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Genetically Modified Crops Are Safe, Report Says (nbcnews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: Genetically modified crops on the market are not only safe, but appear to be good for people and the environment, experts determined in a report released Tuesday. "The committee delved into the relevant literature, heard from 80 diverse speakers, and read more than 700 comments from members of the public to broaden its understanding of issues surrounding GE crops," the report reads. Panel members read more than 900 reports. A lot of concern centered on health effects. The committee determined the following: there is no evidence of large-scale health effects on people from genetically modified foods; there is some evidence that crops genetically engineered to resist bugs have benefited people by reducing cases of insecticide poisoning; genetically engineered crops to benefit human health, such as those altered to produce more vitamin A, can reduce blindness and deaths due to vitamin A deficiency; using insect-resistant or herbicide-resistant crops did not damage plant or insect diversity and in some cases increased the diversity of insects; sometimes the added genes do leak out to nearby plants -- a process called gene flow -- but there is no evidence it has caused harm; in general, farmers who use GM soybean, cotton, and corn make more money but it does depend on how bad pests are and farming practices; GM crops do reduce losses to pests, and if farmers use insect-resistant crops but don't take enough care, sometimes pest insects develop resistance. The National Academics of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have put the evidence up on a website for skeptics of the report. The report also includes a 'Summarized Comments Received from Members of the Public' section for people to look up the facts to answer their concerns.
There are people today who are concerned that there is DNA in their food. They will not believe this report any more than the people who think global warming is a lie or that the creationist 'museum' is factual..
The issue of GMO food has passed rational debate and entered into religious fervor. Some silly report isn't going to change a thing.
It says it's from NBC News, but it reads like the opening speech at the annual Monsanto company picnic.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
The report really knocks the value of GMOs as begin completely over blown and of little value. Further, the report points to many unresolved ares of substantial risk.
I don't doubt that GM crops are safe. But what about the dirty tricks companies play, such as patenting a gene sequence? Or writing contracts that forbid farmers from harvesting seed, forcing them to buy new seed each time? Or deliberately modifying the genome so the plants are fine with respect to food, but don't produce viable seeds?
Are those things really in society's interest?
If natural is better how come it's better to live in a man made house than a cave or a tree? If natural is better how come poisonous mushrooms, ivy, and hemlock will kill you? GMO is safe, people eat natural food and die. How did people die 100 years ago before there was any GMO? Actually if we hadn't used our instincts and brains to develop technology such as plant hybridization thousands of years ago humans would probably be extinct like most of the other species that existed on the planet. Without our ability to make things and to modify natural stuff we would be dead. GMO is safe, I have been eating GMO tomatoes and other stuff for decades and I am not dead yet. Obviously there is a way to eat GMO and not die. Just because you don't know every possible ramifications of something doesn't mean it isn't safe. You don't know every possible outcome of driving on the highway yet you do it. How can you be sure a drunk driver won't get you?
Cancer research has been casting doubt on the safety of roundup (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/roundup-ingredient-probably-carcinogenic-humans/). There is a huge interest in burying the dangers being discovered. The most common GMOs are those modified to work with roundup.
I liked the part of the report which stated that people who eat GMO foods are better looking, make more money, and have sex with supermodels far more often than their non-GMO-eating counterparts.
#DeleteChrome
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Do they say who financed the report ? Who are the scientists that wrote the report ? Full disclosure guys, full disclosure.
If it ends up being financed by Monsanto or written by scientists financed by big agro double lol.
Go to the website and do your own research.
"And Gould said all the vested interests are revealed on the website. "They can look to see if something we reference is funded by industry," he said.
It's from the National Academy of sciences, so you are in denialist class denial if you don't give it some credence.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
The report was done by the National Academics of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine which is non-profit research organization. And they posted all of the findings on the Internet along with a summary of the public submitted comments and information on the researchers who created the report. How much more can they disclose? And just because the report may benefit the companies that develop genetically modified crops that doesn't mean the reported findings are false or misleading. In this case you have already made up your mind that the agro companies are evil and no amount of evidence will make you change your position.
