It's like guns. I respect Second Amendment rights, but that doesn't mean I like someone shooting wildly in a crowded area. My right to not be shot trumps the rights of others to shoot. Same thing here. You choose, seemingly out of sheer spite, to be a disease vector, fair enough, just never do it around the rest of society. If your right to not put something that, in the vast majority of cases, is negligable into your body overrides my right to not get sick and possibly die, fine then, my right to not get sick and potentially die overrides your right to live in the rest of society.
Well okay, seeing as how I'm part of that 'science industry' as you put it, your claim is interesting if true. Let's see here, the first study detected proteins at a level lower than that test can accurately detect (ergo it was noise), the second one doesn't seem to indicate anything special about GE crops, the third one is mere correlation by a known liar with a made up institute (you could use that exact same bogus methodology to link those maladies with organic food sales), the fourth one has been widely debunked for extremely shoddy methodology, then next couple are about glyphosate, not actually genetic engineering, which is it's own often misunderstood topic, the ninth study was based basically on eyeballing pig organs with nothing particularly substantive and was widely criticized when it made the rounds a few years back, and a quick glance over the tenth one looks to me like it does not actually indicate anything about genetic engineering being dangerous, rather it seems to be criticizing not using a one size fits all approach to testing (not a criticism I would make).
So yeah, try again. Maybe explain to me what the causative mechanism is on the genetic and molecular levels and why it shows up in no other type of natural or man made genetic alteration while you're at it because I never really got that part about the claimed dangers of genetic engineering.
Now, about those bribes, know where I can sign up for Monsanto's Free Money Program? Because those stingy bastards haven't been paying me like they're apparently supposed to.
Why? Do you have any evidence to indicate what you are implying, that somehow the corporate conspiracy owns most plant scientists? Because there's also money to be made in literally everything sold at a profit, which is most things, so what's your point?
She hasn't been particularly as overtly anti-vaccine as she could be, which is good, but she has given some pretty wishy-washy answers on the topic of alternative medicine and pandering to the corporate conspiracy crowd. At a time when she should be giving a scientific answer she gave a politican's one; something she would no doubt attack other politicians for doing if the topic was climate change (and rightfully so of course).
Although, on the topic of genetically engineered crops, she has just been consistently in the wrong, and the recent thing about 'subjecting children to wifi' was pretty silly as well.
Yeah well there's just so many other options to choose from. You've got the corporate Teflon, the thought crime promoting nutcase, the de facto plutocrat who would let the invisible hand screw us right on over, and the conspiracy nutter who thinks wifi will fry your brain, and two of them don't even count. The options are so shitty I can't even protest vote, and if you go to any of the more minor parties you find theocrats, would-be communist overlords, and other assholes. There is literally no one who represents me, no one promoting reasonable reform where necessary without all the usual wingnut idiocy. This election day I see no get out of bed, except maybe to write in I. C. Wiener on my ballot. This election is genuinely disheartening.
I absolutely agree. In theory, one would think that the internet, being a global phenomenon, should be treated as such with no one nation having control. In practice, we have other countries bending over backwards to justify their anti-freedom of speech actions, and that's not okay. I'm not going to say that America is perfect...far from it, and in many many ways...but when it comes to freedom of speech, there's really no one even close.
I keep seeing these stories about how this or another person got fined or arrested for saying the wrong thing, a lot in Europe lately, and I see people defending this as completely acceptable, arguing that they still have freedom of speech, just that freedom of speech does not include unpopular sentiment that they disagree with. Saying unpopular, unsavory, or downright asshole-ish things is the exact definition of freedom of speech. The idea does not exist to defend popular ideas, it exists to ensure that everyone, even people who might be downright wrong or mean, get a voice. There are places where if I say the Holocaust did not happen (wrong and hateful), sing a song about how Erdoan is a scull fucking douchebag (honest and accurate), or reject the state's religion or political ideology (every individual's choice), among plenty of other things, I could face legal consequences.
