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Monsanto

I just don't default to B-movie monsters
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I'm a little afraid of Killer Tomatoes, but I think the bulk of the issue lies in the socio-economic aspects of patenting "life" and atoms and molecules.

Adam Smith wrote about the "free market", but by "free" he meant/said "free of rentiers". We're now moving into an age where "rent extraction" is ubiquitous. The very air we breathe could be patented by a multinational and we could be "taxed" for someone's profit.
 
kellyb said:
I'm a little afraid of Killer Tomatoes, but I think the bulk of the issue lies in the socio-economic aspects of patenting "life" and atoms and molecules.
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To be sure, that's part of it, and there is one perspective from which it may well deserve to be regarded as "the bulk" of it. My opinion, though, is that as intuitively compelling as it may be, this is an obsolete perspective -- and the very fact that it is so intuitively compelling nicely illustrates my main thrust in all of this, which is that this technology is moving forward faster than we are. We are like the Generals who, as the old saying goes, are always "preparing to fight the last war instead of the next one".

We all want safe food, clean water, breathable air, etc; and we have devised a system of regulations to protect these things. We also want to live in a society that offers opportunities for personal gain through innovation, entrepreneurship, hard work, clever investment, dumb luck, whatever; and we have devised a system of laws to protect these opportunities. Because these interests so often clash, we have devised a system of collective decision-making in the hope of striking something approximating a fair balance between them. It's never been perfect, and it's never been entirely science-based (in fact, not even close); and at present it is not entirely clear whether it is completely broken or simply in a temporary state of near-total paralysis -- but one thing for sure is that even functioning at its best, it would be unable to produce definitive answers to some of the questions this new technology raises.
 
Manopolus said:
Well, OK, I might have exaggerated a little bit... I wasn't suggesting that anyone was making up their own facts in the mainstream press so much that they may occasionally be misreporting or underreporting certain matters that are sensitive to their advertisers.
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I bet those advertisers are all Jews too.
 
I've been battling a friend of a friend on FB over the last few days over the dangers of GMOs (to be frank, over a Monsanto = Super Satan post), and my friend, of calmer stock than her anti-GMO, anti-vaxxer friend, said she'd do her due diligence on GMOs and come up with her own conclusion. She posted this report:

http://gmojudycarman.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/The-Full-Paper.pdf

In a nutshell it deals with the health of two groups of pigs fed GMO and non-GMO crops. The conclusion was that a longer study was needed, but an unusually high level of heavy uteri and severe stomach inflammation was displayed by the group exposed to GMO feeds.

I don't have very much of a dog in this fight, but I have come down on the side of GMO based on discussions on the JREF fora. Does anybody have any knowledge of this study, or a refutation? At this point I don't care much about debating the kook, but my friend is prone to believing way-out-there BS and I'd like to give her better information.
 
Polaris said:
I've been battling a friend of a friend on FB over the last few days over the dangers of GMOs (to be frank, over a Monsanto = Super Satan post), and my friend, of calmer stock than her anti-GMO, anti-vaxxer friend, said she'd do her due diligence on GMOs and come up with her own conclusion. She posted this report:

http://gmojudycarman.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/The-Full-Paper.pdf

In a nutshell it deals with the health of two groups of pigs fed GMO and non-GMO crops. The conclusion was that a longer study was needed, but an unusually high level of heavy uteri and severe stomach inflammation was displayed by the group exposed to GMO feeds.

I don't have very much of a dog in this fight, but I have come down on the side of GMO based on discussions on the JREF fora. Does anybody have any knowledge of this study, or a refutation? At this point I don't care much about debating the kook, but my friend is prone to believing way-out-there BS and I'd like to give her better information.
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I'll leave others to critique the study, but it would necessarily suffer from what was tested for, wouldn't it? In other words, the positive benefits of GMO, such as higher pig IQ, would be missed if not checked for. That makes it a tough comparison to make when foodstuffs affect entire organisms and the things you test for is limited.

Would I accept a heavier uterus if I also got really good vision and became immune to cataracts?
 
Polaris said:
I've been battling a friend of a friend on FB over the last few days over the dangers of GMOs (to be frank, over a Monsanto = Super Satan post), and my friend, of calmer stock than her anti-GMO, anti-vaxxer friend, said she'd do her due diligence on GMOs and come up with her own conclusion. She posted this report:

http://gmojudycarman.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/The-Full-Paper.pdf

In a nutshell it deals with the health of two groups of pigs fed GMO and non-GMO crops. The conclusion was that a longer study was needed, but an unusually high level of heavy uteri and severe stomach inflammation was displayed by the group exposed to GMO feeds.

