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.
Justin,
I am unaware of the adoption of that slogan by the ‘community’, or by any member of the ‘community’. Perhaps you could supply a reference.
Little known fact: Biofortified’s runner-up in the slogan selection process was “Might makes right.” We voted against it because it sounded uncertain. /sarcasm
Eric.
Sorry I couldn’t resist saying something tongue and cheek in regards to your previous comment.
Ewan,
Where to start?
this seems to be a lovely quote.
“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.”
I will grant that a philosopher is no more to be trusted than anyone else. I am not trying to prove the validity of Nietzsche’s arguments here though. What I am showing is cause between trying to derive worth from science and nihilism.
(quick aside, I do tend to agree that if you start with the same assumptions Nietzsche did and are logically honest you will reach the same results, since I do not start with his assumptions I do not end in the same place he did)
I believe it would be fair to say that most nihilists have been influenced by Nietzsche.
I would also say that Nietzsche was influenced in his ideas by the scientific writings of his day.
If those two statements are true, then it would also be true to say that Nietzsche’s understanding of science has directly influenced most nihilists.
It seems amazing to me that you can miss or deny such an obvious connection.
You however seem to have no issue with making just as far reaching statements. You have implied previously that religion is to be blamed for inequality between men and women. I could ask you for an example of this. I am sure your proof would be no more sound.
It seems to me that there is a bit of a bias in this denial. The idea that scientific reason could lead to nothingness does not fit into your chosen world view, therefore you require unreasonable proofs. What would you like me to do find a sampling of self proclaimed nihilists and ask them if their understanding of science has influenced their philosophical outlook?
If I said a statement such as hippies are influenced by eastern world views through bands such as the Beatles I do not believe you would have a problem. This statement has the same level of proof but is not attacking a sacred cow.
This needing extra proof for things that do not fit your views and requiring less of ideas that you agree with is a conformation bias.
I have not argued (much) with your assertions of safety in GMO crops. However, the way that you cannot find a simple string of logic connecting nihilists through Nietzsche to science makes me wonder how plain the link between GMOs and some health or environmental problem would have to be before you would find it, since it would not agree with your dogma. It frankly makes me place less trust in statements like these.
“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).”
Sorry Karl! (I am not a fan of changing medium half way through a conversation, feel free to rap my hands with a ruler or such – and clearly as a Monsanto employee my duplicitousness is only to be expected)
I don’t deny that it could, I deny that it necessarily does as implied in your statement:- (which I may be misreading, a common flaw of mine)
And then
I wasn’t implying that it was necessarily to blame, but any denial that it is and has been used as a tool to enforce this inequality is a quite obvious denial of reality and ability to read religious texts while skipping the bits you don’t like (anyone who can read the old testament and miss the grinding level of misogyny therein could, I think, be referred to a proctologist for help in removing their head from where it is stuck). For other examples of this simply look at countries which practice Sharia law, look at afghanistan now or at any point in the last decade, look at Iran, look at the history of Europe – we are swimming in the proof that religion quite predominantly is utilized as a tool for justifying the inequalities between men and women.
Perhaps find a sampling of the worlds leading scientific thinkers and assess whether or not they are Nihilists. Assess whether the adoption of the scientific approach appears to have led to a rise in nihilistic behaviours – I’d argue that it hasn’t, nihilism seems abound in groupings of people who are quite averse to rational thought – I don’t know that I’ve met many hardcore nihilists in scientific circles.
Were this a blog on hippies, or the Beatles I may well have a problem – from my vague understanding of hippiness I think you have your reasoning backwards for a start (just to nudge the tangent off into Adamsian dimensions)
To reiterate I wasn’t stating could not, I was arguing that it is neither inevitable nor likely on a wide scale – it is possible that crossing the road will lead to me being killed – this however isn’t an arguement against roads, or an arguement for being against roads because they’re a bit squicky.
Nietzsche’s works are so full of self-contradictory errors that serious nihilists don’t take him seriously. His approach is best described by Abdul Alhazred, author of the Necronomicon: “Nothing is true, everything is permitted.” You can’t ride that pony very far.
What a comment stream! Many good points, but this was supposed to make people sad that so few additional crops will ever by improved in ways that could help with the feeding of the world and with their health and with their enjoyment of life. Imagine when chocolate and coffee get too expensive to eat. Imagine when we don’t have enough bread and Africa and the Middle East become destabilized
The Neo Malthusians are now in the position of opion supremacy. When the 1st steam train headed from Nuremberg to Fuerth my profession which has embodied scientific methods warned of the speed to the human body. It was the king of bavaria who insisted on the train ride. GMO will be the future but unfortunately thousands humans have to starve until the green ideology will be dead.
The choice between GMO or not is a question of luxury. After WWII malaria was rampant in Europe and only pesticides and drainage solved the lives of our relatives. It was not the WWW envisioning habitats for species on the brink of extinction.
As a scientist which i am not in a professional point view one should always keep in mind that the green ideology is utilitarian for its purpose. With 1 USD a day in Egypt there is no question about the origin of the wheat. In the rich countries we cant imagine a situation like in Egypt.
with WW i meant WWF -sorry for my misspelling
In an accident of naming, the Grantham, Mayo, Van Otterloo & Co. ‘GMO’ investment management firm
http://www.gmo.com/America/About/
is spearheading the neo-Malthusian charge, with the claim, naturally, that everyone is running out of everything, and that’s a permanent state of advancing global poverty until we’re back to the Stone Age.
Luckily, there’s lots of stones left over from the Stone Age, so we have a rat’s chance.
That si what the gerontocrats of the Cub of Rome are preaching. There is a sying in German: the stonega did not end because of a shortage of stones.
Make abundand resource like water scarce and you will make a bargain with it. Like a mining compnay that sells everything to its miners working at e remote mine.
Thomas,
I agree with all you said except that the biotech companies don’t engage. They do, but because the are in this for money (as if everyone isn’t) they are dismissed.
Speaking of money, did you see the thing about Colbert and the FEC? He got an unlimited PAC for viacom to run political adds. They don’t know what they will be about except something electiony. I’m thinking they should monitor twitter to get ideas
Hoechst lost its battle in 1984. The recombinant insuline was a revolutionary invention that changed the diagnosis Diabetes for better. Diabetes had meant a severe disease with low life expectancy before 1984. The patient had had to rely on all sort of animal extracted insuline. At the end all were blind and suffered severe vascular complication. The man who , former terrorist and friend of Arafat is now working for the Albright Corp. Joscka Fischer holds meeting at the west coast of the USA where the “elite” university are his audiences.
BASF is right now considering to withdraw its GMO division from Germany. No one cares.
I think a mane mistake of GMO companies was to sell the product with a social or whatever message. It is like the car manufactures who dont want to sell cars but contribitions to the climate change. All this social responsipilty or environmental stuff is totaly contraproductive because it is like the ghost in the bottle one will never get rid off.
Sorrs: the man who prohibited the recombinant insuline porduction was the former secretary for environment , Joscka Ficher.
Ewan,
You forget the average person has a 100 iq. When was the last time you had a serious conversation with a average person? I think you give too much credit. Unless farmers as a group are of above average inteligence.
It matters not one jot what the farmer’s IQ is in general terms – a farmer who doesn’t understand farming doesn’t stay in farming very long (assuming you’re responding to my criticism of Thomas Fix above) – generally even someone of below average intelligence will at least understand their own little area of expertise better than others in other areas.
I feel the need to change the subject again.
Food labelling. I have never given my opinion of it here.
More than one of you has compared the idea of a person wanting to avoid GMOs with kosher practice. In a nutshell you have said that it would be an unfair expense on the whole food industry, that would then be passed on to everyone.
In Israel the majority of people are Jewish. Jewish people as a whole care about kosher labelling. There are laws in Israel labelling mandatory for all foods. Israel respects the wishes of the majority of its people in its labelling scheme, This only makes sense. I have never heard of an Israeli person complaining of the added expense of this system.
I don’t know that any country has ever asked the opinion of its people on GMO labelling. I would like to see a ballot item concerning labelling. Let the majority decide how they would like to spend their money.
Not that GMO labelling needs to even be an extra expense.
How much cost is passed on by labelling products as follows “This product may contain nuts”? I would venture very little. Nobody is going around testing every candy bar made to find out if they have nuts. No the label goes on the untested candy bars.
What if we had a label that said “This product may contain genetically modified ingredients” and the only way to have the label removed from a product was by testing it at the manufacturers cost to be sure it didn’t. Would this disrupt our food system? would this make a unfair burden for the people who are not bothered by this tech.
At any rate my main point is that consumers should be asked a direct question and then have their wishes respected.
Suffocation after an allergic reaction is a dreadfull dead and there is a given chance that a human( consumer) may die after after having eaten nut proteins.
Hallal and kosher food has nothing in common with consumer protection: It is the political implication of a law religion with an influnce on day life though the latter jewish religion is moderate in this case(no capital punishments for consuming i.e. porc).
Well, I just got a message from the Biofortified Brain that I have to leave a comment to keep current my “account”, and since I just gawk rather than get involved in the scintillating tit for tat, I thought I’d try this blogathon to comply with the Brain. So “out of necessity” here is what I saw going from the beginning to this point. Wow, I’ve never seen so many ad hominem attacks. What I thought was going to be a look at some scientific perspectives about GMO angst turned into a philosophy discussion. Just a word of friendly advice about discussing the science of the issue (from whatever perspective you hold). Perhaps instead of relying on the GOOGLE side of the search engine world, turn to the GOOGLE Scholar side. Just use the advanced search option and essentially use English phraseology to inquire about your interests. In that way, you’ll acquire the peer reviewed literature and books. Interestingly, when something “bad” about a technology like agricultural biotechnology breaks through into the published scholarly literature, we’re seeing with increasing speed a rebuttal in other peer reviewed articles and letters. Thus, scientists are engaging in tit for tat from the perspective of discussing information, not character or motives (although there is still some of the latter in the toxicology literature–another story but not for this blog).
Somehow the Beatles and hippies were mentioned a few posts back, so here’s another phrase from the ’60’s: “Nobody’s right if everyone’s wrong” (Steven Stills through the Buffalo Springfield ~’67). The obverse may be true, “Nobody’s wrong if everyone’s right”. In other words, my perception of all these posts, which I came to because I mistakenly thought information was going to be discussed, is one of “ships passing in the night”.
But you might say, someone has to be right (and obversely someone has to be wrong; sort of a yin/yang thing–yea, you’re probably catching on that I’m from the countercultural ’60’s). Well, yes, that is a valid perspective and for that reason, science, which is just “a way of knowing”, is best utilized as a methodology for obtaining the preponderance of the evidence (often called in the regulatory world, the weight of the evidence). Okay, so here is the bottom line (from reading a lot of scholarly literature with occasional bewilderment at mistakes about basic biology made on some websites). The preponderance of the literature concludes…there is no such thing as a GMO. There are numerous soybean cultivars containing a glyphosate resistant EPSPS gene in addition to their own EPSPS genes. Numerous corn cultivars are now registered that have inherited as a dominant allele a gene creating one of a myriad of Cry proteins. Etc., etc. Get the point? By talking about GMOs doing this, and pesticides doing that, you’re not talking about information which exists at the reductionist level of approach, which is what you find in the scientific literature. So, if the discussion aimed at specific, and I mean really really specific products and their traits, then maybe the objectivity of the discussion can be re-established.
On the other hand, you may be getting just as high in these tits for tats as taking a good hit off of non-GMO Panama Red. There, now my login can stay active and I can go back to my observation hole.
Best de-lurking comment evah.
I have let enough of these type comments slide by with no comment that I have to say one now:
“The preponderance of the literature concludes…there is no such thing as a GMO”
“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?”
If it were true that there was NO difference between GMOs and non GMOs then there would be no patents issued. If there were no patents issued there would be no money in biotech. If there was no money in biotech you guys would not have jobs.
I need look no further than the patent office to know that there are significant differences.
Sorry guys cant have it both ways.
No meaningful differences in terms of nutritional composition or effect (I feel I was a little imprecise with language, particularly when discussing patentability, as composition means something utterly different in legalese (and can mean different things regardless)
Unless you suggest that two varieties of corn should be labelled distinclty as such given that you can get patents on them.
Or that corn bred by a particular technique should be labelled as different to that bred by another due to the technique being patented.
As far as I am aware I’m one of the few voices in the conversation who is actually directly employed in Biotech (at least the money making side of things) – and the arguement that there’d be no money in it if it wasn’t patentable is a little silly given the number of academic labs striving to produce viable GMOs for release sans patent – the only thing preventing them is the massive regulatory burden – the profitability or not of their end product isn’t hugely important so long as the grant money keeps flowing and papers can be published
Hi Justin,
I think it’s important to draw a distinction between a technological capability (e.g. welding, etching silicon chips, genetic transformation) and a product made with this capability (e.g. new vehicles, computers or plant varieties).
