Hi Rex,

don't be afraid to post here. You have good reasons for your claims and
you argue logically. The discussion with you is serious and honest and
I don't think that anyone will consider this wrong.

Rex:
>Perhaps I'll be seized and held for ransom.

Not by me, I assure you! :-)

You wrote:
>I consider it to be different.  A point I had hoped to make was that
>artificially removing a fruit before natural ripening *may* and
>probably does interfere with MN's grand design.  Certainly, MN is
>prevented from putting in

You made that point and I appreciate your thoughts.
Also you made your points concerning exceptions to the "let the fruit
ripen on the tree" rule.

Rex: (about compost heaps)
>Mine go to about 140 degrees F if made correctly.  Obviously your
>correct and mine are not the same.  Do you have thoughts dealing with
>104+ temperatures when it is 110 degrees out there where I am using a
>wheel hoe on a typical summer day?

It's pretty warm, where you are located.
Are you a desert farmer? ;-) :-)
I think MN's composts are flat and wet and allow a certain degree of
compensation for high temperatures by giving off water vapour. After
some dry weeks this is not possible any longer but as a farmer I assume
you won't let your trees die of dryness.

Another factor for the compost temperature is the speed at which you
add new matter. If you do it like MN - season for season a certain
amount - the fermentation activity will keep low and the temperature
won't exceed the critical value. This would be permaculture then, a
term which you probably know.

Rex:
>8th or 10th person.  Could the "don't heat the enzymes over 104
>degrees" concept be suffering from some transliteration problems?

This magic number is taken from books about chemistry. They say that
proteins are denatured above 104F. There are however proteins which
bear higher temperatures, but    g e n e r a l l y   (if you don't
know which substances are involved) the 104F border is valid.

Rex:
>Bacteria seem comfortable creating enzymes.  If they get some
>overheated compost, that's overheated as judged by some scientist, they
>go to work and do whatever is needed.  Once they do their job, the
>plant feeds.  Or at least that is the way I see it.

Well, bacteria are a very fast adapting species and therefore will
adapt quickly to the conditions in your high-heap compost. But this
doesn't mean the plants you are feeding the result are adapted to the
output of the process.
Unnatural conditions attract (or generate) unnatural microorganisms.
Unnatural microorganisms will produce unnatural molecules poisoning
your plants.

Rex:
>My composting is only a speeded up digestion.  Stage two of composting
>is when the material hits the soil.  The micro-organisms go to work and
>don't stop

Yes, your compost speeds up digestion. The same is said by scientists
about cooking: it predigests foods so they are better digestable by
humans. But what scientists forgot to say is, that cooking creates
thousands of new substances which are undigestable and harmful.

Rex:
>I don't know "Orkos," so they haven't lied to me---yet.  However, I
>suspect they can be fooled.  I suspect even their best supplier can
>occasionally get lazy and send in a load of sub-standard produce.  Do
>they just throw it out?

Their suppliers frequently try to fool them because they don't un-
derstand why adding a little bit of xxx should be harmful for the person
eating their foods. Mostly xxx will speed up growth or result in bigger
fruits etc.
And yes, Orkos throws away foods from their producers when they don't
pass their tests. And if the farmer continues to try fooling them they
will throw   h i m   out.

Orkos has not lied to me in all of the years I am ordering from them.
I am pretty well able to detect if a food is adulterated and would
immediately notice if they sent me such a food.
I trust my own senses and they haven't lied to me since I went raw.
If everybody could do that there would be no need to buy expensive
refractometers, biophotone meters, etc. And people would never be fooled
by good-looking (but empty inside) supermarket foods.

Rex:
>However, my angle, if one is needed, is that a more abundant supply of
>higher quality food (spelled  b e t t e r - t a s t i n g) will result
>in all, not just Instinctos, eating more uncooked food.

This is something I have given up to hope. To me it seems to be exactly
the opposite: peoples senses for good quality are degenerating more and
more and they buy poorer and poorer quality without noticing it. There-
fore they continue to look only for the price, driving the spiral down-
wards even further. :-(

Rex:
>Third, my experience has been that the aroma from high Brix fruits is
>always of note.

Hm hm. There are tomatos which are "overly attractive" for instinctos
because they contain loads of foreign substances from fertilizers.
I wonder if those would fool the refractometer too.

Rex:
>someone would respond, "That's basil---where could it be coming from?"

He he, farmers and their little hoaxes. :-)
Did you ever eat you excellent basil raw and without mixing? Then
you should be able to find out what a "stop" is. First the taste may
be pleasant. After you go on chewing the next leave it will finally
change into hot and unbearable. This is the stop. Did you experience
it?
BTW: basil is my favorite herb. I like it sooooo much!

Thank you for your detailed answers and interesting thoughts.

Stefan
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