Fear of science will kill us

[Hawke]

Source:
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/04/13/specter.denying.science/index.html?hpt=C1

(CNN) -- American denialism threatens many areas of scientific progress, including the widespread fear of vaccines and the useless trust placed in the vast majority of dietary supplements quickly come to mind.
It doesn't seem to matter how often vaccines are proved safe or supplements are shown to offer nothing of value. When people don't like facts, they ignore them.
Nowhere is that unwillingness to accept the truth more evident than in the mindlessly destructive war that has been raging between the proponents of organic food and those who believe that genetically engineered products must play a role in feeding the growing population of the Earth. This is a divide that shouldn't exist.
All the food we eat -- every grain of rice and kernel of corn -- has been genetically modified. None of it was here before mankind learned to cultivate crops. The question isn't whether our food has been modified, but how.

The source link has the video.

 

[Big Don]

While fear of science MIGHT kill us, FAKE science WILL impoverish us.

 

[Malleus]

Very interesting article and a great video. Cheers.

I'm afraid I'd be a very big proponent of science. My knowledge of GM agriculture is limited, save that I don't believe there's any real threat from eating such crops. I am certain, however, that medical science is responsible for a plethora of benefits to humankind, not least of which is our steadly increasing lifespan.

Which is why this vaccine thing annoys me. I've seen mothers reluctant to give their kids the MMR vaccine due to the sensationalist media coverage of an incorrect paper linking it to autism. It's incredibly dangerous.

A video sorta along the same lines, but done by a stand-up comedian:

http://www.healthy-heart-guide.com/healthy-heart-diet.html

 

[Bill Mattocks]

The author reveals his or her own bias by simply stating what is and what is not science. Dietary supplements? Not science. Therefore belief it in such things is not smart. Vaccines? Science. Therefore belief in such things is good.

While I generally draw the same, or similar lines, and I completely agree that science is responsible for our current longevity, I think science is and always will be a double-edged sword. Blind trust in something 'because it is scientific' annoys me as much if not more than people who think you can take a dietary supplement and instantly lose weight or gain muscle mass.

With regard to genetically-modified foods, the statement is a reducto ad absurdum argument. Of course all of our foods are modified at the genetic level. However, until we learned to directly splice genes, it was impossible to cross a corn plant with a fish. Now we can, and what's more, we do. Pretending that cross-pollination of different strains of corn to increase yields or raise disease resistance is the same as inserting DNA strands that result in resistance to weed killers is ignorant to say the least.

And such manipulations are done daily now. There is no rigorous testing or approval mechanism such as we have for drugs that enter the public sphere; and yet such manipulations may have far more severe consequences on the public health over the long term. We simply have no idea - none - what some of the food we eat has had done to it. No labeling requirements, no testing or approval chain by government regulatory bodies or even independent bodies, no oversight whatsoever. Just chuck it on the market and shove it into our bodies. We don't know what's in the food we eat, no one will tell us, and the government steadfastly refuses to get involved; but they'll line up to tell us how many carbs are in a McMuffin.

Blind trust in science because 'science knows best' is as idiotic as distrust of science because a person doesn't personally understand it. Science has given us cures for dread diseases and the atomic bomb. It's a tool, nothing more. Blind trust is stupid, as is pathological fear.

 

[Sukerkin]

How do you reconcile the sentiment of your last sentence with your stance on religious belief, Bill? I want to be clear that I am not asking a 'hostile' question here, I'm just looking for an insight into how you deal with the logical incompatabilities.

Oh and I agree with you in the above stance too . Yes crops have been genetically modified over generations to favour the characteristics that we want but the abrupt and untestable-until-field GM process is one fraught with pitfalls that are not being addressed rigorously enough (given the consequences if it all goes wrong).

