I am constantly amazed at the frequency I encounter cannabis farmers in head Grower positions who base large decisions about their crop on totally unsupported belief.
I do mean, literally…. no supporting evidence at all! They just believe it!
Sometimes they are so entrenched in this belief that no matter what evidence you show them to the contrary, with studies performed at major universities, or different experts on horticulture or plant physiology… they still refuse to budge in their opinion.
I’ve seen them actually scoff at real scientific evidence and information while proclaiming proudly,
All my buddies and clients know this to be true, so why should I listen to a bunch of science nerds that don’t even smoke?
So what is Dogma?
DOGMA: Held as an established opinion and authoritatively proclaimed, without adequate grounds to support the statements.
TENET: A principle, belief, or doctrine generally held to be true – especially: one held in common by members of an organization, movement, or profession.
Is there any Dogma in the Cannabis world?
Top 5 most commonly heard
cannabis cultivation Dogma
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- Flushing cleans out the plant and improves the smoke
- Defoliation makes bigger buds
- Soluble salts are evil
- LED isn’t strong enough
- You have to let the roots dry out
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An equally common thing I run into that is not exactly Dogma, but more like a general distrust and ridicule for anything that seems like science or an intelligent conversation that contradicts what they want to hear.
It usually goes something like this comment which I copied from my review of the Flushing Study performed by Dr. Derron Kaplan at the University of Guelph…
WOW!!!!
You don’t need to read this, nor any studies – just grow a pot plant and watch what happens.
When you give it ferts, it will turn dark green. If you were to smoke the dark green, it would be unpleasant.
When you quit giving the plant ferts, it will lighten in color. If you smoke it light in color, it is more pleasant.
There is so much freaking mis-information in this document. WOW!
When you fertilize your plants, the chemical process does not use all the elements in the fertilizer and what is left over is a salt that can accumulate in the soil. Your plant will be more healthy if you flush out those salts. You really don’t need to read any studies about this, it is very common knowledge in the entire field of horticulture and very easy to research on nearly all plant crops.
The truth is, people in the horticultural world is shake their heads and sigh at cannabis farmers who do this because most people with a chemistry and horticulture education would never dream of thinking that this might work.
The common threads I see in comments like this one are…
- General disdain for science and the need for using the scientific method.
- Claims that lack supporting evidence.
- Statement that the evidence is wrong without any discussion of why they think so.
- Preference for what they think of as “common wisdom” despite that it contradicts actual evidence produced by someone using the scientific method.
- Claiming that “everyone” believes _____ implying that you are silly if you don’t believe what everyone else believes.
What does Shaw mean by, “False Knowledge?”
And what’s the difference between that and ignorance?
When someone is ignorant, they simply say, “I don’t know!”
When someone has false knowledge, the have an unsupported belief.
Sometimes they will even defend this belief in an extreme manner, despite having absolutely zero actual evidence that it might be true.
Which brings to mind another famous quote…
When someone is not able to provide a logical reason, or a justification for what they claim to believe, then it cannot be considered as truth, which makes it false knowledge.
Does Science change?
Of course it does!
knowledge can never be static or “stuck” in one place. It can only be true for the moment. We can say that, to the best of our ability to understand it, something is true. But our current truth isn’t guaranteed to last forever. In order for knowledge to remain true, it must be subjected to constant questioning and it must change and evolve as those questions bring out new answers.
An easy example would be to say that a person who still believes the earth is flat has false knowledge. We used to think it was true (to the best of our ability to understand it at the time) but science has evolved and now it’s obviously wrong.
In the cannabis world this would be the equivalent of believing that flushing cleans the bad chemicals out of your buds even after seeing a very carefully performed, peer reviewed, university study that demonstrates otherwise.
Some people just get stuck believing in one thing and they refuse to change.
We all have some level of ego and pride that makes us want to be right. Heck nobody likes hearing that they’ve been doing something wrong, and to find out that you’ve been doing something wrong for a L O N G time – that’s the worst.
Well… actually… finding out that you’ve been doing something wrong at somebody else’s farm, and losing somebody else’s money – for a long time….. THAT’s really the worst!
So what happens if you realize you were wrong and you want to try to correct that mistake?
Is there a risk?
Making any sort of major change on a commercial farm carries with it a large degree of personal risk, because it obviously implies that you might have been wrong about what you were doing before.
In general, an improvement in production is greeted with applause from management, but then as soon as that moment of elation wears off, there is the distinct possibility that your employer may look back at the past and start wondering just how much your previous decisions cost them over the years. If it can clearly be seen that the amount you’ve cost them is high, you may soon find yourself out of a job – or at least, that is the fear.
When you see it in the context that a person might lose their job over being wrong, then it’s pretty easy to see why it would be threatening for someone (like myself) to challenge other growers about their grow decisions, and it makes perfect sense that a person might want to defend their old position practically to the death.
As a manager or business owner, the challenge will be to accept that this industry is young, and growers are learning new lessons the hard way every day.
Instead of firing a grower that makes a big mistake, I would recommend thinking of all honest mistakes as necessary learning experiences.
The grower to fire is the one that refuses to listen to new ideas, refuses to learn, refuses to let go of old belief, or refuses to admit that they made a mistake.
Fire that person and never look back.
I think it’s entirely fair to say, that a good grower can be measured by the number of plants they’ve killed. Every dead plant is a hard lesson learned and if that person takes the time to really research the problem and find out exactly what happened, then they’ve benefited from that dead plant and that same problem is unlikely to occur again.
I hope that’s true because I’ve killed thousands.
I’ve often thought of writing a book titled,
“101 Ways to Kill a Pot Plant.”
Maybe someday.
