Avoiding GM Foods? Monsanto Says You're Overly Fussy

blackbeak writes "The BBC today characterized those who avoid GM foods as overly fussy, the very same day that the Wall Street Journal announced that picky eating may be recognized in the 2013 DSM as a psychiatric disorder. The DSM item refers to something completely different, though I'm sure many will confuse the two. Of course, this was not done without subterfuge; the BBC's author, Professor Jonathan Jones, in no way indicates his close ties to Monsanto. Point by point Jones regurgitates the same pro-GM arguments debunked numerous times all over the net for years, while serving up some stale half facts too."

Comments

GM

[rossdee]

I Want to avoid Ford, Chrysler, and Toyota foods too

Re:GM

[blackest_k]

I just want to avoid Monsanto's products GM food might be 100% harmless but Monsanto isn't.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

No, no! In the future, we don't need roads. Toyota, Chrisler and Ford's favourite food will be soylent green.

Re:GM

[YeeHaW_Jelte]

Spot on.

Although I don't agree with John's 'close ties to Monsanto. If you actually follow up on the links provided, Prof. Jones is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Mendel Biotechnologies, which in turn does business with Monsanto.

This does not qualify him as a shill.

And I agree with his point that regulation is creating monstrosities like Monsanto, only not with his answer: regulate less.

It took us decades to fully realize the danger of radioactive materials, it might take decades to fully understand the implications of GM. Until we have a reasonable comprehension of the dangers and risks, we should use other methods for improving crop yields, which, also as the Prof. tells, are to be easily found in better irrigation and fertilisation for third world countries.

And let's not forget; famine is mostly an economical problem these days, bringing in the likes of monsanto to 'solve' this will not bring relief to the starving and ill nourished people of the world.

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[FriendlyLurker]

Very true. Monsanto and friends have bought off the political side and continue to lobby heavily so that clear labels on GM food are not required - preventing consumers from making an informed choice in the free market. Now as part of this broader campaign of voter/consumer deception, they just need to convince all the consumers that are not paying attention that their products are all A-Ok for consumption - so they trot out people like this Jonathan Jones so called "professor" to use his credentials to sway public opinion.

They have to do this campaign to deceive, since consumers tend to avoid GM Food in droves - just look at how fast McDonald's had to drop GM potatoes from their fries. They may be able to buy politicians and hide their GM labels, but consumers are still a force to be reckoned with, and thanks to the internet - more informed than ever.

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[Anonymous Coward]

I Want to avoid Ford, Chrysler, and Toyota foods too

What have you against buckwheat noodles, the holiest type of appendages of the Finite Sta...Flying Spaghetti Monster!?

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[Dachannien]

They may be able to buy politicians and hide their GM labels, but consumers are still a force to be reckoned with, and thanks to the internet - more informed than ever.

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

Same applies to the anti-GM-food people who try to get the public into a panic by suggesting that GM food will make them sick or whatever, when the true agenda of the people who started the anti-GM movement is simply a far-left anti-corporate one. The misinformation they spread about GM foods is just as bad, if not worse, than the lack of information about which products are and aren't genetically modified.

That said, Monsanto is a bunch of assholes because they sue farmers for doing what farmers are supposed to do.

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[Jawnn]

And let's not forget; famine is mostly an economical problem these days, bringing in the likes of monsanto to 'solve' this will not bring relief to the starving and ill nourished people of the world.

Why not? I mean look at BP and how they've helped with "solving" the world's energy shortage. Oh, wait...

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[stonewallred]

I agree with both of your conclusions. Throw in a bit about how the environmentalist movement is more concerned with lowering the US and Europe's standards of living to those of a third world country, rather than lifting the third world to ours, and how they oppose nuclear power even though it is the cleanest realistic energy source we have available, and you'd would be spot on. Of course, expect the wave of downmods to come heading your way when it hits lunch time in the land of the Euro.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Very true. Monsanto and friends have bought off the political side and continue to lobby heavily so that clear labels on GM food are not required - preventing consumers from making an informed choice in the free market.

Too weak. They can't win that one. Knowing the sentiment of the consumer, all producers of non-GM food need to do is label their products with "no GM ingredients inside" label.

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[MoeDumb]

Monsanto: profits before truth.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

It reminds me of how the Romans brought in lead piping for their water. They thought it was great - water pumped to your home, the ultimate sign that you'd made it. An entire ruling class slowly poisoning themselves. We don't know what affect GM crops may have. They might prove relatively harmless to us directly (who knows?) but turn out to have a devastating effect on the environment. Remember that a lot of the high yields some like to report, are not because the crop has been engineered to be super-abundant (selective breeding has already done wonders there), but because they are engineered to resist pesticides that kill pretty much everything else. What does that do for run-off into rivers? What does that do to biodiversity and the general eco-system? What happens if these traits get loose into the wild or to the farm workers and local people exposed to the increased use of pesticides. Not to mention that if some of the GM traits do get loose in the wild, it's pretty much irreversible. So they've engineered plants that secrete a poison normally found in caterpillars to make the plant poisonous to pests. Sounds like one Hell of a survival trait to me. So a little way down the line and insect populations take a tumble because of this, and the birds that depend on them. Maybe everything will be fine, but the point is that we don't know and we can't reverse this if it does go wrong.

But leaving aside the biological issues, the economic ones that we do know for sure are frightful. These crops are patented. The developing world is Monsanto's poster child for GM crops and they'll do anything they can to get everyone using these crops. But first one's always free. If a staple food is monopolised, you're going to trust who that the licence fees stay low? Monsanto? Should there even be licence fees for growing food? And enforcement? Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting. You have to buy again and again. Sure you can try and go back to planting non-Monsanto crops. If you still have seed stocks that are viable. And if you can guarantee that their inspectors wont find any traces of Monsanto crops on your land. Good luck with that.

Monsanto tout things like their "Golden Rice" (such a dream name, that one) as helping the poor third world. It's been engineered to have high levels of Vitamin D. But why do some people in the Third World have vitamin D deficiencies? Because their historical balanced diet based on their usual range of crops, has been replaced with bulk rice farming because that's what the international market demands they grow.

But what's the genetically modified strawman that gets trotted out by Monsanto every year? "You said GM might be bad for people and our scientist has failed to find evidence that it causes disease X, so shut up, because there's nothing to worry about."

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[B2382F29]

I think you did not understand the issue (or are a shill, you decide). The issue is not whether to have a "warning" label. It is whether there is any possibility to identify them at all. It would be enough if they just have a list of ingredients with (GM) after each genetically modified ingredient. (e.g. HFCS (GM)). For all those who love GM food (you?) it might also be great to know which product you need to buy to further the use of GM crops.

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[h4rm0ny]

There are a lot more reasons to boycott GM food than just a concern about its effects on your immediate health. So it's not like autism warnings on vaccines. By lobbying to prevent people being able to find out whether or not a food contains GMOs, companies like Monsanto are preventing people from making informed choices. And regarding the autism / vaccine analogy, presumably people who think an MMR vaccine will trigger autism think that all combined MMR vaccines are similar in this respect. So it's not the same at all: people who take their children for an MMR know that this is what they're doing. Buy some rice and maybe you know it's GM and maybe you don't. You're likening a redundant labelling system with one that would actually convey information.

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[h4rm0ny]

Actually, I should have also said that ultimately, whether you agree with people or not, everyone in a democracy has a right to make informed choices. If you feel that something is not a cause for concern, then the democratic approach is to persuade people of this. Not for a government to trick them into the path they've decided is best for them.

Re:GM

[zippthorne]

There are other reasons people might prefer not to buy GM foods, specifically Monsanto's, than just health reasons. For instance, suppose you wanted to boycott monsanto over their aggressive IP enforcement of cross-polinated neighboring farms, how would you go about doing that?

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[erroneus]

While I appreciate some of the "wait and see" aspects of your view point, I would like to emphasise more your latter commentary that specifies that famine is an economic problem that Monsanto does not solve. In fact, Monsanto makes it worse. All of Monsanto's plants (living organisms) are covered by patents and other intellectual property laws such as trademarks. They have a history of taking advantage of the fact that plants, especially in agricultural/farming scopes, do not "contain" themselves. The fact that the wind blows means that seeds and pollen blow in the wind and travel to neighboring crops and lands contaminating them. And if that weren't enough, they use this as an excuse to sue people for "using their product."

Many foreign nations seek to avoid the likes of Monsanto even when famine is a problem simply to avoid legal entanglements with the giant.

So we don't need decades to learn what dangers there are in GM foods -- we already know a great many of them and are of our own making and society. To me, that is reason enough to avoid GM foods. And frankly, if we were somehow to get rid of that problem by making living things unpatentable, I have a feeling that Monsanto would pretty much disappear shortly thereafter... another problem solved.

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[maxume]

Vitamin A.

Humans can synthesize vitamin D when they are exposed to sunlight.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the business practises of Monsanto and the consequences everybody should be against, like seed debt suicides, life IP, improper applications of GM technologies and so on.

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[lxs]

Well they did bring oil to the masses...

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

You're right. And thank you. Vitamin A is what I meant.

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[Spazztastic]

Humans can synthesize vitamin D when they are exposed to sunlight.

I don't leave the house, you insensitive clod!

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

Or because you worry that turning most of the world's food supplies into a genetic monoculture might possibly be a bad idea. (Another thing that just occurred to me).

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[Spazztastic]

and how they oppose nuclear power even though it is the cleanest realistic energy source we have available

I have a close family member who is a die hard environmentalist. She moved to Central America to get away from the US. I showed her all the information about nuclear power being safe, all the advancements, and it always comes down to "Well I still believe it's unsafe."

This is the same conclusion you'll come to with anybody who opposes GM crops or thinks 9/11 was a conspiracy perpetrated by the US Government. You can't get through to these people.

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

They also have a nasty habit of breeding strains that can not reproduce on their own.

DRM isn't that good of an idea for digital entertainment. But DRM on the human food supply? That is jumping off a cliff into cartoonish insane evil mega-corporation territory.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

Right. And in other news, Osama Bin Laden speaks for all muslims, Rush Limbaugh speaks for all Americans, the Nation of Islam fairly represents the views of all black people and and all computer programmers are geeks who don't know one end of a football from the other. That there is a group of people who make as much fuss and try to get as much attention for themselves as possible whilst claiming to represent a group, does not mean that they actually are representative of that group. To whit, many people I know who consider themselves environmentalists (including myself) are hugely pro-Nuclear power.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to mention that if some of the GM traits do get loose in the wild, it's pretty much irreversible.

 

Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce ...

Your arguements are all largely valid, but it's an extremely one sided view and represents some none issues, issues with company behaviour etc misleadingly. One of the major fields of GM research in Europe is to find what gene(s) increase resistance to disease in plants, once they know this they selectively breed high yield cultivars to get this genetic trait. Doing this by selective breeding rather than pure GM makes it marginally slower, massively more expensive and leads to 'quirks' because of the other changes to the strains genetics that the selective breeding caused.

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

Fun fact, one of Monsanto's innovations is food that contains its own pesticides. It literally contains POISON. What we don't know is the concentration and effects of long term exposure.

I am going to have to err on the side of caution and say that GM foods need to be PROVEN SAFE before they are fed to people. If you wait until some specific gm product is proven unsafe to stop selling it, it could be to late.

Re:GM

[drinkypoo]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

You can tell Monsanto is evil because everything they do requires secrecy. They kept the dioxin contamination of agent orange secret for a surprisingly long time, though they knew about it for an even more surprising, even longer time. They lobbied to get a statement about the FDA saying that rBGH and friends included on all milk cartons which include any text about not using these hormones which states that the FDA can tell no difference between ordinary milk and BGH-treated milk when there are numerous known differences mostly in the quality department. And now they're lobbying to prevent us from finding out which ingredients are GM and which are not.

Monsanto is actually one of the world's greatest mass murderers and should be terminated with extreme prejudice by any means necessary.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

"That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about."

This is a straw man. GM-food labels do not state that they might be bad for you, they simply state that they are GM foods. Medical staff will tell you if they are going to give your children the MMR vaccine. In both cases the consumer can make up their own minds.

Personally I'm very much in favour of the MMR and undecided on GM foods.

Re:GM

[delinear]

Unfortunately, just as with the other examples you provided, the vocal minority are the ones who the reasonable people have to shape their world around because they know how to play the media/politics game.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Most people in industrialized nations do not get enough vitamin D from sunlight to make up for the lack of vitamin D in the modern diet.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

This does not qualify him as a shill.

Perhaps not, but it does give him an interest in the future direction of the industry besides his scientific research. When presenting this kind of article, particularly in a field notorious for industrial political lobbying and trying to avoid disclosure as GM foods, it makes a very bad impression if such ties aren't declared openly.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

The same way we boycott anything else. We'd keep buying their products while whining about them on the internet. Seriously, all the talk about boycotting Sony, or boycotting Apple or boycotting the music labels, or whoever else is public enemy number one that week, and it never makes a dent in the profits of these companies. A lot of people are obviously talking the talk but failing to walk the walk - it's depressing that we let companies get away with their actions and the one way we can make a difference, nobody does.

Re:GM

[commodore64_love]

This wouldn't be possible if the Congress simply put a limit on how long a patent lasts. 25 years and then the engineered food falls into the public domain for the benefit of all the People.

Re:GM

[jeff4747]

Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting.

No, it's not sterile. Farmers aren't idiots and they refused to buy sterile crops.

There are reasons some farmers buy certain crops new every year, such as super-sweet corn, but in those rare cases it's not sterile plants.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

"This does not qualify him as a shill."

Actually, yes, it does.

Re:GM

[jrumney]

Putting a label that says "GM" on products that are GM is in no way the same as putting a label "may cause autism" on a product that is a vaccine. One informs the consumer so that they may draw their own conclusions, the other misleads them into a conclusion which is most likely false based on the scientific evidence.

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[evrybodygonsurfin]

What exactly is the difference between one end of a football and the other?

Re:GM

[Kam Solusar]

Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting.

"If there is one thing the history of evolution has taught us it's that life will not be contained. Life breaks free, expands to new territory, and crashes through barriers, painfully, maybe even dangerously. " -- Dr. Ian Malcolm

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

Indeed. Monsanto is filthy. I grew up in Caholia, IL, two miles south of the Monsanto plant in Sauget, before the Clean Air Act was enacted in 1970. They dirtied the air so badly that you literally could not breathe if you drove up highway 3 past the plant with your windows down; what passed for air literally burned your lungs. Since Nixon signed the Clean Air Act, you seldom smell anything driving past.

Knowing how little Monsanto cares about anyone's health, no way will I knowingly touch any food Monsanto produced until it's heavily regulated, and maybe not even then.

IIRC while they were filthying up the air their motto was "better living through chemistry", a blatant lie. Why should I listen to anything they say today?

Re:GM

[locallyunscene]

So what we really need is not GM labels but Monsanto labels.

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

Prof. Jones is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Mendel Biotechnologies, which in turn does business with Monsanto. This does not qualify him as a shill.

It does in my book. I'd listen if he had no ties, but his ties to Monsanto makes anything he says about Monsanto suspect.

And I agree with his point that regulation is creating monstrosities like Monsanto, only not with his answer: regulate less.

At the risk of a redundant mod, I'm going to link a comment I just made that completely refutes your assertions. Were it not for the EPA, you would not be able to breathe driving past a Monsanto plant. You need to stop drinking the koolaid and read up on some of the environmental disasters, disease, and sickness Monsanto and companies like it caused before environmental regulation.

I completely agree with the rest of your comment.

Re:GM

[Svartalf]

What they won't tell you is that there's a risk they'll peel part of the proteins, etc. that you might be allergic to from some other unrelated plant or animal matter and apply it to that other food that you thought was safe.

Sorry, the risks are quite high, really, for GM foods because of that alone- and we won't get into your line of thinking, because I concur with it and it's a whole level of risks above the ones I just alluded to.

Re:GM

[olderchurch]

I agree with your comment, but you might want use another introduction next time:

It reminds me of how the Romans brought in lead piping for their water. They thought it was great - water pumped to your home, the ultimate sign that you'd made it. An entire ruling class slowly poisoning themselves.

The calcium in the water was deposited on the pipes, which prevented the introduction of lead in the water: http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/leadpoisoning.html

Re:GM

[Joce640k]

Mod parent up.

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[the_womble]

Completely different: the evidence is that MMR does not cause autism. On the other hand the evidence is pretty clear that GM foods are GM.

Also vaccines go through testing and there are studies of safety. They also have undeniable benefits. None of this is true for GM foods. The only clear substantial benefits are cost savings.

Supposedly healthier versions of foods are a stupid idea because it makes it impossible to track what you are eating. Take adding vitamin A to rice: if it is enough to make up the deficiency in the average poor person's diet, then it may well lead to over doses in people who already have lots from other sources (the tolerable upper limit is only about three times the RDA, and some people eat a lot of rice).

Re:GM

[Jesus_666]

Not just environmentalists oppose GM food. I don't like it either, not because of health concerns but simply because I really don't like Monsanto et al. I wouldn't protest against it but given the choice between two otherwise similar foods I'd pick the non-GM one.

Re:GM

[Svartalf]

Heh... They only last 28 years right now. The main problem is that Monsanto has taken to suing farmers for infringement/theft (and winning)- who didn't "steal" their seeds when the stupid pollen from Monsanto's GM crops cross-pollenated.

The courts are, in many of the cases, clueless about crucial details like the aforementioned, or other things in the agricultural space. I've some first-hand knowledge about what the Legal system appears to know and understand about many of these issues- and they're ignorant of a lot of things outside their sphere, namely the law. And, even when the law's explicit, they oftentimes don't have a clue as to how it applies to a given situation.

And this doesn't get into idiot things Monsanto's done like "terminator" wheat.
(Excuse me, you're risking the entire friggin' planet's food supply so you can make a buck and enforce doing so? NICE.)

Re:GM

[mysidia]

Pesticide resistance is the perfect example. I think if the plants are genetically manipulated to resist pesticides, then larger amounts of potentially more dangerous pesticides are being used with them.

Otherwise there would be no point in farmers paying the high price to grow each genetically manipulated plant.

The GM could be harmless and the pesticides not.

It also seems like we are playing with fire. We assume a gene has a specific function and only a specific function, based on a few observations, and we start messing with the genetic code to plants that produce our food, which we've eaten for thousands of years.

How do we really know we don't effect the nutritional value or cause the plant to produce a chemical that may ultimately prove very harmful, or cause dangerous food allergies, as with the case of genetically manipulated soybeans ?

Oh right... we're supposed to ignore all evidence of GM foods being harmful, even when it actually starts to bear out.

There also exists a possibility, that if GM food triggers a food allergy, people who are effected might become allergic to the non-manipulated product as well.

Or.... as GM becomes so popular, they can no longer find the unmanipulated product, or grocers and makers of prepared food are so vague and imprecise with regards to the labelling, the consumer just can't eat anything anymore.

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

Asking that GM food be proven safe is inane. It is exactly equivalent to asking for a formal proof that every computer program existing now and forever be proven. (hint, this is an impossible and absurd task)

Now asking that every GM food be tested in the same way we test medicines is not absurd (probably excessively cautious, but hey). There is a procedure to get new edible species approved, and I expect it was followed. Is it stringent enough? I don't know.

As for the "poison" (btw, please don't shout -- don't people know their netiquette anymore ?) remember that water is poisonous. Poison is a question of dose, for one, and poisons can be very specific. What is poisonous to insects might not be to humans and vice-versa.

Digression: when one produces an new species, it is usually done through forced mutation and selection. Meaning you got to where you think you wanted to go through a random process. The GM way is less random as you put in the characteristic you wanted in one step (conceptually -- cloning is hard, and gene insertion and expression a thoroughly non-trivial affair). Thus there is not particular reason a GM food would be less safe than a non-GM one, quite the contrary.

Digression 2: there is also this argument that horizontal (inter-species) transfer of genes do not happen in nature. This is wrong: a large part of our own DNA comes from bits from viruses, themselves having jumped between species and bringing genetic material with them. So GM food are not something that could not happen in nature.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

don't know one end of a football from the other. .

Spheres don't have ends, stupid.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, how long has GM been in the food business?

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[yotto]

So you're saying we can't synthesize vitamin A *OR* vitamin D?

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[Svartalf]

Quite honestly, I would like to know if there's GM food in the mix.

In one case, they peel off something from peanuts and apply it to some unrelated food, while I'm not allergic to peanuts, I do believe that there are those that are and the GM food COULD kill them. Aspartame, I'm allergic to (couple that with being a Type II Diabetic...fun...) and I do STRONGLY appreciate the labels as simply as much as that in 1-2 sodas causes a risk of a nasty migraine for me.

Food's a minefield and there was a reason to label ingredients for the aforementioned reasons. GM food ISN'T the same thing as the food that isn't GM'ed- it's got other things spliced in for good measure and you can die from an allergic reaction or PKU like problems if you don't know what is in the mix.

It's NOT quite the same problem you try to map it to.

Re:GM

[BVis]

There's something I've never understood coming from critics of the environmentalist movement: Where do you get the idea that people want to drag down the standard of living? Does it come from the fact that you think most of the time making the 'environmentalist' choice (whether it be to recycle glass, or change a light bulb, etc) costs (most of the time, slightly) more money? And do those costs significantly affect people's standards of living? Really? Spending $3 on a light bulb will make me poor?

What exactly brings down my standard of living when I turn off a light when I leave a room? When I shut down my computer when I'm not using it? When I drive in a more fuel-efficient manner (NOT buying a different car)? All of these are 'environmentalist' choices, yet they cost nothing except the effort required to modify my behavior slightly. If you're so against changing a habit, to the point where you argue it damages your standard of living, I think you have other issues to be concerned about.

Re:GM

[donnyspi]

>> Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting.

I hate Monsanto too, but let's get the facts straight. They don't sell sterile seeds. No one sells terminator seeds. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_use_restriction_technology

Re:GM

[m.ducharme]

Not good enough. All the GM food producers have to do is use labelling like "all-natural", which is essentially meaningless, and people will be led to believe that the product is not a GM food. If they have to put a label elsewhere saying "this product is made from GM food" on the label, the weasel-words have a much reduced effect.

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[blueg3]

To my knowledge, Monsanto hasn't actually used the Terminator gene in any of their products, they've just developed and patented it.

Re:GM

[agnosticnixie]

Because obviously the next step is to stop them from having a SUV and a car and a huge suburban house. In fact it's well known the environmentalist movement wants to firebomb (in ecologically-friendly ways) all suburbs out of existence. (I do dislike suburbs, but repealing zoning laws would do wonders on that eyesore ;) )

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[hal2814]

You make a joke, but I personally would've appreciated an explanation of exactly what the fuck GM stands for some time before 1/3 of the way through TFA.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

A nuclear plant well-equipped with the latest technologies provided by advances in science and engineering could be perfectly safe, provided that it is indeed well-equipped rather than poorly furnished and well-run rather than badly mismanaged. The same could easily be said about oil wells in the Gulf of Mexico: the petroleum industry doesn't lack the technical prowess for safety, it lacks the will and common sense on the business end of things.

The real problem with energy safety, whether nuclear or petrochemical or of any other sort, is NOT the technology; it's the management. Any company that prefers cutting corners to cutting risk is going to be in jeopardy of misapplying safety technology.

The question isn't whether you'd want a nuclear power plant in your backyard: it's whether you'd want Tony Hayward running a nuclear power plant in your backyard. That's a different matter.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

Here's the rub: We've been genetically engineering food since the dawn of society. Society as we know it came from the ability to improve plants through breeding and mutations.

Before GM, we've been cross breeding and irradiating plants using X-rays or using mutagenic chemicals to increase mutation rate until we get what we're looking for. This is much more potentially harmful then carefully changing only the genes we need to.

All food is GM food. What gets that label is the carefully, methodically changed, safer food, while all of our foodstock has been randomly and chaotically modified over thousands of years. New GE plants are tested by the FDA, the NIH, and the EPA. New conventional crops get no testing. There have been toxic chemicals found in food sold that have been "traditionally" engineered, but none that have been "on purpose" engineered in in what has become known as GE.

GM food is safer then it's counterparts. I'll take the GM food, please..

BTW, for an excellent reading on the topic, I recommend the Whole Earth Discipline. Where he talks about his expertise (he's an ecologist/biologist by training) he's spot on. I don't agree with him on all the topics included in the book, but the arguments he makes on the rest (like urbanization and power generation) are also worth reading, if not the final word. But the GE and other ecological/biological topics he touches on are full of good insights.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what else is a great idea? Putting a label on people to identify them as Jews. This isn't about persecution though, because people who are pro-Jew can use the label to direct their love towards them.

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[andydread]

You mean like the people who think secret Muslim Kenyan Socialist Marxist Communist Nazi Joker Anticrist took our country away.

Re:GM

[wcoenen]

It took us decades to fully realize the danger of radioactive materials, it might take decades to fully understand the implications of GM. Until we have a reasonable comprehension of the dangers and risks, we should use other methods for improving crop yields

1) Decades? German physicist Wilhelm Konrad Roentgen announced his discovery of X-rays in 1896. Less then a year later Elihu Thomson found that X-rays harm living tissue. 4 years after the discovery of X-rays, it was widely accepted that exposure needed to be limited.

2) I'm not convinced that it ever makes sense to be afraid of "unknown unknowns" without having a threat model. Don't we have to be afraid of everything in that case?

For example, it wouldn't make sense to say this: "It might take decades to fully understand the implications of reading slashdot every day. Until we have a reasonable comprehension of the dangers and risks, we should use other methods for getting our tech news."

It would work better to say something like "Reading slashdot every day is detrimental to productivity, because the time spent reading and posting would otherwise go to useful work." At least then we'd have a minimal model that we can analyze, discuss, test and refine. That way we can also avoid the same problems when we do switch to an alternative. You can't do that if you just cite "unknown risks".

Re:GM

[Yvan256]

"Yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should." - Dr. Ian Malcolm

Re:GM

[nedlohs]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

No it isn't. Unless your arguing against some mythical label that says "GM might cause cancer or be generally bad for you and this product contains them".

The actual GM labels just say that last part "this product contains GM foods", without making any claim to whether that is a good thing or a bad thing.

Do you want your mercury containing vaccines (not that there are many anymore - and look no drop in autism rates...) to not say that they are?

Re:GM

[elrous0]

No, the Romans were right. A lot more Roman lives were saved due to the much-improved sanitation provided by that plumbing than were lost to lead poisoning. And I suspect a lot more starving people will be saved by the better yields that GM crops provide than will ever be harmed by any side-effects.

Re:GM

[drinkypoo]

As for the "poison" (btw, please don't shout -- don't people know their netiquette anymore ?) remember that water is poisonous

Water is not poisonous, it's toxic in large quantities. There's a big difference there. I say this as someone who formerly shared an address with the coalition to ban dihydrogen monoxide.

Re:GM

[elrous0]

How dare you introduce a rational argument into our anti-corporate witchhunt, sir! Who cares if vaccines and GM crops save millions of lives each year? The important thing to remember is that a bunch of himbos and bimbos in Hollywood think they're bad!

Re:GM

[logjon]

Yeah, but when you combine genes from two known safe foods, they can easily somehow turn deadly.

Re:GM

[advocate_one]

IIRC while they were filthying up the air their motto was "better living through chemistry", a blatant lie. Why should I listen to anything they say today?

that's mine too, but it applies to happy pills and other designer drugs to enhance brain function/change mood...

ps. my favourite "chemicals" are Caffeine and Ethanol... Oxygen and Di-Hydrogen Monoxide are also pretty high on my favourite chemicals list... :)

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

Poison and toxic in large enough quantities is, for intents and purposes, the same thing.

Actually, I cannot imagine something which is "poison" and not toxic at the dose. Conversely, I can imagine something toxic at dose which one would not label poison (water), but implicit in that is that you will only ingest small enough amounts, therefore, the expected dose is low enough.

But this is sophistry.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Article doesnt even say what the hell 'GM' (Genetically Modified) is until the second section. After I found out what it was I lost interest in the story.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

selective breeding = genetic modification. Only slower and less scientific.

Re:GM

[flitty]

A quick google search found this info:

The public first became aware of terminator technology in patents jointly owned by the USDA and Delta and Pine Land Company. That engenered massive protests worldwide, and Monsanto, which acquired the Delta nad Pine Land patent rights, backed down from developing the terminator crops described in that particular patent. However, as Ho and Cummins were to learn, there are many ways to engineer sterility, each the subject of a separate patent.

emphasis in the original.
This is from "GMO free: eposing the hazard of biotechology and ensure the integrity of our food supply" by Mae-Wan Ho and Lim Li Ching and the Independent Science Panel on GM. There are 203 studies referenced in this book, and it looks fairly objective.

So it looks like Monstanto uses the "we don't use a 'terminator gene'* in our crops" (*but we do find ways to keep a plant from producing viable seeds) verbiage.

Re:GM

[Gerzel]

Except it wasn't the lead piping that did the Romans in, it was boiling wine in lead vessels. The piping also provided baths and public water works which helped slow the spread of many diseases and allowed for cities to get bigger. Thus the lead pipes were a net gain for the Romans. Also there is little direct evidence that lead poisoning played a role in Rome's downfall. It was far more a political and economic matter after all they lasted centuries with the poisoning.

Re:GM

[agnosticnixie]

So hm... "hunting = animal husbandry"
"firewood = nuclear power plant"
"extensive agriculture = factory farms"
"mini = SUV"

Re:GM

[radtea]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines.

Except for the part where it isn't.

For an analogy that isn't simply wrong, try: "That's a bit like saying consumers are underinformed because there are no contains mercury compounds labels on vaccines." By all means tell people what stuff contains and allow them to make (ill) informed choices about it.

But don't tell me I don't have a right to know what is in the stuff I put in my body.

Corporations are a pure product of state intervention the the free market: they were created in their modern form by the various Companies Acts passed in the mid-1800's. They have demonstrated repeatedly that as a creation of state power they need to be regulated by state power, including requiring labelling of the stuff they sell.

People have many reasons for avoiding GM foods, some of them more plausible than others, and it is not for your or anyone else to decide for them what or why they want to put things (or not) in their body.

Personally, I avoid GM foods because of what I percieve to be both the economic and ecological effects of synthetic monocultures. We can debate whether that is rational. What is not up for debate is my right to know what I'm eating, and without labelling there is absoluely no way for me to ascertain that in practical contexts.

Re:GM

[Tim C]

How on earth is this a troll? It's not like most of us are working the fields day in, day out.

Re:GM

[radtea]

This is the same conclusion you'll come to with anybody who opposes GM crops

Yeah, it's just like arguing with anyone who is pro-GM crops, who insists despite all the evidence to the contrary that everyone who is anti-GM is that way solely because of the purported health effects, and not for any plausibly rational reasons like economic or ecological issues.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Nuclear power being safe?

1) Where are the raw materials for the power plants obtained?
2) How many accidents have there been transporting radioactive material from/to the plants?
3) How many such power plants had accidents already (and I'm not only referring to Tchernobyl big style accidents)?
4) How old are the existing power plants, and for what running time were they projected/build initially?
5) Where is the used radioactive material (aka "radioactive waste") stored and how safe are these deposits?
6) How long have these deposits be taken care of (aka cost money to keep them safe)?
7) How much costs all this in total and how much of this is actually paid by taxes instead of the companies running the power plants?

Nuclear power would be rendered obsolete if the companies had to pay for all this themselves, because no one would buy for their then overpriced electrons. Add to this all the accidents and mishaps resulting in smaller and larger leaks of radioactivity, which are only mentioned by media if they come close to bigger style disasters, and you get your oh so safe and cheap nuclear power. Remember: It's run by companies who want to make $$$.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

It also seems like we are playing with fire. We assume a gene has a specific function and only a specific function, based on a few observations, and we start messing with the genetic code to plants that produce our food, which we've eaten for thousands of years.

This is my main problem with the anti-GM movement. There *is* no food which we've eaten for thousands of years. Our history is largely tied to our abiliyt to modify our food, both plant and animal.

All food is constantly being engineered and modified. All food has been chaotically modified over time, thorough mutation and breeding. "GM" produce is carefully modified, tested, and controlled by many government bodies for heath effects. All other produce is not tested or controlled for health effects.

Kevin Kelly put it this way:

Suppose the sequence is reversed. Suppose genetic engineering is what we have done all along. Then some group says, 'No, we’re going to use this new process called breeding. We’ll create all kinds of interesting recombinations, we’ll blast seeds with radiation and chemicals to get lots of mutations, and we’ll grow whatever comes up, pick the ones we like, and hope for the best.' What would people say about the risk of doing it that way?"

The battle is not GM vs non-GM. The push for profit has given us radical increase in agricultural yield over the past 80 years, and we're not likely to stop looking for more soon. The choices we have are careful GM vs reckless GM, which is what we would call traditional breeding techniques if they were invented today.

Re:GM

[Tim C]

Of course, expect the wave of downmods to come heading your way when it hits lunch time in the land of the Euro.

Well it's 3pm (or 15:00 if you prefer) over here in the UK, and you both appear to be at +5. Believe it or not we're not all a bunch of rabidly anti-US, pro-environment nutjobs over here. Though I do take slight issue with one aspect of your comment; most of us who care about the environment don't want to lower standards of living to that of the third-world, we just don't think that as things are now the third world can safely join us, and that we need to make changes to the way we live. Of course, we're the silent majority.

Nice sweeping generalisation though.

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

And frankly, if we were somehow to get rid of that problem by making living things unpatentable, I have a feeling that Monsanto would pretty much disappear shortly thereafter

'fraid not. They're primarily a chemical company; they make herbicides, insecticides, fuel additives, all sorts of nasty poisons. Genetics is just the latest of their products. Outlawing GM plants or getting rid of patents on organisms wouldn't hurt them much if at all.

Re:GM

[Myopic]

Requiring labeling of GM foods is specifically not free market. Free markets, of course, mean unregulated markets and requiring labeling is a regulation -- a very good regulation that, as you point out, would benefit consumers.

Free markets are bad for consumers because they are opaque, non-competitive, and dysfunctional. Only by using regulation can we achieve a transparent, competitive, functional market.

So my point is that we all need to stop saying "free market" when what we really mean is exactly the opposite: "market". I make this point because the people who make policy listen to people like you who request "free markets", and actually deliver on what that actually means, by eliminating regulations that we all want. We all need to be very careful to reject the free market in favor of carefully, minimally regulated non-free markets.

Please don't read this as an attack. You make an important point with which I do not agree. I only want to correct a diction mistake which is common and also dangerous. Remember: markets are good, free markets are bad.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent point ... but how can you tell one end of a sphere from another?

Re:GM

[sd1000]

GM foods are likely the most dangerous foods available. Breeding does not have the same effect as GM foods. The process of creating a GM food results in mutations in the DNA. Some of the issues: " * The novel proteins created by accident in transgenic foods and their occasional documented effects on human health (allergies, toxicity), which we can't monitor properly due to the lack of labeling of GMO foods. * The horizontal transfer of transgenes to other organisms, such as the bacteria in mammals' stomachs, which we were assured couldn't happen. (Might this be behind the rise in Crohn's disease? We'll never know, because as Lotter documents, GMO foods have barely been tested in their food state on mammals, and not over any long-term.) * Ecological side effects, such as the development of herbicide-resistant weeds and growing pest resistance to the plant-impregnated insecticide Bacillus thurengiensis, along with Bt crops' negative effects on soil organisms such as earthworms and on aquatic ecosystems." http://www.ethicurean.com/2009/06/03/lotter-gmopaper/

Re:GM

[Myopic]

Totally agreed. A person earlier in the thread summed it up perfectly: GM food is good for humanity; Monsanto is bad for humanity. Let's keep those points clear and make policy wisely with that as the basis.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

Maybe you have a point, but is there anyone else??? Is there actually a competition?

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

You are wrong. In the US, the GM food industry is essentially self regulated. There is no formal process for chemical safety testing and clinical trials for GM foods like there are for prescription drugs.

I think you misunderstood my statement. My assertion is that each and every individual GM food needs to be tested and proven safe before it is allowed to enter the market. Not that you have to prove all GM food safe before any GM food enters the market. Each and every GM food needs to be labeled with the company that produced the GM, and at the very least a unique marker that would allow someone to look up the specific chemical changes in that food.

Re:GM

[myth24601]

Pesticide resistance is the perfect example. I think if the plants are genetically manipulated to resist pesticides, then larger amounts of potentially more dangerous pesticides are being used with them.

Herbicide resistance can lead to less herbicide use because you can then apply one herbicide that kills everything but the one thing that is resistant rather than having to apply multiple chemicals depending on what weed you need to eradicate. The same could be said for pesticide resistance, perhaps you can apply stronger chemicals but less often which may be safer than having to apply weaker stuff more often.

Re:GM

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

Spot on.

I consider myself an environmentalist, but my agenda only goes so far as wishing people would drive less and the city would put a bus stop near my home instead of one 2 miles away.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

For some reason, i am kinda of reluctant to test this 10y radioactivity, GM, or whatever evil that comes. I am pretty happy to eat a Natural food, which is btw healthy and expensive, thanks to Monsanto, god bless you.....somehow..

Re:GM

[tibit]

Human synthesis of Vitamin D precursors is highly insufficient unless you want to sunbathe enough to get a serious risk of skin cancer. You can read all about it at GRC's website.

For a typical office dweller, you should shelve photosynthesis of Vit. D precursors as an impractical-to-exploit curiosity. Make sure you get Vit. D in your diet, or take supplements. And get tested for serum levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D.

Here's the fine citation from Holick's NEJM article

[...] it has been estimated that 1 billion people worldwide have vitamin D deficiency or insufficiency. According to several studies, 40 to 100% of U.S. and European elderly men and women still living in the community (not in nursing homes) are deficient in vitamin D. More than 50% of postmenopausal women taking medication for osteoporosis had suboptimal levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D — below 30 ng per milliliter (75 nmol per liter).

Children and young adults are also potentially at high risk for vitamin D deficiency. For example, 52% of Hispanic and black adolescents in a study in Boston and 48% of white preadolescent girls in a study in Maine had 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels below 20 ng per milliliter. In other studies, at the end of the winter, 42% of 15- to 49-year-old black girls and women throughout the United States had 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels below 20 ng per milliliter, and 32% of healthy students, physicians, and residents at a Boston hospital were found to be vitamin D–deficient, despite drinking a glass of milk and taking a multivitamin daily and eating salmon at least once a week.

In all likelihood, you are vitamin D deficient, your health may be suffering for it. This includes mental health!

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Jonathan Jones isn't just on the advisory board of Mendel Biotechnology he's one of its cofounders: http://www.2blades.org/sab.php#jj and Monsanto itself describes Mendel as "one of the company's key collaborators" http://monsanto.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=544 so that would suggest he not only has significant interests in the commercial success of GM crops but also in the success of Monsanto

Re:GM

[Zeromous]

I have a question: I've read stories of Mosanto patented products contaminating other fields via wind and natural processes from adjacent fields...

Just how true are these stories?

If true this would mean the terminator seed process is actually a failure (or simply a failed by design "feature").

If that is also true, it would mean, that there is no way for you to go back to Mosanto even if you wanted to. It's quite a nefarious way of ensuring Mosanto is on every field in the world.

Promise nothing bad will happen, threaten to sue when it might. Perfectly unethical business plan.

And then on the other hand I think about the scientists that have greatly advanced agriculture and our improving ability to feed 200 million new mouths every year.

As a regular joe with a fully belly and a net connection, I'm left completely confused.

Re:GM

[caseih]

Plant genetics are such that the seed produced from the seed of a hybrid cross (second generation) will often not reproduce the hybrid traits that one would find desirable. It has something to do with the fact that plants are often haploid (four chromosomes instead of 2). So if you want to grow the same hybrid crop the next year you have to buy seed again, since the trait will often only last a generation.

Of course, this is certainly not true of selected breeding varieties. For example we've been breeding wheat for various traits for 3000 years now, and it certainly reproduces just fine. But certainly when you cross two varieties of canola, for example, you typically only get the hybrid traits in the first planting only.

Monsanto's seed breeding division makes most of their money on Canola as well. As a farmer I'm quite concerned about Monsanto's power in the industry.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

A mutant with 2 heads and 7 legs is a GMO. A human being with black/red/yellow/white color is a evolution. I know i know, that the only difference is the time, in the first case we have 1y mutation, in the second case some 10 000 years, and i agree that this does not matter.....wait a minute, quite the opposite, I DISAGREE WITH YOU.

Re:GM

[Steve525]

They may be able to buy politicians and hide their GM labels, but consumers are still a force to be reckoned with, and thanks to the internet - more informed than ever.

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

I don't think that's the same. If the label said that GM foods were bad for your health or the environment, then you'd have a point. If all the label says is that the food is GM then it's up to the consumer to decide what that means to him/her. I don't see anything wrong with this. If the consumer wants to vote with his/her wallet to avoid GM foods, then great - companies will respond to the desires of the people by producing less GM food. If people would rather buy GM food, well, then I can't really blame the companies for giving people what they want. (In the absence of evidence of harm to health and environment).

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Spoken by a true Utilitarian.

note: this is a good thing.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

In Canada, there is one case where one farmer sued Monsanto for contamination, and he won the case. So, there is some light in the tunnel...

Re:GM

[Temposs]

First, traditionally developed crop varieties are great in that they are selected for in order to grow the best in hyper-localized regions of the world, and to have the particular nutrients needed for the people of a particular region to balance their diet, and they keep the local ecosystem more healthy by naturally meshing with the soil and critters that are around. This is simply not done with GM crops right now, and the GM industry prefers going with a monoculture, because it's easier to keep track of. Our crop varieties have dwindled so much these days, to where we only use one or two varieties of most crops in the industrial ag system. Crops aren't being adapted to their environment. We're forcing them to work everywhere. This endangers our food supply because if a sickness hits a crop, it can spread like wildfire to all the identical crops around.

There may be an identified toxin in some traditional varieties, but what if those toxins are naturally counteracted by eating in combination with the other parts of that traditional diet? Nutrition science is sooooo primitive right now, and influenced so much by big industries, so that I would not entirely trust the FDA, USDA, etc to tell me that something is healthy or not, because the science just has not gotten to that point yet. Sure they can tell you the chemical makeup of a food and most of its nutrients, but they have no idea how that will mesh with the rest of your diet. The least healthy people in the world are those under the jurisdiction of the FDA/USDA, while those eating traditional diets under the jurisdiction of no food regulator are *always* more healthy.

The problem is not that GM food is particularly harmful in itself, but moreso the tactics that companies like Monsanto take in order to make themselves fantastically wealthy at the expense of the average farmer.

The 'terminator' crops, which can't produce past the first generation, when applied to a staple crop, endangers the food supply, especially in poorer areas. Once the majority of farmers in a country choose to use this kind of GM crop and throw out their old seed, they've become dependent on Monsanto for their food supply, and if they don't pay up, they starve.

The legal aspect of GM crops is the biggest danger, and until that's settled out so that crops cannot be patented and farmers cannot be sued for simply having a GM seed blow into their field, then we should avoid GM crops as a policy.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's such a bad thing, why can't there just be a "non-GMO!" label, much like organic labels. Some anti-GMO group should make certification for non-GMO plants.

I don't see why the government has to step in if there is such a groundswell of support for non-GMO foods.

Oh wait, that's right. Lobbying AGAINST government control when it's not in your interest is EVIL.

Re:GM

[Myopic]

Yeah, labeling would be reasonable as an informational device for the next, say, forty or fifty years. It doesn't really matter if people avoid a certain kind of food for arbitrary meaningless reasons, just that people want to avoid them. After all, we label foods KOSHER for arbitrary religious reasons, not because the food is better or worse. If people want to have a religious-type non-evidence-based belief about GM foods, then as an American, I support the freedom of their religion, and I'm willing to suffer the clutter of food labels for their peace of mind. (So long as it doesn't cost too much, which I don't think it would.)

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

In fact, there is one BIG exception, that proves the harm of all GM food: http://www.sweetpoison.com/aspartame-side-effects.html, or with other words, aspartame is the only GM that is labeled in USA......for a good reason......and that's the reason for me avoiding COCA COLA, SPRITE, 7-UP, FANTA, and tons of tons of drinks and cakes and.....in fact they are so many that it will be easier for me to name the exception: NATURAL DRINKS.

Re:GM

[KarrdeSW]

Poison and toxic in large enough quantities is the same thing.

Fixed that for you.

What we label is largely arbitrary. Many detractors label marijuana poison but do you know how much you have to smoke to overdose on THC? Hint: It takes a lot more time and effort than achieving toxicity from water.

Re:GM

[dwiget001]

Yes, we have modified our food.

But, until GMO-sis, to coin a term, we haven't taken "X" gene from a completely unrelated species and put it in "Y" plant.

Re:GM

[dekemoose]

I think you are in fact agreeing with the GP, he disagrees with the author's conclusion that we should regulate less. It seems that your opinion is also that less regulation of this area would not provide positive outcomes. Unless I am completely misreading your opinion, in which case I apologize.

Re:GM

[Minion of Eris]

Romans used lead acetate as a sweetener, they also used lead based chems as food preservatives. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar_of_lead

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

Why would a GM food be labelled and one produced through forced mutation not? This makes no sense from the point of public health. By now, if there were measurable public health issues with GM foods, we would know. We have a test population, the US and a control, the EU. And yes, people live longer in the EU, but for reasons due to better health care/living conditions. Not because of GM food.

When you are saying that GM food ought to be labelled so consumers can make a choice, you are really saying that the government ought to regulate with which technology goods are to be produced. And I thoroughly disagree.

The government should regulate working conditions. It should regulate the risks posed by products. It should clearly regulate labelling of substances present in significant quantities in the food.

But how it's been produced? Why not ask for the composition of the growth medium for tomatoes, then? Or demand to know whether your car was assembled by workers or robots, and in what proportion?

See. Monsanto is a bunch of assholes. Having any industry self-regulating itself is both stupid and evil. But asking for mandatory labels on how stuff is produced? This is idiotic. If you are breaking laws and norms in your production you should not be allowed to sell. How you produce stuff is what innovation is about. If you have a lobbying/corruption problem, fix that. Don't try to kill technologies which can be used for good because you have irrational fears about them.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

Do you know that in MONSANTO, all the employee are avoiding soft drinks, cafe, cappuchino, in fact anything made from KIOSK like machines.....funny, ain't? I wonder what is the reason....

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

Oh, don't get me started on the drug control situation.

The worst part is that the mafia probably didn't even need to buy representatives to get the wonderfully favourable to itself legislation one can enjoy in the US.

Voter stupidity did that. And populism. And strident Right-wing arguments.

Re:GM

[MachineShedFred]

Because none of those choices are enough for the radicals in organizations such as Greenpeace and the Sierra Club, which actually influence policy. The choices you talk about are rational. The choices they want done are irrational, such as the complete removal of coal power without first building enough baseload generation to make up capacity (as all current tech for baseload generation is something they don't like).

The choice they want to present is the choice between what we have today, and the pre-Edison society of the 1870s.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

The problem is not that GM food is particularly harmful in itself, but moreso the tactics that companies like Monsanto take in order to make themselves fantastically wealthy at the expense of the average farmer.

I agree somewhat that the leagal issues are a problem. However, farmers are choosing genetically engineered seeds for the benefits, and Matasano isn't forcing them on them.

The truth is that most seeds we've used for the past 50 years are single season. You get better crops from buying carefully hybridized seeds whether GM or not then you will get from planting 2nd generation seeds. Pretty much no farmer reuses their seeds for yield reasons. It simply doesn't make economic sense.

My problem with GM food has nothing to do with GM food. It has to do with patents. The large corps involved are getting tons of patents to lock out independant research, including good humanitarian projects.

The problems with Matasano and our patent system are real, but that doesn't mean we should be scared of all GM food or techniques. "Green" campaigns against GM technology that is truely patent and licensing free, created by non-profits for the good of poor nations, is causing people to die of starvation and malnutrition. Dr Wambugu, a Kenyan plant pathologist puts it this way: "You people in the developed world are free to debate the merits of genetically modified foods, but can we please eat first?"

It is a good sign that the people who understand GM techniques are the least scared of GM food. Most arguments against GM seem to largely stem from ignorance and fear.

Re:GM

[vitaflo]

Same applies to the anti-GM-food people who try to get the public into a panic by suggesting that GM food will make them sick or whatever, when the true agenda of the people who started the anti-GM movement is simply a far-left anti-corporate one. The misinformation they spread about GM foods is just as bad, if not worse, than the lack of information about which products are and aren't genetically modified.

That said, Monsanto is a bunch of assholes because they sue farmers for doing what farmers are supposed to do.