Just throwing this out there if anyone's interested. I thought The Windup Girl was a pretty good (YA) dystopian biopunk story by Paolo Bacigalupi set in the 23rd century after GMO farming and global warming have taken their tolls. Heard his following book, Ship Breaker was good too, but haven't read it.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Those are a specific class of pesticides called 'neonicotinoids' that recently rose to prominence in the industry because they're safer than just about any other pesticides, ever. Their LD50 in mammals is so high you could probably sprinkle Safari AG on your breakfast cereal with no ill effects (not recommended, however!) The problem is that they're extremely toxic to bees, much moreso than they are to any other insects.
But these chemicals are produced in a factory, and not naturally produced by plants. They have to be applied in the field by spraying. They have nothing to with GMOs.
GMOs produce their own pesticides, commonly bT toxin, by splicing in genes from creatures that naturally produce it, like bacillus thurengis. So the main safety concern is there could be bT toxin found in the edible portions of the crops.
John
So they've determined that selling GMO plants doesn't lead to increased monopoly control over the food supply?
That's my primary objection. I'm hard to convince on the other points, but I know myself well enough to realize that this is mainly because nothing has altered my main grounds for opposition: monopoly control over the food supply. I could be convinced that chemical pesticides are safe...it would take better evidence than I've seen, but it could be done. However this wouldn't change my opposition to GMO foods unless it could be shown that they didn't lead to increased monopoly control.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Humans selecting for specific genes through breeding is not the same thing as genetic modification any more than predators putting selective pressure on a population is—unless, of course, you can show me how I would naturally cause a frog to mate with a corn stalk and produce interesting results.
The thing is, saying that GMO foods are "safe" is nonsensical. That's like saying that cars are safe. That can be true for every car built today, and then someone can resurrect the Pinto design or whatever. The problem with GMO foods is not that they aren't safe, but rather that companies are arbitrarily mucking with genes in ways that we don't fully understand, with results that we don't fully understand, then unleashing them on an unsuspecting public with little or no scientific testing. So the products today might be safe, but the next product might be a disaster waiting to happen, and we might not even know about the damage until suddenly there's a huge uptick in colon cancer rates or heart disease or breast cancer after thirty years that correlates with areas where they consumed a particular GMO crop.
IMO, the public has a right to know when they're part of a giant science experiment, and that's what this is. Any claims to the contrary are disingenuous at best. People have a right to obtain the information required to judge the risks themselves, and to make decisions based on that judgment. Hiding that information prevents them from making an informed decision.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Dude artificial selection and hybridization is also doing things we don't fully understand. It's not throwing gens around haphazardly scientific understanding about biology and genetics is quite advanced. That aside, we don't understand the laws of physics fully, yet we build bridges based on mechanics. The Romans built the aqueducts using granite without even understanding the atomic theory. Just because something may present an unknown risk doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. What if Queen Isabella of Spain feared that Columbus would encounter a dragon that would have followed him back to Europe when he found America. GMO is safe. Fucking around with genetics, which happens randomly in nature anyway is safe. If it's not, then we will find out about it and make it safer.
Easy enough: that's in the report's FAQ: http://nas-sites.org/ge-crops/...
"Who is sponsoring this study?
The study is sponsored by the New Venture Fund, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the National Academy of Sciences."
I don't see a lot of evil, conspiring corporations in that list. I also don't see people who want to prove their version, either. I see people and organizations who have a genuine interest in food safety, and who really want to know if GMOs are safe or not. They arrived at a conclusion based on facts, not on desires. And the facts are that current GMOs are safe.
If they didn't arrive at your personally preconceived results, it's probably because your biases came from non-scientific sources. You should closely examine the sources where you get your "news", as they aren't exactly proving themselves trustworthy here.
John
Glyphosate, a consequence of GMO modified crops is in people's urine and mothers milk, worst of all in BEER!!!!
And it has "probably" no effect on human's health, not even thinking about the whole soup of endocrine disruptors messing up our bodies or the compound effect of all the goodies additions feeding us so well taken together.
Interesting the timings of those - does no harm - reports coming out - Glyphosate is due for renewal in the EU in July (or so).
When was this trans-fat goodie discovered and put to use? 1800's, right and how long did it take to show adverse effects recognized and get it shut down?
Building blocks of DNA (what they are using to spice the crop's DNA is probably a secret) are swapped between organisms and that process is far from fully researched.