And regardless of how you feel about any of those things, you don't get to take away another person's voice. There are ideas that I consider to be extremely dangerous and actively harming people and the planet but that I argue against them; doesn't mean I get to censor them. Speech is a human right, and that's end of the goddamn story. Recent events continue to show that not everyone agrees, and now they get greater control over the worlds most important communication medium? I don't like that. They say they will not compromise openness on the internet, but this is in a world where censorship in the name of 'preserving dignity,' whatever the hell that's supposed to mean, is argued to be not a violation of the human right to free speech; I ask them to lay out clear guidelines for openness. Like I said, America isn't perfect, but on this issue I trust the US a hell of a lot more than I do any other country.
Technically speaking here, as per legal definitions, a pesticide is anything that kills an unwanted organism. An insecticide kills insects, a miticide kills mites, a rodentacide kills rodents, a fungicide kills fungi, an herbicide kills weeds, and all are technically pesticides, although in the common vernacular, pesticide and insecticide are frequently used interchangeably.
I agree with what you're saying, and the parent poster most likely was using the word pesticide to mean insecticide (because there is a lot of confusion around those terms), but in case anyone tries to get pedantic on you for making the probably correct assumption that the parent posted didn't know what they were talking about, you should know that referring to an herbicide as a pesticide is technically correct, although imprecise and confusing.
We label added vitamins and nutrition facts as those are actual components of food. Genetic engineering is not a food component, and it makes no more sense to label it that it does to label something has being produced through doubled haploid hybridization, grafting, or any of the other many things that go unlabeled (most of which the average person has no idea is occurring). The other difference is that there haven't been years of fearmongering targeting vitamins; is it really informative when you tell people just enough of a fact (but not all of it!) such that they might assume the wrong thing?
You wonder why there is opposition toward singling out one aspect of crop improvement out of many, not telling any of the essential details that would make it actually meaningful information, knowing full well that your average person doesn't really know what it means anyway and may think something incorrect upon seeing it? That's what I would call a lie of omission. Your argument is no more than a variation on 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear' which has always been bullshit.
At any rate, Obama just signed a labeling bill a few days ago. We'll see how that one goes.
Which has been going on for decades, long before genetic engineering. Surprisingly, plant breeders want to get paid too. If you don't like it, that's fine, there are countless varieties of crop that are not patented or off patent (for example, the patents on Honeycrisp apples and Monsanto's first generation of glyphosate tolerant soybeans have expired and both are now free to use). It is an option, not an entitlement, to use newer varieties.
You want to talk to be about short vs long term benefit, what happens when the people who invest vast amounts of time, effort, and money developing the new crop varieties you indirectly benefit from can have their hard work taken right out from under them by someone reproducing them cheaper and leaving them with the bill?
I'm not sure how you can say patents are bad then demand to use the work patents have provided for. That's a very logical inconsistent worldview. That having been said, we should all piss and moan at our local politicians demanding more funding for public land grant university crop variety development programs.
GMOs aren't bad because of the gene manipulation itself. Instead, they are considered bad because that manipulation results in significantly higher concentrations of pesticides being used on GMO crops
No, genetic engineering is totally the reason; the goalpost has just been moved some given how indefensible and ridiculous of a reason it is. In the case you mentioned, people should ask themselves if farmers are spending extra of GE seed just so that they can spend extra of additionally unnecessary pesticides because they have no idea how to farm and need some city dweller to explain it to them, or that there is more to the story. It is the latter.
Yes, there are crops genetically engineered to be resistant to herbicides; what do you think farmers did before these crops? It isn't as if weeds are some new problem, they've always had to be controlled somehow, but before this, they sprayed a combination of different types of herbicides at different stages of seedling growth (and before germination) along with soil eroding tillage, to control weeds. Now, you have a single herbicide applied fewer times with less tillage. Yeah, more of that particular herbicide is used, but that's hardly the issue; these things are used for the type of herbicide and time of application, not the amount which can be applied, contrary to the popular misconception in your post. The context here (which the anti-GMO activists that so many people listen to somehow always conveniently neglect to mention) is critical.
And if that doesn't tell you that the issue has always been genetic engineering, and not herbicides, ask yourself why people protest things like the Rainbow papaya, which is virus resistant no chemical inputs involved, or Arctic Apples, which have the consumer orientated trait of non-browning. Or ask why Clearfield wheat, which is conventionally bred to be herbicide tolerant has not been the target of protest. When GMOs that do not involve pesticides are opposed and conventionally bred crops that do involve pesticides are not opposed, you very well can't claim the actual reason for opposition is the pesticides.