 

[wushuguy]

yeah, some science is fake, sometimes promoted sheerly for profit.

there was one website i saw where doctors admitted that a certain antibiotic produces severe side effects in 60% of the population, yet they still use it without hesitation or regret... after you have side effect from one medicine, they give you another one to counter it, but may also have other side-effects which need a different medicine to counter, etc...

here's another example:
http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/020132sinclair/vaccinaion.htm

 

[Empty Hands]

here's another example:
http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/020132sinclair/vaccinaion.htm

"Vaccination Condemned", "The Germ Theory Exposed", "Toxemia - The Basic Cause of Disease"? Your link is utter ********. This link, in fact, is part of what the author is talking about. Denial that germs cause disease and that vaccination has nothing to do with immunity is the worst kind of non-scientific thinking, and can quite literally kill you. Polio, for instance, is a rarity now in the first world, and not because all the toxins suddenly went away.

So why should we listen to anything you have to say about "fake science" and "science for profit" when what you point to instead is clearly false?

Another post in this thread exemplifies the other denial of science, that which is inconvenient to one's political beliefs.

Is science, or scientists, perfect? Is every conclusion true? Of course not. In fact, science distinguishes itself from other epistemic systems by building in the assumption of error. The important difference is that that error is self-correcting over time, and is continually compared to the real world around us to check it. No other system can say the same. Will you point to religion instead? "Folk wisdom"? Philosophy? What-I-Want-It-To-Be-ism? When anything is determined in this world, it is by using the scientific method with the established principles of materialism and empiricism. Nothing else can tell you if your conclusions or true or not, nothing else has actual evidence behind it.

 

[CoryKS]

While he makes good points, there's a certain irony in the fact that a pro-science author uses terms like "addiction to mindless consumption" to make known his distaste for other people's spending and eating habits. This sort of scientism, this adoption of scientific terminology to lend authority to one's opinions, is IMO a contributing factor in the public's growing distrust of science.

 

[wushuguy]

you got to read both sides of the story. yes, science is not 100% but we can't just deny anything that proves something is amiss.

about polio for example:

http://www.autism.com/ari/editorials/ed_bioterrorism.htm

now I know autistic children, and I've also done research on this because autism affects people I know, so we've also dug up some interesting facts. This is still science, but sometimes science proves itself wrong, in which case it is only people's close-minded arrogance and blind following that prevents them from turning back and changing direction. People do research about autism, it's scientific research, and if they find that there's a relation between vaccination and increase in autism, then that's science still.

statistically:

From 1923 to 1953,before the Salk killed-virus vaccine was introduced, the polio death rate in the United States and England had already declined on its own by 47 percent and 55 percent, respectively. Source International Mortality Statistics (1981) by Michael Alderson."
See page 16.

"Jonas Salk, inventor of the IPV, testified before a Senate subcommittee that nearly all polio outbreaks since 1961 were caused by the oral polio vaccine."
"Official data shows that large scale vaccination has failed to obtain any significant improvement of the diseases against which they were supposed to provide protection" - Dr. Sabin, developer of Polio vaccine.







So it may be inconclusive that some medicines are helpful. Not saying all vaccines or medicines are fake, but there are some that have gained a higher seat than it deserves.

 

[SensibleManiac]

Let me just add that the closer we stay on the path of the scientific method.

(From wikipedia)

A linearized, pragmatic scheme of the four points above is sometimes offered as a guideline for proceeding:[35]

1.Define the question
2.Gather information and resources (observe)
3.Form hypothesis
4.Perform experiment and collect data
5.Analyze data
6.Interpret data and draw conclusions that serve as a starting point for new hypothesis
7.Publish results
8.Retest (frequently done by other scientists)
The iterative cycle inherent in this step-by-step methodology goes from point 3 to 6 back to 3 again.

The more accurately we can attribute the theoris and facts as "science"
My point being that not everything claiming to be science is. Some of it is for special interests and profit.

 

[wushuguy]

science should work for people's benefit, not people work for science's benefit.

we should keep science in it's place and not be fanboys of science, but use it as the tool it was meant to be.