Round-Up-Ready DNA is taken in by weeds and yoii, are they putting it to use. Next is stronger and more complex poisons...
The underlying issues - profit and growth the only criteria, unlimited population growth in a limited environment is too hot a potato to be touched by a politician dependent on "sponsors", if it's even recognized by those conditioned brains convinced that all is OK, gods will or things are just not true...
All-together, just one big Yuck! Fish are dying - can't breath any more.... no more "thanks for all the fish"...
...GMO's REDUCE the use of pesticides/herbicides...
The GM-ed RoundUp Ready crops tolerate high amounts of the glyphosate herbicide.
Of course this will REDUCE the use of herbici... huh?
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
Well they're not entirely wrong to think that, given that miRNA from rice has been shown to alter gene expression.
Since the companies are aggro, they may not be so much evil as simply belonging to a hostile faction . . .
This from their website:
"The federal government funds about 85 percent of our work. The rest is funded internally or by foundations."
So I guess the question is, do you trust the federal government and/or foundations to not be largely controlled by or at least primarily motivated to protect the interests of Monsanto et al?
Given that we grow so much corn that we literally have to find new ways to use it,
http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/...
yet massive federal corn subsidies are still in place,
https://farm.ewg.org/progdetai...
it really does make you wonder.
The GM-ed RoundUp Ready crops tolerate high amounts of the glyphosate herbicide.
Of course this will REDUCE the use of herbici... huh?
More and more weeds are also becoming glyphosate resistant, so more and more farmers are back to spraying several different kinds of herbicides.
I know agricultural researchers and Monsanto is a regular topic of discussion. The influence of Monsanto is there but it's less direct that funding the meta-study by the National Academy of Sciences. Monsanto funds huge amounts of research at the world's leading agricultural research centres while convincing governments that they don't need to fund so much of the research. The ag research community has become somewhat dependent on them. Maybe a researcher isn't currently working in a department that is partly funded by Monsanto but they may do so in the not too distant future. How many agricultural researchers do you think are left who aren't afraid of publishing papers that would negatively impact Monsanto's share price?
BTW, here's an example of what often happens when someone does actually publish evidence against Monsanto's interests: http://www.nature.com/news/wid...
Such a small fragment of truth you should have at least tried to verity. From a quick Google search the number is more than 140 lawsuits filed by one company (Monsanto) against farmers. This does not include any of the other companies performing genetic modification or licensed by Monsanto to use their seeds and their lawsuits.
The fragment of truth is that one lawsuit made it to the Supreme Court who upheld Monsanto's rights to sue.
The second tiny fragment of truth is that one patent expired. There are hundreds of thousands of seeds on patent.
All that said, when Monsanto goes after a specific farmer even if the patent is expired the claim generally puts farmers out of business.
The problem is not GMO as much as shit business practices who ensure that consumers get fucked because competition does not exist. A pox on all the people modding down anything that can possibly be perceived as anti-GMO.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Given that we've practiced some form of artificial selection for centuries, it is pretty much safe to say that crossing two organisms that produce edible food will almost invariably result in a new organism that produces edible food. Most of the things that we don't know are ecological, e.g. the risks of creating a monoculture that is susceptible to a specific disease that doesn't exist yet. Those issues are certainly cause for concern, but they're unlikely to be a health issue.
By contrast, when manually editing genes, it wouldn't be entirely implausible for someone to accidentally slip a recessive gene sequence into an apple tree seed that, when present in both chromosomes, would cause the production of cyanide. And then in the second generation that isn't supposed to exist, suddenly you have fruit that look normal, but kill people....
Look, I'm not saying that GMO foods are bad, or that they don't provide significant benefits for humanity, particularly when it comes to creating drought-resistant crops that can survive in areas affected by famine, etc. What I'm saying is that no one has the right to force someone else to take unknown risks without that person's knowledge or consent, and deliberately unlabeled GMO foods do just that.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Yes those evil companies trying to invent ways for humans to produce more and better quality food with less pesticides
One of the type of genetic modifications performed involves modifying the plants so that you could actually use more chemical crap without hurting the produce. Now it may be safe for human consumption but it turns out that it can have unitended consequences for local environment in general. For example, using more herbicides and fertilizer to promote the growth of crops using the latter but preventing weeds from doing the same using the former results in the Gulf of Mexico becoming a eutrophicated, dead zone.
Ezekiel 23:20
"The NRC has chosen to include numerous scientists who work on promotion or development of genetically engineered (or GMO) crops and who have financial ties to biotech companies, which have an economic and political agenda in this debate."
How much more can they disclose?
Disclosure is good but there is more than that to good science: it needs to be independently peer reviewed. Unfortunately they seem to have avoided going the usual peer-reviewed journal route and have arranged their own reviewers themselves which is unusual. I've also never heard of this group before despite being a physicist who worked in the US for a few years.
That's not to say that the science in the report is wrong it's just when a group you have never heard of publishes it's own report without going through a well known and respected peer reviewed journal which is how science is typically published it raises a few red flags of concern. This could have been largely avoided by publishing the report as a peer reviewed paper.
It's from the National Academy of sciences, so you are in denialist class denial if you don't give it some credence.
I've been over this with the anti-GMO crowd before. There are actually a lot of organizations, ranging from government to nonprofit organizations, that are very much in favor of GMO technology. However each time you list one of them, the anti-GMO crowd comes up with some excuse as for why they're not trustworthy. Here's a list I can name off of the top of my head:
World Health Organization
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
U.S. Academy of Sciences
American Medical Association
American Heart Association (Nifty little tidbit I might add: http://newsroom.heart.org/news... but don't let any anti-GMO people see this or else they'll think the AHA is in on the Monsanto conspiracy as well.)
Girl Scouts of America
The last one in that list is particularly interesting. Why? Because they've been the target of change.org petitions and massive parental protest against what is perhaps their biggest source of income: cookies. And yet still they remain steadfast in their opinion that, indeed, GMO is safe.
And you know what? I happen to agree. I also don't have any financial interest in GMO or any other agriculture, nor do I work for one. In fact I actually work for a major non-profit health care provider. I also happen to believe that GMO will eventually completely solve issues like world hunger and foodborne illness, and possibly even chronic disease as well.
First, there's TTIP (where US want to force Europe, which forbids GMO to be sold for human, to change the laws and the sanity laws to buy their products).
Now, there's *this*, made by... US, telling that GMOs are OK and wonderful.
And for those GMOs-are-great-other-people-are-stupid, let me point you to "milk" and see why the Chinese can't drink it in adulthood and we Europeans can.
Now, show me what the GMOs can really do *in the long term*. Ops, you can't. Why?
And last, think, if such intolerance comes from just natural milk, what could happen with GMO? And a last thought, couldn't it be possible that the last increase of milk-intolerant people in the US be related to the consumption of GMOs? (Because the same trend does not happen in Europe and we have immigrants from Asia too).
One of the type of genetic modifications performed involves modifying the plants so that you could actually use more chemical crap without hurting the produce.
That is a misconception. It doesn't enable you to use 'more' herbicide, it enables you to change when and what you use. Instead of a series of pre- and post-emergent herbicides you can have fewer applications of a less harsh herbicide. Ideal? No, but do you have a better weed management strategy?
For example, using more herbicides and fertilizer to promote the growth of crops using the latter but preventing weeds from doing the same using the former results in the Gulf of Mexico becoming a eutrophicated, dead zone.
That's actually the exact opposite of true. Because of herbicide tolerant crops, more and more farmers have switched to no-till systems, and have used herbicide applications instead of tillage for weed control. Thing with tillage is, it helps with weeds, but tears up the soil and contributes to soil degradation and fertilizer runoff, the nitrogen from witch causes eutrophication. If dead zones are your concern, you should be supportive of things that facilitate no-till farming.
This wasn't really a study in a journal; it was a synthesis of many published studies into an over 400 page report. Not exactly the sort of thing to be published in your average journal yeah? And you've really never heard of the National Academy of Sciences?
Most of those organizations are pro business growth at any cost, that's why they like GMO and fund research to sell it. The farmers of the world that GMO claims to help are so sick of top down reorganization they will not buy it , its that simple. GMO farming is buying into a system you don't control that will ultimately control you. Notice the careful wording about the situations where pests become resistant, that's because its not magic. If you offer a choice to indiginous farmers (without destroying their land first) they reject it.