I think the real interesting bit, which the summary decided to leave out, is in TFA:
Clinton's campaign reportedly says that it supports the pledge's goals.
If memory serves (and I could be wrong), wasn't Clinton one of the advocates for greater control of video games back when that was the menace du jour that we must protect children from?
Well, I'm cautiously optimistic about this. Far as I'm concerned, last truly great Sonic game was Sonic 3 & Knuckles. Sonic Adventure & Sonic Adventure 2 were okay 3D platformers (for their time at least, the first being a bit better than the second IMO), but almost everything past that has been memorize the death drops go where the game wants you to go, and maybe for some reason push button combos to do tricks of some sort along the way. Even Sonic Generations, which a lot of people rated highly (for reasons I don't understand) was no better. They just haven't been any fun lately. Sonic has not aged as well as Mario, and as a long time Sonic fan I really hope they can go back to their roots and make more of what made the Genesis era Sonic so good. Judging by the small bit I can see in this video, it looks like they might be doing that.
And if you think this is just nostalgia talking, there are indeed modern games that are exactly what I'm talking about. If Genesis era Sonic type games are your thing, the best one right now is Freedom Planet. It is an excellent gem of a game, with developers who continue to add on for free what other developers would sell as DLC. It is what the past decade and a half of Sonic should have been, and if you're a fan of 2D platformers, I can't recommend Freedom Planet enough.
You are a scientific researcher but you don't want to make your results publicly available?
I'm guessing they're not, just an AC troll. Researchers don't get paid whenever something they write is downloaded; the journal leeches are paid whenever someone without a subscription buys access, or paid through subscriptions. If anything, not having your work more available is hurting you, since less people can read, access, and cite your paper. I really can't think of what advantage there would be, intrinsically anyway, to publishing in a paid over an open journal.
The NSA reached spying on Americans one step at a time, each step thoughtful and with the best of intentions.
Bullshit. There is no possible noble justification for spying on and lying to the American public then trying to make an example out of the hero who revealed your treason. If some average person did something like that, say put a camera in a private area, then got caught, saying 'I had good intentions and just wanted to protect them' would look like a pathetic excuse. These assholes were on power trips, not making mistakes with good intentions.
That makes no sense. How does a transgene affect anything? You do realize that big seed companies were there long before genetic engineering was a thing and that these same companies sell non-GE seed too yeah? You want to talk about corporate control of basic necessities of life, that's a fine conversation to have, but pinning that issue on genetic engineering is like being opposed to the concept of cooking because of the prevalence of McDonald's.
But what about the dirty tricks companies play, such as patenting a gene sequence?
If they are doing that to naturally occurring gene sequences, as opposed to artificial ones they designed, fair point. But I can't think of that occurring. On the other hand, the first generation of GE soybean is not off patent. What, specifically, is the problem with patenting something you brought made for a set period of time so that you can get a return on that investment and fund future work before it falls into the public domain?
Or deliberately modifying the genome so the plants are fine with respect to food, but don't produce viable seeds
And that was developed (although never implemented) at same time complaining that GE crops cross pollinate other crops (like every other outcrossing plant on the planet) then that might be some evidence of malice. Damned if you do and damned if you don't. And if they were not hybrid seed to begin with which generally do not produce superior progeny in the next generation.
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?
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.
I'm always a bit baffled by how the world keeps looking at Germany and Japan's WWII histories. Germany's is 'What we did was horrible, never forget when we did' and Japan's is always 'What was done to us was horrible, never forget what happened to us.'
Anytime I see any sort of WWII memorial sort of thing here and there, it's almost always about either the Holocaust or the Hiroshima & Nagasaki bombings. Well, those are two very different things. The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, the Rape of Nanjing, Unit 731, the so-called 'comfort women' (or to call that what it actually was, sexual slavery)...I mean, without even considering Pearl Harbor, let's not pretend that there wasn't one hell of a lead up to the bombings.
It just seems wrong that we spend so much more time talking about the thing that ended the war than the actions, and victims, that made those means necessary.