Some people who are anti-GM are really just anti-Monsanto, because let's face it, a majority of GM crops come from Monsanto. Monsanto has destroyed family farming, destroyed everything that farmers have worked for forever, and replaced it with corporate farming under threat of lawsuits. I want to support sustainability in local farming where farmers can keep their seeds without the threat of being sued by Monsanto. I'm not against GM crops, I'm against GM crop lawsuits by the likes of Monsanto.

Re:GM

[FriendlyLurker]

+1 I agree, thanks for the correction. Free to make en informed choice is not equal to "free market".

Re:GM

[spinkham]

Genes code for proteins. Genes don't care what organism they came from.

Picking specific proteins is much safer then hybridization or mutation. Or would you rather have random changes then specifically chosen ones? Shall I engineer your car that way also? How about the local power plant? My company would be sued out of business for being reckless. Yes, "genetic algorithms" can produce occasional good results with many failures in computing and design, but design on purpose is how we deal with the rest of our safety critical problems.

I'd rather take the careful road, and in this case, that's GM.

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

I don't want the government to kill off GM foods. Far from it. Labeling does not indicate I want the government to regulate what technology goods are produced with. It indicates that I want responsible disclosure. Chemical additives to food do currently require disclosure in most cases. Unlabeled GM foods are permitted to sneak around that disclosure.

I want rigorous scientific tests, detailed chemical analysis and express assurances regarding the risks, concentrations and bio-accumulation of potentially hazardous chemicals newly introduced into food by genetic manipulation and even good old fashioned chemical additives before they can threaten millions of unknowing consumers.

I want the choice to boycott individual GM companies who have policies I find utterly reprehensible. If a suitable alternative to Monsanto exists, I would fully endorse it if it performed due diligence in regards to safety and disclosure.

Re:GM

[MagikSlinger]

Um, the "lead poisoining" hypothesis is bunk, FYI.

But the rest of your post I agree with. If there is only one reason to oppose GM crops, it's the terminator crops feature.

Re:GM

[Rutefoot]

For some reason we concentrate on what we add to our diet and the health effects and ignore what we subtract from our diets. Should we be concerned for our health that our corn has caterpillar genes? Maybe, but probably not. But what about the things that genetic manipulation (GMOs and selective breeding alike) are removing from our food? We have had a pretty poor track record when it comes to that sort of thing. A hundred years ago there were those who considered protein a 'poison' and not essential to our diet. Another perfect example is scurvy. Time and time again people became inflicted with the disease and time and time again they had to 'rediscover' that the disease wasn't caused by some communicable disease, but a lack of Vitamin C. Even then people still didn't fully understand the necessity of Vitamin C and replaced Vitamin C rich citrus with other acids thinking they were equally good at preventing scurvy...with, in hindsight, expectedly poor results. Hell, even in the early 20th century people were still forgetting scurvy was the result of a lack of something in the diet and again thinking it was the result of bacteria from tainted meat. We would even pasteurize milk to get rid of bacteria, destroy the vitamin C in the process then wonder why our young children came down with the disease.

The one issue I see arising from GMO crops is the removal of what at the time seems like unnecessary or unwanted traits then find out that those traits are essential to our health. Much like when we started refining wheat to improve its shelf life, not realizing that its shelf life is improving because you've eliminated many of the nutrients bacterias and molds like to feed off of, the same nutrients that are important to our health.

Before we start removing these traits from our food maybe we should be making damn sure that these traits don't play a pivotal role in our overall health. But frankly, even if we exhausted all available research on the matter, I still wouldn't trust it, because we've shown numerous times that what we don't know could fill a dump truck.

Re:GM

[noidentity]

[not having labels state that they contain GM organisms is] kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

No, it's not. Stating that something contains GMs isn't claiming anything about the health implications, just what the hell is IN the product. Your example of an autism warning on vaccines is stating a claimed effect of what's in it. A better comparison would be to a vaccine simply stating what is in it, with no mention of autism or whatever.

It really gets under my skin when people like you argue that foods shouldn't state whether they contain GM ingredients, simply because you believe that GM ingredients are identical in all respects, and that no buyer could ever have a legitimate reason for wanting to know. Clearly, he is a nutcase who believes it will ruin his health. No way he might simply not want to support GM manufacturers, have some weird allergy to particular GM ingredients, or hell, want to only get foods made with GM ingredients.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Pro-Nuclear!?!

Won't you think of the poor atoms? You're just a heartless cruel person. I bet you pull the wings off of flies in your spare time too don't you.

Re:GM

[blackbeak]

http://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/csf/27/4/27_173/_article/-char/en Are you sure GM food is good for humanity? Without enough unbiased testing, how can you know?

Re:GM

[mk2mark]

How exactly do you know one end of a football from another?

Re:GM

[orgenegro]

The real problem you will get with Europeans is suggesting there is an end to a football.

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

GM crops aren't opposed because people believe they're unsafe, they're opposed for many reasons. A few:

1. They may be safe, but we don't know for sure they are, while we do know which non-GM foods are safe and which are unsafe.
2. Monsanto has a long history of producing poisons
3. Monsanto has a long history of polluting the environment, and polluting it VERY badly
4. GM pollen contaminates non-GM crops, causing all sorts of problems (mostly legal but some related to farming) for farmers

Re:GM

[BVis]

I think you're exaggerating what Greenpeace and the Sierra Club are aiming for. Can you cite official policy from either of those groups to back up your claim?

Re:GM

[blackbeak]

GM food might be 100% harmless! What do you suppose those chances are? Everyone here - especially those clamoring for citations - should follow this link to a list of some of the FDA's internal documents on the subject: http://biointegrity.org/list.html

Re:GM

[0xG]

Ithe environmentalist movement is more concerned with lowering the US and Europe's standards of living to those of a third world country

I think that statement speaks for itself; it's a hard act to follow.
Even though I am not one of your "retarded Birkenstock wearing liberal hippy scum", I won't knowingly buy anything that Monsanto has had a hand in producing.
I have no problem eating GM foods, actually. I am not even that afraid of transgenic foods. (I would like to know when I am eating them, though). I just don't approve of Monsanto.

Re:GM

[level_headed_midwest]

The way that Monsanto prevents farmers from using the seed products of GM crops is due to lawsuits, not due to the lack of viability of the seeds themselves. You agree to a license saying you will not use the harvested grain as seed when you purchase and plant the seed. If you buy seed in bags, the license is on a tag on the bags and you are presumed to have agreed to the license if you have planted the seed, similar to EULAs on shrinkwrapped software.

Re:GM

[networkBoy]

Actually those Evil Bastards do produce sterile crop seeds.
For those crops where they don't they might as well be, they sue you into oblivion if you save your seed for later.

Did you know those Evil Bastards own 95% of the soybean crop? That there is only 5% of the corp left that is not GMO? Just in case someone from that group of Evil Bastards is reading this: I plan on planting non GMO soy, just to keep the strain alive. I will send my heirloom seeds to anyone who wants them, free of charge. Sadly I only have a 10 sq foot area to plant, but I'm going to do it anyway, just to make a point.

Also you Evil Bastards: Fuck you.
-nB

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

You bring to mind an old Saturday Night Live skit with Gilda Radner and Al Franken poking fun of "better living through chemistry".

Frankin (playing a Monsanto exec) says "Here, try some of this dihydrogen monoxide."

"Dihydrogen monoxide? What's that?"

"H20."

"Oh!", then laughs and drinks the water. "Here, try some of this SO2O4".

Frankin says "What's that?" and drinks... then screams in agony before falling on the floor.

Re:GM

[tixxit]

On the other hand, one of the big dangers of run-off from agriculture is eutrophication of nearby lakes, rivers, tributaries, etc, caused by all the fertilizer sprayed on crops. Perhaps GM could help solve this problem by creating crops that require less fertilizer. In other words, there are 2 sides to GM; for instance, while it can create crops that are resistant to pesticides, letting farmers spray they hell out of their crops without worry, but it could also create crops that don't need pesticides. That said, I still agree with you; without further evidence, we should stick with what we know.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you talking this case? Monsanto won the case in a 5-4 decision from the supreme court of Canada.

If not, please provide your reference.

Re:GM

[Bakkster]

Monsanto 'piggy-backs' the genes, though. Their first gene that provided resistance to Roundup herbicide (which makes farming so economically superior it's almost mandatory) has a patent expiring in 2014 (for soybeans). However, Monsanto has two methods for preventing use of this gene by farmers.
1) They are marketing their 2nd generation of Roundup-safe soybeans, which have higher yields. They still have the market on the best plants (arguably, this is innovation and good).
2) They ensure that buying a seed with the Roundup Ready gene also has other, patented genes. Thus the seed is still covered under a Monsanto patent, and can't be replanted by the farmer.

Fortunately, since the patent is up, other companies can create seeds with this gene. It's possible they might not even place other patented genes in, which would allow the farmers to reseed.

Re:GM

[commodore64_love]

Watch "Food Inc" which contains several interviews with farmers that have NO association with Monsanto, and yet found themselves sued by the megacorp.

The reason for the lawsuits varied: One farmer was accused of having Monsanto plants without permission (genetically-engineered pollen infected his naturally-growing corn, and then became GM corn). Another farmer operates a machine that separates seed from the chaff, and he was accused of trying to steal Monsanto's seed (which has no basis on fact). It's similar to how RIAA companies tried to sue people with VCRs or recordable Minidiscs. And yet another farmer was sued just because they wanted to *suspected* her had Monsanto plants, based upon reports from his neighbors. He had not done anything wrong and the case was eventually dismissed, but it still wiped-out his personal savings.

If ever there was a living example of "tyrannical oligarchy" then Monsanto fits the bill (as do most megacorps).

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

Totally wrong. Labeling something as GM is a factual description, like color. Causing autism is an effect that some claim. Do you understand the difference between "that corn is from genetically modified seed" and "that corn causes disease."

Interesting that you use the case of vaccine because there is a comparison. For a long time some vaccines had some mercury in them, I believe the producers of the vaccines still claim it was safe (even though I believe it's been discontinued) but many of the people who believe autism is caused by vaccines believe the mercury was the problem. I think most people can understand that labling vaccines as containing mercury is a reasonable description and is different from that vaccine causes autism.

Companies have the right to defend their products against false claims and certainly people should be held accountable for statements they make and should be able to substantiate them. However I have a right to select the products I buy based upon whatever criteria I decide, it doesn't have to make sense to you or to anyone else. Preventing me from exercising that right be obsecuring information is not right. I find it odd that people don't understand this when it comes to GM-food. Imagine if the same thing occurred in IT, you buy an operating system box it doesn't tell you whether it has Windows, OSX, BSD, Linux... because they are all operating systems all providing the same functionallity.

Re:GM

[Aqualung812]

However, farmers are choosing genetically engineered seeds for the benefits

And, those that are not choosing GM seeds are being pollinated by them, then getting sued by Monsanto. Don't get me wrong, I think that GM foods are perfectly safe. I do not buy GM foods, though, because I know that the production of them puts some farmers out of business and destroys the environment though "roundup-ready" farming, which is basically spraying herbicide on everything and killing all non-GM plants in the field and eventually downstream.

Re:GM

[phantomfive]

Better living through chemistry wasn't anyone's motto, but "Better Things for Better Living...Through Chemistry" was the slogan for DuPont for many years.

Re:GM

[Bakkster]

If we removed patent protections on GM seeds, Monsanto would probably just reneg on their promise not to use 'terminator'-gene seeds, which produce sterile seeds. Thus, we trade the problem of patent lawsuits for the fear of cross-contaminating our world food supply into sterility.

Re:GM

[Myopic]

Yes. "Free market" is a misleading phrase. It sounds so good -- who would oppose a free anything? But it's a marketing term which means something other than what people first imagine. I belabor the point to an annoying degree because I think it's important. I'm glad you weren't put off. Be well.

Re:GM

[mini me]

No, it's not sterile. Farmers aren't idiots and they refused to buy sterile crops.

Well, technically, Monsanto does not allow farmers to buy GM seed at all. Seed is essentially leased and final product must be sold after harvest. Attempts to use the seed outside of the terms of the contract signed with Monsanto will lead to finding yourself in court.

Re:GM

[Myopic]

By using logic and reason based on everything we know about the world, of course. That is how we judge the goodness or badness of just about everything.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the term you are looking for is "Hybrid Vigor". We see it in livestock production as well. It has led to the development of Terminal Cross breeding programs. You breed a sow from line X with a boar from line Y and you get a first generation piglet that has growth performance and meat quality characteristics higher than either parent individually. However if you take piglets from the XY generation and breed them with each other, or pigs from another line, the synergistic benefits are lost.

Re:GM

[lawpoop]

Here's the rub: We've been genetically engineering food since the dawn of society. Society as we know it came from the ability to improve plants through breeding and mutations.

No, we haven't. Not like this. This is quantitatively different. An Aztec farmer in the year 200 wasn't introducing arctic flounder genes into his tomatoes.

Up until now, we were only semi-consciously doing what already happens in nature -- natural selection. We can call it artificial selection, because humans were consciously doing it.

There is no way in nature, without the intervention of human beings, that an antifreeze gene from an arctic flounder can find its way into the germline of an tomato plant. Likewise with glow-in-the-dark genes from jellyfish into bunnies. That kind of lateral gene transfer between complex multi-cellular organisms just doesn't happen.

Re:GM

[COMON$]

Welcome to the group, us Christians have been generalized due to vocal assholes for centuries....Potlucks on Fridays and cookies are in the corner next to the punch.

Re:GM

[eparker05]

"They also have a nasty habit of breeding strains that can not reproduce on their own."

Are you saying that the practice of cloning plants by grafting, which has been done since before written history, is going to somehow fail us? The domestication of apples, peaches, cherries, and many other fruits and nuts would have been impossible without clone propagation. If you ever doubt me, please plant an almond and enjoy the bitter useless nut that comes off the progeny. Most of the food you eat today comes from plants that "cannot reproduce their own".

These days we are even more advanced. Through plant tissue culturing we can even reproduce plants that can't be propagated by seed or grafting. Plant tissue culturing sounds impossible, but most people with a book and a credit card could do it in their kitchen.

Re:GM

[stanlyb]

Now asking that every GM food be tested in the same way we test medicines is not absurd (probably excessively cautious, but hey). There is a procedure to get new edible species approved, and I expect it was followed. Is it stringent enough? I don't know.

Now, you are right, there was really a good old proven procedure for such a craps, but it was abandoned, with the little help from Monsanto and Clinton, that's right, Clinton, he killed the procedure, and as a result, the funny thing is that right now, you have to prove that your new Soft Drink is SAFE (for example), but you don't need to prove that substituting "Natural Food" with "GM Food" is safe, WTF!!!!!!!

Re:GM

[lawpoop]

4 years after the discovery of X-rays, it was widely accepted that exposure needed to be limited.

Yeah, but that didn't stop people from dosing radiation from machines like Shoe-fitting flouroscopes until the 1960-70s, or getting a big dose of radiation to treat a routine earache.

Re:GM

[Carnivore]

But they did add lead salts (Lead (II) Acetate) to their wine to sweeten and preserve it.

Re:GM

[mini me]

Even if you feel GM crops are safe, there is still the issue of intellectual property. It is frightening how much control Monsanto has over the food supply

Re:GM

[gknoy]

I don't want to buy GM food. It's not because it isn't safe (because I don't know), but because I do not want to voluntarily support Monsanto's abusive practices. (I don't like the idea of losing our seed diversity, either, but mainly it's that Monsanto's leveraged technology and the legal system in ways which are (to me) evil.) That's why I want to see "Made with Monsanto" stickers on things, just as I look for the "certified organic" labels.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

... all computer programmers are geeks who don't know one end of a football from the other ...

Isn't a football mostly symmetrical? Aside from the directionality of the writing, how would you tell one end of a football from the other? The answer must be a "jock" thing. Back to programming!

Re:GM

[Bassman59]

Vitamin A.

Humans can synthesize vitamin D when they are exposed to sunlight.

At the risk of increased chance of skin cancer. There was a discussion on NPR about this a couple of weeks ago.

Re:GM

[Yold]

Broccoli

Re:GM

[serbanp]

Monsanto tout things like their "Golden Rice" (such a dream name, that one) as helping the poor third world. It's been engineered to have high levels of Vitamin A.

This is a misleading statement, unless by high levels you mean compared to normal rice. A 10-year old would have to eat two pounds of Golden Rice a day to fulfill her vitamin A needs, totally impractical.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

*Remember that a lot of the high yields some like to report, are not because the crop has been engineered to be super-abundant (selective breeding has already done wonders there), but because they are engineered to resist pesticides that kill pretty much everything else.*

Not true, watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIvNopv9Pa8

*What does that do to biodiversity and the general eco-system? What happens if these traits get loose into the wild or to the farm workers and local people exposed to the increased use of pesticides.*

Recent unbiased government studies have shown that overall pesticide/herbicide use has DECREASED as a result of using GM crops that are resistant - see, ordinarily you can't spray 50 liters of "A" on a field because your crop dies, so you instead spray 25 Liters each of A, B, C and D.

*Not to mention that if some of the GM traits do get loose in the wild, it's pretty much irreversible. So they've engineered plants that secrete a poison normally found in caterpillars to make the plant poisonous to pests. Sounds like one Hell of a survival trait to me. So a little way down the line and insect populations take a tumble because of this, and the birds that depend on them.*

You need to refresh your knowledge of simple genetics... moving "traits" around is not as simple as manipulating lego pieces, they don't just get "loose" thats like saying "what if a trait for antlers got loose in the human population? BAN REINDEER!!" It is very difficult to move a fully functional and intact gene from one organism to another in the lab - in the wild recombination like this just does not happen.

*But leaving aside the biological issues, the economic ones that we do know for sure are frightful. These crops are patented. The developing world is Monsanto's poster child for GM crops and they'll do anything they can to get everyone using these crops. But first one's always free. If a staple food is monopolised, you're going to trust who that the licence fees stay low? Monsanto? Should there even be licence fees for growing food? And enforcement? Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting. You have to buy again and again.*
Free market economy my friend! The same study has shown that farmers make more profit planting GM crops, even though the seed is more expensive. Common sense: if there was no profit in it, no one would do it.

*Monsanto tout things like their "Golden Rice" (such a dream name, that one) as helping the poor third world. It's been engineered to have high levels of Vitamin D. But why do some people in the Third World have vitamin D deficiencies? Because their historical balanced diet based on their usual range of crops, has been replaced with bulk rice farming because that's what the international market demands they grow. *

Also untrue : first of all, Golden Rice is engineered to have extra Vitamin *A* (not vitamin D) which is the leading cause of blindness in the world (wiki): "Approximately 250,000 to 500,000 malnourished children in the developing world go blind each year from a deficiency of vitamin A, approximately half of which die within a year of becoming blind." Second, the the reason these people become deficient is they only have so much land to support them, and don't have enough space to grow a diverse range of crops - these families live on what they grow themselves and it is rarely enough. The rice you buy at the supermarket does not come from this population.

As a food scientist (Who has nothing to do with Monstanto BTW, like the rest of the big corp$ they have their problems) I find it appalling when people blindly argue against GM crops without understanding how they're made, the amount of regulation involved, and the amount of non-regulation in "conventional" breeding methods. Do you know what mutagenic breeding is? It was all the rage in the 40's and 60's and is still used today: thousands of new crop varieties have been produced t

Re:GM

[rhakka]

Wow, really?

we've been seriously getting into the genome for all of about ten years now, and you claim that "genes don't care what organism they came from"?

I claim that the entire science of modern genetics is in its infancy. Maybe you should take just a little dose of humility, in light of all the chemical "advances" we made over the last century that we now find may also be making us sick. We were promised better living through chemicals, and sometimes that's true, but that doesn't mean that it's the "safe route". Organic food is safer than non-organic food, and every year more studies prove it. All those chemicals were "tested" as well.

replanting the potatoes that made it longer into the fall the next time around is not even in the same league as direct manipulation of genes. Nor is selecting for positive traits. Creating traits that no plant has ever seen before *just might* have ramifications we don't yet understand. Check that: I'd posit it's almost CERTAIN to have ramifications we don't yet understand. We simply haven't been doing it long enough to understand what we are really doing. the interactions between genes is known only to be incredibly complex, barely understood, and only a part of the overall puzzle that is biological interaction.

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

I hope you enjoy the immanent extinction of the Cavendish banana monoculture due to its complete inability to resist a parasitic fungus epidemic.

Breeding brings variation. Variation means that a single specific pathogen or environmental condition is far less likely to wipe out or significantly affect an entire population.

It is bad for this biological reason, but also from the standpoint that a single company like Monsanto can effectively corner the market and hold the entire worlds food supply hostage if it is the sole source of viable seeds for major food crops.

Re:GM

[Nadaka]

I also forgot to mention that these sterile or semi-sterile plants can, will and do cross pollinate with nearby unmodified crops with the potential to reduce the fertility of grain supplies that were supposed to remain untainted.

Re:GM

[rhakka]

If I, as a consumer, wish to avoid GM food, I should have that right. Maybe I just wish to avoid it for political reasons. Maybe I wish to take my chances with the "oh so scary" normal mutations of plant rather than brand new methods invented in my lifetime. My reason doesn't even matter: I should have a right to make that decision for myself. To make that decision, I must be informed.

A company having the ability to prevent me from accessing that information is simply abhorrent. It's as anti-free market as could possibly be. Never mind an affront to the rights of people to determine for themselves what they consider to be acceptable or not acceptable risks.

I have no idea what the effects of GM are. I don't really care, either. I would prefer not to gamble, and instead continue to eat the same basic foodstuffs we've been eating for eons with just natural variation or, at best, variations that occur within the realm of normal evolutionary processes. for the most part, of course, I don't refuse GM food as a rule, I would just prefer to limit exposure. and I don't really care if you think that is rational or not, though I think immediate faith in the safety of new forms of genetic manipulation is a bit irrational, personally. History shows us we rarely understand the full downside of new tech of any kind until long after it is introduced into the "wild". Ignoring that is definitely irrational.

Re:GM

[eparker05]

Did you even read what I had said? This practice has been going on for thousands of years. What you said about disease in mono culture is true, but many of the sexually reproducing plants don't have more than a few dozen viable strains. Farmers know how to deal with fungal, viral, bacterial, and insect pests.

Furthermore, Monsanto only has a corner on the strains it produces. If that strain is the only viable strain of that plant, then we should applaud Monsanto for making a new breed that is so productive and/or hearty as to make all previous versions obsolete. But patents run out, and if their fees are truly abhorrent, farmers can just wait that 20 years while growing a different crop or strain.

Re:GM

[baldusi]

Actually, the AntiGM movement started as a lobby effort of the pro European agrosubsidy to stop the import from the rest of the world. Who use GM to get better yields and lower costs without subsidies, even with a 35% tariff like in Argentina, and still are cheaper than the French.

Re:GM

[severoon]

I think it's worth distinguishing between GM food and companies that use GM to prop up the agri-industrial complex by making ever more robust monocultures. The problem isn't genetic modification--we've been doing that since Mendel, the only difference is the techniques.

The problem is, instead of using this newfound genetic knowledge to do something worthwhile, companies like Monsanto use it to create corn that can thrive in giant swaths of land that grow nothing but corn. All of the fear levied at GM food in this thread and everywhere is misplaced. It should be aimed at the practice of growing monocultures that deplete soil and wreck the land.

I'm surprised that there's so much FUD in this thread aimed at GM, though. I thought /. was supposed to be mostly pro-science nerds that don't confuse evil corporations with anti-science hippie propaganda. :-)

Re:GM

[blueg3]

Right -- how they actually keep the plant from producing viable seed matters. I mean, they're dicks regardless (although a lot of food plants are hybrids, where you can't use the seed produced anyway), but the Terminator gene either is dangerous or is perceived as dangerous. Not all methods of causing plants to produce sterile seed are as potentially-hazardous.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines.

That's ridiculous. A label identifying a food item as genetically modified informs a person of that fact, empowering them to make purchasing choices that better reflect their demands.

A forced lack of information subverts the workings of whatever free market exists.

Re:GM

[rwv]

I know the paper industry has an expensive certification process that allows paper mill's to source their pulp from "sustainable forests" and this gives them the right to slap a certification on their products (and charge more for the overhead that comes with the certification). Now... I wouldn't want it to get the the point where I look for food with the "No Monsanto" label... but I *would* pay an extra dollar of two for "No Monsanto" lettuce or tomatoes it all else is equal at the supermarket.

Maybe agriculture companies can band together and create the opposite of the "GM label" and start labeling their products "No Monsanto".

Re:GM

[level_headed_midwest]

Aspartame is a synthetic dipeptide comprised of aspartic acid and phenylalanine most frequently made through hydrolysis of methanol. The reason aspartame-containing products containing aspartame are labeled because the dipeptide is cleaved during digestion and phenylalanine is released, which is toxic in large amounts to people who have the congenital disease phenylketonuria (PKU). Some aspartame is made with bacterial enzymes performing the hydrolysis instead of strong acids or bases, but the labeling was in place well before the use of bacterial enzymes.

Oh, and natural drinks can also be harmful to people who have PKU. Infants with PKU are frequently fed synthetic formula without phenylalanine instead of breast milk or as a major supplement to small amounts of breast milk because breast milk contains phenylalanine (regardless of the mother's diet.) Other types of milks and bean-containing products are also high in phennylalanine regardless if they are "natural" or "organic" and must be avoided or eaten in small quantities.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

I agree. Patent issues abound in many fields, and Matasano, Dow Agrisciences and other large companies are getting more power and protection then they should in a rapidly expanding research field.

That's an entirely separate issue then what the original article is about, and different from most arguments made by the green movement, even if that fear of big business is probably the genesis of their other complaints.

My goal is to dial back some of the fear of GM foods and put it in better perspective to the practices that preceded GM. Then we can more rationally discuss what are in fact problems and potential problems in the field.

Re:GM

[the_B0fh]

do you even understand why we have world hunger? It's not because there's not enough food, but that the rich does not want the poor to have it.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a bad summary when I have to RTFA to learn GM="Genetically Modified". (As opposed to General Mills, which at least makes slightly more sense than General Motors ....)

Re:GM

[DwySteve]

There's something I've never understood coming from critics of the environmentalist movement: Where do you get the idea that people want to drag down the standard of living?

Generally I get it from the people in the environmentalist movement who seem to be against the application of power to solve everyday problems because it's 'wasteful' somehow. For many, their agenda is to push their own values on to me in the name of 'conserving' things - electricity, air, water, environment in general, etc. A small example: you should dry your clothes on a line to save the electricity a dryer would use (typically despite any other considerations: schedule, availability of clothes lines, it's raining outside, etc). Some environmentalists would deny me dry clothes for a day or more because its' raining outside. That lowers my standard of living.

Spending $3 on a light bulb will make me poor?

Not me, but someone much poorer than me. The shame of all of this CFL business is that it's a fairly large upfront cost: you'll spend hundreds of dollars to replace all of the bulbs in your house to save maybe $5-$10 a month. It's definitely a choice I'd make, but I have more than a hundred dollars sitting around. If you live in the People's Republic of California and you can't buy the $.50 incandescent anymore, suddenly the $3 you spent on the bulb is money you can't spend on gas or food or something else. The poor don't see the benefit of saving money on their bills monthly because they don't have the upfront money to invest in replacing all of their bulbs, and when push comes to shove the far left environmentalist position denies the poor folk $2.50 to spend on food. Or $2.50 to spend on cigarettes and booze - it's their money anyhow.

What exactly brings down my standard of living when I ... drive in a more fuel-efficient manner (NOT buying a different car)? All of these are 'environmentalist' choices, yet they cost nothing except the effort required to modify my behavior slightly.

Are you serious? Do you know what a Prius costs in comparison to a cheap car? Add $10K or so. That's a car for the rich. And it's such a marginal improvement in gas mileage it's hardly worth it. Remember kids, you save a lot more gas going from 15MPG to 30MPG than you do from 30MPG to 60MPG. I can't believe any environmentalist would approve of that choice BTW.

For me it comes down to environmentalists NEVER performing a cost/benefit analysis on the measures they propose and the costs are always on the end user - us. Is $3 here and $10 there that bad? Not individually, but together, yes! Some people do NOT have the means to afford the difference between $.50 and $3, and not everyone can spend $10K more to have a car that saves you $5 on gas a month. But the furthest left environmentalists would make cheap incandescents and marginally less fuel-efficient cars illegal and push the cost onto the poor because they always assign a value of infinity to the smallest and most insignificant part of nature (of which man is obviously not a part) and assign next to nothing to the potential suffering of their fellow man.

Re:GM

[nurfle55]

Wait...Footballs have ends? Distinct ones? Yeah, I know: not helping. At any rate, it's worth pointing out that this is the Internet. Population: 1 kajillion straw men...

Re:GM

[spinkham]

My point is this: GM is not totally safe. Neither is random mutation, which is often spured on by radiation and chemical means.

All food is frankenfood. It's not pure food vs GM food. Our food will change, and we can be careful about the changes we introduce (that's "GM") or reckless (that's traditional breeding).

If you're worried about safety, campaign for safety testing of all new plant varieties, not just GM ones. GM ones are already safety tested much more then conventional varieties. Testing all plants equally is the rational way forward.

Re:GM

[compro01]

The FDA disallowed "Non-GMO" and similar labels in 2001.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

Yes, we took a gene we understand (in that we understand exactly what compound it produces and how) and added it to a different species. It's not magic. It's much more careful and controlled then random mutations and crossbreeding used for all new crop varieties.

If it's safety we're concerned about, mandate safety testing for all new plant varieties. GM produce already undergoes fairly rigorous testing, which is not true of most non-GM produce produced through mutation and cross breeding. That's something I could get behind.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

However, farmers are choosing genetically engineered seeds for the benefits

One thing that I disagree with on your post: Many farmers ARE essentially forced to use Monsanto seeds. When a nearby farmer starts using them, there is a potential cross pollination with the original farmer in question. Monsanto regularly sends inspectors to farms near their customers. If they see any evidence of cross-pollination, they sue. The victimized farmers sell their fields to the Monsanto farmer and Monsanto slowly spreads its blight o'er yonder. It is like a disease.

Re:GM

[TheSync]

My problem with GM food has nothing to do with GM food. It has to do with patents. The large corps involved are getting tons of patents to lock out independant research, including good humanitarian projects.

On the other hand, without the patents, these products might never get developed (who could afford all the political/marketing effort to deal with the anti-GM crowd, much less the research effort?)

In 2014 the patent on RoundUp Ready Soybeans runs out, and then anyone can use the seeds.

U.S. Constitution - Article 1 Section 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

Re:GM

[agnosticnixie]

(who could afford all the political/marketing effort to deal with the anti-GM crowd, much less the research effort?

Monsanto, obviously, given that they were already an enormous multinational that made its wealth on chemicals anyway.

Re:GM

[Draek]

There have been toxic chemicals found in food sold that have been "traditionally" engineered, but none that have been "on purpose" engineered in in what has become known as GE.

The way you phrase your statement is... weird. Let me ask, then: *which* toxic chemicals were found? were they put there on purpose? in the GE crops, were they tested for *all* kinds of chemicals or only the ones that were found on the traditional crops? were both crops grown in the same manner? if not, what were the differences? and why was there a difference in the first place?

Answer that, and then you'd begin to have something resembling an objective statement, because as it stands it sounds a bit too much like pro-GM FUD.

Re:GM

[BVis]

you'll spend hundreds of dollars to replace all of the bulbs in your house

How big is your house, that you'd be buying 100 lightbulbs all at once? I think I might have 20 all together. You're also conveniently leaving out the fact that CFLs have a longer life than incandescents, saving you money on replacements as well.

and when push comes to shove the far left environmentalist position denies the poor folk $2.50 to spend on food.

[citation needed]

Are you serious? Do you know what a Prius costs in comparison to a cheap car?

Which is why I said:

drive in a more fuel-efficient manner (NOT buying a different car)

Also, your arguments are in terms of money. Maybe it's not about money? Maybe it's about changing your lifestyle to make your impact felt less, and if that saves you money, great. If it doesn't? Well, suck it up. Do what you CAN. You CAN drive more efficiently. You CAN shut off a light bulb. Can't afford to replace your bulbs? OK, fine, shut them off when you're not using them, or buy lower-wattage bulbs where you can. Can't afford a hybrid or another kind of more fuel-efficient car? OK, fine, drive more carefully.

But the furthest left environmentalists would make cheap incandescents and marginally less fuel-efficient cars illegal and push the cost onto the poor because they always assign a value of infinity to the smallest and most insignificant part of nature (of which man is obviously not a part) and assign next to nothing to the potential suffering of their fellow man.

Oh please. First of all, man is a part of ALL PARTS of nature, denying as such is factually incorrect. Potential suffering? It would kill you to turn off a light bulb? To drive 65 on the highway instead of 80? To consider fuel mileage when you purchase your next car? All of these would make you suffer?

I think you're confusing "minor inconvenience" and "a small amount of effort" with "suffering" and "lower quality of living". Will your efforts fix the environmental problem 100% and for all time? No. Will they help? Yes. I think the dissonance is where people disagree on what they CAN do. Usually it's more of a problem of what people WILL do, not what they CAN do.

Also, you keep talking about environmentalists like they're all terrorist organizations. Some of them are quite reasonable. Are there lunatics? Of course. Are there lunatics on the other side of the issue? You bet. Narrow your brush.

Re:GM

[Manos_Of_Fate]

Nearly everything is toxic if you consume enough of it. Does that mean that everything is poison?

Re:GM

[coldsalmon]

That kind of lateral gene transfer between complex multi-cellular organisms just doesn't happen.

Amazingly enough, this does happen in nature. Here is one recent example of a sea slug incorporating genes from algae:

http://www.physorg.com/news182501672.html

Granted, the algae may not be a "complex" multi-cellular organism according to your definition, but the sea slug certainly is.

Re:GM

[Grishnakh]

Exactly. It's about trust. You have to look at the source, and their reputation. Monsanto's reputation is beyond horrible. So why would I want to trust any food made by them to be safe?

It's like trusting nuclear plants made by the designers of Chernobyl. Or trusting BP to do deep-drilling safely.

Re:GM

[mccrew]

And let's not forget; famine is mostly an economical problem these days

I think it's fair to say that famine is mostly a political, not economic, problem these days. Since the second half of the 20th century the major famines have occurred concurrent with political instability, or in the midst of a civil war, or even used as a weapon and tool of repression and control (e.g. North Korea).

Re:GM

[maxume]

Did you know that golden rice is aimed squarely at poor people in the third world, and not at western city dwellers?

And the consequences of dietary levels in those 1 billion people are much less clear cut than you make it out to be, certainly they do not all have rickets. There is lots of room for more subtle diseases and disorders and such, but it isn't widely accepted medical opinion that any exist.

And all the people screaming about skin cancer can relax, 10 minutes (that's right, 10 minutes!) of sun exposure provides 30 times the vitamin D of a serving of milk (that's from your article; they use 10 minutes of quite a bit of skin exposed). A few minutes of sun exposure each day is not going to give most people skin cancer at 50 (that's a baseless assertion on my part).

Of course, I still take vitamin D, especially during the winter.

Re:GM

[Grishnakh]

Don't forget, one of the main factors in the autism/vaccine issue is the use of a mercury-containing preservative called thimerosal, not the vaccine itself. You could easily placate many of the people worried about autism by simply making the vaccines with a different preservative that doesn't contain mercury. The drug companies don't want to do that because thimerosal is cheaper. Personally, I'd rather pay an extra $0.10 so that my child doesn't get a dose of mercury, however small; I can afford it.

Re:GM

[ikarous]

They also have a nasty habit of breeding strains that can not reproduce on their own.

DRM isn't that good of an idea for digital entertainment. But DRM on the human food supply? That is jumping off a cliff into cartoonish insane evil mega-corporation territory.

Your post makes me think of the calorie companies in Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl. Amongst other things, the book rather chillingly portrays the hypothetical worst-case consequences of granting corporations complete control over the reproductive capacities of the human food supply.

Re:GM

[h4rr4r]

No, but vaccines are labeled as vaccines not homeopathic medicine. Clear labeling is not the same as supposing harm. I seek out irradiated meat when I want to have very rare burgers. Without clear labeling how would I do that?

Re:GM

[h4rr4r]

Footballs are round, they have no ends. For evidence you can turn on the tv in a few minutes.

Re:GM

[Faerunner]

It's not sterile, but it doesn't produce "true". F1 (first generation) hybrids bred together will not produce seeds that have the same high yield or in some cases even the same taste and look as their parent crop. Soybeans are like this. You buy high-yield seed from Monsanto. If you choose to use the seed produced by your crop, it won't grow the same high-yield plants that it came from. I'm pretty sure the reason for this is that the plants won't self-pollinate. They cross-pollinate, and the hybrids that Monsanto sells don't produce good seed after the initial cross.

You can test genetics with some store-bought produce. Hybrids are all over in the produce department and their seeds often grow a plant entirely different than the parent. I've seen it happen with apples and pears, melons, and squash... I'm sure it happens with many other plants. Monsanto can control quite a few crops by providing plants that won't produce true, and the farmers can't do much about it, short of spending a lot of time and money on trying to breed new high-producers for themselves. Self-pollinating crops might be harder to control, but I'm sure they'll figure out a way to do it...

I don't trust lab-modified foods. We've been genetically engineering our food supply for higher yield, taste, color, and insect resistance ever since the first seed was planted. Artificial selection of traits is part of why human agriculture was so successful. However, we have only recently started tampering with the genetic code directly. We don't usually eat poisonous caterpillars or pesticide-resistant weeds; why should we blindly accept that the things that we have inserted into our crops are "only poisonous to pests"? I'm not going to accept "The FDA says it's edible", because I don't trust the FDA either.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

"Never rely on the wisdom of fictional characters." - Me

Re:GM

[Mashiki]

Even the Romans knew that lead was bad and dangerous. All of their ductworking was coated with a silicate-carbonate to protect people from lead poisoning. What really was the issue, was the average person using lead utensils and drinking cups. Because it was plentiful, and cheap.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. Some may find this interesting:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/lipid-hypothesis/the-vegetarian-myth/

He touches on some of those same points.

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

Asking that GM food be proven safe is inane. It is exactly equivalent to asking for a formal proof that every computer program existing now and forever be proven (hint, this is an impossible and absurd task)

Asking that all GM food existing now and in the future be proven safe is inane, but asking that a single strain of, say, CM corn is safe is doable, just as a single existing computer program can be proven (and is, if you're talking about flight control software for fighter jets). You are hacking away at straw men with your rediculous analogy. Do you work for Monsanto by chance? Or ore you just trolling?

As for the "poison" (btw, please don't shout -- don't people know their netiquette anymore ?) remember that water is poisonous.

Now THAT (and I'll shout if I want, fuck you very much) is inane. Yes, you can die from drinking too much water, but that's not the definition of poison. "a substance that through its chemical action usually kills, injures, or impairs an organism".

What is poisonous to insects might not be to humans and vice-versa.

True but completely beside the point. What's poisonous to one mammal is usually (no, not always) poisonous to other mammals.

The GM way is less random

Unlike mutation and selection, genetic engineering is NOT in any way random, although the results may be unexpected.

is wrong: a large part of our own DNA comes from bits from viruses, themselves having jumped between species and bringing genetic material with them

The only way your DNA can come from a virus is if one of your parents' (or previous anscestors) gonads were infected with that virus when their offspring was conceived. It is highly unlikely that anything like GM food could happen in nature. Horisontal transfer almost never happens in any organism higher than a bacteria.

The thing is, WE DON'T KNOW. It was only recently that it was discovered that hydrogenated oils caused heart disease, for example. Had they done studies on other animals they would have known.

Re:GM

[Thud457]

"I just hate it when electronic figments of my imagination get all snarky-like"
-- some random jerk on teh intarwebs

Re:GM

[Rich0]

Yup. This is why the free software movement has RMS as its spokesman - anybody more normal wouldn't want to love such an uncompromised life. I actually admire RMS for his stands, but he isn't really representative of most free software developers, even if most admire him.

Who has time to just protest oil drilling operations, or whatever, full time, usually only living on donations/etc? The only people willing to do this are those who are absolutely the most devoted to the cause, and they end up becoming the de facto spokespeople for the movement.

Sure, media/politics has a lot to do with it as well. However, often it just boils down to devotion. Somebody who is willing to live like a caveman is obviously a much more devoted environmentalist than somebody who merely wants reasonably safe drinking water, so they're going to tend to rise to the top.

Re:GM

[sjames]

That's kind of like saying that consumers are underinformed because there are no autism warning labels on vaccines. Anti-vaccine people aren't demonstrating that they're more informed than the rest of us - they're just demonstrating that they don't know WTF they're talking about.

No, it would be like saying consumers aren't informed because they're not told that the injection is a vaccination. There IS a difference.

People have a right to select against any product characteristic they don't like for any reason. The fact that a significant number of people consider GM to be one of those characteristics is sufficient to require labeling.

Re:GM

[rhakka]

bull. cross pollination uses normal plant growth processes. Direct gene manipulation does not.

One has been occurring since the beginning of time. One has been occurring for about twenty years at best. that's not a real number, but the point remains.

Find me an instance of a previously safe variety of food suddenly resulting in a variety that causes long term, but not immediately noticeable, damage in an organism, simply by using standard techniques like cross pollination or selective breeding (not chemical techniques).

  Oddly enough, that's not very likely.

If your argument is that we also use other, dangerous, poorly understood methods to manipulate genes other than basically organic methods, I'm with you there. I wouldn't differentiate between them and GMO. but this has not being going on for "thousands of years" as you've said. just the last hundred or so, at most.

natural mutation and variation doesn't seem to have ever developed the kinds of issues we see with, say, chemical enhancements to pesticides or in fertilizer.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

The Lenape potato is the classic example.

All potatoes have deadly toxins in them, but most have small enough amounts they are harmless. In trying to bring some of the disease resistant properties of a wild potato to the commercial varieties, the Lenape potato was produced by crossing with a Delta Gold. The resulting potato was found years later to produce much higher then average toxicity, and was recalled. Since the potato was produced and made available without licensing cost, 13 other varieties had already been produced from the Lenape.

Because of the known problems with solanine, potatos are one of the few produce items which are routinely screened, and there has probably been little impact.

The point is not that GM foods are safe and traditional varieties are bad, but that all new varieties are potentially dangerous. It can be argued that GM techniques produce more carefully controlled and understood changes, and GM food is safety and nurtitionally tested, while many traditional produce varieties are not.

Should we be careful with GM food? Should there be regulations and controls? Absolutely. But that is true of all of our foodstuffs. The idea of non-"GM" food as natural and traditional is just wrong. "Heirloom" non-engineered produce is hard to come by unless you grow it yourself. And even that is the product of thousands of years of mutations and cross pollination.

The sane thing to do is realize all produce varieties are "frankenfood", and test them all. And that is exactly what we're not doing at the moment.

Re:GM

[shutdown -p now]

Note that the case also isn't quite as clear-cut insofar as "poor farmer accidentally reusing seeds goes". The cross-polination was definitely incidental, but it only affected a small part of the guy's field - and when he discovered it, he performed some testing specifically to determine if it was Monsanto's modified crop, and after the tests were positive, he took the seeds specifically from that part of the field and preserved them all for replanting, so within a year he has 95% of his field with the modified crop, quite deliberately.

Now, for one thing, Monsanto was still bullshitting in the court when they claimed that the farmer has originally intentionally planted their crop (it was definitely established that he did not). For another, the very claim underlying their lawsuit - that they can prevent someone from merely replanting the seeds just because they hold some patents on the genes in those seeds, even if the guy didn't do anything illegal to obtain the seeds in the first place - is absurd on its face (as are patents on genes in general).

But saying that Schmeiser was sued for mere accidental contamination of his fields is not correct, and using such misinformation for propaganda purposes does a disservice to the cause. So please don't do it. Provide the facts - all of them - and let the people judge them on their merits.

Re:GM

[jbengt]

It reminds me of how the Romans brought in lead piping for their water. They thought it was great - water pumped to your home, the ultimate sign that you'd made it. An entire ruling class slowly poisoning themselves.

Before you condemn the ancient Romans to a slow poisoning, look around. There's plenty of lead pipe installed and in use for supplying drinking water around the world (Chicago is a good example). And where there's not lead pipe, there's plenty of copper water pipe with lead solder; brass and bronze faucets, fittings, and valves leaching lead; etc, It's only been the last 25 years or so that lead has been systematically eradicated lead from new installations. In most cases, nobody's requiring the removal of the old installations.

Re:GM

[jbengt]

Huh?!?
Patents are currently limited (in the USA) to 20 years.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Wasn't "terminator" wheat developed to prevent the cross-pollination issue you talked about in the first part of your post? I don't think you can call them evil for both things - one or other, but not both.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

Thanks for the link. I'll look into this further before using that for background again.

Re:GM

[jbengt]

The issue is that those who wish to voluntarily label their food products as non-GM are not allowed to label it.
Living in a country founded on free speech, this just seems wrong to me.
Regardless of the health impacts of eating those foods, free people ought to be able to choose not to support the production of those products, especially considering possible environmental issues that could arise.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

Varieties produced by radiation and chemical mutagens can be and are sold as "organic".

I think most people's problem with GM comes from the misunderstanding of how limited a gene is.
We're not talking about putting in a whole chromosome. It's either doing the same thing as cross breeding (manually turning on the expression of certain genes) or putting a particular, very well understood, small piece of code to produce a certain compound in a particular tissue in a particular part of the plant. We have knowledge and control to that level.

What requires study is what that compound might do to humans, but its often a very benign compound found in may other foods.

Often, the whole point of GM is to reduce the need for "chemical enhancements to pesticides, or in fertilizers". GM foods are designed to be more hardy and disease resistant, as well as optimized for better yield. If you want to attack Matasano or Dow Agribusiness, go ahead, but their pesticides are a much better place to attack then GM foods.

GM produce is regulated and tested, non-GM food is not. At the moment yield is king over nutrition and flavor. What I'd like to see is better regulation of nutrition and safety for all new produce varieties, not just GM. That's a rational position I can get behind.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Living things only became patentable in 1980, it involved a bacteria of some sort that was made by General Electric which in turn was used to clean up the Exxon Valdez spill. It was a very bad decision imo. Sometime later the patent office declared you can patent anything living organism except a human.

http://www.actionbioscience.org/genomic/crg.html
http://cookingupastory.com/patent-law-how-patents-grew-over-time-to-include-living-organisms-2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_v._Chakrabarty

If you research that out this will probably give you the creeps:
http://money.cnn.com/2010/06/14/news/companies/nalco_macondo_bp_spill.fortune/index.htm

Re:GM

[jbengt]

all producers of non-GM food need to do is label their products with "no GM ingredients inside" label.

Which, thanks to the lobbying budgets of companies like Monsanto, is not currently legal for them to do.

Re:GM

[StikyPad]

Well it all comes down to risk management. On the one hand, "organic" foods may or may not have new changes (random mutations), while GE/GM foods are guaranteed to have known mutations, in addition to potential random mutations, but they're heavily scrutinized by manufacturers and regulatory agencies. From that perspective, it's clear that GM foods present a smaller risk to known threats -- production of known toxins, let's say -- with the tradeoff that they present a greater risk to unknown threats.

Personally I'd rather have known threats eliminated, because eliminating potential new threats before they're identified is a fool's errand. You *might* be able to identify one before it causes harm -- if it exists -- but at the same time there's no guarantee that your "safe" organic food hasn't mutated in the interim. It's like looking left, right, and up before crossing the street in case a plane is trying to land. It might pay off, but it probably won't, and you might end up getting mugged and shot from behind while you're busy looking for threats ahead. There's just no way to eliminate risk.

Re:GM

[tcstoehr]

Interesting how the farmers are not the ones against Monsanto. They instead point to people like us as misguided, out-of-touch ignoramuses who buy 99% of their food at grocery stores and don't need to worry about about crop failures. Also, nobody's getting sued for cross-over pollination. That's a myth started by farmers who knowingly propagated seed against their contract, got caught, and lied about it. Quite natural behavior. Farmers are practical people. If Monsanto products don't produce a benefit, they won't buy them.

Re:GM

[gyrogeerloose]

"This does not qualify him as a shill."

Actually, yes, it does.

No, it doesn't. It does qualify him as someone with an economic interest in the outcome, however, which means that it impartiality is in question.

Re:GM

[Aqualung812]

Also, nobody's getting sued for cross-over pollination. That's a myth started by farmers who knowingly propagated seed against their contract, got caught, and lied about it

Tell that to Mr. Schmeiser. Never bought their product and was sued by Monsanto because THEY contaminated HIS field. http://www.percyschmeiser.com/ Sounds like you just don't want to accept that Monsanto really is as evil as they appear.

