As a systems person, what I really love is how this miracle you
describe is itself just one small cog in vast machine of
inter-dependent miracles. A plant growing from a seed is meaningless
outside the context of soil, liquids and gases in the ecosystem, each
part of some other life cycle.
This was brought home to me when a bachelors student presented a final
year project for an "Aquaponics" [1] controller system. I'd never
heard of such a thing but I was blown away by how far you can take
control systems engineering in your own garden shed. Once you add
fish, nutrients, acidity, micro-organisms and whatnot into the
monitoring equations even the most simplified model takes on a
majestic level of complexity.
This is why I am so fascinated with closed loops systems such as aquaponiocs. If we can create a closed loop sustainable system in the small scale, we can then decentralize it to avoid the inevitable cause of the first likely long term international 21st century food crisis: monocultural devastation.
This was brought home to me when a bachelors student presented a final year project for an "Aquaponics" [1] controller system. I'd never heard of such a thing but I was blown away by how far you can take control systems engineering in your own garden shed. Once you add fish, nutrients, acidity, micro-organisms and whatnot into the monitoring equations even the most simplified model takes on a majestic level of complexity.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquaponics