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I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution?
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Mar 20, 2014 12:13
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? The idea that people are eating too meat and maybe we should cut back meat consumption to their historic levels was not met positively by many goons a few pages back in the thread.
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Mar 20, 2014 12:45
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Tight Booty Shorts posted:The idea that people are eating too meat and maybe we should cut back meat consumption to their historic levels was not met positively by many goons a few pages back in the thread. Reducing meat consumption would be helpful and reduce environmental impacts. However, starving subsaharan countries can only benefit so much from Brazilian soy beans.
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Mar 20, 2014 13:10
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? We already produce enough food for people as is, not even counting the land used for animal feed or animals, to feed everyone with a significant margin left over. It's a red herring though because guess what the major base of the economy typically is in developing nations? And guess what happens when you dump tons of food into that region without any concern for the economy? computer parts fucked around with this message at 13:16 on Mar 20, 2014 |
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Mar 20, 2014 13:11
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? My forage professor once told me years ago, "Only through cattle can we get people to eat grass". Not every crop is suitable for human consumption and not all land is suitable either. You can get cattle off of marginal lands much easier than a decent grade of something else. With time and care, you may be able to upgrade the land to crop production. There is also a significant portion of grain production that is unsuitable for human consumption too. Hail damage, bunting, low protein content, wet harvest, a huge number of factors can doom you to feed quality. The best way to recover that value is to put it through a ruminant, who are way more tolerant of quality issues than monogastrics. There is a definite moral argument to be made for vegetarianism and their ilk but sustainable production does require an animal component to complete nutrient cycles. It is a lot harder to grow perfect organic strawberries than cattle and not everywhere has the climate of California. Cattle where I am from is also a little lower on the value chain; growing Russet potatoes is way more income. When all you can grow is sagebush and drought resistant grasses, you do what you can. We do eat a lot more meat than we should though and curbing the demand for meat would help in a lot of ways but let us not pretend that what a cow eats is robbing somebody of bread here. Eliminating meat, much like GMOs, is not the magic agricultural bullet. Edit: I still owe the thread a huge effort post on organic production and its environmental effects. I just need to be less busy to tackle it with the quality it deserves. Hypha fucked around with this message at 13:25 on Mar 20, 2014 |
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Mar 20, 2014 13:23
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? The thing you're missing here is that you can do a whole lot of things to plants with GMO techniques that isn't well explored due to lack of support from folks like your friends. For example, here are GMO poplar trees that break down nasty, nasty chemical byproducts in the soil. This is the sort of thing that isn't economically profitable so is left in the hands of public researchers. Which have little to no public support and face having their laboratories and field stations burned to the ground. It's not just about feeding people, that's simply the first thing we think of.
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Mar 20, 2014 13:45
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Hypha posted:My forage professor once told me years ago, "Only through cattle can we get people to eat grass". Not every crop is suitable for human consumption and not all land is suitable either. You can get cattle off of marginal lands much easier than a decent grade of something else. With time and care, you may be able to upgrade the land to crop production. There is also a significant portion of grain production that is unsuitable for human consumption too. Hail damage, bunting, low protein content, wet harvest, a huge number of factors can doom you to feed quality. The best way to recover that value is to put it through a ruminant, who are way more tolerant of quality issues than monogastrics. There is a definite moral argument to be made for vegetarianism and their ilk but sustainable production does require an animal component to complete nutrient cycles. It is a lot harder to grow perfect organic strawberries than cattle and not everywhere has the climate of California. Cattle where I am from is also a little lower on the value chain; growing Russet potatoes is way more income. When all you can grow is sagebush and drought resistant grasses, you do what you can. We do eat a lot more meat than we should though and curbing the demand for meat would help in a lot of ways but let us not pretend that what a cow eats is robbing somebody of bread here. Eliminating meat, much like GMOs, is not the magic agricultural bullet. How big is the portion of grain production that is unsuitable for human consumption? I've seen this argument a number of times, but the scale of how large the areas where meat production is the only practicable alternative are is never reported.