Re:GM

[ukyoCE]

"we’ll blast seeds with radiation and chemicals to get lots of mutations,"

Is that really done? I was under the impression that mutations almost universally result in death of organisms. (meiosis and sexual procreation being the primary cause of variety for evolution)

Re:GM

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

That is jumping off a cliff into cartoonish insane evil mega-corporation territory.

More and more, it's becoming obvious that even the most outlandish dystopian works are still trumped by the maxim that "truth is stranger than fiction". The abuses of corporations imagined by sci-fi authors are nothing compared to the ruthless ingenuity of real world corporations and their employees.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

It is vitamin A in golden rice, not D. Terminator crops were never released. Seeds from GMO crops are perfectly viable.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not true. The technology to prevent varieties from reproducing (i.e. terminator gene) has never been deployed in a commercial variety. However, I agree that it would be a bad idea.

Re:GM

[Dare nMc]

I think your points are valid, but oversimplified as well (to point they are purely one sided.) For example, while the pesticide/herbicide resistance is true, their are advantages that actually reduce runoff. I was hired as a teenager 20 years ago to go spray, we had much stronger chemicals, we would soak the weeds to try and kill the roots also to keep them from coming back (try and avoid the plants.) We would till and spray everything down in the fall trying to make a sterile field so next year we wouldn't have to deal with so many weeds, we sprayed DDT everywhere because it really worked. It was labor intensive so we would do maximum spray... With the resistant crop, they can now spray a much lower dose 2-3* a year, since they don't need to kill the roots/nests/etc, they just need to keep the leaves below the crop height... Since they can now no till, and leave the grass, etc growing and just stunt it's growth with low doses of herbicide, and without bare ground, the runoff of herbicide/fertilized dirt is now 0.
So sure, the discipline of the farmers needs enforced, but if done right, these are powerful tools for good. Granted many farmers will now over spray because they can (or always have.) That doesn't make the tech bad, it makes the application of the tech bad. We do need monitoring and enforcement of ground water, run-off, pesticide over-spray, we always have needed that. But your logic that they can do it, therefore that's what they are doing, is a flawed argument.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

What you are describing is not the 'terminator' technology (which was never deployed). The issues with saving seed have to do with using hybrid seed which as been around since the 1940s and has nothing to do with the crops being GM. Yes there are issues with commercially breed varieties displacing local ones, but this has been going on for a long time.

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

yes. Conversely, this also means nothing is poison. Poison is an emotional description that fits imperfectly with physical reality.

Re:GM

[loxosceles]

However, I don't think the danger of GMO crops is primarily due to random occasional mutations created in the GM process, like some people here seem to be suggesting. If all they do is change the cellular structure somehow to make the plant resistant to Roundup, and they do some testing of the modified genes to determine that it is very unlikely to be toxic (note particularly that their intent has nothing to do with making the plant toxic), then I don't have a problem with it, although the new proteins might result in new allergies (see next paragraph). Genetic mutations happen all the time in nature, and such changes are incredibly unlikely to present a novel health risk to humans. Like gene splicing experiments in humans (I'm thinking of a "bubble boy" gene therapy experiment that attempted to restore his immune system, only to cause cancer later), splicing genes will sometimes screw up genes that were split because of an imprecise splicing. However, such changes are vastly more likely to cause the organism itself to be unfit, rather than to generate some new toxin that will be harmful to the food chain.

I fully support periodic testing of GMO foods, analyzing all their expressed proteins and looking for anything suspicious; I'm just not too worried about that compared to the other well-known, well-documented effects of GM foods. The anti-GMO community needs to improve its efforts to communicate the precise problems that are likely to occur because of GMO foods. These have all been mentioned above, but I'll outline my concerns:

- There should be explicit differentiation, both by scientists and by the manufacturing companies, between GMOs that are designed to express toxins or other proteins with external effects, vs GMOs that are modified to do other things (like be *resistant* to toxins) where external effects are not intended or desired.

- BT corn is a problem. Willfully introducing a toxin into the food supply, originally from caterpillars (which hardly anyone eats), even if they don't think it affects humans (much), merits a LOT of study, long-term, on health effects in humans. Such studies have not been done. Like cell phones and wifi, they have not been around long enough to accurately predict long-term effects. The standard method of using high doses in rats/animals in place of long-term experiments is not adequate. It simply does not follow that high-dose experiments would have the same results as low-does, long-term experiments, particularly when we know cancer sometimes develop over an extremely long period of time (a decade or more). Hyper-dosing rats with a toxin and noting that they haven't developed cancer in 2 years does not imply that humans eating much lower doses won't develop cancer over 20 years.

- Economic effects: Monsanto's trojan horse tactic mentioned previously. Monsanto wants to make itself sole supplier of seeds for popular crops. Their lawsuits against farmers whose crops have been contaminated, rendering them unable to keep farming without paying a Monsanto tax, are absurd. This is more an indictment of the patent system than on Monsanto, which is behaving predictably to maximize profits.

- Increased use of pesticides: if more crops are pesticide-resistant, even if those modified crops are not inherently bad for us, increased use of pesticides very well might cause large-scale effects on the ecosystem. It might also mean that those "safe" GMO foods will on average be coated with more pesticide by the time they reach markets and grocery stores.

Re:GM

[SomeKDEUser]

See, I don't work for monsanto. I hate and despise them. I also hate and despise people who, under the guise of fighting for Good are in fact destroying the possibility of intelligent debate. I might actually hate them more, because they ought to be on my side, but they are clearly helping the opponent.

You may shout, yes, but then don't expect anyone to respect what you say for its intrinsic value.

Horizontal transfer may never happen, but we still have a significant part of our DNA from it...

Also hydrogenated oil does not cause heart disease. it is a factor increasing the probability thereof. And this kind of stupid confusion is exactly why right-wing extremist end up having a field day on such things as AGW and GMOs[1]. They don't need straw men, you kindly provide for them.

[1] In both cases, they try to eliminate protective legislation which forces corporations into behaving. In both cases, they fill the air with counterpoints to minor errors which tree hugger fanatics kindly provide to them. Sometimes, I think Greenpeace/the WWF are Monsanto and BP's greatest allies...

Basically, GMO's are a brilliant idea. Much better (and safer) way to produce new cultivars than the traditional methods. However, IP "rights" and the behaviour of corporations as well as the market permission mechanism need revision/scrutiny/correction. Fight for that instead of crusading against technology: you cannot win against progress, but you may well undermine your side of the argument as you go, and make the whole world worse off because of your positions.

Re:GM

[curunir]

If people want to have a religious-type non-evidence-based belief about GM foods, then as an American, I support the freedom of their religion, and I'm willing to suffer the clutter of food labels for their peace of mind.

Another comment mentioned all this, but I think it bears repeating, because I agree wholeheartedly. I don't give a rats ass about the health impacts of GM food...I'm willing to accept that it's just as healthy as non-GM food. But I want a way to determine products that use GM crops because I think Monsanto is a despicable company that's perpetrated unconscionable acts around the world and made the lives of legitimate farmers hell and I would like to ensure that not one cent of the money I spend on food makes it into their pockets.

It's not just uninformed or religious people that would want to boycott GM food, there's those of us that would want to do it for ethical reasons too.

Re:GM

[Myopic]

In that case we need a WARNING: CONTAINS MONSANTO - MAY CAUSE MORAL DECAY.

I absolutely support that label. I'll help you heap hate on that company.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Well they did bring oil to the masses...

So did BP...

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Haha amazingly non-brilliant! Have kids and get them vaccinated - aka pumped full of toxic heavy metals and adjuvents(nevermind that we are actually *born* with this crazy thing called an immune system); then, eat plenty of pesticide laden GM garbage franken-food. Oh, microwave that food too to make sure there are zero nutrients left in it. Yay. /scary. http://www.naturalnews.com/028245_GM_food_side_effects.html

Re:GM

[erroneus]

If Monsanto put out a product that caused damage to other people's produce, then Monsanto would eventually be sued into oblivion immediately following a court ordered suspension of all business and production of their hazardous products.

Re:GM

[hellop2]

That is a poor analogy.

A better one would be "that's like saying consumers are misinformed because lobbiests eliminated ingredient information for vaccines".

Doctors and parents need to be informed about the ingredients in vaccines in the case of people with allergies and auto-immune disorders. I would like to be informed of GM foods so that I can boycott them for ethical reasons. I personally don't believe in supporting the use of Roundup. I would like to vote with my dollars, but can't.

Re:GM

[CAIMLAS]

It took us decades to fully realize the danger of radioactive materials, it might take decades to fully understand the implications of GM. Until we have a reasonable comprehension of the dangers and risks, we should use other methods for improving crop yields, which, also as the Prof. tells, are to be easily found in better irrigation and fertilisation for third world countries.

And, this is being done. However, the people who do it are getting branded as "whole food crazies", "crunchy granolas" and a handful of derogatory terminology. They're also being legislated against and (often) pushed against by organizations within the government like the FDA for "health violations" - which, in my experience, most often means "not towing the line" and has no basis in fact.

The problem with Monsanto is that, while all these GM crops are being planted, the regional, local, etc. variants of crops which are specifically adapted to growing in those regions disappear. A lot of effort is going into preserving heirloom plants such as these, but still many generations of work are being lost (through the loss of hierloom variants).

I don't know what the professor is saying, because I didn't RTFA, but I can tell you this: it's imperative that Monsanto be stopped by one means or another. They essentially control the entire food production of the world, and were soemthing to happen to them, there would be massive die-off: not just of people who depend on the food, but also the many, many animals which live "wild" amongst the crop fields, as well as the other plants and animals which will die from the flooding resulting from barren fields.

The issue with Monsanto (and other similar companies) is much more than just "I like my food non-GM" for many people. It's a matter of wanting our very existence to not be at the whim of a multinational corporation (or anyone else, for that matter).

Re:GM

[CAIMLAS]

When a blight comes along which only kills off a specific variant of a crop, historically and typically, everything is OK (except in the locale where the blight occurred): the next season they're planting the same crop again, except it's an imported variant from another region.

With a GMO crop, if that crop gets a blight, that crop is gone. No crop for that year, anywhere. Chances are most places (including the company that makes the GMO) have to start over from scratch - ie, a non-GMO crop.

That's not such a problem as this: since GMO crops have become a monoculture and there aren't a whole lot of variants of "corn" or "wheat" or "soy" being planted, there won't be a sufficient number of seeds to actually plant crops the following year from the available non-GMO variant crops.

Horticulture, like software, wants to be free. It leads to a stronger, better ecosystem with more options. Actually, the analogy translates to "blights", too.

Re:GM

[ChromeAeonium]

You do realize that this has been going on for over a century, right? Farmers using hybrid seed, so they just buy new seed year after year. And the reason for terminator seed was to prevent the possibility of genes going into the wild. If they had darker ulterior motives, who is to say, but people who were concerned about gene spread got what they demanded, then complained about it.

I think heirloom growers should embrace GMOs. Heirloom crops are superior than most things on the market, and genetic engineering can help them expand to wider cultivation. For example, this year I've got two beefsteak tomatoes, Ananas Noire and Kellogg's Breakfast. Why aren't they grown commercially? Probably because of shipping issues; a tomato, no matter how tasty or nutritious, won't sell if it's mush by the time consumers get it. But with new ripening delaying traits, the post harvest lifespan of tomatoes can be dramatically expanded. With this trait, you might see things like Cherokee Purple and White Tomesol and Huge Lemon Oxheart and Green Moldovan on supermarket shelves. I hope someday we see things like Organgelo watermelon and Golden Treasure pepper (got those this year too) and Charentais melon and Dragon's Tongue bean (doing them next year) widely grown, and I hope they will be genetically modified to take advantage of both what they started out with and what science can give them (except, perhaps, the brassicas, as they can cross with way too much). Sure, Monsanto might be doing it wrong, complain about them, fine, whatever, but I think GMO and heirloom would go great together; I don't understand why so many heirloom type people are against genetic engineering (I can't tell if you are, but many are).

Re:GM

[KillerLoop]

Maybe it did make at dent but was interpreted as effects of piracy?

Re:GM

[MaskedSlacker]

Most people in the industrialized world consume Vitamin D enriched dairy, and have since the 1930s.

Re:GM

[MaskedSlacker]

Because it's simply wrong. The human body can produce as much as 40 times the RDI for vitamin D in just 20 minutes (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickets#Supplementation).

The only people who are short on Vitamin D are people with darker skin in more northern climates, or people who get incredibly low amounts of sunlight. Even I get more than 20 minutes a day.

Moreover, most of the industrialized world consumes Vitamin D fortified dairy products as well.

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

A 10-year old would have to eat two pounds of Golden Rice a day to fulfill her vitamin A needs, totally impractical.

Sure, but if she's going blind because she's 10% short on Vitamin A having a dose come from the staple crop of her region might make a big difference to her.

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

If there is only one reason to oppose GM crops, it's the terminator crops feature.

So you you oppose GM crops because of a GM technology that isn't actually in any crops?

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything comes with trade offs. Trying to label things GM is likely to be a paperwork nightmare. Most packaged foods source ingredients from different places and should not have to relabel everything when switching from Jim's far in Idaho to Susie's in Nebraska. Then we have the issue of cross pollination - is it enough or do they need to be certified non-GM? Congratulations, you have just increased the cost of all food, I'm sure every consumer will thank you for that. Realistically, the organic food movement is the better model - appeal to those who care about the issue and let them pay the price premium for this certification process. I still think organic is a misleading adjective as all food is organic in the classical sense, but that is water under the bridge.

Re:GM

[countertrolling]

...we should use other methods for improving crop yields, which, also as the Prof. tells, are to be easily found in better irrigation and fertilisation for third world countries.

Better idea: Peace!

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

Tell that to Mr. Schmeiser. Never bought their product and was sued by Monsanto because THEY contaminated HIS field.

Almost every open pollinated field gets "contaminated", that's what "open pollination" means. And that isn't what got him in trouble - he deliberately separated out the plants with that particular trait and saved them, used them to grow crops while taking advantage of that trait, and sold them. If he hadn't gone out of his way to use the patented trait without paying for it there wouldn't have been an issue.

Sounds like you just don't want to accept that Monsanto really is as evil as they appear.

Sounds like you just want them to be evil, so you'll just take the other side's word for it, and to hell with their side of the story as well as the opinion of the courts that decided the case.

Re:GM

[Drewcool]

Next, they'll license the sun at a low monthly fee for an "unlimited" plan.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks. I watched some of a documentary about this stuff and my sense was that the farmer wasn't entirely innocent/ignorant of what he was doing,... though the documentary wanted to make it look that way.

I believe the final judgement (of possibly a countersuit) says that any "Round-up ready" corn that grows on his property because of contamination from neighboring fields or passing grain carrying trucks (since he's not using it for seed), will be purchased (or payed for) by Monsanto. I'm not a fan of Monsanto, but that seems like a reasonable solution to the situation.

Even without Monsanto and GM, monoculture is not likely a wise way for us to go. You may be familiar with the book Final Harvest.

gerry
[definitely a coward, but only half-anonymous]

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

The problem isn't genetic modification--we've been doing that since Mendel, the only difference is the techniques.

No we haven't been doing this, inserting foreign genes into species that doesn't naturally carry it. However it does occasionally happen in nature, Horizontal gene transfer.

I'm surprised that there's so much FUD in this thread aimed at GM, though. I thought /. was supposed to be mostly pro-science nerds that don't confuse evil corporations with anti-science hippie propaganda. :-)

There's a big difference between FUD and running a world wide experiment most people know nothing about. Not even the scientists in the field know everything.

Falcon

Re:GM

[PinkyGigglebrain]

Actually it was DuPont that had the "better living through chemistry" tag line.

Not that either has shown much concern for the environment unless it was forced on them by regulation.

Re:GM

[tibit]

I was not referring to golden rice at all -- I merely pointed out that many people are vit. D deficient in first-world countries. As for skin exposure to sunlight -- that's fine and dandy under two conditions:

1. You should be young, not old -- folks over 50 should not depend solely on their own vit D production.

2. You should not be deficient to begin with. Skin's production is naturally limited at the source, in spite of systemic deficiencies if any to prevent possible toxicity. So if you are deficient the sunlight won't do you much good.

Gibson (a 50+ guy IIRC) had himself tested for vit. D levels while sunbathing a whole lot, and the UV exposure did nothing to recover his vit. D deficiency.

Rickets is the worst you can get from vit. D deficiency, the problem is that even smaller deficiency is bound to have widespread effects -- just look in how many places vit. D is involved! Our bodies have a way of compensating it seems, but if the problem is so widespread you're bound to run out of range of compensation somewhere, or even in a few somewheres...

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

Actually those Evil Bastards do produce sterile crop seeds.
Just like everyone else that produces hybrid crops.

For those crops where they don't they might as well be, they sue you into oblivion if you save your seed for later.
Yes, because you sign a contract promising not to do that before you buy the seeds. They also sue you if you don't pay them - oh no!

Did you know those Evil Bastards own 95% of the soybean crop? That there is only 5% of the corp left that is not GMO?
Yes - they make really, really good stuff. So evil.

Just in case someone from that group of Evil Bastards is reading this: I plan on planting non GMO soy, just to keep the strain alive. I will send my heirloom seeds to anyone who wants them, free of charge. Sadly I only have a 10 sq foot area to plant, but I'm going to do it anyway, just to make a point.
Plenty of people do that. But I think you're better off leaving that kind of thing to the people that have a better grasp of what "hybrid" and "signing a contract" mean - like actual farmers.

Also you Evil Bastards: Fuck you
And then they laugh, because when people with no real understanding of a topic throw temper tantrums about how people that disagree with them are evil, that's just what people do. When you understand the difference between "hybrid seed" and "terminator seed", know why Bt corn isn't used anymore, and can explain low-lin soy to me, then I'll take your opinion seriously.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

Herbicide resistance can lead to less herbicide use because you can then apply one herbicide that kills everything but the one thing that is resistant rather than having to apply multiple chemicals depending on what weed you need to eradicate.

Quite the contrary, plants are made herbicide resistant so the plant can be drenched by the herbicide. And as herbicide resistance spreads to the wild even more herbicides or more power herbicides are needed. As it is herbicide resistant weeds were discovered in the early 1970s.

The same could be said for pesticide resistance, perhaps you can apply stronger chemicals but less often which may be safer than having to apply weaker stuff more often.

How about instead of using fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides that are natural gas or petroleum based use organic methods. Instead of planting the same crop year after year rotate crops. Instead of monocultures inter-plant different species, companion planting?

Falcon

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

One farmer was accused of having Monsanto plants without permission (genetically-engineered pollen infected his naturally-growing corn, and then became GM corn).
Which wouldn't have been a problem if he hadn't deliberately bred his corn to have the GM trait as much as possible, used the GM trait to save himself time and energy, and then sold the crop. This wasn't just accidental corssbreeding.

Another farmer operates a machine that separates seed from the chaff, and he was accused of trying to steal Monsanto's seed (which has no basis on fact).
No, he told people that they could replant seed when they couldn't, and then cleaned the seed for them in preparation for planting. That is: he lied to people so that they would violate their contracts, and then made money off of helping them do so. Even after he was warned to stop.

And yet another farmer was sued just because they wanted to *suspected* her had Monsanto plants, based upon reports from his neighbors. He had not done anything wrong and the case was eventually dismissed, but it still wiped-out his personal savings.
Yes, our legal system needs reform, but this happens anytime someone gets sued and does everything they can not to cooperate with the legal process, not just when Monsanto sues.

It's similar to how RIAA companies tried to sue people with VCRs or recordable Minidiscs.
If you're talking about the people who use VCRs to make copies and then sell them, yes.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

I just want to avoid Monsanto's products GM food might be 100% harmless but Monsanto isn't.

Good one. Quote of the day :)

Re:GM

[nxtw]

The most dangerous foods available are those improperly stored/transported/cooked after being grown or manufactured.
Stop making shit up.

Re:GM

[Jane Q. Public]

GRC's website was not designed to be the epitome of nutritional accuracy. It was designed to SELL DIETARY SUPPLEMENTS.

I don't have a citation at hand, but I read the other day in a paper on nutrition that 20 minutes of moderate sunlight -- fully clothed -- is enough time for the average Caucasian to generate a week's worth of Vitamin D precursors.

Re:GM

[lawpoop]

This is pretty cool, but it's not actually lateral gene transfer. What's happening is that the sea slug is hosting a symbiotic colony of chloroplasts, which are cell organelles, not DNA, from algae that it consumes. And these chloroplasts are not passed down to offspring; new sea slugs must ingest their own algae to build their own colony of chloroplasts. So the sea slug DNA is not altered, nor is the germ line DNA (sperm and eggs) altered, so no traits are passed on. This is not GM.

What you describe is a symbiosis, like termites hosting a colony of cellulose-digesting bacteria in their gut, in order to eat wood. But instead of hosting microbes, the sea slugs host organelles ( and chloroplasts have their own DNA anyway, just like mitochondria. They're basically little bacteria themselves. There's a theory that nucleated cells arose as a symbioses of two cells, where a chloroplast or mitochondrial-like bacteria came to live permanently in other, nucleated cells millions of years ago ).

It was recently discovered that microbes in Japanese people's guts pick up genes from bacteria from seafood that help them digest sushi. But again, this isn't the human DNA ( nor germline ) that's picking up DNA, this is bacteria-to-bacteria lateral gene transfer.

So, until there is new data, I stand by my claim ;)

Re:GM

[Jane Q. Public]

My mistake! I thought you meant GNC! Haha. What's Steve Gibson doing promoting Vitamin D?

Re:GM

[Jane Q. Public]

In the movie Food, Inc., they interview a farmer who had part of his cornfields pollinated by nearby farms growing Monsanto corn. Some Monsanto goons came on his property (without permission), tested some of his corn near the road, and Monsanto sued him for patent infringement.

The corn that hadn't been contaminated was definitely not Monsanto.

Re:GM

[Jane Q. Public]

If you think so, you might want to have a look at this earlier post. You might learn something new.

Re:GM

[Jane Q. Public]

(That comment was aimed at the parent way back there. ^^^^ )

Re:GM

[ChrisMaple]

If their GM crops didn't produce sterile seeds you'd be complaining that they're contaminating the world with their GM offspring. Your hatred is pathological.

Re:GM

[Dexter Herbivore]

I have a close family member who is a die hard environmentalist. She moved to Central America to get away from the US. I showed her all the information about nuclear power being safe, all the advancements, and it always comes down to "Well I still believe it's unsafe."

I quite firmly believe that nuclear power is safe, nuclear waste on the other hand...

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

GE/GM foods are guaranteed to have known mutations, in addition to potential random mutations, but they're heavily scrutinized by manufacturers and regulatory agencies.

Where are all these regulations of genetic engineering? Let's try Plant Genetic Engineering and Regulation in the United States [pdf]. It says "the United States chose to adapt existing legislation to accommodate new products derived from rDNA technology. An early study conducted by the National Research Council (NRC) for the National Academies of Science concluded that transgenic methods of plant breeding pose no new categories of risk (NRC 1989)." Subsequent studies reiterated that. So little new regulations.

Re:GM

[ChrisMaple]

The idea that plants in a given region are best for the people living there is romantic bullshit. There are well-documented cases of whole populations damaged generation after generation by the limitations of their tribal diets.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

Genes code for proteins. Genes don't care what organism they came from.

Genes do more than that. And they do care, well not genes themselves but people, if there are adverse reactions. There is also the concern of binary reactions between genes. Much like two chemicals can combine to form binary chemical weapons or binary explosives. Now take the chemical soup modern science has created with thousands of man made chemicals and the possibility for millions of genes.

I'd rather take the careful road, and in this case, that's GM.

HAHA!!! GE is not safe.

Falcon

Re:GM

[ChrisMaple]

famine is mostly an economical problem these days

Liar. Modern famine is a polical problem, deliberately caused by tyrannies.

Re:GM

[ps2os2]

But GM's food is rich in iron:D

Re:GM

[ps2os2]

No, it's not sterile. Farmers aren't idiots and they refused to buy sterile crops.

Well, technically, Monsanto does not allow farmers to buy GM seed at all. Seed is essentially leased and final product must be sold after harvest. Attempts to use the seed outside of the terms of the contract signed with Monsanto will lead to finding yourself in court.

Or in some cases murdered or forced out of their farms and other heavy handed nasty things that xxxxxxxxx has done. There are some interesting documentary on what they have done. To be honest it sounds like Al Capone.

Re:GM

[darthvader100]

You can't have an article about Monsanto, without links to the Monsanto Song Listen free online, and can be bought from the artists

Re:GM

[uninformedLuddite]

Here's the rub: We've been genetically engineering food since the dawn of society.

I can remember reading some of Plato's musings on crossing moths with potatoes and jellyfish with corn

Re:GM

[uninformedLuddite]

And I suspect a lot more starving people will be saved by the better yields that GM crops provide than will ever be harmed by any side-effects.

For your perusal. there are many studies that debunk the GMO higher yield claims. the above is just one that makes some mention of it in passing.

Re:GM

[severoon]

No we haven't been doing this, inserting foreign genes into species that doesn't naturally carry it.

Please read at least the very basics about that which you speak before ye spake it. To wit: "Plant breeding is the art and science of changing the genetics of plants for the benefit of humankind... Plant breeding has been practiced for thousands of years, since near the beginning of human civilization.... Classical plant breeding uses deliberate interbreeding (crossing) of closely or distantly related individuals to produce new crop varieties or lines with desirable properties. Plants are crossbred to introduce traits/genes from one variety or line into a new genetic background." [source]

That took me just a few seconds to track down. For shame!

There's a big difference between FUD and running a world wide experiment most people know nothing about.

Most people do know something about it. The people doing the work know a lot about it...it seems to me that it is you who is ignorant. Fortunately, this is a correctable problem, and the correction I offer doesn't happen to require a large fraction of the world population to starve.

Educate thyself about Norman Borlaug: "Throughout his years of research, Borlaug's programs often faced opposition by people who consider genetic crossbreeding to be unnatural or to have negative effects. Borlaug's work has been criticized for bringing large-scale monoculture, input-intensive farming techniques to countries that had previously relied on subsistence farming. These farming techniques reap large profits for U.S. agribusiness and agrochemical corporations such as Monsanto Company and have been criticized for widening social inequality in the countries owing to uneven food distribution while forcing a capitalist agenda of U.S. corporations onto countries that had undergone land reform."

Borlaug's work has perhaps saved more lives and alleviated more human suffering than any single other person's in the history of humankind. And note that even in this strongest criticism I was able to find on his work from an unbiased source, the criticism is not actually aimed at his work so much as what everyone else did with it: large-scale monoculture. (It seems to me I heard someone else say that a little higher up this thread...hmm.) Let us also keep in mind that it's not fair to apply hindsight bias...at the time his work was done, monoculture seemed like a sensible thing to do. It's only since then that this idea has moved from good idea to bad idea to just plain unethical.

Not even the scientists in the field know everything.

No scientist in any field knows everything. Newton didn't understand general relativity, but that doesn't mean that the world wasn't able to do great things by his understanding of gravity.

Admit it: GM food is not a scientific issue for you; it's a political one. This means you don't care about facts, you only care about persuading people to your point of view, even in spite of the truth. Crafting a highly emotional argument without being shackled by reality ought to give you a big leg up in this debate, which is why I can't figure out one thing: how are you making such a hash of it here?

Re:GM

[Bakkster]

And companies will never take risks like this, because their executives can be held responsible for any harm their company causes..... oh wait, that's not right.

If the executives can get rich while risking their company go bankrupt, they will do it and keep the boatload of cash they made while doing it.

Re:GM

[coldsalmon]

"In 2007 scientists, including Pierce and his team, found genes related to photosynthesis in the slugs, and these genes, apparently originally from the algae, were even found in unhatched slugs that had never eaten algae. In the latest research Pierce found more algal genes, and some of them were for enzymes required for the chemical process manufacturing chlorophyll."

Re:GM

[lawpoop]

Well, I eat my hat.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

How about instead of using fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides that are natural gas or petroleum based use organic methods. Instead of planting the same crop year after year rotate crops. Instead of monocultures inter-plant different species, companion planting?

Because then a significant portion of the population would starve. The fact of the matter is, organic methods are great for your backyard garden, where you are supplementing the diet of a few people using a large amount of land per person. Organic methods for all of agriculture is a different story: you'd have to replace the diet of everyone, and this would necessitate an enormous expansion in the amount of land used per person, the amount of money spent on farming, and the number of people who would need to work in agriculture. Organic gardening is simply not anywhere near as productive, and we absolutely need that productivity.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

So your logic is that if you object to being pushed into one unpleasant outcome, it's okay to object, but if you're pushed into a choice of two unpleasant outcomes, one of them has to be okay? You think for some reason it is invalid to say "let's not have to choose between either bad outcome"?

I can see how the US gets away with the two party system. ;)

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

Your system of risk management is incomplete. Random mutations will occur in tiny pockets and are unlikely to propagate through a population if there's any detectable downsides (detectable being the essence of your logic). Therefore your "known risks" category applies to very few people. The "unknown risks" applies to vast swathes of the world's population as Monsanto replaces crops worldwide with their modified ones. So you also have to factor in whether someone is likely to one of the first to be subject to one of the "known risk" categories rather than the the overwhelming likelihood that the same person is going to be subject to the "unknown risk" category. Which is best? 0.001% of people being subject to a 60% risk, or 98% of people being subject to a 30% risk? Statistically, you're more likely to come to harm in the latter scenario by a very large margin.

That aside, I think your premise is flawed, anyway.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

My point is this: GM is not totally safe. Neither is random mutation, which is often spured on by radiation and chemical means.

So you would rather small and gradual changes which emerge in local populations and therefore can be adopted or removed on a local basis are more risky than making radical changes and trying them out on vast segments of the World's population.

Let me guess, you love online poker, right?

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

That's an entirely separate issue then what the original article is about, and different from most arguments made by the green movement, even if that fear of big business is probably the genesis of their other complaints.

It's not a separate issue. The many arguments against GM crops that you've seen in the comments here are made time and time again. But each time, a strawman is set up to say "you said GM were bad for you, and our study couldn't find any harm, so we're right and you're wrong". The strawman (if indeed GM's are all unharmful which I'm very far from allowing) in the linked article is entirely relevant because it is used as a deflection against all these other concerns. I mean look at the comments here - tonnes of people making intelligent, supportable arguments against Monsanto's business practices and the risks and effects of GM crops, and the only reply is always: "this study didn't find any evidence of harm".

You say most arguments from the "green movement". What do you think you are seeing in all the many comments in this thread if it isn't the concerns of people for their environment and our future well-being? Is this the latest version of the No True Scotsman? You're not an environmentalist unless you make arguments that spinkham can find flaws in? You talk about your strawman "green movement"? Take a look at all the comments attached to this story. The real greens are what you're bloody well looking at.

Re:GM

[Golddess]

So a little way down the line and insect populations take a tumble because of this, and the birds that depend on them.

Up until this point, I thought you were going to take an entirely different path.

Super insects! The insects ingest the water containing the runoff and inherit the new poison gene, making them inedible to their natural predators. Soon, the world is overrun by insects, and I for one will welcome our new overlords.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the smell was from Cerro Copper and Brass, next door, where my uncle worked. Try again.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

No, my point is that GM is about making smaller, well understood changes vs other methods.

And monoculture is a problem whether seeds are "GMed" or not. That's an entirely separate issue. If we stopped GM today, monocultures in produce would continue to increase. Farmers all want the best seeds available, which leads to decrease in variety regardless of GM or not.

Re:GM

[tibit]

Just a satisfied user, I guess.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

No we haven't been doing this, inserting foreign genes into species that doesn't naturally carry it.

Please read at least the very basics about that which you speak before ye spake it.

Physician heel thy self. "Classical plant breeding uses deliberate interbreeding (crossing) of closely or distantly related individuals to produce new crop varieties or lines with desirable properties." ie related plants were cross bred and not fish genes inserted into tomatoes.

Most people do know something about it.

No, most people do not. Go to China and ask. Go to Africa and ask.

The people doing the work know a lot about it...it seems to me that it is you who is ignorant.

Ah, that's why they have to run experiments, because they know everything. If they do it all then why the experiments. Experiments are run because they do not know everything, not even a small fraction.

Educate thyself about Norman Borlaug

When did I say anything about him? Or is this FUD and misdirection? Bye.

Falcon

Re:GM

[Doggabone]

Well, I eat my hat.

Do that often enough, and you'll be passing hat genes to the kiddos.

Re:GM

[ThanatosMinor]

all of our foodstock has been randomly and chaotically modified over thousands of years

Make that millions of years. There's another name for random and chaotic modification of genetic code until something is found that works. It's called natural selection. Agriculture takes a bit of the nature out of this natural selection, but selective breeding keeps one important thing in place that is missing in GM crops: biodiversity.

Biodiversity protects a species against diseases and against pests. If every wheat plant in an area has the same genetic code they are all vulnerable to the exact same pathogens to the exact same degree, so instead of a bug wiping out 80-90% of a field of wheat and leaving the remaining plants resistant to that disease and stronger, you now have lost 100% of the plants and will have to start over with a new GM strain that is similarly vulnerable.

Re:GM

[spinkham]

I would draw a distinction between an cautious observer and a argument spewing movement.

There was (and sadly is) an anti-vax movement spreading FUD about vaccines. That FUD has caused real world deaths for no good reason. I know a number of mommies who are very cautious of vaccines now that I wouldn't say are anti-vaxxers. They've heard the FUD and have doubts. That is reasonable. Spreading the FUD is not.

What I have problems with are the people making the arguments for others to repeat who don't understand what genes are, what they do, how they are modified in GM, how traditional breeding works, and other important details.

The movement creates words like "frankenfood" and examples like fish tomatoes (which never made it out of the lab.) People with limited time and caring get a very one sided, bad perception. And we are rightly a risk intolerant species. If one thing has more risks then the other, we tend to avoid it. There are risks in both GM food and traditionally breed food, and people who understand GM the best are the least worried about it.

PBS has a decent site with varying points of view. It's probably the least biased piece I've seen on the issue yet.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/harvest/exist/arguments.html

I consider myself a green, but I'm not an anti-corporate luddite as the "green" movement has become. I'm not the only one who think so: Go ask Patrick Moore (Founder and former president ofGreepeace), Stewart Brand(Whole Earth Catalog, Long now Foundation), and other luminaries.

Older ways are not necessarily better. New is not always less safe then old. Food safety is an important issue, and I'd personally like to see the debate raise above the sound bytes level. That is my personal goal. GM is not bad, but some ways it can be used are bad. Some corporations are more likely to use it to self serving ends, and patent both their discoveries and the basic tools use d to make those discoveries. There are great benefits and potential problems with GM, and we need to move past the initial fear of the unknown stage. Unfortunately, most people are only hearing the FUD.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

New GE plants are tested by the FDA, the NIH, and the EPA

That's what you think, but it in not true. As the NIH's Medline says "Genetically engineered foods are generally regarded as safe. There has been no adequate testing, however, to ensure complete safety. There are no reports of illness or injury due to genetically engineered foods. Each new genetically engineered food will have to be judged individually." Bold added by me.

There have been toxic chemicals found in food sold that have been "traditionally" engineered, but none that have been "on purpose" engineered in in what has become known as GE.

Really? So soya with brazil nut genes, which can cause serious allergy reactions including death, has not been found to be allergic as well? And the military hasn't spend a lot of money developing biological agents, such as anthrax?

GM food is safer then it's counterparts. I'll take the GM food, please..

Citation needed for the safety. As for taking it, go ahead and keep it. Just don't force it on me.

I recommend the Whole Earth Discipline. Where he talks about his expertise (he's an ecologist/biologist by training) he's spot on. I don't agree with him on all the topics included in the book

If his expertise is "spot on" why don't you agree with everything he says? After-all he's an expert. Because the rest doesn't agree with what you want?

Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

The idea of non-"GM" food as natural and traditional is just wrong.

No, this is wrong. I garden and 3 years ago for the first tyme I allowed loose leaf lettuce and mustard I planted to bolt, go to seed. I have not had to plant more of either one in the two years since, they both naturally sprout from seeds that were produced the previous year. This is a bit more wild than what I normally do, intentionally save seeds.

"Heirloom" non-engineered produce is hard to come by unless you grow it yourself.

Again this is wrong. Visiting many garden centers or browsing seed catalogs you can find lots of heirloom varieties.

Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

There is no way in nature, without the intervention of human beings, that an antifreeze gene from an arctic flounder can find its way into the germline of an tomato plant

I used to think the same, until I learned otherwise. Hoizontal gene transfer, genes flowing from one species to an unrelated one, does happen. If you, generic not you specifically, look at the human gnome you will find lots of genes from bacterias and such.

Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

"Green" campaigns against GM technology that is truely patent and licensing free, created by non-profits for the good of poor nations, is causing people to die of starvation and malnutrition.

Citation needed. You did include a quote from a doctor of plant pathology but does he consider non-GM answers? In a previous post I said how the problem of people starving isn't from lack of food but because of other reasons. For instance Zimbabwe used to to the breadbasket of southern Africa but since Robert Mugabe came to power it has been a basket case. Politics reduced Zimbabwe from a food exporter to a nation that needs food donations.

It is a good sign that the people who understand GM techniques are the least scared of GM food.

I disagree. Though no expert I understand GM techniques, and because I do I am scared of them. For instance I am afraid Monsanto's Roundup Ready crops are creating superweeds. I am afraid allergins will be introduced into food that does not contain it now. And I am concerned about the unforeseen. Asbestos used to be called the miracle mineral because of its acid and heat resistance. Well now we know how deadly it is.

I am not calling for an end to genetic engineering, I applaud it's medical potential. What I am calling for is more thorough research being done before it's released into the wild, which is not being done.

Falcon

Re:GM

[spinkham]

Ah, finally, someone with some sort data to back up their rhetoric. I think yours is the 20th response to what I've posted here, and the previous 19 had no basis for their assertions. Reasonable debate at last ;-)

New GE plants are tested by the FDA, the NIH, and the EPA.

I got this from "Whole Earth Discipline" by Stewart Brand, page 127. http://books.google.com/books?ct=result&id=1tTtAAAAMAAJ&dq=stewart+brand+whole+earth&q=national+institutes

He seems to be wrong. The NIH has no direct responsibility or authority over foodstuffs. They do regulate gene therapy for humans, but that's completely different thing.

Here's the real story:
http://www.fda.gov/food/biotechnology/default.htm

The FDA considers GM foods basically safe, and looks over safety tests performed by the company selling the product to ensure they have not overlooked potential dangers. In cases that new proteins or pesticide resistance the burden of proof is much higher then swapping genes already in foodstuff.
The FDA compliance seems to be optional for plants. There was a proposed law to make it mandatory in 2001, but it never went through as far as I can tell. I guess the "war on terror" and economic downturn did it in. It is mandatory for animals however, and companies usually do submit to the FDA, if only for legal protection of following "best practices" if something does go wrong down the road.

The USDA/APHIS regulates new species, and participates in the process from the first stages of testing. Their primary concern is keeping a "superweed" from being created, and their tests and inspections reflect primarily that. Most notably for consumers, they requires data that

A detailed description of the differences in genotype between the regulated article and the nonmodified recipient organism. Include all scientific, common, or trade names, and all designations necessary to identify: the donor organism(s), the nature of the transformation system (vector or vector agent(s)), the inserted genetic material and its product(s), and the regulated article. ...Describe known and potential differences from the unmodified recipient organism that would substantiate that the regulated article is unlikely to pose a greater plant pest risk than the unmodified organism from which it was derived, including but not limited to: Plant pest risk
characteristics, disease and pest susceptibilities, expression of the gene product, new enzymes, or changes to plant metabolism, weediness of the regulated article, impact on the weediness of any other plant with which it can interbreed, agricultural or cultivation practices, effects of the regulated article on nontarget organisms, indirect plant pest effects on other agricultural products, transfer of genetic information to organisms with which it cannot interbreed, and
any other information which the Administrator believes to be relevant to a determination.

Both safety of the plant and transfer of genetic material are important.
http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2008/janqtr/7cfr340.6.htm

The EPA regulates any bioengineered plant that has pesticide like properties. They regulate genes/proteins, and not on the individual plant level.

So there you go. In practice, companies do test bioengineered produce more then traditionally engineered produce, but the human health is the least regulated part of the deal. I would be in favor of all new produce lines, no matter the technique in creating them, be required to have basic testing for nutrition and toxicity. The FDA rejects this, saying it is cost prohibitive.

If his expertise is "spot on" why don't yo

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

Interesting how the farmers are not the ones against Monsanto.

Except there are many farmers who oppose Monsanto, or visa versa.

1. Monsanto versus Farmers.
2. Monsanto's Harvest of Fear
3. Haitian Farmers Fight Back Against Monsanto
4. Nelson Farm - A Fight Against A Giant -- Monsanto Sues North Dakota Farmer Over Biotech Crop Dispute
5. Goliath and David: Monsanto's Legal Battles against Farmers
6. Monsanto vs. US Farmers [pdf]
7. Oregon farmers caught up in Monsanto suit over engineered alfalfa
8. Agricultural Giant Battles Small Farmers
9. Could Monsanto Be Responsible for One Indian Farmer's Death Every Thirty Minutes?
10. Monsanto watch: Targeting American farmers with lawyers, fear and money
11. 1. Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

New GE plants are tested by the FDA, the NIH, and the EPA.

I got this from "Whole Earth Discipline" by Stewart Brand, page 127. http://books.google.com/books?ct=result&id=1tTtAAAAMAAJ&dq=stewart+brand+whole+earth&q=national+institutes

He seems to be wrong. The NIH has no direct responsibility or authority over foodstuffs. They do regulate gene therapy for humans, but that's completely different thing.

Gene therapy is one area I fully support genetic engineering research, and application.

Here's the real story:
http://www.fda.gov/food/biotechnology/default.htm

The FDA considers GM foods basically safe, and looks over safety tests performed by the company selling the product to ensure they have not overlooked potential dangers. In cases that new proteins or pesticide resistance the burden of proof is much higher then swapping genes already in foodstuff.

Is that the same FDA that approved drugs that were later found to be bad?

I disagree with him on the things that fall outside his expertise of biology and ecology.

I don't see what his qualifications or expertize is on the Google or on the Amazon page. His wiki entry has some info but it doesn't say what those qualifications are either. It says he studied design at an art institute but doesn't say what degree he got if any.

Having said that I like that he worked with The Whole Earth Catalog and started the WELL (which I wanted to join). I wonder what he thinks of (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay, I love that song.

For instance, I'm not as convinced nuclear power is our only hope.

I'm a long way from being convinced nuclear power is any hope for energy, instead I believe the oppose and believe that the money used in it's research can better be used in other research. As it is the nuclear power industry is Hooked on Subsidies. The SciAm article A Solar Grand Plan says "A massive switch from coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear power plants to solar power plants could supply 69 percent of the U.S.'s electricity and 35 percent of its total energy by 2050." And the NREL's Wind Energy Resource Atlas of the United States details the wind potential of different regions of the US. One analysis I read of it concluded the Rockies have enough potential to supply the 48 contiguous states with electricity.

The video you link to brought up one problem with alternative energy, the lack of a reliable baseload. However geothermal energy can supply some. And until storage technology is developed that is large scale, natural gas fired and nuclear power plants can be kept online. However which ever way it goes I want to see an end to subsidies whether it's the billion dollars alternative energy gets or the billions more coal, natural gas, nuclear power, and petroleum get. And that includes external costs such as pollution.

Falcon

Oh, on the FDA, I want it abolished. The NIH, which I'd like privatized, can take over some of what the FDA does. As for drug approvals, I believe people should be able to take whatever drug they want without a prescription.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

On the other hand, one of the big dangers of run-off from agriculture is eutrophication of nearby lakes, rivers, tributaries, etc, caused by all the fertilizer sprayed on crops.

Except as GM crops expand, the Deadzone in the Gulf of Mexico is also growing.

Falcon

Re:GM

[spinkham]

I said how the problem of people starving isn't from lack of food but because of other reasons.For instance Zimbabwe used to to the breadbasket of southern Africa but since Robert Mugabe came to power it has been a basket case. Politics reduced Zimbabwe from a food exporter to a nation that needs food donations.

GM crops with increased yield help no matter what the cause is. Famine though plant blight is common, and GE is the best way to get rid of it.
http://www.africanagricultureblog.com/2010/01/gates-foundation-to-fund-cassava.html

But more importantly, there are many areas of the world where the problem isn't caloric, but nutritional. Golden rice is the poster child for this. Lack of vitamin A leads to blindness and death, so adding it to the rice in places where that is the staple diet can save many.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_rice

Golden Cassava was developed (patent free, with grants from the Bill and Malinda Gates Foundation)to solve similar problems in Africa. Before the Cassava blight it was starting to be used by World Vision in its aid work.

It is a good sign that the people who understand GM techniques are the least scared of GM food.

I disagree. Though no expert I understand GM techniques, and because I do I am scared of them. For instance I am afraid Monsanto's Roundup Ready crops are creating superweeds.

Pesticide use made that problem(if it turns out to be one), not GE. Without GE other pesticides would be used, and pesticide resistant plants would evolve.

I am afraid allergins will be introduced into food that does not contain it now.

So we made a gene transfer, did tests, and it did what we thought it would? What's the rest of the story? Is the resulting food being marketed?

And I am concerned about the unforeseen. Asbestos used to be called the miracle mineral because of its acid and heat resistance. Well now we know how deadly it is.

I am not calling for an end to genetic engineering, I applaud it's medical potential. What I am calling for is more thorough research being done before it's released into the wild, which is not being done.

Falcon

What research is being done now, how is it insufficient, and how would you change the level of research required?

Re:GM

[lawpoop]

OK, but all of those examples are animals that live in intimate contact with each other. How do arctic flounder genes get into a tomato plant? That's a rather circuitous route. :P

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

You do realize that this has been going on for over a century, right? Farmers using hybrid seed, so they just buy new seed year after year.

Some do but many more save seeds.

people who were concerned about gene spread got what they demanded

No we didn't. We got more genetic engineering not less.

I think heirloom growers should embrace GMOs.

Not at all, and you admit it yourself. The reason we don't see tomato varieties like Cherokee Purple or German Striped in supermarkets is because they don't all look or taste the same. Large scale growers want their products to have a uniform look and taste. If you want other varieties then coops, farmers markets, and roadside stands have them. Heck, look for orange or yellow tomatoes in chain grocery stores and more than likely you won't find them unless you go to Trader Joe's or Whole Foods. Looking in gardens though will increase your odds.

Finally, there is no need for GE crops. All they do is enrich the pockets of big agribusinesses.

Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

For those crops where they don't they might as well be, they sue you into oblivion if you save your seed for later. Yes, because you sign a contract promising not to do that before you buy the seeds. They also sue you if you don't pay them - oh no!

They also sue if your non-GM crop is contaminated by another's GM crop. You did not sign a contract but you're sued anyway.

Falcon

Re:GM

[ChromeAeonium]

Not at all, and you admit it yourself. The reason we don't see tomato varieties like Cherokee Purple or German Striped in supermarkets is because they don't all look or taste the same. Large scale growers want their products to have a uniform look and taste.

And the reason growers want them is because consumers want them. I don't see how that issue relates to genetic engineering, that's something altogether different. Getting people to think of new or diverse crops as a true part of their diet, just like the foods they're accustomed to, it a task in and of itself. I follow exotic pomology too, and it took decades for mangos and kiwis to get to where they are now, and still, people don't see them on the same level as apples and bananas. I think genetic engineering could be an enabler to get more things to consumers, but getting them to step out of their cullinary comfort zone and actually accept a bumpy green, orange, yellow, and red tomato or whatever as more than a novelty is a challenge in and of itself.

Finally, there is no need for GE crops. All they do is enrich the pockets of big agribusinesses.

Tell that to the farmers who's crops were wiped out by papaya ringspot virus before GMO papayas arrived on the scene. Heck, there are even organic farmers who use the herd immunity provided by the GMO ones to keep their crop safe. If plumpox rears its ugly head, you might see the benefits of the GMO Honeysweet plum real fast. And to think that genetic engineering is nothing but some sort of corporate science, that's absolutely false. Monsanto doesn't own genetic engineering any more than Merck or Pfizer own the idea of administering a measured dose of active ingredient (pharmacology). And by 2015, it is estimated that half of GMOs will be non-corporate. To say there's no need for them, I don't get that either. That's like saying there is no need for plant breeding. Genetic engineering isn't a way of life, it's just a tool for changing plants, whether for drought resistance, pest resistance, nitrogen use efficiency, herbicide resistance, increased nutrients, or whatever. We know it works, no one has ever produced a shred of credible evidence to suggest they're dangerous (and considering horizontal gene transfer between unrelated species happens all the time, it be pretty surprising if they were), so I don't see any legitimate reason not to have GE crops.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

No, my point is that GM is about making smaller, well understood changes vs other methods.

Transplanting genes from animals to plants, which is unprecedented, is neither a smaller, not a better understood process than species of plants breeding together and occasional mutations that produce plants that are still fertile.

Without GM crops, avoiding a monoculture is possible, with Monsanto's model of GM plants, it is not.

Re:GM

[h4rm0ny]

By your logic, the most dangerous foods are the ones stored in tins and thrown at people's heads.

Re:GM

[mcgrew]

I'm not anti-GMO, but I'm all for regulating corporations to protect the environment, workers, and consumers. The cross-pollination problem is especially problematic, as is the patented life problem. I actually doubt that GM food is harmful, and certain that not all of it is, but whether one eats it or not should be up to them. GM food should be engineered to not produce pollen at all, and you shouldn't be able to patent life.

Re:GM

[SpongeBob Hitler]

There's something I've never understood coming from critics of the environmentalist movement: Where do you get the idea that people want to drag down the standard of living? Does it come from the fact that you think most of the time making the 'environmentalist' choice (whether it be to recycle glass, or change a light bulb, etc) costs (most of the time, slightly) more money? And do those costs significantly affect people's standards of living? Really? Spending $3 on a light bulb will make me poor?

What exactly brings down my standard of living when I turn off a light when I leave a room? When I shut down my computer when I'm not using it? When I drive in a more fuel-efficient manner (NOT buying a different car)? All of these are 'environmentalist' choices, yet they cost nothing except the effort required to modify my behavior slightly. If you're so against changing a habit, to the point where you argue it damages your standard of living, I think you have other issues to be concerned about.

There are some environmentalists who do think we should basically live like a third world country and that technology itself is evil. They are the fringe, though. The problem is that people like GP then go and take the fringe outliers and act as though they are the average.

The best way to improve the environment is to develop *more* and *better* technology that will raise all our standards of living while keeping an eye towards the environmental impacts of what we develop. Most environmentally-minded people understand this. But, the people who prefer to be able to shit where we eat want to paint all environmentalists as "tree huggers" or as people who want us to return to the Dark Ages.

Plus, they are the ones who are really holding us back. Instead of developing improved technology, they want us to go on getting our energy by setting fire to things, like a bunch of cavemen. And, those wacky Wahibi-loving governments are going to get even more violent as we move away from oil since they will see their wealth being drained away (no more palaces for you, filthy Saudi princes!).

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

GM crops with increased yield help no matter what the cause is.

Better transportation not GE is needed.

Famine though plant blight is common, and GE is the best way to get rid of it.

Not even, the best way to combat blight is with diversity. When a monoculture is hit by blight or something else the whole crop can be lost. But that's not true when fields are diverse. Take for instance cocoa, ScienceDaily has the article New Cocoa Varieties Needed to Secure World's Chocolate Supply. Scientists at University of Reading are working to "develop new cocoa varieties better suited to likely future climates." Meanwhile Nestle is supplying cocoa farmers with disease resistant cocoa varieties. With 4 main varieties of cocoa people are working to create hybrids.

http://www.africanagricultureblog.com/2010/01/gates-foundation-to-fund-cassava.html

That says nothing about genetic engineering. The 2 tymes "gene" is even mentioned is when it says they are looking for desired genes in resistant varieties of cassava. All that's needed is crossbreeding and hybrids. No fish genes need to be inserted.

But more importantly, there are many areas of the world where the problem isn't caloric, but nutritional. Golden rice is the poster child for this. Lack of vitamin A leads to blindness and death, so adding it to the rice in places where that is the staple diet can save many.

All that's needed for this is to eat crops that have the needed nutrients. For vitamin A, carrots. Carrots are filled with beta carotene which is a precursor to vitamin A. The NIH has more food sources for vitamin A. The percent of RDA is also included. And again as the BBC article GM 'golden rice' boosts vitamin A says "Not everyone believes golden rice is the best answer to Vitamin A deficiency."

For instance I am afraid Monsanto's Roundup Ready crops are creating superweeds [france24.com].

Pesticide use made that problem(if it turns out to be one), not GE. Without GE other pesticides would be used, and pesticide resistant plants would evolve.

That just goes to show how much you know. Pesticides had nothing to do with the creation of superweeds.

Bye

Falcon

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

all of those examples are animals that live in intimate contact with each other. How do arctic flounder genes get into a tomato plant? That's a rather circuitous route. :P

Horizontal transfer does happen, just not from an Arctic fish to tomatoes.

Falcon

Re:GM

[spinkham]

That just goes to show how much you know. Pesticides had nothing to do with the creation of superweeds.

Please explain for the ignorant. Here's what the article you linked to has to say:

How has this happened? Farmers over-relied on Monsanto’s revolutionary and controversial combination of a single “round up” herbicide and a high-tech seed with a built-in resistance to glyphosate, scientists say.

Overusing a pesticide has bred pesticide resistant plants. That is normal. I have heard of no evidence of crossover of any kind. If you have studies that say elsewise, I'd love to see them.

Note that herbicides are a subset of pesticides, if that's your quibble. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pesticide

You can argue that without GE, perhaps Round Up wouldn't be used as much, but that's orthogonal to whether or not GE is dangerous in general.
GE is neutral. Our uses of it can be good or bad.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

And the reason growers want them is because consumers want them. I don't see how that issue relates to genetic engineering, that's something altogether different.

I never said it had anything to do with genetic engineering. You did in the post I replied to. Specifically you said I think heirloom growers should embrace GMOs. Then you explained why, to get hybrids "like Cherokee Purple and White Tomesol" stocked in supermarket stores.

Getting people to think of new or diverse crops as a true part of their diet, just like the foods they're accustomed to, it a task in and of itself.

And that is one of the goals of Slow Food. And guess what they say... Pandemic disease and genetic engineering have wiped out all traditional sources of meat (and many vegetable products) in a matter of decades. "Winona LaDuke, founder of the White Earth Land Recovery Project, which was the recipient of the International Slow Food Award for the Defense of Biodiversity in 2003 said, 'Indigenous people are center to Slow Food International,' because the foods they are talking about have long histories, the very foods Slow Food wants to protect."

I follow exotic pomology too, and it took decades for mangos and kiwis to get to where they are now, and still, people don't see them on the same level as apples and bananas.

And how many people eat kiwis and mangos? I used to take them with me for lunch.

Finally, there is no need for GE crops. All they do is enrich the pockets of big agribusinesses.

Tell that to the farmers who's crops were wiped out by papaya ringspot virus before GMO papayas arrived on the scene.

Yea, let's ask farmers about GE:

1. Monsanto versus Farmers
2. Monsanto's Harvest of Fear

This post of mine has 8 more links.

To say there's no need for them, I don't get that either.

I and others, including experts, have said GE is not needed for food because it is not needed. I dare you prove that wrong. Provide one piece of evidence GE is needed. Then we'll see what reviewers say.

FAO report reveals GM crops not needed to feed the world.

That's like saying there is no need for plant breeding.

You like every other person who tries to justify genetic engineering tries this. Selective breeding and crossbreeding is a hell of a lot different than inserting arctic fish genes into tomatoes. The first happens frequently in nature but the second rarely if ever happens.

We know it works, no one has ever produced a shred of credible evidence to suggest they're dangerous

My, my, my. How wrong you are. One example we know of is soya with a gene from Brazil nuts. Identification of A Brazil-Nut Allergen in transgenic soybeans[pdf]. The fact the soya was not released does not change the fact that the engineering soya was dangerous to those allergic to Brazil nuts and could cause their deaths.

considering horizontal gene transfer between unrelated species happens all the time

I thought you might bring that up, and I already addressed

Re:GM

[ChromeAeonium]

As for the Brazil nut soybean, it should go without saying that you can use genetic engineering to make things like that. A known allergen in something else, it's not too surprising that it turned out that way. You might as well point out that you can put anthrax in an apple if you wanted. You can put arsenic in a cake, doesn't make baking bad. A better way to put that would be no commercially approved GMOs have been shown to be spontaneously harmful. The only example I know of where GMOs were potentially harmful was detected and discontinued long before it was put into use. I've seen the 'smoking gun' studies, they come and go every now and again, but no one has ever been able to find a reason for the alleged harm, no causative agent, no chemical pathways producing that agent, no genetic reasoning for it.

And yeah, the principles of genetic engineering are a lot like breeding. I didn't say it's the same thing, nor should they always be treated the same, but in both cases, you're still changing the genes. One is just a lot more precise with a wider range of options, and it doesn't really matter that it is less natural, what matters is the end result. Does it matter if you insert a gene from a fish or breed it for a million years for the plant to produce it itself?

And Monsanto, they're not your friends, that's fair to say, but saying that because they're bad GMOs are bad is like saying that because the RIAA are pricks you shouldn't listen to music. What the Monsanto does says nothing of the worth of the product, and it certainty says nothing about unrelated people, just like what the RIAA does says nothing of the actual pieces of music, and absolutely nothing about, say, indie bands.

Do we need GMOs? Do we really need agricultural improvements? We could get by without a lot of things, but that's no reason not to use them, and no small amount of people in relevant fields seem to think biotech will be pretty significant.

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

They might prove relatively harmless to us directly (who knows?) but turn out to have a devastating effect on the environment. Remember that a lot of the high yields some like to report, are not because the crop has been engineered to be super-abundant (selective breeding has already done wonders there), but because they are engineered to resist pesticides that kill pretty much everything else

And one of the reasons these crops were developed were to lessen the impact to the environment by modern farming by allowing 'no-till' crops to reduce the amount of fuel used and soil erosion.

Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting. You have to buy again and again

This has been the case with hybrid seeds used in farming for the last 40-50+ years. This is nothing new. The only ones that could save seeds for use from year to year were farmers using 'registered seed' and were growing crops that were then sold to seed companies. Again, this is nothing new or unique to GM crops. The difference is that GM allows companies to develop seeds in a couple years where it would take a lifetime of selective breeding to create 'normal hybrid' crops.

If people don't want to use GM crops, that's fine. Stop donating money to fight starvation and disease in 3rd world countries. Let their populations shrink to a level that can be fed with non-GM crops.

Re:GM

[Reziac]

A point lost in all this is that it doesn't matter how you reach the end result -- a given amino acid is still that same amino acid, with identical nutrient properties, whether it came from a GM crop, a bacterium, a chemistry lab (well, we'll ignore D/L for this discussion), or a wild-type crop. Your body doesn't know or care how it became methoinine or lysine or whatever.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

As for the Brazil nut soybean, it should go without saying that you can use genetic engineering to make things like that.

Ah, change the rules, just like GE businesses do. First you say "no one has ever produced a shred of credible evidence to suggest they're dangerous". When I provide evidence that disputes that you change it to the above, "it should go without saying that you can use genetic engineering to make things like that."

You might as well point out that you can put anthrax in an apple if you wanted. You can put arsenic in a cake, doesn't make baking bad.

Now it's misdirection.

And Monsanto, they're not your friends, that's fair to say, but saying that because they're bad GMOs are bad is like saying that because the RIAA are pricks you shouldn't listen to music.

Misdirection again. First you say "Tell that to the farmers who's crops were wiped out by papaya ringspot virus before GMO papayas arrived on the scene". In response I say, yes let's see what farmers say and provide a bunch of links to what farmers do say.

Do we need GMOs? Do we really need agricultural improvements? We could get by without a lot of things, but that's no reason not to use them, and no small amount of people in relevant fields seem to think biotech will be pretty significant.

Misdirection again. I never said anything about not making agricultural improvements. Instead I asked if GE is needed, then answered "no".

Falcon

Re:GM

[sd1000]

...Stop making shit up.

Did you read the article? Do you understand the ramification of "horizontal transfer of transgenes to other organisms"? Eating GM food once could permanently damage you for life. Your own intestinal bacteria could be modified to produce pesticides or other adverse functions. Due to the large adoption of GM foods, I stand by the statement they are likely to be the most dangerous foods based on the number of people affected and that you can not recover or reverse the affects. The occurrence of improperly stored foods having adverse impacts would be insignificant in comparison if the concerns of some researches over GM dangers are verified. My observation is simply stating what some researches are calling into question. This presentation provides even more detailed analysis on the subject of GMO foods http://vimeo.com/6575475

Re:GM

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it hilariously entertaining to read these posts, but this one was terribly misinformed. They produce strains that can't reproduce on their own INTENTIONALLY! The reason for this is that they don't produce more seed and become a plant pest, or transfer their 'altered genes' into other conventional crops, or weedy relatives. The level of unfounded and poorly researched bias in this comment section is incredible.

It's not that I'm pro Monsanto, I also believe they are the evil empire, but the issue itself is full of alarmist misinformation. If you are wondering, I am pro in some instances, and against in others. It's not a blanket issue.

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

They also sue if your non-GM crop is contaminated by another's GM crop.
No, they don't. All of the companies and governments involved clearly say that a certain amount of crossbreeding is inevitable, and not a cause for legal action. But if you go on to encourage that trait to become the norm in your own crops, and then use the trait for your own financial gain, then the companies (and the courts) think you're deliberately making money off of their patented stuff without permission, and they have the right to sue you.

You did not sign a contract but you're sued anyway.
Yes, because you've violated someone's patent. And this isn't a Monsanto or even a GM issue - plant breeders have had legal protection for new varieties since 1930.

Re:GM

[falconwolf]

They also sue if your non-GM crop is contaminated by another's GM crop.
No, they don't. All of the companies and governments involved clearly say that a certain amount of crossbreeding is inevitable, and not a cause for legal action.

First, Monsanto did claim their GE crops will not cross breed years ago. It was only after it was proven crossbreeding does happened that they stopped making the claim. Secondly, many farmers have either been sued or themselves sued GE companies. Monsanto regularly sends out private investigators, Pinkertons, to collect specimens to test for GE genes. They even threatened someone who's neither a farmer nor a seed dealer. Despite having no evidence, and the State of North Dakota Seed Arbitration Board not having found any themselves, Monsanto still threatens a farming family in North Dakota.

You did not sign a contract but you're sued anyway.
Yes, because you've violated someone's patent. And this isn't a Monsanto or even a GM issue - plant breeders have had legal protection for new varieties since 1930.

In other words if your crop is contaminated, which does happen, you're screwed. The above links are a vary small sample of results Google returns for farmers monsanto. Adding sue still leaves more than a million results. Like this one, Agricultural Giant Battles Small Farmers:

"David Runyon and his wife Dawn put a lifetime of work into their 900-acre Indiana farm, and almost lost it all over a seed they say they never planted."

"'I don't believe any company has the right to come into someone's home and threaten their livelihood,' Dawn said, 'to bring them into such physical turmoil as this company did to us.'"

The Runyons charge bio-tech giant Monsanto sent investigators to their home unannounced, demanded years of farming records, and later threatened to sue them for patent infringement. The Runyons say an anonymous tip led Monsanto to suspect that genetically modified soybeans were growing on their property.

"'I wasn't using their products, but yet they were pounding on my door demanding information, demanding records," Dave said. "It was just plain harassment is what they were doing.'"

Or this one: Monsanto sues and sues and sues and...

Falcon

Re:GM

[severoon]

...related plants were cross bred and not fish genes inserted into tomatoes.

I'm sorry, but your point is lost. You yourself already acknowledged that horizontal gene transfer is a natural process in your previous comment. What ever does this statement you make here have to do with this discussion?

You seem to be attempting to make dire implications about our current practices, but have not yet drawn a clear dividing line between current practices, previous practices, and nature's own practices. So...that doesn't leave you with much of a statement of any kind.

To be clear, I'm for any genetic modification, whether it's crossing tomatoes and fish or whatever, that produces better quality, more nutritional, less expensive, and tastier food. I'm against even the most banal kind of cross—even those that might happen in nature were we not to prevent it—that results in less nutritional, lower quality, more expensive, and less tasty food (which is strongly and directly related to changes that allow foods to thrive in monocultures).

No, most people do not. Go to China and ask. Go to Africa and ask.

Well, I naturally assumed you meant people that ought to matter to the discussion. Most people in general don't know how medical treatment works either...are you against that too?

Ah, that's why they have to run experiments, because they know everything. If they do it all then why the experiments. Experiments are run because they do not know everything, not even a small fraction.

So, if I'm to understand your blockheaded statement here, you mean to say that you will only be happy with GM food if we cease to investigate it? You can't think of a single other thing of great utility to humans about which there is yet more to learn? What a fatuous statement...I cannot cast my gaze in any direction without settling on several such counterexamples.

When did I say anything about him? Or is this FUD and misdirection?

Let me get this straight...in this discussion where you are against GM food and I am not, you accuse me of spreading FUD? This is neither FUD nor misdirection, it is simply direction.

By introducing Mr. Borlaug into the discussion, I am asserting that you are one of the people that wikipedia article is describing "who consider genetic crossbreeding to be unnatural or to have negative effects." But a quick survey of the results of Mr. Borlaug's work ought to inform you about what you're saying we should give up without good reason.

Re:GM

[yndrd1984]

First, Monsanto did claim their GE crops will not cross breed years ago.
I'd like a cite for that.

As for the rest of your post, you have a nice collection of one sided complaints, which is enough to get my attention. But if you want me to really believe that accidental crossing still legally counts as infringement, please get me a copy of a court's decision stating that. If, on the other hand, you just want to say that Monsanto harasses people and sometimes launches suits that are expensive to defend against, then I can't say for certain that you're wrong, but I don't want to 'convict' someone without getting their POV. At least for that claim, I think we'd need more than just an exchange on slashdot to make a strong case either way.

Cheers

ah, Monsanto

[FuckingNickName]

They're the guys overly fussy about protecting their intellectual property in genetic modification, right?

Re:ah, Monsanto

[data2]

Yes, and they are the same guy patenting pigs(!) which have eaten their crops.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[Spazztastic]

Yes, and they are the same guy patenting pigs(!) which have eaten their crops.

I'm going to patent any woman I sleep with.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[GaryOlson]

Only if you eat her first.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[Culture20]

Yes, and they are the same guy patenting pigs(!) which have eaten their crops.

I'm going to patent any woman I sleep with.

That's called a marriage, and in the U.S. it seems to only lasts about 20 years, just like any other patent.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[twoallbeefpatties]

That's called a marriage, and in the U.S. it seems to only lasts about 20 years, just like any other patent.

The U.S. is in the habit of constantly extending patent rights to last long after such things should have moved into the public domain. ;)

Re:ah, Monsanto

[FuckingNickName]

Sirs,

You have segued the OP with waggishness and gusto. My congratulations.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[PinkyGigglebrain]

Citation please.

It sounds like something they would do, and if true I would definitely like to read up on it.

Re:ah, Monsanto

[SpongeBob Hitler]

That's called a marriage, and in the U.S. it seems to only lasts about 20 years, just like any other patent.

Unfortunately, with marriage, you still have to pay maintenance fees even after it expires.

'Viewpoint'

[DCBoland]

I'm sorry but TFA says 'viewpoint' quite clearly. Apparently his points have been 'debunked numerous times' and his facts are 'stale half facts', but where are the links supporting these claims?

Re:'Viewpoint'

[Anonymous Coward]

Trying to debunk claims about GM foods is like trying to debunk claims about technology in general. If it doesn't work the first time, if it doesn't do what you want, you make another version that does. If there's some flaw, you remove the flaw.
 
You simply can't reject an entire field of research and all its practical applications on the basis of "we've never needed it before and some of the previous attempts were no good".
 
I agree with this guy's idea that we need more people doing GM foods. That way if one company is misusing the tech, you can ignore them and go to another one that isn't.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[Dalambertian]

The first time I heard of Monsanto was in this interview with Vandana Shiva, concerning the effects of patented seed on Indian farmers: http://www.hulu.com/watch/133725/cooking-up-a-story-vandana-shiva-the-future-of-food-part-1

Re:'Viewpoint'

[Anonymous Coward]

Please don't link to Hulu on Slashdot. This is an international site (like most of the internet). Hulu is US only.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[sirlark]

I'm not sure competition in the GM food production arena will actually help. The real danger with GM foods is the economic coercion that it entails. If you buy seed for one roundup ready crop (A monsanto feature I believe, but not 100% sure; either way, works for illustrative purposes), that pretty much precludes you from putting seed from any other company (i.e. not roundup ready) as the Roundup insecticide your using kills off competitors crops too. In other sectors of the economy this is usually called antitrust isn't it? Even with more competition in the field, the cost of losing a field for a year because of changing over to a different seed producer is probably going to be prohibitive.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[SkunkPussy]

l2polite cuntfag

Re:'Viewpoint'

[Ed Avis]

Quite. So the guy has worked for Monsanto in the past as well as other biotech companies. Wouldn't you expect that a researcher into plant genetics might sometimes be employed by companies who want to undertake research? If you exclude (ad hominem) all arguments from anyone who has worked in the field, then who is left? On the other side we have the Slashdot contributor 'blackbeak', who has studied genetics for many years, published his PhD on the subject, and is knowledgeable about the science involved. What's that you say? It's just some Internet loudmouth? Clearly, then, we should listen to blackbeak's carefully reasoned arguments and ignore the shilling from the evil Monsanto puppet author of the BBC opinion piece, who clearly doesn't have any idea what he is talking about.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[blackbeak]

All essays published by the BBC editors must go through an "approval" process (one by which I defy you to get an anti GM article past). In addition, the author's credentials only identified him as a Professor, someone qualified to teach us generally at an advanced level. As you must be aware, Slashdot has a number of GM/Monsanto threads, so I figured that end was covered pretty well. Googling "problems with gm food" provides 1,420,000 results, should you need to rehash.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[jedidiah]

> Trying to debunk claims about GM foods is like trying to debunk claims about technology in general.

The Earth and the Human food supply is a production system with no backups.

Both should be treated accordingly.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[stanlyb]

NO ONE wants to reject it. The problem is that EVERYONE does not want to eat it, lol, with a very good and sound reason.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[nelsonal]

I grew up in an area that did a lot of farming. I don't remember a single farmer planting two different crops in the same field, at the same time. I also don't remember any farms that sprayed everything all at once, usually they either took a tractor around with a sprayer or had a crop duster do it. In both cases, they could do a 20 ft wide strip at best.

It was very common though for a farmer to have two different crops growing in two different fields, and to spray two different chemicals on the fields. Also round up doesn't have any lasting effects, I've sprayed it all over lots of weeds, but they keep growing back every spring.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[h4rr4r]

So make no changes ever?
That seems too conservative.

Re:'Viewpoint'

[Dalambertian]

My bad. Here is the full interview on youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vi1FTCzDSck

Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

In other news, U.S. Radium says radium paint is safe. News at 11...

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[takowl]

Only because of the completely inaccurate /. title. In fact, it's not Monsanto saying it:

Professor Jonathan Jones is senior scientist for The Sainsbury Laboratory, based at the John Innes Centre, a research centre in plant and microbial science

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[c6gunner]

In other news, U.S. Radium says radium paint is safe [wikipedia.org]. News at 11...

Hey dumbass - the word "safe" doesn't even make an appearance in the article you link to. In fact, the article specifically states that the scientists and managers at the plant took measures to avoid their own exposure to radium because they were familiar with it's effects. To compare that to the current GM-foods drama is completely asinine.

Note to the idiots who modded you insightful: follow the fucking links next time.

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank God this is done in India now

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[Anonymous Coward]

In other news, U.S. Radium says radium paint is safe. News at 11...

I knew about the Radium Girls story. I didn't know that it was so bad that Geiger-counters still go off at their grave sites!

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[Anonymous Coward]

the scientists and managers at the plant took measures to avoid their own exposure to radium because they were familiar with it's effects.

Do you take measures to avoid your own exposure to unnecessary apostrophes?

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[dunkelfalke]

Well, there is a good chance that Monsanto top management personally avoids GM food at all cost.

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[c6gunner]

There is a good chance that you wear frilly pink underwear. How about we discuss what's ACTUALLY going on, instead of what you think MIGHT be going on?

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[longhairedgnome]

Durr WOOOSH Anyways, you may want to check that link again, if you are having trouble reading, search for safe(Control-F).
The GP was trying to point out the conflict of interest, U.S. Radium would have not only told their workers that the paint was safe, they would have encouraged them to show it off!

Re:Obvious conflict of interest. Why is this news?

[c6gunner]

Durr WOOOSH Anyways, you may want to check that link again, if you are having trouble reading, search for safe(Control-F).

Thanks Mr. 24.111.76.107 - it's good to see that you know how to edit wikipedia articles. I thought about undoing your vandalism, but I'm sure someone else will come along and fix it soon enough.

The GP was trying to point out the conflict of interest, U.S. Radium would have not only told their workers that the paint was safe, they would have encouraged them to show it off!

I really don't give a shit what you think they "would have" done. Unless you can show that they did it, you're just talking out of your ass. Nor would it matter if you DID manage to show such a thing, since the major difference is that we had plenty of evidence to show that radium was harmful, whereas there is no evidence whatsoever which shows that genetically modified foods cause any harm.

Monsanto better say it!

[Anonymous Coward]

'Cause nobody else'll be sayin for them...

Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[krisbrowne42]

I would personally prefer to stay away from Monsanto based products not because I don't trust their science, but because I dislike their business practices and media tomfoolery. GM crops are a double-edged sword by all neutral study, having definite benefits of their own but creating potentially disastrous consequences (super-bugs and super-weeds, which are nearly immune to conventional herb- or insecticides), but the Intellectual Property abuse that comes of their use is hurting more farmers than those issues for now.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[Noam.of.Doom]

Don't forget the fact that they create a monopoly by requiring farmers that plant their seeds to exclusively use certain brands of pesticide and fertilizers.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[Anonymous Coward]

GM crops are a double-edged sword

Agreed.

Barring Monsato's obvious dickishness here, there are plenty of reasons GM crops are both good and bad. The benefit of having far more crops is good for any nation with high populations or small amounts of fertile ground, but the potential danger of breeding with other plants to create superweeds, or of just lacking multiple strains of a crop in case of sudden virus mutations/weather changes/new insects/etc are incredibly bad.

Putting all your eggs in one basket is never good.

If anything, we should be growing multiple strains of supercrops with a minimum x% genetic variation out in the fields while keeping, in laboratories or private farms as many lesser, ordinary strains in case we need to cross-breed them. This should at least allow for a bare minimum sustenance in case one supercrop fails while also allowing for other strains to experiment with for new, better supercrops with different genetic strains.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[cbope]

... and don't forget that Monsanto will come out with an exclusive patented super-weed killer to handle those pesky super-weeds. And since they are the inventor of both the super-weed and the killer to keep it under control, they win. It's a vicious circle that feeds itself.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[arivanov]

To be most exact they are also not allowed to use any of the seeds and have to buy licensed seed material from Monsanto every year.

Granted, very few farmers in the developed world do their own seeds nowdays. They go and buy seed material and there is a reasonably wide market for that. If GM in the form advocated by monsanto is allowed this market is killed outright and converted into a near monopoly for Monsanto. That is by the way the primary concern of legislators, regulators and governments in the EU. It is not the GM itself, it is the fact that if it is allowed a monopoly on par with United Fruit of old will shortly follow.

In any case GM as advocated by Monsanto is actually unnecessary in the longer term. Induced mutations (radiation, chemicals, etc) and other means to create initial material for the standard selection process are perfectly legal and are now widely in use throughout the industry. When this is combined with DNA sequencing and modern mol biol techniques to track the results it allows perfectly legal selection methods which result in pretty much the same as what Monsanto is trying to offer. It takes longer, but it is also applicable to plants and animals that are presently outside the GM scope. The super-wheat and super-corn obtained through such "legal" methods is probably less than 5-10 years away anyway and most importantly it will _NOT_ be a monopoly. There will be multiple varieties to chose from.

From this perspective the prohibition of Monstanto style GM is a very good thing. I am all for it.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[YeeHaW_Jelte]

This isn't Monsanto speaking. RTA, follow the links, I don't think this Prof Jones is a shill for Monsanto.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[txoof]

It's a little terrifying how much power Monsanto has in the US and really, the world. They have farmers all over the world under their thumb through royalty payments and the patents they hold on certain traits. There are plenty of cases where farmers have legitimately planted NON-GMO soy and corn only to find that pollen from their neighbors farms has drifted into their field and GMO'ed their crops. These farmers now have to supply the burden of evidence to show their innocence if Monsanto chooses to chase them into court over patent infringement. Monsanto has single-handedly, in a single generation of farmers, cut out seed saving. This is the single most important advancement that allowed us as a species to move from casual, opportunistic farmers to the agrarian based society we enjoy today.

I don't begrudge Monsanto for trying something new, but I am concerned with their disregard for the wellbeing of farmers and for their consumers. Over the last twenty years there has been mounting evidence to show that pests are developing resistance to BT Toxin and that many other crops are inadvertently horizontally transferring BT genes. But wait! There's more!

In recent studies researchers have found that BT maize (corn) can cause serious health problems in mammals. A diet heavy in GMO corn caused rats to develop liver and kidney problems. Most of the corn raised in the US carries the BT gene, along with a few other, like the RoundUp Ready. I'm sure you're thinking to your self, "gee, I'm glad I don't eat very much corn!" Oh, but you do. Almost everything that isn't a vegetable or a fruit found in American grocery stores has some form of corn in it. From ascorbic acid, citric acid, corn starch, high fructose corn syrup, food colorings and ink, and even some waxes applied to fruit are all derived from corn.

I'm not a biochemist and I certainly don't have any idea how rat models scale (or don't scale) up to humans, but the study cited above suggests that a diet rich in BT corn (which most of us well-fed americans eat) might be bad for us. Perhaps some diversity and choice in our market would be a good thing. At least some public discussion about this subject, and less media schilling on behalf of giant multi-nationals would definitely be welcome.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[takowl]

In recent studies researchers have found that BT maize (corn) can cause serious health problems in mammals.

Government scientists also read these things. See what the Australian & NZ Food Standards agency said about it. To paraphrase: "Oh, those guys again. Still using the suspect statistics that were criticised the last time they used them. This isn't evidence for any harmful effect."

Please don't confuse some of the evil things Monsanto does with the safety of GM as a whole.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[MemoryDragon]

Well it is bad enough even if there are no apparent health risks on GM food that the combination of gm crops + extremely strong pestisides which the crops are resistent to ruin the soil for generations, also the short term benefits are questionable since the insects seem to be able to adapt after a few generations.

But what I fear worse is the dependency on non reproducable crops we have had for generations now in the western world, a major economic crisis and the lack of reproducable seeds on the farmers hands could result in a serious famine though we theoretically could breed enough food. That is a major issue which we have had now since the 1960s when the corporations stepped in as seed suppliers. (this stuff already has caused famines in africa at that time, when Europe and the USA dropped those seeds on local farmers there to help out with shortages on seed)

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[Insightfill]

I'm sure you're thinking to your self, "gee, I'm glad I don't eat very much corn!" Oh, but you do.

"King Corn" is a fascinating movie that touches on this. Two guys rent an acre of farmland to grow corn for a season, documenting every step, from the government buyback contract prices to fertilizer and meeting with the locals. They also make HFCS in the kitchen and drink it straight.

But one of the most interesting scenes was where they break down how much food has a corn component, and actually do a chemical analysis of one of the guy's blood to determine how much of his diet is corn-based.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[blackbeak]

I beg to differ, Jones represents Mendel Biotechnology, who grant exclusive licenses of their biotechnology primarily to Monsanto (their #1 client -- BP is #2, just wait for that article!). The goal obviously is to further expand Monsanto's market saturation.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[drinkypoo]

Don't forget the fact that they create a monopoly by requiring farmers that plant their seeds to exclusively use certain brands of pesticide and fertilizers.

You can use other brands, but Monsanto is the world's largest manufacturer of the active ingredient in Roundup, which is the primary herbicide that's used with their crops. So realistically you can't really get the stuff from anyone but them. Of course, weeds are now becoming Roundup-resistant, which means that there is actually little to no point in buying their seed. "Green Revolution"-style farming is going away as it will be completely unworkable when there's no way to control weeds to create these monocultures in the first place. Literally the only benefit of using "Green Revolution" farming is the ability to use machinery. But we have an awful lot of unemployed people right now, and will only have more, so it's not like there's a lack of manpower. Shit, we pretty much don't even use crop rotation any more in favor of just spraying more chemicals on our food. It shouldn't take a genius to figure out that this will not stand.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[Anonymous Coward]

You could almost call it a *crop* circle... :P

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[StormReaver]

In recent studies researchers have found that BT maize (corn) can cause serious health problems in mammals. A diet heavy in GMO corn caused rats to develop liver and kidney problems.

I'm really glad to hear this (I'm not kidding). About five or six years ago, I developed an extremely painful hemorrhoid. It would go through daily cycles of inflation and deflation, with an occasional excruciating flareup (about twice a year). Preparation H helped for about two months before its effectiveness completely ceased.

After living with this for a few years, I broke down and went to the doctor. His advice was to not sit so much (I'm a software developer, so that did not go over well), and eat more fiber. I did both of those things for about a year before concluding they had zero positive benefit in my case. I had been building towards a decision to have it surgically removed, but wanted to avoid surgery unless I had absolutely no choice.

Last year, I met a woman to whom I later became engaged. One of her many endearing attributes is that she is a die-hard believer in Organic eating (and I was not). As time went on, she convinced me to try eating more Organically and to buy as much as possible from our local Farmer's Market. About two months ago, she convinced me to stop eating store-bought corn since it was so heavily polluted by Monsanto GMO "crap". I resisted at first, but eventually agreed to do so.

Shortly after (a couple days, but I'm not exactly sure of the timeframe), the hemorrhoid stopped its daily inflation/deflation cycle. Two months later, and I still haven't had any hemorrhoid activity at all. More research into the cause of hemorrhoids revealed that liver and kidney issues are directly linked as causes. To my mind, that is plenty of evidence linking Monsanto to health problems.

I used to think that Monsanto was just a figurative pain in the ass. Now I believe that to be literally true as well.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[Joey Vegetables]

I stopped eating HFCS (but not corn in general) about half a year ago and while I did not lose the weight I had hoped to, I definitely notice fewer problems with hemorrhoids, as well as reduced cravings of varying types, less back pain, and less trouble sleeping.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[mcgrew]

I am concerned with their disregard for the wellbeing of farmers and for their consumers.

Corporations seldom have regard for anything but profit. The only thing they care about their customers is that they keep spending money with them. And Monsanto has been historically anti-social in every regard; they had to be dragged kicking and screaming into air quality regs.

There's little you can buy in a grocery store except "fresh" fruits and vegetables that doesn't contain HFCS.

Re:Monsanto isn't an unbiased voice

[ChromeAeonium]

We wouldn't have resistant weeds and bugs if there was a more diverse range of GMOs. Everyone knows what happens if you hit pests with the same thing year after year, it was really a matter of time. It isn't with the use of those traits that is the problem, but with over-reliance on a single trait. It's basically like a GMO monoculture. It isn't that those traits are bad it is that we need more of them. If you grow, say, a rust resistant variety of apple, but only that variety, eventually, something will get it. Say thing happens with GMOs. Eventually, using only one herbicide and relying on one pest control technique will catch up with you, and curb some of the benefits the GMOs already provide. But try being a non-corporate group with a GMO resistant to another type of pest/herbicide. Good luck getting it approved. The luddites oppose Golden Rice with the same fever as Monsanto.

pot calling kettle black?

[Anonymous Coward]

Kdawson complaining about crappy news reporting...heh.

Genetically Modified

[mogness]

OH! That's what GM stands for. Good thing the summary mentions that. Oh, wait...

Re:Genetically Modified

[daid303]

Just the day I lost my mod points. Thanks anyhow.

Re:Genetically Modified

[iainl]

If you don't immediately jump to the MONSANTO IS EEEVIL!!!!oneoneone! Pavlovian response upon seeing the letters G and M in close proximity, this is not the story for you, so it's a helpful shibboleth from that point of view.

And I say

[Dracophile]

And I say that while I have a meaningful choice in what I eat (I've started growing my own food) Monsanto can suck my dick.

Re:And I say

[Halo1]

Monsanto can suck my dick.

Given Monsanto's business model, that might render you infertile more quickly than you can say "Monsanto's SuperSperm Discount Pack".

Re:And I say

[Totenglocke]

Just remember though, you're dead no matter what you eat - might as well eat what tastes good and / or is cheap.

That's why I don't understand the people who say "Don't do X, it's bad for you!" - you're not getting out of life alive, so you might as well enjoy yourself while you can.

Re:And I say

[Anonymous Coward]

you're not getting out of life alive, so you might as well enjoy yourself while you can.

I hope that will still bring comfort in the cancer ward.

If you don't care about living longer why are you living now?

Re:And I say

[put_it_down]

They won't unless it's genetically modified. They're not picky, but they know what they like.

Re:And I say

[Khyber]

I've grown GM crops, and I've grown heirloom crops using hydro, soil, organic, chemical, SEA-90, etc.

Under identical nutrient regimens across multiple crop tests, the heirlooms ALWAYS tasted better than the GM. Sure, they were smaller, but then I had a full bioassay done on a sample from each plant - all the heirlooms had higher nutritional content PER FRUIT, despite being MUCH smaller in mass versus the GM ones. The GM stuff was flavorless, near-malnourished, and like cardboard made wet in texture.

Re:And I say

[Calinous]

I thought that lack of taste was a result of "force-growing" with fertilizers and so on. Apples grown in my parents' backyard had a wonderful "fullness" to them, strong taste and long-enduring aftertaste, and (at least when very fresh) were shooting drops when bitten.

Re:And I say

[Svartalf]

It's actually a combination of both.

If you force-grow heirloom cultivars, you end up with a similar tasteless, lower nutrition result.

In the end, the food industry isn't helping us any- with basically the farming equivalent of strip-mining, GMOs, and substances like HFCS in the mix, it's not unsurprising we're seeing things like Diabetes on the upswing in the Western world.

Re:And I say

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, they'd probably then own your genetic material, and then charge you for using it.

Re:And I say

[Khyber]

"If you force-grow heirloom cultivars, you end up with a similar tasteless, lower nutrition result."

I have found this to be untrue. Set yourself a bucket in bucket hydroponics system with massive airflow through the nutrient reservoir. As long as you provide the proper basic nutrients (instead of all the complex stuff,) the plant is more than capable of building what it needs and producing nutritionally-complete (for that food type) fruit.

Now, on the other hand, those using colchicine to make polyploid plants that produce massive fruits, THOSE most certainly are tasteless things.

Re:And I say

[mcgrew]

Monsanto can suck my dick.

Are you kidding? Good way to lose your dick.

Re:And I say

[will_die]

That they were GM is irrelevant.
The GM plants are modified versions of plants that have been modified for looks, travel time, size(uniformed and large) and increased growth rate. Taste is not a major consideration.
You can get heirloom seeds for that have a wide variety of characteristics you went and got seeds that were known for better taste; no reason they are better then ones that are not.
As for nutritional value it is going to be only certain items that they have a higher value. Nutritional value can vary by variety, age and a whole bunch of factors.

Re:And I say

[Khyber]

"Taste is not a major consideration."

This is dead wrong. In fact, most of your nutritional value can easily be determined by the taste of the product. The tastier ones ALWAYS have higher nutritional content, from apples to tomatoes.

GM Mr Stripey for larger fruits - TASTELESS and nutritionally deficient.

Heirloom Mr. Stripey - smaller tomatoes, 50% additional nutritional value despite the smaller size.

Our food has been losing quality for the past 50 years, and the USDA isn't too happy about it.

Please give me GM everything.

[MikeFM]

All this alarmist bullshit that is hurting the availability of GM and and nano products is nothing more than people whining. Sure a small portion of this stuff may be harmful but it'll be overwhelmingly beneficial. The best way to find the problems is to put it into mass use. It's very unlikely that it is worse than the stuff people willingly expose themselves to - drugs, alcohol, sugar, fried foods, etc. Hell even vegetables can be bad for you. As a non-obese diet caffeine free soda drinker in his early thirties that has recently found out he is diabetic I can tell you that damn near everything you could want to eat seems to be cursed.

It's completely ridiculous that they can't give GM crops to starving people because protestors, that aren't starving, think it's better to let the people starve than give them more viable crops that offer more nutrients than other crops, which aren't even being offered, would.

I will eat GM food and use GM and nano products. Please make em available. If other people are to scared of the bogey man then great I'll have benefits they don't. Please figure out a way to make carb free bread that doesn't suck.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are in the USA you are already eating a lot of GM food. But as for it being designed for your benefit, pfft, why would they do that? Current ones are for instance designed to leverage a companies monopoly in seed supply to a monopoly in pesticide.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[nido]

The best way to find the problems is to put it into mass use.

Health problems are often subtle, and frequently masquerade as something else.

As a non-obese diet caffeine free soda drinker in his early thirties that has recently found out he is diabetic ... I will eat GM food and use GM and nano products. Please make em available. If other people are to scared of the bogey man then great I'll have benefits they don't.

Like diabetes, eh?

It's completely ridiculous that they can't give GM crops to starving people because protestors,

It's completely ridiculous that there are starving people, with all the food that goes wasted or goes into ethanol/biodiesel. Mechanization -> unlimited abundance. Poverty is now a political problem more than anything else.

Please figure out a way to make carb free bread that doesn't suck.

How about this: your body can't handle bread. Stop eating it. That'd be the smart thing to do.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anghwyr]

Why on earth do you need a carb-free bread? Unless you are allergic, just manage your eating habits in a normal way.

The point of the above sentence being: medicine is not always the best answer. Third world countries are starving because we 1. destroy their local farmers' economy by dumping free food on them (note that when the chinese are dumping textile on european / USA markets, we start adding trade taxes for a reason), and 2. destroy what food-production they still have by making it financial beneficial for individual farmers to grow cheap maize for our cattle, rather than food for their countrymen. (3. Because their governments are far from brilliant, but we're not making it easy for those governments either).

I can see that one solution is to make the few farmers these countries have be more efficient in producing grain with GM crops, but there's also the solution of 'lets stop to abuse the fcuk out of third world countries', which seems to be the higher moral ground.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[DMiax]

Being a scientist, I would ask for the tests that show GM products to have a low risk of causing harm to the human body. In their absence, given the record of the companies involved that used dangerous pesticidal and antibiotics, I don't trust them to provide a correct view. They played with public health in the past and it would be foolish to assume they won't do it again.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[agnosticnixie]

Or you could just change your diet. Just like I don't need "lactose free milk" when there's a shitton of alternatives.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[FriendlyLurker]

You make it sound like choice is good - so why not label GM food clearly? . Why does Monsanto and their competitors need to lobby politicians so that they labels are not required?

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Moraelin]

1. Umm, being no worse than stuff already considered harmful, is hardly making anything good. Especially since it's not as an alternative to, but effectively in addition to. It's like saying that kicking someone in the nuts is OK, because he would have suffered worse in a car accident and he obviously doesn't mind risking that every day. Sorry, it doesn't work that way.

2. The risks to people are but a small aspect of it. The breeding super-weeds was even on Slashdot recently. Given that agrobacteria which transfer genes between plants exist in the wild -- and in fact that's how the GM gang is doing it in the first place -- it was just a matter of time until weeds started appearing with the exact same genes for producing pesticides or resisting herbicides that the GM crops have. Now they have actually been found. Now what?

3. In the same vein, some GM crops have already driven some harmful or even beneficial insects and worms nearly exitinct in some places, because frankly the pesticides they produce aren't the most discriminating ones. We're far from figuring out the DNA that encodes a more narrow action pesticides, and basically all that happens is copying some existing genes from bacteria and the like. The spread of those genes even to weeds now, well, you can see where that is going.

4. I don't remember Monsanto giving any starving people any crops. Would be nice if they were that charitable, but they aren't. On the contrary the crops they sell are sterile, so you have to buy another truckload of seeds next year. So basically you'll have to do better than that if you want to paint the GM guys as the knights in shiny armour and the protesters as some kind of villains.

5. Carb free bread? How do you think that might happen? To wit, there are two ways the plants store energy for the sprout in the seed. One is starch, which only some grasses do (grain being a grass) and oil which most plants use because it has higher energy density. And even if you converted grain to have an oily seed instead of starchy ones (though you probably wouldn't want to eat that kind of "bread" anyway), there's the issue of the cellulose inherent in plant cell walls. It's a polymer of sugar too, and cooked it ends up absorbed as carbs. So, what, your great hope for GM crops is to produce a BS fantasy bread? You might as well wish for the lembas bread from LOTR or Dwarven war bread from Discworld then.

Basically, please, while there is a case to be made for GM crops, that kind of uninformed regurgitating talking points and making stuff up simply isn't it.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Moraelin]

Just to make it clear what one aspect of those super-weeds is: if you're a farmer that doesn't use GM crops, if those spread to your field, then the weeds are much more resistant to herbicides than the actual crops. Your choice to plant anything else than what at least has the same genes just went down the drain right there. I don't think it's entirely fair to force that kind of a situation upon anyone.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[agnosticnixie]

That and let's face it, at the level of awareness we're at, most species' genomes are pretty fucking close.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

+1 Speaks the truth!

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[YeeHaW_Jelte]

"It's completely ridiculous that they can't give GM crops to starving people because protestors, that aren't starving, think it's better to let the people starve than give them more viable crops that offer more nutrients than other crops, which aren't even being offered, would."

Yeah right, because that's the real reason GM crops aren't feeding starving people.

Most people are malnurished or starving because THEY HAVE NO MONEY TO PAY FOR FOOD.

And ... Monsanto and other GM companies ARE IN IT FOR THE MONEY.

I'll leave it as an exercise to you to finish the sum and to conclude if GM is an answer to starvation.

Sorry for shouting, Thank you for your attention.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[agnosticnixie]

How will a company that makes people rebuy seeds every year, makes a pesticide that kills everything else, and sues the pants off farmers whose fields get pollinized by the monsanto seeds help feed starving people who can't afford that shit anyway?

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[value_added]

I don't need "lactose free milk"

Indeed. I suspect my milk is getting fussy being surrounded Monsanto's genetically-engineered, artificially-flavoured soy products. Or as Lewis Black put it,

There's no such thing as soy milk. It's soy juice. But they couldn't sell soy juice, so they called it soy milk. Because anytime you say soy juice, you actually... start to gag. Know how come I know there's no such thing as soy milk? Because there's no soy titty, is there?

Milk. Straight from the tit.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

"4. I don't remember Monsanto giving any starving people any crops. Would be nice if they were that charitable, but they aren't. On the contrary the crops they sell are sterile, so you have to buy another truckload of seeds next year. So basically you'll have to do better than that if you want to paint the GM guys as the knights in shiny armour and the protesters as some kind of villains."

Except that if the crops were not sterile they would spread a lot more easily. So basically in your world it is impossible for the GM guys to ever be anything but the villains and the protesters to ever be anything but the knights in shiny armor.

Which is a good reason not to even discuss with you.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[agnosticnixie]

If they were not sterile Monsanto would remain villains because they've shown what happens when pollinization happens: "OMG OUR IP" and sue the already half broke farmers of the region.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please figure out a way to make carb free bread that doesn't suck.

It's called lettuce.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[locofungus]

At least in Europe, this is really Monsanto's problem. The fact is that "the people" have spoken and the vast majority have decided that they'd rather pay more than eat GM food. The majority of people don't want it, so the shops won't sell it, so the farmers won't grow it. There isn't a step in that chain that wouldn't jump at GM if they thought it would increase their profits and they could get away with it.

There isn't a restaurant in the UK that doesn't have a sign "We do not knowingly use GM ingredients". Quite frankly, if they could be sure to not use them accidentally then there would instead be a sign "We do not use GM ingredients".

It's somewhat refreshing that, for once, "the people" have chosen a path that I want to follow. My concern about GM foods isn't that they couldn't be safer, or even better, than non-GM foods but that the drive to GM is being driven by the search for profit.

BP was drilling in the Gulf in the quest for profit. It made the choices it made because it felt at the time that they had the best return on investment. It doesn't really matter whether they were criminally negligent, too laissez-faire, or just unlucky, the results are the same. There's no reason to suppose that a similar scale of accident couldn't happen with GM crops.

Corporations have too much power and too little interest in "doing the right thing". They have as little regard for their host, the human race, as the malaria parasite has for its host.

Tim.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Just to make it clear what one aspect of those super-weeds is: if you're a farmer that doesn't use GM crops, if those spread to your field, then the weeds are much more resistant to herbicides than the actual crops. Your choice to plant anything else than what at least has the same genes just went down the drain right there. I don't think it's entirely fair to force that kind of a situation upon anyone.

I sense a heavy class action lawsuit brewing just over the horizon.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

I can see that one solution is to make the few farmers these countries have be more efficient in producing grain with GM crops...

Not really. Every time every one of these so called primitive third world countries gets Western Aid to modernize their agriculture the citizens of these countries always suffer. They often get kicked off of their land (i.e. in historical Britain this was referred to as the enclosure movement), for example, and their food consumption drops precipitously because most of the food grown on these Westernized farms gets exported to the West and the money gets put into the pockets of government politicians and corporate executives.

I remember once reading (a couple of decades ago) that some (IIRC) Mexican peasants celebrated because their government stopped receiving financial aide because of an economic recession that was happening in the market economies of the industrialized world. Things only got better for them without this corporate government assistance.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you understand how stupid you're being?

You're asking Monsanto to prove a negative.

This is alike asking you, as a scientist, to prove that God does NOT exists: you can't.

I'm not a scientist just an average software developer. But you're being as stupid as any fundamentalist Christian. You're rejecting new concepts for the sake of it being different than what you think and you disregard logic in your twisted way of negating reality.

And to make me sad, you're modded to +5 Insightful :/

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

And even if you converted grain to have an oily seed instead of starchy ones (though you probably wouldn't want to eat that kind of "bread" anyway), there's the issue of the cellulose inherent in plant cell walls. It's a polymer of sugar too, and cooked it ends up absorbed as carbs.

Actually, neither cooking nor our digestion can break down cellulose into simple sugars that our body could use. Unless you are a ruminate (,me insensitive clod!) or member of one of the invertebrate species that are able to digest cellulose, it just goes right out on the other side of your digestive tract mostly unchanged. We sometimes eat food high in cellulose content because fiber is beneficial for our bowels, but it hardly (or not at all) provide us humans any energy for our metabolism.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[zippthorne]

I saw a product labeled "carb free pasta" at the market the other day, and couldn't help but wonder, what's in it?!

People will eat anything if you call it a {thing x}-free version of something they like.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[instagib]

Health problems are often subtle, and frequently masquerade as something else.

So true. In that context, take the hyped health benefits of margarine as just one example of how selectively quoted studies and misused statistics made millions of people eat happily cancerogenic transfats for decades. If you read about this issue, you'll find that our knowledge of the metabolism is still limited, but it doesn't stop the food industry to push their products as healthy. So in the case of GM foods, those proclaiming that they are harmless or even beneficial don't have the slightest clue about the long term effects.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[RockyPersaud]

I used to think it was whining too, until I suddenly became allergic or sensitive to everything I like to eat. I won't deny there are fear-mongers out there, but the fact is that people develop allergies to all sorts of things, and not knowing whether the protein that someone is are allergic to from one nut or grain is present in a completely different food could cost someone their life. Probably already has, but we'll never know. What if the cause of your diabetes is just that sort of a situation?

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[h4rm0ny]

You're asking Monsanto to prove a negative.

Asking them to prove something can never ever in all of time and space be harmful to us? No, they can't do that. But don't take your principle to extremes. It's perfectly reasonable to ask for neutral and thorough trials before millions of people start consuming something daily.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[dkleinsc]

Because their governments are far from brilliant, but we're not making it easy for those governments either.

I'm going to disagree with that point, for a couple of reasons:
1. The governments of many if not most third world countries are in an impossible position of being in debt well beyond their ability to pay for it. Even worse, that debt is in a foreign currency (usually US dollars), so they can't devalue their currency to pay for it. The usual effect of this is that the International Monetary Fund basically controls any government action that involves the economy.

2. Governments of third world countries that take too aggressive a stance against first-world multinational corporations tend to get overthrown. In Latin America, the US has historically made sure of that, while in Africa the European colonial powers generally handled it. The unusual thing about Latin America's crop of socialist-leaning leaders (Chavez, Lula, Morales, etc) is not that they exist but that they've been allowed to retain power.

So it's not that the governments are stupid, it's that the governments are generally speaking subject to the whims of other countries and interests.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[listentoreason]

Being a scientist, I would ask for the tests that show GM products to have a low risk of causing harm to the human body.

Could you clarify how these tests would not be a proof of the null hypothesis? How do you define "low"? I share your distrust of corporations, but asking every product to demonstrate that it's never harmful is obviously impossible. "Low risk" is going to be subjective; more helpful would be, say, the number of people in a study, the time followed, a difference in overall mortality and the statistical significance of that difference. I think most people would agree that GM foods are not dramatically harmful (eg drops of life expectancy by decades), so presumably to have the statistical power to detect "low risks" we're talking about a large (100s? 1000s?), long (years? 10s of years?) controlled (don't get to eat what you want) study. People tend not to sign up for those, so if that is your level of comfort you're probably just asking GM products to be shelved. I recognize that is a request/demand for many people.

The same issue can be applied to many other technological concerns; cell phone radiation, high voltage power lines, plasticizers, etc. Some of those have been addressed by epidemiology (eg HV lines / transformers), and some have shown statistical risk in animal models (bisphenol A). You have requested human data, though, and as mentioned above I don't think you can get adequately powered controlled groups of people for food consumption like you can for power lines or transformers, where you can at least segregate groups by proximity to EM fields at the place of residence. If you have a specific substance you suspect of causing harm, you can try to correlate presence of the substance to risk (for example, with, bisphenol A). If you could find a distinct chemical marker related to the GM product (ie a substance that remains in the human long enough to be sampled), then I think you could do a nicely powered study for even reasonably low risk. It's not clear what this correlating substance would be, though; I don't think the transgene, in either DNA, RNA or protein form, would be detectable in a human consuming the food.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[TFAFalcon]

Are they sterile in the way of not producing pollen or do other plants polenated by them not producing any seeds? If it's case 2 then it could cause quite a few problems for neighboring farmers.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

crop of socialist-leaning leaders (Chavez, Lula, Morales, etc) is not that they exist but that they've been allowed to retain power.
About Chavez, you know he spent time in prison in the 80's b/c of an attempted coup right? Also he tried to retain power by removing the restrictions on how long the president could serve, so yeah Chavez isn't a friend of democracy by any stretch of the imagination. Stop watching Oliver Stone films and read a book.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

It was a referendum to remove term limits, not to make it so the president can remain forever in office until he decides to step down for an election.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[FriendlyLurker]

The fact is that "the people" have spoken and the vast majority have decided that they'd rather pay more than eat GM food. The majority of people don't want it, so the shops won't sell it, so the farmers won't grow it.

Too bad it has not played out that way in Australia. There they have deviously turned the tables: you have to pay to be certified GM Free as apposed to labeling GM food clearly.

In Australia, multiple surveys have shown that while 45% of the public will accept GM foods, some 93% demand genetically modified foods be labelled as such. Labelling legislation has been introduced and rejected several times since 1996 on the grounds of "restraint of trade" due to the cost of labelling. The controversy erupted again in 2009 when Graincorp, the nations largest grain handler, announced it would mix GM Canola with its unmodified grain. Traditional growers, who largely rely on GM-free markets, have been told they will now need to pay to have their produce certified GM free.

Woe to be an Aussie wishing to avoid GM food.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[c6gunner]

Third world countries are starving because we 1. destroy their local farmers' economy by dumping free food on them

*sigh*

This is why the anti-capitalism/anti-west side is always impossible to please. There's another guy a few comments higher up claiming that there should be no starvation because we make so much food. Now here you are claiming that starvation happens because we give them free food. Right. No matter what we do, we're bad, they're innocent, and it's all our fault.

Just get off the computer and go watch Avatar or something ...

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why on earth do you need a carb-free bread? Unless you are allergic, just manage your eating habits in a normal way.

Why on earth do you need running water? Just manage your water habits and get a bucket.

Hippie nonsense - we have big brains, lets use them to make our life better...

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Calinous]

I've seen cholesterol-free sunflower oil. It surely must be better than regular sunflower oil too.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[DMiax]

I am not asking to prove a negative. Probabilities can be bounded from above with some testing. And if there is a totally new effect that no one could imagine, well that is life and science. But if there is something we can discover now then it is our duty to try before we commit ourselves.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[dkleinsc]

I didn't Chavez was any variety of "good guy", just that he was socialist-leaning, and that historically at least socialist-leaning governments in Latin America have been overthrown by the United States (frequently by the CIA, but the Marines have also been used for this purpose). This wasn't even a reference to the Venezuelan coup attempt - read about how Batista came to power in Cuba, how Pinochet took over Chile, how the Panama canal zone was created, or the political history of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, and Haiti.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[DMiax]

1. You quote me asking for low risk, then accuse me of asking to prove it is never harmful. Don't misrepresent my words, please.

2. How much risk? What about a good study with probability estimates and everyone can decide, or ask his/her preferred physician for an opinion?

3. It seems that you actually suggest to use paying customers as guinea pigs because testing is difficult. I must be misunderstanding, but if this is the case: will they pay sorely, should the product be proven harmful?

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

As a non-obese diet caffeine free soda drinker

That's an odd way to describe yourself, it implies you are overweight. And just because the soda is diet and caffeine-free, doesn't mean it isn't bad for you.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Zouden]

Not really; Monsanto didn't force farmers to use more Roundup - they just made it easier for them to do so. That widespread use of Roundup has led to the appearance of Roundup-resistant weeds, in the same way that indiscriminate use of antibiotics led to antibiotic-resistant bacteria. You can't sue the antibiotic companies because their products created MRSA, and Monsanto isn't directly responsible for the rise of Roundup-resistant weeds.

They still deserve the blame, however, since they directly profited from the scenario they created, but it'll come back to bite them soon - when all weeds are Roundup-resistant, they won't be able to sell Roundup, nor Roundup Ready crops.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[delinear]

"The best way to find the problems is to put it into mass use." - exactly the same kind of sentiment that led us to radioactive consumer items, including toothpaste, hair cream, food and even radioactive snake oil. The "problems" are self evident to us with the benefit of hindsight, back then it probably sounded like a great idea.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[s122604]

Like diabetes, eh?
Any reasonable evidence to back that up?, i.e. data that shows that a diet with GM based foods will cause diabetes, where the equivalent diet, with non-GM based food, would not?
I find that really hard to believe given that something like HFCS is defined at the molecular level, and is not going to be any different sourced from GM or non-GM

Or is that one of those special Fox News "I can make any kind of unsupported BS assertion I want, as long as I phrase it in the form of a question" type statement.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

The latest results show that of the three "round up ready" corn strains tested -yes already in the food chain- all three do cause liver and kidney damage!

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[delinear]

Unfortunately this isn't like, say, cigarettes, where we can easily deal with the consequences if they turn out to be harmful later (ultimately if we banned all cigarette production tomorrow, the consequences of the producers denying knowledge of the effects would not be too long lived in the grand scheme of things). With GM food, there's no way to easily turn back the tide. Once this stuff gets out into the wild it could literally change the face of the planet - even if the companies behind it get sued into oblivion, how do you reverse the effects on nature? And I say this as someone who isn't even vehemently opposed to GM food if it's done right, but when profit is the main motivation, things are rarely done right.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[radtea]

BP was drilling in the Gulf in the quest for profit. It made the choices it made because it felt at the time that they had the best return on investment...

...given the protection the people who constitute BP get from the nanny state under the Companies Act and its descendents from personal liability for their actions.

This is the thing libertarians don't get: corporations only exist due to the special status they get by dint of government interference in the free market.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

You're wasting your breath. GP probably believes drugs companies are donating tons of free medicine to poor third world countries, too. Some people clearly do buy marketing and PR spin, either because they're too lazy to look for the truth or it suits their conscience to believe that's the way things are while they're enjoying the luxuries of a western lifestyle.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Myopic]

Hmmm. Well, genetically engineered food is almost indistinguishable from conventional food (which is also genetically modified), so as a scientist the evidence suggests that the effects would be almost indistinguishable as well.

It is an extraordinary claim to say that genetically engineered food would be harmful, so really we would need extraordinary evidence for that. I know of none, and would be surprised to learn of a pathway by which engineered food could affect a body differently than conventional food. What could that pathway be? I can't think of any.

Similarly, although it is possible that the position of planets in the sky foretells the futures of individual humans, I just can't imagine the pathway for that effect, so I reject it until shown extraordinary evidence.

That's how a scientist thinks.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Myopic]

3. Legal liability attaches when a person knows or should have known of the harm. So, they would pay dearly if they cover up evidence, or willfully ignore an obvious problem. Otherwise, no, that's not how our legal system works.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[CaptSaltyJack]

It's very unlikely that it is worse than the stuff people willingly expose themselves to - drugs, alcohol, sugar, fried foods, etc. Hell even vegetables can be bad for you. As a non-obese diet caffeine free soda drinker in his early thirties that has recently found out he is diabetic I can tell you that damn near everything you could want to eat seems to be cursed.

If you knew how to eat properly, you wouldn't have these problems and you most certainly would not have adult diabetes. And please clue me in on which vegetables are bad for you, I'd love to hear about that.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[DMiax]

Definitely an informative comment, thank you.

A governmental survey is pretty much the best solution for introduction of new technologies... (of course a different test must be carried for any mutation!)

The intent is clear and complete and the list of assessments is definitely reassuring.

The only thing that rings a bell is that the submitter is only required to provide data. I suspect that the evaluators would be better served with samples. Unfortunately the governments do not have the money to run the tests and have to trust the producers for the results...

Finally, I do not appreciate being called luddite when I am just concerned about health. We introduced many dangerous technologies in the past without adequate testing... learning from mistakes seems wise to me.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Do YOU understand how stupid you're being?

"I would ask for the tests that show GM products to have a low risk of causing harm to the human body." is not the same as asking them to prove that there are *no* ill effects. They key word in the sentence is "risk". Which can be measured as a probability. Which is a statistic. Which can be measured, er, statistically, through statistical tests.

Given appropriate tests with a large enough population over sufficient time with no systemic bias it should be possible to show within reason that there are no ill effects.

What is "large enough" or "long enough" is the important factor. I suspect the people who drank radium water or used it to paint their teeth or licked brushes to paint clocks found no problems for the first 5, 10 or 20 years. Then their jaws fell off.

I suspect that you are not an "just an average developer" but, in fact, a *below* average software developer given YOUR lack of understanding of 1) statistical methodology and 2) what constitutes proving a negative.

I very much doubt that there is anything wrong with GM food, but if one is seeking to (metaphorically) shove it down the throats of the entire population one had better be damn sure, to the best of ones statistical reckoning, that it's not poison.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Rich0]

That seems fair, as long as farmers have to show the same proof to plant any other crop.

I'm not aware of any evidence that shows that natural corn doesn't have negative health effects. Sure, people have been eating it for centuries, but for all we know maybe that's why we don't live to the age of 150.

I'm generally fine with taking an evidence-based approach to health, but we're holding GM foods to a standard that no other food product in the world could stand up to. More traditional foods are grandfathered in as safe merely because they are traditional.

Just look at all the controversy in the diet world - it exists because these kinds of questions are very difficult to actually answer via controlled studies. If you could lock up people in cages for 50 years and feed them controlled diets you might be able to get somewhere, but that seems a bit unethical in my book.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Rich0]

BP was drilling in the Gulf in the quest for profit. It made the choices it made because it felt at the time that they had the best return on investment.

Uh, I hate to break it to you, but just about everybody is on a quest for profit. Why is it that you do something that pays you for a living rather than sit around and create artwork and beg for food? Why is it that missionaries devote their lives feeding the poor rather than doing something like polluting the earth which would be spiritually unprofitable? Whether motivated by dollars or the afterlife, most people do whatever it is that they think will get them (or their kids, or at least their ideological offspring) ahead in the end.

And hey, if their parents weren't so good at doing the same things, they wouldn't be around to be doing it themselves. So, it obviously has something going for it...

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Philip Morris must be quaking in his boots!

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[h4rr4r]

By removing the restrictions you mean he used democracy to hold a referendum and let the populace vote?

Oh noes, he was in jail, our founding fathers were traitors.

He might be a huge asshole, he is, and a royal pain, but if they want him out they can vote him out or have another coup. Either way the USA needs to stay out of it.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[Myopic]

Yeah. PM paid out a bunch of money for exactly that reason -- hiding and ignoring evidence. Liability attached.

Re:Please give me GM everything.

[ChromeAeonium]

Here are some. Now, is there any credible (key word) evidence that GMOs do cause harm? And if so, why? What is the causative agent, the novel protein produced in the GMO, but not in the conventional crop? What is the chemical pathway taken to produce that compound? What is the genetic reason for it being produced like that? Why does it only happen in man made GMOs, and not in natural, uncontrolled horizontal gene transfers? Not a single one of those very critical questions have been answered for a single commercially approved crop by the any of the anti-GMO guys. There's something to be said for requiring something be shown reasonably safe, but there's also something to be said for perpetual goalpost shifting (one more study and a few more years!) requiring that a negative be proven (prove they aren't dangerous) and falsifiability (prove that they will never ever, via any presently unknown mechanisms, be dangerous).

Would you prefer "irrational"?

[QuantumG]

Genetically modified foods are just foods. There's nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops. Unless you're going into the woodlands and picking wild berries for breakfast you're eating unnatural food. Welcome to the modern world.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Richard_at_work]

Also, the people decrying the lack of long term studies about the safety of GM quietly ignore (or are ignorant of) the fact that thousands of new artificial drugs enter medical and over-the-counter usage every year without long term studies.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[agnosticnixie]

*citation needed*
I decry both.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

lol good random introduction of the naturalist fallacy. Strawman though; no-one even mentioned "natural". But yeah direct manipulation at the level of the genome is just the same as selective breeding. Not. You may as well say what's the problem with nuclear power we've been burning wood for years.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Kijori]

There's an important difference between genetic modification and selective breeding, though: selective breeding causes gradual change. Genetic modification is like doing selective breeding without the hundreds of years of gradual testing through eating and planting, and as such it carries much more chance of unintended consequences. That's why there needs to be regulation of GM food - in order to create the possibility of new, improved crops you're removing the natural oversight, and it needs to be replaced by something comparable.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[izomiac]

Exactly. Modern crops have been artificially selected for over 10,000 years and bear little resemblance to their ancestors. Strangely enough, the leading causes of death are related to diet... Eating unaltered food is probably a good idea, but it's not like modern agriculture grows anything like that, GMO or not.

Heck, most genetic engineering methods (e.g. tranduction) can occur naturally, and probably have given the time-frame, so it's not like this is unprecedented. The primary difference being that a scientist is guiding it, rather than several generations of farmers waiting for it to happen randomly. Plus the farmer only has appearance and taste to go off of.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[agnosticnixie]

There is a huge difference between ten thousand years and ten thousand hours; for one, in these ten thousand years, we had a lot of time to do trial and error and figure out what was a bad idea or not. Some of the earliest plants cultivated had horrible effects on the health of people because they're basically empty calories, and only appeared widespread in a few small regions before mostly disappearing. At least until the 20th century.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

You might want to do some reading on how GM foods came into being. Naturally selecting crops is far different than the GMO process. To create a "round-up ready" crop, they had to introduce a virus to get the cells to accept genetic material that they would naturally reject. There is no possible way that the GMO seeds could naturally occur even after a million generations.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Richard_at_work]

Why is a citation needed? Its quite plain to see the lack of protesting against new drugs coming to market, compared to the protesting against GM food.

Does anyone else feel 'citation needed' is becoming overused? Most usage of it these days comes across as 'I don't agree with what you are saying, but I cannot answer your points so I will just try and create doubt on them by pushing the requirement for further validation back on the original poster'.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[LurkerXXX]

When you go into a pharmacy and get a prescription filled, or buy something off the rack, you know for a fact you are buying a drug which may have unknown long term effects.

When you go into a grocery store and buy a few ears of corn, you have absolutely no idea if you are buying stuff which has been genetically engineered to produce some insect/mold killing drug may have unknown long term effects.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[stonewallred]

Replying to an AC, how low I have fallen. You fucktarded idiot. Given enough space, time and labor, you could breed a plant to eat round-up as a fertilizer. Look into the various bacteria that have become immune, through exposure and breeding, to many antibiotics. GM merely cuts massive amounts of time from the equation. Marijuana is another good example of heavily altered plants, using selective breeding to achieve desired results, which could have been done in a few generations using gene modification.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

It also cuts massive amounts of testing in the equation.
That means bugs, unforeseen bugs, and more bugs, idiot.
But hey, I mean, Chernobyl sure got built fast!

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Richard_at_work]

How is this different to pesticide use, feed use, treatments, preparations et al? You aren't told about any of those either.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[cbope]

Please get a clue, genetically modified crops are NOT the same as selectively bred crops.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[zippthorne]

To be fair, you can't do a full life-span study of *anything* in a time period shorter than a typical life-span, which means you'll forgo the benefits of things with few short-term side-effects for generations before releasing them to the general public if you demand to know all the long-term effects first.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[internic]

Genetically modified foods are just foods. There's nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops.

I used to take exactly the same view, but having thought about it a bit more I've realized it's a little silly for essentially two reasons. 1) The selective breeding that was used throughout most of human history introduces changes relatively slowly and involves either selecting out a subset of the crops you're already using that have desirable characteristics or cross-breeding with other crops that you're already using for food. So you're talking about a process that will lead to small changes over a series of growing seasons, which larger changes only being accomplished over a much larger timescale. Because the process is slow and usually involves selecting traits for things you can already eat*, there is a fair degree of safety automatically built in. Modern techniques of genetic engineering allow one to make significant changes to the genome of a plant over a comparatively very short timescale, and one can add in genetic material from a totally different sort of organism that may well not be a human food source at all. As such, there is a far greater risk of introducing significant harmful effects.

To emphasize the point that very different genetic material can be added, it seems that in some cases genetic material is added to produce toxins that act as an insecticide. I believe that Bt-corn is one such example. I presume that this compound is known to be safe (in reasonable concentrations) to humans, yet my point is that adding in genes from non-food sources for the production of insecticidal compounds it considerably different than, say, selectively breeding corn with bigger sweeter kernels.

Understand, I share your frustration with anti-science Luddites who assume that "natural" means good and "chemicals" are bad. I also think it's silly that people don't understand the level to which our modern food crops are a human creation (resulting in things like "the atheist's nightmare" video). I believe these things should be examined through a rational discussion based on scientific evidence. I don't think genetically modified organisms are generically a bad thing, but I do think that saying that directly injecting foreign genetic material into the genome is no different than selective breeding is disingenuous, and doesn't help us have a rational fact-based discussion of the merits of GM crops. Personally, I'm far less concerned about the health implications and far more concerned about the ecological impact, which I think is both harder to predict and harder to control.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Ltap]

"Other people do stupid things, so it's okay for us to do stupid things as well."
Fixed.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Richard_at_work]

Sorry but your post breaks, not fixes, my post.

Its called consistency, and lack of it damages credibility - why the fixation on GM by the anti-GM people when the same thing is going on in other markets? This isn't about 'other' people being stupid, its about the same group of people in both cases. Selective protesting. Selective interest. Selective ignorance.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[drinkypoo]

Genetically modified foods are just foods.

Foods which may kill you, like the 20th-generation toxic corn.

There's nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops.

That is an extremely foolish thing to say, you clearly didn't even think about this. We started selectively breeding crops when we started eating plants. You pick the best examples because they're easiest to find, and their seeds are propagated over a broader area as a result. All animals that eat plants in a way that makes them capable of carrying seed or pollen (which covers nearly all examples) selectively breed crops. What's unnatural about that again? Stuff like grafting onto different root stock is unnatural. Selective breeding was going on before we were here, yet on the very same basis.

Unless you're going into the woodlands and picking wild berries for breakfast you're eating unnatural food.

Even that is a ridiculous thing to say because there is no such thing as natural or untainted any more. There is no such thing as organic gardening/farming, you WILL have contamination from the world's energy consumption and toxics production on any crops grown outside. Of course, there are certainly degrees; less contamination is better, so "organically grown" food is still generally superior in this regard. And further, it IS generally nutritionally superior, not as an inherent result of the way it is grown but because different varieties are generally used, ones not designed for shipment but for consumption.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[drinkypoo]

Also, the people decrying the lack of long term studies about the safety of GM quietly ignore (or are ignorant of) the fact that thousands of new artificial drugs enter medical and over-the-counter usage every year without long term studies.

Which people are those? I decry both. Your statement, it appears, is false. Let us now visit a grandchild comment:

Its called consistency, and lack of it damages credibility - why the fixation on GM by the anti-GM people when the same thing is going on in other markets? This isn't about 'other' people being stupid, its about the same group of people in both cases. Selective protesting. Selective interest. Selective ignorance.

So because people are aware of GMO food failures but not those regarding prescription drugs, they are hypocrites of some sort? If someone doesn't know everything, that damages their credibility? Logical fallacy time. You are demonstrating a personal bias.

Hmm, here's another of your comments which does the same:

When you go into a grocery store and buy a few ears of corn, you have absolutely no idea if you are buying stuff which has been genetically engineered to produce some insect/mold killing drug may have unknown long term effects.

How is this different to pesticide use, feed use, treatments, preparations et al? You aren't told about any of those either.

That is not at all true, you are either uninformed or disingenuous. All of that is covered by the organic label, as diluted as it may have become since the USDA took over the word. Except for preparation of meat, which is covered by other logos (notably "Kosher".) So we are indeed able to avoid pesticides, artificial feed supplements, etc etc by simply looking for a logo, which indeed is administered by the US Gov't. And further, if you're not satisfied with that, there are other more reputable organic certifications than USDA, like Oregon Tilth. We are indeed able to legally place these logos on our food. However, due to lobbying by Monsanto, any dairy product which tells you it does not include rBGH/rBST must carry a completely dishonest notice about not being able to detect differences in milk from cows treated with it even though this is not true. Now Monsanto wants us to be prevented from finding out if there are any GM ingredients; indeed, they would like GM products to be certifiable as organic, though this abuses both the original spirit (which the USDA handily abuses regularly) AND the current letter of organic standards.

I don't know why you have such a hard-on for GMO foods, but perhaps it's because you're mistaken about them in every way.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[betterunixthanunix]

However they do bear an eerie similarity to hybridization techniques that have been used for a long time now. Selecting traits from wild species in a particular region to produce domesticated species better adapted to that region is nothing new; the traditional way to do it is to create hybrids, then select for offspring that retain the wild trait in question and as much of the domestic traits as possible. After a few generations, you will have crops containing precisely the trait you were interested in.

The difference with modern genetic modification is that we can pull in traits from species that are not very closely related to our crops. Of course, in modern times we know the risks of invasive species and introducing foreign genetics into the wild (a side effect of growing foreign crops), so we really have no excuse for this sort of thing.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[izomiac]

Given the prevalence of diabetes, hypertension, and atherosclerosis, I don't think we've quite cleared the "error" part of "trail and error"... GMOs might be better or they might be worse, but we really ought to given them a trial. As far as public health is concerned, the only thing worse than our current diet is our sedentary lifestyle.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree totally and touches on the thing that really annoys me: this is is prime case of dumbing down an issue to make it easily digestible by Mr Everyday.

Arguing against GM crops is completely ignorant. GM how? Everything we eat has been modified either via selective or cross breeding to some extent to make them viable as a profit making exercise (ie wastage due to disease or other natural issues is reduced to a point where it is worth even growing them).

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Genetically modified foods are just foods. There's nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops. Unless you're going into the woodlands and picking wild berries for breakfast you're eating unnatural food. Welcome to the modern world.

What you say makes absolutely no sense. Can you explain to me how this is moderated +5 Insightful?

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[sam_nead]

Your post was interesting, but I think there is an important point lurking in your sentence "The selective breeding that was used throughout most of human history introduces changes relatively slowly".

Here "slowly" is the critical word. Human history is very long compared to the modern era (20,000 years versus 200) but not so long on an evolutionary time scale. We are omnivores and "supposed" to eat a wide range of foods. According to Jared Diamond's "Guns, germs and steel" the advent of agriculture caused a _decline_ in average height and life expectancy which we have only recently recovered from.

It is very hard to decide what a "good" diet is -- it really depends on what "good" means to you. In particular, a food (say, bread) with a 20,000 year history should not get a free pass. A food with a 20 year history (say, twinkes) should be viewed with extreme suspicion.

If you haven't read them already, let me recommend to you Michael Pollen's earlier books, especially "The Botany of Desire".

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[internic]

the people decrying the lack of long term studies about the safety of GM quietly ignore (or are ignorant of) the fact that thousands of new artificial drugs enter medical and over-the-counter usage every year without long term studies.

Besides any unknown deleterious side-effects, most drugs have well known undesirable side-effects (well, drugs that actually work anyway, as I've tried to explain to people who trumpet homeopathic remedies for their lack of side-effects). There is still a rational basis for taking a medication, however, when the problem it treats is worse than the side-effects. For many prescription drugs, weighing these factors is a significant part of a doctor's job (whether they do that job correctly is a different issue). It's true that many drugs are approved without study of their long term effects, but this is because with medicine there's always an ethical dilemma: If you approve a drug too soon, you may be exposing patients to unknown side-effects (or giving them a drug that doesn't actually work); however, if you wait too long you may be denying patients medicine that would help them.

Now, you might argue that some similar ethical dilemma exists for GM crops in cases where you believe their introduction could alleviate malnutrition in developing nations, but in developed nations where food availability is not a big problem there is no such calculation. Where medicine is hopefully only taken by a small proportion of the population who needs it (often under the supervision of a doctor), GM crops could be introduced into the food chain of a large proportion of the population on a relatively short time-scale. If one were to make an analogy to medicine, it would be like telling all patients across the country to start taking a new drug, which treats something that can easily go without treatment, which would be unwise and probably unethical.

Now, there is in fact a balance to be struck (assuming that GM crops, in fact, offer benefits) between caution in introducing a new technology and it's potential benefits. If you subtract out the people screaming about "chemicals" and "frankenfoods", I think you can find a rational debate about whether this balance is being properly struck, and indeed a similar debate does exist in medicine. It's just that in medicine the factors counter-balancing caution are much more compelling, so the balance must be struck differently. That's why it's sort of comparing apples and oranges.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[agnosticnixie]

Bread is actually only about 3000-4000 years old. But I agree on the rest, some of the food we've been growing forever is absolutely horrible for sustaining humanity, like manioc, which was actually abandoned for thousands of years in many places. The plant produces mostly empty calories.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[sam_nead]

"We started selectively breeding crops when we started eating plants"

I'm going to disagree with this. There is a huge difference (in terms of time scale) between co-evolution and agriculture/selective breeding.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[h4rm0ny]

When I have time to address all of the worlds problems at once, I'll let you know.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[h4rm0ny]

Also, genetic tinkering can and has crossed the species barrier. We have crops now with genes in them from caterpillars. Ever tried breeding a cereal crop and a caterpillar? Good luck!

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[agnosticnixie]

We started selectively breeding crops when we started eating plants.

No, it took centuries and millenias for agriculture to show up, and then it took centuries to get to extensive agriculture. Then some forms of selection happened, thousands of years after we "started" eating plants.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[c]

> Genetically modified foods are just foods. There's
> nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops.

For many things like flavour, size, colour, pest/pesticide resistance and whatnot, I'd have to agree that direct genetic manipulation is just a shortcut for selective breeding. Of course, taking shortcuts does mean less time to analyze side-effects like cross-pollination with other crops, but that doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the safety and quality of the crop as a food.

However, it is profoundly unnatural to selectively breed crops which are intended to be reproductive dead-ends, which pretty much covers anything with Monsanto's terminator genes. That's just a flat out opposite of how life works. The viability of life is largely defined by its ability to reproduce, and in that sense Monsanto is deliberately producing non-viable lifeforms.

I can't imagine how you'd see that as "natural".

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

It must be nice to be able to divide everything in the world into simple categories like natural/unnatural, good/bad. No pesky subtleties, no annoying parsing of mitigating factors or exceptions.

Your mistake is in suggesting there's no difference between a pocket saw, a chain saw, and an industrial tractor mounted tree cutter, they're all saws right? So we can generalize that one is the same as the other and we can safely give a chain saw to our 12 year old while we're out camping because no one's ever been seriously injured using a saw on a pocket knife.

Selective breeding results in minor, isolated changes and requires many plant generations to get somewhere useful most of the time. Genetic engineering allows substantial changes within single generations, changes that can be brought in from entirely different species or even kingdoms. Selective breeding and genetic engineering are both artificial change yes, but you are a fool if you really think they are the same thing and carry the same risks.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[drinkypoo]

You pick the best examples because they're easiest to find, and their seeds are propagated over a broader area as a result. All animals that eat plants in a way that makes them capable of carrying seed or pollen (which covers nearly all examples) selectively breed crops.

No, it took centuries and millenias for agriculture to show up, and then it took centuries to get to extensive agriculture. Then some forms of selection happened, thousands of years after we "started" eating plants.

You have just failed your CTBS reading comprehension test. Report to elementary school immediately. Hint: selection does not require agriculture. Thanks for playing, though.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[molo]

Produce is labeled "conventional" or "organic" (no chemical pesticides) where I shop. Meat is labeled "growth-hormone free, antibiotic-free" or "grass fed". All labeling does is provide that same kind of information for GMO or non-GMO foods. Why would you be opposed to that?

-molo

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ssh, you. Stay away with your "science". We only welcome "scientists" in threads about climate change. This thread is "conspiracy theorists only".

The GM industry is bad, m'kay, because of Mon$atan and their iron control of all media. DON'T YOU SEE! WE ARE BEING LIED TO! The lizard men are putting mind control viruses in our food!

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[internic]

Yes, "slow" is of course relative. I was speaking of selective breeding being slow compared to the time scales on which long term health effects might manifest in individuals. Certainly it is fast compared to evolutionary time scales, and just because we've been eating something for a few hundred or thousand years doesn't necessarily mean we're well adapted to eating that thing. Actually, I wouldn't even assume that the diet that an organism has eaten in its recent evolutionary history is necessarily the optimal food for it to eat. It might only have been the optimal food available in its particular ecological niche. Logically, it's possible that we could even develop a food that is better for us than any occurring in nature but which could not survive well in nature (the latter is already true of many food crops).

As far as deciding what a good diet is, I think we can pick out many things that have been eaten enough for us to say they are unlikely to kill you in the short term and are unlikely to cause a drastic decline in health in the long term, but when it come to more subtle effects (e.g., 10% increased chance of [health problem] later in life) we're probably mostly in the dark. The problem is that even foods with a long history of use mostly only have anecdotal evidence to back them, not the sort of controlled quantitative analysis that will discover subtle health effects.

Personally, I don't actually worry too much about all this. Mostly I guess it's that without much evidence to go on there's not much point worrying. The best advice I've heard can be summed up in two words, "variety and moderation". If one assumes that at least most traditionally used food sources don't have horrible problems and that most of the effects are cumulative, then a significantly varied diet should be a pretty good way to avoid any really bad pitfalls.

If you haven't read them already, let me recommend to you Michael Pollen's earlier books, especially "The Botany of Desire".

I've flipped through one or two of his books at the store, but there was a lot of stuff about the (nutritional) importance of locally grown food and so on that struck me as nothing more than faddish and pseudoscientific. My overall impression was that he rightly points out we don't know much about nutrition, but then he improperly concludes that then we should adopt some sort of intuitive notions about how to eat that are even less well supported. Maybe my impression was wrong, but I decided to skip the book because nothing irks me more than knee-jerk Luddite thinking.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Subura]

Correction. Genetically Modified foods are just Copyrighted foods.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Genetic modification is like doing selective breeding without the hundreds of years of gradual testing through eating and planting, and as such it carries much more chance of unintended consequences.

Making drugs from basic chemicals is like doing pharmacy without the hundreds of years of gradual testing through extracting aspirin from tree bark, and as such it carries much more chance of unintended consequences.

Making electric cars is like doing automotive engineering without the decades of gradual testing of the internal combustion engine, and as such it carries much more chance of unintended consequences.

Making electric cars is like doing automotive engineering without the decades of gradual testing of the internal combustion engine, and as such it carries much more chance of unintended consequences.

etc.

Sometimes you don't have hundreds of years. Pesticides and antibiotics have increased the carrying capacity of the planet by well over a billion people, simply by making sure that food grown for human consumption is eaten by humans - not bugs and germs. That happened in decades, not centuries, and there was no testing. (Even our mistakes aren't that bad. DDT's probably not worth the risk in North America, but the ban on it has caused a surge in malaria that's killed millions.) You wanna undo that mistake? Fine, you sit by and watch a billion people starve to death for the sake of your misguided ideology.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wiseass. Selective breeding has been done for thousands of years and we know exactly how it works. If we on the other hand fuck with genes, there's no telling what will happen. It's also a bit hard to selectively breed, say corn with bacteria, yet that's exactly what biotech companies are now doing with genes. Frankenfood indeed.

I also dislike when people think the word "natural" means "good" but please don't muddy the waters in this thread about the monster monsanto.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[delinear]

The difference is, if the drugs turn out to be harmful, we just don't produce them any more. Sure they might do damage, that's a calculated risk where we have some control over the consequences. Alternatively, if I claimed I'd developed a chemical, one drop of which added to any of the earth's oceans would render all water safe to drink, but I can't prove that there's zero chance of it poisoning all drinking water on the planet, we might just want to do some thorough testing, preferably led by someone with no profit motivation, before deploying something that is almost impossible to reverse.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[delinear]

I certainly remember people holding protests against (at the very least) pesticides and feed uses (notably BSD, being in the UK), and there are always calls for more clear labelling. Maybe that wasn't as successful (remember, a lot of those practices were put in place before the internet was popular, where you had to be really determined to seek out other like-minded people, or even to find out information about said practices), but it's no reason for people not to try again with GM if it's what they believe. On the flip side, there's nothing preventing these incredibly rich companies from trying to change people's minds, the fact that they're struggling to do that even with their deep pockets is telling in itself about how strongly people feel on this issue.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[zzyzyx]

It's natural in the sense that it is a process that naturally and spontaneously occurs, only steered in one direction or another by human interaction. On the other hand, introducing bacterial or insect genes in plants is NOT something that occurs naturally at all.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Myopic]

Moreover, it is unethical to do many such studies. What are we going to do, take some babies and feed them nothing but GM corn all their life, and other babies only organic corn?

It's clever when people demand studies before a policy is implemented, when those studies are either technically or ethically impossible. Actually, it's not clever, it's just stupid. It's even stupider when they do it without realizing it.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Myopic]

Oh, gosh, your grocer doesn't say whether the cows are fed KOSHER grass? I only eat KOSHER-fed beef, but it's so hard to find that label.

Also, I only drink water drawn from wells deeper than 70 feet, because I think it's healthier. But gosh, I almost never see on the label how deep the well was.

Another thing, when I bought my house it didn't come with a statement of whether tall people or short people laid the cement in my driveway. I hate short people, so I want to make sure my driveway was poured by people at least 5'11".

My point is that some labels are reasonable, some are ridiculous. At this point, I think a GM label might be just barely reasonable, only because so many people want it, not because there is any plausible distinction to be made. I hope that the next decade or two puts this issue completely to rest, at which point a GM label will go from just barely reasonable to woo-woo crazy.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Myopic]

Both breeding and genetic manipulation cause changes to genes. Those are different scales of the same effect.

Burning wood combusts chemical bonds, whereas nuclear energy breaks nuclear bonds. Those are the same scale of completely different things.

I see the analogy, sort of, but I don't think it's a strong way to support your point.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[delinear]

Of course, I meant BSE - sorry, having a "mad cow" moment.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[tophermeyer]

But if you are buying your goods in a store rather than growing them yourself, you know that you do not know where that food item come from. Rationally, you should assume that any food good bought in a story may have unknown long term effects, simply by nature of the fact that you have no knowledge of the process. If there are specific known risks than the producer/seller ethically should alert the buyer, but the buyer must also put some consideration into the source of their food.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you realize that in the last few decades the amount of genetic diversity that is available for selective breeding has been exhausted to the point that most breeding programs now use extreme mutagenesis to produce the required diversity. This is compounded by the fact that when selected traits are introduced even the 6-7 rounds of backcrossing that follow will not get rid of a number of other genes that have been transferred together with the gene having a desirable trait. Those other genes could potentially have much higher deleterious effect than any positive effect from the gene of interest. Compare that to direct modification where only one gene is introduced. As an analogy you can have a surgery on your eye done with a laser scalpel (GM) or with an axe (selective breeding). Which one would you choose?

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Anonymous Coward]

A laser scalpel doesn't risk switching on a gene we had no idea does what in this combination.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[TheSync]

yet my point is that adding in genes from non-food sources for the production of insecticidal compounds it considerably different than, say, selectively breeding corn with bigger sweeter kernels.

There are plenty of "natural" genes for insecticides as well, such as psoralen, found in the common Fig, celery, and parsley.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[sjames]

When you go into a pharmacy and get a prescription filled, or buy something off the rack, you know for a fact you are buying a drug which may have unknown long term effects.

Personally, I try to stick with drugs that have a long history of safe use rather than the new ones that have no track record. Fortunately, that's easy enough to do since they have to tell me what's in it.

As you say, I don't get the same opportunity with food since there is no label to indicate the use of GM techniques or what was added to the plant as a result.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[sjames]

There is a lot of consumer demand there as well. I'm not sure how you have managed to completely miss the whole thing about "organic food". Much of that is due to consumer demand to avoid the various unknown treatments and pesticides.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[SleazyRidr]

Bingo, you saved me some typing.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Pentium100]

On the other hand, one of the first nuclear power plants in Russia, operated for almost 60 years without blowing up. So, this means that this model is the only one that is safe enough.

Too bad it's only 6MW and probably much less efficient than newer versions, but at least we know, that if we used technology available in 1951 and built a power plant like that now, it would work for 60 years, assuming we did not start using such stupid things like computer control (software is always buggy), video cameras that provide the crane operator (who loads the fuel) with clear image of what he is doing (hey, radiation can affect cameras in weird ways), instead using a 50cm thick glass window.

Since a newer version of that reactor was RBMK, we know that trying to improve older technologies will always end in disasters.

Hmm... my PC is flaky again, I think one of the relays in the FPU has failed, I'll just grab a spare and replace it, oh and while I'm at it, I'll add some coal to the furnace, I don't want to run out of power, restarting a steam engine can be a long process.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[molo]

Some things are not worth the risk to me. You may have a different perspective, but why should you prevent labeling that would allow others to make informed decisions?

-molo

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Myopic]

You might not have quite understood my post, where I said that I would support labeling, not because the thing being labeled is meaningful, but because a sufficient number of people think it is. Even if I'm not one of them, many people want that label, and since it's not unduly difficult to have, we should have it. In the future, I would hope that people would stop caring about the label, because they come to my position on GM crops, and thus the label would no longer be needed.

So, I should not prevent labeling, and I don't and wouldn't.

Label away. Three cheers for informed decisions.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Ltap]

Who knows? Maybe it's simply a more important issue. When people buy something, they have a chance to research it (buyer beware). With GM/GE foods, you could buy it without knowing, indirectly funding Monsanto's activities.

Our food and water supplies are far more critical than our drug supply.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[ChromeAeonium]

Actually, we can't really do things like taste too well right now. It's a bit too complex. Also, look at heirloom, triploid, and seedless crops. One has had all variability bred out, one is sterile, and one doesn't produce seed. Not the same, but in principle, close. And of course, terminators, their merit aside, are only one small facet of genetic engineering.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[internic]

Note:

one can add in genetic material from a totally different sort of organism that may well not be a human food source

As far as I can tell, the one I'm referring to does not normally exist in significant concentrations within human food sources.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[PinkyGigglebrain]

Selective breeding would never be able to add genes from a Brazil nut to soybeans.

But they GM'ed Genes from a Brazil nut into a soybean, and created a soybean that could kill someone violently allergic to Brazil nuts. Never made it to market but you should keep in mind that many of the GM'ed plants are being engineered with toxins to keep bug from eating them, toxins that are not very good for humans either. Sure the levels are so low that its safe, of course that is what they said about things like DDT and Agent Orange.

The issue is two fold, first, information about what foods are GM'ed or not is being kept from the public so they can't make informed free choices. Second, there is insufficient, peer reviewed, unbiased research into what the effects of GM'ed plants/foods are. There are already situations of the Roundup Ready gene jumping to other related plants, monarch butterfly caterpillars having a 50% mortality rate when eating milkweed dusted with pollen from corn GM'ed to include Bt toxin.

More research is needed, but until that research shows solid evidence of the safety or danger of GM'ed foods then people should be able to choose whether or not they eat them. But firms like Monsanto actively block efforts to label foods and perform research, which makes me wonder why. After all, if they have nothing to hide they have nothing to fear.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[Richard_at_work]

Ahh looks like the affliction has also spread to the Troll moderation option.

Re:Would you prefer "irrational"?

[sam_nead]

I don't see Pollen as a Luddite but more as a person urging caution about the most modern of food choices, say corn syrup and twinkies. Anyway, I found him to be an interesting, accessible, writer.

Millions Against Monsanto

[mim]

Why Monsanto is Evil... http://www.organicconsumers.org/monlink.cfm

Re:NaturalNews talks a lot about this stuff

[Anonymous Coward]

that would be the same naturalnews that have such a firm grasp on the concept of medicine then..

For example their wonderful views on MMR http://www.naturalnews.com/025596_vaccines_immune_system_doctors.html

Re:GET A CLUE

[DMiax]

He did not do genetic engineering. Stop clouding the issue. It is complicated enough when discussed rationally.

Re:NaturalNews talks a lot about this stuff

[HungryHobo]

wow.
That disease mongering engine has to have come from the church of Scientology.

2 words for Monsanto...

[cbope]

Fuck. You.

There is probably no more evil company on the planet. It's got nothing to do with so-called GM foods, but rather their business model based on blackmail and coercion. They are destroying what's left of America's agriculture industry and trying to spread their influence into other countries as well. If they are not stopped they will have a complete and utter monopoly over our food supply from the fields to the table.

I refuse to buy any product known to have come into contact with anything related to Monsanto.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Anonymous Coward]

If I had mod points, I'd mod the parent up. The scam here is that Monsanto sells genetically modified seeds which are able to grow in the presence of Roundup, the pesticide that they also produce and sell -- after which nothing else except their seeds will grow in that area of ground anymore. Their required agreement to obtain the seeds includes not keeping/stockpiling any seeds for following seasons, thus mandating that you re-buy THEIR seeds every year, which are EXPENSIVE. This is putting Indian crop producers out of business and causing them to commit suicide, as they are going into debt buying Monsanto seeds and unable to grow anything else afterwards. Then if some of the crop goes airborne and grows in an adjacent field, Monsanto sues that plantation for patent infringement even though they weren't even involved in choosing to grow GMO crops. It's a vicous cycle that shows no end in sight. It's ridiculous.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[slyguy135]

[citation needed], otherwise it just looks like extreme FUD to a neutral observer, e.g. me.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[will_die]

The only thing ridiculous is your ignorance of science.
There is nothing in glyphosate that will stick around beyond a very short period or leech itself into the ground and modify it future non-glyphosate protected seeds will no grow.
Please show some scientic info that even hints at soil being modified by glyphosate protected seeds so they will not grow other seeds.
You do more damage to the soil for a longer time by using vinegar based herbicides then you do with round-up and glyphosate

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Bob9113]

There is probably no more evil company on the planet.

I was recently discussing Monsanto with a friend of mine. It went a little like this:

Me: They actually sued farmers whose crops got pollinated by Monsanto crops.

Him: And they modify their corn to not reproduce.

Me: Well, yeah, but suing farmers for getting pollinated is really evil. It's virtually a protection racket -- buy our corn, pay us. Don't buy our corn, get hauled into court.

Him: Yes. But making our food not capable of reproducing could end the human race.

Me: Hmmm, I see your point.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[freedumb2000]

You must be referring to terminator seeds. This technology is actually on hold and not being used, which is a bad thing IMHO. This could have effectively prevented cross-pollination with regular plants. They way things are now, it is entirely possibly that all plant life will be GMO contaminated at some point.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[jeff4747]

So....farmers are idiots? They're willingly purchasing their own destruction?

Btw, the 'Monsanto sued me for wind pollinating my crops!' farmer was lying...or the wind managed to blow sacks of Monsanto seed into his barn.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Demonantis]

http://www.foodincmovie.com/. I think I remember watching it covered on that documentary. It is stupid how little attention this issue gets and then Monsanto manages to get their own shill on BBC. Plus, you(not to single you out though) prove that many people are still not informed about how this company does business. A lot of people here hates software patents. I definitely think this IP is worse.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Rayonic]

Wait, so if the corn isn't capable of reproducing, then how would it spread over the globe in some kind of apocalyptic way? And no, not all farmers will adopt it. And yes, genetic backups of original crops are kept by Monsanto and other organizations.

Also, I would think anti-GM people would be against GM crops cross-pollinating with other crops. Because of random mixing of genes and what not. It is possible to keep crops segregated so they don't cross-pollinate, you know. (Or they could buy the sterile variety.)

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Tim C]

There is probably no more evil company on the planet.

I can think of one that is certainly in the running.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

Or Monsanto has people tossing their seeds into everyone's farms.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, you only need to use the [citation needed] meme when there's not a veritable mountain of information readily available on your search engine of choice, otherwise you don't look uninformed, you look lazy.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Myopic]

Agreed. Fuck Monsanto.

But I think you'll starve if you try very hard to avoid Monsanto-tainted food.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[berbo]

And it gets worse. Weeds are becoming resistant to Roundup.

And then Monsanto will sell you stronger (more dangerous) herbicides. Along with new GM seeds that are resistant to these new, more dangerous herbicides.

And on and on and on...

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. I am a farmer and you are sure wrong. Monsanto makes sure to keep their crop just slightly cheaper than using more chemicals/tillage to control the same weed problem. (It is literally only a couple bucks per acre cheaper). If it didn't have a net benefit, we would plant a traditional variety instead.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[slyguy135]

I am lazy :) http://everything2.com/title/A+good+programmer+is+a+lazy+programmer

Anyway, I did look up the Monsanto article on wikipedia (more laziness). The Indian suicide claims have been debunked by the International Food Policy Research Institute. Hence, FUD.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Anonymous Coward]

Him: Yes. But making our food not capable of reproducing could end the human race.

Me: Hmmm, I see your point.

Them: But we're assured high profits for the next quarter and big bonuses for all the execs.

Us: Just as long as we get the Low Price Always.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[TheSync]

They are destroying what's left of America's agriculture industry and trying to spread their influence into other countries as well.

"The level of U.S. farm output in 2008 was 158 percent above its level in 1948, growing at an average annual rate of 1.58 percent." Source

It doesn't look too destroyed to me...perhaps you should use facts rather than feelings in your posts.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[SleazyRidr]

Makes me think, what if the neighbor was contaminated with the terminator crops? Would they be sued in addition to not having any corn to grow next year?

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm with the general sentiment here against the IP shenanigans going on.

But to me cross breeding = crude GM. I don't understand the fear over GM as a tool. It's not magic. It's just like cross breeding but with highly targeted goals in mind. Cross breeding and transporting crops to non-native locations has just as many unintended consequences.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[ChromeAeonium]

That's about the size of it. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I believe they are working on a new type that is pollen sterile so that no cross pollination take place to begin with (could be wrong here though, I don't know much about that particular trait) and what are called 'traitor seeds' where the seeds will not grow without an application of a certain chemical. This is one of those things that really highlight how it is not about the properties of the GMOs themselves, but the fact that they are GMO. The issue that many of the anti-GMO crowd have with GMOs, once you rebut the nonsense and get down to the nitty gritty, is simply that they were made with biotechnology, not for any really rational reason. It's basically just an appeal to nature.

Also, needing to buy new seeds every year is nothing new. Farmers have been doing that since hybrids from seed companies came on the seen in the early 1900s, so the claim that GMOs mean you can't safe seed is not very relevant (some people, however, even encourage people to save their GMO seeds). There is something to be said for saving seed if you have a backyard heirloom garden like I do, but if you want to get the most out of your plants, that increasingly means some sort of GMO, and that is hopefully going to mean some sort of safeguard against genes escaping into the wild. I mean, I haven't heard a whole lot about how much that actually happens in practice, but still, it is something to keep in mind, because the ecology of GMOs is easily the most scientifically complex and controversial aspect of them because you must weight the danger posed to escaped genes with the benefits they provide and damage they can prevent.

Re:2 words for Monsanto...

[DwySteve]

Wait, so if the corn isn't capable of reproducing, then how would it spread over the globe in some kind of apocalyptic way?

Well, it's not apocalyptic, but if you planned on saving seed from your crop (which is a poor poor practice for western farmers, but I digress) and your crop gets pollinated by something with the terminator gene (very possible - it all just flies on the wind as far as the wind will take it) then next year your crop doesn't grow and you have to re-buy your seed stock. If there were enough terminator-including crops around then its possible that you couldn't successfully save seed ever and you'd have to buy it all - possibly contributing to a monoculture of plants that may all get wiped out by a disease.

Of course, if that happened to me I'd go to court with Monsanto, prove I actively attempted to cull their worthless half-breed seed out of my stock and failed, show monetary damage that wasn't covered by crop insurance and force them to pay me because they robbed me of value with their seed. You might win. Hint: the farmers who lose against Monsanto usually try to retain the GMO lines that accidentally breed their corn. It's a bit suspicious when your corn has strong GMO sequences in it 3 years after everyone around you stopped planting that strain...

One more thing: with corn at least the only reliable way to ensure that you don't cross-pollinate with anything else is to manually remove the tassles. By hand. In July. No one does that for non-seed crops (no one really saves seed either BTW).

I think its a worrying trend

[Chrisq]

I think its a worrying trend when a company attempts to have people who don't like their product as suffering from a psychiatric disorder. The corporate masters of Western society are using the same techniques as the Soviet Government. What's next, compulsory treatment of people who avoid certain foods? I know that all they probably have in mind mow is having their detractors classed as mentally unstable, but if that becomes generally accepted what will the next step be?

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[equex]

Oh, the next step is mandatory vaccinations against all sorts of bullshit, like swineflu/birdflu. Oh, and Tamiflu is an anti-viral drug, not a vaccine just so you know. Be sure to tell them that when they strap you to a chair so they can ram it in you. Rumsfeld has major stakes in the flu business. That alone should make you realize what kind of powers we are dealing with.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[Trepidity]

I don't think it's quite that. Even the summary admitted that "the DSM item refers to something completely different".

I'm not quite sure what the cause of it is, but there is an odd prevalence in mainly white, upper-class, liberal-ish areas of strangely heightened food allergies, with many people being supposedly allergic to two or three things that would otherwise be quite rarely found at all, much less together. Maybe there's a scientific reason that there are so many more food allergies among upper-class white residents of San Francisco than among lower-middle-class black residents of Atlanta, but it's at least possible that the reason is psychosomatic.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[Totenglocke]

Wow, way to do a very bad job of reading the summary (let alone RTFA). Monsanto is NOT trying to label people who are picky eaters as having a psychiatric disorder, it's a group of Psychiatrists who are wanting to label picky eaters as having a disorder.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[Chrisq]

Oh, the next step is mandatory vaccinations against all sorts of bullshit, like swineflu/birdflu. Oh, and Tamiflu is an anti-viral drug, not a vaccine just so you know. Be sure to tell them that when they strap you to a chair so they can ram it in you. Rumsfeld has major stakes in the flu business. That alone should make you realize what kind of powers we are dealing with.

Patient: But doctor I don't tink this injection is really necessary!
Doctor: Don't worry we have another injection that will cure you of that delusion.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[drinkypoo]

Maybe there's a scientific reason that there are so many more food allergies among upper-class white residents of San Francisco than among lower-middle-class black residents of Atlanta, but it's at least possible that the reason is psychosomatic.

Probably they've always been allergic to those foods, but it's only if you have time to sit around and wonder how you got that rash that you discover that you're allergic to cilantro, or whatever. In the ghetto you're too busy trying to get some money together to buy some cereal and if you're lucky some milk to think about whether you've got a dairy allergy.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[jeff4747]

IMO, those white, upper-class yuppies are hyper-protective of their offspring, and make sure to use the latest anti-bacterial, 'dye-free', '100% pure' products to make sure their spawn never is exposed to anything dangerous. As a result, their spawn's immune system goes bonkers when exposed to safe things because it's rarely had to fight off even a cold.

On the other hand, those lower-middle-class residents of Atlanta can't afford to go crazy protecting their kids from phantom threats. So they get the sniffles occasionally, and end up with healthy immune systems.

Re:I think its a worrying trend

[delinear]

Is it not equally likely that poorer communities have more immediate health and social concerns, or even that they can't afford the health costs (even where health care is free or they have insurance, they might not be able to afford the time off work, etc) to investigate relatively minor health problems to the same degree as people in more affluent countries/states/communities? Look at how disorders such as dyslexia, until recently relatively unknown, have become much more widely diagnosed as education and quality of life have improved - there's no suggestion that it's any more widespread than it was in the days of mass illiteracy, just a hell of a lot easier to spot with the change in lifestyle.

what risks are we talking about ?

[Moabz]

Eating those crops _might_ not pose a health risk, you might not die from it. This can be and will be proven again and again, but that's not the issue.
Allowing a company like Monsanto muscle itself into the world food business by IP protected crops, that's the real illness that we must protect ourselves from.
There is so much evidence that Monsanto is a dirty company, anyone who eats there GM stuff must be a Microsoft fan boy.

This Mr. Jones is on the scientific advisory board of Mendel Biotech, which states on their own web page: "Mendel's most important customer and collaborator for our technology business is Monsanto".

Re:what risks are we talking about ?

[TubeSteak]

This Mr. Jones is on the scientific advisory board of Mendel Biotech, which states on their own web page: "Mendel's most important customer and collaborator for our technology business is Monsanto".

The lack of proper disclosure on tv news/opinion shows is a serious and ongoing problem.
And it doesn't seem to be fixing itself.

The FCC already regulates various kinds of disclosures,
maybe they need to step in and create some rules for the talking heads.

Re:GET A CLUE

[agnosticnixie]

A) Mendel did not do engineering, he did experimentations on crossbreeding
B) He also did not then patent the genome of wheat or peas so that all german farmers would have to buy their seeds from his monastery, their fertilizer from his monastery, and their insecticides from his monastery, while suing people who would accidentally get his seeds through natural pollinization.
Die, shill

Superweeds

[idji]

what about superweeds that are now glyphosate resistant and mirid bug plagues in Northern China because they haven't been using pesticides on their bollworm killing GM-Cotton from Monsanto. Nothing is as simple as Monsanto wants you to believe. We are only now seeing the effects of decades of use of this stuff.

Re:Superweeds

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice try, except that the most terrible world you could reach where ALL weeds are glyphosate resistant would be no worse than the world before glyphosate came onto the market. The deceptive and deceitful term 'superweeds' has been manufactured to give the impression that glyphosate produces a form of "Superman"-like weeds - when in reality, the only difference between a superweed and a non-superweed is that the former is glyphosate resistant (and therefore eliminates the benefit Monsanto provides, taking the food supply to a pre-Monsanto state) and the latter isn't.

Also, your 'mirid bug plagues' link specifies that the rise in mirid bugs is due to the REDUCTION in pre-Monsanto "Kill-Everything" pesticides and REDUCED amounts of spraying: "Before switching to GM cotton, farmers used more broad-spectrum insecticides to kill bollworms and other pests. But as more farmers began growing Bt cotton, their use of sprays declined, leading to a steady rise in pests, including mirid bugs." In terms of toxicity, it could be interesting to compare the toxicity of chemicals used by Chinese farmers before to what is used now.

The problem with the 'complex world' view is that, as you say, nothing is as simple as Monsanto wants you to believe - but in a complex world there always, regardless of the circumstances, is plenty of material for the ignorant to spread FUD based on, as you so eminently show here.

Re:Superweeds

[ChromeAeonium]

Everyone knew the superweeds would come, if that surprises you you must not be following this field too closely. There are only two different types of herbicide resistant GMOs out there (Round-Up Ready and Starlink). When you keep spraying the same thing like that, just like antibiotic resistance, resistant weeds will emerge, and hamper the benefits those GMOs have been providing. Even Monsanto predicted that. As for the mirid bugs, another way of putting that is that GMOs allow for a more diverse insect population. They sprayed less insecticides, so an opportunistic non-target insect attacked (China is working on a new GMO that will also target mirid I think). You're right, it isn't always simple, but no one (Monsanto's marketing team aside) is making it out to be. If anyone is oversimplifying, is is the 'All GMOs are bad' crowd.

Re:Superweeds

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep...Mother Nature is hard to fool (or fool with). http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/051015_superweed and: http://www.france24.com/en/20090418-superweed-explosion-threatens-monsanto-heartlands-genetically-modified-US-crops

Re:Superweeds

[pbhj]

http://www.poptel.org.uk/panap/pest/pe-gly.htm appears to be a pretty good review of papers concerning potential harmful effects (and lack of expected harmful effects) across all areas of the ecosystem due to glyphosate use.

Excerpts:

"Cancer:

There is still considerable controversy over the carcinogenic potential of glyphosate. The conclusion generally reached by regulators is that glyphosate, and glyphosate-containing products, are not carcinogenic to humans. IPCS has concluded that "bioassays in mice and rats did not indicate that technical glyphosate was carcinogenic". It discounted a study that it said constituted evidence of cancer because a more recent study, at higher doses, did not show the same effect. (IPCS ,1994)

The US EPA has concluded that glyphosate is probably not carcinogenic to humans. However, this was based on the results of three studies which showed a variety of carcinogenic effects, all of which were considered not statistically significant: [...]"

[...]

"Water

Glyphosate is moderately persistent in water and not removed by normal drinking water processing. It is more likely to occur in surface waters than groundwaters. Glyphosate is soluble in water, but resistant to hydrolysis. It moves from water into sediment or suspended particles with a half-life ranging from a few days to 91 days. After a year, 0.1ppm of glyphosate was still found in the sediment of a farm pond. Glyphosate was calculated to have a half-life of 120 days in sediment. (Agriculture Canada 1991; IPCS, 1994; US EPA, 1993)

Glyphosate has been found in surface waters in Canada and in ground waters in the Netherlands and USA. One study detected glyphosate in a watershed 4 months after application. (Edwards et al., 1980; Frank, 1990; IPCS, 1994; US EPA, 1992) "

"Residues in food

Glyphosate and its metabolite AMPA are translocated throughout plant tissue, residues are unlikely to be completely removed from produce by washing, peeling or removing the outer leaves. Minimal breakdown of glyphosate occurs in plant tissue and pre-harvest use can result in significant levels of residues; in grains they are not destroyed by milling and much of it remains in the bran. Baking does not remove these residues. Residues in malting barley are transferred to beer. Use of glyphosate on forage and animal feed can result in residues in the kidneys, meat, milk and eggs. Residues are stable for up to one year in plant materials and in water, and two years in animal products, in storage. In the wild, residues of glyphosate can persist for a long time (45mg/kg found in lichens 270 days after application). Sampling of wild berries after forest spraying operations showed that residues remained above 0.1ppm for at least 61 days. (Roy et al 1989; Agriculture Canada 1991; IPCS 1994; US EPA 1993)"

A Bad Seed

[Anonymous Coward]

Mon$anto is a Bad Seed Plain and Simple

Most forums sensor the word Mon$anto so they can avoid trouble and not get sued!

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[TheKidWho]

What? I'm sorry but you're argument makes no sense...

Without GM foods the world would be starving right now.

We should probably ban computers too, yah know to prevent a robot revolution from occurring.

While we're at it, let's stop working on nano tech, it could potentially result in a grey goo scenario.

Hell, why are we letting people work on medical technology? It's only going to result in overpopulation and exacerbate the situation between the Haves and the Have-Nots.

debunked?

[1u3hr]

Point by point Jones regurgitates the same pro-GM arguments debunked numerous times all over the net for years, while serving up some stale half facts too.

I'm afraid that "debunked numerous times all over the net" isn't a persuasive argument. Any nutcase can claim to "debunk" anything, and many do. You can find many self-proclaimed "debunkers" of climate change, evolution, the Holocaust, Obama's nationality ... anything. Having a bunch of bloggers attacking a topic doesn't have a damn thing to do with how scientifically accurate an idea is. Why didn't this guy actually cite some SCIENTIFIC refutations instead of a scaremongering blog?

Personally I think that Monsanto has some pretty evil business practices, but as for health effects to consumers, I have no problem. I don't believe Monsanto could cover up evidence of that if they tried. There are already a lot of unpleasant things in food -- pesticides, rat droppings, steroids, antibiotics, radioactives, etc, etc. As much in "organic" foods as anything else. Not to say these are fine, but that there are no perfectly pure and healthy foods if you examine them in microscopic detail. You have to measure and set a limit; but zero is just impossible. The real world is imperfect.

Re:debunked?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't believe Monsanto could cover up evidence of that if they tried

Type "Monsanto Cover up" into Google. Seems they have plenty of experience at doing exactly that.

Re:debunked?

[blackbeak]

I'm afraid that "debunked numerous times all over the net" isn't a persuasive argument....Why didn't this guy actually cite some SCIENTIFIC refutations instead of a scaremongering blog?

Because I believe the refutations to be common knowledge at this point. It is in no way obscure, and we're not covering any new ground here. My post is aimed at the already (at least partially) informed regarding the known problems of GM foods, and I merely intended to point out this particular sly propaganda method used to forward the onslaught of "Frankenfood." GM food has not had the rigorous quality independent testing it should receive before being allowed to dominate the world market. Instead companies, primarily Monsanto, invade the regulatory apparatus and weaken it so proper testing can be circumvented and competition otherwise weakened.

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

I merely intended to point out this particular sly propaganda method used to forward the onslaught of "Frankenfood."

The message you send with your "sly" style of fact-free innuendo and loaded terms like "Frankenfood" is that you're pretty good on the propaganda front yourself.

And again, I do see serious problems with the business practices of Monsanto. I'm no shill for them.

Because I believe the refutations to be common knowledge at this point. It is in no way obscure, and we're not covering any new ground here.

It's common knowledge that some people are afraid of GM foods. I haven't heard any sensible reason myself. Too bad you can't be bothered to explain your reasoning.

My post is aimed at the already (at least partially) informed regarding the known problems of GM foods,

So , if I don't agree with you, I'm just uninformed?

Screw you.

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

Type "Monsanto Cover up" into Google. Seems they have plenty of experience at doing exactly that.

Odd then that the FDA seems unaware of this. Maybe they need to learn how to use this "Google" to do their job.

Re:debunked?

[Joey Vegetables]

Many countries with high rates of consumption of HFCS and corn in general also have high rates of obesity, metabolic syndrome, and related problems. This alone doesn't prove causation, but, in conjunction with other studies which do implicate at least HFCS as causative through various mechanisms (leptin suppression, contamination with mercury, bioaccumulation of the enzymes used to produce it, etc.), I believe significant caution is in order. We don't know what effect Monsanto's genes have on us, or on the environment. They may be harmless, but we do not know that. Even if we did not know that its "business" practices are extortionate if not genocidal, there would still be sufficient reason for caution. Factor in this knowledge, and I think it makes sense to avoid their crap at least until such time as all the evidence is out and sufficiently studied, which I do realize could take years or even decades.

Re:debunked?

[ChromeAeonium]

Actually, the thing that showed up on /. a while back alleging organ damage from GMOs is what was debunked. The people who 'debunk' the 'myth' that genetic engineering doesn't give you [insert disease here] are usually the same people who, in their next post, wax about the virtues of homeopathy. As far as science is concerned, no horticulturist or biologist I've ever met could find a shred of evidence that GMOs posses any health risks. Plenty suggesting otherwise though. People claim that Monsanto is covering up all the proof that GMOs are dangerous. Conspiracies are not an arguments, they're a denialism tactic, an ultimate defense against evidence. What, I'm supposed to believe that Monsanto is bribing off the vast majority of relevant horticulturists, botanists, agronomists, microbiologists, geneticists, zoologists, ect in the UK, France, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Switzerland, Israel, Egypt, South Africa, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zeland, Mexico, Canada, Brazil, ect.? Bullshit. Heck, scientists in Iran and China, the last places an American company is going to take over, have developed their own strains of GMO.

Really, I'm sad to see tripe like this on Slashdot. Anti-vaccine=anti-science. Anti-GW=anti-science. Anti-evolution=anti-science. Anti-Genetic engineering=oh so enlightened and wise. I can't believe that so many people have fallen for the agricultural equivalent of vaccine denialism. It's a little disheartening.

And sure, let's be fair, there's always the possibility that a GMO could be harmful. Here's one that was. But that does not imply that they are all harmful. In that case, they found the compound, the harm's causative agent, that was potentially harmful, the chemical pathways that produced that protein, they found the problem, and moved on. How many anti-GMO cranks can name a single causative agent for harm in an commercial GMO? Zero. Never happened. Not once. So, they fall back on vague appeals to long term health, although never say when we will have enough proof for them. Sound familiar? Like people who only want 'one more' transitional fossil? You can make these vague claims about anything, I could claim that the smallpox vaccine has some sort of crazy complex intergenerational side effect that will kill us all in a few years, and you can't disprove that (ain't non falsifiability grand?), but we have no evidence to suggest that is the case. Same with GMOs. I can't disprove that they'll kill us all, but that burden of proof doesn't rest on me. It is like saying that pork should be banned until we know that it won't cause eternal damnation. It's not a very rational position.

We really need to do for science based agriculture what was done for other areas that skeptics espouse, like science based medicine. Sure, Monsanto can be pricks, but I don't care if the CEO eats a bowl of kittens for breakfast everyday, that says nothing of the science behind GMOs, and one company does not own an entire branch of science. More people need to learn about the science, not the weaselly fearmongering you see from NGOs like the Union of Concerned Scientists [sic] or Greenpeace or the Organic Consumer's Union. The actual scientists have done the research, the evidence is in, GMOs are safe, they are effective, and they are the next big thing in agriculture. We need more people to be more aware, more scientifically literate, less magically thinking, about plant science, and to me as a one who studies horticultural, seeing so many poeple, on this site o

Re:debunked?

[blackbeak]

I merely intended to point out this particular sly propaganda method used to forward the onslaught of "Frankenfood."

The message you send with your "sly" style of fact-free innuendo and loaded terms like "Frankenfood" is that you're pretty good on the propaganda front yourself.

I'll take that as a compliment!

... Because I believe the refutations to be common knowledge at this point. It is in no way obscure, and we're not covering any new ground here.

Just reading through the Slashdot community's comments proves my point - educated people are aware of the issues already.

It's common knowledge that some people are afraid of GM foods. I haven't heard any sensible reason myself. Too bad you can't be bothered to explain your reasoning.

... So , if I don't agree with you, I'm just uninformed?

It's possible you could be better informed. Try this: http://www.sgr.org.uk/GenEng/CaseAgainstGMcrops.html

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

Many countries with high rates of consumption of HFCS and corn in general also have high rates of obesity, metabolic syndrome, and related problems.

So? What has that to do with whether the corn is GM or not?

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

It's possible you could be better informed. Try this: http://www.sgr.org.uk/GenEng/CaseAgainstGMcrops.html

"The GM industry assures us that their products are safe to eat. Yet there is very little evidence to confirm such statements. Clearly, the millions of people in the United States who are unknowingly eating GM food (there is no labelling and hence no choice) are not dying in droves. Nevertheless, it is possible that more subtle deterioration in health is taking place."

That's the best y0u got? No proof at all that it's dangerous. Just darkly hinting at unknown long term harm and asking for an impossible degree of certainty that it is safe -- a criterion that NO FOOD AT ALL would pass. We can't live on distilled water and sunshine.

Thanks, I am better informed; now I'm pretty sure that the anti-GM activists are superstitious scaremongerers, whereas before I gave them the benefit of the doubt.

Re:debunked?

[Joey Vegetables]

Most of the corn in the U.S., one of the top nations in both categories, is GM.

Re:debunked?

[blackbeak]

Those millions of people in the United States are not exactly the healthiest group the world has known. I think it's a safe bet GM foodstuffs will eventually be shown to be part of the problem. If industry assurances and government regulatory agencies stacked with industry cronies satisfy you, you're living in a dreamworld not I.

I've posted a few links (amongst the comments here) that I had bookmarked some time ago, admittedly they may not be the best to back up the argument - but it's a start. I will provide better when time permits.

For now, how about these quotes from a PBS inquiry:

• "Today the vast majority of foods in supermarkets contain genetically modified substances whose effects on our health are unknown. As a medical doctor, I can assure you that no one in the medical profession would attempt to perform experiments on human subjects without their consent. Such conduct is illegal and unethical. Yet manufacturers of genetically altered foods are exposing us to one of the largest uncontrolled experiments in modern history." --Dr. Martha R. Herbert, pediatric neurologist
• "With genetic engineering, familiar foods could become metabolically dangerous or even toxic. Even if the transgene itself is not dangerous or toxic, it could upset complex biochemical networks and create new bioactive compounds or change the concentrations of those normally present. In addition, the properties in proteins may change in a new chemical environment because they may fold in new ways. Further, the potential toxic or carcinogenic effects could have substantial latency periods." --from The Need for Greater Regulation and Control of Genetic Engineering: A Statement by Scientists Concerned About Trends in the New Biotechnology
• "Lots and lots of people -- virtually the entire population -- could be exposed to genetically engineered foods, and yet we have only a handful of studies in the peer-reviewed literature addressing their safety. The question is, do we assume the technology is safe based on an argument that it's just a minor extension of traditional breeding, or do we prove it? The scientist in me wants to prove it's safe." --Dr. Margaret Mellon, director of the agricultural and biotechnology program, Union of Concerned Scientists

I wouldn't recommend giving Monsanto the benefit of the doubt when it comes to your best interests. Better to err on the side of public safety.

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

Most of the corn in the U.S., one of the top nations in both categories, is GM.

Is the corn syrup from this GM corn more toxic then "natural" corn? If not, what is your point?

Re:debunked?

[1u3hr]

Those millions of people in the United States are not exactly the healthiest group the world has known.

Of course, they're fat. They eat too much. And the US is the most litigous place on the planet, lawyers would be on this if there was a shred of proof that the food itself was toxic. (Well, more toxic than "ordinary" food. As all food is toxic in one way or another.)

I think it's a safe bet GM foodstuffs will eventually be shown to be part of the problem.

So you really do have nothing except unease to offer as proof.

Re:debunked?

[blackbeak]

I never made the claim that GM food is especially toxic, just that the claimed safety of it is unproven, that it is suspect and that it's being shoved down our throats with the aid of captured regulatory agencies. Of course it's highly doubtful someone will be immediately (acutely) poisoned by eating an ear of GMO corn, though over time there may well be significant immune system or organ damage that may or may not get traced to GM food. But I'll rise to the challenge and yet again further attempt to convince you to be more wary:

• http://www.soyinfo.com/haz/defects.shtml
• http://www.aaemonline.org/gmopost.html
• http://www.biolsci.org/v05p0706.htm
• http://news.discovery.com/earth/is-genetically-modified-corn-toxic.html
• http://www.i-sis.org.uk/GMFoodNightmareUnfolding.php
• http://www.responsibletechnology.org/utility/showArticle/?objectID=2989
• www.seedsofdeception.com/DocumentFiles/145.pdf
• http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13701
• http://uniorb.com/RCHECK/animalgm.htm
• http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1999/05/990521054837.htm
• http://www.informedleadership.org/
• http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tandf/bfsn/2009/00000049/00000002/art00005?crawler=true
• http://www.thiele-und-thiele-consult.de/science-review-letters/science-review_us/309_us.html

My original post is in support of those who prefer to wait and see before just swallowing everything companies like Monsanto offer. I find they have pretty valid reasons to be cautious, especially if their immune system is already compromised. If nothing in those links moves you to rethink your position I can't really help you.

Another Win for Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

It is well known that Monsanto is in bed with Microsoft, using a closed source, proprietary operating system (Windows) to do all their genetic modifications in an inherently inferior and insecure environment. Monsanto scientists sit in cramped cubicles, using Visual Studio to do all of their genetic modification, but even with Resharper installed it cannot come close to the power of even EMACS or VI on Linux.

So, where Monsanto to use a free, open source operating system (any flavour of Linux would do) to do their genetic modifications, they would gain access to powerful tools like EMACS and VI, and would immediately notice a surge in productivity. Plus, they could upload everything to GitHub where the public could inspect their code for bugs.

Debunked - by the farmers or by whom?

[Anonymous Coward]

You would think that the best people to 'debunk' whether GM food is better or not from a _farming_ and _volume_ perspective are the farmers who have decades of experience growing food, right?

As a shitton of farmers plant GM crops, seems it's a game set and match for their virtues in favour of the pro-GM crowd.

Of course, what is preferred by the _farmer_ says nothing about the _health_ effects - but eating genes in themselves is not a problem, like eating a tumor does not give you cancer.

Re:Debunked - by the farmers or by whom?

[delinear]

These would be the same farmers who fed brain stems from cattle to other cattle and gave the world mad cow disease? Yeah, I guess they're totally the best people to be the gatekeepers of our health and well-being and not at all profit motivated.

Re:Debunked - by the farmers or by whom?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're probably not the same farmers. And hey, you could take the profit motive out of farming and have the government take over.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh, the world *is* starving (third at least).
USA is the main users of GM foods, other parts of the world use much less. We would get by just fine without GM foods.

Bad Public Policy

[sqrt(2)]

These problems can nearly all be traced back to one thing: corn subsidies. We pay farmers to grow corn so intensively that it has become cheaper to chemically process corn into whatever food-like product we want than it is to grow real, healthy food. Our entire food chain is dependent on mass produced, cheap corn - but it doesn't have to be that way. Farms do not have to be operated on the factory model, and we don't have to sacrifice output to do things the right way, the sustainable way if good public policy decisions are made. We WOULD however be sacrificing profitability and efficiency and that's why market forces cannot be trusted to fix the problem, as the market will always tend towards higher profits regardless of the long term problems it causes. We need policy that will encourage small scale farming, and discourage the kinds of practices that we know are harmful to our health and the environment: chemically altered corn-derived ingredients like HFCS, use of hormones, over-use of chemical fertilizers and insecticides, feed lots, shipping food hundreds of miles to be sold. I'm thankful I can afford to buy healthy food, millions cannot and this is a tragedy worthy of the greatest of efforts to end.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[yyxx]

Quite right. Actually, the problem is food subsidies in general. In the US, corn subsidies are the big culprit, in Europe, it's milk and other products. Food subsidies in the US and Europe also keep other nations from developing a reasonable economy; if we stopped subsidizing food production in our countries, dropped import duties, and imported more from South America and Africa, those nations would actually have a chance to get out of poverty and develop decent, functioning economy. Instead, we send them "development aid", which simply gets misused as subsidies to our own corporations and disappears in corrupt governments and aid organizations.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[c6gunner]

We need policy that will encourage small scale farming, and discourage the kinds of practices that we know are harmful to our health and the environment: chemically altered corn-derived ingredients like HFCS, use of hormones, over-use of chemical fertilizers and insecticides, feed lots, shipping food hundreds of miles to be sold

Any citations? AFAIK small scale farming is more "harmful to our health and the environment" than any of the other things you've listed.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[dkleinsc]

The real kicker about corn subsidies is that while the real economic effect is to dramatically decrease the cost of corn to Archer Daniels Midland Inc and other corn distributors, because it's paid to farmers rather than the companies directly any Senate candidate from any state that depends on corn for a large portion of its economic output would get creamed if they failed to support corn subsidies. Oh, and of course most senators from corn-heavy states get significant donations from ADM.

Why did I focus on the Senate? Because the Senate is the only place where the representation of 11 states with relatively small population can prevail over the vast majority of the population of the country.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[rotide]

Funny how you ask for citations and then make a grand claim without any citations yourself.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[agnosticnixie]

There are a lot of ways to do small-scale farming.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[drinkypoo]

It's not that funny, c6gunner is a long-term troll. Check his posting history if you don't believe me.

The simple truth is that factory farming is inherently harmful. Literally everything about "Green Revolution" agriculture is inferior to what we were doing before, with simple crop rotation. And that in turn is inherently inferior to no-till forms of agriculture like permaculture where plants are grown in guilds which support one another. Of course, there is one superior aspect to growing food in monocultural fields: machine cultivation. Unfortunately, that is also a down side; nutrition suffers because the varieties grown must be conducive to machine processing, and that means breeding (or altering) them for shelf life, firm flesh, et cetera, as opposed to being driven by nutrition or flavor.

We need more distributed food production in this country. Having the majority of the food grown in one state just doesn't work. It's inefficient at best.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[Anonymous Coward]

Idea (feel free to tell me it's horrible)

Remove the corn/sugar/etc... subsidies completely and replace them with an "organically grown crop" general subsidy, which would encourage (potentially) healthier foods.

Possibly even have it tied to nutritional value at point-of-sale: Have no-crap salads at McD be tax-free where a McWhopper isn't.

Re:Bad Public Policy

[c6gunner]

That would be why I asked for clarification, and used the term "AFAIK". I'm not an expert (as he apparently is) so I'd like to see the well-sourced information which solidified his beliefs to such a degree. Although, judging by the amount of bullshit that people bring out when talking about environmental issues ... I'm not holding my breath.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[somersault]

Hmm.. so we don't want the government to have totalitarian control over anything.. apart from when it furthers your own agenda?

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

The world is starving, and Monsanto is a huge contributor to it thanks to having a monopoly on their seeds, while roundup kills pretty much everything else, and of course their "license agreement" doesn't allow stocking seeds for the next year, and has led to farmers getting sued to ruin for having their field pollinized by GM crops. Fuck off shill.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

Corporations are just another form of government, anyway.

Maize People

[bunabeans]

"Today 93 percent of soybeans and 80 percent of corn in the U.S. grow from seeds genetically altered according to Monsanto company patents." http://theemergencyfoodsupply.com/archives/93-percent-of-soybeans-and-80-percent-of-corn-in-the-u-s-grow-from-seeds-genetically-altered-by-monsanto "Wheat, rice, and maize provide just over 50 percent of the world’s plant-derived food energy." "The maize found even in remote areas of Mexico today is not the same as the maize found in the same location hundreds of years ago. Maize is an open-pollinating species that readily exchanges genes with other maize plants growing nearby. Farmers long ago recognized this as a way to adapt varieties to their own needs. Mexican farmers say that their maize “gets tired.” When this happens, they seek other varieties to mix with it." http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-31631-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html

Re:Maize People

[Yvan256]

Wow, that's a-maize-ing.

Re:Maize People

[blackbeak]

Wow, that's a-maize-ing.

When cattle broke into a GM trial of maize in the United Kingdom, they did not eat any of it. Cattle have been known to break down a fence to reach and feed on non-GM maize, having waded through a field of GM maize to reach it. -- http://www.sgr.org.uk/GenEng/CaseAgainstGMcrops.html#SafeToEat

Cattle don't need citations to know what's up! That's a-maize-ing.

Science

[Anonymous Coward]

The health issue is of concern as not enough research has been done on the effects of Genetic Engineered food. The problem is does have is the ecological damage on the environment.

Indeed, you're both boobs...

[agnosticnixie]

But what does this have to do with soy millk?

I'm also aware that most of soy products are GM, I mostly buy Almond milk however. Not to say I don't use soy, I use it a lot, thanks to being used to the cooking we do on the asian side of the family.

Follow the money, brown nose the boss...

[Bob_Who]

Consider the source: He works for Rupert Murdoch now, and he knows where his genetically modified bread is buttered - that is to say, with the same Vegemite yellow journalism that permeates "Fox News" and the rest of that "neo-fascist-corporate domination can do no wrong" ideology they slather on our media. I guess buying MySpace was his backup plan in case the "sheeple" misbehave and start to clone the truth incorrectly.....

Re:NaturalNews talks a lot about this stuff

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet, all of a sudden, by pushing vaccines, these same doctors are admitting they have NO faith in the technology of the very human beings they claim are genetically superior thanks to natural selection!

I'm out of words to describe this article.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[stonewallred]

Fact is that the world produces enough food for everyone. Blame the governments and dictators who deny food and aid to their hated enemies and there is your problem solved. Food and diamonds can be compared since there is an artificial scarcity of both. One because of money and profit, and the other due to power and hate.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[stonewallred]

large multi-national corporations are the government for the majority of the world. FTFY

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

Funny how you mention diamonds, as in that case, too, they're under the control of a huge megacorporation who basically owns governments. Governments, dictators and corporations are to blame. The last one is important.

Yeah, right. "We didn't say that"

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously, either you are naïve and don't know how such things work (hint: flattening by the media machinery plus association), then you are involuntarily part of the ploy -- or you are voluntarily part of the ploy in the first place.

So not eating Monsanto products means you're nuts?

[J.J. Dane]

So, basically Monsanto is lobbying to have people declared certifiably insane if they don't eat their products ..?

This is going to make child rearing so much easier..."Eats your damn peas,Timmy,or it's back in the straightjacket"

Re:2 words for Monsanto.

[Bob_Who]

We need to take back our dna from these corporate scum pigs. Hopefully we'll just get smart and tell them to piss off. India and China would certainly concur.

Biodiversity

[Max Romantschuk]

The greatest risk with GM food is possibly not the food itself, but the lack of biodiversity that using such crops exclusively will lead to.

As an example, the Cavendish banana is practically all the same clone:
http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-06/can-fruit-be-saved

GM foods are not far off, since the genome needs to be tightly controlled in order to guarantee the presence of the artificially introduced genes.

Re:Biodiversity

[Anonymous Coward]

"... Like almost all bananas, Cavendish lacks genetic diversity ..."

wikipedia.

An artifact of the species.

In fact, the sort of thing genetic engineering could actually help with, by introducing resistance and variability.

Re:Biodiversity

[Rayonic]

Which is why Monsanto (and other organizations) are keeping genetic backups of various DNA strains (original and modified). If some plague wipes out one of their biggest products, they would want to come out with a plague-proof variety.

(Cue the conspiracy theorists saying that Monsanto will invent such a plague, and that anti-virus writers create computer viruses, and etc. etc.)

Re:Biodiversity

[ChromeAeonium]

Not even close. Don't know if you know this or not, but there was no genetic engineering involved in the Cavendish. Genetic engineering is not a way of life, it's a tool for altering a plant, and like breeding (which brought you things like the 70's corn failure), you can use it well or poorly. Some people want to use genetic engineering to improve biodiversity. For example, introducing ripening delaying traits to heirloom tomatoes and other crops that just don't ship well, or widening the growing range of crops to enable them to be grown in more areas. Yeah, no doubt Monsanto doesn't care about polyculture (although, to be fair, given the choice between a strange, I don't know, White Tomesol tomato, and perfectly round red hybrid #385, what one are consumers going to choose?), but Monsanto does not own GE tech any more than Merck owns pharmacology or the principles of vaccinations. Some people advocate locally developed GMOs. Problem is, thanks to all the scientifically illiterate anti-technology (and yes, it anti-GMO is anti-science, I used to give them much more credit until I really started to grasp the issue) opposition going against GMOs, only companies like Monsanto (and Sygentia, BASF, Bayer, Dupont, Dow, ect) have the resources to get them approved. It would be like if you hated McDonald's so much you wouldn't let any other restaurants open. Anti-GMO sentiment is the best thing that ever happened to Monsanto.

You seem smart enough to get that GMOs aren't going to hurt you (and considering everything has likely had horizontal gene transfer at one point it it's evolutionary history, humans included, it would be surprising if they were inherently dangerous), but understand that monoculture is not the way it has to be. Instead of opposing genetic engineering in general on those grounds, it would be far more constructive to support a better use of the technology. Genetic engineering should be an enabler of polyculture, right now it is more or less just a complement to monoculture systems that have existed before GMOs were a part of the food supply (but of course, so are tractors).

Re:Biodiversity

[Max Romantschuk]

I'm not really against GMOs. I'm just afraid that human greed will have it's way like it has with so many other things...

But thanks for the references, I will have to look through them properly once I'm not at work. ;)

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[TheKidWho]

Shill? Do you know what a shill is?

GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[FriendlyLurker]

The misinformation they spread about GM foods is just as bad, if not worse, than the lack of information about which products are and aren't genetically modified.

The evidence is currently against pro GM food blind faith supporters - the fact is that Pro GM food really "don't know WTF they're talking about". Quote from the link:

As of January 2009 there has only been one human feeding study conducted on the effects of genetically modified foods

ONE STUDY. So much for peer review. On the other hand, there have been numerous non human studies, and every single one that has found evidence that indicate that things might not be as rosy as Monsanto and friends claim has been contested by the GM industry - in some cases not attacking the science, but resorting to character assassination and smear campaigns.

If you claim that GM food skeptical consumers don't know WTF they are talking about - what does that make GM supporters, given the massive void of research into long term effects of GM Food? Personally I would call it blind faith - so I prefer my food to be clearly labeled and my politicians to be unbiased, so I can make an informed choice for me. You can eat whatever you want.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[andydread]

+1

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Anonymous Coward]

So you now cite wikipedia as a source? It seems that its only a good source when it meets your opinion.

Go to pubmed search for yourself, also learn biology, and campaign for equal testing of GMOs and non-GMOs then you might have my attention.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Myopic]

We have been running a long-term study of the effects of GM food on the human population for the last ten thousand years, since GM food was introduced with agriculture. So far, we're doing okay.

We claim that engineered food is safe because it comports with everything we understand about the natural world. To change that understanding would take credible evidence.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I know there aren't any studies on the negative health effects of hearing the word "Belgium". So much for peer review!

Wake up sheeple! We're all being poisoned to death!

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[FriendlyLurker]

We have been running a long-term study of the effects of GM food on the human population for the last ten thousand years, since GM food was introduced with agriculture. So far, we're doing okay.

10K years were of selective breeding crops in small isolated pockets, which then spread into other suitable areas at a very slow rate. Not mass worldwide introduced on never before experienced timespans like they are now. Further, the last 10k years were not dominated by monocultures, with all the problems they bring. whether we are talking about GM crops or not.

Show me one scape of evidence that our ancestors successfully crossed and then selectively cultured any type of crop with any type of non-plant based life (or even non-related species of plant) - e.g. with caterpillars, to produce poison protected crops. It has never happened before in human history. Claiming that GM food is safe based on "everything we understand about the natural world" sounds awfully like blind faith, at worst intellectual dishonesty.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Myopic]

Oh okay I get you now. So it's not genetic engineerign per se, or even most common forms of it, but rather just some rare kinds of the most extreme manipulations that you oppose? Yeah, okay, it's a sliding scale. The more crap we mess with, the more careful we should be. For sure.

Also, totally agreed about monocultures and other non-genetic-type problems with modern crop production. Lots of issues not related to GM are big problems that we need to address.

But GM food, generally, is not at all scary.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Rick17JJ]

Yesterday, I just starting reading a book about the documented health risks of GMOs. I had recently heard the author talking about his book on a late-night radio show. I have only just barely started reading the first chapter, so I am not yet very far into the book.

But in the first chapter, I read about a 1996 study in the UK, where GM potatoes affected "virtually every organ system of young rats - with most changes found after just 10 days. Their brains, livers, and testicles were generally smaller." Mr. Pusztai, the head researcher was interviewed on TV with permission from his director. A couple of days later he was released from his job and silenced with threats of a lawsuit, the 20-member research team was disbanded, and the project terminated.

Then the first chapter goes on to talk about a rat feeding study where rats fed GM tomatoes got bleeding stomachs and several died.

Also in the first chapter, there they mentioned a 90-day rat feeding trial where the rats were fed Bt corn. "During the 90-day rat feeding trial, a group of 20 males and 20 females fed the corn developed multiple reactions. Changes included those typically found in response to alergies, infections, toxins, and diseases including cancer, anemia, and blood pressure problems." "Also found were increased blood sugar levels, kidney inflammation, and liver and kidney lesions."

Flipping ahead beyond the few pages that I have read so far, I see headings like "sheep died after grazing in Bt cotton fields" and "farmers report pigs and cows became sterile from GM corn." A few pages further on is the heading "Mice fed Roundup Ready soy had unexplained changes in testicular cells."

The introduction to the book mentions that "soy allergies skyrocketed by 50% in the United Kingdom, soon after genetically engineered soy was introduced." I plan to keep reading until I finish the book. I also plan to continue avoiding foods such as corn, soy, canola, and cottonseed, which are the most likely to be from GMO crops.

The Wall Street Journal article talks about the "selective eating" psychiatric disorder, which will be in the new version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The article says that "doctors worry that over the long term such eating habits could lead to nutritional deficiencies linked to health concerns, including bone and heart problems." Despite being a selective eater, I eat a healthy wide variety of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, walnuts and grass fed buffalo meat. I believe my long term eating habits have been a varied, well balanced safe diet. However, I do try to avoid soft drinks, sweets, junk food, trans-fats, saturated fat, excessive pesticides, and GMOs.

Decades of "selective eating" has not hurt my health. I am 55 years old. With the help of a good diet and daily exercise, my total cholesterol is only 135 without the help of medication, my triglycerides are a reasonable low 108, my glucose level is 73, and by blood pressure is typically 125/74 without the help of medication. I recently spent a week in the summer heat, digging a ditch and prying up rocks by hand with a pick and shovel, in the hard dry rocky soil of the Arizona mountains. Unlike many other people my age, I can still do hard physical work, just as well as when I was in my 20's.

• Genetic Roulette by Jeffrey M. Smith
• The Non-GMO Shopping Guide

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[1u3hr]

Genetic Roulette by Jeffrey M. Smith

http://academicsreview.org/reviewed-content/genetic-roulette/

"Genetic Roulette is Jeffrey Smiths second book in which he makes unsubstantiated claims against biotechnology. In it, he details 65 separate claims that the technology causes harm in a variety of ways. On these pages each of those claims addressed in the same eight sections that correspond directly with the book are stacked up against peer-reviewed science."

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[lewiscr]

This is clearly documented in the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy. Read your history books!

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Grishnakh]

Sorry, I think it's scary as hell, and it's all about trust and reputation. Who's doing the genetic engineering? Monsanto. What's their reputation like? It stinks. We already know that Monsanto is doing all kinds of horrible things, like adding caterpillar poison genes to crops, making terminator crops, promoting monocultures, etc. They can't be trusted.

Why would you trust someone with a bad reputation to make safe food? Would you trust BP to do deep-drilling safely? Would you trust the designers of Chernobyl to build a safe nuclear plant? I wouldn't.

At least with drilling and nuclear plants, we have alternatives. There's lots of other oil companies that haven't had any major accidents (yet). There's many nuclear companies, including the one that runs all the plants in France, and has a great safety record. But AFAIK the GM food companies are few, and just like Monsanto. It's not like I can get food genetically modified by some nice small company with a good reputation.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Myopic]

Do you question the safety of GM crops, or do you question Monsanto's ability to produce GM seeds safely? From what you said it sounds like you oppose both.

I'm fine with GM crops (if done safely), and my impression of Monsanto is that they are plenty good at the science, and way TOO good at the bad shit like suing poor farmers. Those are all different issues and I encourage you to consider them separately.

Sure, I want a safe, well-regulated food supply. I want it based on a good diversity of crops. I want any genetic manipulation done carefully with oversight. I want all patents for living organisms eliminated. I want farmers to have the right to save seeds for later if they can.

I also want GM crop seeds to have terminator genes -- perhaps not forever, but at least for the next, say, fifty or a hundred years. That's an inexpensive hedge against problems with interbreeding. I want GM crop seeds to be produced by a wide variety of organizations: my preference would be non-profit scientific organizations; or perhaps universities; but for-profit corporations are also okay so long as they are watched carefully.

I don't trust BP to do anything, but that doesn't mean I'm against all drilling. The Chernobyl disaster doesn't make me think we should abandon all nuclear energy.

Does that sound unreasonable to you? Try to work some subtlety and nuance into your beliefs. Break them down and determine how different parts of the puzzle fit together. You don't have to throw out the baby (GM crops) with the bathwater (Monsanto).

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[FriendlyLurker]

Very interesting, will pick that book up. Also see Genetically modified food controversies for some more recent info, and Arpad Pusztai page for more on the GM potatoes research. Here is an extract:

In February 1999, 30 international scientists from 13 countries published a memo supporting Pusztai. On 19 February the Royal Society, which is at the "forefront of defending GM technology" and does not normally conduct peer reviews, publicly announced a peer review committee would review his work and on 18 May the board issued the results at a press conference condemning Pusztai. The same day the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee also attacked Pusztai. Behind the scenes coordination was partly revealed by a memo showing that the government had set up a Biotechnology Presentation Group which used both findings to publicly support GM in Parliament only three days later. The Royal Society had also set up a "rebuttal unit" headed by Rebecca Bowden to push a pro-biotech line and counter opposing scientists and environmental groups. Dr Bowden confirmed the groups role was to coordinate biotech policy but denied it was a spin doctoring operation.[6]

The Pusztai experiment was eventually published but because of the controversial nature of his research the 1999 data paper, co-authored by Dr Stanley Ewen, was seen by six reviewers - three times the usual number. Five gave it the green light to be published in The Lancet, the only reviewer arguing against publication was Prof John Pickett of the government funded Institute of Arable Crops Research. After consulting with the Royal Society, Pickett broke the protocols of peer review by publicly attacking the Lancet for agreeing to publish the paper.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Grishnakh]

Their science is bad, because it's used towards evil ends (like suing poor farmers). So as far as I'm concerned, I'm against Monsanto, and everything they do.

