Why are GMOs bad?

[Humanist_Activist]

I would recommend you watch the whole video before commenting on the title.

[Major Nikon]

1. Who cares about the science when we have pictures of skulls and crossbones next to GMO produce?

All you really have to do is call it "poison" referencing Seralini's junk science and then say anyone who attempts to introduce rationality into the debate MUST be on "MonSatan's&quot see what I did there!) payroll.

[drynberg]

2. Yeah, I watched the WHOLE VIDEO

So, if plants can take RoundUp poison, can humans?

How about a little farmer minding his own business getting wind born pollen of GMO crop, say corn, blown into his non-GMO corn, now making it GMO. This little farmer might also have GMO corn fall off a seed truck and land in his crop...now Monsanto sues the little farmer and wins. Is this fair?

Or world wide, no increase in crop yields are present with GMO crops...but the even littler farmer in India is "stuck" into buying his crops from Monsanto and is broke, so he and thousands more of these littler farmers commit suicide as they are in a situation they can't survive let alone win.

You mentioned the French study of RoundUp and rats, any others you care to mention as discredited?

And lastly, I can only imagine what the folks of Monsanto said to you to create a total change of conclusions.

[DhhD]

5. This sounds like TPP decision making. n/t

[Major Nikon]

12. You should watch it again

So, if plants can take RoundUp poison, can humans?

That might be a good question if the epidemiology of plants were the same as humans. As it is it makes as much sense as calling something "poison".

How about a little farmer minding his own business getting wind born pollen of GMO crop, say corn, blown into his non-GMO corn, now making it GMO. This little farmer might also have GMO corn fall off a seed truck and land in his crop...now Monsanto sues the little farmer and wins. Is this fair?

Ah yes, the often repeated myth of Percy Schmeiser, who was doing anything but "minding his own business" according to both his hired hand and himself. Interesting how what he says in public and what he says while under oath don't quite reconcile, no?

As established in the original Federal Court trial decision, Percy Schmeiser, a canola breeder and grower in Bruno, Saskatchewan, first discovered Roundup-resistant canola in his crops in 1997.[4] He had used Roundup herbicide to clear weeds around power poles and in ditches adjacent to a public road running beside one of his fields, and noticed that some of the canola which had been sprayed had survived. Schmeiser then performed a test by applying Roundup to an additional 3 acres (12,000 m2) to 4 acres (16,000 m2) of the same field. He found that 60% of the canola plants survived. At harvest time, Schmeiser instructed a farmhand to harvest the test field. That seed was stored separately from the rest of the harvest, and used the next year to seed approximately 1,000 acres (4 km²) of canola.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_Canada_Inc_v_Schmeiser#Origin_of_the_patented_seed_in_Schmeiser.27s_fields

Or world wide, no increase in crop yields are present with GMO crops...but the even littler farmer in India is "stuck" into buying his crops from Monsanto and is broke, so he and thousands more of these littler farmers commit suicide as they are in a situation they can't survive let alone win.

A twofer. First you're repeating the myth of "no increase in crop yields are present with GMO crops" per nonsense studies which tested GMO crops in laboratory conditions rather than actual conditions. Then you follow up with the utterly debunked myth of Indian farmer suicides.

You mentioned the French study of RoundUp and rats, any others you care to mention as discredited?

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2015/01/26/10-studies-proving-gmos-are-harmful-not-if-science-matters/

And lastly, I can only imagine what the folks of Monsanto said to you to create a total change of conclusions.

The rest of what you posted demonstrates a pretty active imagination, so I'm not going to dispute you here.

[cprise]

16. You should check your claims again

I can't tell from this graph when GE corn and soy were introduced... can you?

The data is from agricultural yield for the entire US, not supposed bogus studies as you claim.


http://agronomyday.cropsci.illinois.edu/2010/tours/b5breed/


This graph shows bushels per acre for corn:

http://grist.org/food/frankenfoods-good-for-big-business-bad-for-the-rest-of-us/

Here you can easily see where the 'Green Revolution' in fertilizers took off after WWII, but GE might as well be a phantom.

That leaves us with the question: Have we relied on GMOs for continued increases in yield? Hardly.

-

As for the question of "science", let me remind you that the greedy recklessness of the nuclear and chemical industries set a large swath of the baby boomer generation against "big science". Yet, chemistry is science. People who question the application of chemistry today are not automatically labelled "anti-science"... but they used to be.