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Mar 20, 2014 14:11
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? I don't know if this is true or not, but either way it seems non-sequitor. Even if we didn't already produce enough food, increasing yield is still a positive thing in a vacuum. "We have enough land to feed everyone without GMOs" is not a reason not to use them - increasing yield could still result in reduced arable land/water usage, less labor for farmers in developing nations, and generally reduced environental impact throughout the process. Also the earth's population is going to increase, better to squeeze out all the yield we can now rather than waiting until it's an (even bigger) issue.
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Mar 20, 2014 14:58
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NeilPerry posted:I've got a question here. When I discuss GMO's against opponents they tend to be vegan(as am I though). As a result, the first answer I always get is that GMO's aren't necessary in our food because we overproduce anyway, and that it's simply going to the wrong target(namely, livestock). If we eliminate livestock then we have more than enough food for everyone. I find that argument a bit sketchy though, so barring specific instances of GMO's to combat specific problems(like the vitamin A one), is there a need for GMO crops simply to provide enough calories to the human population that wouldn't be solved by eliminating livestock and fixing distribution? To add to what others have said: the higher the yield of our crops, the less land we need to plant them, the less soil we damage, and the less impact global agriculture has on the environment. If we stop feeding grain to livestock this will still be true. If global population increases more than expected, it will also still be true. A more aggressive development of GM crops could even give us better options for marginal land now suitable only for livestock, if desired. It also absolutely is one of the best potential tools for minimizing any impacts climate change or unexpected pest/disease developments have on global crop yields. Mostly, while we could increase the food supply by feeding less corn to cattle and burning less of it in engines, it's not like we have a choice between doing that or using more efficient farming practices.
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Mar 20, 2014 15:11
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Thanks for the lucid replies, it pretty much confirms what I thought. I myself believe veganism and GMO's are compatible, but most veganists have this affluent white classist mentality with no regard of the bigger picture. Their arguments are always 'why have GMO's when we don't want them?' without any regard to others, and then deflecting it by saying the problem will be solved by veganism anyway. In fact, to them veganism would solve almost every problem, so they feel no further responsibility beyond that. It's like all the anti-scientific leftists gather in those communities.
NeilPerry fucked around with this message at 15:24 on Mar 20, 2014 |
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Mar 20, 2014 15:22
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Separately from pure yield issues, many strains of GMO crops do not produce more yield per acre of land, but they are better able to handle things like less water, or better able to resist weeds encroaching, or better able to resist insect and small mammal attack. Various things like these may not seem to make too much of a difference on a single farm's level, but across the entire agricultural world it would and does add up to a lot less incidental resource usage for the same output.
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Mar 20, 2014 15:26
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The Erland posted:How big is the portion of grain production that is unsuitable for human consumption? I've seen this argument a number of times, but the scale of how large the areas where meat production is the only practicable alternative are is never reported. USA is probably the biggest offender at feeding grain to cattle. Most of the world operates either on grazing(statistics says it's 9 percent of the world's production of beef and about 30 percent of the world's production of sheep and goat meat.) or integrated farming(this is supposedly biggest category, but I can't find the percentage), where cattle gets to graze on fallow fields, get fed crop residue silage or hay.
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Mar 20, 2014 15:40
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Install Windows posted:Separately from pure yield issues, many strains of GMO crops do not produce more yield per acre of land, but they are better able to handle things like less water, or better able to resist weeds encroaching, or better able to resist insect and small mammal attack. Various things like these may not seem to make too much of a difference on a single farm's level, but across the entire agricultural world it would and does add up to a lot less incidental resource usage for the same output. Not to mention the fact that this would be a huge boon to the local food movement. Imagine staple or heirloom crops customized to local growing/climate/pest control conditions. Of course, the same folks who love local food also hate GMOs so there you go...