GM crops might be ok if they were done by someone trustworthy. But who fits that description (trustworthy, and capable of genetically engineering crops)? No one that I know of. Your idea of non-profit scientific organizations sounds good, but again there don't seem to be any of those in the real world doing GM crops.

I don't trust BP to do anything, but that doesn't mean I'm against all drilling. The Chernobyl disaster doesn't make me think we should abandon all nuclear energy.

I agree completely. BP should never be allowed to drill again, nor should the people who designed and ran Chernobyl ever be allowed to work on nuclear power again. However, with both of those, there are companies with good track records. France is a huge energy exporter with all their nuclear plants, and they don't seem to have had any major incidents. Russia and the USA can't claim that.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Cyberllama]

We've been genetically modifying our food for thousands of years now and now that we're suddenly able to do it with a scalpel instead of a hatchet, "Ooh, it's scary." I won't speak in support of Monsato, their legal practices are indefensible. But, for the life of me, I can't understand the urge to separate out GM foods for "special" research in the first place. What do you think makes them different?

Look at our banana crop. It's almost entirely made up of Cavendish bananas. At one point you could walk into a store and choose from several varieties, but when Panama disease nearly wiped bananas off the face of the earth back in the 50's, the cavendish was discovered to be immune and it became the banana we all know today. So the genes that make it immune to panama disease is fine, if we eat it in the Cavendish -- but if we were to say use GM to move it to the Gros Michel and reintroduce it, suddenly we should be concerned? Why? "Because we just don't know what's going to happen" is not a good answer. There has to be reason to suspect something would go wrong.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Myopic]

as far as I'm concerned, I'm against Monsanto, and everything they do

Okay. This is plainly stated, and it is what we disagree about.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy quote mining batman! Use your creatard tactics elsewhere. The quote indicates that there has only been one study done on GM food and horizontal gene transfer. There has in fact been many more then one peer reviewed study done on GM food and if you would have read the articles you link you might have known that.

Gene transfer

As of January 2009 there has only been one human feeding study conducted on the effects of genetically modified foods. The study involved seven human volunteers who had previously had their large intestines removed. These volunteers were to eat GM soy to see if the DNA of the GM soy transferred to the bacteria that naturally lives in the human gut.

Re:GM Food supporters == Blind Faith

[pbhj]

>so I prefer my food to be clearly labeled and my politicians to be unbiased, so I can make an informed choice for me. You can eat whatever you want.

This is the whole of it for me. The scientific arguments don't matter in a way - this is about democracy.

If I choose to eat GM because I think it'll turn me into a superhero that's my choice; if I choose to avoid it, that's my choice. Why are we being dictated to on this - greed.

Considering the science: if this global open (as in uncontained) experiment goes wrong we can't put GMOs back in the box and move on, it's done, the ecosystem - particularly the parts closest to human food production - have been irrevocably altered. This should be the longest most drawn out trial in the history of science. We have very little to gain (except richer capitalists and even more imbalance of wealth distribution and power in global food production) and everything to lose.

render unto monsanto.....

[Anonymous Coward]

now that we're tiring (as in fatally defeated) of being hostages to oil, why not water, food etc....? don't even bother looking now, if you haven't been looking all along. it's not pretty, & does not match the cheesy hypenosys we're blanketed with. none of us are well prepared for the events that are occurring (partly due to intentional lack of accurate information), & there's no 'script' to follow.

the corepirate nazi illuminati is always hunting that patch of red on almost everyones' neck. if they cannot find yours (greed, fear ego etc...) then you can go starve. that's their (slippery/slimy) 'platform' now.

never a better time to consult with/trust in our creators. the lights are coming up rapidly all over now. see you there?

greed, fear & ego (in any order) are unprecedented evile's primary weapons. those, along with deception & coercion, helps most of us remain (unwittingly?) dependent on its' life0cidal hired goons' agenda. most of our dwindling resources are being squandered on the 'wars', & continuation of the billionerrors stock markup FraUD/pyramid schemes. nobody ever mentions the real long term costs of those debacles in both life & any notion of prosperity for us, or our children. not to mention the abuse of the consciences of those of us who still have one, & the terminal damage to our atmosphere (see also: manufactured 'weather', hot etc...). see you on the other side of it? the lights are coming up all over now. the fairytail is winding down now. let your conscience be your guide. you can be more helpful than you might have imagined. we now have some choices. meanwhile; don't forget to get a little more oxygen on your brain, & look up in the sky from time to time, starting early in the day. there's lots going on up there.

"The current rate of extinction is around 10 to 100 times the usual background level, and has been elevated above the background level since the Pleistocene. The current extinction rate is more rapid than in any other extinction event in earth history, and 50% of species could be extinct by the end of this century. While the role of humans is unclear in the longer-term extinction pattern, it is clear that factors such as deforestation, habitat destruction, hunting, the introduction of non-native species, pollution and climate change have reduced biodiversity profoundly.' (wiki)

"I think the bottom line is, what kind of a world do you want to leave for your children," Andrew Smith, a professor in the Arizona State University School of Life Sciences, said in a telephone interview. "How impoverished we would be if we lost 25 percent of the world's mammals," said Smith, one of more than 100 co-authors of the report. "Within our lifetime hundreds of species could be lost as a result of our own actions, a frightening sign of what is happening to the ecosystems where they live," added Julia Marton-Lefevre, IUCN director general. "We must now set clear targets for the future to reverse this trend to ensure that our enduring legacy is not to wipe out many of our closest relatives."--

"The wealth of the universe is for me. Every thing is explicable and practical for me .... I am defeated all the time; yet to victory I am born." --emerson

no need to confuse 'religion' with being a spiritual being. our soul purpose here is to care for one another. failing that, we're simply passing through (excess baggage) being distracted/consumed by the guaranteed to fail illusionary trappings of man'kind'. & recently (about 10,000 years ago) it was determined that hoarding & excess by a few, resulted in negative consequences for all.

consult with/trust in your creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and t

Everything is a disorder or illness

[RichiH]

Why? Because lobby groups influence the WHO to say so. Warning levels become lower and lower all the time, thus _more_ people have illness X.

Why? Because then you can sell people all kinds of crap they don't really need.

Re:Everything is a disorder or illness

[pandrijeczko]

It's also because it gives some people the opportunity to blame something else for their condition rather than accepting that it's their own problem to deal with.

No, that's not the case with *ALL* medical conditions but I myself am about 3 stone overweight not because I'm "big boned" or have a glandular problem, but because I shove too much food in my mouth and don't exercise enough.

Sorry, but when I was a kid about 40 years ago, you ate what was cooked by your mother and put on a plate in front of you, end of story. I had great parents, never wanted for anything and was fed a balanced diet - but the fact was there wasn't the disposable income about then that there is now, I had proper discipline and morals instilled into me, and my father and mother were happy enough being good, loving parents to me, not trying to be my "friend" like so many modern parents do.

Re:GET A CLUE

[johnjones]

A/ engineering produces a result...
B/ your complaining about a patent system....

not a shill just being honest

Straw man

[Anonymous Coward]

The main argument against GM foods is that it is bad for the environment, not that it is bad for your health. To suggest otherwise is just a straw man argument.

Re:Straw man

[todrules]

To suggest otherwise is just a straw man argument.

But it's a GM-straw man, so it's OK.

Re:Straw man

[Myopic]

Really? Shit, that wasn't my understanding at all. I thought the environmental issue was ancillary and subordinate to the health issue. Thanks for setting me straight, but you have a LOT of comments to reply to in this thread, and countless others, correcting all the people who say it's about health. Good luck with that.

Re:GET A CLUE

[agnosticnixie]

A - Engineering does fuck all without research. And Mendel still did nothing of the sort you suggest he did.
B - I'm complaining about the abuses of it. Not the system itself.

not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[yyxx]

Most GM food is biologically perfectly safe to eat. The problem is that it's not economically, ecologically, and socially safe.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[eulernet]

Most GM food is biologically perfectly safe to eat.

Citation needed.

In France, a journalist filmed a documentary about Monsanto's practices.
She discovered that the directors of MonSanto were only eating organic food (in France, it's called 'bio').

So I think that your argument is not acknowledged even at Monsanto's.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[Alinabi]

No, it is not always safe to eat. The danger is rather indirect. Some of these GM crops have been engineered to be highly resistant to pesticides, which means that they are aggressively treated with Monsanto's own Roundup and they end up with a pesticide content that is 200x greater than the levels that would be tolerated by non-GM plants.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[Myopic]

I wish more people were capable of making that distinction. I get tired of hearing this argument:

Person 1: "GM food is safe to eat"
Person 2: "No it isn't, because Monsanto sues poor farmers."

Person 2 is a retard.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[agnosticnixie]

If the food you eat carries with it this sort of legal liability, it's unsafe from a social point of view, no matter how biologically sound it might be.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[the eric conspiracy]

Exactly what social damage has Monsanto caused? In detail with citations in peer reviewed literature please.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[yyxx]

This may come as a surprise to you, but it is actually possible to have meaningful discussions about politics and science without citations. Furthermore, it's not the job of other people to do your literature search for you. If there are specific issues that are controversial, you can ask for references, otherwise your comment is idiotic.

As for what damage they have done, I doubt there is much disagreement on the facts: they support factory farming, support large monocultures, and create and patent genetically modified organisms. Many people (myself include) consider that damage. You may not. We'll just have to agree to disagree on that.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[yyxx]

Roundup is a herbicide; it has fairly low toxicity in humans. If you're a farmer and spray it, you may have to worry. But levels found in food, even Roundup treated, are orders of magnitude below those where toxic effects have been seen. Calling that "not safe" is really a stretch.

No, the arguments against Roundup are environmental and economic, not safety, but those are compelling.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[Anonymous Coward]

So they fire 3 scientists in Canada over blowing the whistle on rBGH because it is safe? In the A. a UK a government-funded study demonstrated that rats fed a GM potato developed potentially pre-cancerous cell growth, damaged immune systems, partial atrophy of the liver, and inhibited development of their brains, livers and testicles. When the lead scientist went public with his concerns, he was promptly fired from his job after 35 years and silenced with threats of a lawsuit.

Calgene, the makers of the first GM crop, the FlavrSavr tomato, was the ONLY company to submit detailed RAW DATA from animal feeding studies to the FDA. Their lab rats refused to eat the tomatoes and had to be force-fed. Several developed stomach lesions, and seven of forty died within two weeks. The tomato was approved, but has since been taken off the market.

Yes LAB RATS REFUSED to eat it. Given a choice rats, cows, pigs and a whole slew of other animals won't eat it. Only when no other food is around will they eat it.

Yea they have nothing to hide. As to your statement "most GM food is biologically perfectly safe to eat" you have 2 choices: 1) Back it up or 2) Withdraw it.

You can't and you won't.

Re:not harmful to you, but harmful to the world

[the eric conspiracy]

People making assertions should supply evidence for said assertions. Proof is the responsibility of the claimant in every debate. Period.

As for what damage they have done, I doubt there is much disagreement on the facts: they support factory farming, support large monocultures, and create and patent genetically modified organisms.

Factory farming and monocultures existed long before GMO. These are economic and biologically driven trends irrespective of the use of GMOs and were well established trends long before GMOs were brought to market. So again I say what social damage have they done? You have NO evidence of any such and are just whistling out of your butt.

create and patent genetically modified organisms

Again you have NO evidence this causes ANY social damage.

Re:GET A CLUE

[johnjones]

exactly what is forced cross breeding for a specific purpose if not genetic engineering... the problem is that the rational people dont stick around

I'm not kidding

[Anonymous Coward]

In the future every organic food will have this disclaimer:

"no significant difference has been shown between food derived from GM crops and non-GM crops."

It's not just genetic hacks that monsanto is into

[bl8n8r]

They are also into putting family farms out of business[0] and monopolizing future food stocks[1]. Overly fussy? screw you monsanto. frickin crooks.

[0] - http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/26/eveningnews/main4048288.shtml
[1] - http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7529

MONSANTO == DEATH

[Yaa 101]

Everything they touch dies a horrible death.

Re:MONSANTO == DEATH

[Aphoxema]

Everything they touch dies a horrible death.

You've probably ate a "Monsanto patented" food product already today. It's impossible to avoid on accident.

Re:MONSANTO == DEATH

[will_die]

So who cares????
Monsanto produces a corn seed which they touch and that corn then grows, gets put to death by the grinder or roaster and gets made in bread or beer.
O the fools who make headlines that try to make people upset that some plant dies.

Healthy suspicion

[jonnat]

You have to be at least a bit suspicious when people ask Monsanto for more studies on the safety of their GM crops and, instead, they get a massive PR campaign.

Make a distinction between Monsanto and GM

[BangaIorean]

In the EU, Japan, etc., you need special labeling on GM food so that the consumer can choose for himself if he wants to buy it (or not). Let's not confuse Monsanto and it's policies with GM food as a whole...

Re:Make a distinction between Monsanto and GM

[will_die]

That is about 7 year old info that was never implemented.
As it is now there are 3, may be up to 4, countries in the EU that allow you to put a no-GM sticker on your products. The others do not and don't allow it.
In fact the EU is suppose to have a vote later this year to see if they are going to allow this type of marketing and most countries have come out saying they don't want it since it has no scientific basis.

About that DSM classification

[luckytroll]

The Monsanto arguments all have a lot of merit, and we should be working to fix that aspect of our agriculture.

However, blaming them for the DSM categorization of picky eating is a bit beyond. I had a friend who suffered from this picky eating disorder and it was horrifying. It started with vegetarianism, then veganism, then avoidance of an increasingly expanding list of politically incorrect foods. Eventually she became a skeleton who had to be fed through an IV because she was eating little more than a couple very specific kinds of white rice. With treatment, they managed to get her back to a surviveable diet, but it was a close shave. It wasnt anorexia per se - it was something else that Doctors need to be aware of. Making informed choices that make the world a better place and make ones diet more nutritious is one thing - succumbing to a psychological disorder like picky eating is way different.

Re:About that DSM classification

[thijsh]

Yeah, but i'd see it more as a symptom... Some troubled people become very obsessive with their food, but those are often the same people who are obsessive with just about anything else that is supposedly 'bad' (radiation, water, chem trails, the crazier the better)... Those people might benefit from some therapy, but not specific for their food-pattern but a 'how-to-live-life-without-constant-paranoia-and-obsession' kind of therapy.

Creating a DSM classification for this might be overkill. But then again, the DSM classifies pretty much anything observable regardless of merit... in the past they even classified homosexuality as a disorder for example.

Re:About that DSM classification

[luckytroll]

True, but the intent is to characterize mental illnesses so that they can be identified and treated. My friend would have snuffed it had there not been intervention by doctors. For the people who suffer this specific form of illness, there is often little or no help from doctors until they are literally at deaths door because their dietary choices cannot be readily pidgeon-holed into a diagnosis that indicates action. If she had had classic anorexia they would have had some traction because they have that one classified already. TFA makes valid points about people who are suffering - and while Monsanto et all may try and use the disorder to stigmatize everyday people who care about what they eat it dosen't lessen the fact that it is a disease and the people who suffer from it need help, sometimes badly.

Re:About that DSM classification

[Calinous]

Avoiding one food or another is perfectly understandable (there are plenty of people that are "biologically unfit" for consumption of some foods - like, let's say, cucumbers). Also, some people have "strange" choices, in that they eat one type of processed food but not another with similar ingredients (like sausages but not meat).
      However, that eating disorder is when your feeding habits are clearly unable to provide you with a sustainable eating (most of the calories, most of the vitamins, most minerals and trace elements and so on).

Re:About that DSM classification

[thijsh]

Veganism is still a choice, but so is extreme body modification... We might find both strange, but some people in their right mind still choose to do so. But I want to bet that a large portion of the people who make these extreme choices have some mental illness that can in fact be diagnosed and treated (or to put it bluntly: we all know most vegans are a little nuts ;-D). If that is the case there is no need to create an extra disorder, only one of possible symptoms caused by another disorder.

Re:About that DSM classification

[EmagGeek]

On top of that, it is almost impossible to get insurance to cover medical treatment for something that has no official diagnosis code associated with it.

Re:About that DSM classification

[nedlohs]

No one told her the IV was full of man made chemicals? Lucky she wasn't an internet forum addict at the time I guess...

Re:About that DSM classification

[Joey Vegetables]

There are folks who have discovered through trial and error that they have food sensitivities or incompatibilities. I'm one of them. I have to avoid animal products, oils in large quantities, and fats that are solid or semisolid at high room temperatures (30-35F) because I can't digest them and would get very sick if I ate them. (It is unclear to me whether natural fats like coconut oil or cocoa butter are safe for me; I know that small quantities of nuts are OK, hydrogenated oils are not, and large quantities of any fat or oil are not.) There is no known biological cause, although I suspect my gallbladder and liver may be a bit off. I also choose to avoid HFCS, and to try to limit consumption of refined sugars and flours because I believe them to be bad for my long-term health. I am left with the possibility of a very healthy and balanced diet of whole grains, veggies, fruits, soy products (including milk, meat and cheese substitutes) and whatnot. Some people believe it is all in my head. I don't think so, especially since my children and my wife, after having been on a mostly-vegan diet for several years, have developed similar (though much less severe) sensitivities. BTW, I'm overweight (borderline obese) and only became so after eliminating the "bad" foods from my diet, and, thus, the constant nausea and pain and fatigue that they caused. My problem is that I don't have a lot of time to cook, and thus I tend to eat one big meal per day instead of several smaller ones. Plus, like most Slashdotters, I spend way too much time sitting on my a** and way too little exercising.

Re:About that DSM classification

[Reziac]

In a dog, the diagnosis would be easy: Pancreatic insufficiency (caused by a simple recessive gene).

"my children and my wife, after having been on a mostly-vegan diet for several years, have developed similar (though much less severe) sensitivities."

Doesn't this, all by itself, warn you of something??

Re:About that DSM classification

[Joey Vegetables]

In a dog *or* human, the pancreas, liver and gallbladder all must work right to allow proper digestion of fats, and problems there plus lactose intolerance could explain a lot of the issues I have. If it's genetic, my kids could have similar issues, although they aren't nearly as bad as I was at their age. But my wife's situation is puzzling. She has no problem eating anything in her home country (Republic of Macedonia), just here in the U.S., where a lot of our soy is GM as well (and soy is VERY big in a typical vegan diet), and our "meat" is full of hormones and antibiotics. Hers might just be a very normal reaction against the consumption of things that have never been part of human diets in the past and that we know next to nothing about.

Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[jollyreaper]

What did Enron say about their finances? Perfectly fine, perfectly fine, nothing to see here. What did BP say about their drilling practices? Perfectly fine, perfectly fine, nothing to see here. And what will we say in ten years when GM foods are proven to wreck your DNA and give your kids monkey lung and restless genitalia syndrome? "Who could have possibly foreseen this after we suppressed all the data? It's an act of a cruel and uncaring God, not us."

Rule #1: Never trust the prospectus. And taking a company's word on risk assessment -- a company with a significant interest in the risks being low to non-existent -- because they're going to be lying their fucking asses off.

Rule #2: Did you forget about rule 1? because I see you taking the salesman's word for it! Go back and read rule #1!

Rule #3: Oh, there's an auditing firm involved, a disinterested third party that gave a review. It's a bond rating agency telling you the bonds are good or an engineering company telling you the well design is solid or hey, it's Arthur Anderson! Your new rule is to make sure the third party isn't operating under the same moral hazards as the first, otherwise you're just getting yourself bullshat from both directions.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, I think I've eaten way too much GM food because I'm pretty sure I have restless genitalia syndrome right now.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Myopic]

What did the school nurse say about masturbation? Doesn't cause blindness.

What did the doctors say about Thimeresol? Doesn't cause autism.

What did Salk say about his vaccine? Not a secret conspiracy to give kids polio.

What did the nerd say about video games? Doesn't cause violence.

Sometimes the rational cool thinkers are right.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Chowderbags]

restless genitalia syndrome

I thought that was already called "The Y Chromosome".

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Anonymous Coward]

None of them are the corporations, those are rarely ever cool, rational thinkers.
For one, they gave information, instead of sale brochures.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Myopic]

I don't have a sales brochure, and I'm claiming that GM foods are good for humanity, on balance.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[phantomfive]

That's just basically good science: don't trust people, or what they say, no matter how 'prestigious' they might be; make them show you the evidence and decide for yourself.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[Anonymous Coward]

One should not be afraid of GM food wrecking your DNA. How many corn genes do you have in your cells? Soy? Apple? The fact that it is GM does not increase or decrease the ability of the genes to jump over to your cells. Your digestive system is designed to break down DNA. The thing to fear from GM crops is other chemicals. You GM some corn to produce a pesticide. What happens when you eat this pesticide? Does it trash your kidneys? Your liver? Is it addictive? That is the unknown.

Re:Simple rule -- don't trust corporate assurances

[kindbud]

And what will we say in ten years when GM foods are proven to wreck your DNA...

And the scientifically plausible mechanism by which this occurs - and which is not a concern for non-GM foods - is.... ... Magic? ... Evil Energy? ... Hysterical Confluence?

Please - inform us.

Added a BBC comment...

[Anonymous Coward]

I've attempted to add the comment:

"Dr. Jones opinions are relevant to the discussion of GM foods, but I wonder if it is also relevant to point out that Dr. Jones has served as a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Mendel Biotechnology (http://www.mendelbio.com/team/scientific.htm; accessed 1/27/03) a company which does extensive business with Monsanto."

We'll see if the BBC allows that comment or not...

Wrong argument

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is not that we need GM crops, the problem is that there are 2 fucking billion more people on the planet than it can naturally sustain. STOP HAVING FUCKING KIDS, IT'S NOT YOUR CIVIC DUTY. That's the answer.

Re:Wrong argument

[Anonymous Coward]

The planet could sustain twice as many; we have more food than needed to fee everyone.
The problem is a few countries hoarding so that their rich can eat their fat steaks.

Great

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't care if you like GM food or not. What I care about is that GM food is CLEARLY marked as such, so that I can make a rational decision. Makes sense, doesn't it? Of course it does, but Monsanto is working very hard to make sure that doesn't happen. Their goal is to get you eating GM food (therefore generating royalties for them) -- without knowing it.

Fussy Reader

[hemo_jr]

I am overly fussy about writers who use uncommon abbreviations without noting what they abbreviate. G.M is Genetically Modified. DSM is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. How lazy must one be to skip this step?

Re:Fussy Reader

[wzinc]

Thank you! I had no idea what GM meant.

I avoid GM foods not for health reasons ...

[Ihlosi]

... but because I dislike the business model behind them.

They're being too polite

[lashwhip76]

I knew before I ever clicked on my RSS feed that this would be a kdawson article. If Slashdot is going to post unscientific claptrap, shouldn't Taco hire a young earther just to balance it out a little? There is an ecological argument to be made against biodiversity reduction caused by GM crops, and there is an argument to be made that Monsanto as a company is particularly evil, although it took considerable government intervention to get that way. But there is no legitimate argument at all regarding individual safety. If you refuse to eat GM food for non-political reasons you're not overly fussy. You're an ignorant crank.

Re:They're being too polite

[ChromeAeonium]

It's funny that you mention that, because I've always figured it would go quite a ways to proving creationism if organisms had a built in anti-tampering device, that if altering the genes directly always produced something that was a dangerous. I don't know how you're post got modded troll, because it is spot on. Monsanto pricks? Sure. GMO ecologically damaging? Potentially. That's a very complex area, and you've also got to consider the differences in damage between an escaped gene and the amount of damage that they can prevent. Agriculture is very damaging to the environment. If, say, a nitrogen use efficiency, or pest resistance, or increased output trait can offset any other harm GMOs cause, it might be worth it. GMOs dangerous to your health? There is more evidence to indicate that Elvis is still alive. Genetic engineering, like any applied biology, is complicated. For example, in China, the adopted a GMO strain of cotton, stopped spraying pesticides, which improved insect biodiversity, which meant a once minor pest became a major one. These are certainty interesting times with thins technology, and times they are a' changin. And one thing we don't need is demonizing them based on unscientific fearmongering. The claims of GMOs causing health problems have no merit whatsoever, and it doesn't do any good for any one to make shit up. It is a problem that so many people are letting their strange ideology trump science and critical skeptical thinking.

wrong! roundup has no soil activity

[Anonymous Coward]

it needs to land on the foliage. unresistant plants may
be planted very soon after application, for values of
soon near one week.

it's further a bit rich blaming suicides on this incorrect
assertion.

i don't like monsanto, but i'm not going to stoop to spreading
fud about them, even if i am an a.c.

Mod down

[Anonymous Coward]

FUD not implied by the article (in fact the opposite is stated: "The DSM item refers to something completely different, though I'm sure many will confuse the two.") and contradicted by facts. -1 Offtopic, not +2 Interesting.

Re:Mod down

[J.J. Dane]

Well,I was going for "Funny" tbh, otherwise I might've RTFA first...

That said, I'm not sure a certain amound of paranoia with regards to Monsanto might not stand you in good stead, all things considered

You're not only too fussy

[EmagGeek]

If you consciously avoid eating GM foods, you're not only too fussy, but also have a mental disorder (orthorexia). In short, you'd be crazy to avoid GM foods!

Re:GET A CLUE

[c6gunner]

It's a sad day for slashdot when "die shill" is considered +5 Insightful.

Coounter-labelling

[Midnight Thunder]

Very true. Monsanto and friends have bought off the political side [guardian.co.uk] and continue to lobby heavily so that clear labels on GM food are not required [google.com] - preventing consumers from making an informed choice in the free market. Now as part of this broader campaign of voter/consumer deception, they just need to convince all the consumers that are not paying attention that their products are all A-Ok for consumption - so they trot out people like this Jonathan Jones so called "professor" to use his credentials to sway public opinion.

Given this climate, the alternative approach is for companies using non-OGM food sources to label their foods as such.

I did a bit of searching to see what there was in this way and came up with the following links:
  - http://www.non-gmoreport.com/FDA_disallows_GMO-free_label.php
  - http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/europe-says-gmfree-food-labels-need-not-tell-truth-737880.html

The only thing I couldn't seem to find is some form of accepted label or logo to indicate GM free food.

Which modern world? ...

[openfrog]

Genetically modified foods are just foods. There's nothing "natural" about selectively bred crops. Unless you're going into the woodlands and picking wild berries for breakfast you're eating unnatural food. Welcome to the modern world.

The modern world is not about the simplistic opposition between the natural and the artificial. The 18th century and onwards have demonstrated the value of enlightened public debate. The modern world in this sense is currently having second thoughts about the environmental effects of GM plants, patents on life, and other issues on how Monsanto operates. Welcome to the modern world.

monsanto, shills, DSM IV

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder

debunked numerous times?

[Charliemopps]

Many of the starving in African countries are denied free food aid simply based on the fact that it's GM. Would you rather these people die TODAY of starvation or in 40 years due to cancer? This is of course assuming your paranoid disillusion of the evils of GM food prove accurate, which I doubt will happen.

Re:debunked numerous times?

[agnosticnixie]

Many of the starving african nations are there because food aid completely fucks up local agriculture and leads to their agro industry only being used for exports to fatten up eurasians and americans.

Re:debunked numerous times?

[pandrijeczko]

I agree that the current global economic model has it flaws but there are benefits also - money being paid to food producers & workers means they can afford to put in pipes for fresh running water, build schools for education & to get an improved standard of living.

No, it's not perfect and exploitation of workers and pay is still rampant - but those same people wouldn't work out in fields picking foodstuffs if they didn't get some benefits themselves from it.

Oh, and Monsanto are still nasty evil fucks also.

Re:debunked numerous times?

[tophermeyer]

In theory, yes. But that's not how it works. Westerners ship over tons of food for the "starving" Africans, who get it for free. Local farmers have nobody to sell their crops to, because most of the people in the area are 1) dirt poor and 2) subsisting on the free aid food. Those farmers then turn to the crops they can get the most money for, which happens to be super cheap corn to feed the Western ethanol/biofuel industry. These farmers make less on corn than what they could make on producing local food crops, and can't support their operations. Everybody loses.

Re:GET A CLUE

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot is dying, netcraft confirms it.

Re:wrong! roundup has no soil activity

[shadowofwind]

This is right, roundup does not prevent non-resistent plants from growing where it was applied. So yes, Monsanto is evil, but the grandparent AC claim is false, unless AC wants to log in and clarify.

Re:Damage?

[Anonymous Coward]

You do more damage to the soil for a longer time by using vinegar based herbicides then you do with round-up and glyphosate

Please show some scientific info that even hints at that being true.

Re:GET A CLUE

[Anonymous Coward]

a) Doing experimentations on cross-breeding is a form of engineering.
b) True. But many of the other dangers associated with the new GM food apply to the old GM food too. For example, where I live someone produced a potato that had many desirable properties for farmers but it was extremely susceptible to pseudo-fungus. This caused farmers to drown the fields in toxic pesticides, which then washed into the environment.
@"Die, shill": How can you even type such a thing? Have you no shame?

Here's The Reason...

[pandrijeczko]

...too many people are far too full of their own self-importance these days to "never have the time" for anything - this is one thing you start to realise when you get to middle-age like me.

As soon as you hand over too much personal responsibility to big, evil corporations like Monsanto, they will exploit you for financial gain - that is the purpose of a corporation.

The solution is to take your head out of your backside and make time to grow a few things yourself - in plastic tubs, on a small patch of soil, whatever. No, you don't need to be self-sufficient, grow a few things so that you can feed yourself to a degree, then with the money you save use it to buy better produced home-grown foodstuffs.

Companies like Monsanto exist because there are certain problems that are created when you try to grow foodstuffs in places where it wouldn't normally grow or when it's only economical to grow it there in the first place if there is a certain minimum yield per acre, hectare, etc. We ourselves create those problems because we expect food at a certain price and refuse to eat based on seasonal produce.

Monsanto is a demon created by our own consumer demand - go back 40 years and foodstuffs were transported less, more of it was homegrown and took up a higher proportion of incomes because local producers had to pay reasonable pay to their workers.

I'm not one of these green "loonies" either, I'm more scared about the power we willingly give to huge corporations over what we may or may not be doing to the planet.

Actually, it's not like that at all

[Moraelin]

Actually, it's not like that at all. If you want to find out what's in a vaccine, it's usually right on the label. If you're concerned that the mercury in thiomersal in that vaccine will turn your kid autistic, nobody is hiding from you whether or not there's thiomersal in that vial.

Besides, since you accuse the anti-GM of having some far-left anti-corporatist agenda, wouldn't it make sense to propose to let the free market solve it?

But the concept of a free market is based on some key concepts, one of which is: perfectly informed buyers. No, really. It would be fun if all the Austrian school proponents (mostly libertarians) and the other right-wingers actually read what it says instead of just the bulleted propaganda points. That's the key assumption behind the idea that the market will sort out good from bad: the buyers actually know all aspects of it, and make an informed choice which to buy.

If a product's or company's survival depends on keeping the public uninformed, on people not knowing they got product X instead of the Y they wanted, that's a more gross violation of the very idea of free market than any far-left proponents ever went.

So you're telling me... what? That unlike those "far-left anti-corporatists", you're just against the free market? Or that it's only good until it gets in the way of the corporations, and then you're better off just bending over and trusting them to lube you first?

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Logic and Reason]

But the concept of a free market is based on some key concepts, one of which is: perfectly informed buyers. No, really. It would be fun if all the Austrian school proponents (mostly libertarians) and the other right-wingers actually read what it says instead of just the bulleted propaganda points. That's the key assumption behind the idea that the market will sort out good from bad: the buyers actually know all aspects of it, and make an informed choice which to buy.

Bullshit. What you're talking about is an idealized, "perfect" free market, which economists sometimes talk about in the same way physicists sometimes talk about frictionless surfaces. Real markets do not in any way require perfect information to function well. And what, exactly, is "it" in the phrase "read what it says"? The dictionary? I find nothing about "perfectly informed buyers" in mine.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[agnosticnixie]

Free markets do, otherwise they're not free and controlled by who controls the information.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[andydread]

My sentiments exactly

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Moraelin]

I meant actually reading an economics book, rather than the BS talking points from the likes of Cato. But if your gold standard of educating yourself about free market economics is looking it up in the dictionary... well, you just illustrate the problem I'm talking about.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Logic and Reason]

Then please point me to the economics book that claims markets need perfect information to function.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Anonymous Coward]

You're throwing the Austrian school in the same sack as the neoconservatives, it was after all Mises that said that Human action could not be predicted, and that is one of the main reason for the abandonment of mathematical modelling in the Austrian School. Also most giant corporations exist because of special grants from government(AT&T anyone?), rarely because of any merit.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[agnosticnixie]

Mises also gave a definition of socialism that encompasses tsarist russia. I wouldn't trust him on much else.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Moraelin]

Markets don't need anything, if you just want them to function at all. After all, the internal market of the USSR also functioned... for loose enough definitions of functioning.

But the free market theory postulates a few more effects of it, though. That's why it's still being argued. Not because it would just continue to work better or worse, but because it's supposed to lead to an optimum point. Which really have only been argued on that ideal model. The whole behaviour of the free market as a perfectly self-correcting mechanism, and which does this or that so well without government intervention, is only argued to any satisfactory degree for that ideal market model and not at all on even the most laissez faire RL model. Much less on one which diverges as massively as what Monsanto wants.

They're not there as just some ideal to strive from, but as the reason why you expect certain results. Why you expect for example an increase in Pareto efficiency or Pareto distribution of wealth isn't just that choice A has some advantage over choice B, but that the buyers know that they're better off with A instead of B, and how much money difference that's worth. Otherwise the optimum point may well never be reached.

The more you deviate from it, the more, well, you may not get the same results. Most of that theory was never proven at all on a case which differs from the ideal at all. E.g., go ahead and try to prove the first welfare theorem _without_ assuming perfectly competitive markets or perfect information and a few more such perfect assumptions. And then try the same for the second theorem, which requires even more such assumptions.

But at any rate, the whole maths and handwaving behind the supposed perfect allocation and self-correction qualities of free markets really _only_ work with those assumptions, and _because_ of those assumptions. Real markets having the same effects is nowhere near proven (and if you believe Stiglitz, you could say it's even disproven.) It's all based on the handwaving that it's still close enough to the ideal to still sorta work that way.

Same as if you calculated that something should come down in X seconds by sliding down a frictionless plane (since you used that as an analogy before), the more that plane differs from frictionless, the more the result will differ. Past a point, that body won't be coming down the slope at all. Past a point you get a result that isn't just a little different, but not the same kind of behaviour at all.

And when you get to the extremes that Monsanto wants, where not just you don't know it all, but basically you know _nothing_ at all about the product you just bought, or at least not know if you got product A or B because they don't want them labeled... well, if you have some market theory which can sort the good from the bad without even knowing which is which, I'm all ears.

At any rate, which to read? Well, you can start with say Milton Friedman. Should be palatable enough to the right wing, right? See if you can spot in how many ways his ideas fundamentally require an ideal free market to produce the results he claims.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Myopic]

I don't want to address any of your points except one: "free market" is tantamount to "unregulated market". That is literally the definition of the term. It has nothing to do with perfect information (which is a basis of general market theory).

For instance, if we required GM foods to be labeled, then you (and perhaps I) would cheer for that -- and that would be a specifically non-free market because it is a market regulation. That is why free markets tend to be opaque and non-competitive, specifically because the lack of regulations typically results in poorly informed consumers.

Any call for "free markets" lends credence to an untenable anti-consumer economic ideology, which is why I ask you to reject free markets in favor of carefully, minimally regulated non-free markets.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Myopic]

You are mistaking the term "free market" for something else. I used to make that mistake. I thought "free markets" meant "transparent, functional, competitive markets", but that is not at all what it means.

"Free market" means "unregulated market". Unregulated markets are almost universally bad, bad, bad!

What you want is a "market". A "free market" is something we should all spend time trying to avoid. It's important to make the distinction because that slip of nomenclature bolsters the policy makers who want to strip away consumer protections and other regulations which result in transparent, competitive markets.

Regulated markets are good; free markets are bad.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Myopic]

If your book defines "free market" as anything other than "unregulated market", then it is not in line with the contemporary understanding of the term. My guess is that the book doesn't actually say that.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[agnosticnixie]

Glorious Chicago boys, where would we be without their changing "free market" meaning a market of free (in the classical sense) agents into a market of free (in the mad max sense) for all...

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[rocker_wannabe]

People get a B.A. in Economics, not a B.S. because it isn't a science but an attempt to make useful generalizations about commerce. Because each human being makes economic decisions for a myriad of reasons that is the best you can do. When you say that "Real markets do not in any way require perfect information to function well" you have an idea in your head what that means that may not be shared by everyone else. This causes a lot of frustration because Monsanto making a lot of money may be your idea of a functioning market but Monsanto going out of business my be another persons idea of a functioning market.

The world is filled with good and bad information that we can't always sort out by getting more informed. Sometimes we have to base our beliefs on faith or gut instinct. Everyone does it and anyone who says they don't is lying. Our limited experience of the world based on living in it for a mere 100 years or less will give us a worldview that necessarily can't incorporate all the information out there.

For me, the moral issues trump anything else. If you can't see that Monsanto's behavior is morally wrong for wanting, among other things, to hide the fact that a particular food is GM food then we will never agree.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[agnosticnixie]

People do not, indeed, get a BS.
Because it's a BSc in Economics.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Logic and Reason]

But the free market theory postulates a few more effects of it, though. That's why it's still being argued. Not because it would just continue to work better or worse, but because it's supposed to lead to an optimum point.

I've never heard an argument that free markets always produce some idealized, perfect outcome. What is argued is that markets tend to allocate scarce resources very efficiently. NOT perfectly efficiently, nor with perfect consistency. You are simply putting up a straw man.

Which really have only been argued on that ideal model. The whole behaviour of the free market as a perfectly self-correcting mechanism, and which does this or that so well without government intervention, is only argued to any satisfactory degree for that ideal market model and not at all on even the most laissez faire RL model. Much less on one which diverges as massively as what Monsanto wants.

Again, you are the only one calling the free market a "perfectly self-correcting mechanism".

The more you deviate from it, the more, well, you may not get the same results. Most of that theory was never proven at all on a case which differs from the ideal at all. E.g., go ahead and try to prove the first welfare theorem _without_ assuming perfectly competitive markets or perfect information and a few more such perfect assumptions. And then try the same for the second theorem, which requires even more such assumptions.

Of course you can only prove theorems about an idealized form of the market. But the welfare theorems are a much stronger form of the argument that markets tend to allocate scarce resources efficiently, and as such need not be assumed to apply perfectly in the real world.

And when you get to the extremes that Monsanto wants, where not just you don't know it all, but basically you know _nothing_ at all about the product you just bought, or at least not know if you got product A or B because they don't want them labeled... well, if you have some market theory which can sort the good from the bad without even knowing which is which, I'm all ears.

If you want non-GM products, then buy ones that are labeled as such. Nothing forces you to buy a product that is not labeled in the way you require. And if not many products are so labeled, it means not that many people actually care about having that information (e.g. Kosher foods). Besides, even without such labels, you can visit sites like this to get the information you require. Seems like the market is functioning pretty well to me.

At any rate, which to read? Well, you can start with say Milton Friedman. Should be palatable enough to the right wing, right?

Are you serious? Friedman was a monetarist. Monetarists advocate monetary intervention in the form of a central bank, which is directly contradictory to a laissez-faire approach. Try Rothbard, Mises, or Hayek instead.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Myopic]

If your point is that you are upset that the meaning of free market has changed into something you don't like, then I agree.

But we're stuck with the definition. It means what it means. I like free speech and free software and free beer and free love, so I'm etymologically inclined to like free markets -- but knowing what it really means, I must say that free markets are bad. Please excuse me for annoyingly repeating my point, I truly think it's sorely understated overall.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[NeutronCowboy]

Bullshit yourself. Yes, economists are aware that the idealized benefits of a free market come from a free market that exists as much as a frictionless surface of uniform gravity. However, when conservatives trot out the mantra that the free market will fix itself because Smith's invisible hand will guide it, they do conveniently the two requirements for that invisible hand: zero barrier to entry for sellers and complete information available to buyers. As these two criteria degrade, so does the ability of the invisible hand to do its work in a free market.

That's the key part. There's also a difference between a market functioning "well" (for whom?), and efficiently. Logic and Reason is nothing without knowledge to which to apply Logic and Reason.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[stanlyb]

That's why there is a anti-trust law, which was "forgotten", no matter that Monsanto is world wide MONOPOL.

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[Anonymous Coward]

well, some people haven't had any in a while ... something is better than nothing?

Re:Actually, it's not like that at all

[shutdown -p now]

because it's supposed to lead to an optimum point

Free market does lead to an optimum point for some criteria of "optimum". The missing piece is who sets those criteria, and who benefits...

Re:GET A CLUE

[agnosticnixie]

a) No, it's fundamental science
b) so that makes what we're doing now tolerable how?
kri moar

Dangerous

[BCW2]

As long as Monsanto can sue farmers whose crops get "polluted" by pollen from GM crops, we have a serious problem.

Re:Dangerous

[SirWhoopass]

Can you cite an example where they succeeded? I'm not trolling, I'd really like to see one. I've never yet seen a case where someone was successfully sued for seeds that "blew across from the next field". A poster above cited the link below, but the story clearly indicates that Monsanto dropped their action and the state even changed their laws to restrict Monsanto's ability to go onto farmer's land.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/26/eveningnews/main4048288.shtml

Then there is the well-known Schmeiser case. Schmeiser was clearly and knowingly applying Round-Up to selectively kill non-GM canola and preserve the Monsanto Canola that had blown in. He saved those seeds to use the following year. In the decision, the court noted the argument that seeds had "blown in" but that it was implausible given that the entire field consisted of Round-Up Ready Canola.

So, again, I am not saying I support Monsanto's legal tactics. Nor that I support the idea patenting genes. But that does not change the fact that family farmers being ruined because a few seeds blew in would appear to be a total myth. If someone has an example otherwise, I'll gladly retract my statement.

Until then, I do not believe that exaggerating things to make Monsanto appear worse is in any way helpful to the very real problems that do exist.

Re:Dangerous

[BCW2]

Case banning planting of GM alfalfa in Idaho decided in Monsantos favor. Farmer wanted a ban on GM alfalfa because it would pollute his organic crop. Supreme Court overturned lower court ban.

Great...

[Wyatt Earp]

Now in addition to PTSD from cancer and chemo I'll have "picky eating" as a psychiatric disorder.

Yea, I'm a picky eater, in addition to chemo palate some foods and smells will trigger my PTSD. See when I had cancer some things would set off my nausea.

The Monsanto business model

[Anonymous Coward]

Sit back and stay quiet while the world's governments allow population growth to escalate out of hand. When the population reaches a point where conventional production techniques cannot provide enough food given the land available, step in and clean up.

Of course, the population growth will still continue, and that will have to be dealt with regardless, but in the short term Monsanto and related companies will have carried out their land grab.

It is the same business model as that of the nuclear industry and it is supported by conniving politicians across the world.

Actually "the BBC" is not saying any such thing

[Raging Bool]

If you look at TFA more closely, you will see that this is a contributed piece, not the BBC's view at all. The author is credited at the foot of the article as being an external contributor.

By all means, let's have a discussion about GM foods, but please let's not confuse the medium and the message in the original post.

Golden rice

[Zouden]

Monsanto has nothing to do with Golden Rice. It was developed by university researchers and is distributed for free. Yes, in an ideal world everyone would have a balanced diet and we wouldn't need vitamin A-enriched rice. But the world is not ideal, and we do.

Do you get it yet?

[Foozy]

They are patenting the food chain.
They are patenting the food chain.
They are patenting the food chain.

Re:Do you get it yet?

[Myopic]

Agreed. That's terrible. We should promote widespread adoption of GM crops by first eliminating legal protection of living things.

Up with GM foods! Down with patentable foods!

Monsanto has been pulling punches

[betterunixthanunix]

You may decry their legal attacks on seed saving, but Monsanto has been holding back their worst tactic: terminator genes. A few years ago, Monsanto acquired a company that developed plant genes which would prevent the formation of viable seeds.

Of course, here in the USA, that would not change much. Most of the crops we grow are hybrids, and farmers do not save hybrid seeds because of the unpredictability of future generations (you can see this for yourself if you want -- plant the seeds from some tomatoes you buy at the supermarket). The technology was actually developed to attack third world farmers who frequently save seeds, and whose countries do not respect patents on genes. Luckily, the resistance to the deployment of the technology was so strong that it remains unused, although it is still discussed at industry conventions.

Re:Monsanto has been pulling punches

[txoof]

This really is the scariest and most potentially cruel thing Monsanto and their buddies could do to the third world. Thank goodness for heirloom seeds from places like Seed Savers Exchange.

It's just a matter of time before some super bug, insect, virus or bacteria find a chink in the modern corn crop and leave us in the great potato famine of the 21st century. Corn is the single most successful plant on the planet. We've given over so much of our land to it that if we had a serious corn failure, we'd definitely be in some hot water.

Lack of choice is harmful

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree wholeheartedly with the parent. I doubt that GM foods are harmful but the business model of Monsanto is.

Any system which reduces choice and makes us increasingly dependent on one particular solution, or one particular company is both disastrous and corrupt.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[betterunixthanunix]

their "license agreement" doesn't allow stocking seeds for the next year,

They also have the ability to introduce terminator genes which prevent crops from producing viable seeds, but they have not yet attacked the world with that tactic. We have not yet seen the worst of Monsanto.

StarLink corn shell Taco Bell Diarrhea

[Culture20]

Some of us just have good memories.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgenic_maize#The_StarLink_corn_controversy

Re:StarLink corn shell Taco Bell Diarrhea

[the eric conspiracy]

28 people got diarrhea which may or may not have been caused by the Starlink protein. Is that reason to eschew something as critical as a major new crop technology that may end up feeding billions of people?

That cannot possibly be justified as an ethical or rational position.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

Awesome, the food chain is in the hands of moustache twirling cartoon villains :/

If your religion requires that you...

[John Hasler]

...avoid "GM" foods, do so. No need to inflict your rants on the rest of us (but of course you intend to inflict your religion on us as well, don't you?)

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[Anonymous Coward]

So if there were no 'Monsanto seeds', less of the world would be starving? I am going to have to call bullshit on that one. Exactly what crops are impossible to grow without 'Monsanto seeds'? Also, there is a very simple problem to the 'roundup kills everything else' problem - don't spray Roundup.

Genetically modified food a "taste sensation"

[David Gerard]

THE LAB, Borg Cube, Wednesday (NotScientist) — Dedicated Monsanto geneticists, working for the good of humanity and a badly-written space filler in the newspapers, have produced a fabulous array of valuable new cash crops with 100% all-natural artificial flavors that developing countries can grow to pay the interest on their ludicrous debts to the International Monetary Fund.

"Bananas that taste like banana flavoring!" said Cylon Number Six of Monsanto Public Relations. "Strawberries that taste like strawberry flavoring! Brewed coffee that tastes like instant! I was really disappointed the time I ate a strawberry as a kid, it didn't taste anything like strawberry flavor. Now your kids will never have to suffer the same way."

The wholly natural artificial flavoring builds on examples from nature: bacon with the magical taste of bacon, Quorn with the magical taste of Quorn and Budweiser with the magical taste of urine. The latter example also produces urine with the magical taste of Budweiser.

Some flavors for specialist niches were not a success. "Ice cream that tastes like vanilla dental dams turned out too gritty for the lesbian market, probably because no-one actually uses them." Authentic ManJuice chewing gum for the gay market was considered too "outré" at this time, as no-one could actually bring themselves to use the word "tasteless."

The company looks forward to continuing to feed the world at very reasonable rates on heavily patented non-breeding seed. "Without us, the poor would starve. Starve, you hear? Naturally grown Big Macs with the magical taste of a New Jersey chemical vat will save the world. Anyone who hates Monsanto hates humanity and probably turns tortoises upside-down in the desert," said Six, nibbling on a Red Dye No. 1 fruit fresh off the vine. "We do what we must because we can."

McDonald's Anyone?

[pandrijeczko]

Firstly, let me state that I think Monsanto are evil fucks.

However, why has nobody mentioned the greater impact on agriculture that McDonald's and other food-related corporations have had on agriculture? If anything, Monsanto just provides the seed, animal feed & pesticides that allow the likes of McDonald's to implement highly intensive, mechanised agriculture to churn out millions of hamburgers across the world daily, whilst sticking two fingers up to animal welfare & fair salaries.

And do you really have a right to moan about Monsanto if you're stuffing McDonald's burgers or KFC down your throat 2 or 3 times a week?

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

Learn2read: contributor =/= sole cause.