Whether a given implementation is a boon or a disaster is a result of the engineer’s skill, foresight and intentions. While countless scientific studies have indicated that current GM crops differ in no meaningful way from non-GM crops (outside of their new trait), it would be disingenuous to disregard the fact that genetic engineering REALLY DOES increase the range of changes we can make to crops (which is a large part of why it’s so valued) – and that there’s as much opportunity for miracles as there is abuse of this technology, as all technologies. Whether your technological item is an axe or a spaceship – it can be used for positive or negative purposes, though the more advanced and powerful the technology, the bigger the impact is likely to be.
That being said I think a big part of the divide in opinions on GM food comes down to our personal view of technology. I believe that the march of technology is usually positive (at least with appropriate oversight and regulation), and that we probably couldn’t stop it even if we wanted to. If you’re reading this on a computer, I expect you probably share this view. I think most people who love their iPhone but hate the idea of GM food are probably making the mistake of somehow seeing agriculture as something romantic and removed from all other aspects of our society – where we can (and should) limit further technological progress. I think this would be a very short sighted decision.
Matt,
Yes I am a bit of a hypocrite when it comes to technology. Then, unless I build a log cabin in the mountains and have no running water or power it is hard to be anything but.
“I believe that the march of technology is usually positive (at least with appropriate oversight and regulation), and that we probably couldn’t stop it even if we wanted to.”
I think that our planet is overpopulated, polluted, and dangerous. I think that since the industrial revolution the quality of life has gone down for the average person.
There is better education, wider knowledge, better medicine, etc.
There are also weaker family and community bonds, co2 emmisions, global warming, threat of WMDs, food shortages (brought on by the longer life expectancy leading to population growth to an unsustainable level) etc.
It seems that each new layer of technology just further destabilises our ecosystem and adds a new threat for human self destruction.
I will agree it cant be stopped though.
I feel the need to comment here. Before the kinds of technological advancements that we take for granted today, the world was even more dangerous, cities and some waterways were even more polluted, and while the world was not overpopulated, one reason why it was not was because of famines, and food insecurity.
Today, a bacterial infection is no big deal – you get antibiotics to help your immune system, and pain killers and decongestants to help yourself tolerate the symptoms. Before such technologies, you would suffer for a long time, and sometimes die. If you survived, you may have been crippled, depending on the disease. Things that we scoff at today were dangerous back then. Magellan couldn’t make it around the world on his ship built for that purpose, while today Craig Venter scoops ocean water while sailing around the world looking for DNA.
Yes, we have created new dangers, but we have also created new safeguards against existing (And future) dangers. We also have the ability to recognize dangers more than we did in the past – we have telescopes looking for asteroids that we didn’t even know were there, and public health organizations predicting evolving epidemics in time to stop them. In the past, WMDs were the common flu, just ask the Native Americans.
The weaker family and community bonds are in some cases expected when it comes to increasing education. “Strong families” is somewhat synonymous with “repressive social structures”, and the cultures with the ‘strongest’ families are often the most patriarchal.
I was riding my bike past a power generation facility yesterday, with a tall smokestack, and I couldn’t help but think that if it was just this one power plant, there would be no problem with burning coal day and night in there (or whatever else they burn when they actually turn it on). But since we have so many of such smokestacks, we cannot treat them all as individual disconnected acts, and must consider the effects of them all together. We have to take some things that we have built and seek to build a little more seriously than what has been done in the past. Many of the technologies we have today were developed in a world where such considerations were not made, or we didn’t need to be made. Cars, paper mills, power plants, farms, all came before this time. There is a big difference between a windmill and a coal power plant – yet both are technologies. “Technology” itself does not necessarily lead to good or bad, but technologies can be developed to suit good and bad purposes. We need more good technologies that are appropriate for the world that we live in, and want our children to live in.
As scientist You have the unique chance to change plants for the purpose that “famine” will be unkown word in the future.
Be aware in case You accept or even adopt the ideas of ending resources You are in the mouse trap of the fear mongers. Personally i doubt very much that the fossile resources from Trias and Carbon will end in the next decades or centuries. Anyway a sustainable devolpment is favourable which it has been all time long. Rememeber tunas wer predicted extinct 30 y ago . Sushi is still very common. By the way the differenc between a wind mill and setam powered turbin ist the time of use: Windmill in Europe 1400h/Year. Steam turbine almost 8600h/Year.
I’m always struck by what a funny bubble this GMO argument is.
Almost all the plant scientists I know who are pro-genetic engineering are cut from the exact same liberal hippie environmentalist cloth as the anti-genetic engineering crowd. I’m pretty sure it’s the exact same demographic, with the only difference being that the plant scientists understand this one particular issue on a deeper level.
I was against genetic engineering myself until I understood it (until a fellow grad student really pinned me down on what I was worried about).
How many of you scientists were against it before you for it?
Great question, Matt. Back in the late 90’s, I questioned the routine planting of Bt corn for European corn borer control as seeming to violate the principles of Integrated Pest Management. In other words, are you just doing something prophylactically without really knowing what your pest density is and thus potential economic damage? After all, Bt corn is regulated as a pesticide. Then, at a meeting a colleague whispered in my ear…think host plant resistance. Hit by the Japanese Buddhist concept known as “satori”, I realized that Bt corn was a specific trait that provided…”host plant resistance”. And you didn’t have to push around the genome too much to provide the quality trait (as we now know that “conventional” breeding does–see the increasing literature on proteome and metabolome studies comparing the phenotypes from different breeding techniques). Now here is where specifics are important. Before I get pummeled, I realize that herbicide resistant crops are a different beast from a regulatory perspective and are not modern examples of a quick way to breed host plant resistance. But I do know this–the dream of organic farmers is to have host plant resistance built into their phenotypes. Too bad they have to wait so long to get it. Nothing wrong with patience, but pests invade all the time. In the West, we’ve been bombarded with at least three new “exotic” insect pests in just the last two years alone.
Very good observation. I’m the first goofball worried about worker safety, environment, equitable food access, conservation of resources, etc. These are all the same issues that the anti-GM folks support. We’re 95% the same as them! This is why it is so important to give them that last 5%!!! Many come around eventually.
“What I thought was going to be a look at some scientific perspectives about GMO angst turned into a philosophy discussion.”
I think that discussing GMO angst from a scientific point a view without involving philosophy, religion, fear, prejudice, and so forth is to narrow to be of any use to anyone except a scientist.
As long as we don’t confuse philosophy discussions with empirical observations that feed into policy, I don’t mind joining in on the fun. I must say, perhaps philosophically, that your post at 10:50 am reminded me of a long litany I’ve heard before, except it was on a college campus in the 60’s. Reminds me of another lyric, “We’ve all been here before”. So here’s the thing, philosophically speaking, that I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around. As a result of our pre-EARTH DAY rantings in the 60’s about the future not being as bright as necessitating shades (helped by Rachel Carson’s popularization of scientific literature about DDT that dated back to the 40’s–check out the dates on the papers she cites in her bibliography in Silent Spring) a mess of environmental regulations were passed and then mostly put under the EPA following Nixon’s signing of the bill creating the Agency in 1970. Things really did get better, I mean empirically. Perfect no, largely because of that population problem (we’re into exburbs now). However, we know so much more about basic biological processes. Indeed, the more I learn the less concerned I become. But that sense of being less concerned is obviously not shared (and I would not be rational if I thought it should be). I’m trying to understand why, however. The bottom line is that the litany of problems cited in association with our modern world are not new. And that’s why we have the regulations we do. That’s why the regulatory system is dynamic, so that it can respond to new problems, and even perception of problems that may not really be all that problematic. I would be in much greater angst if we didn’t have these regulations. I’m often in angst that some political party would gain “control”, but I’ve seen these changes over so many years and each time I note that we humans tend to find our way back to the “middle way”. I have faith that eventually we do the right thing. But, it’s just a philosophical whim.
By pro GM logic, its OK to eat fox glove because its perfectly normal for humans to eat plants. Or could it be that some gene transfer happens in nature and some gene transfer does not? In my opinion, theres not enough angst.
@Ophadeus. By pro GM logic, its OK to eat fox glove because its perfectly normal for humans to eat plants.
**This is an absurd assumption. The argument is that we already face risks in our food (potatoes, celery, maize, cassava), and they can be managed. Yes, cassava can kill you as it has cyanides. But it can be eaten too with the right precautions. We don’t ban it.
What is certain is that there is massive gene transfer in nature and it is dangerous. The German E. coli outbreak illustrates this. What it also shows is that focussing of fears( GM food), rather than real risks (E.coli in manures getting into foods that are not cooked) has caused harm by diverting attention from the real risks. There is massive EU research on detecting GM in imports, and complete failure to implement effective testing of pathogenic E. coli in imported food.
Also the vegetables that might contain E. coli are not being labelled. Labels on sprouts and crudities are more important for safety than labels about GMOs. Their absence has killed at least 50 people and maimed 1000. Making a fuss about the wrong things slows down action on the right things.
Yes that is woodoo science approach You may find apart from Biology. Bangladesh would be fine with enough high leevees. Instead of this reasonable approach by bulding higher dikes counsellors are waging the global theme ad nauseam with no usefull help. The Golden Rice inventor hoped to help the people eating rice to prevent the debilitating BerBeri-disease. The anti-GMO activists stopped this possibility.
Frankly, it is mess -we livenow in an era that is pre-enlighted.
Orphedeus
The enzymes controlling the DNA/RNA scan as long as an organism is alive for aberrant strings.
In Case of cancer or virus infections (HPV) the pathologies are already known when repair mechanisms do not work properly. In Your bowl tissue alien DNA is incorporated but in most cases it wont do harm thankd to the repair abilities. No human has been killed by GMO but by other natural toxins(spores,rhizin, atropin, aflatoxins etc) enough.
The environmentalist/anti-GM movement is a perfect haven for angst-addicts. Normal people encountering angst put their worries behind them by understanding the facts. Angst-addicts, on the other hand, revel in their fears, and speculate rampantly to produce even more imaginative fears.
Eric,
There must be some pleasure associated with fear
Steve
There may be a little pleasure with fear. However, I think you would agree that the real rush comes from smug superiority.
Steve, Justin,
You’re both right. It’s likely that the list of gratuitous pleasures associated with opposing GM crops is very long. Also on that list is making money from frightened consumers.
Since the days of Rachel Carson there have been a lot of changes.
Alzheimers was then known but not a big problem.
Parkinsons the same.
Cancers the same.
Breast cancer was almost unknown.
Lung cancer was a problem then and today has got better (no dangerous high nicotine cigarettes)
Autism was virtually unknown.
Allergies to peanuts were unknown.
AIDS was unknown then
E coli poisoning was unknown then.
Bleeding disorders after eating normal foods were unknown to most people until 5 or so years ago.
In my small circle of friends I just discovered yesterday another case of cancer this time brain cancer from someone who used to use his mobile phone much more than most people.
All of the above illnesses have increased and the only common factor is complete IGNORANCE about any of them.
Mention for example that brain cancer for this man is due to his use of the mobile phone and you will be laughed at, ridiculed and told your knowledge of science is less than ZERO.
Ask themwhy he got brain cancer and they will say variably:
Who wants to know?
He would have been dead at 6 years of age back in 1950.
The fox today is completely in charge of the hen house.
Since the days of Rachel Carson there have been a lot of changes.
Alzheimers was then known but not a big problem.
Parkinsons the same.
Cancers the same.
Breast cancer was almost unknown.
*** I know one person who had a mastectomy in the 50s.
Lung cancer was a problem then and today has got better (no dangerous high nicotine cigarettes)
Autism was virtually unknown.
Allergies to peanuts were unknown.
** Do you really think so?
AIDS was unknown then
E coli poisoning was unknown then.
*** This is definitely not true. Stan Falcow for example said in 1975 that starting 1965 there was plenty of evidence that certain E. coli strains cause diarrhea and mentions Orskov and Orskov, 1966. J of Bacteriology. 91. 69 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC315911/
Also Tennant 1971 Neobnatal Enteric Infections caused by E. coli A book from New York Academy of Sciences.
Smith HW 1963. J. Pathol Bacteriol. 85, 197
Bleeding disorders after eating normal foods were unknown to most people until 5 or so years ago.
In my small circle of friends I just discovered yesterday another case of cancer this time brain cancer from someone who used to use his mobile phone much more than most people.
