Will the Food Industry Botch the Introduction Of Gene-Edited Foods? (sfgate.com) 166
We've reached a milestone in gene-edited food, according to the Washington Post. "Calyxt's 'healthier' soybean oil, the industry's first true gene-edited food, could make its way into products such as chips, salad dressings and baked goods as soon as the end of this year."
Calyxt's soybean is the first of 23 gene-edited crops the Agriculture Department has recognized to date.... Scientists at Calyxt, a subsidiary of the French pharmaceutical firm Cellectis, developed their soybean by turning "off" the genes responsible for the trans fats in soybean oil. Compared with the conventional version, Calyxt says, oil made from this soybean boasts far more "healthy" fats, and far less of the fats that raise bad cholesterol. Chief executive Federico Tripodi likes to say the product is akin to olive oil but without the pungent flavor that would make it off-putting in Oreos or granola bars.
It has earned praise from the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer group that says public health will benefit from ingredients with less trans and saturated fats, regardless of how they were developed.... Scientists in university labs and at companies such as Calyxt are already designing plants that are more nutritious, convenient and sustainable, they say.... [U]niversities around the country are working on plants that will withstand droughts, diseases and the ravages of climate change. Such improvements, underway in crops as diverse as oranges, wine grapes and cacao, could protect these plants in the future while cutting down water and chemical use, experts say....
While Congress passed a law requiring food makers to disclose genetically modified ingredients in 2016, those rules will probably not apply to foods made with newer gene-editing techniques, said experts who had reviewed it. Calyxt has marketed its soybean oil to food-makers as "non-GMO," citing the fact that it contains no foreign genetic material. But consumers are unlikely to accept this distinction, said Michael Hansen, a senior staff scientist at Consumers Union. Hansen argues that GMOs developed a negative reputation in part because biotech companies botched public outreach in the 1980s and 1990s. Should businesses repeat that mistake, he said, consumers will reject a promising technology.
Non-GM foods are already a multibillion-dollar market, the article points out, adding that according to a 2016 Pew Research Center report, nearly 4 in 10 American consumers believe genetically modified foods are bad for their health.
It has earned praise from the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer group that says public health will benefit from ingredients with less trans and saturated fats, regardless of how they were developed.... Scientists in university labs and at companies such as Calyxt are already designing plants that are more nutritious, convenient and sustainable, they say.... [U]niversities around the country are working on plants that will withstand droughts, diseases and the ravages of climate change. Such improvements, underway in crops as diverse as oranges, wine grapes and cacao, could protect these plants in the future while cutting down water and chemical use, experts say....
While Congress passed a law requiring food makers to disclose genetically modified ingredients in 2016, those rules will probably not apply to foods made with newer gene-editing techniques, said experts who had reviewed it. Calyxt has marketed its soybean oil to food-makers as "non-GMO," citing the fact that it contains no foreign genetic material. But consumers are unlikely to accept this distinction, said Michael Hansen, a senior staff scientist at Consumers Union. Hansen argues that GMOs developed a negative reputation in part because biotech companies botched public outreach in the 1980s and 1990s. Should businesses repeat that mistake, he said, consumers will reject a promising technology.
Non-GM foods are already a multibillion-dollar market, the article points out, adding that according to a 2016 Pew Research Center report, nearly 4 in 10 American consumers believe genetically modified foods are bad for their health.
Fristy (Score:2)
Depends. Will it be cheaper, including any fines and penalties, than doing it right?
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Exactly. If the history of how new technology has been used is any indication, we'd better be ready for "Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes" to become a serious problem in addition to a bad movie.
Re:Fristy (Score:5, Interesting)
Sounds fair to me, no?
I mean, we label already for ingredients, % of carbs, sodium, etc....and I think some states even mandate restaurants label foods on the menu....
So, why not do this here too...for GMO and gene-edited and give the consumer the info they need to make their own health choices?
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Oh I'm not arguing against the labels. In fact, I don't think they go far enough. It doesn't protect consumers from products that tangentially use GMOs in their processing (think GM peanut allergies), and it doesn't put any reasonable amount of info on the package about what types of modifications were made, nor does it place any restrictions or reasonable oversight on what type of modifications are allowed.
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It's OK if the manufacturers label it voluntarily, because if it's voluntary they don't have to do it, and so they won't.