DIE SHILL

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets see if this is reproducible. If not, you lose.

be honest in your argument

[jDeepbeep]

This is the same conclusion you'll come to with anybody who opposes GM crops or thinks 9/11 was a conspiracy perpetrated by the US Government. You can't get through to these people.

It is intellectually dishonest to paint anti-GM consumers as conspiracy theorists by categorizing them together. There are many reasons individuals may wish to avoid modified organisms. Some of the reasons may be irrational, but that does not mean all of the reasons are, or even most.

Re:be honest in your argument

[Myopic]

The fact that some of the concerns are irrational does not, as you correctly say, mean that all the concerns are irrational.

But, the fact that all the concerns are irrational does, by definition, mean that all the concerns are irrational.

And that does make them similar to the 9/11 woo-woo nutters: none of the arguments make any sense; they are all hollow and meaningless. When you get to the end of the list of grievances, there was no reality in there anywhere.

Sure, GM food COULD be bad, and 9/11 COULD have been perpetrated by the US government. But, having looked at all the claims, they are all wrong in both cases. And thus, the valid comparison between them.

Re:be honest in your argument

[blackbeak]

Sure, GM food COULD be bad, and 9/11 COULD have been perpetrated by the US government. But, having looked at all the claims, they are all wrong in both cases. And thus, the valid comparison between them.

Get out your reading glasses and look again Myopic, here's Biointegrity's list of some FDA documents with which you should be more familiar: http://biointegrity.org/list.html

Re:be honest in your argument

[Myopic]

I sincerely appreciate the link. I considered scoffing, but instead I took a little time and looked over those documents. They all seem to be from 1991-3 (and so does the website), so I'm wondering where is the science from the last two decades. Nevertheless, science from my childhood is still valid, so I started reading.

I didn't have time to read every link, but I read "our summary" of about ten papers. Unfortunately they weren't really summaries, which would have saved some time, but I persisted. I focused on the sentences which were underlined, but in the end I was underwhelmed.

For instance this one

http://biointegrity.org/FDAdocs/14/view1.html

is a request for the FDA to review a marker gene. There is no alarming warning, let alone the result of a study showing harm. Honest question: is a request for a study supposed to make me worry?

Here's another one

http://biointegrity.org/FDAdocs/21/view1.html

which appears to be a statement of purpose for the FDA and options for regulating foods. The options strike me as boring and procedural. Honext question: is that supposed to make me worry?

One more:

http://biointegrity.org/FDAdocs/09/09.pdf

this one is interesting. It is a critique of some report. The critique suggests some language changes. To me, it sounds perfectly reasonable to 'focus on the safety of food, not the method of production', but maybe other people want to focus on the method of production instead of the safety of the food? Honest question: is it your position that the method of production deserves more attention than the safety of the end product?

When you engage in this kind of discussion in the future, you might do well to find a different list of links to provide. Otherwise you might run across a person like me who (ahem) puts on his reading glasses, checks your facts, and finds them uncompelling. I remain unconvinced by your arguments.

Re:be honest in your argument

[blackbeak]

I must admit, for lack of time I grabbed an older bookmark thinking Biointegrity's heading: "INDEX: KEY FDA DOCUMENTS REVEALING (1) HAZARDS OF GENETICALLY ENGINEERED FOODS--AND (2) FLAWS WITH HOW THE AGENCY MADE ITS POLICY" (I'm not yelling it's their caps!) would be backed up with better documents.

As to your first link, that's specifically an "antibiotic resistant marker gene". And did you miss "Memorandum from Dr. Murray Lumpkin to Dr. Bruce Burlington. Subject: "The tomatoes that will eat Aron." Those same GM tomatoes were later removed from the market.

Also, I wasn't planning to single-handedly prove GM foods are toxic. Just don't have the time right now and it wasn't my intent today. For now, how about these quotes from a PBS inquiry:

• "Today the vast majority of foods in supermarkets contain genetically modified substances whose effects on our health are unknown. As a medical doctor, I can assure you that no one in the medical profession would attempt to perform experiments on human subjects without their consent. Such conduct is illegal and unethical. Yet manufacturers of genetically altered foods are exposing us to one of the largest uncontrolled experiments in modern history." --Dr. Martha R. Herbert, pediatric neurologist
• "With genetic engineering, familiar foods could become metabolically dangerous or even toxic. Even if the transgene itself is not dangerous or toxic, it could upset complex biochemical networks and create new bioactive compounds or change the concentrations of those normally present. In addition, the properties in proteins may change in a new chemical environment because they may fold in new ways. Further, the potential toxic or carcinogenic effects could have substantial latency periods." --from The Need for Greater Regulation and Control of Genetic Engineering: A Statement by Scientists Concerned About Trends in the New Biotechnology
• "Lots and lots of people -- virtually the entire population -- could be exposed to genetically engineered foods, and yet we have only a handful of studies in the peer-reviewed literature addressing their safety. The question is, do we assume the technology is safe based on an argument that it's just a minor extension of traditional breeding, or do we prove it? The scientist in me wants to prove it's safe." --Dr. Margaret Mellon, director of the agricultural and biotechnology program, Union of Concerned Scientists

This link also indicates areas of concern: http://www.actionbioscience.org/biotech/pusztai.html

That's all I have time for now. Just go on unconcerned if you must.

Article's comments on Monsanto

[optevo]

I wonder if anyone read TFA or just saw the word Monsanto and started frothing at the mouth/keyboard. For those too lazy to read it, here is what Prof Jones said about them: "Some fear the domination of the seed industry by multinationals, particularly Monsanto. Monsanto is certainly the most determined and successful agbiotech company. In their view, they had to be; they bet the company on agbiotech because unlike their rivals (who also sell nylon or agrichemicals) they had nothing else to fall back on. But monopoly is bad for everyone. Here's a part solution; deregulate GM. If it costs more than $20m (£13m) to get regulatory approval for one transgene, lots of little GM-based solutions to lots of problems will be too expensive and therefore not deployed, and the public sector and small start-up companies will not make the contribution they could. Never before has such excessive regulation been created in response to (still) purely hypothetical risks. The cost of this regulation - demanded by green campaigners - has bolstered the monopoly of the multinationals. This is a massive own-goal and has postponed the benefits to the environment and to us all." That sounds more to me like he is encouraging changes that would open up companies like Monsanto up to more competition. There are perhaps other regulatory changes that may help too (removing subsidies and relaxing the scope of what is patentable and for how long would also be very helpful) but the comment he makes seems quite valid. And not the sort of comment that a shill would make.

Again, it's not that simple

[Moraelin]

Again, it's not that simple.

What helped bacteria get so resistant to antibiotics so quickly, was horizontal gene transfer. Bacteria exchange short loops of DNA from one bacterium to another, even across entirely different species. So once one bacterium had that advantage, suddenly a lot more bacteria than its descendants started to have the same resistance. So you don't just have MRSA, but also antibiotic-resistant TBC and a few others by now.

And it's the _same_ genes that confer resistance to the same antibiotics. Convergent evolution would have produced different combinations in different species, or even in different batches of the same bacterium which developed it independently. But that's largely not the case.

The biggest pain in the butt isn't evolution, is horizontal gene transfer.

And in the case of Roundup-resistance, what we're seeing in those super-weeds isn't just some freak other gene that also blocks Roundup, but basically a verbatim copy of Monsanto's gene. What we're seeing is horizontal gene transfer again.

And if you had read my previous message, we also have a pretty darned good idea about _how_ that kind of thing happens. There's an entire class of bacteria whose very survival depends on transferring genes from one plant to another. It's mostly genes which cause a root tumour in which said bacteria thrive, but essentially it can be loaded with any payload you wish. (That's _how_ the GM companies transfer for example a pesticide producing gene from a non-plant species to grain.) And occasionally it can on its own transfer a bit more, or the wrong segment.

Re:Again, it's not that simple

[Agent0013]

And in the case of Roundup-resistance, what we're seeing in those super-weeds isn't just some freak other gene that also blocks Roundup, but basically a verbatim copy of Monsanto's gene. What we're seeing is horizontal gene transfer

If Monsanto sues farmers that end up having Monsanto's genes in their crops due to cross pollination and wins in court because they own the patent on those genes, then doesn't Monsanto own the same genes found in the super-weeds also? If Monsanto own the genes, then it stands that they own the super-weed also. Then it seems like they should be responsible for invading a farmer's fields with super-weeds when the farmer did not request them. So when is a farmer going to sue Monsanto for an invasive herbicide resistant super-weed that ruins their crops?

Re:GET A CLUE

[DMiax]

No one calls that genetic engineering. His work was with plants, he never tried to modify genes directly, he worked on probabilities, changing the environment. Regardless, genetic engineering does not mean that ("genetic engineering is different from traditional breeding"), no matter how much you want to confuse it.

It's being lobbied by US Agribusiness

[Anonymous Coward]

It's being lobbied by US Agribusiness. Since they don't segregate GM from nonGM, they can't export their crops to Europe without labelling them GM and that impacts the saleability of the item, reducing sales. Therefore US agribusiness want this labelling removed so they can sell to Europe.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey idiot, follow your own advice. "less people" =/= "no people". If the presence or absence of Monsanto crops has no effect on the starving population of the world, how is it a contributor?

Straw man much?

[Moraelin]

That would maybe be relevant if the anti-GM stance had anything to do with their being unnatural. But, hey, it's easier to bravely mow down strawmen than address what they're actually saying, right?

The main objections to GM actually has to do with:

1. Those crops being actually engineered to produce their own pesticides. E.g., about 60% of the corn cultivated in the USA has a gene copied from bacillus thuringiensis which produces essentially a pesticid. (Other plants get it too.)

The resulting plant will essentially be marinated in that pesticide, since just about every cell in it produces some. It's not stuff you can get rid of by just washing your veggies before eating them.

Is that pesticide that harmless when eaten in high quantities by humans? That's a good question. Monsanto's tests say so, tests by Greenpeace show it causes liver damage in rats. Neither is exactly unbiased, but I see no reason to trust the former to be honest, any more than I would the latter.

But at any rate, its being natural has _nothing_ to do with it. Of course it's "natural", since it comes from a bacterium. But that doesn't make it either automatically good, nor automatically bad. Hemlock is natural too, but I wouldn't want that gene added to grain.

2. Those crops being engineered to resist ridiculously high levels of Roundup and other herbicides. Again, the net result is that the actual food you buy at the supermarket afterwards will also contain high quantities of that kind of stuff.

Even if you handwave the herbicide-resistance gene as natural, the herbicide itself isn't. And at any rate, there are good reasons to not want it in your system anyway.

3. They are causing genuine ecological and economic problems world-wide.

Etc.

But yeah, let's pretend instead that it's just about "natural" vs "unnatural". It's easier that way. No need to do the boring parts like, dunno, actually reading what they're saying or doing some research on the topic. We can skip directly to the sounding all smart and doing the "hur hur, silly people not knowing what natural means" circle-jerk dance.

Nuclear waste leak in germany

[pain]

I really hope you live up to your signature. Nuclear power will provide us with plenty of surprises in the future. Here in Germany we have such a thing right now. And politics don't even care that nuclear waste is leaking into the ground water.
Read it on wikipedia

Too few, not "nobody"

[SanityInAnarchy]

I haven't bought a single Sony or Apple product lately. I still use the Apple keyboards I have, but when that wears out, I'll definitely be looking for something else to replace it with.

But you're right, it does seem people in general have done this.

Re:wrong! roundup has no soil activity

[drinkypoo]

This is right, roundup does not prevent non-resistent plants from growing where it was applied. So yes, Monsanto is evil, but the grandparent AC claim is false, unless AC wants to log in and clarify.

Like any pesticide, roundup harms soil diversity. Healthy topsoil can contain as much as 60% living matter in the form of beneficial bacteria and nematodes, not to mention worms. Roundup harms everything good in the soil, so after spraying it on your crops for years you're basically in a situation of doing hydroponic farming in a dirt (not soil, but dirt) medium. This harms production of everything but weeds, some of which have evolved to live in those conditions. So while it doesn't prevent non-resistant plants from growing, it is counter-productive in the long term anyway and will reduce yields.

"mostly an economic problem"

[grey1]

Re your final point, about "famine is mostly an economical problem these days, bringing in the likes of monsanto to 'solve' this will not bring relief to the starving and ill nourished people of the world".

It's worth remembering that whatever problems we have now will be exacerbated by:

• a growing world population (up from about 6 billion at the start of the century to around 9 billion by 2050?)
• a shift in desired diet as developing countries become wealthier (people tend to eat more meat as they become richer, meat uses more grain and multiplies the demand on food supplies)
• restricted resources (land suitable for growing food is fairly fixed, available water is constrained) mean we need to do more within the limits of what we have
• other random impacts from freak weather events, biofuel production, and 'futures' speculators

so we should be exploring a range of solutions, understand the benefits and disadvantages of each possible solution, and expect to use a complicated range of them. GM may well form part of that portfolio. Expecting a single "magic" solution such as the whole world reverting to subsistence farming or turning vegetarian seems quite unrealistic to me.

But maybe (given the tone of the debate so far), I've got unrealistic expectations of this forum...

Re:"mostly an economic problem"

[tlhIngan]

so we should be exploring a range of solutions, understand the benefits and disadvantages of each possible solution, and expect to use a complicated range of them. GM may well form part of that portfolio. Expecting a single "magic" solution such as the whole world reverting to subsistence farming or turning vegetarian seems quite unrealistic to me.

The problem of the hungry is not one of growing enough food. We actually have sufficient food to feed everyone (and then some). The problem is, and has been, politics and distribution.

Politics in that farm subsidies actually hurt poorer nations because they can't sell the food they grow, and are forced to convert their farms from food they need to food they can sell to make money. Crops like corn are so heavily subsidized that effectively, everyone in North America eats corn (directly or indirectly) - from corn-fed animals to processed corn products.

The likes of Monsanto actually would worsen the problem, not alleviate it.

Re:"mostly an economic problem"

[Bakkster]

Wouldn't cheaper crops with higher yields reduce the need for farm subsidies?

You're right that it's the politics that causes the big problems, but that doesn't preclude GM crops from being used in conjunction with fixing the politics to solve our food issues.

Corporate Death Penalty

[drinkypoo]

If there were any desire for justice inside the US Government then the corporate death penalty would have been invoked against Monsanto when it was found that Agent Orange was contaminated by Dioxin due to a desire to make it faster and cheaper, and that company officials knew that it was contaminated and continued to sell it knowing it would be sprayed all over forests full of people including our own soldiers. Except then they'd have to admit that they knew it was contaminated and sprayed it anyway, to avoid having to eat the cost. Further, in the process the known carcinogen was released liberally from the plant, as well as absorbed by plant workers.

Monsanto is one of the clearest expressions of evil in the name of profit on our planet today. Their officers should be pureed and put into the same rocket as the puree of the officers of Union Carbide, and the whole thing launched on a collision course with the sun. That MIGHT provide enough energy to consume their pure evil.

Disorders.

[MaWeiTao]

Every goddamn little personality quirk today is considered a personality disorder. And I see two serious consequences due to this mentality. First, if you're not a materialistic, gullible, image conscious drone like everyone else there's something wrong with you. This is not only a problem from a consumerist standpoint but it makes for a very malleable population who will eat whatever crap the government or special interests feed them. Second, blaming everything on a disorder absolves individuals of responsibility. I taught a course a couple of years ago and a few weeks in I get a letter informing me that one of my students had attention deficit disorder. I'm convinced he used that as an excuse to slack off in class because when he was doing something he enjoyed he sure could focus.

So I'm not surprised in the least that we're being told we're the ones with the disorder because we're selective about the crap companies would like to shovel down our throats. GM foods may be perfectly safe, but it's going to take a generation, likely two to be sure. And given all the on-going changes what is safe now may not be when some new modified foods hit the market a few years from now.

I've got to problem whatsoever with all the research being conducted. It's a good thing, who knows what benefits we may yet reap. But I do have a real problem with what I consider untested foods being sold to us and us being expected to blindly trust corporations and governments that the foods are safe.

Re:GET A CLUE

[delinear]

In any event, it's not sufficient to justify dangerous practices today on the basis that someone else did something similar in the past, even if that yielded positive results.

Re:wrong! roundup has no soil activity

[shadowofwind]

OK, I'll buy that. The AC post was still an overstatement though.

Incidentally, my current yard had about 10 feet of dirt removed before the house was built. The first couple of years there were no ants or worms, nothing. Much of the surface clay came from underneath sheets of rock that were dug up for the basement, which based on the fossils in them are about 450 million years old. (I don't know if the clay had been under the rocks for that long, or was carried down through cracks later, though based on the striking blue color of both clay and rocks there wasn't a lot of water moving stuff around, or else there would have been oxidized iron present.) After a couple of years worms, ants, and lots of other bugs showed up in large numbers. The lawn still isn't extremely healthy, though I'm not sure how much of that is because of the bad dirt and how much its because of all the buried rocks.

My comments on roundup were based on my experience using it as a farm hand, though my experience doesn't contradict your statement.

In any case, we're all in agreement about Monsanto. In my mind, their worst evil is the infertility of their seed. They have also been involved with disposing of toxic waste by reclassifying it as fertilizer, which is unregulated.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[Myopic]

You responded to a point about GM foods with a point about corporate behavior. That is a non-sequitur, so you lose the argument.

But you are right, Monsanto is an abomination.

gene pool is the issue, not the GM food itself

[jpc1957]

To me the content of the resulting GM food isn't where the risk is. It's relatively easy to know what is in the GM food, you just analyze it. The real risk is the unknown effects on the gene pool of the targeted GM food, and all the interrelated species. Who knows where the RoundUp resistance gene might show up in 50 years. Plants, viruses, bacteria or even worse?

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

To be fair, the idea that GM foods will feed the world any more than other methods being experimented, like some of the modern no-till methods, is still very much arguing the consequent :p

What about

[nu1x]

Classifying being picky about my picky eating a disorder, punishable by punching in the face, repeatedly ?

There are no more picky picky-eating criticizers as meat eaters.

It is a fact in my life.

Nearly Impossible

[thechemic]

Considering the fact that approximately 95% of sugar beats are Genetically Modified products, and that the sugar produced from those beats is added to the products that appear on store shelves everywhere, it is nearly impossible to complete avoid GM foods at this point. You would need to avoid almost everything boxed/packaged that contains sugar and buy the majority of your foods from local markets which are known to avoid GM seeds/crops.

Externalities

[mpapet]

What you describe are called Externalities in Economics. Monsanto is waving away the externalities because they don't want to see them or ever have the externalities discovered.

The classic Free Markets ideology as practiced by Americans is to privatize the profit and socialize the costs and externalities. It's a form of welfare for the ruling class and their wealthy sponsors.

GM crops are also a poison pill of sorts for farmers who are not Monsanto customers. Monsanto 'discovers' their GM crop on an unlicensed customer's fields next door to their customer then sues the farmer next door for intellectual property violations. GM in this case is being used as a trojan horse for all kinds of other nefarious (albeit legal) economic activity.

Re:Externalities

[falconwolf]

The classic Free Markets ideology as practiced by Americans is to privatize the profit and socialize the costs and externalities. It's a form of welfare for the ruling class and their wealthy sponsors.

Free markets do not socialize externalities. Just because the current mixed systems do, which are not free markets, that does not mean free markets do.

GM crops are also a poison pill of sorts for farmers who are not Monsanto customers. Monsanto 'discovers' their GM crop on an unlicensed customer's fields next door to their customer then sues the farmer next door for intellectual property violations. GM in this case is being used as a trojan horse for all kinds of other nefarious (albeit legal) economic activity.

And in a free market Monsanto would not be allowed to get away with it.

Falcon

Roundup Ready Crops and GM

[whitelabrat]

There are all sorts of problems with the Monsanto GM products. First of all is that it puts them into position for a near monopoly of the seed market, and could prove devastating to genetic diversity if traditional crops. Then there's the issue of GM crop safety. Do you want to be the guinea pig for this stuff. Yeah. Think cancer.

So what's the big attraction to the Monsanto seeds? They're Round-up (a Monsanto product) proof. That means farmers can dump more herbicide on food crops. Yeah! Great idea!

Re:Roundup Ready Crops and GM

[^_^x]

That sums it up pretty well. Actually, I'm not bothered by the idea of EATING GM crops, but I've seen so many cases from different sources explaining how Monsanto essentially enslaves American farmers, even those who didn't sign up to use their seeds, and will legally bully them into bankruptcy even if they don't have a defensible case, in order to make them comply.

I don't avoid GM crops for picky eating, but I'd avoid them when I even know they're there in the first place, due to who it ends up supporting, the tendency to underexamine how they overtake traditional crops in the wild, and like you said, because in this case they're basically engineered to survive herbicides.

What did you expect from the summary?

[EQ]

After reading the article, the summary is sensationalistic egregious and erroneous sophomoric propaganda, complete with loaded language and inflammatory terms, as well as an over-the-top accusation of "shill" (once you look into the truth and facts of the situation).

This article is pure kdawson, the unmitigated master of shite gathering for /. Malda, please fire this asshat, he keeps beclowning himself (and slashdot) with his blindness to leftard bullshit. Its just as bad as someone with a rightard BS fetish would be. Musn't let them corrupt our pure bodily essences, be it GM foods or fluoridation, eh?

If your standards are so low as to continue to allow someone with so little reasoning ability and such a large and obvious political bias as Kdawson employment as an "editor", you may as well let Ann Coulter and "Daily Kos" start choosing articles for slashdot too, The flame wars and comedy would be great and you'd get tons of web hits (assuming that is all you are after). Let Slashdot finally descend into political lunacy and irrelevance, and die, rather than exist as a chintzy blog populated by mind-numbed zombie-like newbies and brain-dead editors -- for it is now spiraling toward the whimpering undeath of irrelevancy under the effects of your repeated bad judgment regarding your editorial staff. Just do it, give in to whoring the site for fake and politicized controversies, and your journey to the dark side will be complete.

(Before anyone says it: I have kdawson filtered on my /. account, but its not possible to do so on the RSS feed I use, so here I am).

Re:What did you expect from the summary?

[ChromeAeonium]

A science based piece, a piece about something totally different, and a site that, if you scroll down, has anti-vax bullshit, all spun up with a hearty amount of GMO denialism. This is a record low even for kdawson.

Re:What did you expect from the summary?

[Reziac]

Tho the piece about "picky eating" does remind me of a research article I recently came across on one of the medical/genetics journal sites, which tied "meat tastes icky" type vegetarianism to a hormone disorder, explaining why such a desire sometimes suddenly appears in women following a total hysterectomy.

BTW as a long-ago biochem major, I've been getting a kick out of your fine posts :)

Re:What did you expect from the summary?

[ChromeAeonium]

Thanks, I used up a nice chunk of time writing them (duty called), I'm glad someone read them.

Re:What did you expect from the summary?

[Reziac]

LOL! Tho given the modern deluge of educated idiots, you gotta wonder why we don't just let natural selection do its job. ;)

Monsanto licences farmers to use their products?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well what about the other users?

Food processors - they use GM material in their process - need a licence for that?
Food distributors - GM foods essential part of their business model - need a licence for that?
Food sellers - ditto - need a licence for that?
Cooking - can't tell whether you are using GM products, ooops, your bad - need a licence for that?
Food consumers - changing the composition of products using GM foods (derived works) - need a licence for that?
Crapping the GM food down the toilet - illegal distribution, leading to potential unlicenced use - need a licence for that?

Will never happen, will it? After all, a company would have to be totally amoral and greedy, not to mention sufficiently wealthy to buy off lawmakers, to force this down our throats.

Re:Spot On!

[Phrogman]

I am always rattling on about how I distrust companies because they are inherently amoral. In the case of Monsanto I have to say they are the posterchild for all I hate in a big corporation. In my opinion their policies and actions are actually evil. Their products? Well I am not sure on that. GM is probably fine, but the potential for not fine is pretty high when you are modifying biology - and if you can imagine a biological equivalent to the current BP oil disaster occurring somewhere, you might agree with me. Some well meant commercial GM product that didn't receive adequate testing because developing it cost the company too much and the bean counters want to start shipping NOW, causes an ecological disaster of some kind. Imagine trying to ensure you got all the seeds of a particular species of plant that spread through some area in say Oklahoma, or Kansas.

How does it harm soil diversity?

[maillemaker]

My understanding is that Roundup works by stopping photosynthesis in plants that it comes in direct contact with. It does not contaminate soil and prevent photosynthesis in future plants that might try to grow in the soil. It also should have little effect on any living matter in the soil that is not dependent on photosynthesis.

Re:How does it harm soil diversity?

[drinkypoo]

If you could spray Roundup only on the leaves of the plants with some sort of variation on powdercoating technology or similar then it might work that way, but in practice it is overused like everything else and it ends up in groundwater... a fact for which citations are trivially easy to locate, which you would know if you had even tried.

Radium paint is safe for US workers

[Anonymous Coward]

when the factories are in China.

Re:NaturalNews talks a lot about this stuff

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh god.

Do they still have that report on how washing your hands is the cause of disease in North America?

A GM Rose by any other name

[Anonymous Coward]

So, if you engineered software, or any other device, that performs the same way GM crops do - infect other producer's inventory with patented bits of your component - could you claim judicial precedence based on Monsanto's legal arm twisting?

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[TheSync]

The world is starving

Actually the share of malnourished people in the developing world is decreasing, from 37% in 1970 to 17% in 2007.

Most transgenic crops are grown in the US, with smaller amounts in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, India, China, Paraguay, and South Africa.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[agnosticnixie]

17% of Earth is the entire African continent, just saying.

Monsanto Evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Monsanto is very evil. But it doesn't matter in terms of elections or public opinion because despite their massive size, I bet the masses don't have any clue who Monsanto even is. When you aren't in retail, you can be almost as evil as you want.

Matasano?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who is Matasano?

the only truth is

[Anonymous Coward]

Genetically engineered food for ANY reason, should be ban, i dont care if it's to stand weather, bugs, pesticide, insecticide. As soon as you make something different,everything living off it, is affected.

CounterThink webcomic

[Dr. Cody]

Natural News has the greatest goddamn webcomic ever:

http://www.naturalnews.com/021571_vaccines_vaccinations.html

The organization responsible for Agent Orange

[AthleteMusicianNerd]

I wonder if those deformed in Vietnam were too picky. Why would anyone need a normal face?

OT - your sig

[mcgrew]

Mod Me Up. You'll make a grown man cry.

If you mod me up... if you mod me up I'll never stop, never stop, never never never never.
Mod me up -- if you mod me up I'll never stop, never stop, never never never never.
You make a grown man cry, you make a grown man cry...

Apologies to the Rolling Stones.

Re:OT - your sig

[MoeDumb]

Hey! You! get off of my sig!

Oh, cry me a river.

[Fantastic Lad]

After reading the article, the summary is sensationalistic egregious and erroneous sophomoric propaganda, complete with loaded language and inflammatory terms, as well as an over-the-top accusation of "shill" (once you look into the truth and facts of the situation).

Wow. Did we read the same article? The one I read, "Fussy Eaters" was a fear-mongering piece of sophomoric propaganda, spewed false logic and faulty premises complete with all the loaded language and inflammatory terms you accuse kdawson of using, when all HE was doing was pointing out the astonishing fact that it existed. The simple fact that the writer is in a conflict of interest with his journalistic duties via monetary connections to Monsanto is enough to validate the summary.

Kdawson nailed it.

You, however, are reacting in the manner of a frightened child-man who made the life-defining choice long ago that when faced with upsetting information you would hide from it rather than face it, explore it and learn from it.

You are a coward. You even seem think that hiding, (using filters to make the things you don't like go away) is a virtue of some sort. Whatever. But let me tell you this; the people who are brave enough to SEEK objective reality and pounce on it, are NOT going to go away just because you piss and moan about how upsetting they are to your make-believe world view.

-FL

=Sputter=

[Fantastic Lad]

Are you insane?

I'm sorry, but did you miss the last seventy days of oil disaster thanks to a profound lack of regulatory oversight?

Did you miss the economic meltdown which has shaken the globe due to a profound lack of regulatory oversight?

Every corporation, ever, which strained against regulations which prevent the spread of their irresponsible, psychopathic greed has done so by arguing that free market capitalism is being strangled, (with the implied notion that this is a grave offense against Darwin or some such nonsense.) The article you are quoting is EXACTLY the sort of crap a shill journalist would write.

Shake your head and try again.

Sheesh!

-FL

GMO's are cancerous

[Anonymous Coward]

In 1999, Dr. Arpad Pusztai, the world’s top GMO safety researcher at the prestigious Rowett Institute in Scotland was working on a UK government grant to design long-term testing protocols intended to become part of the official European GM food safety assessment process. When Pusztai fed supposedly harmless GMOs to rats, they developed potentially pre-cancerous cell growth, smaller brains, livers and testicles, partially atrophied livers, and showed signs of a damaged immune system. Moreover, the results clearly indicated that the cause of the problem was due to the unpredictable side effects arising from the process of genetic engineering itself. In other words, his study suggested that the GM foods already on the market, which were created from the same process, might also create such effects. When Dr Pusztai expressed his concern he was fired from his job of 35 years and silenced with threats of a lawsuit. His 20-member research team was disbanded, all testing protocols were abandoned, and the pro-GM establishment embarked on an extensive disinformation campaign to discredit the study’s results to protect the reputation of GM foods already in the marketplace.

When an invitation to testify before Parliament allowed Pusztai to finally tell his alarming story, all hell broke loose. The outpouring of news coverage, said to one columnist, “divided society into two warring blocs” over the GM food issue. An industry wide rejection of GMOs was reached quickly thanks to the buying power of consumers who convinced manufacturers to keep GMOs out of the European Union, in spite of official approvals by the pro-GM European Commission.

Brazil-Nut Allergen in Transgenic Soybeans

[tlambert]

"Identification of a Brazil-Nut Allergen in Transgenic Soybeans"

Full article from 1996 New England Journal of Medicine

http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/334/11/688

-- Terry

Re:Brazil-Nut Allergen in Transgenic Soybeans

[the eric conspiracy]

The purpose of safety testing is to evaluate if a product will be safe for consumers (Lehrer and Bannon 2005; Goodman and others 2008). In this case, when it became clear that the transferred protein with potentially an allergen--remember nobody has ever eaten this soybean or suffered an allergic reaction--the project was stopped. The soybean never made out of early stages in development; it was never submitted to regulators nor was any attempt ever made to market it. This is exactly how the premarket safety assessment is supposed to help developers ensure that only products that are as safe as any other food reach the market. It is a fact that no GM product has ever caused a food allergy (Goodman and others 2008). Ironically, about 10 common foods cause over 95 percent of all food allergies (Bannon and Lehrer 2005). No premarket testing is required for non-GM foods and they are not taken off the market when they cause allergies.

http://academicsreview.org/reviewed-content/genetic-roulette/section-3/3-1-gm-soybeans-and-allergens/#claims

Re:Brazil-Nut Allergen in Transgenic Soybeans

[ChromeAeonium]

Academics Review is a great site. Have you ever been to Biofortified or Tomorrow's Table? I like this one too. I guess you've been to GMO Pundit, since he's one of the guys who wrote Academics Review. They're some great sites for science based info on genetic engineering.

Joining the ranks of the great!

[Digital Pizza]

Union Aerospace
Weyland-Yutani
Cyberdyne Systems
Umbrella Corporation
Omni Consumer Products
Wolfram & Hart
Yoyodyne
Blue Sun
Buy-n-Large
Veidt Industries
Soylent Corporation
Monstanto

if Monsanto has anything to do with the food...

[cdpage]

I simply will not eat it. I have not fear of GM food, we all Love the Strawberry's coming from CA... But if i see Monsanto i will not buy it. They are THE WORST thing to happen to agriculture the world over... Next only to the US HEAVILY subsidizing Corn.

Re:Damage?

[will_die]

A quick google search will bring up the reasons here are times from gardeners and others.
Vinegar will change the pH for 2-3 months more if in the shade.
Basic Round-Up is ready to be replanted once the plant you want dead is dead. The label recommends 2-3 weeks but then companies tend to be longer then is needed just to be safe.

Re:They will ALL abuse the tech

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, do you remember all the people in India who committed suicide because they had a minor drought and didn't make enough to pay off Monsanto? F* Monsanto!!!!!!

FYI, last week Hawaii had some GM eco-terrorism.

[hellop2]

Video: 8500 Papaya trees chopped down.

I guess some people are pretty fussy.

Think about it dood..

[stevekoru]

Natural food has no copyrights or patents attached.. He who controls the food controls the world..

There's so much more to this than meets the eye...

[mr.andreas]

"The BBC today characterized those who avoid GM foods as overly fussy, the very same day that the Wall Street Journal announced that picky eating may be recognized in the 2013 DSM as a psychiatric disorder."

How easy it is to label people as having a disorder nowadays. Never mind our human rights (we should be allowed to make our own choices of what we eat). Of course, how do they then treat these "psychiatric disorders" nowadays? Drugs and more drugs some of which makes you barely human. (Never mind that, in some countries, they may even put you on a CTO (Compulsory Treatment Order) taking away your human rights full stop.) The whole lot is interconnected by money and more money. It's big business in which you and I are indirectly the commodity. The more people they have eating their food and taking their drugs (and making them dependent on them) the more they make and the more people they can convince to follow the same path (why shouldn't you eat the same food and take the same drugs as your neighbour?). Is this what we want to buy into?

genetic pollution is more of a concern

[swatkins]

I'm not worried about the dangers of eating GM foods, but I am very concerned about genetic pollution. GM crops inevitably cross-pollinate with other crops nearby, and with wild grasses and plants. It's a bit like someone smoking in a crowded restaurant, everyone else is forced to breathe the smoke whether they like it or not. I don't want to live in a world where natural organisms are a fading memory. GM (Genetic Mutilation) is very different from normal breeding. You can breed a horse with a donkey, but you can never breed a pig with an avocado. Those crazy GM companies can do stupid things like that, combining DNA from totally different organisms. Some scientists seem to think they have the right or obligation to do anything they like in the name of science, however obscene or morally offensive it might be. Monsanto can go to hell. We can send them out of business by lobbying for labeling of all products (not just food) containing GM products.

Should there even be licence fees for growing food

[falconwolf]

Slashdot had an article after the Iraqi invasion where Paul Bremer, who was appointed as the administrator of Iraq's Coalition Provisional Authority, made a law like this: Iraq law Requires Seed Licenses.

Well, the seed they sell you is sterile. Terminator crops will not reproduce so you can't save seed from last year for this year's planting.

Seed saving has been practiced by farmers for thousands of years.

Monsanto tout things like their "Golden Rice" (such a dream name, that one) as helping the poor third world. It's been engineered to have high levels of Vitamin D.

FYI vitamin A not vitamin D. At first look it may sound good, engineering rice to contain a nutrient needed for eyesight, but in fact those who need the vitamin need to eat other foods such as some of those listed here.

Falcon

Monsanto has nothing to do with Golden Rice.

[falconwolf]

Monsanto doesn't have anything to do with Golden Rice? Then you'd better tell CBS they are wrong. And Monsanto.

Falcon

Link

[PinkyGigglebrain]

Sorry, forgot to link to the info about the Brazil/soybean.

They're NOT "harmless"! Study shows toxicity.

[Jane Q. Public]

THIS STUDY published in the International Journal of Biological Sciences shows liver and kidney toxicity in rats due to 3 different varieties of Monsanto GM corn. And before anybody jumps in and says the study "cherry picked" data or anything of the sort, be aware that the study used Monsanto's own data, from its own experiments that were performed in order to get USDA approval for the products.

And this is not some "fly-by-night" outfit. IJBS is a reputable peer-reviewed scientific journal.

If you can stomach reading scientific papers, this is an interesting read.

The battle is not GM vs non-GM.

[falconwolf]

No, the battle is GM vs non-GM. I will not buy GM food. Nor will many other people. How about this, have GM food labeled then see how many people buy it. Companies like Monsanto fight attempts to require labeling.

The push for profit has given us radical increase in agricultural yield over the past 80 years

One, for most of those 80 years foreign genes were not inserted into plants. Two, more than one thing accounts for increases in yield, And three, a lack of food is not the problem. The problems are political and armed conflicts. With neoliberal policies yields only went up modestly. Here's a story about millions of metric tons of wheat rotting away in a warehouse in India. Another one says how the supply chain is messed up, "Industry experts estimate more than 30% of all fresh produce is lost or spoils before it reaches the market." Many more stories like these can be found. How about in Africa? In the Democratic Republic of Congo looting of crops by armed groups and general insecurity has undermined farming. Or take Zimbabwe. Before Robert Mugabe came to power the country was a bread basket for southern Africa, ie a net food exporter. Food was the one of the biggest if not the biggest cash earner for Zimbabwe. After he came to power he forced white farmers off the farms then gave the land to his cronies, who do not know how to farm. Now Zimbabwe does not grow enough food for its own population.

Quite simply GM will not "fix" the problem of too little food. There's plenty of food so genetic engineering is not needed. To go further Infrastructure: The new gold explains how infrastructure is part of the problem. It blames the rotting food in India on the "country's creaky infrastructure".

Falcon

Monsanto = Shitbags

[dogzdik]

Yeah - this PR bullshit coming from a company that fires and sues and legally shuts a former scientist / researcher who said "GM potatoes rotted the internals of the rats that ate them and they all died"....

Yeah and lets not forget what a pack of fucking arseholes the people who manage Monsanto ARE - with the GM pollen spreading to NON GM farms and then suing the farmer and taking everything they have for infringing Monsantos patents...

With their packs of roving goon squads raiding peoples farms....

These cunts should be shot on sight.

Re:GET A CLUE

[ChromeAeonium]

People are bitching that that is different, cross breeding and GMOs, but the problem is, while it is true that they are different, many people are against GMOs because they perceive them as unnatural, so it is a valid point. It kinda works like this:

GMO denialist: GMOs are bad because they're unnatural!

GMO proponent: We've been modifying plant DNA for years via breeding.

GMO denailist: Tooootaly different! I'm not against it because they're unnatural, I'm against it because {insert unscientific argument or issue unrelated to science here]

Basically, every time an anti-GMO claim gets rebutted, it comes back in a different form, but the conclusion is always the same. Don't give me this bullshit that you're just against Monsanto when you also oppose things like Rainbow papaya, BioCassava, Golden Rice, or HoneySweet plum. Don't give me this nonsense about concerns about human health when there is not a single shred of credible evidence indicating any health problems whatsoever. And don't give me this crap about environmental concern when GMOs have been shown to be beneficial for the environment (although concerns for cross pollination of wild species is a valid concern). If people were pointing out specific issues with specific GMOs, that would be fine. If they said that a specific crop does not perform as expected, or that certain factors may cause some sort of issue (like the Round-Up resistant weeds produced by over-reliance on a single herbicide*), or that a specific GMO produces a specific compound by a specific means that raises health concerns that would be fine. But they're not. They're against ALL GMOs for every conceivable reason. Sure, some people might have a more nuanced view, but the vast majority of the anti-GMO are just denialists, plain and simple, no better than vaccine denialists or 9/11 truthers or the moon landing guys. When you strip away the other arguments, what you are almost without fail left with is that GMOs do not fit into their naturalistic magical thinking, no matter how hard they try to claim they're reasonable, that is, by and large, the heart of the anti-GMO movement. Of course, some people are just misled by said magical thinkers, just like there are concerned parents who were misled by opportunistic douches like Andrew Wakefield, and these are the people that need to be reached. I am increasingly starting to think that the hard core active denialists may be too deep into the woo to reach.

*Note, over reliance, not over use. There's a difference.

Re:GET A CLUE

[ChromeAeonium]

In the world of GMO denialism, accusations of being paid off by Monsanto are considered perfectly valid arguments. That's why you can't trust anyone who knows what they're talking about, because every single relevant expert is 'one of them' and is being paid huge swarths of money by Monsanto (who inexplicably owns an entire field of science used by horticulturists, microbiologists, zoologists, ect. all over the world). I shit you not, in my experience I've found that this is what no small number of them actually believe. If you know what you're talking about, you can't be trusted. I don't know if anti-GMO sentiment is anti-science masquerading as anti-corporatism or if it's the other way around. Funny thing is, they even oppose non-corporate GMOs, like Rainbow papaya, BioCassava, Golden Rice, or HoneySweet plum. In other words, their 'I'm not against science I'm against Monsanto' claim holds no water, but they really are against making a profit on R&D. They're hard to figure out.

I wish

[WeeBit]

someone would post a list online of the GM products. In the USA they can't say which products are GM. But places in Europe they can. So it is listed on European food packages by law.

Truth in Labeling

[zQuo]

Labeling a food ingredient accurately is perfectly valid and should be supported. Many people have a preference and will pay more for one or the other.

There is an actual difference between GMO foods and non-GMO in the process of how they are grown, no matter whether the end product is similar or not. Accurate labeling is simply letting the people decide on the relative price difference between the two, such as organic milk or free-range eggs. It doesn't need to be intrusive... GMO corn starch, partially GMO corn starch, or non-GMO corn starch, etc.

If this is done accurately, it helps everyone. People who accept GMO risks end up paying less for their food costs. Which is exactly what we want. And people who are worried about unknown risks will pay more. If GMO foods truly cost less for a farmer to produce than regular foods, then the price savings should be evident in the market, and the price savings should be compelling enough to convince people to buy them.

Re:NaturalNews talks a lot about this stuff

[uninformedLuddite]

Do vaccinations confer future generations immunity/resistance to the diseases immunised against? Does natural selection confer this immunity/resistance? I have always felt that nature tends to get most things right and that many of our efforts are little understood even by the advocates/practitioners of these efforts.

Monsanto: helping us eat our young

[vaporland]

http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/americas/Monsanto-Donates-4-Million-of-Seeds-to-Haiti-93847874.html

they donated GM seeds to Haiti, but i bet they sell the Roundup to go with them...

http://www.psychicpolitics.com/psychic_politics/psychic_politics/Entries/2010/5/16_let_them_eat_tech.html

Of course I did not try - I asked you instead.

[maillemaker]

As I said, I was relaying MY UNDERSTANDING of how Roundup works, which is that it does not stick around in the soil or affect future growth of plants growing in that soil.

Sure I could go and research Roundup myself, but since you had already started the conversation, I figured I'd just ask you instead.

I guess next time I'll stick to Google and skip the attitude.

http://www.guarding-our-earth.com/aggrand/roundup.htm

plant variants

[falconwolf]

there aren't a whole lot of variants of "corn" or "wheat" or "soy" being planted

I don't personally know about wheat and soya, but I love gardening and I've grown Black Aztec Corn, which is black, and Inca Rainbow corn, which is rainbow coloured. Over the years the only "regular" corn varieties I've grown are sweet white varieties. Seed Savers Exchange has more varieties.

Falcon

Re:plant variants

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, there are tens of hundreds (or maybe more) individuals planting non-GMO heirloom variants. But they are in (significant) minority, and if all of the output of their crops were released in a year to reseed fields previously planted with GMO plants, there would not be enough to cover the fields in any significant fashion.

Re:GET A CLUE

[c6gunner]

They're hard to figure out.

Not really. Same mindset as all conspiracy theorists. I'm just surprised to see so many on slashdot falling for it. You'd think nerds would be the LEAST likely to latch on to anti-technology conspiracy theories.

Lateral transfer, yes, but gradual and tested.

[zooblethorpe]

While it is true that these sea slugs have indeed been appropriating the protein machinery required for them to maintain (and possibly at some point produce) chloroplasts of their own by ransacking the genes of their food algae, we must also note that this is a process that has been going on for quite some time, certainly longer than any GMO efforts, and thus we can also infer that the slug (the gene receiver in this case) has found a way to effectively bug-test and shake out any overly adverse negative effects.

Meanwhile, with GMOs, we have creative scientists combing the breadth and width of the vast library of known genes, picking and choosing with little clue of the myriad possibilities for unintended long-term consequences. And, when the underlying motives are ultimately about earning profits for the very select population of shareholders and executives, it's a fair bet (and has been exhibited through history by many corporations) that the genetic manipulations put in place are being implemented orthogonally to the greater good -- and by "greater good" here I speak not metaphorically of some nebulous mythic concept, but quite literally of that outcome that produces the maximum benefit for the most beneficiaries, that particular bell curve shape that has the greatest integral.

So, on the one hand, we have a process occurring over an extended period and with properly implemented bug-testing, carried out to improve the success of the users of the change. On the other, we have a process occurring over a very short period and with minimal testing, carried out to improve the success of the implementers of the change.

Whether the processes in question affect foods, medicines, nuclear power, or even skin creams or furniture glue, for my part, I know I would prefer that product developers lean more towards the former of these two patterns.

Re:GET A CLUE

[ChromeAeonium]

Not really. Same mindset as all conspiracy theorists.

Well, I can't argue with that. Yeah, I am a bit disappointed too that the people here are falling for classic anti-GMO half-truths and whole lies, I was hoping to see a bit more critical thinking on the issue. I'm a horticulture major, and genetic engineering is kinda my area of interest (that and exotic pomology), and I am just baffled at the ignorance displayed about this topic. I have been at rounds with people about this, and the reaction I get is 'Who's paying you?' And it's a very successful strain of crankery; most people don't even know they're buying into absolute rubbish. They really should have a basic knowledge about food and agricultural science, and the funny thing is, the people with just a bit of knowledge are often the most ignorant. Like the people who think they're saving the world by using inefficient farming practices. Can you imagine it if someone tried pulling that with cars? 'Yeah, my car gets really low millage, and it spits black smoke everywhere, and it leaks fuel as it goes, but I'm doing it for the environment.'

It's just crazy that this is such an issue. I just don't get how we, as a society, ended up here with this pervasive horticultural quackery. GMOs are safe and they are effective, there is hardly a shred of credible evidence that says otherwise, and I don't get how people can possibly think that bullshit conspiracies are a valid rebuttal to mountains of good science. I'm not saying there aren't any issues to work out, with anything there are always new issues to work out, but it is still a legitimate tool for plant improvement. Genetic engineering shouldn't be the controversy it is, it should be something taught in middle school biology.

It's frustrating when one of your professors tells you that there's not much of a future in your area of interest (genetic engineering of fruits in my case) because, while the science is there, it can be done, no one really wants you to do it. Perhaps he was a bit overly pessimistic, and pomology funding is suffering to begin with, but still, but they say the only commercially grown GMO fruit, the Rainbow papaya, would have a much harder time if someone wanted to make it today, so thanks a lot you science hating assholes.

Wall Street Journal's article on food habits

[Anonymous Coward]

Food is naturally available, as two other most important supports - air and water-, in the form of breast milk as you are born. Where is the need to be so greedy about making money in the name of 'seeds'.
Unfortunately DSM has not considered this greediness as a mental disorder. The father of modern medicine Hippocrates termed Hybridisation as disease and death - VIDE his aphorisms.

I don't think you know a damn thing about farming

[Anonymous Coward]

We pay farmers to take land out of production and grow grass on it instead of grains. Crop price supports were meant to help small scale farmers stay in business. They were already growing too much corn and were going out of business in droves because demand could not keep up with supply. A lot of that was due to Jimmy Carter's disastrous Grain Embargo which cut off demand and encouraged competitors to expand their operations. This was especially evident in South America where rangeland was plowed under for planting crops to make up for what the US wasn't selling the Soviets and encouraged rain forest clear cutting for grazing cattle and/or more crops. Unfortunately, the price supports do encourage more corn output, but without them, there would be even more small farmers going out of business and more consolidation.

What many advocate as "the right way, the sustainable way" (politically correct organic farming) does sacrifice output and would lead to massive food price increases and shortages. Subsidizing the production of bio-fuel was linked to food shortages and riots recently in poorer parts of the world. Those would be minor compared to what would occur if current production methods were ditched (a good way to kill off a big portion of the planet though). The "factory model" was scientifically developed to maximize output, profitability, efficiency, etc and is increasingly sustainable. The 'no-till' GM crops were originally developed to help eliminate fuel usage, soil erosion, and excessive use of pesticides/herbicides. The "right way" is only profitable if one has access to niche markets where people are willing to pay exorbitantly high prices for it. Most do not and still want to be profitable so they can farm their land for generations, which is why the "factory" methods have evolved the way they have.

BTW, if you really wanted to reduce the use of high fructose corn syrup, eliminate the sugar tariffs. Also, the hormones used are the same as what are produced naturally by the animals. Not to mention that the animals are tested before being sold. Producers who continue to use them after the animals reach a certain age will find themselves w/o buyers and a market that will not accept their animals. But all too often people just regurgitate the writings of someone who has never visited a farm or ranch in their life. The truth can be an eye opening experience, as this guy found out when he visited a typical feedlot: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/cattle-feedlot-visit

Re:GET A CLUE

[c6gunner]

I love the car analogy :) Thanks for speaking up - it's good to hear the odd voice of reason in all this insanity.