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Mar 20, 2014 16:30
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Install Windows posted:Separately from pure yield issues, many strains of GMO crops do not produce more yield per acre of land, but they are better able to handle things like less water, or better able to resist weeds encroaching, or better able to resist insect and small mammal attack. Various things like these may not seem to make too much of a difference on a single farm's level, but across the entire agricultural world it would and does add up to a lot less incidental resource usage for the same output. This is true, but I've tried to think of the "effective" yield of a crop in the environment. IE, a roundup ready crop performs equally to or slightly worse than the unmodified version in an ideal environment. However if there are weeds all over your field and you need to spray herbicide, then either roundup ready variety will have a higher effective yield since you can more effectively control weeds, which improves the yield.
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Mar 20, 2014 19:02
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The Erland posted:How big is the portion of grain production that is unsuitable for human consumption? I've seen this argument a number of times, but the scale of how large the areas where meat production is the only practicable alternative are is never reported. For the first point, that can vary quite a bit and is harder to find the numbers for. It is easier to find the higher grade stuff for an individual crop, due to export statistics. Feed grade stuff is not readily shipped and a significant portion of it sells through direct sale from the farm to the feedlot. I have numbers for last year but last year is not a fair comparison due to it being a bumper crop year. Most of it was flagged for export over going into the cattle industry. Also any numbers I do have will be incomplete due to grain companies handling things different and not being so free with their numbers as the government. Actual feed grade quality for wheat is about 1% of the annual production based on crop insurance, though I can't get a breakdown on the million of tons of the lowest graded material for the other classes, at least for wheat. Barley would be more significant for feed but it has a lower utilization for people over animals and generally a farmer is growing barley for agronomic reasons over economic. Rangeland though I can do easily. That information on land use is readily available thanks to the commissions and government land surveys. I am coming from a Canadian perspective, so on the Canadian Prairies, there are 10.9 million hectacres of rangeland grazed by domestic animals. Rangeland can be unsuitable for cropping due to heavy clay soils, loose sandy soils, extremes in slope and being too rocky for farm machinery to work safely, among other issues. Actual cropland still outnumbers it considerable though.
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Mar 21, 2014 11:05
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Solkanar512 posted:For example, here are GMO poplar trees that break down nasty, nasty chemical byproducts in the soil. This is the sort of thing that isn't economically profitable so is left in the hands of public researchers. Which have little to no public support and face having their laboratories and field stations burned to the ground. This is a little dramatic. Bioremediation research has never, afaik, been targeted by anti-GMO protesters, and IIRC the last anti-GMO firebombing was the ELF at Michigan 15 years ago. I make transgenics for a living in a department with a revolving door to Monsanto and our biggest security threat is the dude who breaks in to masturbate to his iPad in the stairwell. The animal rights groups are totally ineffective but the anti-GMO folks make them look like special ops ninjas; the animal rights groups can find us on a map, and sometimes get past the front door, for instance. If you work on TG crops the usual worst case scenario these days is someone destroying your crop in the field, which really only happens long after the basic research is complete and they're into safety trials anyway. You need not shed a tear for the folks mucking around with poplar cyp450s in culture, really. Paper Mac fucked around with this message at 23:58 on Mar 21, 2014 |
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Mar 21, 2014 23:56
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Solkanar512 posted:Not to mention the fact that this would be a huge boon to the local food movement. Imagine staple or heirloom crops customized to local growing/climate/pest control conditions. Of course, the same folks who love local food also hate GMOs so there you go... To be quite honest, a traditional breeding platform could do local customization too.
