Written by Steve Savage
From what I read on various blogs and comment streams, there is way too much angst out there about GMO crops. Too much angst because every significant panel of scientists that has reviewed this technology has concluded that it is as safe as any other domesticated food crop. Too much angst because the reality is that only a small number of crop species will ever be genetically engineered for commercial use. There are four main reasons why this is the case:
1. Brand protectionism
2. Unfavorable economics
3. Other ways to achieve the same goals, and
4. Anti-GMO activism
1. Brand Protectionism
For most crops, somewhere along the chain of commerce from the farmer to the consumer, there is a step where there is considerable “concentration.” This means that much of the market is in the hands of one or a few players. A classic case is potatoes. In the US, McDonalds corporation is such a dominant buyer of frozen fries, it was able to stop the commercial deployment of biotech potatoes with three phone calls. Unlike standard potatoes, the GMO potatoes in question are not planted into a supply of insecticide sufficient to be picked up by the roots for 60 days because they make their own, super-safe and specific “pesticide” in their leaves (Bt). The GMO potatoes also don’t need to be sprayed for aphids close to harvest because they are resistant to the virus those aphids spread. The potato growers were extremely excited about the technology, but purely for the sake of brand protection, McDonalds was able to deprive the entire industry of this advance. Potatoes are still a perfectly safe food. It could just be easier on the growers.
There are other cases of this sort of brand-protection power. The major frozen food companies and grocery retailers have been able to block most use of “Bt Sweet Corn” which could save farmers 8-10 insecticide sprays/season. Frito-Lay blocked the use of GMO, Bt white corn for corn chips even though that technology greatly reduces the risk of contamination with the mycotoxin, Fumonisin, which has been linked to neural tube defects in humans.
Brands are very valuable things and are protected fiercely. Activists like Greenpeace know this well, and they are able to use the threat of protest to turn that business instinct into decisions that are counter-productive for farmers and consumers alike.
2. Unfavorable Economics
Genetically engineering a crop is not that costly, but doing all the work necessary for the regulators is very expensive. Unless the crop in question is very large, very valuable or both, it will just never “pencil” to make the R&D investment, particularly if there is any marketing risk. I was once on a team that helped a major banana company and a biotech company think-through whether they should spend the money to develop a disease resistant banana. In Central America, it is necessary to spray this crop from the air almost every week to control a disease called Black Sigatoka. Bananas are a large, global crop so I was certain that the “business case” would be attractive. To everyone’s surprise, when we did the math, it came out as a poor investment! The problem is that banana plantations only get re-planted about every 20 years, so even if the new technology was available, only a small area would be planted each year. Saving >50 aerial sprays wasn’t enough to cover registration costs once the time-value-of-money is factored in.
So no minor crop and almost no perennial crop is ever going to become GMO unless the growers band together to make the investment. A coffee expert explained this to the global Specialty Coffee Association last year and suggested that they contemplate what it means that coffee will never be GMO. With the issues of climate change and declining labor availability, that entire industry is at risk.
3. Other Ways to Achieve the Same Goals
There has been a tremendous, public/private, global investment in biotechnology, far beyond that for the few crops that have been modified. That has led to the development of many new methods to alter the genes of plants etc. that don’t involve the introduction of any “foreign DNA.” Most of the crops that fit category 2 above will likely be improved using these alternatives (Marker Assisted Selection, Directed Mutagenesis, Induced Polyploidy…). These improvements will not involve expensive regulatory barriers, and so far, don’t draw the ire of activists. (With the exception of one attack on “Hidden GMO” sunflowers that were generated by mutagenesis.)
4. Anti-GMO Activism
Plant genetic engineering has been the most carefully thought-through new technology introduction in history. I remember attending major scientific conferences on the safety and environmental questions at least 10 years before the first commercial seeds were planted. We talked through everything with ecologists, botanists, sociologists, economists, molecular geneticists, food industry experts. But none of this influences the “environmental” groups who have seized on this issue to raise funds and draw attention. The activist’s task is made easier because molecular genetics is a fast-moving science that few consumers understand. The press has also been unwilling to take the time to understand this to the extent that journalistic standards would require and so many have not helped to counteract the fear-mongering. This is the only way I can explain some activist-driven rejections.
My all-time-most-read blog post was titled, “A Sad Day For Wine. A Sad Day For Science.” There is a virus called Grapevine Fanleaf Virus that is spread by a nematode (Xiphenema index). If the two ever infest a given vineyard site, good quality wine can never be produced there again because the vines will soon decline and die. That means that there are many wonderful vineyards around the world that have the an excellent “terrior” (something the French appreciate so much), but that site can no longer produce good wine. Grapes are grown on “rootstocks” and Cornell University had modified a rootstock to be resistant to the virus. This was an elegant solution to the Grape Fanleaf Virus problem because the top part of the vine is unchanged and only one kind of rootstock has to be developed. Last fall an experimental block of this new technology was ripped out of the ground by activists who believed they were saving the French wine industry from “genetic contamination.” That fear is 100% irrational – it is a rootstock under the ground that never flowers. Besides, grapes are not grown from seeds anyway. Different varieties of wine grapes are planted side-by-side all the time with no ill effects!
Is This Good Or Bad-Consider the Case of Wheat
So for a variety of reasons (some economic, some logical, some irrational, some selfish), very few additional crops will ever be GMO. That is not to say GMO is a small contribution to the food supply. Corn, Soy, Cotton, Canola, Sugarbeets and Alfalfa are GMO and cover hundreds of millions of acres and find their way into many processed foods, meat and milk. Still, I will continue to argue that GMO crops can be beneficial. The world will survive without a bit more excellent wine (very few vineyards in California, Chile, Argentina or Australia are contaminated!), but the other crop where activist-generated-fear has “won” by eliciting Brand Protectionism is – wheat, the second largest food crop on earth. By 2004, Greenpeace was able to generate enough fear in Europe to get major millers and bakers to threaten not to purchase North American wheat if any became GMO. The Canadian Wheat Board blinked, and two, nearly commercial wheat traits, were stopped in their tracks. One kind of GMO wheat would have been easier to farm with no-till methods and easier to keep pure for specialty uses. The other GMO wheat would have reduced disease-related yield losses as well as mycotoxin contamination.
It is far easier to stir up fear than it is to educate the public. There was an excellent article by Justin Gillis in the New York Times on 6/4/11 titled, “A Warming Planet Struggles to Feed Itself.” Much of the article is about how wheat production is failing to increase sufficiently to meet rising global demand. GM technology is not the full answer to this challenge by any means, but the fact that we are not including GM in the wheat improvement toolbox is a clear-cut “bad thing” in my book.
This post originally appeared on Sustainablog on 6/8/11.
You are welcome to comment here or to email me at applied.mythology@gmail.com. My website is Applied Mythology. Image of Edvard Munch’s 1893 painting, ”The Scream” from oddsock. French Fry image by Sun Dazed. Alsatian vineyard image near Colmar, France from Andreea.
Written by Guest Expert
Steve Savage has worked with various aspects of agricultural technology for more than 35 years. He has a PhD in plant pathology and his varied career included Colorado State University, DuPont, and the bio-control start-up, Mycogen. He is an independent consultant working with a wide variety of clients on topics including biological control, biotechnology, crop protection chemicals, and more. Steve writes and speaks on food and agriculture topics (Applied Mythology blog) and does a bi-weekly podcast called POPAgriculture for the CropLife Foundation.
I know the last question was not directed at me but I am going to answerit anyway. Ik am not a biologist or a farmer, but I am a profesional in my field. I do not understand all of the scientific goings on behind this tech and its aleged saftey (though I do make an effort)
For thousands of years people have farmed and eaten without this tech. Recently there has been more and more diabetes, obesitey, heart disease etc. While I cannot corelate this to GMOs and it is probably more due to packaged food and fast food, I can look at earlier models of how people raised and ate their food as being healthier.
There are lots of people who say that nucelar energy is safe and green. They are experts. I am disinclined to believe them.
What I do believe is that if I take my own diet into my hands I will be healthier. I resent that this is becoming more difficult. And I resent being told by an expert that there is nothing to fear (remember asbestos everyone thought it was safe) and I resent that it has become more difficult to eat grits and cornbread.
I lastly do not believe that science should do things because they are possible. We are all people and it is not our place to play at gods.
And they died in great number when their harvest failed, and the notion of the crops themselves as healthier is questionable at best.
Everyone’s diet is in their own hands. Like matters of health, that doesn’t have much to do with GMOs, however I assume that you mean avoiding GMOs, and if so, hey, your call, but just because it is your own health does not imply that actions you take will help it. I’m sure plenty of vegetarians have said the same thing without an understanding of essential amino acids, which is not to say avoiding GMO foods will be physically harmful like that (although it may be needlessly harmful to your wallet), just that that is faulty reasoning.
I don’t much care for being told by non-experts that there is something to fear, especially when a small mountain of data says otherwise. The thing with expertise is that we remember the individual times when the people who have it are wrong. We don’t remember the countless times those without it are wrong. Given the choice between trusting someone with knowledge & experiences and trusting some random guy, I’m going with the experts.
If I decide that the genes responsible for big apples with a greater diameter than ancestral apples are to be avoided I’m going to have a hard time eating apples, and it would be silly of me to harbor resentment towards the apple growers for wanting superior varieties. Cornbread is still there, you’ve just applied some self limiting arbitrary restrictions on it.
Tell that to the folks opposing Golden Rice. Rejecting the benefits that genetic engineering can bring comes a lot closer to ‘playing God’ than moving around a few molecules does.
This conversation is rather strange in my opinion. As a scientist I know the main causes of food-borne illnes and ill-health are microbes and microbial toxins.
I explained this here:
Food Safety: Focus on Real Risks, Not Fake Ones
Academics Review Mar 18, 2010
There is a lot of heated discussion going on about hypothetical food hazards such as GM and low level pesticide contamination which solid scientific work shows are causing no detectable harm. On the other hand, there is an example of real harm, dangerous E. coli in sprouts in Germany which has killed 38 people and permanently damaged 800+ people with HUS, sickened about 4000.
This actually happened.Its not supposition, like the GM and trace pesticide fears.
In the paswt of 2 weeks several GE companies and many scientist have used genetic engineering methods to analyse completely the genes of these organisms causing the German outbreak, and donated their work to the world free. Yes donoted free for all to use.
https://github.com/ehec-outbreak-crowdsourced/BGI-data-analysis/wiki
Follow the link to see the list of what has been done.
But at the comments here we get growls of distrust and sniping at the science, when scientist are using GM technology to try and fix the mess in Germany fast.
