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When we do have an oil scarcity (whenever it is, 100 years away or whatever) shipping grains around the world will be a lot harder. I think it'd be better if we start adapting now, and eased off of monocultures and such. That's why I'm not a fan of gmo's, commodity crops, etc.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:14
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effectual posted:When we do have an oil scarcity (whenever it is, 100 years away or whatever) shipping grains around the world will be a lot harder. I think it'd be better if we start adapting now, and eased off of monocultures and such. That's why I'm not a fan of gmo's, commodity crops, etc. None of what you said follows from anything else. Like, seriously, you think we'll run out of oil without anyway to move things otherwise, and therefore you hate monocultures and gmos? That makes negative sense. Also the only grains you actually see shipped worldwide tend to be from countries that have tons of it to countries that are in famine situations or otherwise had something happen to severely damage the agriculture system there. Most grain stays in the country it was grown in.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:19
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effectual posted:When we do have an oil scarcity (whenever it is, 100 years away or whatever) shipping grains around the world will be a lot harder. I think it'd be better if we start adapting now, and eased off of monocultures and such. That's why I'm not a fan of gmo's, commodity crops, etc. Did it ever occur to you that we could speed up adaptation of crops by modifying their genetic makeup to better match local water, climate and soil conditions? I mean come on, have you ever grown a plant before? Do you know how long it takes to develop an improved species? Did you know monocultures exist anywhere one particular cultivar is grown in abundance, regardless of whether or not that plant's genetic makeup has been specifically changed? Why is it that folks like you can't bother to take a loving biology class? I mean poo poo, next you're going to complain that farmers aren't able to save their seeds when virtually no commercial farmer does so.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:26
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effectual posted:When we do have an oil scarcity (whenever it is, 100 years away or whatever) shipping grains around the world will be a lot harder. I think it'd be better if we start adapting now, and eased off of monocultures and such. That's why I'm not a fan of gmo's, commodity crops, etc. Absolutely right we need to start adapting now. So I assume you're in favor of increasing our studies in how to better manipulate the world around us through things like genetic engineering and all so that production of these crops can move to a global scale, which would solve the problem of transportation well. Also if somehow we run out of oil before having ANY backups, we'll switch to loving sailboats again before we just throw our hands up and go 'welp'.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:29
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effectual posted:When we do have an oil scarcity (whenever it is, 100 years away or whatever) shipping grains around the world will be a lot harder. I think it'd be better if we start adapting now, and eased off of monocultures and such. That's why I'm not a fan of gmo's, commodity crops, etc. To add to the above responses, biodiversity is a general problem, not inherent to GMOs, and honestly only if you consider basic market-driven scenarios. Genetic engineering actually allows for an increase in crop diversity, especially if crop diversity is a goal, since you can introduce individual traits in any genetic background.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:39
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GMOs being a profit-driven private industry thing mainly at the moment, means the opposite of monoculture. You can't make the big bucks if you're only selling one variant of each crop! You turn out dozens of provably distinct strains every year so you can upsell farmers and laser-target your marketing to different areas and local conditions.
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Jan 15, 2014 01:47
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Install Windows posted:GMOs being a profit-driven private industry thing mainly at the moment, means the opposite of monoculture. You can't make the big bucks if you're only selling one variant of each crop! You turn out dozens of provably distinct strains every year so you can upsell farmers and laser-target your marketing to different areas and local conditions. Is there any research out there that actually tries to guess at the genetic diversity of planted crops? It seems like a non-trivial task to try to figure it out. I guess you would need to first get data on what seed products farmers are buying, and then try to get the information on the genetic heritage of each seed (which I guess are trade secrets). That might give you some idea of the susceptibility of modern crops to specific new pathogens, but I'm somewhat out of my league. Looking at Monsanto's site gives a whole bunch of different products for corn alone, along with all everything else. I also didn't realize that farmers in the US were required to leave a portion of their fields planted with non-Bt resistant seeds so that any insects starting to show Bt-resistance might breed with others that live in the non-Bt "refuge" (this is what I get for reading too much wikipedia, instead of actual sources). This totally seems like a viable way of discouraging insects from becoming homozygous for some Bt resistance gene by increasing the odds that they will reproduce with non-bt resistant mates.