All of the above illnesses have increased and the only common factor is complete IGNORANCE about any of them.
The fox today is completely in charge of the hen house.
*** But in Germany today, who is the fox?
The foxes are the green NGO that got almost 9 billion Euros in 2009 by the EU:
http://www.policynetwork.net/sites/default/files/Friends_of_the_EU.pdf
Your list of all the new ailments is meaningless.
In some cases it’s just wrong – the disease was indeed known when Rachel Carson was writing. Certainly peanut allergies were well known, as was Parkinson’s disease. Rachel Carson herself had breast cancer.
But many of the diseases you think did not exist in the 1960s were just called by a different name. In a few cases, like AIDS, the disease is indeed newer, but its cause is well known and is totally unrelated to GMO food. Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.
One of the “diseases” on John Fryer Chemist’s list was:
“Autism was virtually unknown.”
c_Rader stated: “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.”
David Tribe also stated the “Autism was virtually unknown.”, but then did not address the statement???
H.Kuska comment to c_Rader. Please provide the literature references which you feel supports your statement regarding Autism and GM food.
As background I suggest the readers look at the interview with one of the authors of a highly publicised very recent reviewed research publication concerning Autism.
http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=11-P13-00027&segmentID=2
Of particular interest are the quotes:
“HERBERT: I think this paper is fantastic for saying: ‘Lets pull out the stops and look at everything we possibly can – environmentally.”
AND
“GELLERMAN: Are there any suspects that perhaps stand out from the crowd?
HERBERT: There are a number of chemicals that it’s a good idea to watch out for. Bisphenol – plasticizers that make plastics moldable. Flame retardants – flame retardants in baby pajamas and in bedding that were not tested for the baby urinating in the bed, which then makes the chemicals float around in the air that the baby then breathes in. Pesticides – be really careful about spraying your house. Find more natural ways of avoiding pest exposure. Pesticides in food – try to eat organic if possible. Don’t microwave in plastic. Look under your sink and clean out a lot of the products, which have long lists of chemicals that you can’t pronounce. There’s lots of ways of cleaning your house with simple products, with vinegar and water and baking soda, and things that are not going to cause problems, that may show up now or later.”
H.Kuska comment. Please note that this paper is NOT saying GM food is definitely implicated. It is saying: “‘Lets pull out the stops and look at everything we possibly can – environmentally.”
One recent post (theory) concerning the possibility of autism and GM corn.
http://somethingcausesautism.blogspot.com/2011/06/another-autism-cause-theory-gm-corn.html
Henry – the null hypothesis would clearly be that there isn’t a link – one would only require evidence that there was, sans this evidence the claim that there is no link stands.
As to the claim that autism was virtually unknown this is clearly a lie, it has been known and diagnosed throughout most of the 1900’s and described accurately (although not categorized as autism) in documentation dating from the 1700’s (wikipedia article)
Ewan, ???? This is the c_Rader statement that I challenged:
“Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.”
H.Kuska comment
Please notice the use of the word “possibly”. Your attempt to utilize the “null hypothesis” is confusing (to me). The definition of “null hypothesis is given at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_hypothesis.
I asked the person who made the statement the following: “H.Kuska comment to c_Rader. Please provide the literature references which you feel supports your statement regarding Autism and GM food.”
Instead of providing any, he replied: “c_rader
July 9, 2011 at 5:56 pm · Reply………”(please read his complete reply)
I will leave it to the individual readers to decide whether the autism comments and replies are consistent with the stated aims of this forum:
“Biofortified’s volunteer authors are devoted to providing factual information and fostering discussion about agriculture, especially plant genetics and genetic engineering.”
For those not familar with “where” autism and the environment scientific research is at now please read the following full 2010 scientific review:
http://www.eht-journal.net/index.php/ehtj/article/view/7111/8175
“For the way forward, it seems clear that additional
focused research is needed. But more importantly, successful risk reduction strategies for autism will require more extensive and relevant developmental safety testing of drugs and chemicals.”
Post by David Tribe,
There nothing in the reference you cite Henry pointing to Gm food as a possible link to autism.
Also we should note that a lot of the apparent increase in autism is an artifact:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19047542
Autism prevalence trends over time in Denmark: changes in prevalence and age at diagnosis.
Parner ET, Schendel DE, Thorsen P.
CONCLUSIONS:
Shifts in age at diagnosis inflated the observed prevalence of autism in young children in the more recent cohorts compared with the oldest cohort. This study supports the argument that the apparent increase in autism in recent years is at least in part attributable to decreases in the age at diagnosis over time.
GMO Punit stated: “There nothing in the reference you cite Henry pointing to Gm food as a possible link to autism.”
H.Kuska comment. Yes, snd I did not state that there was.
There seems to be a problem distinguishing between scientists looking for cause(s) of autism and scientists reporting published literature or giving oral papers reporting that they have found a cause or causes. I feel that I have sufficiently documented that there is a problem and scientists feel that research is needed to find the cause(s). To do research on a new problem “tips of the iceberg” are looked for.
c_Rader stated: “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.” I elected “autism” to challenge his statement.
Please note the key term “possibly”
Please refer to my July 9, 2011 at 2:10 pm · post.
In the last part of that post, I selected one “possible autism – Bt link” article that I was particulary impressed with.
“One recent post (theory) concerning the possibility of autism and GM corn.
http://somethingcausesautism.blogspot.com/2011/06/another-autism-cause-theory-gm-corn.html
”
If one desires more, here is the full Google search using the following search terms (“genetically modified food” autism):
http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=1R2IRFC_en&q=%22genetically+modified+food%22+autism&aq=f&aqi=g1g-b1&aql=&oq=
Please note that the paper that claimed to find Bt in human blood is much in question. See: If you record noise, you don’t get music – you get nonsense. Even if there is Bt in human blood (which hasn’t been shown) there are more sources than just Bt in transgenic plants: There are a lot of different ways for Bt proteins to get into our food.
So Henry,
You seem to believe that because a google search turns up hits, it is evidence something is true.
I just googled “Elvis is alive”.
I got lots of hits, including a whole website
http://www.elvis-is-alive.com/
One wonders why there is no funding to research the veracity of this.
I smell a conspiracy.
David Tribe, please do not connect my name to “you seem to believe” type statements. If you wish to say “some may believe”, I have no objection, but I request that you withdraw the post in its present form.
But Henry – you do seem to believe that – had David suggested you actually do believe this then perhaps you’d have grounds for complaint.
It may just be lack of clarity that leads to you seeming to believe certain things – but that you seem to believe this is true.
I find it odd that you (or anyone) would be “impressed” with such a paltry offering.
First, it’s a review of a Jeffrey Smith article, which really in the mind of anyone remotely sensible should set off all kinds of alarm bells.
No mechanism is discussed – merely stated the well known fact that Bt toxin causes gut perforation in insects (although fails to mention the targeted nature of this) and then goes on to mention that Bt has been found in human blood (with the obvious intention to leave the reader thinking that Bt in the blood must get there by causing gut perforation) – and as Anastasia has pointed out the research around this area is such that even concluding that Bt is getting into human blood is utterly inconclusive.
There is some yammering about pesticide and heavy metals as causative agents for autism (which combined with vaccines pretty much form the crank trifecta)
The whole thing is unsourced other than the lamentable link to Smith – and it contains nothing original – simply a rehash of Smith’s nonsense with a smattering of Autism crankery.
Researching willy nilly on whatever random nonsense one can come up with isn’t how real science is done at all – a hypothesis should at least have some sound backing logically or mechanistically – GMOs as a causative agent for autism have neither (as your link quite obviously shows) – your proposed approach to science would bring the whole endeavor to a screeching halt as everyone went off chasing down nonsense rather than actually applying some thought to the process first.
Ewan,
There’s also the situation where publishing troubling findings can result in more funding for research.
Evan R. stated:
“Researching willy nilly on whatever random nonsense one can come up with isn’t how real science is done at all – a hypothesis should at least have some sound backing logically or mechanistically – GMOs as a causative agent for autism have neither (as your link quite obviously shows) – your proposed approach to science would bring the whole endeavor to a screeching halt as everyone went off chasing down nonsense rather than actually applying some thought to the process first.”
H.Kuska comment. My proposed approach is not what you have described. I stated (as you cited right above your comment):
“To do research on a new problem “tips of the iceberg” are looked for.”
I feel that what I have stated is consistent with what is being used. see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
Your “interpretation”, of what someone else has specifically proposed concerning autism, of course, can be part of the feedback loop that scientists use in deciding whether to go to the next step. Please note that the article does provide the ability for comments. The references that Smith gave are listed below. Fortunately, Google Scientific lists what papers have cited a given paper. This allows the interested reader to quickly check if there is any serious concern about an individual paper.
References:
“1.Aris A, Leblanc S. Maternal and fetal exposure to pesticides associated to genetically modified foods in Eastern Townships of Quebec, Canada. Reprod Toxicol (2011), doi:10.1016/j.reprotox.2011.02.004 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21338670
2.Finamore A, Roselli M, Britti S, Monastra G, Ambra R, Turrini A and Mengheri E. (2008). Intestinal and peripheral immune response to MON810 maize ingestion in weaning and old mice. J Agric Food Chem, 16 November 2008
3.Seralini GE, Cellier D, Spiroux de Vendomois J. 2007, “New analysis of a rat feeding study with a genetically modified maize reveals signs of hepatorenal toxicity”. Arch Environ Contam Toxicol. 2007;52:596-602; and Vendômois, JS, François Roullier, Dominique Cellier and Gilles-Eric Séralini. 2009, “A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health” . International Journal of Biological Sciences 2009; 5(7):706-726
4.Gendel, “The use of amino acid sequence alignments to assess potential allergenicity of proteins used in genetically modified foods,” Advances in Food and Nutrition Research 42 (1998), 45–62. See also: G. A. Kleter and A. A. C. M. Peijnenburg, “Screening of transgenic proteins expressed in transgenic food crops for the presence of short amino acid sequences indentical to potential, IgE-binding linear epitopes of allergens,” BMC Structural Biology 2 (2002): 8–19; H. P. J. M. Noteborn, “Assessment of the Stability to Digestion and Bioavailability of the LYS Mutant Cry9C Protein from Bacillus thuringiensis serovar tolworthi,” Unpublished study submitted to the EPA by AgrEvo, EPA MRID No. 447343-05 (1998); and H. P. J. M. Noteborn et al, “Safety Assessment of the Bacillus thuringiensis Insecticidal Crystal Protein CRYIA(b) Expressed in Transgenic Tomatoes,” in Genetically modified foods: safety issues, American Chemical Society Symposium Series 605, eds. K.H. Engel et al., (Washington, DC, 1995): 134–47.
Bt protein failed to break down quickly in a simulated digestive solution. In fact, it left fragments that were typically the size of allergens. The Bt also failed the heat stability test, and had shared 9–12 amino acid sequences of vitellogenin, an egg yolk allergen.
5.Vazquez et al, “Intragastric and intraperitoneal administration of Cry1Ac protoxin from Bacillus thuringiensis induces systemic and mucosal antibody responses in mice,” 1897–1912; Vazquez et al, “Characterization of the mucosal and systemic immune response induced by Cry1Ac protein from Bacillus thuringiensis HD 73 in mice,” Brazilian Journal of Medical and Biological Research 33 (2000): 147–155; See also L. Moreno-Fierros, N. Garcia, R. Lopez-Revilla, R. I. Vazquez-Padron, “Intranasal, rectal and intraperitoneal immunization with protoxin Cry1Ac from Bacillus thuringiensis induces compartmentalized serum, intestinal, vaginal, and pulmonary immune responses in Balb/c mice,” Microbes and Infection 2 (2000): 885–90.
6.Vazquez et al, “Bacillus thuringiensis Cry1Ac protoxin is a potent systemic and mucosal adjuvant,” Scandanavian Journal ofImmunology 49 (1999): 578–584. See also Vazquez-Padron et al., 147 (2000).
7.I.L. Bernstein et al, “Immune responses in farm workers after exposure to Bacillus thuringiensis pesticides,” Environmental Health Perspectives 107, no. 7(1999): 575–582.
8.EPA Scientific Advisory Panel, “Bt Plant-Pesticides Risk and Benefits Assessments,” March 12, 2001: 76.
9.Washington State Department of Health, “Report of health surveillance activities: Asian gypsy moth control program,” (Olympia, WA: Washington State Dept. of Health, 1993); and M. Green, et al., “Public health implications of the microbial pesticide Bacillus thuringiensis: An epidemiological study, Oregon, 1985-86,” Amer. J. Public Health 80, no. 7(1990): 848–852.