Why this great gap between fear and reality.
The distrust of GM is fear driven.
The risks of pathogenic E. coli germs are reality driven. Lets get real, I say.
Only going to respond to this piece as Greg H did such a sterling job knocking the rest on its head.
Argumentum ad populous? For real? Peter Molyneux made a tidy living on precisely the opposite principle.
I had the good fortune to be at a talk by your comrade in arms against lunacy Bruce Chassy yesterday (David and Steve both got mentions!) – interestingly he places simply overeating as the main cause of food related illness (not quite food borne… but kinda! I must admit I hadn’t even considered it that way) then microbes etc – I’d strongly recommend anyone interested in the issues at hand to catch a talk by him – although don’t expect time for questions at the end!
In a nutshell I want to limit what I eat to what I know is good for me because I understand it. Call it fear if you will but it is valid.
Justin,
How does taking control of your diet improve your food safety? Do you have credentials in the field of nutrition?
Why is your fear valid? Do you have credentials in epidemiology or something similar?
Eric,
If you had asked the same question 200 years ago people would have laughed at you… but none (ok very few) of them would have been obese or had food alergys.
And they also would have had, probably unknowingly, lots of experience with fun wildlife like Listeria, Botulinum, Salmonella… and with rickets, beriberi, pellagra….
I think the old movie (and TV) trope of short parents/grendparents and tall children springs from the dramatic effect grain enrichment brought about in the early 1900s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enriched_flour
I don’t thing allergies were recognized until 1906. Exactly what would have happened to someone in Georgia who had a peanut allergy before then?
You should say “none (ok very few) of them that SURVIVED…”
I am not saying that all knowledge was available 200 years ago. I am not saying we should live like they did. What I am saying is that the idea of having to consult an expert or have credentials to know how to eat a healthy diet is a very modern idea that is frankly a little silly… and while we may not have acknowledged food alergys that long ago, you surely wouldn’t deny they have increased over the last 100 years and esp the last 20
Ahhh wikipedia nothing like some good peer reviewed journalism 😉
I would love to see epidemiological/statistical data on height vs. age broken-down by year, region and occupation/socioeconomic class, and correlated with the introduction of grain enrichment: My theory, I’m embarassed to say, is based on old cartoons, Lil’ Abner, and The Beverly Hilbillies. Wikipedia is a substantial step up from that….
Alex, Steve, Eric
The justification is reasonable. I am sure each of you has things you do out of fear. I am sure each of you have a distrust for experts in some field or another (perhaps lawyers) I believe what you guys have a problem with is that YOU are the experts that are distrusted in this situation, and that the fear is of something that you have a personal investment in.
ah, Justin, to be young and impulsive. If you scroll to the top of the comments section, you’ll see I was the first post with a report highly critical of GMOs.
My diet at present is as organic as I can get it; I’ll be moving soon and growing my own food from the ground up. No pesticides, no modifications. That is my preference, and my prerogative. Some folks are perfectly fine with eating bologna and twinkies. I had those dietary habits for 26 years. I recently got sick and tired of being sick and tired (cliche, I know) and decided to do something about it. Read through my comments for more.
I disagree with Steve, Ewan et al. regarding the validity of Genetically Engineered crops in a modern world with an exploding population, and from a 40,000 foot perspective, you and I are on the same side of the issue. I’m no expert in ANYTHING except for what my works best for my body, and even I’m still learning that.
Sorry Alex. I came into the conversation late and it is hard to keep up with who is who on a smartphone. I am actualy middle aged and impulsive :). I work in aviation and everything looks beter from 40,000 ft.
GregH
The whole golden rice thing is a rather tired red herring.
http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-myths/11130-golden-rice-qcould-save-a-million-kids-a-yearq
Lets start with the first misrepresentation about Golden Rice in the link you post. Its typical of every anti-GM group I come in contact with.
The facts
Golden Rice is an effective source of vitamin A. Guangwen Tang, Jian Qin, Gregory G Dolnikowski, Robert M Russell, and Michael A Grusak. Am J Clin Nutr 2009;89:1–8. American Society for Nutrition
Why don’t the anti-GM groups discuss this paper’s findings?
It shows the Golden Rice investigators have worked out you need about 50 g of Golden Rice 2 to give an effective supply of vitamin. This is a small child’s serving. Green peace claim 9 kg. A huge error on the part of Greenpeace. Why don’t they make a public correction?
Why do Greenpeace want people to believe falsehoods about Golden Rice? Why don’t GM Watch mention this work?
David
The reason that anti GM groups don’t discuss that paper is really quite similar to the reason simple cheap natural alternatives aren’t discussed here. There is nothing that golden rice could accomplish that could not be accomplished more elegantly and for less with carrot seeds and education. But carrot seeds do not allow the biotech community to take the moral high ground. The reason that people don’t mention things that disagree with their world view is that they have a point to prove and they don’t want facts to get in their way. We all do it, let’s not pretend otherwise.
Scientists, including most of those involved in biotech, are acutely aware of all the options available that might help those who are suffering. The thing is, the scientists understand that passing out carrot seeds requires fertile ground suitable for carrots that is available to the people who need the Vitamin A. This doesn’t exist for the urban malnourished who have may have pennies a day, if they are lucky, to fill their bellies, and can’t afford carrots.
I went to a conference last year about biofortification. We talked a lot about improved seed through breeding and biotechnology, but we also talked about a lot more. You can find my write up about the conference here: https://biofortified.org/2010/11/goals-for-nutrition/
The scientists and other NGO workers who are doing all they can to find solutions that work, no matter the method. The people who are “NO GMO” without exception are preventing some of the solutions that could work from even being considered. Who’s got the moral high ground now?
PS: You shifted the goal posts, in case you didn’t notice. 1st the goal was providing enough Vitamin A, now the goal is to provide Vitamin A with carrots. What’s next?
This is patently false. Let’s compare carrots and rice – using the list here and comparing uncooked long grain brown (chosen arbirtrarily) and raw carrots.
Rice has significantly more energy per 100g than carrot – 329kcal more per 100g than carrot (rice therefore has 900% the calorific value of carrot)
rice has more protein (7g more, equating to 850% the protein content)
rice has more iron (400%), magnesium (1100%), phosphorus(950%), Zinc (840%), Selenium (234000%)
Rice has more Thiamin (600%), more riboflavin (160%), more niacin (510%), more vitamin b-6 (370%). Rice also has more of all fatty acids, and all amino acids per 100g
So no, a simple switch wouldn’t work (carrot does blow rice out of the water in terms of carotenes, Vitamin A, Lutein, Vitamin K) but in areas where calories are the most important aspect of the diet (they only become empty once you’ve got enough, prior to that point they are arguably the number one requirement after water in the diet) arguing that folk should switch to vegetables which cannot supply their nutritional needs (hey kids! You won’t go blind! You may not be able to appreciate this what with being dead, but these wholesome carrots helped you out!)
Of course this isn’t the whole issue – as carrots tend to yield more per hectare than rice (what with the water content) – ~30 T/Ha for carrot in china compared to ~7 T/Ha for rice – but this is still a 50% shortfall in calories (this alters my list above only slightly however) – clearly not an acceptable option for folk who are on the borderline in terms of calorific intake.
I’m guessing there are probably also storage issues – rice being less than 10% water is easily stored and hard to spoil – carrots… not so much.
Quacks and charlatains should have no weight in a debate concerning health (see Orac’s Respectful Insolence for coverage of their lunacy)
The ratio is probably in the 1:10 – 1:100 range, and for credible studies and credible scientists you can’t even set up a ratio because 0:X doesn’t work.
You’re right. And imagine how wonderful it would be if the whole world had access to carrots, squash, sweet potato, ect. But the fact is, they don’t. It’d be nice if they did, but they don’t. There’s a lot of people who can’t just hop down to the local megamart and grab some fresh produce. Yeah, as it mentions that on the home page of the Golden Rice project’s website, there is nothing, nutritionally, Golden Rice can do that a complete well balanced diet couldn’t do better. But ‘let them eat cake’ is little solace to some kid in the slums of Bangladesh living on pennies going blind. It would be great if every country had the agricultural, political, and economic framework we have in developed countries, and if anyone can provide everyone with an open democratic free market developed stable society with abundant food education infrastructure ect. then that would be amazing. But that’s easier said than done. We can talk about how the system is to blame and how if there were perfect food distribution this wouldn’t be a problem and all that other stuff, and that’s true, but you could say that about a lot of things. In the mean time, biofortified crops are not the complete solution to every problem, but at least people would stop going blind and dying, and that’s something.
And I think Golden Rice really shows where a lot of people really stand on GMOs. How often do we hear ‘Oh, I’m not against the science I just don’t like Monsanto.’ If that were true, then those Millions Against Monsanto people would support Golden Rice…but they don’t, they attack it just the same as a do Monsanto’s. Or look at Greenpeace. They claim to be an environmental group, so to oppose GMOs in that context would make sense (I mean, it’d be wrong, but I guess within their own warped logic it’d make sense), but they’re bashing Golden Rice on all fronts too.
That sword cuts both ways. I think most of us know that a safe, effective remedy to a serious problem like vitamin A deficiency coming from the evil, selfish biotechers is the anti-GM movement’s worst nightmare. And the longer it takes to make it to the people who need it due to the political obstruction of the Greens and others, the worse it looks. So…it must be squashed!!
How much of the budget of Greenpeace, FOE, Sierra Club and OCA goes to the development and distribution of these ‘simple cheap natural alternatives’ you describe??
For those interested, I thought this article on Genetically Modified Foods from the American Academy of Environmental Medicine had some interesting nuggets.
“There is more than a casual association between GM foods and adverse health effects. There is causation as defined by Hill’s Criteria in the areas of strength of association, consistency, specificity, biological gradient, and biological plausibility. The strength of association and consistency between GM foods and disease is confirmed in several animal studies.”
I understand that for every scientist and study anti-GMO folks reference suggesting GMOs are unsafe, pro-GMO folks can point to other scientists and studies to say they are. I don’t know where that leaves Joe Consumer. As long as there is such disagreement within the scientific community (at least as is perceived by the public) distrust toward GMOs will likely remain for a significant portion of the general population.
Can you hear that? It sounds like the last word.
Sorry, dude. Just because you call yourself an Academy doesn’t mean you get the last word. These people are a joke (check the citations), kinda like the Physicians for Responsible Medicine (made up mostly of non physicians!) If there is a last word, it is ‘woo’.
