Séralini Republished

[Red Baron Farms]

I think the study is more interesting for what it left out. They conducted a toxicology study, and came back with carcinogenicity results.

Know what that tells me? That they didn't find any toxicity at all.

If you perform an experiment to test something specific, and then you leave out that specific thing when writing up the publication... that's kind of a no no.

Questionable results, shaky scientific integrity, publish-retract-unretract... nobody does it like Seralini.

He didn't leave it out. The commentary simply keeps ignoring the severe liver and kidney damage and hormonal disturbances and focusing on the unexpected emergent side effect that may or may not have shown. (probably statistical noise but needs a new study to confirm) Not conclusive because the trial wasn't designed for it. That's why I think there might be some credence to the scandal claims. Even now there is some commentary claiming it wasn't a properly done cancer study! Well D'oh. It wasn't a cancer study at all. So likely that commentary was written without even reading the study, a meat puppet.[1]

 

[Diogenes]

So...how many long-term/multigenerational studies would it take for you to accept that Seralini's work is bad? (If we ignore the errors in his work.)

"...Results from all the 24 studies do not suggest any health hazards and, in general, there were no statistically significant differences within parameters observed. However, some small differences were observed, though these fell within the normal variation range of the considered parameter and thus had no biological or toxicological significance..."

Here's a literature review of 12 long-term and 12 multi-generational studies.



http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691511006399

 

[Red Baron Farms]

So...how many long-term/multigenerational studies would it take for you to accept that Seralini's work is bad? (If we ignore the errors in his work.)

"...Results from all the 24 studies do not suggest any health hazards and, in general, there were no statistically significant differences within parameters observed. However, some small differences were observed, though these fell within the normal variation range of the considered parameter and thus had no biological or toxicological significance..."

Here's a literature review of 12 long-term and 12 multi-generational studies.



http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691511006399

I only need one actually. Which one of those studies reviewed in your citation was on Roundup-tolerant NK603 corn? It's behind a paywall and I can't see.

 

[Diogenes]

I only need one actually. Which one of those studies reviewed in your citation was on Roundup-tolerant NK603 corn? It's behind a paywall and I can't see.

Do you have a hypothesis why that strain would be substantially different such that Seralini's work suddenly has merit?

Here's an author's summary of one that was in that review that should be accessible.

http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2008/11/full-report-of-austrian-study-on-gm.html

Other work:

Here's a 90-day study.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/images/8/87/Hammond_Study_NK603.pdf

Are you going to suggest conspiracy in the peer-review process?

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Do you have a hypothesis why that strain would be substantially different such that Seralini's work suddenly has merit?

Here's an author's summary of one that was in that review that should be accessible.

http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2008/11/full-report-of-austrian-study-on-gm.html

OK then! That's perfect actually and actually used NK603:

The comparison of organ weights did not indicate directed dietary effects, except for kidneys. The electron histological investigation of the cell nuclei revealed differences as to fibrillar centres, dense fibrillar components and the pore density in hepatocytes, and cells from spleen and pancreas. This could point to an effect of the GM crop on metabolic parameters.

So now we have 2 long term studies on NK603 that show kidney effects. Dr. A. Velimirov et al and Seralini et al. Go for three?

 

[Diogenes]

So now we have 2 long term studies on NK603 that show kidney effects. Dr. A. Velimirov et al and Seralini et al. Go for three?

Oh, you're one of those.

For a moment I thought you were genuinely interested in actually discussing science rather than cherry-picking and implying different=harmful.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Oh, you're one of those.

For a moment I thought you were genuinely interested in actually discussing science rather than cherry-picking and implying different=harmful.

So you are now claiming Round-up tolerant NK603 is actually benefiting kidney function due to the differences?

I suppose it is possible. Is it?

 

[Reality Check]

He didn't leave it out....

Actually he (and the other authors) did leave out the fact that they were using rats that were prone to tumors by not analyzing the effects that this would have on their results. That the sample size was too small to produce conclusive results was obvious.

 

[Reality Check]

So you are now claiming Round-up tolerant NK603 is actually benefiting kidney function due to the differences??

He is pointing out that it is your implication that different = harmful by associating the "harmful" effects Séralini paper to this "different" effects paper, Red Baron Farms.
The literature review is
Assessment of the health impact of GM plant diets in long-term and multigenerational animal feeding trials: A literature review

...
The studies reviewed present evidence to show that GM plants are nutritionally equivalent to their non-GM counterparts and can be safely used in food and feed.

Selecting the negative study out of 2 studies is cherry picking.

The paper in Full report of Austrian study on GM maize Nk603xMon810

Biological effects of transgenic maize NK603xMON810 fed in long term reproduction studies in mice

is multi-generational, reproduction studies in a different strain of mice.