If they're mandated to do it that's that's regulation, and regulation is bad because something vague and vacuous about freedom. Don't you watch Fox News?
Re:Fristy (Score:4, Insightful)
Hey, how about they just make them LABEL these new and exciting foods for being gene-edited, and let the consumer decide?
Okay, but make sure also to label all of the foods that were bred with the use of mutagenic chemicals and radiation, which is a more random and dangerous process than carefully-targeted editing.
Of course, this would require labeling nearly everything in the grocery store. Including nearly everything that is labeled "organic, non-GMO".
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Because labels list ingredients, and genetic editing is not an ingredient.
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Only if we get to label everything thats a GMO - in-line breeding or direct selections in a lab. Welcome to half your fruit and vegetable displays wearing the GMO label.
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Hey, how about they just make them LABEL these new and exciting foods for being gene-edited, and let the consumer decide?
Because consumers are stupid, and adding irrelevant information will not help them make better decisions. In the case of the new soybean oil, the relevant difference is the amount of trans-fat, which will be reflected in current nutritional labelling.
99% of the population have no clue as to how genes naturally change, and how food genes have been artificially changed for thousands of years. But a lot of us are aware of the legitimate concern over trans-fat.
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I will make a decision that does not let companies like Monsanto patent lifeforms and form monopolies on our food. I'm sure it will not be harmfull for my body but it is harmfull for the economy and freedom to grow the crops you want.
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Hey, how about they just make them LABEL these new and exciting foods for being gene-edited, and let the consumer decide?
Sounds fair to me, no?
Oooh a label. Why is there a lable on it? What does it mean? I don't know but they were forced to label it so it must be bad. The act of labelling itself has a connotation among consumers.
How about you prove something is worth labeling before you overwhelm consumers with pointless information.
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Hmm..interesting, I never knew this can of pork and beans I'm looking at, with its mandatory ingredients label had "demonstrated and legally proven side effects hurting users"....or, were you thinking of possible fart dangers after eating?
But then, what about this can of corn, or the box of panko crumbs, or....or......
This is about spin, not science/regulation (Score:3)
Depends. Will it be cheaper, including any fines and penalties, than doing it right?
Really nothing to do with that. It's whether the term "gene edited" will be as aesthetically displeasing as "GMO" has become to consumers. I don't see consumers making a distinction between the two. For one, the antipathy to GMO products was never based on science in the first place. Tests to prove safety or increased benefits really won't change consumers' minds. Neither will "outreach". Not when there is an industry based on fear of GMOs that can and will respond to protect its market share.
For another, s
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Meanwhile, Europe has already decided that "gene edited" is a subset of GMO, thus effectively banning those foods from the European market.
That does make it harder to simply blame anti-science Americans for the whole thing...
Familiar Ring (Score:5, Insightful)
It has earned praise from the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer group that says public health will benefit from ingredients with less trans and saturated fats, regardless of how they were developed
Who else remembers hearing the same spiel about how trans fats were just plain better than other fats? Maybe that kind of talk is more relevant to why customers tend to be skeptical than any specific paranoia over GMO/editing/selective breeding/etc.
Re:Familiar Ring (Score:4, Insightful)
This, and only this, will decide whether the introduction of genetically designed food will be received well. What's going to matter is whether we'll be treated with honestly or whether marketing will try to sell us trash as gourmet food.
And yes, of course I know how it's going to end.
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This, and only this, will decide whether the introduction of genetically designed food will be received well.
Sure. This goes by reputation, and reputation is usually well-deserved.
We all know that it is possible to make genetically modified food that is in every way as good as natural. Science makes it possible. But we also knows, that is not how corporations work. Quick and dirty, don't waste money testing too much. Lets have a payout now, and ill effects can surface after 50 years of sales - like the tobacco history. Corporations aren't there to make 'better' food for us. They dream of starting where tobacco wer
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And that's pretty sad, isn't it? It wasn't even a generation ago when people were looking forward to getting the newest and latest, be it technology or anything. You wanted the new gadget, because it was so much better, faster, cooler and more useful than the old one.
Today, you're usually better off with the prior version that couldn't lock you down, rip you off or outright harm you for the profit of its maker as well as the new one can.
Re:Familiar Ring - Just like Coffee (Score:2)
Many years ago a friend told me to watch nutritionist's position on coffee. It seems to switch from good to bad to good again at least one cycle per year. Do I want non trans fat coffee whitener, or the other spread?