The American Academy of Environmental Medicine is on Quackwatch’s list of “Questionable Organizations.”
http://quackwatch.com/04ConsumerEducation/nonrecorg.html
Also:
“Theron Randolph (1906-1995), M.D., an allergist, seems to be the main person behind the origin of the concept of multiple chemical sensitivity. In 1965, Randolph co-founded the Society for Clinical Ecology (now the American Academy of Environmental Medicine). This organization and the notion of “clinical ecology” are largely ignored in the medical community.”
http://www.skepdic.com/mcs.html
Wow. They cite Jeffery Smith. They must be legit!
Wow. ‘Strength of association and consistency’ sounds like the ramblings of a group that can’t state that there is real statistical significance. BTW, what exactly is the causal agent (toxin, allergen, etc.) in GM foods that leads to these adverse effects? GM is a process, not a compound. If it present in all GM foods, even Jeffrey (bring the body bags) Smith should be able to find it.
Kind of sounds like the number of scientists that deny global climate change or the number of scientists that believe in creationism.
My point was primarily that Joe Consumer isn’t going to have an easy time assessing which scientists and studies are “legit.” If he reads an article about cattle dying after grazing on Bt cotton or sees a study identifying GM-related toxins entering our blood stream, he’ll likely find that alarming. He most likely doesn’t know that the toxin targets a molecule that is absent in humans (if I understand Ewan correctly — and thanks, Ewan, for that point of clarification).
I’m still not sold on GM food, but I think if the biotech community wants to eliminate all the “angst,” some effort to educate the public and quell those fears (even if they are unwarranted) would do more good than simply saying, “Trust us, we know what we’re talking about.”
Disclosure – Monsanto employee, though no relation to Ewan R. Also – opinions are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer
From the original article above: “It is far easier to stir up fear than it is to educate the public.”
I think the biotech community does try to educate the public, but the anti-GMO activism as described in 4 of this article is what gets churned through the internet.
The posters on this website are trying to educate the public with this open forum, yet no one believes them?!? I took a look at Karl’s recent post in the forum “Confused About Safety” where he addresses one persons concerns. He tries to address those issues and he points to a large body of evidence where people can look for more information.
I would also direct you to Monsanto’s company website http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/Pages/food-safety.aspx#q3 where food safety issues are addressed. However, that does not address the issue of “trust us, we know what we’re talking about” but it does try and address a lot of the fears people have.
I’m not asking you to be sold on GM food, but as I said at the beginning, the biotech community is trying to educate the public, however, point 4 of the article addresses why that is so hard. Everything is so easily dismissed by “corporate shill of the biotech company.”
MKlein,
I would be interested to know what an “effort to educate the public” would look like, and the likelihood that it would be effective.
When consumers started being more conscientious about CO2 emissions, eventually auto manufacturers started highlighting their efforts to be green in commercials and print media. Similarly, fast food companies began promoting salads, yogurt parfaits, “apple fries,” etc., in response to consumer concern over the healthfulness of their menu selections.
You might argue that the difference is that CO2 emissions are harmful and that fatty hamburgers and chicken nuggets are unhealthy. But the similarity is that there is a negative perception.
One of the messages from the anti-GMO group is that biotech companies are silencing the media — so the fact that these topics aren’t being discussed (to the best of my knowledge, anyway) makes it seem all the more that there is something to hide. By the sound of it, a lot of people don’t realize they’re eating GMOs. (Personally, I didn’t know GM ingredients had permeated our food supply until a few months ago.) If a person has any reservations about GMOs and then discovers he has been ingesting them for years, a likely response will be a sense of personal violation.
Again, I’m focusing on public perception here. If biotech companies don’t believe public opinion plays a role in the success of their products, then this angst really isn’t a big issue. If public opinion does matter, a PR campaign or news coverage would foster good will … with some.
I’m not a PR person, so I can’t speak to the effectiveness of such an approach, but bringing the subject to light and allowing for greater conversation around it (beyond the Internet) would at least remove the perceived veil of deception and at most foster good will and educate consumers about the safety of GM foods (or alleged safety … sorry, I can’t help it — I’m not convinced yet).
For now, the notion of educating consumers about GM crops is utterly and completely insuperable.
GM seeds are engineered with farmers in mind. Fewer inputs, better outputs. So the multinats could go to the consumers, and say, wow, our seeds and integrated farming practices are really good for farmers.
Who’s going to use that metric to choose one food item over another? Nobody. Consumer concern is cost, at #1 place. They don’t give a rat’s nethermost fundament about the rest unless you count the hippies at the local farmers market.
We will shortly see oil from GM soybeans hitting the market and boasting of improved nutritional merits. We’ll see how that turns out.
But in the meantime, GM seed providers have literally nothing to advertise to consumers. Why should they advertise to a market that doesn’t buy their stuff?
I appreciate that more information is better. However, do you really think a PR campaign by biotech companies would be well accepted?
A while back, Monsanto tried to donate locally adapted non-GMO seed to Haiti in the most responsible way possible by selling it at low cost through farmer co-ops being set up by the US and Haitian govts instead of flooding the market and driving prices down. The seeds were given with no intellectual property ties so the farmers could save seeds. Monsanto didn’t make a PR campaign out of it, I don’t even think it was in the news. While I think tooting your own horn when making donations is rather distasteful, this donation could have been part of a larger humanitarian ad campaign. So what happened?
Activist groups swarmed on Haiti and convinced farmers that the seeds were poisonous and that they should be burnt. Activists in the US decided it would be a great idea to mail seeds from the US that hadn’t been sanitized so were potentially carriers for plant diseases and not only that but the seeds were adapted for the US, not for sub-tropical Haiti so probably wouldn’t do well anyway. Happily no seed was actually burned and the seeds were a success despite the lies told by activists. I don’t know what happened with the potentially diseased maladapted activist mailed seeds.
Ok, sorry that was long. The whole thing really upset me.
Anyway, the point is, if this donation that seriously had no profit motive (how could it, Hatian farmers have no money), and still the response was so bad, what would Monsanto have to do to get any better PR? Pioneer, Syngenta, and the other companies are generally ignored and I’d bet they’re happy to stay that way.
EDIT: After looking back on my post on Haiti and hybrids I saw/remembered that we had quite a discussion about PR in the comments there, if you are interested in checking that out and commenting there.
Yeah but that was a case of hey look, heavy industry is bad – do something about it – so preconceived ideas happened to mesh with reality (the confirmation bias doesn’t necessarily mean you’re wrong) – the story with biotech is harder to tell because nobody is primed to believe that a corporation that nets billions of dollars a year is potentially not doing so by harming folk. Also – there’s no story there for the media to tell – GM crops harmless doesn’t sell papers, get folk watching over a commercial break, or shift books off the shelf – the media is no longer about telling the truth, it’s about preying on fears to shift product – to paraphrase Terry Pratchett – a lie can be half way around the world before the truth has its boots on. In such a climate how can anyone too lazy to do any actual legwork be expected to happen upon the right information – it’s boring, it’s long, it lacks sensation – very few people get excited seeing a plant whose only phenotypic difference to all other plants of its kind is that it doesn’t keel over and die when sprayed with herbicide – if I tell you it causes infertility in cattle, spontaneous abortions, and ear cancer however – boom, that got your attention.
See, I’d expect a sense of mild embarassment that you thought something was probably terrible but it was so non-exceptional that it didnt effect you. I’m odd like that though.
I’m not sure where you got the impression that it didn’t affect me. To be honest, the anti-GMO claims that really caught my attention were that they cause miscarriage, spontaneous abortion and birth defects in animals. I have personally experienced two miscarriages and lost my second born when he was four weeks old due to an unexplained AV malformation in his brain.
Now I’m not going around saying my losses are the result of eating GMOs. However, as I said before, there is enough perceived disagreement in the scientific community about the safety of GMOs that I’m not convinced they’re safe and consequently I’m now choosing organic when I can. So it did affect me.
I’m also not sure where you would expect my embarrassment to lie. I learned about Bt corn initially and didn’t think much about it, understanding (or misunderstanding) that it was for cattle feed. The only thing that rubbed me the wrong way at the time was the idea of cross pollination being an issue. Then I heard claims about GM foods having negative effects on animals. Then I learned that not only are we eating this stuff, it’s so prevalent in America that it’s hard to avoid.
So, representing Joe Consumer who doesn’t know the ins and outs of why gene splicing should be considered safe, but hearing about studies suggesting rats and other mammals have reproductive issues when they eat GM corn, I’m just pointing out that’s the source (or at least one) of the angst this article is addressing.
Studies refuting those claims don’t seem as easily accessible to the layperson. Or maybe they are accessible, but there are too many anti-GMO articles flooding search results to find them.
But, as I said in another comment, if the biotech industry doesn’t think public concern over anti-GMO claims will affect GM crop production and isn’t interested in spreading pro-GMO messages where they think misinformation is prevailing, then I’m not sure why anyone is even spending time discussing it here.
I can’t speak for the biotech industry, but I can speak as a biologist, geneticist and food safety scientist. I am very worried about misinformation, and the harms that come from paying attention to the wrong things. If you are making food choices based on fear of GE food rather than well established major risks with food, you are doing yourself and children a disservice. Infectious disease is the major food risk. Think about Listeria, Campylobacter,norovirus, Salmonella and pathogenic E. coli. Also think about toxoplasmosis, aflatoxin and fumonisin. Think also about what factors favor these risks. If you don’t know them well, you have been distracted by misinformation.
I’d also add that promoting fear of cancer caused by traces of pesticides is similarly distracting. The message that obesity and lack of exercise contribute to cancer risks gets distorted by red-herrings.
David,
It would seem that the actual goal of the Environmental Working Group is to increase cancer rates. They frighten people away from eating fruits and vegetables filling with cancer-fighting chemicals. They also scare people away from using sunscreen. They have probably killed far more Americans than Al Qaeda
MKlein, I, too, am a lay person. My degree is in English, but I do have a small farm. I can pay attention to what people say and I have some critical thinking skills.
I worked at an organic farm for four years, so I know the ins and outs of thats.
I want to comment on this section of your response:
If you didn’t want people to make a connection between the alleged dangers of GE crops and spontaneous abortions, then why did you bring up your own miscarriages?
Not being “convinced” of the safety of GMOs because of “perceived disagreement in the scientific community” is the exact argument used by global warming deniers to cast doubt on anthropogenic climate change.
“Choosing organic” means nothing more than that you are spending too much money for your food. The organic farming movement, as I have found through years of experience and reading, is a marketing ploy based on pseudo-science, fear-mongering, superstition, and absurdity.