So what we have here is a replay of an old power dynamic between an establishment of manipulators and a skeptical public. Now, a word about the nature of public skepticism:

The problem with this view is that rather than being anti-science, the UK public is quite pro-science (see, for example, the Wellcome Trust monitor reports). It is particularly positive about research using genetic techniques in medicine. Moreover, the more scientific understanding the public has, the more sceptical they tend to be. This is because they have a sophisticated understanding of how scientific claims to certainty arise, and the more they know about science the more they recognise that it is not a simple process.

Debating science reveals the uncertainties that inevitably exist, and the public can quickly work out that there are social influences on how conclusions emerge. They recognise that who funds science, for example, will have an impact on its outcome. The results of clinical trials in medical research become biased if pharmaceutical companies don't publish negative results. Telling the public that industry-funded research finds GMOs are wonderful isn't going to convince them, because they recognise that they have every incentive to say that.

As a result, if you want to get the pro-science, technically sophisticated UK public to change its mind about a technology it is deeply sceptical of, you don't imply that they are stupid, unpatriotic Luddites who don't care that babies in developing countries will starve to death. By being so clearly in favour of a particular outcome, rather than being seen as an honest broker for a wider public debate, the minister may well have set the whole debate up to fail.

The French study you mentioned, BTW, was retracted because of industry pressure (mostly from genetic engineers with financial ties to Monsanto) but not actually discredited. It was re-published by Environmental Sciences Europe.

According to SpinWatch, a European muckraking organization, 11 <out of 13> of the authors of letters to the editor slamming Séralini’s study had undisclosed financial relationships with Monsanto. In 2013, Paul Christou, the editor of Transgenic Research, coauthored an attack on Séralini and the FCT editors in his own journal, calling for a retraction of the study. Christou did not disclose his multiple conflicts of interest, including being an inventor on patents on GM crop technology, many of which Monsanto owns. Meanwhile, back at Food and Chemical Toxicology, a new position for an associate editor was filled by Richard E. Goodman, a University of Nebraska professor who previously worked for Monsanto, and who has a longstanding association with the industry-funded International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI). Months later, Elsevier, FCT’s publisher, announced the retraction.

...and...

The retraction of the Séralini study is a black mark on medical publishing, a blow to science, and a win for corporate bullies.

http://www.thehastingscenter.org/Bioethicsforum/Post.aspx?id=6684&blogid=140&utm_source=constantcontact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=bioethicsforum20140110

[Major Nikon]

18. That's some funny shit right there

Your first link actually says...

The increases in crop yields over time are the result of both genetic and agronomic improvements.

Furthermore your yield chart shows how much was produced overall, which is a function of demand. Do you think farmers are going to produce more corn and soybeans than what's demanded just to show the yields are higher?

As far as increased yield goes, ask Italy about that. Italy banned GMO corn. Just recently virtually the entire Italian corn crop was rendered unusable by people and even animals because of the European corn borer, which also used to wipe out US corn crops until the advent of Bt corn which is immune to the pest. So what was their solution? Import US GMO corn that their own farmers are forbidden from growing. You can't make shit up this funny.
http://deltafarmpress.com/blog/italys-corn-production-comedy

The French study I mentioned was retracted because it was junk science. Evidently your source didn't bother investigating Seralini who was and still is personally profiting from the organic industry. Kinda funny how you'd cite conflict of interest as a reason Seralini's pseudo-science was NOT shit while conveniently ignoring Seralini's own conflict of interest that he blatantly lied about, no?

There were far more than 11 or 13 or whatever that pointed out Seralini's study was shit. But hey, let's just focus on the ones that had a "conflict of interest" as if the biotech industry is just supposed to remain silent while a hack produces a shit study while personally profiting from it.

