deplete, or mine, the soil, I would show him data from regenerative farms that are improving their soil nutrient levels year after year. Does this violate the “hole” in the system he spoke about? How can we account for those nutrients leaving the soil? In my opinion, thinking of life in a zero-sum equation can oftentimes cause us think too linearly. The two ends of the equation he speaks about are actually connected into one beautiful circle. “The Circle of Life” as one famous Disney put it. Life begets more life, as I like to put it. I think we humans naturally see the world from a macro-perspective, which makes sense because we are macro-creatures. Microscopic life runs this world. Whether we like to think of it that way or not, it’s the truth. Microscopic life works on incredibly fast time scales and we cannot fathom the production they can offer if we provide the right environment for them. Properly functioning soil microbiology will provide for our crops abundantly year-after-year under the right working conditions. I would encourage Peter to take a Total Nutrient Digestion test to visualize just how abundantly rich his land is with useful elements. In addition, I would encourage him to think about the massive quantity of N that is in the air, ready to be fixed by soil microbes when given the opportunity. Where does the vastly rich and productive Amazon rainforest receive its nutrients to feed the life there? Yes, they are mainly perennial and cycling is more efficient there, but organisms are constantly in motion and nutrients are not always replaced where they were taken from. What about the rich prairies of the past? Animals grazed on it and often died somewhere far, far away. (Was the manure and urine laid down equal to the amount of nutrients they took while grazing?) While I agree conventional agriculture does mine the soil and rely on inputs from outside of the operation, I don’t agree that nutrients from climax forests and prairies are simply placed in the same spot in the soil to be cycled again without a need of external inputs. In fact, fruits like berries were designed to be eaten and taken far away from the parent plant. The nutrients in those berries are not returned back to the parent plant. I think we would be amazed at the amount of food that is produced each year in these ecosystems, all while constantly increasing the health and resilience of the system. I have no doubt we can mimic these systems within our own contexts.