GMO crops, as grown, have no effect on you – outside that which the conventional crop would have. This I get from the scientific literature and from the ~15 years of use without a single verifiable recorded instance of harm on human or animal from GMO (insane claims may count as recorded instances, but they are unverifiable because they only ever happened in the imagination of the person inventing the claim.
This is horrible, I’m sorry that you’ve had to endure this.
The misinformation effected you – the GMOs did not. If I lie about Dr Tribe’s prediliction to stealing your socks, and you subsequently hide your socks, this isn’t the fault of Dr Tribe (he is likely to steal your socks though)
I, personally, would feel embarassment if I was convinced some additive to food was likely to be massively harmful and then later discovered that I, and everyone around me, had been consuming it for years with no signs of ill effect. (not enormously embarassing, but at least a little red of cheek)
To be fair studies making the claims aren’t accessible to the layperson either – scholarly articles rarely are – blogs and websites reporting on the studies are a tad easier to find – and I believe I’ve dealt with why you get more of one sort than the other above.
I don’t understand why the second piece would be dependant on the first – it could be that the biotech industry (in general) doesn’t care too much, or is resourcing things differently (chumming up to farmers – if you live in the American Midwest and watch TV this is abundantly clear (dunno how widespread the Monsanto commercials are outside the corn belt)) – but that doesn’t mean that academics (which is the area most effected, in my opinion, by public perception of GMOs – both in terms of funding and likelihood of successful launch of a trait (without going through a big biotech company), and private individuals (such as myself – despite Monsanto being my employer none of my meanderings here are in the slightest their doing or their opinion (opinions may match at times, but this is just happenstance)
MikeB – the reason things were brought up is because due to them, and the misinformation about GMOs, MKlein(understandably assuming the misinformation was taken as containing even a remote grain of truth) totally shifted her diet – I’m assuming bringing something like that up is still horrifically painful so I’d request not badgering on that particular point.
Educating the public and quelling fears is an issue for many science topics, from GMOs to vaccines to climate change. When our news media continues to enforce an equal time doctrine even when the data and information all points in one direction, we will continue to get this confusion. In these days of distrusting expertise, anyone who has said expertise is often discounted as a shill for the bogeyman of the day.
So, we understand why there is confusion and that is why blogs like this exist. To help educate the public on the science of a complex issue.
Anastasia,
I did not shift anything. The original assertation I was responding to was by GregH. He said that witholding the benifits of golden rice (vitamin A) is paramount to playing god. I replied that the same benifit could be obtained through other means and that not discussing them is just as reprobate as witholding the magical cure of golden rice.
Carrots are by the way an oversimplification. There are many other availble things that could be grown besides the golden rice.
Ewan
Comparing the value of an uncooked dry grain to a raw vegtable is not an apples to apples comparison. If you cook the grain and eat the carrot raw that would be a fair comparison. Besides nobody said anything about replacing all the rice in a diet with carrots.
The distinction is that Golden Rice is here now, it’s real, it works, and those pushing against it are ideologically driven. The framework to provide a well balanced diet is presently just not there, and what is holding it back is many complex global social & economic issues. These two are not equivalent interchangeable items.
You need to assess output from a given unit of land – this was the fastest way to do so – cooked rice takes on water that was never part of the growing process – carrots contain that water as a given – 100g of carrot from the field is 100g of carrots. 100g of rice from the field, once cooked, is likely significantly more than 100g on the plate – as such comparing cooked rice to carrots when considering the nutrition one can draw from a hectare of land will be skewed by cooking information (unless you have such info at hand, but despite the illusion of time I actually don’t have enough to do so)
Regardless, every plot that is planted to carrots is a plot that isn’t planted to rice – you lose calories from a diet that can ill afford to lose calories. Your solution doesn’t work.
There is, after all, a reason that staple crops are staple crops – civilizations are built around high calorie cereals – without the calories the micro-nutrients are meaningless. You simply aren’t going to be able to provide a high beta carotene equivalent to rice that will yield the same calories as rice in the areas we’re discussing (if there was one it’d be grown… contrary to popular belief (at least on one side of the debate…) subsistence farmers aren’t stupid) – unless you provide some other methodology by which farmers can massively increase their productivity such that they supply enough calories for themselves and their family that they can afford to plant an area to crops with vitamins etc it would appear that the best option is to fortify their main crop. As providing these methodologies is proving to be a slow laborious prospect hampered at each turn by armchair farmers one would imagine that having an interim crop even as a patch (and 200,000+ preventable deaths each year seems somewhat more than a patch) should be an absolute non-issue – why, given as GregH points out above that the technology is already here and ready to go, would you not use it other than out of some psychotic delight in knowing that your blocking of the release of the technology will have a death toll that puts your average serial killer to shame (actual real impact in terms of human misery instead of invented impact of what might be because we haven’t tested these technologies to ludicrous levels of certainty (to paraphrase what Bruce Chassy said yesterday – we know with as much certainty as we ever will that crops produced by the transgenics are no more dangerous than crops produced by other breeding methods – further testing is simply ridiculous (he also equated the death toll from not using golden rice over the period of a decade or so to more dead than the holocaust – just to, y’know, put things in perspective)
Amusingly the info is right in the pages linked… I’m on the ball today, oh yes.
My apologies, I thought you brought it up. It’s hard to keep track of threads in a long comment stream like this, especially when people don’t use the reply feature.
Did you read the link I posted about biofortification and other methods to improve nutrition? I think you’ll see that there are a lot of options, and in many cases biotechnology can complement those other methods. Sadly, there is no silver bullet, but there are many small things that could help people.
Yes let’s talk about the alternatives to Golden Rice
One is distribution of vitamin capsules. It can work but unfortunately is not reaching everyone. And is financially unsustainable — you need to raise aid funds year after year. Not so Golden Rice. Once farmers get given seed, they replant is at no each cost year after year. This is very cost effective
A wider range of foods would help, but the villagers don’t have access to much choice because of poverty. But they can grow rice.
Could the same results as golden rice be obtained without the regulatory hurdles using marker assisted selection? And if so they why hasnt it been done?
In short, no. Maize has been improved for beta carotene levels using marker assisted selection but this is not possible in rice for two reasons. 1st, there was existing genetic diversity with regard to carotenoids that allowed for selection in maize and there is not in rice. 2nd, rice is polished in order to remove the fats that turn rice rancid and what little carotenoids there are exist in the aluerone and embryo not in the endosperm, but maize can be left whole with little rancidity problems.
Anastasia, thank you for you response.
Ewan,
I am also pressed for time though it may not appear so.
My question is not about mass or calories but the neutrent value after heating.
Check out the “Apeal to Hitler” in this link
https://biofortified.org/2010/09/logical-fallacies/
Anyway I am the joe consumer in this situation. I am an aerospace expert which has nothing to do with genitics or nutrition, but it seems these days we all have to try to be experts to avoid being fat cows and dying of a heart attack. This whole subject is rather new to me and I am going to do some more research, and try to keep it as fair as possible. I have learned a good bit reading around this site. I will personally and for my family continue to eat nongmo and grow or catch as much of my food as possible. I may reasess my views in 20 years if all my nieghbors don’t turn into zombies 😉 I n the meantime I will continue to use my evolutionaty instinct toward fear of the unknown to ensure my survival.
Thank you all it has been enlightening
Goodbye
Disclosure – Monsanto employee, no relation to Ewan, etc.
What a fantastic article and some great posts. I have really enjoyed reading all of the comments. I like the diverse opinions presented and addressed. Thanks for the info on golden rice, I had heard the opinions on golden rice requiring a huge amount to make any difference to a diet and it was nice to see the other side of that argument posted.
I really liked Maria’s post explaining that she is able to avoid GMO in North America by reading the ingredients. This is obviously something that concerns her and it is her right to choose whether or not to eat GMO. It is not something that concerns me, I generally just look at sugar and fat content (though I’ll admit that I look to the country of origin on vegetables as well-not sure if that is rational, but I do it).
I recently met a person at a cooking class who was very opposed to GMOs in general and my employer specifically. I could only offer her eating organic as an alternative. Thank you Steve for allowing me to direct people more accurately in the future: Beans, wheat, fruits and veggies – except maybe papaya.
By the way – love this website for all the info it contains – I am a non-scientist working at Monsanto and it really helps me see all sides of the issues in the public.
One more thing – since Percy Schmeiser was mentioned above and I work in Canada> when I was being interviewed for a job at Monsanto I read the actual court judgements of the Schmeiser cases. I did this because I was concerned about working for Monsanto due to the negative press from this case (and this was 5 years after the case). When I read the facts of the case and the court judgement I had no issues with working here.
Richard,
Please accept my applause. When I began my current job/career, I was smitten by my conscience — all the claims of ‘GM killing the Universe’ etc. Turned out, the opponents were all clever liars. With ulterior motives. No doubt about it, this is a culture war, and GM crops/foods is a major front.
With Monsanto playing defense, fortress mentality, ‘wait out’ the enemy. Everyone in the world is afraid of Greenpeace’ unkind attentions, when in point of fact the Amsterdam multinational is completely vulnerable. An intelligent assault on their position would bring them down in three months.
ok I just have to weigh in on the subject of violation vs embarasment.
I think it is a fair thing to say that most people in america do not like to eat cow bile, even though it is not harmful (that i am aware of)
Now supose that I owned a resturant and used cow bile in my dishes as a secret ingredient and had done so for years. Then let’s say that a food critic came to my resturant and I told him my secret ingredient, and he put it in the paper that cow bile had been in all my dishes. Do you believe that I would loose coustomers? Do you believe that people would feel embarased for having liked the cow bile soup, or would they feel violated and not trust me and come back to my resturant.
For most of us this is what happened. Sure I’ve eaten my share of gmos before i Found out how prevelant they were. But even if I am unharmed (hard to say my knee has been bothering me lately) it does not mean that I am not grossed out and violated by someone putting a secret ewwww ingredient in my food.
Most people don’t know they are eating hybrids, or products of mutagenesis, or a million other small details. Should they feel “violated” about these unknown characteristics of the foods they eat every day? What is the remedy to the lack of knowledge? How much knowledge is needed to ensure that no one ever feels “violated” or caught unawares? And that’s just the actual content of the food – what about other details? I’d feel pretty bad if I found out I was eating something that contained an ingredient that was produced by severely underpaid workers, for example. Not quite “violated” but I would feel bad. Maybe that information should be on all the food, too. We might need some bigger boxes… for everything.
I really hope you’re not blaming your hurt knee on GMOs. If you are, do you happen to have any sort of biological explanation for this claim?