 

[Malleus]

With regard to genetically-modified foods, the statement is a reducto ad absurdum argument. Of course all of our foods are modified at the genetic level. However, until we learned to directly splice genes, it was impossible to cross a corn plant with a fish. Now we can, and what's more, we do. Pretending that cross-pollination of different strains of corn to increase yields or raise disease resistance is the same as inserting DNA strands that result in resistance to weed killers is ignorant to say the least.

And such manipulations are done daily now. There is no rigorous testing or approval mechanism such as we have for drugs that enter the public sphere; and yet such manipulations may have far more severe consequences on the public health over the long term. We simply have no idea - none - what some of the food we eat has had done to it. No labeling requirements, no testing or approval chain by government regulatory bodies or even independent bodies, no oversight whatsoever. Just chuck it on the market and shove it into our bodies. We don't know what's in the food we eat, no one will tell us, and the government steadfastly refuses to get involved; but they'll line up to tell us how many carbs are in a McMuffin.

Great post, and I agree with you about blind belief in something because it comes from a supposedly reputable source. The one caveat I can identify is that the typical scientific process will include release of a paper into the scientific domain, where it should be scrutinized by the community at large. Anything that doesn't stack up should be shredded, and having to revoke a paper can be a crippling event to any scientist's career.

On the topic of GM foods, I agree that 'crop husbandry' is a far cry from genetic manipulation of crops the likes of which we see today. But to the best of my knowledge, there's little danger to eating such crops. The genetic composition of a foodstuff doesn't pose a threat to us as biological organisms: there is no chance of an abberant, artificial DNA sequence 'infecting' our cells and causing cancer, for instance. Genetics simply don't work like that.

More of a concern is what the gene sequences code for. If a crop was designed to secrete a weedkiller that it was immune to, then this could have massive reprecussions for us. We'd be exposed to weedkiller every time we ate the plant. On the other hand, fortifying grains with vitamins shouldn't pose any threat at all (provided that in high doses, the vitamins aren't carcinogenic or any such problems.)

Genes aren't a threat: what they code for could possibly be. As long as we're sure that the genes we're inserting into crops are producing safe amounts of safe substances, there's nothing to fear from the genetic engineering process at all. The argument from artificiality is not a valid one without proof the additives produced are dangerous.

There's also the worry of what happens when these artificial crops cross-breed, and on that topic I'm not knowledgable to comment.

 

[jks9199]

I think the problem isn't fear of science. It's lack of education and laziness in regards to critical thinking. We've reached a point right now in the US where there's a lot of popular science "knowledge" gleaned from TV shows and the like. This is often, at best, incomplete or very simplified and frighteningly commonly just plain WRONG. An example from my field: TV shows like CSI have spread and become so popular that people expect DNA tests to be done in every case, and to have results back within hours. And them to be absolute identifiers. Or they expect us to successfully develop usable latent prints, and to get a response back on them almost instantly. (One of my favorite examples is one episode where someone pulls out a jeweler's loupe, looks at a print they just lifted, and identifies it as the suspects. Without a print card to compare, without any further work. It ain't that easy!) Similarly, shows and movies like Star Trek and ER have given lots of people surface fluency with the words of science -- but not the functional literacy to know what the words really mean.

Critical thinking is another problem. With respect to a few members here on MT, I'll use vaccination as an example. There are a number of correlational anecdotes tying vaccination with changes in behavior that eventually led to a diagnosis of autism. At the same time, solid scientific studies don't consistently support a causational link. Lots of people leap at the correlations -- and ignore the rest. Global warming is another example; the climate IS changing. Why is a more complex question -- and it's not all that clear.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

How do you reconcile the sentiment of your last sentence with your stance on religious belief, Bill? I want to be clear that I am not asking a 'hostile' question here, I'm just looking for an insight into how you deal with the logical incompatabilities.

I am a complex individual, as I suppose most of us are. I do not put every thought, belief, and opinion that I have on the same plane or subject it to the same requirements for belief. My personality supports a mix (and hopefully a healthy balance) of scientific skepticism, artistic yearning, self-protection, and communion with the sacred.

