Is solar “allowed”? I’ve got a small one for “camping” as well. It sucks. It has no built in battery so you have to keep your phone plugged in while in the sun. And it was built back in the flip phone days so it doesn’t really put out enough juice to charge a smart phone in a functional amount of time. I keep saying I’m going to go bigger but never have the money or spare weight.
Based on a documentary I saw recently they seem to be OK with battery powered devices and use them extensively on their farms. But powerlines are considered the devil or something. And autmobiles as well, unless you get a chauffer. Not sure how much this differs between communities though, doesn’t seem like there is a central authority for all Amish.
Right, which is the cause of our issue. Where do they get the electricity to charge the batteries? The houses don’t have it. The buggies done have it. I’d hate to think of the damage done to a phone using a dirty power from a hand crank generator. Is there some solar cell loophole? “It not electricity, it’s sunshine.”
Ok you actually made me curious so I threw in a quick search, turns out they aren’t opposed to technology or electricity per se at all, it’s a much more philosophical stance about being connected to / dependant on the outside world. And it’s indeed different for every community/parish to what degree it is allowed, some more conservative groups still don’t use it all.
Some Amish, though not all, also accept the use of solar panels to generate energy to charge batteries, power an electric fence for livestock, or heat water. Donald Kraybill has called this form of electricity tapping into “God’s grid”. […]
The Amish are not against use of electric power and acknowledge its usefulness. They seek to remain off the public grid in order to prevent worldly influences from entering the home, and as a symbolic means of remaining separate from the world.
At the same time, they see value in limited use of electric power, and thus generate it by various means, making use of diesel generators, batteries, inverters, and solar panels, among other technologies.
There are still some extremely conservative orders (also called “low” orders or “old” orders) of Amish that still do not allow the use of batteries either in the home or as safety lights on buggies. […]
As history marched on, and new inventions were discovered and marketed, lines had to be drawn as to what was, and what was not acceptable within the Amish church. The acceptance of electricity within the home was one of these lines. By the 1920’s most Amish churches had agreed on a ban for Amish church members being allowed to connect to the electrical grid. […]
Today, most Amish churches forbid the use of public electricity because it is seen as a “connection to the world” but batteries allow many Amish families and businesses a limited connection to power and the ability to run such items as calculators, alarm clocks, cash registers, drills, electric fences, and even cell phones without discipline form their local Bishop.
Now please don’t ask me how they rationalise buying generators and fuel as not being dependant on the outside world, because I don’t have the slightest clue.
Gasoline powered generators apparently, and then the big batteries charged on those can charge the phones or power whatever they need. But again, this is different from community to community as far as I understood it.
My wife and I had a question about how they’re charging the cell phones once they have them. Do you have any information on that?
A small solar power pack would do it. My wife has one for camping.
Is solar “allowed”? I’ve got a small one for “camping” as well. It sucks. It has no built in battery so you have to keep your phone plugged in while in the sun. And it was built back in the flip phone days so it doesn’t really put out enough juice to charge a smart phone in a functional amount of time. I keep saying I’m going to go bigger but never have the money or spare weight.
Use it to charge a powerbank if you want to transfer it to your phone later
Based on a documentary I saw recently they seem to be OK with battery powered devices and use them extensively on their farms. But powerlines are considered the devil or something. And autmobiles as well, unless you get a chauffer. Not sure how much this differs between communities though, doesn’t seem like there is a central authority for all Amish.
Right, which is the cause of our issue. Where do they get the electricity to charge the batteries? The houses don’t have it. The buggies done have it. I’d hate to think of the damage done to a phone using a dirty power from a hand crank generator. Is there some solar cell loophole? “It not electricity, it’s sunshine.”
Ok you actually made me curious so I threw in a quick search, turns out they aren’t opposed to technology or electricity per se at all, it’s a much more philosophical stance about being connected to / dependant on the outside world. And it’s indeed different for every community/parish to what degree it is allowed, some more conservative groups still don’t use it all.
https://amishamerica.com/do-amish-use-electricity/
http://www.amishcountryalmanac.com/2014/02/batteries-and-amish.html
Now please don’t ask me how they rationalise buying generators and fuel as not being dependant on the outside world, because I don’t have the slightest clue.
Gasoline powered generators apparently, and then the big batteries charged on those can charge the phones or power whatever they need. But again, this is different from community to community as far as I understood it.