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A lot of GM crops are significantly more hardy than the original variants. This means that, if they breed true, then they are going to displace all of the originals and you will end up with a homogeneous group, which is then vulnerable to a single parasite/bacterium. Humans already have a dangerous lack of diversity in our food crops (go and look up the WHO's projections on how many millions would starve to death if wheat production were threatened globally) and GM crops are likely to decrease diversity even more.
The second problem is that many of them don't breed true or, indeed, at all. You must keep buying new seeds from the same company, you can't collect your own seed stock. This means that your food supply becomes entirely dependent on a small number of companies. This is less of a problem for the USA, but the EU spends a lot of money subsidising farmers to ensure that we have an independent food supply and making it dependent on seeds bought from the US seems to counter this quite effectively.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
This is where I get worried:
They left "yet" off the end of that and the rest of their findings. It would be fairer to say, "GM foods are safe at this time so far as we know". How about leaking out of the plant world into ours - is that possible? The idea that we should study the wider impact of unnatural DNA by letting it wander round the environment, then find out what it's up to seems reckless to me.
Since it's so wonderful and safe, you should label it so we will know which foods have it in the supermarket!
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Seriously- if you want to get people to go for GMO, just label it and start selling it for 10% less money. Within 6 months, 99% of the population will be eating it to save money even if it gave them green skin. It's the refusal to label it that is making it an anathema.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
That makes sense since soy lecithin and corn starch don't contain any DNA. It makes no sense to worry about them being GMO, unless you believe in homeopathy.
You miss the point. It's not about whether the product differs, chemically, but that people refuse to reward companies that use GMO. Some of us want the products to be GMO free for ideological reasons, and want to be able to vote with our wallets.
It's like buying furniture that's marked with a "sustainable" mark, but they avoid mentioning that the lacquer and glues were made from unsustainable sources because the lacquer and glue is chemically identical.
Or produce marked as "locally grown". If it's mixed with non-locally grown produce, it is a lie even if there's no way to tell the difference.
It's not about the end product; it is about the production.
I have two objections to GM crops: biodiversity and lock-in (though they don't both apply to the same crops).
This, this! Not the other alarmist crap, should be the biggest worry with GMO products.
Most of those organizations are pro business growth at any cost, that's why they like GMO and fund research to sell it.
That, dear sir, is one of the most amazing accusations I've heard in a long time. There are some who would say the opposite.
The farmers of the world that GMO claims to help are so sick of top down reorganization they will not buy it , its that simple.
You seem to think that GMO=Monsanto, and throw all GMO under the bus with Roundup ready seeds. That's really unfortunate, and wrong minded.
GMO farming is buying into a system you don't control that will ultimately control you. Notice the careful wording about the situations where pests become resistant, that's because its not magic. If you offer a choice to indiginous farmers (without destroying their land first) they reject it.
And more of the same. GMO foods, even if you don't buy into my idea that given the inherent nature of sexual reproduction, everything is genetic modification, and we've been doing it manually for a long time. But since a lot of people don't understand genetics, we can narrow it to just modern laboratory based manipulation.
So since anti-GMO kooks are all pissed off at Monsanto - which in itself is not a bad idea, given that they are inadvertently breeding some kickass Roundup resistant weeds - they allow their outrage to extend to fruits and vegetables that have been engineered for better nutrition, longer shelf life, and other very positive aspects that make the produced food actually better in all measurable ways than the base food source.
And even when we don't do it in the lab, we've been doing it since we harvested wheat and corn, selecting for the seeds that stayed on the shafts first by accident, and later by cross breeding for desired characteristics.
And just to be certain, we sometimes created things that were bad for us using this method - enter the Lenape potato: http://boingboing.net/2013/03/...
So in your hatred for Monsanto, and your apparent wish to throw all GM under the bus because of that, do you now want to freeze all genetics in their present form, so that everything stays exactly the same? REduction to absurdit isn't difficult when the basic premise is absurd to begin with.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
The second problem is that many of them don't breed true or, indeed, at all. You must keep buying new seeds from the same company, you can't collect your own seed stock.