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Jan 15, 2014 02:35
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Slanderer posted:Is there any research out there that actually tries to guess at the genetic diversity of planted crops? It seems like a non-trivial task to try to figure it out. I guess you would need to first get data on what seed products farmers are buying, and then try to get the information on the genetic heritage of each seed (which I guess are trade secrets). That might give you some idea of the susceptibility of modern crops to specific new pathogens, but I'm somewhat out of my league. I'd have to actually look up a source but from my memory, for wheat, there are about 2000 SNPs. So, not a whole lot of diversity between crops. Of course, that does not include land races, which likely has a greater degree of variation. Considering the guard hypothesis however, it is difficult to say how much variation is required to find disease resistance. Not every disease follows the gene-for-gene theory. Sorry I have not given a proper write-up in this thread in a while, I've been super busy.
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Jan 15, 2014 04:43
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Lack of genetic diversity among crops is actually a serious issue. And it's worse even for plants that don't use seeds; like I remember there being a Banana crisis somewhere along the way because all the Banana trees are clones of each other with zero genetic variety and they were being killed by some plague or another. Aren't there studies on these things? There should be.
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Jan 15, 2014 19:39
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Markovnikov posted:Lack of genetic diversity among crops is actually a serious issue. And it's worse even for plants that don't use seeds; like I remember there being a Banana crisis somewhere along the way because all the Banana trees are clones of each other with zero genetic variety and they were being killed by some plague or another. Aren't there studies on these things? There should be. So what does your concern have to do with GMOs?
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Jan 15, 2014 20:10
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This rules. Trees rule. The only potential problem with this is that plants used to help reclaim land, prevent erosion, beautify construction sites, etc, have notoriously become invasive species. But this sounds great for where this type of poplar already has an ecological niche. I guess what I'm saying is GM all the plants.
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Jan 15, 2014 20:23
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Knockknees posted:This rules. Trees rule. The only potential problem with this is that plants used to help reclaim land, prevent erosion, beautify construction sites, etc, have notoriously become invasive species. But this sounds great for where this type of poplar already has an ecological niche. I guess what I'm saying is GM all the plants. I think this is what frustrates me the most. There are a bajillion useful things we could be doing to make this planet a better place to live but we can't because ~DNA~ or ~MONSANTO~.
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Jan 15, 2014 20:33
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Solkanar512 posted:I think this is what frustrates me the most. There are a bajillion useful things we could be doing to make this planet a better place to live but we can't because ~DNA~ or ~MONSANTO~. And honestly, it's probably safer in regards to invasion than an unmodified foreign plant. In this instance, since they'd modified it to clean up chemicals better, they also modified it to not sprout when it dropped branches.
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Jan 15, 2014 20:57
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Deregulating ecosystem regulation and handing it over to for-profit entities sounds like a recipe for disaster.
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Jan 15, 2014 21:54
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V. Illych L. posted:Deregulating ecosystem regulation and handing it over to for-profit entities sounds like a recipe for disaster. That's why I'd prefer to have it in the hands of groups like the NSF and associated agricultural research institutions. After that, I'd like a pony.
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Jan 15, 2014 22:07
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V. Illych L. posted:Deregulating ecosystem regulation and handing it over to for-profit entities sounds like a recipe for disaster. This has already happened.
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Jan 15, 2014 22:13
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V. Illych L. posted:Deregulating ecosystem regulation and handing it over to for-profit entities sounds like a recipe for disaster. No poo poo. However, there should be an active interest in using things like transgenic phytoremediation at contaminated sites, especially when the alternative is abandonment, and any opposition to it should be based in reason and not blind idiot fear.
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Jan 15, 2014 22:22
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Of course. I'm just saying, Monsanto is a lovely company, even if it's not a uniquely lovely one anymore, and giving them and their ilk the reins of important stuff out of a reactionary contempt for other people's reactionary fear would be an absolutely terrible idea.