If I found out cow bile was the secret ingredient of food I liked, I’d get over any prejudices I have about cow bile and ask the owner how to cook with it. I didn’t get very up in arms when I heard about shellac and carmine. Anyway I don’t think that is quite a comparable analogy because you’re talking about a whole different ingredient, not a different variety of the same ingredient. A better one would be finding out your favorite raspberry tart uses the variety Meeker instead of Latham. And it’s hard to call GMOs secret too. Only a handful of crops are GMO, and if they’re in the ingredients, it’s probably GMO. There’s a big difference between not knowing something because it’s being hidden and not knowing something because you didn’t properly research it.
Well said, Greg. “No… not Meeker raspberries! I’ve been violated…” sounds pretty silly!
I’m a vegetarian and I was still ok with it when I learned about carmine. Talk about a secret!
I think the biggest reason for the “Angst” (couldn’t we have chosen a more grown up word talking about angst has the conotation that people who don’t accept GMOs are pimpilly teenagers) is that GMOs are caught in the “uncanny valley” so to speak.
I don’t know – angst might not be quite the right word, but it does mean “fear or anxiety” which is completely appropriate here.
I completely agree that GMOs are in an “uncanny valley” of sorts. I had the chance to talk to Lisa Weasel, author of Food Fray, a while back, and she has a similar idea that I hope I can portray properly here:
Humans like things that fit into categories. The need to categorize is especially strong when it comes to food. Two of those categories are “natural” and “artificial”. We are ok with things that are natural, and we are ok (mostly) with things that are artificial. Take Diet Coke, for example. It is 100% artificial, except for the water, but many people (including me) happily drink it all the time. The angst comes up when things don’t fit into either category. Genetic engineering takes a plant, which is viewed as natural and wholesome, and applies a technology that is (for the most part) man made, compromising the plant’s “naturalness”, yet not turning it into something wholly artificial.
I’m going to add on to Dr. Weasel’s idea here:
Those of us who are very familiar with the technology understand that the “unnaturalness” is really not so great after all, that even though the plant isn’t 100% natural, neither are most plants that we eat due to breeding, mutagenesis, grafting, and other technologies. People who are at least a little familiar with the technology and also trust scientists (or at least don’t think scientists are evil and cartoonish) are also see the technology as natural enough to overcome this categorization problem. I think the same is true with irradiation and some other aspects of food science and agriculture.
So, what does all this tell us and how does Biofortified fit in? I think it tells us that the fear is based on lack of knowledge. I find it to be ethical to provide information in a fairly unbiased way so people can make decisions based on on fear but on sound information. In fact, I find it to be a moral responsibility that I take the knowledge that I am able to understand and help make it accessible to everyone. I find it to be very unethical to provide poor or incomplete information (which is part of why my posts are so long).
No I’m teasing you guys. I tore my ACL about 5 years ago. Though perhaps GMOs were a contributing factor in my poor judgment the day I did it (just kidding)
Whew. I was hoping. I used to be pretty good at telling when someone was joking, even in text, but I gotta tell you, I have interacted with people online who seriously blame everything wrong with them on some pretty odd unrelated things that make zero biological sense. (come to think of it, I think we have one in this thread…)
GregH
See, I don’t think cow bile is a strong enough comparison. Beef bile has been used in southeast asian cooking since…. basicly forever. It is well tested known to be harmless and has some purported health benifits. It is not a new ingredient.
GMOs did not exist when I was in high school. They may be well tested and have some purported health benifits. But in the grand scheme of things they are a completely new class of orginism, and a completely new class of foodstuff.
You guys say there is no more difference between a gmo and the original plant than there is between different breeds of the same plant. As a percent of genetic difference I am sure that is true. However, if there were no more difference between the GMO and the original strain than what occurs through breeding then you guys would be plant breeders.
Ahhh…. but the difference you will say is that we can’t accomplish the things we are doing with gene splicing by breeding because the genitic traits are not available anywhere in the species. So if you take the whole of the genitic library of all soybeans and can’t find what you need you just add a book to the shelf. The problem is that library contains the species of soybean (too lazy to look up latin name) when you add something to it it’s no longer the same library. If nature, evolution, God, whatever… intended for soybeans to be drenched with herbicide then the genetic code to accomplish that would be found in the library. If you take the view that the library of a species is complete, then when you add something to it you have created a new species. This may be little more than semantics, but since people think in words semantics are important.
You say there is a diffrence between not knowing because something is hidden and not knowing because of a lack of research. Because this is a whole new class of foodstuff that from at least one point of view consists of whole new species that did not exist a few years ago there would have been no reason for me to expect that every time I see the word corn unless otherwise noted what is meant is GM corn. It would have made as much sense for the average person to be researching if when their food said vegtable protien if it really meant ectoplasm from a ghost. People do not go around researching if their food contains things that do not exist, and are generaly taken off gaurd when they find out that they do. Today the knowledge of what contains GMOs is out there for people who care to find it. There was a point though for those of us that were not involved with bringing GMOs to market where we first learned to our great suprise that they even existed. This point was generaly after we had been eating them for a few years.
I know people who won’t eat at asian resturants because they are afraid that they are eating cats. These same people would not return to a resturant that they knew put beef bile in their food even if they previously enjoyed the food. These same people would not be expected to return to a resturant that put ghost ectoplasm or any other magicaly conjured ingredient that previously did not exist into their food.
I know people who judge gays or interacial couples because they say that is not the way that nature, evolution, God etc. intended people to act. These same people should not be expected to accept a soybean that is not acting how it should act.
Empathy is defined: identification with and understanding of anothers situation feelings or motives
Aspbergers syndrome is defined as having a lack of empathy. (Amongst other things)
Theres a higher portion of research scientests, engineers, drs. Etc. With aspbergers than in the general population.
I think it is telling that the original question is “why so much angst over GMOs” then when people try to tell you some of the reasons behind their angst it is still not understood. I believe if the industry had taken the time to try to put themselves in joe publics shoes then this angst would not be coming as a shock and need an explination.
A little empathy will go further than all of the positive research in the world.
Please address what the outcome would be if we replaced “hybrid” or really any other tool that breeders use instead of GMO in the above comment. Hybrids really are a whole new class of foodstuff circa 1920s or so. The ability to make wide crosses between related species is recent. Mutagenesis is more recent than that, and marker assisted selection has only been around for a few years.
Also, please address where cisgenics fit into this.
I have a lot of empathy for people who are afraid of science due to widespread poor science education and fearmongering for profit. That’s why I take the time to write about the science, and why I am so interested in learning what people think about the subject. The people who are really afraid tend to be angry so aren’t very conducive to conversation. Talking with people more in the middle is much more educational for me (and hopefully them too). So, thank you for sticking around for lots of conversation. It means a lot to me.
BTW my last post is not necessarly my viepoint, though it contains portions of it. It was really more of an exercise in finding possible views.
This is not my area of expertise
This is not my area of expertise so you will correct me if I’m wrong.
Hybryds are crossing of closely related species. So you cross a pear and an apple and come up with a papple or something like that? People have a frame of reference for this. You cross a horse and a donkey and you come up with a mule, or a lion and a tiger and get a liger etc. It is something we could immagine happening on its own.
Mutagenisis is just rapidly accelerated directed evolution. If the species is able to adapt to whatever outside influnce you subject it to on its own then perhaps in time it would have evolved that way on its own without the outside influnce?
Marker assisted selection is really just fancy breeding. You have a scientific way of determining what to breed with what because you know what you are looking for and know which plants have those qualities. There is nothing saying that given enough time it could not happen on its own, or that a skilful breeder could not have accomplished the same results with perhaps more work.
Genitic splicing is taking two unrelated things and crossing them. More akin to wanting a person with better endurance, and acheving that goal by transplanting a horses heart into a person. This is something that we cannot immagine happening on its own or immagine as an end result of some conventional means of plant husbandry.
At GMO Pundit blog I have 91 posts that largely related to natural gene movement between species. Check them out via the Natural GMOs tag. They are events that “We cannot imagine happening” if we are not familiar with modern biology. Let’s start by examining what modern biology has discovered, not what the average person can imagine, and we would be nearer to an objective risk assessment rather than a personal fear assessment, the latter being a risky way to make decisions.
I do not believe I have a problem with cisgenics based on my limited understanding. I would not call it a new class of species since you are not adding anything to the library so to speak. I do not see where cigenics could add some trait to the plant that was not there in some member of the species. And I do not see where you could accomplish more with cisgenics than marker assisted selection (asside from perhaps accomplishing it faster and more precisely)
Anastasia
Thank you for taking the time to formulate reasonable and helpful responses. I have indeed learned a good bit. I still however perfer to grow my own food or buy from people I know, and stick to things that have existed for longer than I have.
If you have never watched the movie Gattica you should.
David,
My last several posts have nothing to do wit personal fear. They have much more to do with idealogical distaste, which is different. It is easy to brush away a sceptic as fearful even if their problems with the tech are based on philosophy not fear.
Now I will admit that the two things can go together, but I think that the philosophy is what causes the fear not the other way around.
But you would have us all trade one fear for another and cower in fear of the ecoli on our spinach and the salmanola on our sprouts….
How many more times have you washed your hands today than was necessary based on a realistic risk assesment?
david
That said I will check out your 91 posts later when I have time.
David
I did some reading on your blog.
There were some things that stood out to me.
the entry
“Opportunity and Means: Horizontal Gene Transfer from the Human Host to a Bacterial Pathogen”
“Some genes very occasionally jump from humans into the germs that infect them. One remarkable example has been discovered where a bit of human DNA has moved into the germ that causes gonorrhoeae. This germ is well known to readily take up DNA from the environment, so in retrospect this DNA movement is not totally surprising.”
“The acquisition and incorporation of genetic material between nonmating species, or horizontal gene transfer (HGT), has been frequently described for phylogenetically related organisms, but far less evidence exists for HGT between highly divergent organisms.”
As i read this there is limited data to support the idea of genitic data jumping between non phyogenicly related species. I also read that it is in a microbe that is known to readily take up dna from its environment.
All of the other cases of hgt that you described in you blog were between phyogenicly related species
so what that tells me is that we could perhaps take some tommato genes and splice them with bell pepper genes without oversteping nature. Or perhaps if we had a species of plant that had a propensity to pick up dna from its environment we could place dna that we would like for it to pick up in its environment and see what happened without overstepping nature.
However, nowhere in your blog did I see an example of something more akin to take a bit of frog DNA and splice it into a completly phyogenicly unrelated maize plant that is not its host or visa versa.