Better not eat any apples - a natural food that I've been told has a 1 in 10K chance of seeds from any apple of reproducing true.
This means that your food supply becomes entirely dependent on a small number of companies.
And yet the seed catalogs are full of different varieties, including heirloom varieties that will make for kickass results if you are willing to put in the work. No one is forced to buy Roundup ready seeds. Heck, I've only seen a few in my area that do - certainly many farmers have the breeds vintage posted at the edge of their fields, either as the main or in demo fields.
This is less of a problem for the USA, but the EU spends a lot of money subsidising farmers to ensure that we have an independent food supply and making it dependent on seeds bought from the US seems to counter this quite effectively.
I wonder if the EU today would object to the fine grapes that are living because when their disease prone roots rotted away, were transplanted on to the inferior american rootstocks. They should have stayed pure, and allowed the industry to die out of principle.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Your libertarian ideals are great right up until the real world gets applied to them.
Imaging yourself, you the consumer having contracted an incurable, debilitating illness from a new GM soybean product. Of course you have no way of knowing what caused your illness. There's no regulatory environment requiring oversight that would have identified the problem with the soybeans. Maybe it was the factory down the road, maybe it was something you ate, maybe you just happened to win the genetic lottery. All you know is that you life has been irrevocably destroyed, you can't work, you have mountains of medical bills you can't afford. Of course you're not the only one, thousands of others have had a similar experience, similar illness. But it's a mystery, others have gotten sick so it probably has nothing to do with the factory since many don't live near you. Perhaps it's something everyone eat. But what? Ten years later, after manyfold more people have had their health shattered, young children have died, etc. a young university student makes the correlation. This particular soybean has boomed into a billion dollar industry. "Unfounded", "baseless accusations" they, say "millions around the world eat food made from our beans and they're not sick." Fortunately an ambulance chasing lawyer group steps up to create a class action lawsuit against the megacorp responsible for the bad beans. Unfortunately, the case is thrown out for lack of evidence. Aside from the correlation findings by the university student, no one has been able to prove it was the beans. License to use the GM soybeans prohibits any use other than to produce food, independent research on the beans is stymied. Not that it would have mattered much, your health has continued to deteriorate, you stand in financial ruin living off of government disability pay (good thing the Libertarians didn't take that away). A financial windfall might have been salve to your money woes but what difference would it make when you're laid up in bed wracked with pain most of the time. Why, oh why couldn't someone have discovered this problem early, before I ate all those french fries fried in soy oil?
BTW, I'm impressed with your confidence in GM plants not being harmful. Personally I'd be quite concerned with a food plant that produces its own pesticide that works by causing hemorrhaging in the gut. Particularly given that gut inflammation continues to be found at the root of many health problems. Or herbicide resistant crops that can crossbreed with weeds to likewise gain a resistance.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
The fact that:
A) the FDA and EPA are both heavily staffed by ex-monsanto employees
B) crop diversity is reduced by GMO's (If you are pro-science, than it should be obvious that that is a terrible thing).
C) companies like monsanto are buying up seed supply businesses that sell non GMO seed
D) companies like monsanto are patenting non GMO seed (go ahead and fight us in court)
E) monsanto goes after individual farmers
is evidence enough for me that it isn't safe, there are ulterior motives involved, and that huge multinationals controlling the strings to most of the food supply is not good. There are bigger implications here regardless of the safety issue.
Ever hear of what happened in Bolivia when Bechtel owned the water supply? Why are people so eager to be in the same situation themselves one day?
Anyone with any amount of foresight can see this coming.
I chose to end my comments, not with a rim shot, but a long decaying F#7sus4
Scientists swore for decades that smoking was safe, until it was proven otherwise.
Scientists swore that thalidomide was safe, until it was proven otherwise.
Scientists swore that fen-phen was safe, until it was proven otherwise.
The list goes on and on. This is just a sample: http://prescriptiondrugs.proco...
So forgive me if I don't trust the "scientists". Do I believe that GMO in inherently bad? Of course not. It's simply a method. It's how that method is used that concerns me. When it's done for profit, then I am highly suspect of its safety. When it's done for strictly humanitarian reasons with no profits involved I'd be much more willing to be open to it.
Our history is rife with companies that would poison their own mothers if they could make a buck from it.