This is increasingly apparent. My computer constantly bugs me about installing something I don't want, and I keep hearing stories of people whose computers decide to update anyway without their explicit permission, and of people who try to revert after the upgrade but have problems doing so. I paid for Windows 8. I don't really care for it, I preferred the last version, I liked the Start menu is much more useful than whatever the hell I've got now is called, but that's what I've got on my machine, and if it is really my machine, than I get the choice to do what I want, how I want, when I want, and if I want. Microsoft it seems does not appear to agree with that and can't take no for an answer. I don't care if Windows 10 is the best thing ever; it's my property and my choice.
I've for years been one of those uncommon people who has had experience and done work on Mac and Linux systems but still preferred Windows. Next computer I get, and I'll likely be in that market soon, I do not think I will get a Windows machine. This is too much humbug, and I don't like where Microsoft is taking things. If this story is accurate, this is more of Microsoft trying to control what should be under your sole command and ownership, and that's not acceptable.
Well I am an academic at a public institution, and I sometimes have the same problems when I hit something my institution does not have a subscription for, or does not have access to a certain year (some journals we don't have before or after a particular year). Yeah, I can get ultimately get it if I want, but it's bullshit that I have to jump through hoops, or am expected to shell out money to do my work, just to get papers my tax dollars already paid for. All I want is what is mine. The people paid for this research, they should get access to it. Full stop, end of story, no exceptions, not next year, not when (if) the copyright expires, NOW. Copyright infringement is downloading something you did not pay for. This is not copyright infringement because you have in fact already payed for it. This is getting what you are owed, what you and I have already paid for through our taxes. Leeches like Elsevier and their ilk are the thieves who are stealing from us, not the other way around. Good on anyone who makes publically funded research rightfully available to the public.
That's like saying an artist or musician without an art or music degree is not an artist or musician. To be a scientist, you must do science. It isn't about the formalities.
Bingo. It doesn't have to be scientifically accurate or in any way meaningful, it just has to be bounced around on social media with a scary caption to the point where the FUD moves faster than the facts. Standard Greenpeace MO. Notice how they opted to use images of schools and nurseries too, gotta work in that nice 'think of the children!' bonus.
Slashdot Mirror
It's like guns. I respect Second Amendment rights, but that doesn't mean I like someone shooting wildly in a crowded area. My right to not be shot trumps the rights of others to shoot. Same thing here. You choose, seemingly out of sheer spite, to be a disease vector, fair enough, just never do it around the rest of society. If your right to not put something that, in the vast majority of cases, is negligable into your body overrides my right to not get sick and possibly die, fine then, my right to not get sick and potentially die overrides your right to live in the rest of society.
Well okay, seeing as how I'm part of that 'science industry' as you put it, your claim is interesting if true. Let's see here, the first study detected proteins at a level lower than that test can accurately detect (ergo it was noise), the second one doesn't seem to indicate anything special about GE crops, the third one is mere correlation by a known liar with a made up institute (you could use that exact same bogus methodology to link those maladies with organic food sales), the fourth one has been widely debunked for extremely shoddy methodology, then next couple are about glyphosate, not actually genetic engineering, which is it's own often misunderstood topic, the ninth study was based basically on eyeballing pig organs with nothing particularly substantive and was widely criticized when it made the rounds a few years back, and a quick glance over the tenth one looks to me like it does not actually indicate anything about genetic engineering being dangerous, rather it seems to be criticizing not using a one size fits all approach to testing (not a criticism I would make).
So yeah, try again. Maybe explain to me what the causative mechanism is on the genetic and molecular levels and why it shows up in no other type of natural or man made genetic alteration while you're at it because I never really got that part about the claimed dangers of genetic engineering.
Now, about those bribes, know where I can sign up for Monsanto's Free Money Program? Because those stingy bastards haven't been paying me like they're apparently supposed to.
Why? Do you have any evidence to indicate what you are implying, that somehow the corporate conspiracy owns most plant scientists? Because there's also money to be made in literally everything sold at a profit, which is most things, so what's your point?
She hasn't been particularly as overtly anti-vaccine as she could be, which is good, but she has given some pretty wishy-washy answers on the topic of alternative medicine and pandering to the corporate conspiracy crowd. At a time when she should be giving a scientific answer she gave a politican's one; something she would no doubt attack other politicians for doing if the topic was climate change (and rightfully so of course).
Although, on the topic of genetically engineered crops, she has just been consistently in the wrong, and the recent thing about 'subjecting children to wifi' was pretty silly as well.