My logical core tells me that with no proof a Creator exists or has ever existed, it is illogical to place belief in religion at all, let alone a specific religion. If I want to be even more critical, Christianity itself is beset with contradictions, logical impossibilities, and historical inaccuracies, not to mention the problem of Paul.

However, having experienced personally the peace of God, communion with my fellow Christians, meditations on the Divine, I find I also cannot deny that my person requires a connection with that which is termed the sacred. Christianity is merely the most comfortable version of that for me, based on my culture and upbringing. I felt the same connection, the same sense of the sacred, when I called myself a 'Wiccan' in years past, so I don't doubt that this need is nearly universal in human experience, and that no one religion has a lock on providing it.

So I do not subject my need for a spiritual connection to logical scrutiny. It would not survive it. However, if I subjected all my desires to that same standard, I would not eat pie on occasion, either.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

The one caveat I can identify is that the typical scientific process will include release of a paper into the scientific domain, where it should be scrutinized by the community at large. Anything that doesn't stack up should be shredded, and having to revoke a paper can be a crippling event to any scientist's career.

One of the problems with the free market model is that science must be proprietary, not shared, and kept hidden for as long as possible. Medicine has an uneasy balance, where tradition and law require sharing of information and peer review, but science in industry for such things as genetic manipulation of crops does not have any such mechanism for peer review or sharing of information.

On the topic of GM foods, I agree that 'crop husbandry' is a far cry from genetic manipulation of crops the likes of which we see today. But to the best of my knowledge, there's little danger to eating such crops. The genetic composition of a foodstuff doesn't pose a threat to us as biological organisms: there is no chance of an abberant, artificial DNA sequence 'infecting' our cells and causing cancer, for instance. Genetics simply don't work like that.

On the contrary...

First, it is not so much what the genes inserted into the crops will do to our genetics, it is how they express themselves in unknown ways in the crops or food animals in which they are inserted. Prions, as I'm sure you know, give rise to incurable and untreatable diseases in some cases, and they're nothing more than proteins. We know that huge sections of genetic material once thought of as 'dark' may well have functions we simply do not understand yet, and they may express themselves in a variety of ways.

Second, I just read yesterday a news report about a study which shows that parts of our own DNA are composed of ancient retrovirii which self-destructed in reverse-transcribing their RDA into their host (human) DNA. What does it do? No idea. Could be benign, but some endogenous retroviruses have been suspected in certain cancers. Some companies that go GM food engineering are experimenting with RNA silencing as well, not to mention intron manipulation - which gets us back to exons and yes, prions producing proteins once more. Introduce a retrovirus? Who knows?

More of a concern is what the gene sequences code for. If a crop was designed to secrete a weedkiller that it was immune to, then this could have massive reprecussions for us. We'd be exposed to weedkiller every time we ate the plant. On the other hand, fortifying grains with vitamins shouldn't pose any threat at all (provided that in high doses, the vitamins aren't carcinogenic or any such problems.)

There are secondary issues. An example is the weedkiller resistance. As this occurs, farmers are able to dump massively increased amounts of weedkiller (primarily Roundup) on their crops without damaging them. This increases runoff and pollutes watertables. It even makes it into our drinking water in many places. Hope you like weed killer, you're possibly drinking it.

Despite occasional public news-bytes that tell us how GM food is going to put things that are healthy for us (omega-3 fatty oils) into food that would normally not have any, most GM engineering is designed to satisfy market requirements. Food is engineered primarily to resist pesticide application, resist typical pests or diseases, stay fresh-looking longer, be more resistant to damage during transportation, and taste better. There is no capitalist impetus to make the food better (healthier) for us. That would only come from government regulation, and the government doesn't (in the US, anyway).

Genes aren't a threat: what they code for could possibly be. As long as we're sure that the genes we're inserting into crops are producing safe amounts of safe substances, there's nothing to fear from the genetic engineering process at all. The argument from artificiality is not a valid one without proof the additives produced are dangerous.