Just label it and move on (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Just label it and move on (Score:5, Interesting)
If you stop to look at your argument, what is marketing's excuse if there is no label and it does not sell as they wanted? The answer is that marketing didn't do their job of making people want to buy the product, and if you have a marketing department that can't sell health and environmentalism, the management deserves to be out on the streets.
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It's marketings job to make people want to buy products with the label. If they're doing their job, the label is big, flashy, and reads something like "Proudly GMO"
It's been done before. Better living through chemistry [wikipedia.org] was DuPont's slogan for almost 50 years. While at the end it may have been kind of a joke, it was a solid marketing effort for a long time.
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How about “GMO? More like GMAWESOME!
Compelled speech (Score:2)
There are very narrow conditions where the government can force someone, or a company, to print something on a label. It's called compelled speech, and courts take a dim view of it, even in the more tightly regulated commercial speech arena.
You can say that you need an ingredients list on the label for food allergies. You can say nutritional information is required for health reasons. What is the exact reason for putting GMO/non-GMO labeling on food? Is there a scientifically acknowledged health concern? No
Re: Just label it and move on (Score:1)
"proof of a conspiracy or cover-up"
Well, I mean, it is pretty much literally a cover up. The frankenfood manufacturers DON'T WANT THE PUBLIC TO KNOW what's in their food.
Yeah yeah yeah - "but muh Science(tm) says it's the best thing ever!!1!!!" Sorry, we've heard this before. It's always a lie. The average Joe isn't fooled anymore.
Don't even bother with the fight for labeling. Let's just ban this poison NOW, and pack its makers off to the Gulag.
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Just slap some kind of a GMO label on it and move on. If idiots that believe it's evil or unhealthy want to use something else that's probably less healthy for them, that's on them. The idiocy and fear-mongering will be there regardless
And remember, where there is idiocy and fear mongering, there's money to be made.
Anti-vaxxers are a gold mine for those selling snake oil (like David Wolfe).
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Just slap some kind of a GMO label on it and move on.
Labels naturally carry a negative connotation. The act of requiring the label even more so. It shouldn't be the marketing department's job to convince people that products are healthy, it should be the critic's job to prove otherwise.
Next up: legal obligation to label every food which is not Halal because some people have some feelings about the matter.
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This would ring truer if the arguments against GMOs were more cogent :-\
It is however using the usual hyperbolic reason-free alarmism playbook that works well enough on joe six pack and jane soccer mom and leads to so many other human catastrophes (Nuclear Power and Vaccines come to mind as examples)
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As gene editing results in different food items we put in our bodies ("healthier soybean oil") there's a good argument against its usage: we have insufficient long term knowledge about the consequences of these new compositions.
Trans fats are a good example of what can happen if you introduce new kinds of substances without proper testing. And proper testing is almost impossible to do for dietary items.
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> This would ring truer if the arguments against GMOs were more cogent :-\
"Roundup Ready"
I am fine with a GMO that was created to deal with a crop pest. I'm not so enthusiastic about a GMO created by a poison maker.
It's your argument that lacks nuance. It's not the tech. It's not about being a blind science groupie and treating science like religion. It's about individuals that use technology.
Monopolistic mega corp, versus university professor, versus monk.
I don't trust the overly processed food-like-sub
Re:Just label it and move on (Score:4, Insightful)
That's not a cogent argument at all, you are merely patronizing people. A free market requires informed consumers. The analogies you draw are also fundamentally flawed:
- Whether you build a nuclear power plant or not is a political decision, not one made by an individual person, because many people benefit from the power plant and many people would be affected if there is a major incident. Labeling GMO food as such keeps no one from buying it who wants to buy it.
- If you decide for your children that you don't want them to get vaccinated, then you are literally endangering the life of your children and the life of other children who cannot get vaccinated for rare medical reason. By not buying GMO food, you do not endanger anyone's life.
Not buying GMO food is a customer choice just like not buying some food because you don't like the look of its packaging or the logo of the company. If a company doesn't want that to happen, then they are free to offer non-GMO food. Not labeling food is and always has been nefarious, there is simply no cogent argument for not labeling the nature of food ingredients. You can also easily invent compressed codes or put a link to online information on the packaging.
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The non-nanny-state thing is to have voluntary labeling of non-GMO foods; then you can choose to buy non-GMO foods without forcing anybody to include unsupported "warning" labels.