And you are correct, it was re-published in a shitty pay-for-play journal that nobody reads without further peer review. I'm not sure what you think that proves, but please do keep carrying Seralini's water. Very telling that and also quite hilarious.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007843

[cprise]

19. The neocon stories really should stop

Apparently, the Italian story didn't have legs for some reason (and no mention what happened in the 2 years since). Perhaps because its being spewed by a Heartland Institute alum who writes for a neocon-funded advocacy group:

To hear Entine tell it, his defenses of atrazine and other pesticides are entirely pro bono and driven by his own initiative. He told me he gets "almost all" of his income from the Genetic Literacy Project, which, he added, is funded by what he called the Templeton and Searle foundations. The project is housed at the Statistical Assessment Service program at George Mason University, where Entine is a fellow. Though Entine would not specify which Searle trust funded the GLP, the Searle Freedom Trust's 2010 tax form lists a $154,000 grant to STATS for a "Gene Policy and Science Literacy Project," which sounds an awful lot like Entine's. Founded by pharmaceutical and Nutrasweet magnate Daniel C. Searle, the Searle Freedom Trust funds all manner of conservative and free-market think tanks, including the Manhattan and Heartland Institutes.

BTW, Italy produces corn for pig feed, about 1/35th what the US produces. OTOH, other countries growing non-GMO corn have done OK.

-

The increases in crop yields over time are the result of both genetic and agronomic improvements.

And the other links show those increases from GE are miniscule.

Furthermore your yield chart shows how much was produced overall, which is a function of demand.

Sigh. No, if it were about only "demand" then it wouldn't be about US production, would it? GM became prevalent in US corn and soy production, so don't pretend those charts I posted aren't indicative.

The French study I mentioned was retracted because it was junk science. Evidently your source didn't bother investigating Seralini who was and still is personally profiting from the organic industry. Kinda funny how you'd cite conflict of interest as a reason Seralini's pseudo-science was NOT shit while conveniently ignoring Seralini's own conflict of interest that he blatantly lied about, no?

That is a concern if it was hidden, but why go around pretending the overwhelming influence from GM and big agribusiness is not an issue until someone else brings it up? Talk about hypocrisy. Perhaps now you are going tell us what the big-bad organic counterparts to ConAgra, Monsanto and ADM are in Italy. And perhaps you will also borrow a note from the neocon sites you post and also point out how evil politicians are for accepting donations from labor unions.

There were far more than 11 or 13 or whatever that pointed out Seralini's study was shit.

Apparently the journal found 13 were worth publishing. Its logical to assume those 13 had greater bearing on their decision.

[Major Nikon]

20. So the story needs to stop because it's untrue, or because you can't deal with it?

BTW, Italy produces corn for pig feed, about 1/35th what the US produces.

WTF difference does how much they produce make? They still need corn, and they also produce a lot of it for human consumption. Ever hear of that Italian staple called polenta?

OTOH, other countries growing non-GMO corn have done OK.

Really? Check the chart on page 6 and then tell us again how GMO doesn't have higher yields.

http://www.endure-network.eu/da/content/download/5142/41481/file/Maize%20Case%20Study%20Guide%20Number%201.pdf

[GreatGazoo]

3. Summary: same GMO marketing hype -- conflates hybrids with GE/GMO: a lie

Says golden rice worked -- it failed.

Says Americans have had no ill effects from the food they have been eating for the last 20 years yet Americans are among the sickest people on the planet and spend far more on healthcare per capita than any other country; nearly 20% of total GDP.

Separates GMO crops from the pesticides they are designed to be sprayed with (and ARE). Use of RoundUp and glyphosate is increasing at a 21% rate year over year.

Says that GMOs will be necessary to feed the world's growing population yet GMO crops have lower yields and higher costs than hybrids. GMO crops stop offering advantages to farmers after only a few seasons since weeds rapidly become round up ready as well.

Bad news for this professional hipster -- Consumers have spoken. It is really very simple and they get it. More GMOs = more pesticides and food that is less fresh and less nutritious.

This girl would kick his talking point babbling, sweatshirt wearing under hot lights butt:

[drynberg]

6. Lovely video, should be seen be all, especially GMO supporters

[Quixote1818]

7. Golden Rice didn't fail it still being developed. Please do more research.

Last edited Sat Jul 11, 2015, 02:01 PM - Edit history (1)

It now clearly has enough vitamin A to make a difference and could save millions but scare tactics and ant-science scumbags ripping up the fields has not allowed it to be integrated the way it needs to be. Meanwhile millions of poor families that can only afford rice continue to go blind and die because of ignorant, anti-science scumbags.

Even skeptics like Michael Pollan who criticized Golden Rice back in 2001 now think the research needs to continue:

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/27/from-mark-lynas-to-michael-pollan-agreement-that-golden-rice-trials-should-proceed/?_r=0

[cprise]

8. Research is just dandy, but marketing this as a poster child for GE

...is what's really scummy.