I disagree. The re-sequenced DNA modification is done to achieve a particular purpose, and it is tested and judged successful based on the results of that requirement. Side-effects must be obvious and relatively rapid in order to be considered as show-stoppers to release. We must accept that in the world of DNA, what we don't know about how genes express themselves in ways other than where we are looking is huge, vast. The bar should be far, far, higher than it currently is (which is virtually no bar at all, by the way).

There's also the worry of what happens when these artificial crops cross-breed, and on that topic I'm not knowledgable to comment.

The next generation of GM crops may be sterile in the second generation, which requires farmers to repurchase seed each year, and puts a stop to that fear.

However there are other issues. We are essentially working towards a single genetic expression of every given plant; in other words, a corn plant from a GM supplier is genetically identical to every other plant from that supplier. No diversity at all, which means that any disease or pest which adapts to eat or destroy that plant will be able to destroy them all. No hybridization means they are at a genetic dead-end evolutionarily speaking; they cannot mutate to adapt.

On a more commercial aspect, farmers are being sued - successfully - by GM crop makers for allowing GM seed to blow from one field onto another and germinate, even if it was not only unintentional, but despite the best efforts of the farmer to keep it from happening. Increased crop yields from GM crops ensure that farmers are essentially locked into a cycle of having to purchase what their neighbors do, or suffer lower yields and less money (high yields drive down prices, so they lose money if they don't keep up).

We also have issues of monopoly which are essentially left unaddressed and unrecognized in the US. Given current trends, there will shortly be only one or perhaps two producers of seed for all crops grown commercially in the US, and all of it will be identical genetically.

This seem like a good idea to anyone?

 

[cdunn]

From 1923 to 1953,before the Salk killed-virus vaccine was introduced, the polio death rate in the United States and England had already declined on its own by 47 percent and 55 percent, respectively. Source International Mortality Statistics (1981) by Michael Alderson."
See page 16.

An amazing version of cherry-picking the data. It is perhaps unfortunately poorly known, but the rate of disease within a population always fluctuates, wildly. Here is the rate data for polio. Here is the data for another example, measles. You'll note a cyclical nature to them, one that outright ends with the introduction of introduction of the vaccine, which brings a flatline.

The largest problem with the sciences today stem not from the technological progress being made, but with the ease of spreading disinformation coupled with extremely poor education involving the understanding of risk factors and science-based decision making. The public becomes the battleground of entrenched interests, the ill-informed, the paranoid, and the opportunist. There is a requirement of policy, of risk and expense calculations, things which simply cannot be done in the firestorm of shrieking.

(And yes, GM crops are six kinds of screwed up. Thank you, Oh Most Holy and Perfect Captialistic Market.)

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Lots of people leap at the correlations -- and ignore the rest. Global warming is another example; the climate IS changing. Why is a more complex question -- and it's not all that clear.

Absolutely agree. However, the concept of global warming has jumped the fence into the realm of belief. One may not entertain a scientifically valid skepticism regarding anthropogenic global warming; global warming itself has become conflated with anthropogenic causes, and if one rejects or even expresses doubts about the latter, one is the enemy of the now-rigid belief in the former, and one must perforce be derided, subjected to ridicule, and otherwise disposed of.

Here's another example that has been in the news lately, which I feel also illustrates your point; the Large Hadron Collider.

When the LHC first began to make the everyday news, there had been a fear raised by some that it might produce dangerous stable microscopic black holes, which could destroy the planet.

The core scientific issue was and is valid; some scientists expressed a level of concern, and most scientists disagreed that this was a concern. No problem so far.

However, the public forced this issue from the realm of science into the realm of belief. One either thought the LHC was perfectly safe, or one was a crackpot, lunatic, or a conspiracy buff.