Perhaps if there was some way of knowing which genitic sequences would be likely to to jump that kind of gap you could work with them and come up twith something that could be concevably natural.
I see the argument that because it happens in limited scope in nature that we have carte blanche to do what we want as being weak.
David
In fact while I did not read every last post in your blog I didn’t notice a single case of anything larger than a single cell organism being the reciepent of hgt. I do not see how this supports the idea that artificaly doing this in plants corelates to anything natural.
Well first of all, remember Agrobacterium will inject DNA into a wide range of plants.
Second, you do not seem to have looked at many of the earlier Natural GMOs posts.
Eg.
Natural GMOs Part 31. Bacteria mate with worms among the roots and leaves.
Natural GMOs Part 30. Massive Horizontal Gene Transfer in Amborella trichopoda
http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2006/02/natural-gmos-part-12-nanobot-mules.html
http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2005/12/natural-gmos-part-2-genes-move-around.html
http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2006/03/friendly-uncle-osmar-mariner-helped.html
Speaking of horizontal gene transfer, I would like to hear some takes on this article.
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FSAopenmeeting.php
I can already hear some of you dismissing the article in my last post because of the source. I am capable of doing that without your help. I would prefer if you addressed the content not the source.
Yeah, not the most awesome source. ISIS has some, um, creative ways of interpreting biology that are, um, different.
I have mixed feelings on this subject. I find it to be intellectually dishonest to say “look, nature does HGT so GMOs are ok!” yet, it is true that HGT happens in nature occasionally. My personal favorite example is of fungus genes in aphids. This is one of very few examples of eukaryotic (not single celled) gene transfer that scientists have found. HGT is rare in nature, and scientists who have tried to make HGT happen on purpose have only found it under certain conditions that are very unlikely to happen in nature. I wrote a post titled GMOs could render important antibiotics worthless (hint: no, they can’t) about HGT that addresses most if not all of the concerns in the ISIS article and that describes those unlikely conditions.
To get back to the actual GMOs that are on the market and that people are researching – while there are a few examples of animal genes being used in plants, the products of genetic engineering on the market do not (my major prof developed one but it’ll never be on the market because it’s presumably too scary). Bt is a gene from bacteria, the glyphosate resistance gene is from bacteria, virus resistance (anyone who knows more about this can correct me) is actually synthetic DNA that matches the sequence of part of a virus. Many of the other traits are using genes from other plants. You can find an incomplete list of traits here along with links to more lists of traits. Why use genes from other plants? Maybe because it’s more likely to be accepted, although I don’t know if most scientists actually think about that. I think it’s probably because it’s easier to source the genes and genes from a plant are more likely to work without the need to “translate” from “animal code” to “plant code” (there are slightly different “languages”, referred to as “codon preference”).
In the cisgenics post I linked to earlier, I remark at the end that cisgenics are more likely to be safe than transgenics, but I was wrong to say that. We know that the process of genetic engineering is safe, but the products need to be tested individually because the safety of the product depends on what is being expressed. The soybean with the brazil nut protein is an example of a plant-plant GMO but the protein turned out to be an allergen so the research was ended. The rice with a human saliva protein that would help fight life-threatening dehydrating diarrhea is an example of a human-plant GMO that to my knowledge has not been found to have any safety concerns. To reiterate, the key is what the trans or cis gene is expressing, not the process that got it there.
Of course, public perception is incredibly important, so I’m all for doing cisgenics whenever possible to achieve a result in hopes that they will actually make it to the market. I’d like to share with you an example from my own work.
I work on making maize contain more bioavailable iron. The problem with iron is that in plants there are a lot of compounds that prevent you from digesting the iron and actually absorbing it from the food you eat. For most Westerners, that’s no problem because even vegetarians have access to enough variety of food and enough fortified food to get enough iron. In the developing world, not so much. What little iron there is in grain is not very bioavailable. Of course, the best solution is making sure that everyone who lives in an area where maize is a dietary staple also has enough money to get meat, leafy greens, and fortified foods, but until we figure out how to grow money on trees it’d be nice if we could find something to help decrease anaemia which is the world’s most prevalent nutritional deficiency.
Different researchers have tried different things, but long story short breeding for iron probably isn’t going to work in maize. There just aren’t any high iron maize varieties to use as a source of genes for breeding or Marker assisted selection. There has been success in increasing bioavailable iron using genes from bacteria and from soybean but that’s got the whole interspecies “yuck” factor. My work, started by Amy Proulx, is using maize genes in maize to increase iron bioavailability. And, happily, it seems to be working. How can it be that breeding wouldn’t work but genetic engineering does? It’s because the maize DNA has been rearranged in a specific way that could happen given like a billion years, but is very unlikely to happen. In other words, random DNA rearrangements happen, but it’s random. To get the exact arrangement I want, genetic engineering is necessary. I can go into more detail if you’d like but I suspect this comment is already long enough 🙂
This.
Anastasia, Woulden’t it be reasonably easy to increase maize’s secretion/uptake of siderophores? Wouldn’t that increase the whole-plant iron concentration?
My interest in siderophores was (re) awakened when I came down with a nosocomial infection of an interesting siderophore-making organism, and I was able to culture it from a drop of my own blood…. But, it wouldn’t have made a good pet: it took a lot of IV mycins to get it out of me…. I was talking about it here with Ewan whilst I was up on my desk with a big bag ‘o genta.
I still want a copy of http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?index=books&linkCode=qs&keywords=1402066236.
Justin
There’s so much to say about this link to the ISIS website we’ll never finish. First check what I wrote and subjected to peer-review) at Academics Review about several of the issues raised. There are other relevant articles you might want to read in addition to those I highlight here.
2.5—Promoters can insert naturally into DNA
2.6—Breeders produce genetically stable crops
2.7—Mobile DNA drives evolution
5.6—The 35S promoter has been thoroughly researched
5.4—Transgenes are not incorporated into our bodies
5.1—DNA fragments in the gut are plentiful, but cause no problems
The link mentions
Ho MW. Horizontal Gene Transfer. The Hidden Hazards of Genetic Engineering, TWN Biotechnology Series, Third World Network, 2001
This book is possibly the worst book on HGT LGT) in existence. It ignores the history of gene transfer before laboratory GE was discovered (covered here http://wp.me/pLZyg-1HE and here http://wp.me/pLZyg-1CV). Why? I don’t know, but most likely lack of knowledge, not deliberate bias surely. ISIS frequently fail to find relevant published papers that contradict their opinions though, that’s a bit of a worry.
Also go to the peer-reviewed literature cited at Academics Review to see how unkindly some of the ISIS speculations are treated.
I think Ho’s problem is a fundamental misunderstanding about biology. If I really correctly, she doesn’t accept evolution and has some odd theories about genetics that aren’t supported by any of the rest of biology. She’s also got a really weird CV that involved lots of jumping around (away from legitimate organizations) and an inflated publication record.
David
No I didn’t make it that far back in your blog. Between my family and job my “angst” and “fear” over GMOs must sometimes take a backseat. I will be sure to read the ones you linked
I did however find a paper on the Australian office of the gene technology regulator website
“a summary of the issues trans species gene transfer”
Toward the end of page 15 they admit to the ethical delima of unintended hgt from GMOs affecting the environment.
Yeah. Sorry about that. We (as in Biofortified-ers) need to get way better at listening and meeting objection with a smile rather than snark and self-superiority.
I think the “ethical dilemma” is sort of funny. In my antibiotics post (no worries if you don’t read it, we are all busy – I totally shouldn’t be commenting right now lol) I talk about how it’s actually very easy to avoid increasing risk of HGT by carefully choosing gene sequences that aren’t similar to bacterial sequences (because it’s easier for bacteria to pick up DNA that has some similarity to their own DNA). As long as those similar sequences are avoided, the risk of HGT from GMOs is no higher than risk of HGT from everything else out there. Bacteria are no more likely to pick up DNA from a GMO plant than from a non-GMO plant.
Not to change the subject, but it occurs to me as Anistasia was saying it is not the process but the product that is dangerous. However,my understanding is that most governments only regulate the products of transgenisis heavily and let all the other products of genetic manipulations go basicly straight to market.
It seems to me that if any process can lead to unfavorable and dangerous results then they should all be regulated. Otherwise we are entrusting too much in the goodwill and ethics of individual scientests and corparations.
One other point. I work in the aerospace/defense industry. having been in this industry for awhile I am aquainted with the kinds of people and thought processes that go on. It would be very niave of you not to think that there is someone right now looking at military applications and ways to weaponise this tech.
While your goals may be noble and your ethics top notch. It does bother me that not everyone is that way. The trope of the mad scientest is only interesting because it is so possible.
One final thought/question. Name a major type of technology pioneered in the last 100 years that has not been weaponised/milatirised.
It is true that some sort of weaponized GMO could happen. I can think of several things I could do really easily that would be really dangerous. But does that mean we should ban the technology? I’m way more worried about DIY biohackers in garages than I am about government, academic, or corporate scientists, and banning the technology won’t stop DIYers. I’m not really sure what your point is here.
It is not the process but some of the products which could potentially be dangerous. Please don’t take what I said to mean that all products of biotech are dangerous, because that is not what I am saying at all.
All products of genetic engineering are regulated, heavily, even things for which the risk is very low like if a commonly consumed protein is overexpressed at levels that are within the normal range for foods that are already consumed. Products of mutagenesis and other non-biotech methods are not regulated, and maybe they should. We can point to things like psoralens being upregulated in celery through plain old breeding and causing skin burns in field workers. Should these all be regulated? I don’t know. Things like the celery are fairly rare and all this regulation would really increase the cost of food and would put plant breeding at a standstill. Talk about unintended effects. The book I just linked to (Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods:
Approaches to Assessing Unintended Health Effects) is a great source that discusses the risks of not just genetic engineering but other methods as well. If you really are interested in these things, I recommend this book (which can be downloaded as a PDF) as a well-referenced unbiased source on this topic.
Oh, neato. I was looking for other biotech related books on the National Academies website and found this: Globalization, Biosecurity, and the Future of the Life Sciences. This will likely have the answers to your concerns. I look forward to reading it (once I’m done with my thesis!). Thanks for getting me to find it!
The synopsis:
And here’s a book devoted to understanding habitat level effects of GMOs: Genetically Engineered Organisms, Wildlife, and Habitat. It’s a few years old, but likely still full of useful info.
