word "pernicious" -- at
least from your view. From my view, "pernicious" is a good allegory for
the dishonest myths (and crank science - e.g., "fruit is just like
Mother's milk") promoted by certain raw dietary extremists.
Tom Billings