Yeah well there's just so many other options to choose from. You've got the corporate Teflon, the thought crime promoting nutcase, the de facto plutocrat who would let the invisible hand screw us right on over, and the conspiracy nutter who thinks wifi will fry your brain, and two of them don't even count. The options are so shitty I can't even protest vote, and if you go to any of the more minor parties you find theocrats, would-be communist overlords, and other assholes. There is literally no one who represents me, no one promoting reasonable reform where necessary without all the usual wingnut idiocy. This election day I see no get out of bed, except maybe to write in I. C. Wiener on my ballot. This election is genuinely disheartening.
I absolutely agree. In theory, one would think that the internet, being a global phenomenon, should be treated as such with no one nation having control. In practice, we have other countries bending over backwards to justify their anti-freedom of speech actions, and that's not okay. I'm not going to say that America is perfect...far from it, and in many many ways...but when it comes to freedom of speech, there's really no one even close.
I keep seeing these stories about how this or another person got fined or arrested for saying the wrong thing, a lot in Europe lately, and I see people defending this as completely acceptable, arguing that they still have freedom of speech, just that freedom of speech does not include unpopular sentiment that they disagree with. Saying unpopular, unsavory, or downright asshole-ish things is the exact definition of freedom of speech. The idea does not exist to defend popular ideas, it exists to ensure that everyone, even people who might be downright wrong or mean, get a voice. There are places where if I say the Holocaust did not happen (wrong and hateful), sing a song about how Erdoan is a scull fucking douchebag (honest and accurate), or reject the state's religion or political ideology (every individual's choice), among plenty of other things, I could face legal consequences.
And regardless of how you feel about any of those things, you don't get to take away another person's voice. There are ideas that I consider to be extremely dangerous and actively harming people and the planet but that I argue against them; doesn't mean I get to censor them. Speech is a human right, and that's end of the goddamn story. Recent events continue to show that not everyone agrees, and now they get greater control over the worlds most important communication medium? I don't like that. They say they will not compromise openness on the internet, but this is in a world where censorship in the name of 'preserving dignity,' whatever the hell that's supposed to mean, is argued to be not a violation of the human right to free speech; I ask them to lay out clear guidelines for openness. Like I said, America isn't perfect, but on this issue I trust the US a hell of a lot more than I do any other country.
The difference between herbicide and pesticide
Technically speaking here, as per legal definitions, a pesticide is anything that kills an unwanted organism. An insecticide kills insects, a miticide kills mites, a rodentacide kills rodents, a fungicide kills fungi, an herbicide kills weeds, and all are technically pesticides, although in the common vernacular, pesticide and insecticide are frequently used interchangeably.
I agree with what you're saying, and the parent poster most likely was using the word pesticide to mean insecticide (because there is a lot of confusion around those terms), but in case anyone tries to get pedantic on you for making the probably correct assumption that the parent posted didn't know what they were talking about, you should know that referring to an herbicide as a pesticide is technically correct, although imprecise and confusing.
We label added vitamins and nutrition facts as those are actual components of food. Genetic engineering is not a food component, and it makes no more sense to label it that it does to label something has being produced through doubled haploid hybridization, grafting, or any of the other many things that go unlabeled (most of which the average person has no idea is occurring). The other difference is that there haven't been years of fearmongering targeting vitamins; is it really informative when you tell people just enough of a fact (but not all of it!) such that they might assume the wrong thing?
You wonder why there is opposition toward singling out one aspect of crop improvement out of many, not telling any of the essential details that would make it actually meaningful information, knowing full well that your average person doesn't really know what it means anyway and may think something incorrect upon seeing it? That's what I would call a lie of omission. Your argument is no more than a variation on 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear' which has always been bullshit.
At any rate, Obama just signed a labeling bill a few days ago. We'll see how that one goes.
Which has been going on for decades, long before genetic engineering. Surprisingly, plant breeders want to get paid too. If you don't like it, that's fine, there are countless varieties of crop that are not patented or off patent (for example, the patents on Honeycrisp apples and Monsanto's first generation of glyphosate tolerant soybeans have expired and both are now free to use). It is an option, not an entitlement, to use newer varieties.