10.Netherwood, T. (2004) “Assessing the survival of transgenic plant DNA in the human gastrointestinal tract”. Nature Biotechnology, 22, 204-209.
11.Noteborn et al, “Safety Assessment of the Bacillus thuringiensis Insecticidal Crystal Protein CRYIA(b) Expressed in Transgenic Tomatoes,” 134–47.
12.Vazquez et al, “Cry1Ac protoxin from Bacillus thuringiensis sp. kurstaki HD73 binds to surface proteins in the mouse small intestine,” 54–58.”
I have just received a full pre-publication copy of an in-press paper that tested a commercial Bt based product on female rats.
The abstract is available at:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691511003073
Henry – Smith egragariously misuses references (as David has shown on numerous occasions – either misrepresenting what is said, or heavily relying on junk science which has made it through the peer review process) and as such I have absolutely no compelling reason to chase down each and every reference – I’ll note that the discredited Aris & Leblanc paper heads up the list and that Seralini also appears – that is, to me, enough to dismiss the whole nonsensical post (the fact it refers to Smith at all is enough frankly)
by David Tribe
We should also recognise there may not be an autism epidemic
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2006/04/evidence_against_an_autism_epi.php
RESPECTFUL INSOLENCE
Evidence against an “autism epidemic”
Category: Autism
Posted on: April 4, 2006 10:07 AM, by Orac
One of the key arguments by advocates claiming a link between mercury in childhood vaccines is that there is an “epidemic” of autism. They’ll claim that autism was unknown before the 1930’s, when thimerosal was first introduced into vaccines. (Never mind that there are plenty of descriptions of autism-like conditions dating from as far back as the 18th century.) They’ll then claim that there is an “epidemic” that accelerated in the 1990’s, when additional vaccines were added to the recommended childhood schedule, and that it was the additional mercury from those vaccines that was responsible. It has been argued that a lot of that apparent increase was actually due to a widening of the diagnostic criteria for autism in the early 1990’s.
Now there’s more evidence to support that view. Just published in the April issue of the journal Pediatrics is a study by Paul Shattuck at the University of Wisconsin, entitled, The Contribution of Diagnostic Substitution to the Growing Administrative Prevalence of Autism in US Special Education. (Hat tip to the “source” who informed me of this article.)
In the paper, Shattuck analyzes special education figures that are being used to bolster claims of an autism “epidemic” and finds them wanting. In essence, diagnostic substitution can explain nearly all of the apparent increase of autism as recorded by the number of children receiving special education services. What that means is that children that would have been diagnosed with something else 15-20 years ago are now being diagnosed with autism. Dr. Shattuck starts with an example from a different condition, mental retardation as one of his reasons for suspecting diagnostic substitution as a cause of the perceived “epidemic”:
Second, prior research has established a precedent of diagnostic substitution in special education enrollment. From 1976 to 1992 the number of children in the mental retardation (MR) category decreased by 41%, whereas the number in the learning disabilities (LD) category increased 198%. There is considerable evidence that suggests this was because of a growing likelihood that schools would use the LD label for children with mild MR, presumably because a label of LD was increasingly seen as carrying less stigma than MR. Finally, a recent epidemiological study depicted a downward deflection in the incidence trend of other developmental disorders just as the trend for autism made a sharp upturn in the early 1990s, again suggesting the possibility of diagnostic substitution.
OK Henry, I apologize for being flippant. Unlike some GMO critics, you are not immune to logic. You don’t deserve to be dismissed like a crank.
Although this is an apology, let me explain. I’m sure you will not disagree that the list of ills blamed on GMO food is extraordinary and that almost all the entries on that list are nonsense, e.g. morgellons, colony collapse disorder, cause of AIDS, etc. Our recent colleague J.F.C. adds new entries more rapidly and with less restraint than almost anyone else. So my comment that “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.” seemed self evident. Because it seemed self evident, I was arrogant when you demanded a reference to “prove” that autism could not possibly be caused by consuming GMOs. (End of explanation and of apology.)
You have posted a reason why GMO food, in particular GMO food containing a gene for cry protein, might be worth investigating as a cause of autism. The reason is that some researchers have claimed to find evidence that some cry finds its way past the digestive tract. I don’t think this has been definitively proven, but at least it has been brought to the attention of the scientific community. It has not been connected to autism, except in the sense that connects it equally to every other process in human biology that might have a cause in metabolism. E.g. it could equally cause hair loss or vision problems.
Now please take seriously my suggestion that there may be a problem of crying wolf once too often.
c-Rader stated “Now please take seriously my suggestion that there may be a problem of crying wolf once too often.”
H.Kuska comment. The above statement has nothing to do with the scientific method. Mankind has a serious problem. Scientists are trained to look at tips of icebergs and see possible correlations. I am impressed with the well thought “insight” exhibited by the author of the autism possible Bt article.
Well thought “insight”?
Surely the above statement has nothing to do with the scientific method. (a blog, linking to a blog, inaccurately describing a not particularly good scientific article is hardly the sort of evidential standard which you yourself seem to expect from others – one might almost consider this a glaring case of confirmation bias going on)
Right, nothing to do with the scientific method. In the fable, the villagers who ignored the young shepherd when there really was a wolf were guilty of the ad-hominem argument, “This fellow was unreliable in the past, so he is unreliable now.”
But there’s more to consider than the scientific method, even in science. How do we decide where to look for new knowledge?
Ewan,
Every time you see the phrase, ‘has been linked with’, there’s likely something fishy going on. It’s the activists’ favorite phrase. Anything you can imagine can be ‘linked with’ GMOs, with very little work.
c_rader,
Do you mean to suggest that Greenpeace could get something right about GMOs? And will it be by accident?
C_Radar said, “You have posted a reason why GMO food, in particular GMO food containing a gene for cry protein, might be worth investigating as a cause of autism. The reason is that some researchers have claimed to find evidence that some cry finds its way past the digestive tract. I don’t think this has been definitively proven, but at least it has been brought to the attention of the scientific community.”
Are you saying you don’t think the claim that some cry finds its way past the digestive tract has been definitively proven? I thought that was essentially what this research proved. Although if there is suspicion that that’s a false claim, I’d be interested in hearing why.
I realize the cry protein targets something in insects that isn’t in humans, but I still can’t help but wonder what it’s affects are on humans. It sounds like it was expected to break down via the digestive system, and the fact that it isn’t seems to undermine, to some degree, the credibility of those who claim it’s safe. If they were wrong about whether it breaks down in digestion, what else might they be wrong about?
I understand that cry proteins have been sprayed on crops since, what, the ’50s? But that breaks down in the sunlight, right? If there’s any left over, how much can be washed off before consumption? And if any remains then, is that kind broken down via digestion … and maybe that’s why experts expected the cry protein that’s genetically engineered into a crop to also break down.
Are there any nutritionists on here? I’d be curious to know what perspective someone would have from that angle. I know people who are fans of juicing fresh fruits and vegetables often understand that juicing the produce essentially makes it much easier for the body to absorb the nutrients. You can eat an apple, pear, kale, etc., but juicing them together causes them to be digested somewhat differently — by the sounds of it.
All that to say that even if the cry protein is on some food that we’ve been consuming for decades, that doesn’t mean genetically engineering it into our food will have the same results.
I haven’t seen any followup studies identifying what, if any, affects the cry protein that’s making its way into our blood is having … but I’m keeping my eyes open for it. And I think that question remaining unanswered as of yet makes a lot of people at least somewhat reserved about GMOs.
Actually, the experiment about Bt (cry) proteins getting into the bloodstream used an improper method that was not confirmed by a more reliable method. Here is a post that explains the basics of what was wrong with it:
https://biofortified.org/2011/04/nonsense/
They reported levels of Bt protein in blood that were below the levels that the test they used could possibly detect. The bottom line is, the method they used is not evidence for Bt in blood.
Bt is known to break down in the mammalian gut from tests with actual Bt protein in both test tube digestion (in vitro) and real life digestion (in vivo) experiments.
There are also other ways for Bt to get in food:
https://biofortified.org/2011/05/there-are-a-lot-of-different-ways-for-bt-proteins-to-get-into-our-food/
I’m not sure I’m following this entirely correctly, so bear with me.
That article says:
“First question: do 93% of pregnant women in Canada actually consume corn almost daily?
Second question: are the values in blood reported by Aris and Leblanc consistent with the levels present in Bt corn kernels?
The answer is no. Here is why:
The authors reported average values of 0.19 nanograms per milliliter (ng / ml) of blood from pregnant women. Knowing that, in corn MON810 for example, levels of Cry1Ab in the grain are between 190 and 390 ng / g fresh weight, assuming that 1% will pass into the blood (which is on the high side taking into account losses during corn storage, cooking, gastric digestion and the intestinal barrier), this would require a woman of 60 kg to consume 120 g of corn (for the mean blood value of 0,19 ng / ml, assuming a plasma volume of 2.5 liters) and about 1.5 kg (for the maximum reported blood values of 2.28 ng / ml), which seems unrealistic … And even more if one takes into account all extracellular fluids (10 liters, which would imply an average consumption of 490 g of corn and 5.8 kg in order to reach the maximum value in blood).”
Is this saying that the amount of corn that would need to be consumed to pass the cry protein on at a detectable level is unrealistic — people don’t consume that much corn?
If that’s all it’s saying, then my next question is whether the cry protein could be passed on at that level if it is being absorbed into the blood stream of cattle, for example, and thereby being delivered in a more concentrated form to the women eating beef. DDT became more concentrated as it moved up the food chain, right? Could something similar be going on here?
Just asking questions. As I’ve said before, I’m not a scientist. I’m just trying to understand the claims on both sides.
Karl stated: “They reported levels of Bt protein in blood that were below the levels that the test they used could possibly detect.”
H. Kuska comment. My interpretations of that paper and methods used are stated in that thread and and are not consistent with Karl’s stated above interpretation. He can send his interpretation to the editor (or to another reviewed scientific journal). Science provides a feedback method that will also be subject to peer review.
As you are of a very literal minded bent on most occasions Henry c_raders statement is entirely consistent – there is nothing on that list which would be abated by worrying about GMOs
As for peer reviewed literature regarding the statement one need only go through… all the peer reviewed literature on Autism and see that there is no link postulated or shown for GMOs to see that c_rader’s statement holds water (indeed looking at your linked paper one needs to really suspend disbelief in order to remotely implicate GMOs over and above anything else – if you’re going to take it as evidence that GMOs may be implicated in any way to be taken remotely seriously then you also must accept that absolutely everything we do ever is also equally implicated and should be out there demanding improved safety screening of actions such as opening doors and using high speed elevators)
Your return (again) to the forum guidelines as if they are some kind of sacrosanct ruleset rather than guidelines is also quaintly annoying – apparently your go to when you’re overwhelmed by the oddity of your stance – your approach however again seems inconsistent as you appear not to have demanded the recanting or banning of John despite his departure into the realms of conspiratorial fantasy.
On the null hyopthesis – if you are looking for scientific evidence that GMOs were connected with autism then this would be your hypothesis, the null, which is what one would accept if you fail to provide evidence backing the hypothesis, would therefore be that GMOs are not connected to autism – I am not surprised, based on our history here, that you are confused by this, nevertheless it still stands that c_rader’s comment is correct in this area and such a comment clearly is not where any burden of proof would lie in this matter(perhaps, if PDiff (or anyone else well versed in statistics) is still masochistic enough to be drudging through this particular subject they can come eviscerate my assumptions here)
Just a point of clarification, that part of the mission statement refers to authors. This means that the executive editors will choose authors who will provide factual information and further discussion. The standards for commenters (for better or for worse) are much more lax.
BTW, I’m not interested in trying to figure out who exactly is adhering the closest to our mission statement with each comment – people who are providing productive, entertaining comments know who they are!
…and they win community contests as well.
Eventually… =p
If anything, it appears that we are doing a good job of providing a place where people can debate whether or not their debating partners are holding themselves to our comment policy well enough…
C Radar says: “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.”
Henry Kuska says: “Please note that this paper is NOT saying GM food is definitely implicated.”
So basically, both C Radar And Henry Kuska are in complete agreement – so what are we debating about here? Oh yeah, whether it is reasonable to “pull out the stops” and investigate Bt as a possible cause for autism. One side says there’s no evidence for this, the other says well there’s no study that demonstrates that it is NOT a cause of autism. It can certainly be difficult to determine how to proceed in these situations, as on one hand you could be ignoring a potential important discovery with grand health implications, and on the other hand, completely wasting grant money on an unfruitful cause while taking money away from more promising research. How to proceed?