The idiocy of those who immediately claimed that the LHC was safe has been made clear. Those same persons have since crowed mightily about the fact that we have not all vanished in puff of smoke when the LHC was first powered on, when it first began to produce collisions, and when the power was first elevated above that of any collider yet tested. None of these were the points identified by the scientists who suggested that there might be danger. The LHC has not yet, in fact, reached the power levels identified by the original scientists who expressed fears and doubts; so we still do not know if any of their fears are valid or justified.

And none of those who adopted the safety of the LHC as an article of faith took any stock of the fact that none of the scientists who expressed confidence that the LHC would not produce stable black holes have said that it unequivocally will not do so; only that it is unlikely. That means that even in their own opinions, it could.

This is an example of blind faith in science, simply because it is 'scientific'. I am reminded that once upon a time, science stated that rocks do not fall from the sky, and imprisoned men who claimed to have seen them do so. We laugh at those 'scientists' now, and naively believe we have the answers they once lacked; but future generations will find us as primitive and superstitious regarding what we call science now as we do our predecessors. We are not the ne plus ultra.

 

[Sukerkin]

I want to compliment my fellow posters on some wonderful contributions to this thread.

It is one of 'those' subjects that it is hard to not take to extremes and, oddly, easy for emotional responses to slip their chases.

Hearty "well-dones" all round.

 

[Malleus]

I just read yesterday a news report about a study which shows that parts of our own DNA are composed of ancient retrovirii which self-destructed in reverse-transcribing their RDA into their host (human) DNA. What does it do? No idea. Could be benign, but some endogenous retroviruses have been suspected in certain cancers. Some companies that go GM food engineering are experimenting with RNA silencing as well, not to mention intron manipulation - which gets us back to exons and yes, prions producing proteins once more. Introduce a retrovirus? Who knows?

Yes, I'm familiar with the concept of retroviruii contributing to our genome. However, retrovirii are only one means of transfecting cells with desirable genes. If they are utilized, their entire genetic component is gutted (apart from the elements that allow it to upload its payload into the target genome: reverse transcriptase etc) and replaced with the gene that we wish to express. Thus, it can incorporate this gene into the plant, but without the requisite genes to copy itself, there will be no other retrovirii produced, rendering the danger to us from accidental transfection null.

I'm afraid I don't understand your concerns regarding exons, introns and prions. True, prions are implicated in certain diseases, not least CJD. However, they are a protein product. They are detectable. They will, by definition, be produced from the exon sequence of the genome, if produced at all: thus it is possible to monitor for them.

You say that GM foods are not regulated, and this appears to be untrue. From wikipedia:

The starting point for the safety assessment of genetically engineered food products is to assess if the food is "substantially equivalent" to its natural counterpart.[12] To decide if a modified product is substantially equivalent, the product is tested by the manufacturer for unexpected changes in a limited set of components such as toxins, nutrients or allergens that are present in the unmodified food. If these tests show no significant difference between the modified and unmodified products, then no further food safety testing is required. The manufacturers data is then assessed by an independent regulatory body, such as the Food and Drug Administration.
However, if the product has no natural equivalent, or shows significant differences from the unmodified food, then further safety testing is carried out.[12] A 2003 review in Trends in Biotechnology identified 7 main parts of a standard safety test:[13]

1. Study of the introduced DNA and the new proteins or metabolites that it produces;
2. Analysis of the chemical composition of the relevant plant parts, measuring nutrients, anti-nutrients as well as any natural toxins or known allergens;
3. Assess the risk of gene transfer from the food to microorganisms in the human gut;
4. Study the possibility that any new components in the food might be allergens;
5. Estimate how much of a normal diet the food will make up;
6. Estimate any toxicological or nutritional problems revealed by this data;
7. Additional animal toxicity tests if there is the possibility that the food might pose a risk.

Despite occasional public news-bytes that tell us how GM food is going to put things that are healthy for us (omega-3 fatty oils) into food that would normally not have any, most GM engineering is designed to satisfy market requirements. Food is engineered primarily to resist pesticide application, resist typical pests or diseases, stay fresh-looking longer, be more resistant to damage during transportation, and taste better.