I don't have very much of a dog in this fight, but I have come down on the side of GMO based on discussions on the JREF fora. Does anybody have any knowledge of this study, or a refutation? At this point I don't care much about debating the kook, but my friend is prone to believing way-out-there BS and I'd like to give her better information.
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http://monsantoblog.com/2013/06/13/something-smells-and-its-not-the-pigs/

Not to mention that the "Journal of Organic Systems" is an open access journal, which should set off alarm bells.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
http://monsantoblog.com/2013/06/13/something-smells-and-its-not-the-pigs/

Not to mention that the "Journal of Organic Systems" is an open access journal, which should set off alarm bells.
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That's hilarious.

The blog first criticizes the authors of the study for having an opinion, even though they have defended their opinion with a published scientific paper and then proceed to justify this critique by quoting those with opinions without showing their defense of these opinions with arguments to the paper in a published scientific journal.

At least it is consistent with the level of argument presented by the poster who quoted it.
 
!Kaggen said:
That's hilarious.

The blog first criticizes the authors of the study for having an opinion, even though they have defended their opinion with a published scientific paper and then proceed to justify this critique by quoting those with opinions without showing their defense of these opinions with arguments to the paper in a published scientific journal.

At least it is consistent with the level of argument presented by the poster who quoted it.
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No, what's hilarious is your obvious bias when clearly the scientific paper has serious quality issues. It's SO inconvenient when the science doesn't support your ideology, huh? :crazy:
 
!Kaggen said:
Or link a Monsanto blog as a scientific argument for a published paper.
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Well, the anti-GMO, anti-science morons never post scientific journal articles, so why should anyone else? I've spent years asking these idiots for a single peer reviewed journal article to support their whacko views (GMO's cause cancer, GMO's cause allergies, etc), and I've yet to be successful. All I ever get is "watch this YouTube video", "here, read this blog" or "I saw a guy on Oprah".
 
psionl0 said:
It's just a case of, if you have nothing intelligent to say, accuse those you disagree with of being antisemitic.
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I think you may be right. It just seemed so absolutely loony and antagonistic that I thought surely he wasn't saying what I thought he was saying.

As to the subject involved -- I actually do know a little bit about advertising, sales, and influence (not to mention PR). There's no conspiracy involved in what I posted. There doesn't need to be for it to affect the information we receive -- from both sides of the issue.

I find neither side any more believable than your average politician -- because that's what it really is at the base:

Politics. The politics of money, to be more specific.
 
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The Central Scrutinizer said:
Well, the anti-GMO, anti-science morons never post scientific journal articles, so why should anyone else? I've spent years asking these idiots for a single peer reviewed journal article to support their whacko views (GMO's cause cancer, GMO's cause allergies, etc), and I've yet to be successful. All I ever get is "watch this YouTube video", "here, read this blog" or "I saw a guy on Oprah".
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Strawman
 
!Kaggen said:
Strawman
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I'm sure you don't speak for that crowd, but your sympathies seem to lie there. Perhaps you know of a study? Just one. In a peer reviewed science journal.

I'm sure you already know, and I shouldn't really have say this, but open access "journals", Oprah episodes, YouTube videos and blogs are not generally considered to be peer reviewed science journals.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
I'm sure you don't speak for that crowd, but your sympathies seem to lie there. Perhaps you know of a study? Just one. In a peer reviewed science journal.

I'm sure you already know, and I shouldn't really have say this, but open access "journals", Oprah episodes, YouTube videos and blogs are not generally considered to be peer reviewed science journals.
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Open access journals are (generally) peer reviewed just like pay-for-access journals; the information is just free to the public.

I'm pretty sure some of the "woo journals" (like "medical hypothesis"?) aren't open access.

I'm with you on the youtube videos, blogs, and Oprah, tho.
 
kellyb said:
Open access journals are (generally) peer reviewed just like pay-for-access journals; the information is just free to the public.

I'm pretty sure some of the "woo journals" (like "medical hypothesis"?) aren't open access.

I'm with you on the youtube videos, blogs, and Oprah, tho.
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Well, all one has to do is look at the affiliations of the "researchers" tied to this article to know it's a joke.

Also, I believe the "pay journals" are a subset of "open access" journals. Not sure which one this is.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
I don't think ad hom means what you think it means.

But since this is a Monsanto blog, perhaps you can come up with some sources for the common claims (among anti-GMO nutwads) that GMO's cause cancer or allergies or...whatever. I've asked for years, and all I ever get is "watch the video" or a link to an Oprah episode or a loony conspiracy blog. Maybe you can point me to several peer reviewed scientific journal articles? Probably not.
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And around the vicious circle we go again: you demand "proof", we provide proof, you ad hom your way out of addressing the proof.

Rinse, repeat.

You don't want proof. You want someone to just agree with you despite all the evidence you are wrong.

No sale, Scrut. No sale.
 
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