ETA: Maybe I know why you neglected Results of a 13 week safety assurance study with rats fed grain from glyphosate tolerant corn (PDF)
The authors are worse than "meatpuppets for Monsanto" - they actually are Monsanto

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Selecting the negative study out of 2 studies is cherry picking.

But selecting 2 out of 2 isn't cherry picking at all. I have only seen 2 long term studies on Round-up tolerant NK603 corn. One is Seralini et al that claims severe liver and kidney damage and hormonal disturbances. The other is Velimirov et al that claims "the electron histological investigation of the cell nuclei revealed differences as to fibrillar centres, dense fibrillar components and the pore density in hepatocytes, and cells from spleen and pancreas. This could point to an effect of the GM crop on metabolic parameters." and actually calls for further studies.

My position is the same. So is the scientist I quoted Dr. Peter Dearden. "should be investigated, repeated, and new data published to either disprove or support the original findings."

ETA: Maybe I know why you neglected Results of a 13 week safety assurance study with rats fed grain from glyphosate tolerant corn (PDF)
The authors are worse than "meatpuppets for Monsanto" - they actually are Monsanto

Actually I ignored it because it is a short term study and I asked for a long term study. Everyone knows Round-up tolerant NK603 corn got through the short term safety studies. But so far the only long term studies I have seen raise questions. You have another one I can look at?

 

[Reality Check]

But selecting 2 out of 2 isn't cherry picking at all.

Red Baron Farms, making up fairly arbitrary criteria is not useful.
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same strain of mice?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies study toxicity?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies only look at one generation?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same sized samples?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same feeds?
ETA: Why did you seem to have the criteria that "long-term" means 2 years when scientists use it to mean more than 90 days (see below)?

By ignoring these quite reasonable criteria you are cherry picking. On the other hand by adding them we get down to one and only one dubious study !

Why does your opinion and one scientist's opinion outweigh the opinions of the many scientists and institutes that complained about Séralini's paper?

I have 12 long-term studies for you to look at:
Assessment of the health impact of GM plant diets in long-term and multigenerational animal feeding trials: A literature review

The aim of this systematic review was to collect data concerning the effects of diets containing GM maize, potato, soybean, rice, or triticale on animal health. We examined 12 long-term studies (of more than 90 days, up to 2 years in duration) and 12 multigenerational studies (from 2 to 5 generations).

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Red Baron Farms, making up fairly arbitrary criteria is not useful.
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same strain of mice?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies study toxicity?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies only look at one generation?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same sized samples?
Why did you not add the criteria that the studies use the same feeds?

Why did I not add all that criteria? Because I wasn't cherry picking. I actually wanted to see if any other long term studies besides Seralini contradicted him. What was given to me was a long term study that probably by recommending further research, instigated him to do that said research on NK603 corn.

It's a pity that Seralini was the only one to do that.

 

[Reality Check]

It's a pity that Seralini was the only one to do that.

So we have to judge Seralini's paper by the contents of Seralini's paper. And that is not good - small sample sizes and ignoring the effects of the strain of mice used = inconclusive results.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

inconclusive results.

Yep. The study needs repeated with the perceived flaws corrected.

ETA: Of course even if it turned out that ALL round-up resistant corn got banned, it wouldn't matter to me one bit. I do use no till, but I don't use Round-up. I raise my sweet corn with pasture cropping.

 

[Reality Check]

Yep. The study needs repeated with the perceived flaws corrected.

I agree but it is unlikely.
That Seralini did not even try to do this in the 2 years between the original publication (and criticism) and now is disappointing. The number of scientists who would undertake the study is likely to be small. Not only would they know about the success of the short-term studies but this study being inconclusive will not encourage them to invest 2 years of their lives.

 

[Diogenes]

I agree but it is unlikely.
That Seralini did not even try to do this in the 2 years between the original publication (and criticism) and now is disappointing. The number of scientists who would undertake the study is likely to be small. Not only would they know about the success of the short-term studies but this study being inconclusive will not encourage them to invest 2 years of their lives.

Eh, throw a couple million dollars at me and I'll do it provided I could get IRB approval.


Red Baron Farms, I'd still like that reasonable hypothesis why NK603 would be substantially different.

Here's an article that gives a overview of 1,783 articles...there's a spreadsheet that lists them all including funding sources.

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.o...foods-among-most-analyzed-subject-in-science/

More recently:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25184846

"...Data on livestock productivity and health were collated from publicly available sources from 1983, before the introduction of GE crops in 1996, and subsequently through 2011, a period with high levels of predominately GE animal feed. These field data sets, representing over 100 billion animals following the introduction of GE crops, did not reveal unfavorable or perturbed trends in livestock health and productivity. No study has revealed any differences in the nutritional profile of animal products derived from GE-fed animals. Because DNA and protein are normal components of the diet that are digested, there are no detectable or reliably quantifiable traces of GE components in milk, meat, and eggs following consumption of GE feed..."