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Pesticides Blamed for Fall in Male Fertility
hapdiddesigner writes "Man-Made Pesticides Blamed for Fall in Male Fertility Over Past 50 Years -- According to a new report by Michael Skinner of Washington State University in the June 3rd edition of Science Magazine, pesticides and environmental toxins can have a deleterious effect on fertility and susceptibility to disease for generations. A Commondreams.org posting of an Independent UK article states 'Pesticides and other man-made chemicals may lower male fertility for at least four generations, according to new research."' A Eurekalert.org copy of a Washington State University press release begins "A disease you are suffering today could be a result of your great-grandmother being exposed to an environmental toxin during pregnancy.'"
It also made my P3N1S shrink..and the damn enl4rg3m3n7 p1ll5 just made me go bl1nd.
I knew my daddy was smart when he never let his kids do any of the spraying in the garden (even as we got older). He even offers to come over and spray pesticides for us to this date.... Go dad!!
Madre de Dios! Es El Pollo Diablo! -- Captain Blondebeard
The development of persistent epigenetic modification is interesting, but turning this into "Man-Made Pesticides Blamed for Fall in Male Fertility Over Past 50 Years" is a good example of the idiocy rampant at both the Independent and Common Dreams.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
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Is it possible that there would not even be four generations if fertility is lowered?
"Teleporting Rodents with D-Cell Battery Displacement" theory -- IgnoramusMaximus (692000)
it's not pesticides, it's falling sperm count! nerds.
We're going to run out of people!
what you are really saying is fresh vegtables are bad for you. Its ok, just come out and say it. Cause i'm fertile as an earthworm and I ate my grapes from a can.
We all know this is especially true for geeks. After all, we are constantly being exposed to RAID.
Both me and my grandmother may have been exposed to pesticides. I'm interested in checking if my fertility has been affected. Are there any volunteer females to help me in this research here?
How the hell do you go on such a diet? Is there enough organic stuff available?
I have been considering switching to a mostly vegetarian diet but I have to say that it is a hell of a lot of work. It's hard to find stuff to eat.
I can't take on something that is nearly a full-time job in itself (I do have to work!).
The common sense-o-meter is an extremely valuable tool when analyzing research. It lets us know that a statistical preference for hamburgers among chemestry students compared to a statistical preference for hotdogs among Algebra students does not in reality have anything to do with the courses and is just a coincidence.
In this case, the common sense-o-meter ticks because anyone who knows farmers is aware that almost all of them have kids and they usually have to count them in pairs. I would venture that a study would show that people working in agriculture have more children than bankers.
Did Supernintendo Chalmers oversee this research? /obscure
How many people with a 5% cancer survival chance have you known?
How many of the them tried your "nothing but natural" miracle-diet?
Did they abstain from other forms of cancer treatment?
The reason that DDT as used in pesticides was made illegal in the US and other places is because it does not decay, and produces appreciably reduced fertility in the males of many species, not just humans.
The projections of 15-20 years ago about the knock-on effects of DDT usage were very scary, almost to the point that we should be amazed that there is a relatively balanced population in North America at this point.
OTOH, for geeks, that means that soon enough there should be close to a 2:1 ratio of women to men... good news?
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
How about the rapid increase in RF radiation we're subjected to every day?
Pretty Pictures!
And her I was, thinking it's all the techno-geek self-abuse going on...
...most Slashdotters really need to care about this, they don't tend to reproduce anyway.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
I don't consider this to be a bad thing.
I really don't want the people in my community reproducing anyway...
P.S. I live in a red state... figure it out.
--Phillip
Can you say BIRTH TAX
i blame my vasectomy.
------ hi mom
How the hell do you go on such a diet? Is there enough organic stuff available?
I have been considering switching to a mostly vegetarian diet but I have to say that it is a hell of a lot of work. It's hard to find stuff to eat.
Not only that, but it's really expensive.
If you're a parent, you've got to have a solid 6 figure income in order afford feeding that stuff to 4+ hungry mouths.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Scientists also report to not worry since the hormones that are fed to cows which increase milk production also increase breast size of humans as well.
But they did include that it wasn't the fact that women would make up for lack of fertility on the men's part, but rather the men would have breasts too and would be too hideous to find a willing female thus making low fertility a moot point.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
LP: yo man you owe me $100.
Cancer victim#1:er.. *cough*cough* but I'm dyin' man, can't you see I have er... cancer. The doc' only gives me a 5% survival chance!!
LP: oh ok. I'll let you off then.
Later..
CV#1: yo man, I don't have to pay my debt to liquidpele anymore I told him I had cancer and only a 5% chance to live and he let me off the hook yo.
CV#2: rrreeeaaallyyy... *rubs hands together and smirks*
LP bumbs into CV#1 and CV#2 in starbucks a year later.
LP: WTF!!! you bastards I thought you were both dying.
CV#1: oh, yo man we switch to eating only organicalaly grown free of chemicals foods. It's like teh bomb.
the end.
With 6+ billion people on the planet and little hope that we will max out before at least 12 billion, is lowered fertility really a bad this? I say lay on more pesticides!
I hear these arguments usually from parents who like to feed their kids packaged meals. Vegetables are more expensive than meat? What planet do you live on.
Bush and Blair ate my sig!