The GE industry has taken credit for advances in ongoing cross-breeding efforts. That is really scummy.

And the GE industry doesn't recognize ecological arguments about risks to the environment. They are biologists who have walled themselves off from ecology, which is a major field of science. That is really pseudo-science.

Why should we let capitalist ideologues re-program the living things around us just so they can wallpaper over the system's unwillingness to distribute our existing surplus of food to the poor?! (Oh, and get a little bonus in the form of control over agriculture down to the last person and penny.)

And why aren't these sainted Golden Rice researchers castigating the bad actors in their field?

[Quixote1818]

11. Capitalist ideologues are on both sides

[cprise]

14. Don't think so

The GMO pushers have proven themselves monopolists who care about intellectual property more than anything else. That is exactly the kind of business model large institutional investors have been drawn to.

Organic agriculture has not lead to anyone having their crops forfeited because they happen to be adjacent to an organic field. There is no coercion of farmers based on twisted concepts of "property".

What's more, organic agriculture is fulfilling its main goals: Healthier soils, less erosion, and less consumer pesticide exposure.

The GE industry cannot make similar claims; It is the one with religion in search of a holy grail.

[DhhD]

9. Too much Vitamin A can be toxic.

http://www.nutritionatc.hawaii.edu/HO/2007/370.htm

snip
Q: Can you consume too much vitamin A?

A: Yes. Vitamin A (especially the retinol or retinyl forms) is one of the most toxic vitamins. Ongoing consumption of two to three times the current recommended intake of vitamin A in the retinol or retinyl form is associated with increased bone loss and bone-fracture risk as people age. Also, there is evidence that pregnant women may increase the risk of birth defects in their offspring by consuming too much vitamin A during pregnancy.

more at site link

[Quixote1818]

10. Of course but that is not a problem with golden rice

a single carrot has a lot more vitamin A then even a bowl of golden rice.

[Major Nikon]

13. Too much water can be toxic

[DhhD]

4. Poisonous plasmids can be and are airborne. Humans breath in particles/molecules from

the air. Related: Intentional arson is a crime. Arson can kill someone through particle inhalation.

The presence of living and capsuled airborne microorganisms, with enclosed genes, is a new study. The Chronic Wasting Disease molecule(s) need to be added to the Texas studies as well as influenza subunits, in my opinon.

http://www2.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/ESD-air-bacteria.html

[drynberg]

15. 2nd Science Guy that swings and misses, but back to Nye

Tumblr6 Google +11 15


Earlier this year, Bill Nye, renowned as the “science guy,” made news for changing his mind about genetic engineering (or GMOs) after a visit to Monsanto, the pesticide and seed giant at the forefront of the biotechnology industry.

Nye is an emblematic science educator, who has done a lot to kindle the interest of young people in science, to defend the validity of evolutionary science, and raise awareness about climate change. Until recently, he spoke and wrote about GMOs as environmentally risky technology.

In a video shot backstage after an appearance in March on Bill Maher’s “Real Time,” Nye told an interviewer that he was revising the chapter about GMOs in his latest book. “I went to Monsanto, and I spent a lot of time with the scientists there, and I have revised my outlook, and I’m very excited about telling the world,” he said.

So what did Nye learn at Monsanto headquarters that changed his mind? In a recent interview with the Huffington Post, Nye said that he does not believe genetically engineered crops are inherently bad. To the contrary, he said he now believes that they have been beneficial to agriculture.

To illustrate his point, he explained that GMO crops “put the herbicides and pesticide inside the plant, rather than spraying it on them and having it run down into streams.”

In the case of herbicides, Nye is simply incorrect, and it’s an important error to point out.

More Herbicides, Not Less

GMO herbicide-resistant crops are made to withstand the spraying of herbicides, primarily glyphosate (or Roundup), in quantities that would otherwise kill them. GMO Bt crops, on the other hand, are engineered to produce an insecticidal toxin within the plant. Rather than decreasing toxic pesticides in streams, the former products contribute to their presence. Glyphosate is now widely detected in our country’s water, according to government scientists. And recently, a major, independent body of scientists determined that glyphosate is probably carcinogenic, raising the stakes.