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Jan 15, 2014 22:31
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Solkanar512 posted:I think this is what frustrates me the most. There are a bajillion useful things we could be doing to make this planet a better place to live but we can't because ~DNA~ or ~MONSANTO~. Do you really think that it's the fear of those technologies which prevents them from being adopted? The kind of people who are scared of ATOMZ or GMOs have 0 political power today. disheveled posted:No poo poo. However, there should be an active interest in using things like transgenic phytoremediation at contaminated sites, especially when the alternative is abandonment, and any opposition to it should be based in reason and not blind idiot fear. The opposition has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with cost.
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Jan 15, 2014 22:52
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down with slavery posted:Do you really think that it's the fear of those technologies which prevents them from being adopted? The kind of people who are scared of ATOMZ or GMOs have 0 political power today. Particularly in European countries, there is regulation with zero scientific basis that destroys any chance of commercial development. It is annoying with respect to food crops, but utterly absurd with respect to uses like phytoremediation. Here's some reading material to get started: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_of_genetically_modified_organisms_in_the_European_Union down with slavery posted:The opposition has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with cost. The cost of developing the technology is quite high. Relative to other technologies, the cost of phytoremediation can be lower by an order of magnitude, so developers would make bank licensing transgenics to clean up contaminated sites.
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Jan 15, 2014 23:10
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disheveled posted:Particularly in European countries, there is regulation with zero scientific basis that destroys any chance of commercial development. It is annoying with respect to food crops, but utterly absurd with respect to uses like phytoremediation. Here's some reading material to get started: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_of_genetically_modified_organisms_in_the_European_Union Sorry, I was speaking from a US perspective. We have no political parties fighting against GMOs or anything like that, but we don't see them because private companies are intent at avoiding any and all liability from the kinds of situations these tools would be best used in (cleaning up polluted sites) so we get half-assed or non-existent cleanups of environmental disasters.
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Jan 15, 2014 23:14
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down with slavery posted:Sorry, I was speaking from a US perspective. We have no political parties fighting against GMOs or anything like that, but we don't see them because private companies are intent at avoiding any and all liability from the kinds of situations these tools would be best used in (cleaning up polluted sites) so we get half-assed or non-existent cleanups of environmental disasters. It's almost like there's a case for government initiated cleanups here.
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Jan 15, 2014 23:26
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
blowfish posted:It's almost like there's a case for government initiated cleanups here. Oh I agree that there is, I just don't think anti-GMO/anti-ATOMZ people are the ones stopping it here.
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Jan 15, 2014 23:30
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down with slavery posted:Do you really think that it's the fear of those technologies which prevents them from being adopted? The kind of people who are scared of ATOMZ or GMOs have 0 political power today. There were two initiatives in CA and WA to basically put scare labels on food that may contain GMOs. they failed, but only because Monsanto et al have really deep pockets. Given that the right takes a giant poo poo on anything publicly funded, it is the shitheels on the left who should be supporting this research but are too busy jacking off to OMG GMOs and other lovely Youtube "Documentaries".
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Jan 15, 2014 23:39
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Solkanar512 posted:There were two initiatives in CA and WA to basically put scare labels on food that may contain GMOs. they failed, but only because Monsanto et al have really deep pockets. Given that the right takes a giant poo poo on anything publicly funded, it is the shitheels on the left who should be supporting this research but are too busy jacking off to OMG GMOs and other lovely Youtube "Documentaries". Failed initiatives to put labels on food are not holding back scientific progress. The Anti-GMO crowd has no political power, they aren't holding back anything.
