It tastes like the inside of an Erlenmeyer flask?

Yule, the Indian suicides don't really conform to the evidence. The suicides in Maharashtra were first noticed between 1995 and 1997. Monsanto started selling Bt cotton there in 2002. Does Monsanto have a time machine?
 
When I went to Disneyland, some 40 years ago, Monsanto had the best ride ever. They shrunk you so you could get inside the human cell. I hope it's still there.
 
originally posted by John Roberts:
Let's start with two:

Producing the Agent Orange that was dropped on the people of Vietnam.

Producing (and encouraging the use of) massive amounts of pesticides that have poisoned our farmlands, our drinking water, and the Gulf.
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Well this one wasn't a typical anti-GMO meme so it was finally an interesting one. But do you have any links as to what might be the original source for the claim?
 
Re (1):

Government: we're going to bomb a nation of brown people. Send us the chemicals.

War profiteer: but these chemicals kill people!

Government: send them.

War profiteer: "shrugs" ok "receives cash"

They produced agent orange and (of course) knew it was toxic. The goverment's racist guilt does not absolve them.

Re: (2)

You want evidence of RR usage? Check their SEC filings and the dead zone in the gulf.
 
Enlighten me? Reads still like someone other than Monsanto was to blame for the evils of AO.

And even if Monsanto was super-evil in the past, why should that matter with what goes on today? Nobody seems to care about other corporations that used to work for less than ideal partners or did bad products. Why is Monsanto a universal bad guy now? How about we look at what Monsanto does now? I'm all for proper criticism of that. But saying that in the past they provided AO in a formula for the US government that they warned against is just anti-GMO propaganda. We have to talk about actual issues, not about myths that "happened" decades ago.
 
Cite links you haven't read and then revise your posts to change the meaning of the thread: the gold standard of Internet posting!
 
The survivors in the article clearly blame GM crops as part of the reason for their farms failing. They would know...they were there when their husbands and fathers killed themselves.

Are GM crops the only reason for the epidemic of suicides. Probably not. But, they are part of the problem.
 
originally posted by Otto Nieminen:
Oh, one more thing, Bt is actually used in organic farming as well. Why is it perfectly fine when used on organic farms as sprays but a terrible, scary thing when the plant itself has the trait in a GMO form? Humans don't have alkaline stomachs afaik, so there's nothing to fear.
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Otto, you misunderstand me. I am not objecting to the BT proteins, which are indeed safe ehen not spread on the winds to poison milkweed for Monarch butterflies. Rather, I was expressing my own doubts about the wisdom of making such drastic changes to the genome. When BT corn was introduced, the science of epigenetics was unknown. Likewise, at that time the importance of "junk" DNA wasn't understood. It's all about the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Mark Lipton
 
John,
AFAIK, and I know of several of the players involved, Dow Chemical made most of the Agent Orange. If you have a source that says otherwise, I'd like to see it. Also, AO was hardly an unalloyed evil. It was a mix of 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T, two top-shelf herbicides for defoliation. Just listen to CCR's "Run Theiugh the Jungle" to get a sense of why they were used. The big tragedy was that a byproduct of the production of AO was dioxin, a potent carcinogen. Sloppy production and lousy QC led to all the problems.

Mark Lipton
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:


We're already there with some foods (carrots and bananas).
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And corn. The lack of genetic breadth has the industry terrified, which is ironic because it is their own aggressive market takeover and intellectual property strategies that have largely caused the erosion.
 
originally posted by Otto Nieminen:
But why do you want to trust old methods of producing foods when it is those old methods that have caused every single problem? Why not instead trust a science that actually tests the products before releasing them on the market? One that has a superb safety record?
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What a bizarre statement.
 
Mark -

Even Monsanto's website does not disclaim responsibility on the grounds that they weren't really involved or didn't produce much.

Re Dow Chemical - I hate them too!

John
 
And just to be clear, Mark, your disappointment with the end product is the fact that it was carcinogenic, not the fact that it was used to illegitimately defoliate 5 million acres of Vietnamese land? Because presumably even if it were properly produced it would have had the same effect in terms of defoliation?

Despite what you say, it was not just jungle; it was crops.

Oh I get it:

Air Force fuck #1: how can I kill those little fuckers if I can't see them?

Army fuck #1: and our boys have to crawl through all that thick jungle, illegitimate invasions are so hard!

Air force fuck #2: let's get rid of the trees!

John

P.S. When you see the players involved, punch them in the face for me!
 
originally posted by John Roberts:
Cite links you haven't read and then revise your posts to change the meaning of the thread: the gold standard of Internet posting!
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Wait? I'm supposed to have read every source in an article I link to? I linked to RationalWiki page not to Schuck's book. Does his book say something that was misquoted or taken out of context in the article? Is that what you're saying?

originally posted by Yule Kim:
The survivors in the article clearly blame GM crops as part of the reason for their farms failing. They would know...they were there when their husbands and fathers killed themselves.

Are GM crops the only reason for the epidemic of suicides. Probably not. But, they are part of the problem.
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So a couple farmers blamed it on GMOs? Ok then. That doesn't really prove anything being anecdotal evidence at all. Steven Novella has a longer take on the topic here: http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/gmo-and-indian-farmer-suicide/

You know what's funny about GMO threads all over the internet? The science is pretty clear on how safe and useful they are. The concensus among scientists is about the same as it is for AGW. Yet few people want to trust this concensus. I find that weird. And then discussion of safety always gets derailed into Monsanto stuff. GMO does not equal Monsanto. And it gets derailed into Indian suicides. Next someone will usually bring up rats with huge tumours or inflamed pigs' stomachs. But I am happy that one actual new thing did surface for once. I hadn't thought about epigenetics before. Going to have to read about that one.
 
