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The Gap Between What The Public Thinks And What Scientists Know
First time accepted submitter burtosis writes Despite similar views about the overall place of science in America, the general public and scientists often see science-related issues through a different lens, according to a new pair of surveys by the Pew Research Center in collaboration with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). From FiveThirtyEight: "The surveys found broad support for government to spend money on science, but that doesn't mean the public supports the conclusions that scientists draw. The biggest gap between scientists and the public came on issues that may elicit fear: the safety of genetically modified (or GMO) foods (37 percent of the public said GMOs were safe, compared to 88 percent of scientists) and the use of pesticides in agriculture (28 percent of the public said foods grown with pesticides were safe to eat, versus 68 percent of scientists). There was also disagreement over the cause of climate change (50 percent of the public said it is mostly due to human activity, compared to 87 percent of scientists). Here’s a full list, via Pew Research Center, of the scientific issues the survey asked about."
That's not always correct. Roundup-ready crops sold by Monsanto (for example) are not resistant to pests, they are resistant to herbicides. They let you spray MORE, not less.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
> A recent GAO report said that $106 BILLION was spent by the US government through 2010 on global warming research
Im staring at the Forbes report at http://www.whitehouse.gov/site.... Note that a lot of that money is involved in "clean" energy projects which have dual or triple use: reducing pollution, improving arable land, water management, emergency planning for coastal areas, and switching from unsustainable fuel resources to sustainable, less greenhouse gas producing fuels.
I'm also afraid you're comparing apples to oranges. Most of the federal budget is not "advertising" to compare to oil companies, it's a great deal of real work with multiple scientific. urban development, and economic uses. If you compare it to the amount of money oil companies spent on drilling for new oil or on research to expand their markets, you'd have a better scale.
That is true, but without understanding what the GAO report was covering it can be a bit misleading. Here is a bit of a graphic summary. http://www.gao.gov/key_issues/...
First it is important to note the 106B was over like a 20 year period. It is also important to note, that 106B wasn't all for science (in fact only the minority of it was). That number was the full amount they could attribute towards any are of work on climate change. In the above link the break it down into science, technology, and international assistance. So this covers FAR more than what one would first think of if they were told 106B went to climate change research. Research into clean coal? That would be counted. Nuclear, that would be counted. Research into better batteries for electric cars, that is counted. Research in to solar/wind, that is counted.
You can dig into the reports further to get a more detailed understanding. The point is simply saying climate change got 106B may sound like "oh my god climate researchers are getting rich!!!!". However, when you understand what the report really covers (long period of time and only a small portion goes to what you'd normally thing of as climate research) it does change the perspective a bit.
"reality has a well-known liberal bias" - Steven Colbert
No.
BS.
http://arstechnica.com/science...
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Exactly this.
What's funny is that when Climate Change Skeptics, the Koch Brothers, funded their own study and planted an outspoken critic of climate change science as the director of the research, that skeptic ended up becoming a believer and published an Op-Ed in the NYT explaining how wrong he had been to not accept the science.
But somehow people still find a way to rationalize it all away as just the invention of a bunch of wealthy limousine-riding scientists keeping down those poor, defenseless oil companies.
i ~ Celebrating Science, Cyberspace, Speculation
The only issue there is that if pollen blows into my field, I don't think it is reasonable that I have to pay you a licensing fee.
Take for example a bull that breaks through a fence and breeds with some of my cattle. Do I have to pay a breeding fee for you bull's "service" to my herd? No.
And the thing is that Monsanto has done that in the past...
I believe you've been misled. If you can cite and example that'd be great. The one that got me up in arms was back when Percy Schmeiser lost in court against Monsanto for exactly this. His case was famous at the time, until I brought it up with my family that actually are farming. He's basically the only case I'm aware of where the claim of cross pollination led to a lawsuit by Monsanto. The truth though, is that Percy collected his own seed from his crop normally. Then, his neighbour planted round-up ready Canola beside his own field. Contrary to the story that you and I are told by the GMO fear mongers, his field was NOT accidentally contaminated. Percy actually went along the edge of his field that was shared with his neighbour, and sprayed the entire strip with round up, killing everything he planted but keeping enough of seeds that made it to the edge of his field from his neighbour's. Percy then collected the surviving plants to plant as seed. He deliberately and purposely set out to acquire the GMO seed and went to extreme lengths to do so.
I can second you anecdotes with my own. Having grown up on farms I've had the exact same experience. I went off to university when Monsanto was just rolling out round-up ready Canola. I got pretty worked up over their patent policies and was eager to reminisce with all the guys back home who where farming. Turns out universally they were all more than happy to buy Monsanto's seeds as it just made them far more money than other approach. More over, as pointed up thread, the only ones Monstanto was suing were guys trying to use Monsanto's seed for free, and the guys willing to buy the seed had no sympathy.