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Mar 22, 2014 00:55
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The petition states: “Over the last decade, there has been a sharp decline in the monarch population that traverses the American Midwest and overwinters in Mexico. By eliminating milkweed — the exclusive food source for monarch larvae — the pervasive use of glyphosate has contributed to the monarch’s decline. The decimation of milkweed communities, particularly from agricultural areas, is associated with an 81 percent decrease from 1999 to 2010 in the production of monarchs in the Midwest and a 65 percent decrease over the same period in the size of the entire monarch population that overwinters in Mexico. This winter’s annual monarch census in Mexico reported the lowest population levels ever measured, down from last year’s record low.” The petition also pointed out that glyphosate use has increased significantly since re-registration in 1993. Noting that “glyphosate is applied in part to control milkweed but is also detrimental to crops, its use was not widespread until the creation and approval of glyphosate-resistant crops. The rapid replacement of traditional crop strains with glyphosate-resistant strains substantially accelerated an increase in the use of glyphosate, contributing to a significant decline in milkweed communities.” Monsanto killed bees, now the butterflies are next. http://rockrivertimes.com/2014/03/19/nrdc-calls-for-action-to-protect-monarch-butterflies/ They aren't just evil, they are super villian status.
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Mar 22, 2014 03:32
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Ironed Idol posted:Monsanto killed bees, now the butterflies are next. The pesticide believed to be harming bees is not made by Monsanto and has nothing to do with GMO crops. Other than all your facts being wrong, your shrieking comic book view of the world is great, though.
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Mar 22, 2014 03:40
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meat sweats posted:The pesticide believed to be harming bees is not made by Monsanto and has nothing to do with GMO crops. Other than all your facts being wrong, your shrieking comic book view of the world is great, though. http://www.redicecreations.com/article.php?id=25381 yeah about that.
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Mar 22, 2014 03:42
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Ironed Idol posted:http://www.redicecreations.com/article.php?id=25381 Clearly the most credible peer-reviewed scientific study ever done.
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Mar 22, 2014 03:44
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Ironed Idol posted:http://www.redicecreations.com/article.php?id=25381 Do you have any Dees cartoons about vaccination you'd like to share?
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Mar 22, 2014 03:49
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meat sweats posted:Do you have any Dees cartoons about vaccination you'd like to share? http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/05/monsanto-roundup-effects-on-honeybees.aspx Jenny McCarthy not autism son has caused this as well. http://www.statesman.com/news/news/travis-county-infant-dies-of-whooping-cough/nfGYZ/ Ironed Idol fucked around with this message at 03:55 on Mar 22, 2014 |
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Mar 22, 2014 03:52
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Ironed Idol posted:http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/05/monsanto-roundup-effects-on-honeybees.aspx lol someone died of whooping cough!!! monsanto 
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Mar 22, 2014 03:57
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Ironed Idol posted:http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/05/monsanto-roundup-effects-on-honeybees.aspx So, since there is no evidence for just why the IDoA took the bees, it must have been Monsanto's doing. Crackerjack detective work, that.
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Mar 22, 2014 03:58
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Deteriorata posted:So, since there is no evidence for just why the IDoA took the bees, it must have been Monsanto's doing. Crackerjack detective work, that. I should argue you about how a chemical company became a plant company, but I won't. Name one thing Monsanto produced this year, that will save humanity.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:01
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Ironed Idol posted:I should argue you about how a chemical company became a plant company, but I won't. That's not really relevant to anything. What you posted about the bees was complete bullshit. Now you're going for an appeal to emotion since you don't have any actual facts.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:03
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Mercola! That's arguably even worse than citing Jenny McCarthy. The funny thing is, the current scientific consensus is, in fact, that a huge agribusiness-made pesticide is responsible for a huge environmental problem: http://www.thewire.com/global/2013/12/bayer-wants-you-know-it-does-not-kill-bees-bayer-loves-bees/356104/ But because it's not MONSANTO and it's not GMOs, the nitwit anti-science people don't even care! They would rather make up conspiracy theories that fit their specific narratives about who exactly is using magic gene rays to do evil than even endorse credible, mainstream scientists saying "here is an agritech company doing a bad thing" if it slightly diverges from their narrative. Absolutely incredible.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:04