The reason why the anti-GMO people don't like that is that not enough people agree with them, so they want to try to manipulate public opinion by putting extra warning labels on your food.
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I wasn't arguing for or against nanny states, I was arguing for free consumer choice. Your suggestion does not give customers the choice to buy non-GMO foods, because there is no guarantee that there will be "voluntary labeling of non-GMO food".
Walk into any grocery store today and you will see tons of food voluntarily labeled as non-GMO. This is only a problem in your imagination.
Enforced labeling has to do with anti-GMO scaremongering, not free consumer choice.
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On the contrary, it's a very real problem for me because I live in Europe where (1) almost no food is labeled as "non-GMO food" because there is almost no GMO food right now, (2) US corporations and international corporations like Monsanto have been trying for decades to lower EU protection and food labeling standards, last time it was part of secret TTIP negociations to allow GMO food to be imported without labeling, and they will try again, (3) even with higher standards in the EU not buying any US food w
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On the contrary, it's a very real problem for me because I live in Europe where (1) almost no food is labeled as "non-GMO food" because there is almost no GMO food right now,
...And when there is GMO food in your market (assuming that you are correct), why don't you think that it won't follow exactly the same pattern that we've seen in the U.S.? Non-GMO labels get slapped onto every possible product, because the manufacturers know that some people will buy because of it.
Your argument makes no sense. If companies are producing non-GMO food, and there is any demand for it at all, then why wouldn't they want to label it such? If there's no demand, then nobody will be producing a
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I have to admit that it's annoying that you continue pretend to not understand what I'm saying and keep insisting on your voluntary scheme and anecdotal claims about food labelling in the US ("if you go into any supermarket", "get slapped on every possible product". ) At least you could have provided some figures about how many food products are labelled voluntarily and how many aren't.
I want a guarantee that customers can make a free choice, which requires fully informed customers, which in turn requires m
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I want free consumer choice and I have made clear what that implies.
Voluntary labeling gives you the ability to choose only non-GMO foods, which is what most of the pro-labelers claim they want. We've already got proof of that, based on the what happens in U.S. supermarkets. You've decided, apparently, that I'm lying about that; I can't help that. Do your own research if you're interested. (Which I know you're not; you're just being difficult.)
So the only thing you seem to be wanting is the ability to choose only GMO foods, since some manufacturers may not label their f
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So the only thing you seem to be wanting is the ability to choose only GMO foods, since some manufacturers may not label their food GMO-free when they otherwise could.
You literally don't know what choice means, and I'm giving up on you. You have presented a whacky argument without presenting any kind of evidence - you were neither able to produce any figures about which percentage of non-GMO food is labelled as such and which percentage isn't nor did you present any other evidence besides anecdotal claims - for something completely different than what I have argued for, and then have chosen to ignore my arguments. It's pointless trying to discuss with you any further, ge
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We're not looking to let special interest groups run
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I mean, you don't label a banana, since it naturally comes that way picked off the tree.
A GMO banana would also naturally come that way picked off the (GMO) tree. I doubt you've ever seen a real natural banana—they're mostly seeds. The seedless kind sold in stores is a hybrid which would not exist without plenty of human intervention in the growing process.
GMO vs. non-GMO is a distraction. The only labeling that makes sense along these lines is an estimate of how long humans have been regularly eating food with the exact same DNA and chemical makeup. It makes no difference whether the ch
Uh... (Score:3)
developed their soybean by turning "off" the genes responsible for the trans fats in soybean oil.
"Trans fats" are caused by hydrogenation; they don't occur naturally.
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"... oil does contain very low levels of trans-fat, as do all oils that have been deodorized ..."
And to put that in context:
Two glasses of milk have the same trans fat of a salad made with soya oil.
One hamburger has about 3 times the trans fat of a salad made with soya oil.
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What about one soyburger vs the salad made with soya oil?
Not so simple anymore, is it?
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Depends on how the soy burger made, soy beans themselves don't have trans fats.
Maybe best to avoid soya and canola oils if you want to really want to try and avoid most trans fats.
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Trans fats are formed as part of the deodorization process. It sounds like the heating involved is the main culprit.
http://lipidlibrary.aocs.org/O... [aocs.org]
So this oil is apparently engineered so heating doesn’t produce as many trans fatty acids.