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Jan 15, 2014 23:56
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WampaLord posted:Failed initiatives to put labels on food are not holding back scientific progress. The Anti-GMO crowd has no political power, they aren't holding back anything. They act as ways to unify popular support against GMOs, scare the poo poo out of people who don't know any better with bad science and make politicians wary of supporting public funding. And come the gently caress on, they've had two initiative campaigns already, and they want to try again in WA and start one up in OR. "No political power" my rear end. This is the popular image of GMOs in WA now:  EDIT: What sort of evidence would I have to provide to change your mind? Solkanar512 fucked around with this message at 00:16 on Jan 16, 2014 |
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Jan 16, 2014 00:07
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Solkanar512 posted:EDIT: What sort of evidence would I have to provide to change your mind? More than 6 people posed in front of a van and two failed ballot initiatives. I don't deny there are a ton of Anti-GMO idiots out there, that's plain to see. I'm saying that they have no political clout, no power, no ability to actually affect significant change. Do you understand the distinction? They can talk about Frakenfoods till the (genetically modified) cows come home, it's not actually affecting anything other than cultural perceptions. Remember the post that sparked this conversation was: Solkanar512 posted:I think this is what frustrates me the most. There are a bajillion useful things we could be doing to make this planet a better place to live but we can't because ~DNA~ or ~MONSANTO~. Name one thing the Anti-GMO crowd has actually done to prevent one of the "bajillion useful things" that we could be doing. For the record, I'm as pro-science, pro-technology, pro-GMO as they come. I just think that you're attacking a boogeyman that doesn't exist - there's no such thing as a powerful and effective anti-GMO lobbying effort.
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Jan 16, 2014 00:25
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WampaLord posted:More than 6 people posed in front of a van and two failed ballot initiatives. They raised $6.8M here in Washington, in addition to qualifying for the ballot. Before industry sources poured money into the fight, the anti-GMO side had a 40+ pt advantage in the polls. $22M later, right at the very end, the pro-GMO side won with 51.09% of the vote. If you're trying to tell me that losing by a percentage point while being outspent 3 to 1 isn't political power then I don't know what to tell you. Other than setting a UW biology lab on fire they haven't succeeded in anything as of yet, expect popularizing the idea that GMOs are dangerous, raising a poo poo ton of money and vowing to do the whole thing all over again the next chance they get. Furthermore, there's no pro-science/technology/GMO group out there (that is, groups interested in promoting research and the like as opposed to just selling GMO products) to counter these groups - the pro-GMO folks won by convincing farmers that it would increase costs, not that GMOs are safe and the opposition is just loving crazy. So in the absence of any meaningful support for public research and a huge groups of people who either hate public funding or hate GMOs, how in the heck can you claim that they hold no power? They aren't that strong, but with no one to push back, they don't need to be. And again, you need to define what you would accept as "actual power" so we can have a meaningful discussion. I'm tired of guessing and then having you say "NOPE".
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Jan 16, 2014 01:03
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The bulk of the public response to GMOs appears to be less explicitly political than economic, in much the same way that food irradiation goes criminally underused despite being perfectly permitted and despite the clear benefits to public health that it offers. We see General Mills, for example, dropping GMO ingredients from cheerios, because people have this nebulous anxiety about them. You don't actually have to ban a practice at the state level to effectively kill it. Market power can be enough, for something that people genuinely care about. Which I guess is kind of sad, comparing the consumer reaction to GMOs to that which they have to, say, sweatshops. Strudel Man fucked around with this message at 04:14 on Jan 16, 2014 |
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Jan 16, 2014 04:12
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These are fantastic: http://jameskennedymonash.wordpress.com/category/infographics/ingredients-infographics/
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Jan 19, 2014 19:58
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As seen in an anarchist infoshop near you:  SO WHAT ABOUT BIOTECHNOLOGY??!
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Feb 15, 2014 03:24
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Absurd Alhazred posted:As seen in an anarchist infoshop near you: Man, I like what anarchists do for animal, lgbtq and worker's rights but oh my god I do not trust them with anything remotely scientific.
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Mar 12, 2014 04:24
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V. Illych L. posted:Deregulating ecosystem regulation and handing it over to for-profit entities sounds like a recipe for disaster. That's really an accomplishment of the anti GMO crowd. The protesting and fearmongering succeeded in scaring politicians and non-profits. There's very limited funding to create GMOs because they'll end up being unpopular no matter how useful they are. There's still plenty of money in them, though. so for profit entities just keep on keeping on. I'd love to see an "open seed" system where useful GMOs are made freely available, but it's just not happening until people can separate their opinions on the corporations and the science.
