Translations:Benutzer:Arian/Klett-Mini-Test/1079/en

Just as mistaken as the concept of "nitrogen fertilization" is, just as little applicable is that of "mineral fertilization," which subsumes the application of every kind of mineral substance in agriculture and horticulture, regardless of what origin in the household of nature they may have or by what technical process they have been prepared. The mineral elements make life processes possible in a highly differentiated way, but do not bring them forth. They do not manure life as such, but provide for its physical-sense-perceptible appearance. In the current conception of mineral fertilization, no distinction is made between the nitrogen from the element of air and the earth-born substances, such as phosphorus and the alkali and alkaline-earth metals — potassium, calcium, magnesium, and others. Nitrogen is nearly reaction-dead in air and reaction-alive in earth. The substances of the earth are reaction-dead in their depths and become active in contact with air and warmth. This qualityless conceptual equalization had fatal consequences. Either "mineral fertilization" was propagated as the last word of wisdom, as the only successful technology of yield-assurance and yield-increase — or "heretics" appeared who rejected it in summa. In practice, minds divided and a deeper cognition of the matter fell by the wayside. Today, these things are judged in a more differentiated way. It is not insight into the being of substances that has brought about this change, but the taking-seriously of ecological contexts in practice. The moment one arranges the farm in the spirit of the organism principle such that nature itself takes care of the required nitrogen balance — supported by a process-oriented soil cultivation, a legume-rich crop rotation, and animal manures — the mineral balance regulates itself out of the soil's own resources, as a rule. This capacity of the soil to maintain itself in health at a higher level of production — that it owes to the artful hand of the human being.