Of course, the alternative is to use oils like safflower and sunflower, which are already neutral in flavor/smell and don’t require the same amount of pre-processing...
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Agreed, Great link too.
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Two glasses of milk have the same trans fat of a salad made with soya oil.
The same amount of total trans fats, or the exact same trans fatty acids ? There are good reasons to assume that the particular trans fatty acids in milk are harmless.
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"The same amount of total trans fats, or the exact same trans fatty acids ? "
Not sure.
"Trans fat is considered by many doctors to be the worst type of fat you can eat. Unlike other dietary fats, trans fat — also called trans-fatty acids — both raises your LDL ("bad") cholesterol and lowers your HDL ("good") cholesterol."
https://www.mayoclinic.org/dis... [mayoclinic.org]
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Trans fat is considered by many doctors to be the worst type of fat you can eat
Agreed, but this in the context of industrial trans fats, which were causing health problems. It says nothing about ruminant trans fats (mostly vaccenic acid) in particular.
Simple question: if ruminant trans fats are bad, why does mother nature give them to the calf ?
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“Deodorized” is not a naturally occurring process.
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Yes, Type44Q was right.
You can even take really low quality soya, olives, or whatever, even ones, make oil, and then deodorize it.
Calyxt seems to be modifying soya beans so they have less saturated fats, which in turn will reduce the amount of trans fats produced by the deodorization process. If that's right it's mainly for the producers: they'll be able to use even lower quality soya beans and deodorize them more, all without raising the trans fat content, and if they can lower trans fats below 0.5% they c
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"You can even take really low quality soya, olives, or whatever, even ones, make oil, and then deodorize it."
You can even take really low quality soya, olives, or whatever, even *rotten* ones, make oil, and then deodorize it.
Atomic Gardening? (Score:5, Interesting)
We're not going to be able to feed the planet if we don't embrace GMO, we just need more some more focus and care.
GMO is not in itself a bad thing or unhealthy in it self in anyway, it can be quite the opposite. It's the dodgy GMO that should be targeted and shunned, none of this Roundup Ready type garbage so we can drench acres in toxic chemicals bullshit. Focus on less inputs (fertilizers and control chemicals) and maximize yield would be an ideal direction IMO.
Or how about modifying pest weeds to make them spread less and grow smaller or not reproduce at all?
Blanket labeling GMO may not be the right direction, we could in theory make a GMO "organic" plant that requires no inputs. Would this wonder plant have to be binned next to the pesticide soaked produce at the grocery store because it's GMO?
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"Or how about modifying pest weeds to make them spread less and grow smaller or not reproduce at all?". They frequently produce by seeds. Birds eat the seeds. So the birds will spread less or not reproduce at all. It helps to think before you act.
Re:Atomic Gardening? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the dodgy GMO that should be targeted and shunned, none of this Roundup Ready type garbage so we can drench acres in toxic chemicals bullshit. Focus on less inputs (fertilizers and control chemicals) and maximize yield would be an ideal direction IMO.
[...]
Blanket labeling GMO may not be the right direction, we could in theory make a GMO "organic" plant that requires no inputs. Would this wonder plant have to be binned next to the pesticide soaked produce at the grocery store because it's GMO?
This doesn't seem to be a scientific viewpoint. Fertilizers and pesticides (herbicides, fungicides, insecticides, etc.) are demonstrably effective at increasing harvest yield. Organic farming that doesn't use glyphosate-resistant crops just use other herbicide chemicals like rotenone and copper instead, which occur naturally. And the produce themselves are naturally filled with toxic pesticides as an evolutionary deterrent. Herbivores and us large omnivores can usually handle it, but say, an onion is deadly toxic to a carnivorous cat.
Or how about modifying pest weeds to make them spread less and grow smaller or not reproduce at all?
Evolution will not allow it. These shitty weeds would be out-competed by natural weeds due to natural selection.
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The only issue I take with GMO at the moment is it's being used to allow increased inputs of things like herbicides. There's nothing scary or bad or dangerous about GMO except for the potential for increase in inputs, wit
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Evolution will not allow it. These shitty weeds would be out-competed by natural weeds due to natural selection.
Not necessarily. While deliberate irradiation can't produce any ends which couldn't occur naturally, nature still hasn't necessarily produced all possible ends. We could still make a better weed by accident. The odds are probably sharply against it, though.