Otto, your enthusiasm is very cheerful but not very rigorous.

originally posted by Otto Nieminen:
The link you gave is simply wrong. The so called "terminator" technology was certainly patented by Monsanto but was never developed into an actual product. RoundUp Ready does not equal terminator technology. That is just wrong.
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Agreed.

The history of why Monsanto started research into a "terminator" seed, i.e. one that wouldn't propagate, was because anti-GMO groups were worried about GMOs spreading into the wild. When Monsanto listened to these worries (which aren't really a problem - how often do you see conventional crops spread into the wild?) they started development on a strile seed. The same groups that pressured Monsanto to create such a seed then started going on and on about how evil such a terminator seed is because farmers need to purchase seed every year instead of saving it! Talk about having your cake and eating it too!
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You have no proof of this statement and much else of what is written indicates otherwise: that "terminator" seeds are a way for businesses like Monsanto to protect their IP. You gave a link from Forbes, a magazine known for its alignment to business interests not its scientific accuracy. This article from ABC News indicates that the USDA was involved in "terminator" seed discovery so that agriculture corporations can protect their investments. Finally, let me offer an article from Nature, a premier scientific journal. Even here, where the science can be expected to be legitimate, much of the conversation is about money, not food.

Well, the problem here is that saving seeds is very rare in any case. Most farmers won't want to do so any way because it's cheaper to buy seed and, for hybrids, by buying seeds you will ensure that you'll have the desired traits year to year.
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Everybody says this is true in the First World. IANAF. It is apparently not true among subsistence farmers, however.

And yet, people do it. And Monsanto sues them. The Schmeiser case is more interesting to me than the Bowman case because it gets us away from the contentious topic of Monsanto and from the interesting-but-not-mine topic of "terminator" seeds, and back onto the original point of the post: GMO crops spread once they are introduced to nature. It can't be helped. And, in 40 or 50 years, my argument won't make any sense. But, until then, these things don't have a long safety record and yet we have begun a global experiment that we cannot curtail, should we have to.

And I, for one, declare that humans are fallible, including ivory tower types in Perugia, beaker-heads at Monsanto, plutocrat playthings at the USDA, and everybody else.

Other topics:

You say the crops are safe. They may make safe food but they violate plenty of assumptions in the relevant frame of reference: how to farm. If you pay for a given trait then you change how you farm so as to maximize its benefit to you. In the case of RoundUp Ready that means you skip the other herbicides and spray heavily with RoundUp. That's an easy one, and that is what people do. Has anyone considered what happens to the other parts of the environment when all that RoundUp washes into the water table, streams, harbors?

But why do you want to trust old methods of producing foods when it is those old methods that have caused every single problem?
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That is a silly argument. The old methods are the baseline. (And, frankly, I'm not sure that I trust Mankind -- a species that produced glow in the dark puppies on purpose -- with the future of the planet.)

Why not instead trust a science that actually tests the products before releasing them on the market? One that has a superb safety record?
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See my previous comment about ivory towers, beakers, and playthings.

I'm personally a big fan of meta-analyses because they look at a huge number of studies on a single issue. If a good meta-analysis (i.e. published in a well-rated journal with good life post-publication) can't win you over, then I guess nothing can.

1) Nicolia & al's meta-analysis apparently can't be viewed for free on-line any more, but here's a good take on it with a link if you have access to the journal: http://www.skepticalraptor.com/skep...10-years-gmo-research-no-significant-dangers/

2) van Eenennaam's feed study on 100 billion animals is discussed here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonenti...-is-over-thanks-to-a-new-trillion-meal-study/

Instead of looking at anti-GMO propaganda, look at this kind of sources instead.
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Meta-analysis is fine but these are focused on whether the food is safe and not the proper topic of discussion: farming.

And while we're at it:

Skeptical Raptor is using charged language. If their case is sound, they should refrain. As it stands, they read as poorly as the people they claim to debunk.

When I tried to get the Nicolia article from SkeptRapt the link failed and I ended up at the Genetic Literacy Project. These are bald-faced apologists for GMO, as ritual in their defense as the other side is in their attack. Apparently, the funding for the site comes from Templeton and from Searle, notorious for funding various 'free market' and 'conservative' causes. The man in charge of GLP, Jon Entine, is now a fellow at AEI, another hoary supporter of pro-business-who-cares-about-people kinds of causes. Which does not necessarily bear on their accuracy but, in absence of my own knowledge, it colors my opinion.
 
Otto -- I think that for many of us, the agricultural scientists as a group have diminished or no credibility.

They told us that:

(1) chemical fertilizers and herbicides were great for vineyard,

(2) no adverse result from use of tractors in the vineyards,

(3) Pinot droit was a big improvement over Pinot fin,

(4) commercial yeasts were an improvement over indigenous yeasts,

(5) filtration was entirely positive and did nothing to diminish the quality of the wine,

(6) phylloxera was impossible in California, and anyway AxR was the rootstalk of choice,

etc., etc.

So why believe them now about GMO? If and when the ooops!! moment comes, it may be too late to go back the prior environment.
 
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