I notice that people tend to go off of their fears when it comes to proposing links like this. Bt is being suggested as something that should be investigated, but how about Beta-carotene? Carrots have been bred to have substantially more beta-carotene then they used to have – to “pharmaceutical levels” as one carrot breeder in my building would say. Could this be a cause of a rise in autism? Show me the paper that demonstrates that beta-carotene is not a factor in autism? How about every other change in our food or daily lives? Hey, you know babies eat a lot of mashed-up carrots, right about the age that autism shows up… so you never know.
Now I must ask the question, why are people suggesting that Bt should be investigated as a contributing factor for autism, but not beta-carotene? Because of the simple fact that people are worried about GE foods, and are not worried about the orange color in carrots.
If we are to be truly scientific about what to investigate and what not to – the list of possible causes should not be determined by fears but instead by an analysis of the likelihood of it occurring based on what we understand about the disease and the many things that may have changed, from environmental, to genetic, to interactions between the two. (Why won’t anyone ever suggest GxE as causes for these diseases?)
Karl stated:
“C Radar says: “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.”
Henry Kuska says: “Please note that this paper is NOT saying GM food is definitely implicated.”
So basically, both C Radar And Henry Kuska are in complete agreement – so what are we debating about here?”
H. Kuska comment. Please note that my statement includes the words “this paper”. I do not understand how that can be interpreted as anything but what it states.
Karl later states: “the other says well there’s no study that demonstrates that it is NOT a cause of autism.”
H. Kuska comment: this simplication is an extreme that I feel is not accurate. What I am saying is that the scientific method is such that if there are tips of the iceberg then exploratory research is the next step (below are quotes of my use of iceberg in this thread):
“Scientists are trained to look at tips of icebergs and see possible correlations. I am impressed with the well thought “insight” exhibited by the author of the autism possible Bt article.”
“H.Kuska comment. The above statement has nothing to do with the scientific method. Mankind has a serious problem. Scientists are trained to look at tips of icebergs and see possible correlations. I am impressed with the well thought “insight” exhibited by the author of the autism possible Bt article.”
“There seems to be a problem distinguishing between scientists looking for cause(s) of autism and scientists reporting published literature or giving oral papers reporting that they have found a cause or causes. I feel that I have sufficiently documented that there is a problem and scientists feel that research is needed to find the cause(s). To do research on a new problem “tips of the iceberg” are looked for.”
Karl if you feel that you have “tips of the icebergs” for any of the areas that you mentioned as should be investigated as the cause of autism, please present them. In other words to answer your question as to:
“Carrots have been bred to have substantially more beta-carotene then they used to have – to “pharmaceutical levels” as one carrot breeder in my building would say. Could this be a cause of a rise in autism?”.
I would reply follow the scientific method and look for “tips of the iceberg” that suggest such a possibilty.
Your attempt to then state that “Show me the paper that demonstrates that beta-carotene is not a factor in autism.” is confusing. Are you refering to my statement?
The statement that I made (put in context) was “c_Rader stated: “Nowhere on your list is there a single problem which can possibly be abated by worrying about GMO food.”
“H.Kuska comment to c_Rader. Please provide the literature references which you feel supports your statement regarding Autism and GM food.”
Please notice that I did not say that this was a criteria for doing research. As a scientist I was interested in his basis for making such a strong statement.
http://idosi.org/abr/5(4)/5.pdf
Henry, you are trying to goad me into a debate that I could only lose. Fine, until it is proven that it is impossible for a GMO food to cause autism, it remains a remote possibility and I won’t be comfortably able to demonstrate otherwise. So I had no right to say “…which can possibly be abated …”
I need a word slightly less absolute, conveying the idea that it is extremely unlikely, but not completely impossible, that GMO food has caused any of autism, lung cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s disease, breast cancer, AIDS or peanut allergies.
But Henry, it is intriguing that you have taken so much effort to combat my side of the debate, while ignoring the wild ideas that J.F.C. has put forth. And many of the claims commonly made about GMO danger are stated as facts, without qualification, even when they are outright false. How many times have you read about tomatoes with fish genes, or the prevalence of terminator technology, or the corn with a scorpion gene?
c_rader on July 11, 2011 at 5:34 pm · stated: “Henry, you are trying to goad me into a debate that I could only lose.”
H.Kuska reply. I already had stated: ” As a scientist I was interested in his basis for making such a strong statement.”
I am sorry that you interpret my answer as that I was attempting to goad you. I appreciate your answers (when sincere) and am sorry that I did not thank you then.
I am putting considerable effort into just one of J.F.C’s cited “diseases” (the question of autism and genetically modified foods (specifically Bt)) and the scientific method. This is a forum run by graduate students. I was happy to find it as being both a scientific researcher and an educator (particularly at the graduate/PhD level I felt that I could give add an additional dimension (experience of someone from an earlier generation) to the discussions. My advanced graduate classes that I taught often included group discussions of assigned topics – I am comfortable with a forum set-up.
Concerning your question about my not addressing other claims. This indepth analysis of one point should serve as an example of how one can investigate other claims (Whether pro GMO or con GMO). One can give someone a fish or teach someone how to fish.
As background reading the following may be useful:
http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2010/06/16/2928357.htm
Particularly: “The public feel dismayed and worried that people who lead the technology seem to be uncertain. But we can get around that by trying to explain how science is done and what scientists can do and what they can’t do.”
Henry, I would suggest to you that the list of bad consequences attributed to GMO food is so long and so consistently nonsensical that adding a new item to the list has the opposite effect from what you would want.
Some day, someone will find a real problem with some GMO food, and I, for one, will not believe it because I will associate it with the flood of nonsense.
There’s a folk tale about a shepherd boy who cried wolf once too often.
The post on autism is very sad. I can’t imagine how horrible it must be to have a child that is sick and have even the best researchers and doctors known what is causing it. I understand that reaching out to any idea that seems remotely plausible may give a person some sense of peace, being able to blame someone or something else. Unfortunately, that grasping for explanations has led to a whole lot of misinformation.
Dr Rader
You say the origin of AIDS is well known?
Perhaps you can point me to the true cause then?
My own idea is that it was from the result of 1972 work by Paul Berg using E Coli and SV40.
He was actually warned by Professor Pollack that his work woulmd lead to an illness like AIDS.
After a huge search for such illness in workers or indeed anywhere his (Prof Pollock) ideas were called woolly.
MY own investigation more than a decade ago elicited such comments from top biologists as
WE ARE NOT INTERESTED in finding the origin of AIDS.
One Oxbidge professor who was interested in my ideas died mysteriously so called from malaria COMPLICATIONS.
Can you point me to modern research paid projects on SV40 as well?
I said that the cause of AIDS was well known, not the origin . I was not assuming then that you were a member of the subculture that considers AIDS to have been created in a laboratory. I don’t pretend to have any credentials to even discuss that.
David
Thank you for your work but please listen to evidence and do not just ignore or deny it.
I said clearly that cancers have increased.
Hardly Rocket Science.
Yes, cancers do go back in fact to the beginnings of life as nuclear radiation is a 100 per cent cause of such illnesses.
But today amongst my very very small number of friends there are three with breast cancer. I did not know a single person with breast cancer until 30 or so years ago and the numbers from my own observation are going up. My sister like Rachel Carson did not make 60 years of age.
When my daughter was born in 1971 I looked round to see what challenges to her health shewould find in England and failed to see anything much.
Today we have pollution from more and more Nuclear units (Nebraska is current)
Today we have GMO food directly and indirectly affecting us. Deaths to people in France from E Coli much used in GMO work.
Today we have increasing pesticide use from GMO and conventional farming. ( a three year drop in use was then followed by now 20 years ofincreased use with land abandoned to weeds with GMO herbicide resistance – pigweed etc etc.)
Use of monsanto aspartame known to be a source of phenylamine and carbon monoxide and a carcinogen.
We have an unknown source of infant deaths in England and USA at the age of their vaccines which uses a teratogenic or several teratogenic ingredients ( a law just passed to legally allow this to continue).
In short and too short to discuss here, I have reservations for the well being of many yet to be born people in todays unsafe world.
Just discovered in the pacific an island of debris bigger than europe from flotsam and in space similar debris nearly causing a catastrophe this week to space travellers.
Not a rosy picture admirably described by american indians who drank, swam and fished in their rivers.
A treat not recommended today to any of the survivors descendants – last of the Mohicans etc.
In support of ophadeus and foxglove danger.
A common site in this area and my garden at present.
The deaths to people in France and Germany are not and never were from E Coli manure.
Normally E Coli pollution dies off slowly and is used as a measure of such pollution.
What is KILLING these people is the EATING of SPROUTS without EXTERNAL E Coli contamination.
Thousands of tests have shown this.
People are dying from eating sprouts WITHOUT E Coli measurable from normal tests.
But they are dying from the same sprouts that are FREE of external E Coli.
CONCLUSION
The E Coli is INTERNAL and not testable by current lab practices.
Monsanto themselves have known for years of the LETHAL danger from eating GMO sprouts.
ERGO
The cause of the biggest health catastrophe ever will in time be found to be due to GMO foods.
Politically and forever shouted by John Dalli et al is that
WE WILL NEVER identify the cause.
Just so!
Your 1975 date is out as GMO was already well established and in the hands of BIOLOGICAL warfare developers by 1972 so their work would be expected to be EXTANT by 1975.
I mean they (USA) designed, developed and flew the moonlander in less than 6 months. Beats the 9 years development time for CONCORDE by a MACH TWO factor.
People have died without having eaten any sprouts at all.
EHEC in Germany is a puzzle whereas i have a theory about which David Tribe finds doubtfull.
Right know it i rainy and cold and this for 3 weeks. My prognosis is thta EHEC will come back wehn dry and sunny.
Strike one, and in the first line!
Strike two – I assume you’re suggesting mandatory E.coli spraying of sprouts?
No doubt you forgot to link to this evidence, I have no doubt that you’ll fix this.
What do you mean by this? Please explain. Diagrams would be useful.
One assumes this would be why there are no GMO sprouts on the market. (I’ll call this strike 3, which is a shame as I’m only half way done and thus my baseball analogy falls sadly short)
Really? Bigger than the quite obvious link between poor public health practices and stuff like the black death which wiped out a good portion of the European population, or the health catastrophe that destroyed a major nascent civilization when Europeans discovered the Americas? That’s a pretty bold statement, although perhaps not so much if you’re as ignorant of history as you are of science.
On the bizarre AIDS/HIV conspiracy theory – I was under the impression (perhaps mistaken) that there are clear evolutionary relations between HIV and Simian viruses
Which would be rather odd in a lab created strain.
I shall return for the next inning once I have a tad more time.
Thomas Fix
Can you explain carefully what you are saying;
I take it you mean GMO food will mean we have no shortages?
You do know yields of GMO foods are 9 per cent less?
You do know that GMO developments now mean a large proportion of the food crops has now moved to fuel making?
You cant eat or drink fuel for cars and with less yield the predictable doubling of price of food in thepast five years will do nothing, absolutely nothing for the starving people you claim are all around us.
I meant that GMO is a chance to help feed the world. Yea, i know the cynicial situation of burning/fermenting food for fuel/electricity.
With C1 plants and lets be genorous 2-3 Watts per square meter it is only a qusetion of heavy subsidies by the taxpayer not a question of sustainabilty. It costs more energy than it produces.
Risk aversion-managemnt and overreaction: A scientific paper from the law experts-no asbestos lawyer:
http://www.google.de/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&hl=de&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4ADRA_deDE408DE408&q=Overreaction+to+Fearsome+Risks+Cass+R.+Sunstein
It makes clear the the assesment of risk is a subjective matter. When skiing You may ask someone how high the risk of bone fracture even death is. The answer will be that it may be a risk to ski but manageable one. If You say there ist a chance of 1: 10 Mio that you may get an undesirable reaction to a certain food/drug most will prefer not to take the food or drug.
With labeling of GMO food the door for the fearmongers and asbestos lawyer is open.
“You do know yields of GMO foods are 9 per cent less?”
All GM foods?
Jonathan
“You do know yields of GMO foods are 9 per cent less?”
Is that every year? What about in the years where the trait is severely tested (eg. high weed pressure years for Roundup crops or high infestation years for Bt crops)?
Jonathan
“You do know yields of GMO foods are 9 per cent less?”