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Deteriorata posted:That's not really relevant to anything. What you posted about the bees was complete bullshit. Now you're going for an appeal to emotion since you don't have any actual facts. Its logged in the Illinois website. Do I have to do all the research for you? edit: Monsanto patents many of the seed varieties we develop. Patents are necessary to ensure that we are paid for our products and for all the investments we put into developing these products. This is one of the basic reasons for patents. A more important reason is to help foster innovation. Without the protection of patents there would be little incentive for privately-owned companies to pursue and re-invest in innovation. Monsanto invests more than $2.6 million per day in research and development that ultimately benefits farmers and consumers. Without the protection of patents, this would not be possible. When farmers purchase a patented seed variety, they sign an agreement that they will not save and replant seeds produced from the seed they buy from us. More than 275,000 farmers a year buy seed under these agreements in the United States. Other seed companies sell their seed under similar provisions. They understand the basic simplicity of the agreement, which is that a business must be paid for its product. The vast majority of farmers understand and appreciate our research and are willing to pay for our inventions and the value they provide. They don’t think it's fair that some farmers don’t pay. you really should source this quote Ironed Idol fucked around with this message at 04:07 on Mar 22, 2014 |
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Mar 22, 2014 04:04
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Ironed Idol posted:Its logged in the Illinois website. You might try doing some research for yourself. You have yet to post anything credible or sensible.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:06
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Deteriorata posted:You might try doing some research for yourself. You have yet to post anything credible or sensible. Yeah, I'll get right on that. Now that the Monsanto shills are out in force, it is kinda funny. Reading your post histories. edit: also I hope even senators don't save you http://rt.com/news/monsanto-roundup-kidney-disease-921/ Ironed Idol fucked around with this message at 04:11 on Mar 22, 2014 |
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Mar 22, 2014 04:07
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Plant patents are 80 years old.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:08
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Ironed Idol posted:http://www.redicecreations.com/article.php?id=25381 I thought it was BT in the pollen that was the issue, not glyphosate. A lot more toxic things have come and gone before glyphosate but the pollen being contaminated with BT is novel at least.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:15
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Install Windows posted:Plant patents are 80 years old. And also aren't what Monsanto uses. Monsanto uses standard utility patents, which are, well. In the constitution and have been around since the beginning.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:15
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Ironed Idol posted:Now that the Monsanto shills are out in force, it is kinda funny. Reading your post histories. I love the fact that every conspiracy theorist is so grandiose that he assumes he is about to change the world's mind on his gibberish issue, and huge corporations are frantically paying people to post agitprop on Some Thing Aw Ful Dot Com to prevent him blowing the lid off the whole racket.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:17
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meat sweats posted:I love the fact that every conspiracy theorist is so grandiose that he assumes he is about to change the world's mind on his gibberish issue, and huge corporations are frantically paying people to post agitprop on Some Thing Aw Ful Dot Com to prevent him blowing the lid off the whole racket. You ever play chess?
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Mar 22, 2014 04:18
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Ironed Idol posted:You ever play chess? You couldn't even win a game of tic-tac-toe. meat sweats posted:Mercola! That's arguably even worse than citing Jenny McCarthy. At this point it really starts to seem like the obsessive focus on Monsanto has to be coming from long-term astroturfing from rival seed/farm chemical companies.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:21
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Install Windows posted:You couldn't even win a game of tic-tac-toe. But there are no rival seed/chemical companies, MONSANTO is an evil monopoly. Or so I am told.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:23
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Install Windows posted:You couldn't even win a game of tic-tac-toe. http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-firms/10558-the-worlds-top-ten-seed-companies-who-owns-nature wait, only 4.3% of america is not owned by monsanto. hrrm
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Mar 22, 2014 04:23
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Ironed Idol posted:http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-firms/10558-the-worlds-top-ten-seed-companies-who-owns-nature You couldn't even read the title of the sub-infowars site you're referencing, great job.
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Mar 22, 2014 04:25
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