You want to talk to be about short vs long term benefit, what happens when the people who invest vast amounts of time, effort, and money developing the new crop varieties you indirectly benefit from can have their hard work taken right out from under them by someone reproducing them cheaper and leaving them with the bill?
I'm not sure how you can say patents are bad then demand to use the work patents have provided for. That's a very logical inconsistent worldview. That having been said, we should all piss and moan at our local politicians demanding more funding for public land grant university crop variety development programs.
GMOs aren't bad because of the gene manipulation itself. Instead, they are considered bad because that manipulation results in significantly higher concentrations of pesticides being used on GMO crops
No, genetic engineering is totally the reason; the goalpost has just been moved some given how indefensible and ridiculous of a reason it is. In the case you mentioned, people should ask themselves if farmers are spending extra of GE seed just so that they can spend extra of additionally unnecessary pesticides because they have no idea how to farm and need some city dweller to explain it to them, or that there is more to the story. It is the latter.
Yes, there are crops genetically engineered to be resistant to herbicides; what do you think farmers did before these crops? It isn't as if weeds are some new problem, they've always had to be controlled somehow, but before this, they sprayed a combination of different types of herbicides at different stages of seedling growth (and before germination) along with soil eroding tillage, to control weeds. Now, you have a single herbicide applied fewer times with less tillage. Yeah, more of that particular herbicide is used, but that's hardly the issue; these things are used for the type of herbicide and time of application, not the amount which can be applied, contrary to the popular misconception in your post. The context here (which the anti-GMO activists that so many people listen to somehow always conveniently neglect to mention) is critical.
And if that doesn't tell you that the issue has always been genetic engineering, and not herbicides, ask yourself why people protest things like the Rainbow papaya, which is virus resistant no chemical inputs involved, or Arctic Apples, which have the consumer orientated trait of non-browning. Or ask why Clearfield wheat, which is conventionally bred to be herbicide tolerant has not been the target of protest. When GMOs that do not involve pesticides are opposed and conventionally bred crops that do involve pesticides are not opposed, you very well can't claim the actual reason for opposition is the pesticides.
Well dang, so it is. I can't believe I actually read the article more than the summary; that doesn't happen very often.
I think the real interesting bit, which the summary decided to leave out, is in TFA:
Clinton's campaign reportedly says that it supports the pledge's goals.
If memory serves (and I could be wrong), wasn't Clinton one of the advocates for greater control of video games back when that was the menace du jour that we must protect children from?
Well, I'm cautiously optimistic about this. Far as I'm concerned, last truly great Sonic game was Sonic 3 & Knuckles. Sonic Adventure & Sonic Adventure 2 were okay 3D platformers (for their time at least, the first being a bit better than the second IMO), but almost everything past that has been memorize the death drops go where the game wants you to go, and maybe for some reason push button combos to do tricks of some sort along the way. Even Sonic Generations, which a lot of people rated highly (for reasons I don't understand) was no better. They just haven't been any fun lately. Sonic has not aged as well as Mario, and as a long time Sonic fan I really hope they can go back to their roots and make more of what made the Genesis era Sonic so good. Judging by the small bit I can see in this video, it looks like they might be doing that.
And if you think this is just nostalgia talking, there are indeed modern games that are exactly what I'm talking about. If Genesis era Sonic type games are your thing, the best one right now is Freedom Planet. It is an excellent gem of a game, with developers who continue to add on for free what other developers would sell as DLC. It is what the past decade and a half of Sonic should have been, and if you're a fan of 2D platformers, I can't recommend Freedom Planet enough.
You are a scientific researcher but you don't want to make your results publicly available?
I'm guessing they're not, just an AC troll. Researchers don't get paid whenever something they write is downloaded; the journal leeches are paid whenever someone without a subscription buys access, or paid through subscriptions. If anything, not having your work more available is hurting you, since less people can read, access, and cite your paper. I really can't think of what advantage there would be, intrinsically anyway, to publishing in a paid over an open journal.
The NSA reached spying on Americans one step at a time, each step thoughtful and with the best of intentions.
Bullshit. There is no possible noble justification for spying on and lying to the American public then trying to make an example out of the hero who revealed your treason. If some average person did something like that, say put a camera in a private area, then got caught, saying 'I had good intentions and just wanted to protect them' would look like a pathetic excuse. These assholes were on power trips, not making mistakes with good intentions.