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Mar 12, 2014 04:42
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Adventure Pigeon posted:That's really an accomplishment of the anti GMO crowd. The protesting and fearmongering succeeded in scaring politicians and non-profits. There's very limited funding to create GMOs because they'll end up being unpopular no matter how useful they are. There's still plenty of money in them, though. so for profit entities just keep on keeping on. It's pretty much mirror universe regulatory capture. There's so much red tape (some necessary, most not) to go through as a result of the anti-GMO activists that large corporations are the only ones with the ability to successfully navigate said red tape.
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Mar 12, 2014 07:58
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Do you think GMO activists with the total political power of Philadelphia's second largest Walmart are the ones responsible for overly complex legislation, or maybe the collection of multibillion dollar corporations that have a huge interest in restricting access to their market? Just a thought
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Mar 12, 2014 08:10
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down with slavery posted:Do you think GMO activists with the total political power of Philadelphia's second largest Walmart are the ones responsible for overly complex legislation, or maybe the collection of multibillion dollar corporations that have a huge interest in restricting access to their market? Just a thought Just a thought, maybe those invested market interests might not want someone hedging in on the organic market with the actual science of it. Its banking on the hippy anti-science bend which is really viable at this point.
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Mar 12, 2014 08:24
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Grognan posted:Just a thought, maybe those invested market interests might not want someone hedging in on the organic market with the actual science of it. Its banking on the hippy anti-science bend which is really viable at this point. So it's the GMO activists fault that the corporations are co-opting their movement and using their endless resources to change legislation. How "Realpolitik" of you. It's always the fault of the left! Is it also the fault of free speech advocates that we're seeing more Orwellian laws being put into place by the Government?
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Mar 12, 2014 08:27
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down with slavery posted:Do you think GMO activists with the total political power of Philadelphia's second largest Walmart are the ones responsible for overly complex legislation, or maybe the collection of multibillion dollar corporations that have a huge interest in restricting access to their market? Just a thought The corps MO for this was patents on transformation technology, like Monsanto and Agrobacterium based transformation methods. Why restrict when you can own a slice of everything? Problem was, it was possible to go around them and it got bogged down in the courts so hard that no one actually made much off the patent before it expired. Companies like Calgene did also try that method as well, to make it harder for their competitors. They blew up spectacularly on their own though, with their legacy being horrible tomatoes and extra red tape. The huge guys in there now bought their seats moreso than founded them. Even so, it is not the GMO activists who really hold the power. It is stuff like the European markets which will kill an entire industry if they get a wiff of GMO. Classic example was CDC Triffid for flax in Canada, where its detection in European bound flax shipments decimated flax production till they could prove that there were no more seeds at all of CDC Triffid out there. Agriculture loves these protectionist tiffs where, if there is an excuse to close the border against a competitor or dump them out of a market, they will use it. GMOs are a wonderful excuse and markets that will turn their nose up at you have significant pull.
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Mar 12, 2014 08:36
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down with slavery posted:Do you think GMO activists with the total political power of Philadelphia's second largest Walmart are the ones responsible for overly complex legislation, or maybe the collection of multibillion dollar corporations that have a huge interest in restricting access to their market? Just a thought Those multibillion dollar corps aren't spending millions of dollars demonizing GMOs. down with slavery posted:So it's the GMO activists fault that the corporations are co-opting their movement and using their endless resources to change legislation. How "Realpolitik" of you. It's always the fault of the left! No, but as someone who's on the left, it's important to point out "my side" has gone wrong, and with regards to GMOs they're taking a clear anti-science route here. They need to deal with that reality.
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Mar 12, 2014 16:13
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Solkanar512 posted:No, but as someone who's on the left, it's important to point out "my side" has gone wrong, and with regards to GMOs they're taking a clear anti-science route here. They need to deal with that reality. If you read what I quoted (my god D&D has been struggling with this lately) he said quote:as a result of the anti-GMO activists that large corporations are the only ones with the ability to successfully navigate said red tape This, in my eyes, is false. The red tape you see that's involved in restricting access to the food market is solely that of the large food producers. Blaming GMO activists for getting anything done is a stretch.
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Mar 14, 2014 05:57
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