Is there anything more satisfying and/or uncanny than watching this clever machine simultaneously fondle a cube of hay with tenderness while violently swaddling it in packaging? So many parts moving in impressive, carefully choreographed synchronicity to accomplish an end product that is pretty underwhelming: a rubbery, pink, rectilinear hot-dog of grass. Oh, the synthesis of an ordinary mound of plant matter and dozens of yards of plastic wrap into something utterly alien… the process is terrifyingly efficient and horrifyingly wasteful at the same time.
Some day, our generation’s grandchildren will look back on this era in awe from their toxic world and wonder at how a civilization advanced enough to produce such a mechanical marvel was also idiotic enough to fill the Pacific Ocean with petroleum products. Conversely, Jean-Marc Côté and the other illustrators who predicted France in the Year 2000 over a century ago would probably be pretty thrilled without reservation:
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