Incorrect. On the farm, GE soy yields no different, and GE corn (if it has Bt) yields about 5% more than the same corn that is non-GE. Cotton yields more (but I don’t know by how much). Ironically, it took the Union of Concerned Scientists to publish a report called “Failure to Yield” for me to realize that GE crops do actually increase yield. (The oddly-named report found an increase in yield)
1 billion dollar buck -Diabrotica virgifera- will be a huge problem in Germany because we have vast corn cultivation for the purpose of biogas production. BT corns has been prohibited and therefore the farmer are using non GMO with the effect of massive petsicides application. In the south they used Clothianidin with the effect that beekeepers lost all stocks in this region 2008. It was quiet the situation as a couple of weeks ago: dusty-dry hot, the pesticides could not be dilutetd. EHEC Had not been present. First the bees then humans- with GMO would not had happened.
Bt cotton yields are consistently higher than non-Bt varieties. Almost double in most cases. Between 10 and 75% higher were presented in data from the Indian region of Maharashtra in 2004-2005.
See page 24 of the IFPRI report here…
http://www.ifpri.org/publication/bt-cotton-and-farmer-suicides-india
Hi Thomas what is your job and link to agrochemical?
The bee die off is a recognised problem and the clothianidin involvement beyond dispute to you and me.
Also which country are you in?
Clothianidin is from Bayer, Germany and is a product of Germany and foisted on the rest of the world by German Agrochem.
It is used on CANOLA in America and to my knowledge all CANOLA is GMOis it not?
Damage is not even restricted to bees but in the USA there is huge die of to birds and mammals.
Your idea that bees and humans would be untouched and unharmed by GMO growing is FALSE, LYING and at bets PROPAGANDA.
The use of agrochemicals was set so low in the rush to get GMO accepted that increases in pesticide/herbicide/fungicide use have increased from 10 per cent to more than double depending on which ones we are talking of. Eg Dicamba use on GMO has doubled in Argentina from earlier levels.
Most sane people are moving away from CLOTHIANIDIN very very fast.
Hi John, you appear to be new here. I would like to caution you about calling people liars because they may disagree with you. Please take a look at our comment policy.
https://biofortified.org/about/comment-policy/
Hi John,
Lets say i am a hobby biologist from Germany and i have nil connections to agrochem.
But i got plenty of connections to farmers and the agriculture department because i like to go for hunting, fishinga and i am a beekeeper.
Initially i thought that GMO is a great chance for human kind. The Golden Rice is a solution for nutrinial causes diseasea like Beri Beri. The dveloper of Goledn Rice as far as i know a swiss scientientist gave it for free-no charges.
The same i supposed for the modern agriculture which is in its indsutrial way devastating for the countryside. I hoped that at least the pesticides could be reduced. That is what i am thinking. The corn monoculture is relay a destroying way of farming, no herbs, no insects no gamebirds.
Hi Thomas
I can see you are keenly interested in GMO plants and animals.
You also say you are a bee keeper. So if chemicals kill a bee then you would expect dead bees in the hive. As I understand colony collapse disorder (CCD) the bees just disappear. How does this relate to toxic death then?
I have to say my interest was many many years ago when I protested in vain of the danger of splicing bacteria, toxins and viruses into anything living.
You are aware of E Coli for example in GMO since the inception by Paul Berg in 1972?
And the ramifications of altering of setting going instability in an essential bacteria for man that had stabilised over the millions of years?
Today E Coli is out of control and killing on a scale never seen before but predictably if my and other ideas are correct in an increasing way.
Several thousands of permanently ill people in a small area is scary to me and I have to say I had the same scare back years ago which resulted in me having to use very expensive foods to avoid and overcome a mild form of whatever it was.
In this respect I know again of several people at the same time here in France with bleeding disorders and the other two both had operations.
In the past people have fallen foul of toxic food usually on the scale of the odd one or two. What happened in your country and mine is new, scary and we do not know the future from eating raw foods.
I see in America they are already disinfecting food so it has a hospital taste to counter the effects.
Also there is a marked similarity of bleeding deaths to consumption of GMO food.
All I say is we need answers to this E Coli problemand increasing our food supply with any and every version of E Coli in every bit of our food is just maniacal.
How can you separate E coli harm in every country from making novel foods with E Coli in them?
I am a chemist and not a biologist but do not suffer from fatigue of knowing too much about why E coli is essential for every human, E Coli harm is overwhelmingly post GMO development and finally E Coli deaths where the bacteria is found but cannot be found in the offending foods seems not odd but political manoevering.
I can think of a very simple convincing way that every person got ill or died using an E Coli GMO contamination of the food chain and exactly the same as the argument Professor Pollack put forward in 1972 when the dangerous practice of GMO was ACCEPTED as dangerous.
I admit to huge gaps in knowledge but are huge gaps in knowledge acceptable to people who control this GMO advance?
I am a firm believer in FAIL SAFE and not RISK TAKING.
Nuclear Power was once argued so safe we would never have a melt down. History shows this is ABSURD and WHO propaganda of two deaths from Chernobyl are about as accurate as information given as to the safety of GMO; SUBSTANTIALLY EQUIVALENT BULLSHIT.
For me every E Coli death is GMO responsible UNTIL we know different.
To labour the point, the population of the Ukraine is estimated to be 55 million IF Chernobyl had not happened. The real population is 45 million and so TEN MILLION people have been vaporised off the planet and that is the cost in that country and the bilan of just 25 years out of the millions of years of our planets life.
As a person retired the effect of catastrophe in the making may not affect me or even many born today but the problem will not ease off by IGNORING or NOT taking RESPONSIBILITY.
Wooooaaaaah! Is this really the level of stupidity we have to deal with. Never before have I read such a random, confused collection of half-understood science and contradictory reasoning backed up by yet further misinterpretation of conspiracy theory.
I need to lie down in a dark room.
Jonathan
“As I understand colony collapse disorder (CCD) the bees just disappear.”
You ever notice that nobody is investigating the link between bee disappearances and insecticides approved for use in organic farming?
Then maybe it’s not chemicals. Perhaps a bird species has recently evolved a dietary preference for bees. That would explain the bees simply going missing.
“One review, considering 20 studies of 16 species of bee-eaters, showed that 20 percent to 96 percent of the birds’ diets consisted of ants, bees and wasps, and among those, honeybees were the most common prey.”
http://www.ehow.com/facts_5647607_kind-birds-eat-bees_.html
Hi John,
Let me answer with Your latest statements on Tschernobyl. First of all the Tschernoby Syndrome is a terminology from social medicine: it consists of pauperism-neglect-polytoxico dependencies and social benefits.
The great misery of Tschernobyl was not the china syndrome or meltdown of the core but the measures taken like irrationally deplacing people. Radioactive caesium or Jodid was not the problem at all. The smart ucrains preferred to leave a country that was due its communist past exhausted. Things are now getting better.
You may missed the fact that the E.Coli outbreak is tracked down to an organic farm in northern Germany
http://www.gaertnerhof.org
One of the great scientific methodologist Karl Raimund Popper from Austria had the chance to flee the Nazis to NZ where he wrote the “The Open society and its Enemies”. I would prefer a “Popper” approach to the GMO risk.
The counterhypothesis “GMO is a thread to human health” has to be falsified.
With a douple blind test which will cost 1/2 billion Euros and we may falsify or not. Instead the EU puts 9 billion in the fear mongering green NGOs. Historism and Empirism are not good friends of the modern sciences.
I’m seeing some Crank Magnetism (or is it “Altie-Poe”?) on the thread: who was it that proposed that there is some sort of reward associated with fear? I know lots of people who are continually Taking-Up the Call for the next Big International Conspiracy; it’s a whole subculture where thay get together to cross-discuss and trump-up each other’s theories, and they spend so much time and effort angst-ing and eating weird diets that it makes me sad. If they put half as much effort into learning from credible sources, then a quarter more of the effort would be sufficient for them to make an actual contribution to solving real problems in the world.
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Crank_magnetism
(BTW, Freddy Kreuger was a GREAT villain, and I enjoyed his appearances greatly: does THAT count as “pleasure from fear”?)
OrchidGrowinMan,
Enjoying Freddy Krueger doesn’t fall under the same rubric as reactions to GM crops. To really get off on fear, you need to instill it in others as well, so that you can have a sense of identity among your fellow fear-ers.
And if you’re successful spreading fear, that gives you celebrity status as. Which is a real thrill. Imagine how self-satisfied Jeffry Smith is.
There’s another aspect. Activist groups hire persons to troll the web all day long, who essentially repeat a prepared narrative for comments on sites. They may have no actual opinions either way — they just get a paycheck.
Eric,
I think everybody should learn rudimentary epidemiology: then maybe DGaP evidence would be less credible: when my friend reported that she had heard from a Drunk Guy at a Party that microwave ovens make any food DeadlyPoison(tm), she was really really worried because she had heated the water for her kombucha that way….
It seems obvious to me, but I’ll say it anyway: if a microwave is such a source of danger, then wouldn’t we have NOTICED by now?
And explaining to her that a drunk guy who’s trying to get into her pants is not the most reliable source for food-safety advice gets me nowhere: “that’s what They WANT you to think.”
The pay isn’t all that good. Just beats delivering pizzas.
Seriously guys your ravings about activists and greenies and the like sound just as cracked and conspiritorial as anything you are likely to hear on the other side of the fence
Xenophobic….
Justin,
It’s the other way around. Just because someone’s discovered a way to make money doesn’t make it a conspiracy.
Well, unless it’s Monsanto that hired ’em in which case it’s a bid to control the world’s food supply, you know. /snark
Bt Cotton yields consistently higher according to the report you reference.
That is being picky with the figures.
Like everything there are conflicting figures which effectively drive you crazy.
State government reports, on the other hand, are often more critical of the technology (Andhra
Pradesh 2002; Maharashtra 2002). Both of these surveys show that in the first season, the Bt cotton
hybrids performed rather poorly, compared with the popular non-Bt hybrids. In Andhra Pradesh,
especially in Warangal district, the performance of Bt cotton was particularly poor, consistent with the
conclusions of the economic literature. According to the Bt cotton farmers surveyed there, yields were
less than the traditional hybrids and the incidence of bollworm was also higher. The quality of the cotton
Add to this the fact that more than 100 different Bt GMO cotton plants are around and some are certainly not as good as others by logic.
In the first years the use of GMO was an extermely chancy economic proposition and the title of the paper SUICIDES among farmers does not evoke confidence in this business for the unsuccessful few.
Even in counting dead bodies we see reoprts of changes from 10 times more to 5 times less and actual hard numbers of deaths varying more than fivefold. Hardly good for epidemiology.
Sir Richard Doll was a paid for Monsanto epidemiologist so what credibility do we give to this conflicting report.
Again the FAIL SAFE view is that with 100 different Bt GMO plants there are going to be bad varieties getting into the system for those who are unlucky to have them in their fields.
Testing for purity or which genes have been altered does not comecheap to farmers who have basic intelligence according to the report which suggest 1 out of 3 can only put a cross by their name.
Hardly good for the use of plants that need exceptional control to avoid contamination of the environment.
When Bt toxin was first put in GMO plants scientists themselves were unaware of its action.
The known action is not good for the insects and may not be good for other living creatures.
Here we go again, off focusing on ad hominem attacks instead of information that can be discussed. So someone said earlier we should not ignore the evidence. The best way to “not ignore the evidence” is to tackle the litany of angst driving problems in a reductionist manner, i.e., one at a time. So, this post is about the statement concerning reduction in yields of GMO crops to the tune of 9%. Before tackling this a comment is in order. The GMO crop is not specified, and of course the species makes all the difference in the world. But, considering that in the U.S. presently basically only four major crops have been deregulated by the USDA-APHIS, namely, corn, soybean, canola, and cotton, and the first two make up a combined ~160 million acres of land usage, let’s start with those. (Note: Because alfalfa and beets have only been deregulated recently following court lawsuit battles, these are not useful for addressing the issue).
Okay, so here is the approach. Observation (albeit unsourced): GMO crop yields have declined 9%. Hypothesis: Use of GMO technology to breed crops has resulted in a historical yield decrease. Prediction: Examination of historical crop records should show that yield of corn and soybeans have declined over time following widespread planting of GM cultivars.
Experiment: Examine historical yield information to determine the trend in crop yields in the U.S. (expressed as bushels per acre). Methodology: Query the publicly available Crop Production Historical Track Records published by the USDA National Agricultural Statistical Service. The latest publication is dated April 2011 and the production records run from the mid 1800s for corn and 1924 for soybeans through 2010. To make data analysis simpler, start from 1980, several years before Monsanto figured out how to efficiently express a bacterial gene in a plant. BTW, the URL for the pdf file is
http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/usda/current/htrcp/htrcp-04-26-2011.pdf
If that doesn’t work, use the search string “USDA Historical Track Records” in the GOOGLE search line; the link is about no. 3.