Anastasia,
A list of recommended books on agro biotech has been compiled by the AgBioWorld Foundation, and can be found at
http://www.agbioworld.org/newsletter_wm/index.php?caseid=archive&newsid=2833
Yes, many governments regulate transgenics, but leave conventional breeding largely unregulated, despite the fact that conventional breeding , unlike GMO crops, occasionally serves up in the marketplace hazardous crop varieties (Lenape potato, celery, some other pest-resistant vegetable, understandably because pest-resistance relies on natural toxic plant-made chemicals such as psoralens in celery and alkaloids in potatoes). Only Canada is rational in its crop-risk regulation, requiring risk-assessment of all new varieties, irrespect of the process used to develop them.
This whole topic is a wonderful illustration of how responding to fear rather than risk lead to worse-than ideal outcomes.
This reminds me to mention that I have just started reading on my Kindle a fabulous book that covers this topic –the “Perception Gap between Fear and Risk and it’s harmful consequences in really engaging way. Ill blog on it when I’ve finished reading. The book is How Risky is it, Really? by David Ropeik. Don’t worry, its non-GMO centric, but it has many compelling examples of how fear perceptions skews rational risk management. E.g The women who fears obsessively tiny levels of synthetic chemicals causing cancer in her child, but smokes cigarettes and is obese– while fuming angrily in the same manner as anti-GMO people at the unfairness of evil chemical exposures which science says do no detectable harm.
We see a similar skewing with anti-GM fears. The real risks of deadly microbes and cancer-causing microbe chemicals in plants damaged by pest-attack are obscured by distracting fears. Not to say dangerous raw milk being drunk by people who fume over rec-Bst given to cows. Deadly E. coli risks in sprouts or spinach being fashionably forgotten among people loving the aura of organic veggies. Its a Perception Gap for sure. The aura doesn’t protect against deadly germs though.
A new bread of wheat that is resistant to a disease that is wiping out crops in Africa and which threatens the global food system has just been developed.
http://www.scidev.net/en/news/-super-wheat-resists-devastating-rust.html
It has numerous new genes in it and hasn’t been widely tested for safety. Scientists created it.
Are we to hold it up till it is proven to be safe=– which will take years, by which time wheat crops world-wide could be devastated?
Or do we move forward in a timely fashion to bolster food security?
This question, in my view, encapsulates all the main issues of the GM debate, and raises the key question: Is the so-called precautionary principle a threat to human sustainability and welfare?
“It is true that some sort of weaponized GMO could happen. I can think of several things I could do really easily that would be really dangerous. But does that mean we should ban the technology? I’m way more worried about DIY biohackers in garages than I am about government, academic, or corporate scientists, and banning the technology won’t stop DIYers. I’m not really sure what your point is here.”
My point was not saying that we should ban technology. My point was to take a “fishing trip” to see how much if any thought the biofortifieders had put into the possible darker side of this technology.
I agree that people who may want to use this to do harm would not be stopped by any kind of ban. I would also presume that the kind of people who would want to would be few and far between (but then there are what 6 billion ish people on the planet whatever is statisticaly possible for one of them to do will happen eventualy)
In my field nobody gave enough thought to the possible downsides of what they were inventing until it was built.
“the aeroplane has made war so terrible that I do not believe any country will again care to start a war,” – Orville Wright
“I once thought the aeroplane would end wars. I now wonder whether the aeroplane and the atomic bomb can do it.” – Orville Wright after the bombing of Hiroshima.
I would like to hear some quotes from Palestinens about Isreali F16s.
In fact I wonder if flight has had enough benifit to offset all the suffering it has caused or made possible.
another example.
“As soon as men will find that in one instant whole armies can be utterly destroyed, they surely will abide by golden peace.” – Alfred Nobel (inventor of dynamite who later donated his fortune to set up the Nobel prizes out of regret over his invention)
My point is that when creating a “risk assesment” for a new technology not only the damage that can be caused by it while trying to use it for its intended purpose should be factored in. Perhaps the more important thing that should be factored in is what could concevably be done with it by an evil man. I do not believe the scientific community in any field of science stops to ask this often enough.
Just food for thought. (I realise this tech already exists but does it ability to help man outweigh its danger to the environment and people if used by the wrong people?)
I will be sure to read “Globalization, Biosecurity, and the Future of the Life Sciences” as soon as I can
Thank you
Justin, this is a good thing to talk about, indeed. Certainly, someone with evil schemes in mind (or even pseudo-good ones like self defense) could genetically engineer a pathogen of humans, or crops, even, and put many people in the world at risk of harm. But at the same time, it may very well be the same technology that would provide the solution to such a potential calamity. If we were to consider banning genetic engineering in agriculture or in other areas because of this risk of weapon development, it may not do much to slow down the potential development of those weapons. But it would certainly slow down our ability to develop countermeasures based on the same technology. If, for instance, we stopped trying to develop virus resistance in plants via RNAi – we would lose the talent necessary to develop resistance to a viral weapon designed to destroy our crops – should it ever be developed.
A really great TV series that talks about scientific discoveries and the development of technologies and the connections between disparate events and bits of information, is Connections, with James Burke. If you have Netflix, I really recommend renting the first Connections disks. One of the things that Burke points out is that technologies for peace can be used for war, and war for peace, and it is difficult to predict precisely where certain investigations may lead. Modern inventions like radar, or vitamins, find their origins in the most unlikely places. Another thing to think about is what unforeseen benefits (As well as harms) may be curtailed by halting some investigations. The debate over stem cell research is another area where this concept comes into play.
On the contrary, having worked with a lot of scientists, I find them much more thoughtful about these kinds of issues than people make them out to be. I found only one working on an advanced genetic engineering technology that was doing it for narrow reasons of discovery and sheer development, and was asking other people – so, um, what can we do with this once it works? He was an anomaly that fit the stereotype you describe. (But he did already have some ideas and it might have been a ruse to make us grad students think out loud during our pizza lunch.)
Again my point is not that the technology should be banned. Since it is here unless one of you owns a time machine there is no way to go back.
My point could be summed up in the question, everything else being equal, 30 years ago before this technology was developed was the world a safer place?
Too many variables to answer either way. I don’t think it’s a particularly useful question to ask of any technology – as every technology has the capacity to be used for either great works or evil works.
When developing a new technology I don’t think one should have to look at all possible uses of the technology – once the technology is around it is up to everyone to make those decisions on a case by case basis – you shouldn’t throw out a technology simply because it could be used for evil (if this was the case you’d never have any technological advancement, because people are, if anything, very good at thinking up nefarious uses for essentially anything)
Is this an arguement against pioneering technologies? Do we really want to go back to 1910 because people can be evil? I’m assuming the answer is no, therefore I’d posit that this isn’t a useful line of inquiry. (interesting, but not informative in terms of whether or not the tech should be used – I could, I’m sure, posit a number of nefarious uses for GM (I’m thinking it’d be easier to come up with 5 workable evil uses for GM in plants in the next 30 minutes than it would to come up with 5 blockbuster ideas that’d work in ag in the rest of my career to be perfectly honest… getting awesome stuff to work is just hard)
Random jumping around responses to justin contained herein – my own fault for taking a long weekend break from the intertube.
A transgenic isn’t a new class of species (or a new species – the term class of species doesn’t particularly make sense, although I think I know what you mean) – it’s the species with an added gene – given that members of exactly the same species can have utterly unique genes you simply cannot use genetic identity as a classifier of species. You absolutely can add new things to the library, and frankly with whole genome sequencing (not even whole genome to be fair), enough time, and big enough populations I’m convinced you could do everything transgenics does using only cisgenics (take a piece of junk DNA and simply select for base changes in the region which most closely represent the sequence you want – repeat ad infinitum until you have a functionally expressed gene – it’d cost a boatload of time and money but these, as far as I can see, are the only obstacles to this approach – as such, with sequencing, one can assume that no gene is impossible to breed for (assuming it doesn’t kill the plant, but then that wouldn’t work transgenically either))
The current set of dekalb hybrids didn’t exist when I was in high school. They may well be tested (in terms of safety they ain’t, in terms of yield and whatnot they are). But in the grand scheme of things (assuming your statement about GMOs holds true) they are a completely new class of organism and a completely new class of foodstuff.
See the problems? They ain’t – you can’t demonstrate that GMOs are a completely new class of foodstuff – they’re essentially indistinguishable by any meaningful measure.
This generally isn’t the case when discussing crop genetics – discussing hybrid corn what you’re talking about is a cross between two inbred lines (I guess lines would be roughly equivalent to races, although only very very roughly as race is massively arbitrary and says essentially nothing about the genetic variation of individuals, whereas an inbred is going to essentially be genetically invariable (plus or minus a bit… I talk to a lot of plant breeders but that doesn’t necessarily mean I totally get it…)) To create a hybrid of the two lines which has desired characteristics of one, or both parents, and generally exhibits increased vigor in the field (referred to as heterosis – you may well do better to look this up than rely on my hastily scribbled definition) – unlike interspecific hybrids corn hybrids aren’t infertile – although in terms of utility within agriculture almost may as well be – the progeny of a hybrid crossed to itself will generally be all over the place in terms of phenotype, whereas the hybrid itself is normally pretty predictable, as are both its parents)
I’d add that genetic engineering is just really fancy mutagenesis crossed with really fancy marker assisted selection – as alluded above anything is technically possible if you were to use marker assisted selection at the level of the base rather than larger sections of code.
So the arbitrary ewwww factor should be used to what? Legislate? Enforce labelling? Whose ewww factor should be taken into account? Do we have to label all pork products? (two of the three major abrahamic religions place a pretty high value of ewww on pork) On contents of beasts that crawl on their bellies? (I may be misremembering scripture here… hopefully you get the point)
David Tribe and others here obviously put a relatively high ewww factor (although this time with demonstrable risk rather than a nebulous invented risk) on crops produced using manure – perhaps any product that comes from manure produced crops, regardless of how far removed, requires labelling on this front?
Neither are good starting points for making rational science based decisions – if you can admit that an approach is purely ideological I’d suggest you throw it out and try and replace it with something reality based.
There is no such thing as two organisms which evolved on earth which are completely phylogenetically unrelated. This is one of the marvels of biology. There are degrees of interrelatedness but no delineations where we can say – this thing here and this thing here are completely unrelated. This remains such a powerful idea that I still get all giddy thinking about it.
Then everything should be regulated. You should require governmental clearance to leave your front door, because as far as the evidence goes there is a far higher chance that you’ll set yourself up in a bell tower and start sniping passing strangers than there is that a commercialized GMO will cause any harm whatsoever (given that there are recorded instances of humans doing the former, and no recorded instances of GMOs doing the latter).