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We're not going to be able to feed the planet if we don't embrace GMO
Even with GMO, you're not going to be able to feed exponentially growing population indefinitely. At some point in time you're going to hit the limits, and the higher the limits are, the more people will suffer.
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> We're not going to be able to feed the planet if we don't embrace GMO
That particular narrative has to DIE. It's total bullshit. We already make plenty of food. We have for decades. We let food rot and fields go fallow to prop up commodity food prices. We simply don't need GMOs to "feed people".
Monsanto GMOs have NOTHING to do with "feeding the planet". They only make your Twinkies cheaper.
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The problem is less with growing enough food than how much habitat destruction is required.
The higher the yield, the lower the number of acres needed, and more land can be returned to a natural state.
If you want to help the natural environment to help prevent more species from going extinct, then you want to reduce our impact on it. Reducing the amount of land we use for agriculture is the first place to start.
Anything that makes agriculture less productive means more land is required and that means more ha
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When you say, "feed the planet" who are you talking about that isn't getting enough food? I would venture to say most people that are experiencing food shortages on a regular basis likely have a failure of basic government as well.
If people are starving in Africa, how much is mother nature versus another band of outlaws coming along at taking everything by force? If their governments were more effective, this wouldn't be happening.
I'm pretty sure we have plenty of usable land and enough water. Those things
It doesn't matter (Score:1)
A lot of consumers know nothing about these techniques and won't appreciate the subtleties of them. They are convinced organic food is healthier and no amount of facts or science will change that. They think every piece of produce should be heirloom and grown by a small farming family on an idyllic farm of rolling green hills and happy farmers. They have a completely distorted view of where their food comes from and how 7 billion mouths are fed. You can't fix it because these positions are emotionally justi
Crisper in EU (Score:2)
An EU court has already ruled that things made with CRISPR must follow the same guidelines as GMOs. Short form -- No GMOs in EU [sciencemag.org]
Perhaps, since an EU member has money in the game, this will be reviewed
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Here in WA state, the GMO haters tried to destroy agriculture in this state with a ballet initiative meant to either murder all of the farmers through starvation or get them to not grow GMO crops. It required them to buy all new barns, storage facilities like silos, new equipment, new trucks, and new distribution facilities in order to segregate the GMO from the non-GMO produce because of "labeling" requirements.
You say there's no reason to not inform, but when it's impossible due to the fact that you have
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But why do liberals have more of a problem with GMO than with cultivars that result from being blasted with gamma radiation to induce mutations? The radiation-curation method of getting a usable variety is like tossing a deck of cards into the air until they fall in some desired way, while GMO is nothing but the sorting the deck the way you wanted in the first place.
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Probably because gamma radiation treatment is never discussed in the media, so they don't realize it's happening ? I must admit I had never heard of it until now.
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It's been used throughout the postwar period, but since much of that time was the pro-science Fifties and Sixties, there were no activists to focus on it.
Good Science (Score:3)
Good Science demands proper verification through peer review and testing for safety and efficacy, that stance is not anti-science as the shills suggest. The pharmaceutical industry manages this, there is no good reason GMO should avoid this burden of proof. GMO offer great potential, but a disaster such thalidomide, DDT, asbestos could set progress back decades.
Re:Good Science (Score:5, Interesting)
Organic should have EXACTLY the same burden. Using chemical mutagens and radiation to cross-breed plants and to mutate the genome and selecting for desirable traits is FAR more likely to have nasty side effects. You should look and see what organic actually allows. For a long time people have used certain crushed rocks or other chemicals to get plants to cross-breed. We now know that most of those are chemical mutagens or radiation sources. I trust gene editing far more than that and all of the methods should be tested.
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Furthermore, asbestos was "organic" in that it was an unmodified natural substance. Everything we use should be tested and held to the same standard.
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"Organic" means nothing except less pesticide use,
As the term is used by governments, it doesn't even mean that. It means no synthetic pesticide use, and no synthetic fertilizer, but it doesn't mean anything about the quantities of approved pesticides and fertilizers.
As the term was envisioned by the people who coined it, however, organic meant cyclical systems in which it was recognized that community health is related to soil health. It was a time when produce was overwhelmingly produced locally, so this was an insightful observation. The concept include
ddt (Score:2)
DDT wasn't really a disaster. It dropped malaria to zero for long enough to get rid of it in many of the places it was used, and the mosquitoes had become resistant so they stopped. No one actually cared about the condors.