Simplified Results for Corn: The average yield (bu/acre) of corn in the U.S. from 1980-1995 was 110.7. Since 1996 (Bt corn for corn borer, followed by a slower increased planting of Roundup Ready corn), the average yield is 143.2 bu/acre. Breaking the data down a little further results in an average yield of 133.6 bu/acre from 1996-2003 (Bt corn with Cry 1Ab for borer control) and 154.2 bu/acre during 2004-2010 (advent of Bt corn with Cry 3B for rootworm control). RR corn started coming on much stronger post 2000. Corn farmers still love atrazine, however, but rates are lower than they were before the 90’s. (Sidenote: The precision I’m using on the yields is the same as what the USDA uses.)
Simplified Results for Soybean: The average yield from 1980-1995 was 32.4 bu/acre. The average yield from 1996-2010 was 39.9 bu/acre. Further analysis within the era of RR soybeans shows an average yield from 1996-2001 of 38.3 bu/acre and from 2001-2010 an average yield of 41 bu/acre.
Conclusions: Analysis of historical data do not support the prediction of a decline in yields due to specific adoption of GM breeding technology. Thus, the hypothesis of a yield decrease should be rejected.
Final (snarky) comment. If this analysis is a little too nerdy and much too detailed, then I suggest we’re not going to really have much to talk about and learn from.
Yes indeed. Also Steve Savage demonstrated similar things in his earlier post “Cost of precaution”.
https://biofortified.org/2011/05/the-cost-of-precaution/
Hi Jonathan
So what is your interest in GMO and are you in the industry?
My current interest is the deaths and illness in Europe and what causes it.
However you look at this episode still ongoing it represents a huge change in health to humans here and deserves an answer.
I believe it is totally responsible for the GMO industry, regulators and governments to look at E Coli spliced into our foods from GMO technology both deliberately and also by accident.
With India using more than 100 different Bt GMO cotton plants in the few years of its use there must logically be a lot of contaminationand gene crossing going on in the cotton plants and other plants.
Who is monitoring all this?
And where are the results?
The many thousands permanently ill from E Coli have by excellent French science tracked back the contamination to Egypt a hot bed of GMO and therefore E Coli splicing into any and all sorts of plants and foods.
With Thompson and Morgan stalling over exactly who and where in Egypt this killer food comes from hardly seems to display openess and T&M arethemselves avowed avoiders of GMO seed.
Dijon mustard is nolonger made at Dijon but before its demise GMO mustard got into the supply. Was this the reason for its demise.
I am looking for answers and am not an expert on this subject and my worries are from my own logic and science and not those of activists or fear mongers.
With thousands dead or ill permanently from just a couple of months in a medium size country and one area only is this not genuine cause for FEAR of our food supply?
Comments comparing dropping atom bombs hardly need anyone to realise the harm but death and the worlds biggest catastrophe from eating ordinary food is SCARY.
The need to look a
Hit the wrong button.
E Coli harm in Europe.
E coli used in foods by GMO manipulation.
RESPONSIBLE people need to link the two and seek the link or explain why there is no link.
The fact that after now nearly three months there is absolutely no link mentioned is not conspiracy but certainly an exhibition of crass ignorance of modern food developments and possible outcomes.
Dying of ignorance again.
John,
Please look at the numerous other recent posts at this site about the E. coli outbreak.
The germs in Germany have been completely sequenced several times over.
https://github.com/ehec-outbreak-crowdsourced/BGI-data-analysis/wiki
There is no evidence in that analysis to support your suppositions. The “ignorance” is not what you think it is.
Ewan
We know people are dying after eating sprouts.
Some at least of these are GMO and will contain E coli spliced into them.
We know that after extensive testing of the culprit cause of illness and death there is no testable E Coli.
But people nevertheless are dying.
Clearly to me there is the POSSIBILITY that adult women in this case (age 32 to 36) are converting E Coli GMO food into lethal E Coli that makes them permanentlyill or dead.
Is this not a logical HYPOTHESIS for the experts to examine?
I can explain more fully why this is moe than just theoretical but the hypothesis itself is in URGENT need of people doing something about it.
One of the drawbacks of GMO is just this.
We advocate the need for cheap and plentiful food but forget safety checking once elementary is now so complex and expensive that even if we hypothesise the connections there is no capability, no desire and no money to securs our food.
In France one convicted lifer spent his life in prison because the state could not AFFORD to do one DNA analysis to check his guilt or innocence. He was found innocent not fromDNA testing but from ordinary witness statements CORROBORATED only later by a 200 to 1 000 euros one off DNA test.
Thousands of simple E Coli tests have shown the killer foods are clean.
To do the same tests at the molecular level would cost hundreds of millions of euros and years or research.
Meanwhile how many more health scares will come and go if we decided to match GMO food production with PROPER safety checks?
Do you have the slightest idea of how plants are transformed? I’ve been doing this for fifteen years and this is the first I’ve heard of sprouts having E. coli spliced into them!! Are you actually implying that E. coli transforms plants like A. tumefaciens? Or that an entire bacterium that does not contain T-DNA is being spliced into the plant?
Hi David
I got your comment on DNA checking of the E Coli.
As a chemist the analysis does not do too much for me unless people can link it to GMO and E Coli spliced into food. Does it contain antibiotic marker genes etc. I am not at the level to do this myself and just ask those who can and do understand to look at this.
BUtwhat has not been checked is the DNA analysis of the suspect food.
We are all falling into the trap of looking for neat E Coli rather than E Coli hidden in sprout plants.
A world of difference and to date ZERO analyses done.
But search for the E.coli and the genes of relevance in the sprouts is what is and has been done by the labs in Germany. that is now standard microbiological analysis. There is a thorough account of the DNA content of the germs too.
Allan
Yes it was me who found the 9 per cent loss of yield which was for GMO soya over ten years ago.
The answer is complew and of course confusing.
To find yields is no easy matter and quite complex depending on soil, technology, numbers of plants seeded etc etc.
There is a phrase I found called YIELD DRAG which I suspect is from the industry rather than its opponents.
It basically ACCEPTS the loss of yield and seeks to explain and overcome this loss.
Any comments please?
John Fryer, I’ll answer the yield drag issue first. The phrase was a creation of Chuck Benbrook in the paper (from 1999) titled, “Evidence of the Magnitude and Consequences of the Roundup Ready Soybean Yield Drag from University-Based Varietal Trials in 1998”. Benbrook is one of industry’s least favorite people (if you put the title into the GOOGLE search line, you’ll hit the pdf copy for download). Some literature addressed this issue in specific research on beans and in cotton earlier during the 2000s. The issue seems not be of concern for today’s cultivars.
Here are the cotton stats for the U.S. Without addressing the issue of cultivar differences with other countries, here are the results of my analysis using the USDA database. From 1980-1995, cotton production (pounds/acre) averaged 600, but during 1996-2010 production average 743. Looking within the GM breeding years, average production from 1996-2003 was 668 lbs/acre and during 2004-2010 production was 828 lbs/acre.
Regarding your E. coli concerns, if you could be more specific about what you are trying to communicate, then perhaps evidence can be brought to bear on a friendly and more pertinently informative response. Perhaps you can cite some literature to support your argument. Until then, I’ll offer what is known. E. coli is used to create cloned plasmids with the correct gene constructs for genetic engineering, but these plasmids are not E. coli once they are extracted. Furthermore, the constructs have all undergone extensive restriction mapping and pathogenic genes do not occur in them. (Antibiotic genes are going out of favor for producing constructs, but of those that were used, they were not functional in the plant and often were not even incorporated into the plant genome.)
I don’t know about the evolution of the recently rediscovered pathogenic strain of E. coli (O104:H4) associated with sprouts, but the typical pathogenic strain of E. coli (O157:H7) in historical outbreaks has been hypothesized to be evolved from horizontal gene transfer between Shigella and non-pathogenic E. coli. Ironically, Shigella and E. coli are very closely related and Shigella itself may be evolved from E. coli, having acquired at some point a pathogenic potential. Through horizontal gene transfer some strains of E. coli may have acquired this pathogenic characteristic from their ne’er do well cousins. None of this research, however, is linked to commercialization of genetically engineered crops. I recommend using GOOGLE Scholar for a little reading of the primary scientific literature. Okay, here’s one to start for your pathogenic E. coli search, which is free through GOOGLE Scholar: Maurelli et al. 1998, “Black holes” and bacterial pathogenicity: A large genomic deletion that enhances the virulence of Shigella spp. and enteroinvasive Escherichia coli; Microbiology 94:3943-3948. Note the date of this research paper–this is information that was around substantially longer than the commercial introduction of GM technology bred crops. Whether you choose to go the extra mile and extend your reading domain or not, please be assured that a lot more is known about microbial genetics, biochemistry, and evolution then we can imagine.
And if you’re wondering what my interests in all of this are, well, I’m a biology teacher and my job is to ensure that the next generation knows how to access the scientific literature, analyze it, communicate about it, and above all, maintain a skeptical outlook. Oh, and I like to eat, especially freshly prepared home-made cooking.
John Fryer,
Right now, there are more Escherichia coli cells within your body than human ones. That is normal, healthy and unremarkable. You would probably die if they were eliminated. Look-up “Intrinsic Factor.”
Laboratory strains of E. coli are also nonpathogenic. In fact most could never survive “in the wild.”
E. coli is not “spliced into” anything. The term is meaningless.
The genes that have been spliced into commercially-available plants are, to the best of my knowledge, not even originally FROM E. coli: I believe they are all from Agrobacterium tumefaciens, an organism that normally and naturally inserts its own genes into plants the world over, and Bacillus thuringiensis, the same B. t. that is so frequently sprayed on Organic produce “up to the day of harvest” because it can produce and contain toxins against specific pests. Different B. t. varieties produce different toxins, each of which affects only a well-documented, well-circumscribed group of insect pests, and does not affect other organisms. But the origins of the specific genes are not important, so even if I’m wrong, it doesn’t matter.
Genetically-engineered peanuts (Arachis hypogaea) in the sense you seem to be using are not available, but are being developed, at least partly in an effort to eliminate the ten or so proteins they normally contain that some people have allergies to. There are varieties that have been bred for millennia as crop plants, but I don’t recommend trying to eat the wild ancestral varieties, as they are likely very toxic (I know wild Phaseolus lunatus is). That peanut allergies may be on the rise has nothing to do with genetic engineering, but may be related to human lifestyle or better reporting.
I seriously doubt that any available “sprouts” are of genetically engineered plants, and certainly not Trigonella; David has pointed-out that minor crops are not, and likely will not be so manipulated, just from the economics.
“Yield Drag” doesn’t mean what you think it means. It just means that the years spent developinng a genetically-engineered variety is time lost relative to the breeding programmes beside it. It COULD be that some aspect of the genetically engineered variety’s metabolism is a bit messed-up, or that there is a resource cost to it in producing some new protein or changing its rate of production of some existing one, but that happens all the time time in regular plants. If the genetically engineered trait is valuable enough, farmers will still choose to plant that variety, as the maximum possible yield of the other varieties might not be realizable in the presence of the pest (or whatever) the genetically engineered trait addresses. Look it up. Look ALL this up.
Read Nina V. Federoff’s book “Mendel in the Kitchen: A Scientist’s View of Genetically Modified Food.” Please.
Mr. Fryer, There is no way that the illnesses associated with sprouts in Europe have anything to do with GMOs.
Imagine that you were in the business of selling sprouts. What seeds would you sprout?
For many of the plant species one might use as sprouts, there are no GMO seeds available. I haven’t seen any company offering fenugreek seeds.
If you were sprouting seeds of a variety for which there was a GMO choice, the GMO seeds would be more expensive. You would buy them only if the advertized trait was of value to you. Since weeds are not a problem for sprouts, you certainly wouldn’t pay anything for a herbicide tolerance trait. Likewise, you wouldn’t have a problem with lepidopteran insect pests so you wouldn’t be paying anything for a Bt trait.
If you were to care nothing about the cost of the seeds, there is still that fact that no variety of seed you would be likely to sprout is legally available in Europe.
Hi
My sincere apologies for calling people liars.
Everybody here does seem very honest and sincere and I do not want to spread misinformation any more than I need to be fed misinformation.
I have learnt several very important facts or bits of information.
First the loss of the bees. How can they just disappear. They cant. And someone here suggested a new type of bird ate them.
This made me link the sudden large scale death to bats and CCD. Any relation here? This is how my brain works.
We do have problems with bees and it is not sudden as the name collapse indicates but was a problem to Rachel Carson who basically put a lot of blame on organochlorine compounds and the new organophosphates. Today we can add whole new types of killer chemicals to add to all the old varieties.
Does splicing in Bt Toxin give a whole new concept to insecticides.