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The harm caused by pesticides is much less than the harm caused by pests, which is why humans live longer and better with use of pesticides. But we can do even better with GM crops that require less pesticides, because the harm of GM is less than the harm of pesticides.
Understanding that this is anecdotal evidence, I would like to add my 2 bits of anecdotal evidence.
I believe that it isn't so much whether or not the food has pesticides or dyes, but whether or not you are eating real food or processed food. If you are buying your food from the vegetable and meat section of the store, you tend to be doing a lot better than those who shop the breakfast aisle and the soda pop aisle.
But this isn't rocket science. The foods on the shelves are designed to be addictive and to taste good, all the while skimping on the "real food" part that is good for you. Farmers and butchers can't do a whole heckuva lot to make their food tastier or more addictive, and they can't hide the "real food" from you.
I would believe the bulk of the benefit your friend had came from bidding farewell to the Pop Tarts and the afternoon Pepsi and from welcoming whole foods onto his plate in its stead. Granted, avoiding pesticides and various other chemicals is probably a good thing, but I don't think it gives much better benefit than my suggestion.
I think in general, the key to being healthy is to learn how to turn the food in the vegetable and meat section into edible foods on the table without adding too many things found on the shelves.
Again, this is all speculation and totally non-scientific. But so was the article this comment is attached to.
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
Vegetables are more expensive than meat? What planet do you live on.
What comment are you reading?
The OP was referring to organic food, not "factory" vegetables (i.e., raised with petro-based fertilizer and doused in petro-based pesticides).
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Consensus Statement: Atlantic Coast Contaminants Workshop 2000
It's relatively well known some chemicals mimic hormones or otherwise disrupt sexual functions in a number of animals.
This is a study on rats
This is a big problem with medical research today, many drugs are tested on rats, guinea pigs, and other animals, which doesn't really show what effects those drugs will have on humans. One candidate may not be effective as a drug on the species being used to test with whereas it may very well be effective for humans, and visa versa.
What about all the breakthroughs we've gained through animal research? The historical value of animal research with regard to human health remains in question.
Researchers from Harvard and Boston Universities concluded that medical measures (drugs and vaccines) accounted for between 1 and 3.5% of the total decline in mortality rates since 1900. Scores of animals were killed in the quest to find cures for tuberculosis, scarlet fever, smallpox and diphtheria, among others, but was their unwilling contribution important to the decline of these diseases? Dr. Edward Kass of Harvard Medical School, asserts that the "primary credit for the virtual eradication of these diseases must go to improvements in public health, sanitation and the general improvement in the standard of living." These benefits have nothing to do with animal studies.
Animal research appropriates money, time, personnel, facilities and other resources that would save more lives if those same resources were placed into, let's say, education or prevention. In the end, it becomes a question of priorities - do we want to focus on supporting what we know works or do we place our faith in serendipity? Over 44 million Americans have either no or inadequate health care coverage, if we really want to "improve human health" we need to provide adequate access to care, not fund more animals experiments, which offer no promise of success (in fact their track record is abysmal) and divert funds, support and attention from more productive areas.
FalconShould there be a Law?
With 6+ billion people on the planet and little hope that we will max out before at least 12 billion, is lowered fertility really a bad this? I say lay on more pesticides!
Forget a population of 12 billion, it's doubtful we'll have a population of more than 9 billion. More and more people are having else and less children. For instance China's population is expected to start declining shortly and there is some concern that within 50 years there won't be enough people working to support those that will be retiring. As it is now the CIA estimates China's growth rate is 0.58% and India's is 1.4%. And as more people move to cities and get more education, which is happening all over the world, they tend to have less children.
FalconShould there be a Law?
we can do even better with GM crops that require less pesticides,
By using organic farming methods you can eliminate or reduce the use of pesticides.
humans live longer and better with use of pesticides.
Can you prove this?
Researching effects of chemicals and pesticides upon health
Falcon FalconShould there be a Law?
Can you prove that adapting current agricultural techniques in developing countries from using pesticides to using organic methods would not cause a mass famine due to lost production?
As for famine or starvation, not all of this is due to lack of food, but where there are shortages many of those shortages are directly related to conflict and/or political policies. An example is Zimbabwe, before President Robert Mugabe evicted White farmers off thier land and gave it to his cronies Zimbabwe was a breadbasket of Southern Africa producing much more food than the country consumed, it was net exporter of food. Now that there aren't people on the land who know how to farm, grow food, Zimbabwe almost continuously face famine. And just as in Ethiopia, Zimbabwe is also suffering from draught which is directly linked to global warming. In cases such as this pesticides and herbicides won't help.
U.N. to Resume Food Aid to Zimbabwe
...
Drought in southern Africa has cut food production in several nations but none so severely as Zimbabwe, which has a population of 12.7 million. The country's agricultural sector is reeling from triple-digit inflation and the effects of a land redistribution program that parceled out white-owned commercial farms to landless blacks and a large number of government officials.
Once known as the breadbasket of southern Africa for its bounteous exports of corn and other staples, Zimbabwe has failed to produce enough food for its own population since the often-violent land seizures began in 2000.
...
Can you prove the using pesticides and herbicides increases crop yields without health or environmental risks?
FalconShould there be a Law?
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