Compounding these problems, herbicide-resistant GMOs have led to an explosion in herbicide use due to the emergence of herbicide-resistant weeds. Monsanto genetically engineered corn, soy, cotton, and more recently alfalfa and sugar beets, to resist herbicides, and by 2012 their use led to an estimated 527 million more pounds of herbicide being used in the U.S. than if these crops had not been commercialized.

This was great news for Monsanto, which sells both GMO seeds and pesticides, but not for the environment. The emergence of glyphosate-resistant weeds has led us backward, away from weed control strategies that work with the environment, and toward monoculture (farming that relies on growing the same crop every year)—the opposite of the diverse cropping system Nye says he wants.

To deal with the problem of resistant weeds, Monsanto and other pesticide companies are doubling down with GMO crops that can withstand a combination of glyphosate and old herbicides like dicamba and 2,4-D, setting the stage for the evolution of weeds resistant to multiple herbicides and even further escalation of herbicide use.

These glyphosate-resistant weeds are a direct result of GMO crops and the herbicide used on them. Resistant weeds arise in response to herbicide use—susceptible weeds are killed, leaving rare individuals that carry a resistance gene. The greater and more continuous the herbicide use, the faster resistant weeds arise, and the faster they spread. GMO crops allowed much greater use of glyphosate, and encouraged more continuous use because of their convenience. There was only one weed resistant to glyphosate prior to the emergence of genetic engineering, despite the fact that it had been sprayed for nearly 20 years beforehand. There are now 14 glyphosate-resistant weeds in the U.S. alone.

As these weeds appear on more farms, the market for herbicides is exploding—a fact that might explain Monsanto’s desire to acquire Syngenta, the world’s largest seller of pesticides (a large class of chemicals that include herbicides).

It is hard to see how Nye could have so misunderstood this. After all, herbicide resistance is the primary commercial application of GMO crops in the U.S. and worldwide.

Nye understands that industrial agriculture causes big ills, including reduced biological diversity and increased chemical pollution. But he fails to recognize that the major applications of GMO crops are intimately entwined with that system, and actually contribute to it.

The Monarch Connection


Nye commendably noted his concern about the 90 percent decline in the population of the monarch butterfly, which he calls “catastrophic.”

Several research studies have linked the loss of milkweed, the sole food of monarch caterpillars, directly to glyphosate use on engineered crops. But Nye inexplicably dismisses the connection between monarch decline and GMOs, and lets biotech off the hook by blaming the monarch demise on industrial monoculture generally. In the Huffington Post video, he blames it on, “the efficiency of farming and the expansion of cities.”

But glyphosate is especially toxic to milkweed. In Iowa and the surrounding states through which monarchs migrate, glyphosate has virtually eliminated milkweed from corn and soy fields. Before GMO crops were introduced 20 years ago, enough milkweed remained in crop fields to support a healthy population of monarchs despite the use of “efficient,” “modern” farming.

Nye spoke favorably about the plans Monsanto and Cargill have announced to establish new habitat for butterflies now that the milkweed is gone. And indeed habitat enhancement is welcome. But there is likely too little land for milkweed outside crop fields to support the butterflies, because so much of the Midwest is devoted to corn and soybeans.

Nye did not mention that the best way to protect the monarch is to limit the use of glyphosate (and other pesticides) and allow milkweed to harmlessly exist alongside crops in the fields.

Nye also gives GMO crops undue credit for raising productivity over the last 150 years, when in fact it has only been commercialized for about 20 years. In fact, genetic engineering has contributed only marginally to crop productivity since it was first commercialized, for only a few crops, and much less than other technologies.

So back to the original question: What did Bill Nye learn from Monsanto?

Everyone has a right to change their minds. But Nye is an important science educator who could contribute positively to the understanding of the complex issues swirling around the GMO debate. Either way, if he’s going wade into the debate, he has to get the science right.
- See more at: http://civileats.com/2015/06/03/what-bill-nye-got-wrong-in-his-about-face-on-gmos/#sthash.EzCRMtfG.dpuf

[cprise]

17. How does an _engineer_ become "an important science educator"?

This must be a sign things are going downhill. He is no Carl Sagan, who was an actual scientist.

I've debated with AGW deniers for years and I don't think I referenced Nye once. But I'm supposed to think his defence of climate science makes his opinions about GE carry weight.