If the source is a cow’s back end it is a fair assumption that the content falls within a certain category. (ironic coming from a Monsanto employee, I know, but hard to resist)
The point of technology is to magnify the effect of human effort.
A thousand years ago, a well-educated person with access to state-of-the-art technology could probably kill a dozen people or so.
Today, a somewhat-educated person with access to state-of-the-art technology could depopulate a city.
Would we rather live now, or back then? It’s not a difficult question. Unless you’re easily frightened, of course.
“I don’t think it is a particulary useful question to ask of any technology”
That depends on what you are trying to answer with the questioning. Perhaps standing in the way of advances to prevent evil uses is the wrong answer.
Again not the point I’m getting at.
The point of this whole line of posts (though it does tend to drift) is to have an open dialogue about the sources of “agnst” in the greater public. In that context it is a useful question.
(Imagine the angst the japanese must feel over neuclar technology, and how they might answer a similar question)
Actualy I think it is a fair line of questioning that should be engaged in often for those who are in a field that has the potential to either create or enhance WMDs or their delivery systems. Any technology that has the capicity to kill millions in one stroke perhaps should have had more forethought in its early stages.
Again you appear to have absolute certainty that use of this technology hasn’t been thought about – the absolute opposite however appears to be the case – there are restrictions across the board in the production of and release of transgenic materials – and I’d ask – how would you use the assessment on various technologies?
Would you have been for or against the development of air travel for instance.
What’d you want done with transgenics if you were sitting 30 years ago before the development of the technology – given that we can imagine a world in which it could potentially be used for evil how would you proceed?
In answer to your militarizable technologies…. I think you already mentioned it – organ transplant – I can’t think of a military use for organ transplants, or a weaponizable form of organ transplant (at least not without venturing far into the realms of computer game mythology (Syndicate springs immediately to mind))
Ewan and David
I have thoughts about both of your recent posts. Rather than share them with you though, I am going to get some sleep. See you later.
Ewan
“Neither (fear or idealogy) are good starting points for making rational science based decisions – if you can admit that an approach is purely ideological I’d suggest you throw it out and try and replace it with something reality based.”
This is an assumption based on scientific rationalism, an ideal. Your assumptions about the nature of truth and what is rational are based on philosophy. When it comes right down to it all the science in the world has no meaning if its philosophical underpinnings are taken away.
As humans we have the ability to conjucture about what has meaning and value. I feel this ability is what gives us value as humans, and taking it away to be suplanted by “scientific truth” is dehumanising and eventualy leads to Nihilism. I place value on the distinction between natural and artificaly manipulated orginisms, you do not. Neither choice may be proved right or wrong / good or bad if the philosophy behind it can not be proven beyond doubt.
If you care to argue scientific determinism we will be here a long time.
more later.
I’m not sure what this even means. Let’s assume we remove the philosophical underpinnings of science, how does that remove the meaning of the conservation of momentum, or the laws of thermodynamics? It doesn’t. It means nothing. It appears to simply be an act of sophistry designed to validate fuzzy thinking. Science works. Fuzzy thinking not so much. Anyone who steps onto an aeroplane believing that sans philosophical underpinnings science doesn’t mean anything is a hypocrite (to paraphrase Dawkins, as this appears to simply be cultural relativism wearing a somewhat different hat)
I’m not sure that is what gives us value, that appears to be an utterly different discussion, and it rather discounts those with abnormalities in development who cannot assign value or meaning.
This is plainly a ludicrous statement. Which is more dehumanizing? The bloody ridiculous assertion that women are inferior as they were made second, out of a (or the)mans rib, and subsequently buggered everything up after a talking animal persuaded them to eat a magic apple thus angering an ill tempered giant or the scientific approach which shows us that this whole tale is beyond unlikely and stupid (together with all the scientific evidence which shows that frankly the differences between men and women are not all that – insight impossible without the application of the scientific method to acknowledge the effects of cultural bias on the results of experiment)
and you can point to instances of this occuring where precisely? You seem to be rather nihilistic in denying science (therefore knowledge) whereas I cannot see that a scientific approach is necessarily nihilistic (although in some aspects perhaps, but as to whether this is a bad thing I have doubts – life is without external meaning, this doesn’t mean that it cannot be given meaning by those that live it).
More sophistry.
I do not believe that the shape of an aeroplane wing has anything to do with the ability of the aeroplane to fly – you do. Neither of these options can be proven right or wrong / good or bad if the philosophy behind it can not be proven beyond doubt.
Clearly if I make the above statement (I don’t, just to be clear, it is merely illustrative) I’d rightly be assumed to be an utter raving lunatic (and a hypocrite every time I stepped on a plane) – particularly amongst those employed in aerospace, but due to the relatively good politics free dissemination of information about physics (at least up to but not including nuclear physics) most 8 year olds would rightly mock me and throw rotten fruit – the statement is clearly wrong and no philosophical wrangling can make it less so – arguements in philosophy which appear to make it so are clearly spurious deviations into the realms of the word salad (the geography of which I am clearly well versed in!)
(there are obviously numerous other aspects of science that could have been used above, too many to list, all of which would probably have worked better)
Philosophy and science have everything to do with each other.
Even so, it’s best to consult a philosopher on philosophy, especially the philosophy of science.
I can’t resist:
Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds. – Richard Feynman
🙂
That wasn’t Feynmann talking, it was his brain tumor.
Ewan,
I think that you sum up my point quite well when you say
“I cannot see that a scientific approach is necessarily nihilistic (although in some aspects perhaps, but as to whether this is a bad thing I have doubts – life is without external meaning, this doesn’t mean that it cannot be given meaning by those that live it).”
Life is without external meaning. It would then follow that death is also without external meaning. If neither life or death have meaning then what meaning can I assign to any moral statement?
“this doesn’t mean that it cannot be given meaning by those that live it.”
I would call that
“cultural relativism wearing a somewhat different hat”
I will agree that a scientific statement can be either true or false. However, what is the value of that or meaning? Science describes the physical world, it does not assign value or meaning to what it describes.
Let me give you an example. If I jump out of an airplane with no parachute the law of gravity says that I will fall. I would not argue that. Now if I fall to my death what does that mean? Science may describe the mechanism of gravity that makes me fall (actually nobody knows), or my rate of fall. Science cannot make any statement as to the meaning or value of my death caused by the fall.
Biofortifieders have a habit of moralizing the millions who may starve if we don’t throw your tech out there for the world. Then in the next breath ask the skeptics to toss out their ideology for sound scientific reasoning.
If 1 human life = value 0
1000000 human lives = value 0
Your morality is based in something other than science (perhaps your cultural upbringing). So is my disdain for GMOs.
“and you can point to instances of this occurring where precisely?” (science leading to nihilism)
“The statement “God is dead”, occurring in several of Nietzsche’s works (notably in The Gay Science), has become one of his best-known remarks. On the basis of it, most commentators[52] regard Nietzsche as an atheist; others (such as Kaufmann) suggest that this statement reflects a more subtle understanding of divinity. In Nietzsche’s view, recent developments in modern science and the increasing secularization of European society had effectively ‘killed’ the Christian God, who had served as the basis for meaning and value in the West for more than a thousand years.
Nietzsche claimed the death of God would eventually lead to the loss of any universal perspective on things, and along with it any coherent sense of objective truth.[53] Instead we would retain only our own multiple, diverse, and fluid perspectives. This view has acquired the name “perspectivism”.
Alternatively, the death of God may lead beyond bare perspectivism to outright nihilism, the belief that nothing has any inherent importance and that life lacks purpose. As Heidegger put the problem, “If God as the suprasensory ground and goal of all reality is dead, if the suprasensory world of the Ideas has suffered the loss of its obligatory and above it its vitalizing and upbuilding power, then nothing more remains to which man can cling and by which he can orient himself.”[54] Developing this idea, Nietzsche wrote Thus Spoke Zarathustra, therein introducing the concept of a value-creating Übermensch. According to Lampert, “the death of God must be followed by a long twilight of piety and nihilism (II. 19; III. 8). […] Zarathustra’s gift of the superman is given to a mankind not aware of the problem to which the superman is the solution.”
from the wikipedia article on Nietzsche.
could go on and on but I would be neglecting other things.
Justin, this is way too much deep philosophy about whether you have a right to decide whether to eat or not eat foods developed by a new technology. I don’t think anyone doubts that you have that right. I don’t think anyone doubts that you have a right to make your decision based on other factors than science. Really this shouldn’t be invoking Nietzsche or cultural relativism.
As I recall, the title of this thread was “Way Too Much Angst About GMO Crops” and I think you are demonstrating that.
You don’t get rights just because you say you have them.
Having an actual ‘right’ means you can force other people to do what you want.
There is no right to demand that others supply scientifically useless information.
One can start with a basic approach to ethics in that to be ethical one should not cause suffering, from that point on ethics can be approached in a scientific manner. I haven’t the ability to espouse the view further than that – I tend to agree with Sam Harris on the issue (despite not necessarily agreeing with some of the routes it takes him down vis a vis torture etc)
So if the scientific statement that GM crops are equivalent to non-GM crops in terms of composition is true, and the scientific statement that the equivalent of GM occurs in nature – what rational objection can one have to GM crops? It’s squicky doesn’t cut it – particularly if you’re willing to meander off into the nuances of Nietzche to support other aspects of arguement – one would expect that if you’re going to that level you’d maintain some level of internal intellectual coherency to your thinking.
Arguably the scientific method could do just that – I’m no sociologist but could envision a system whereby a network of friends, colleagues, enemies and acquaintances was established and the net suffering and or joy caused by such an incident could be at least estimated on a scale normalized to some sort of brain chemical signature of pleasure/suffering.
My morality still makes sense in the light of science. Yours doesn’t. The science is at worst silent on my morality – it flatly contradicts your disdain at every turn.
Given that most religion is as devoid of morality as any nihilist could hope I give no credance to killing of god being a bad thing or leading to anything other than a net increase in global happiness.
I would note also that you don’t give an example of science leading to nihilism, simply a rehashing of sophistry on the subject – just because a philosopher said it doesn’t make it so.
Just a suggestion, perhaps you gentlemen could start a forum post to move this discussion there? It is kinda getting off-topic.
I sir, am no gentleman. (I will desist in the other offtopicness however as you’ve given me this awesome opportunity to go off on a tangent which is actually utterly unrelated rather than simply only vaguely related – for that, as corporate speak would have me phrase it, I thank you)
(although you don’t get a $50 gift card)
Eric,
May I suggest that if the biotech community is worried about angst that it should not adopt the slogan “might makes right”.
Except perhaps behind closed doors 😉