Oh yeah, that's as ridiculous as saying someone with a big gun could be harmed by someone with a smaller gun utilizing sort of asymmetric war tactics.
Sarcasm aside, nirvana fallacy.
That makes no sense. How does a transgene affect anything? You do realize that big seed companies were there long before genetic engineering was a thing and that these same companies sell non-GE seed too yeah? You want to talk about corporate control of basic necessities of life, that's a fine conversation to have, but pinning that issue on genetic engineering is like being opposed to the concept of cooking because of the prevalence of McDonald's.
But what about the dirty tricks companies play, such as patenting a gene sequence?
If they are doing that to naturally occurring gene sequences, as opposed to artificial ones they designed, fair point. But I can't think of that occurring. On the other hand, the first generation of GE soybean is not off patent. What, specifically, is the problem with patenting something you brought made for a set period of time so that you can get a return on that investment and fund future work before it falls into the public domain?
Or deliberately modifying the genome so the plants are fine with respect to food, but don't produce viable seeds
And that was developed (although never implemented) at same time complaining that GE crops cross pollinate other crops (like every other outcrossing plant on the planet) then that might be some evidence of malice. Damned if you do and damned if you don't. And if they were not hybrid seed to begin with which generally do not produce superior progeny in the next generation.
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?
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.
I'm always a bit baffled by how the world keeps looking at Germany and Japan's WWII histories. Germany's is 'What we did was horrible, never forget when we did' and Japan's is always 'What was done to us was horrible, never forget what happened to us.'
Anytime I see any sort of WWII memorial sort of thing here and there, it's almost always about either the Holocaust or the Hiroshima & Nagasaki bombings. Well, those are two very different things. The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, the Rape of Nanjing, Unit 731, the so-called 'comfort women' (or to call that what it actually was, sexual slavery)...I mean, without even considering Pearl Harbor, let's not pretend that there wasn't one hell of a lead up to the bombings.
It just seems wrong that we spend so much more time talking about the thing that ended the war than the actions, and victims, that made those means necessary.
This is increasingly apparent. My computer constantly bugs me about installing something I don't want, and I keep hearing stories of people whose computers decide to update anyway without their explicit permission, and of people who try to revert after the upgrade but have problems doing so. I paid for Windows 8. I don't really care for it, I preferred the last version, I liked the Start menu is much more useful than whatever the hell I've got now is called, but that's what I've got on my machine, and if it is really my machine, than I get the choice to do what I want, how I want, when I want, and if I want. Microsoft it seems does not appear to agree with that and can't take no for an answer. I don't care if Windows 10 is the best thing ever; it's my property and my choice.
I've for years been one of those uncommon people who has had experience and done work on Mac and Linux systems but still preferred Windows. Next computer I get, and I'll likely be in that market soon, I do not think I will get a Windows machine. This is too much humbug, and I don't like where Microsoft is taking things. If this story is accurate, this is more of Microsoft trying to control what should be under your sole command and ownership, and that's not acceptable.
Well I am an academic at a public institution, and I sometimes have the same problems when I hit something my institution does not have a subscription for, or does not have access to a certain year (some journals we don't have before or after a particular year). Yeah, I can get ultimately get it if I want, but it's bullshit that I have to jump through hoops, or am expected to shell out money to do my work, just to get papers my tax dollars already paid for. All I want is what is mine. The people paid for this research, they should get access to it. Full stop, end of story, no exceptions, not next year, not when (if) the copyright expires, NOW. Copyright infringement is downloading something you did not pay for. This is not copyright infringement because you have in fact already payed for it. This is getting what you are owed, what you and I have already paid for through our taxes. Leeches like Elsevier and their ilk are the thieves who are stealing from us, not the other way around. Good on anyone who makes publically funded research rightfully available to the public.
That's like saying an artist or musician without an art or music degree is not an artist or musician. To be a scientist, you must do science. It isn't about the formalities.
Bingo. It doesn't have to be scientifically accurate or in any way meaningful, it just has to be bounced around on social media with a scary caption to the point where the FUD moves faster than the facts. Standard Greenpeace MO. Notice how they opted to use images of schools and nurseries too, gotta work in that nice 'think of the children!' bonus.