I in my simplicity cannot distinguish between chemicals or novel foods (GMO) designed to kill harmful insects stopping at just those. The monarch butterfly debate was argued by both sides but failure to resolve the issue just leads naturally from monarch butterflies (who cares about them?) to bees where there is huge concern (no pollinators no insect pollinated fruit unless farmers go around each of their plants with a brush).
The other thing important I learned was creepy and that was the notion that AIDS or those with like conditions may be shedding dangerous E Coli. This has yet to be proven to my satisfaction but the link of E coli and SV40 and the origin of GMO then called hybridisation is too close for comfort if this fact is found true.
Just tofinish with my sincere apology and the need to provide safe futures as we are effectively guarding a planet already too dangerously polluted, over exploited and in overdue need of recuperation.
Hi John,
Our planet is not over polluted and so on.
Look at Europe: wolves are coming back, salmon roam the rivers and fish-stocks are in Norway or Island in a good shape.
When I was a boy in the 70ies the Club of Rome predicted that we would run out of everything. Nothing happened what was predicted. A modern diesel engine has 1,6 l volume and 200 hp whereas it needs less than 8l/100km or less than 2 Gallons/65 miles.
For 100km to fly in huge new passenger plane it takes less than 2l cherosine/passenger. AIDS is curable due to genetic engineering not to herb picking in the forests. Yes You may be right in the assumption that the polychemotherapy in AIDS is supporting multiresistencies in bacterias/fungi. Due to AIDS we encounter a small but right now not solvable problem of a resistant-malignant bacterium tuberkulensis. Who suffers of this bug is closed away in prison like sanatories in Bavaria.
It has to be mentioned that in Germany AIDS is allocated to a special way of life and/or drug addiction. The other AIDS cases are from Africa.
Dr Rader
You missed my point about Dijon mustard being CONTAMINATED with GMO seeds?
I agree entirely that there is no GMO in Thompson & Morgan seeds of ANY type.
But contamination is possible and we have European evidence for this contamination.
How can an investigation be an investigation if you studiously avoid the most evident causes.
Using my own style logic look at BSE where again GMO growth hormone was a factor put forward alongside organomercury toxicity and organophosphatetoxicity. Eventually the imaginary cause was placed at the door of the PRION a novel style of illness for cattle. The health effects of the obvious candidates was again studiously denied. Take DIAZINON which is not mentioned once in the 16 million word report and following an 18 month OPEN enquiry where they must have heard DIAZINON mentioned more times than the total words in their report. After the flak died down there was a short worldwide ban on DIAZINON but I fear that it is creeping back into use?
If investigations are restricted they are not investigationsforme but simply a whitewash.
Meanwhile in todays news they claim the POISONINGS and DEATHS are gaining speed again in Germany?
Do we have always to die from IGNORANCE?
Orchid Grower man
Your comment on the number of E coli in our body is not news to me.
In fact this is the very thing that sent panic through me and that of Professor Pollack back in 1972 when Paul Berg was doing just this to break up and reform DNA sequences.
He let loose a cascade of new gene variations in an organism that had stabilised over millions of years.
Described well as the opening of PANDORAS BOX.
Although AIDS was first brought to our attention in the bath houses of California you can find indications of a new killer illness of the AIDS type in a California woman in 1975. I am still searching to find her type of employment which I predict may be in the microbiological industry but this is hypothesis.
Just to reiterate E Coli is NOW known to be ESSENTIAL to human life and it is so sad that it has now become an organism to fear as well as need.
E. coli is, always was, and always will be anything BUT “stable.” That’s the point of the discussions on the German outbreak.
And if you continue to assert that HIV is somehow artificially created, you must present some evidence that addresses how then the simian viruses are so similar, and why the normal process we see with so many other viruses jumping hosts does not apply as the most parsimonious explanation of its origin.
“He let loose a cascade of new gene variations in an organism that had stabilised over millions of years”
As an experienced and professional expert on E. coli since before The time of Paul Berg’s announcement, I can state categorically this statement is completely factually wrong. It shows complete ignorance of well established highly relevant biology. You mention John, reading about Nina Fedoroff’s book on the subject. Why don’t you get it and read it and think about it. That would help you a lot, rather than shifting to having opinions about her motivations without thinking about the facts of known biology.
GMO food has not been here for long and my concerns are definitely geared to safety issues but even looking at non safety issues there is evidence that not all has been going well.
Claims of being able to feed the poor are for me not true (avoiding that word I am now banned from using).
Looking for information on Nancy Fedoroff’s book I find she is in a powerful position to lobby in either way for or against novel foods.
But the food riots of 2008 came up and Wiki have done a page about this.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007%E2%80%932008_world_food_price_crisis
From 2007 the chart shows a new and worrying departure in food prices DESPITE the fact there is NO SHORTAGE.
Monopolistic Practices again?
Hi my concern is for proper safetyin GMO.
Pollution has increased across the board.
Plastics apart from early forms were non existent when I was a boy. Today we have the Pacific with a floating mass of the stuff twice the size of Europe;
Cod fish in Iceland are in good shape if thats a quarter of what it was when I was a boy.
Life has the habit of adapting to harm so at a quarter of the recent past is quite alarming.
Wolves did not just come back but were put there by mans actions and the sheep that die there have no identifiable creature responsible. Convenient that.
Plants unknown in England were brought over by the Romans and plague us today none the less because almost any herbal remedy is exposed as quackery or worse.
My fear amongst many is that GMO plants too will pollute the planet for ever as introductions before have proved unremoveable.
Pig weed I have mentioned but also other weeds and grasses are taking over and making land impossible to use. Not sure quite why man claims weeds and grasses make farming impossible. This does not seem realistic in todays technological world but thats what the reports say.
http://www.voxeu.org/index.php?q=node/871
Professor Gylfason is claiming our stocks are not good but dwindling and takes no account of the health as in the North Sea the health is also something to take into account again because of pollution.
“Having an anxiety reaction to genetically modified foods?” Find help for your condition at http://understandingpanicattacks.net/panic-attacks-cured/
Eric
I am not having an anxiety attack but as an intelligent person demand proper labelling.
I gave the example of Fukushima. People in the nuclear business tell us in all their apparent honesty that we can take a Fukushima every day and not worry.
It might be interesting to know what you think of other specialists narrow view to catastrophe.
Whatever the cause sudden death or permanent illness to people from eating what a long time ago was actually very healthy for us is no matter to make fun of those like me who dont have PhD’s in biotechnology.
However if Professor Pollack who is an expert warned of harm in 1972 of an illness unknown until 1981 then we have a problem.
If we can find the real reason for all these people dying or getting ill the problem is over.
Dont you get worried when thousands get ill and from day one they put the worlds least qualified person John Dalli who OK’s GMO crops for Europe and he says WE WILL NEVER KNOW THE CAUSE.
To me its a bit like Fukushima and all those who say what is the problem and it is not the fault of plutonium but of nature.
We need to take responsibility and in my life time there is always denial Nuclear power is 100 per cent safe or failure even to look at causes however improbable.
I have a feeling what is at the bottom of this but people keep you at arms length.
What is happening in Europe today is commonplace in GMO accepting countries.
Argentina for example has this number of bleeding disorders and it is an accepted problem.
In Europe I repeat it is relatively new and John Dalli and the GMO acceptors will lead us to a world where it is as normal as in GMO nations.
As a retired person this problem is of limited problem to me but for those yet to be born they need when old enoughto realise the affects of past GMO pollution.
GMO pigweed was not made by man but clearly comes from GMO pollution.
My argument is why not E Coli deaths from newly established GMO pollution in Europe.
There is an easy answer but first comes RECOGNITION.
If we obfuscate the recognition then even my idea of the answer will be too late.
1982 first cases of HUS in USA
This did not happen in France (GMO refuser) until decades later when GMO began tobe imported by forced USA trade agreements to get GMO in WITHOUT LABELLING.
I have had a smaller dose of this illness and know a large proportion of my friends who suffered at the same time several years ago.
If watching your body bleed without control and cured by eating ORGANIC is anxiety then I got it big time and silly write ups are not the cure that I found worked.
John,
It would be helpful if you stayed on topic. You’ve raised so many unrelated issues that your point is impossible to determine. Unless your point is to show that you have far more unfounded concerns than anyone else.
Hi Loren
I accept your superior knowledge.
I also would imagine using the bacteria you mention is a whole lot safer than using E coli but the use of any bacteria, any virus or any antibiotic marker cannot be risk free.
I reiterate I am no expert on E Coli or other bacterial harm from splicing into foods and other living matter. Splicing may not even be the correct way to describe this.
The history of GMO is not 15 years old but at least 40 years old and you can imagine that things have happened in this time that many experts would wish to be buried.
E Coli splicing with SV40 must be one. Professor Pollack had it worked out from his knowledge. The biological warfare centre spent a hectic two years working on the techniques and its potential.
Now 40 years later Europe is facing a health disaster that needs people who are qualified and knowledgeable to find why dozens have died and thousands will need very expensive medical treatment for life.
My knowledge is zero on current GMO but I have witnessed problems in the past and the spread into the environment.
I already said that in 1971 there was no major illness that we needed to worry about.
Since then many completely new illnesses are claiming lives at unacceptable rates and many mild illnesses have become killer illnesses.
As a biologist you must realise it is most unusual for illness to get more serious.
For me killer flu and killer E Coli et al may in fact be novel illnesses that are grouped alongside illnesses that we have had for many many years.
Is there any reason why we shouldnt put GMO in as part of the complete investigation into deaths in Europe not seen before in our history or must we accept John Dalli and rest ignorant of its true cause?
Hi Loren again
You have never heard of splicing E coli into living matter?
Try this reference the first I found from 1978.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC411453/pdf/pnas00015-0236.pdf
A BERK wrote this three years before AIDS was normally recognised as being a serious killer illness distanced as much as is scientifically acceptable from such experiments.
Presumably it wasnt the first time as we know Paul Berg got the credit for such experimentations and the tip of a veritable ICEBERG of the contamination now in our world that we have to live with to our cost in Europe at the moment.
Mr Rader
You say there is absolutely no GMO in our sprouts but many of the plant constituents have been GMO’d eg soya, mustard and alfalfa and even with predictions of bleeding disorders to come from such experiments.
I have failed miserably to find GMO fenugrec which is very closely linked to harm but get worried that every source claims the stuff is GMO FREE. Why the claim if no one has mucked about with the purity of this plant?
Can anyone confirm whether this has ever been GMO’d and if so how?
John, I absolutely don’t know how to reason with you any more plainly.
These E. coli incidents are in Europe.
The fact that many soybeans are genetically modified in North and South America should not have anything to do with Europe, and nobody uses GMO soybeans for sprouts even in America for reasons I thought I explained clearly. GMO alfalfa also exists in North America but is not used in Europe and GMO alfalfa is not used for sprouts anywhere. “Mustard” is a rather vague term that applies to several greens and to the best of my rather limited knowledge the mustard that has been genetically modified in Europe, Sinapis alba, is not used as a mustard green, but as a pungent spice. It is herbicide tolerant and therefore would not be used for sprouting, even notwithstanding it being illegal to use as a food. So-called mustard greens are in the genus brassica.
You suspect that fenugreek must have been genetically modified because everyone denies it. Is there any way to present information that would get you to reconsider your beliefs.
John Fryer,
It has been explained to you directly why it is irrational at best to claim any link between E. coli pathogenic strains and “GMO.” It has been explained to you why this is so. You have been pointed to articles on this site and to other sources that could explain it to you.
Whatever this “bleeding disorders” you talk about in anecdotes is, please either stop or provide something besides oblique anecdotes.
Please define “GMO pollution.”
Dop you have any sort of reference to the nefarious plot (Bwa-ha-ha-haa) to “GMO began tobe imported by forced USA trade agreements to get GMO in WITHOUT LABELLING” and whatever it is you are saying it caused actually happening, besides hysterical catastrophizing and anecdotes?
There is no such thing as “GMO Pigweed.” It’s a misleading made-up name. There are a lot of plants that naturally have unusual resistance to glyphosate (Calystegia being one), and some that have acquired increased resistance due to mutation and selection: the same would be true if there never were any genetically engineered plants.
Please read an introductory book on Botany. Then read Federoff’s book. THEN come back.
Your implicit claim that somehow the western food system is less healthful and safe now than at some unspecified past point is patently false. Aflatoxin, ergotism, and dicoumarin are much less prevalent than they once were. (For an example of “bleeding disease” please look-up dicoumarin.) Do not confuse better surveilance with increased incidence. What was once called “stomach flu” is now well-known to frequently be caused by food contamination, and so now we know better how to reduce its incidence.