I want cold hardy avacados and mangoes.
maybe (Score:2)
Its an interesting idea and it might be true but the evidence isn't in. Tedx isn't ted its just whoever wants to talk. In this case it is better than most, he is actually a PhD in charge of a research organization, but his research is based at least in part on falsified results.
https://www.the-scientist.com/... [the-scientist.com]
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Skinner had a postdoc from Taiwan named Chang handle the vinclozolin research alone, and he seemingly just made up some results. It was later discovered, and the paper retracted. The research was redone, and the paper republished.
Quote from page: "While the specific epigenetic marks found to be transmitted in the retracted paper turned out to be incorrect, the transgenerational effects of vinclozolin exposure are still well documented in other animal studies. "T
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Good Science demands proper verification through peer review and testing for safety and efficacy, that stance is not anti-science as the shills suggest. The pharmaceutical industry manages this, there is no good reason GMO should avoid this burden of proof. GMO offer great potential, but a disaster such thalidomide, DDT, asbestos could set progress back decades.
Then, your good science demands that the same rigorous tests and standards be applied to all food products.
Natural, Pesticide free, Organic, Cross pollination, grafting, Every single method of growing food. Some number of generations of humans to be certain that hidden issues might not crop up.
Because without some pre-defined standard of each item I challenge anyone to make an accurate claim that say, unaltered soybean oil is healthier than modified.
And then there is that bitch evolution. It doesn't t
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I doubt soybean oil in any variety is all that healthy compared to current alternatives. Soybean oil is just a really cheap waste product leftover from making cheap livestock feed.
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I don't know the details, but I think most of the oil is gone from the soy meal by the time it's fed to them.
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I doubt soybean oil in any variety is all that healthy compared to current alternatives. Soybean oil is just a really cheap waste product leftover from making cheap livestock feed.
The winged bean and it's use in the food production revolution might just make the downfall all that much worse when it happens. People who are all concerned about hypothetical effects of GMO foods don't have much to say about soy's general lack of nutrition, or it's phytoestrogen contents. Men should be careful about their consumption of foods like Soy and peas. https://draxe.com/phytoestroge... [draxe.com]
Consumption of Soy products is proven to lower testosterone levels https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... [nih.gov]
Low testo
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Women should avoid it for all the same reasons.
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Women should avoid it for all the same reasons.
One exception. As a natural fertility treatment when a woman has low estrogen. And women are not as affected by being doused with estrogen.
The scary part is the estrogen mimics. These have been implicated in birth defect in male children https://www.sciencedaily.com/r... [sciencedaily.com]
And the really nifty one https://www.wfaa.com/article/n... [wfaa.com]
It is incredibly interesting that there is no national program, no hue and cry to eliminate this problem, other than the BPA mimic issue. It's real, it's proven, and I'll le
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People treat "GMO food" as if all GMO foods are necessarily all the same. We don't expect a Kia Rio to be exactly as safe as a Volvo XC90, so why should all GMO foods be inherently equally safe or unsafe?
Like any other engineered artifact, a piece of GMO food's quality is a product of the care taken in its design and production, and of course the objectives of the producer. At present I'd expect GMO foods to be very safe because public acceptance of GMO is low, regulatory suspicion is high, and the price t
The media botched it (Score:2)
But can we change them? Fear binds the readers, it brings them money.
Don't even try to win over the Luddites (Score:2)
The general public is not going to buy into any artificial distinction between GMO and gene-edited, any more than the tech community was able to sell that "hacker/cracker" distinction. The best strategy would be to openly apply genetic engineering to totally new foods, rather than having it just be a convenience for farmers.
This approach is already working for the Impossible Burger. It's not vegan because it's GMO, but foodies and vegetarians don't care.
Probably yes. (Score:2)
Given their track record that isn't exactly known for its eco- or consumer-friendlyness.
All GM Food Should Go Throught FDA Approval (Score:2)
I think that all GM modified foods should have to go through the same FDA approval process as drugs. If one rouge prion/protein makes it way through, so many people will have a horrible death that the creator's insurer would afford.
It doesn't matter (Score:2)
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we already have such a crop surplus we're using corn oil to make fuel and paying farmers not to grow on land
viewpoint doesn't hold, we can have huge yields without GMO no matter what Monsanto has brainwashed some into believing