Be this as it may, all of those attributes (though perhaps not improved taste) are vitally important in addressing those countries that suffer from food shortages. And that isn't to say that GM food won't be made healthier for us either.

I disagree. The re-sequenced DNA modification is done to achieve a particular purpose, and it is tested and judged successful based on the results of that requirement. Side-effects must be obvious and relatively rapid in order to be considered as show-stoppers to release. We must accept that in the world of DNA, what we don't know about how genes express themselves in ways other than where we are looking is huge, vast. The bar should be far, far, higher than it currently is (which is virtually no bar at all, by the way).

And I'll have to disagree with this. As shown by my Wikipedia quote above (not the most reputable source TBH, but their referencing seems to stand up to casual scrutiny), the bar is quite high for safety testing. I'd happily eat foodstuffs that have passed this testing, and in all honesty, probably do.

The next generation of GM crops may be sterile in the second generation, which requires farmers to repurchase seed each year, and puts a stop to that fear.

However there are other issues. We are essentially working towards a single genetic expression of every given plant; in other words, a corn plant from a GM supplier is genetically identical to every other plant from that supplier. No diversity at all, which means that any disease or pest which adapts to eat or destroy that plant will be able to destroy them all. No hybridization means they are at a genetic dead-end evolutionarily speaking; they cannot mutate to adapt.

If crops are sterile, then they're obviously not going to be able to adapt to environmental stressors such as disease, correct? It's a moot point. Hopefully if such a situation arises the next generation will be adapted to survive it. And this is not a problem specific to GM foods: any major crop type could hypothetically fall victim to such a predator. True, wild-type corn may have an adaptation that allows resistance to a certain disease: but the vast majority of the crop will die out anyway. If we're talking about a single generation, the ability of a GM crop to survive vs a wild-type will be virtually identical. Evolution, of course, only acts over multiple generations at best. (Bacteria etc being the obvious exceptions.)

On a more commercial aspect, farmers are being sued - successfully - by GM crop makers for allowing GM seed to blow from one field onto another and germinate, even if it was not only unintentional, but despite the best efforts of the farmer to keep it from happening. Increased crop yields from GM crops ensure that farmers are essentially locked into a cycle of having to purchase what their neighbors do, or suffer lower yields and less money (high yields drive down prices, so they lose money if they don't keep up).

Yes, this is stupid. However, it has little to do with the science of GM crops: rather the politics of a surplus.

We also have issues of monopoly which are essentially left unaddressed and unrecognized in the US. Given current trends, there will shortly be only one or perhaps two producers of seed for all crops grown commercially in the US, and all of it will be identical genetically.

This is conjecture, and quite a leap at that. Even if we accept that there will be only 1 supplier of seed in the US down the line, and even if we accept that wild-type grains will become completely extinct: if the end result is the proliferation of grains that are longer lasting, more land efficient, healthier and more robust then their wild-type cousins, I fail to see the problem.

 

[Andrew Green]

Blind trust in science because 'science knows best' is as idiotic as distrust of science because a person doesn't personally understand it. Science has given us cures for dread diseases and the atomic bomb. It's a tool, nothing more. Blind trust is stupid, as is pathological fear.

Science and blind trust are not compatible.

If something requires blind trust, it is not science. Science requires evidence and skepticism.

If I get in a plane science can tell me that planes have flown before, why they are able to fly, and what sort of risks are involved in flying in one. There is no need for blind faith that it will fly, there is supporting evidence and explanation of the causes.

It also doesn't tell me that every single person that gets on a plane will arrive safely at there destination. In fact it can provide evidence that some percentage of people getting on a plane will die as a result.

Medicine has come up in this thread, which seems to be one of the least trusted branches of science. But it's no different. For any drug science tells you that it has, in the past, had some beneficial property in a large number of people, as well as a number of other effects, some negative in others. It also tells us that occasionally a drug will react in a way not yet seen in others. It never says that a drug will do x, only x, and do it 100% of the time.