Re: GM food approval
Posted: Fri Mar 19, 2010 12:15 am
Thanks for your well-meant advice, Sortanormalish, but if it's all the same to you I'm going to hang on to my vintage wines and whiskeys - 12 years old or not.
I appreciate what you say (whilst not agreeing wholly) about GM, but I don't see where you're going with the water-treatment subject. Are you advocating that we should NOT treat our waste water? If not, what are we to do with it (considering that you appear to be suggesting that it is loaded with nasties)? Merely for the sake of the argument, I'm going to postulate (because I haven't actually seen any data) that no-one in the UK has died from ingesting mains water for at least a century. Certainly, there may be allergic reactions to chlorine - or any of the many other treatments used - but that's a separate issue.
Or are you saying that our water treatment doesn't go far enough (ie we should be adding further treatments to take care of those drugs you mention)?
And, while I'm here, you still haven't told me where this bit came from ...
"Granted GM is resistant even to animals. They actually avoid eating it. In labs when they are forced to eat it exclusively, they die. Do you really have any doubts about 'potential toxicity'?"
... which, if it is a summation of valid research, needs to be shown to the world so that gnarled old sceptics like me would be forced to shut their gobs.
Now, don't anyone get this all wrong - I am not supporting anything here except rationality. If I claim that I have bred a piglet with anti-gravity tendencies, I should be prepared to expose said piglet and his pedigree to the world (after I've patented him). I should have to prove what I claim. This applies as much to anti-GM activists as it does to Monsanto. Monsanto are, shall we say, not very forthcoming with their complete data sets. Nor, sometimes, are their opponents. I need only mention the perversely well-timed exposure of misrepresented climate data to demonstrate how much damage can be done to a cause by being economical with the truth. No description of "the truth" involves Chinese Whispers - there is a HUGE difference between saying that something is true and saying that your opinion is that something is true.
Sometimes, though, it's difficult to make out which of those things is being said. I'm as guilty as anyone - I often realise that I've spent a hour or so trying to convince someone of what I perceive to be the absolute truth (ie my opinion). But it's wrong. If anyone wants to take on the Monsantos and GSKs of this world, rule No. 1 is to make sure that every single thing you state as fact is undeniably, indefatigably, categorically provable. If you don't, you will either be sued or your argument will be publicly ripped to shreds. Either outcome is intensely damaging for the case against whatever you're complaining about.
Okay - time to shut up and let someone else have a go.
Mike
I appreciate what you say (whilst not agreeing wholly) about GM, but I don't see where you're going with the water-treatment subject. Are you advocating that we should NOT treat our waste water? If not, what are we to do with it (considering that you appear to be suggesting that it is loaded with nasties)? Merely for the sake of the argument, I'm going to postulate (because I haven't actually seen any data) that no-one in the UK has died from ingesting mains water for at least a century. Certainly, there may be allergic reactions to chlorine - or any of the many other treatments used - but that's a separate issue.
Or are you saying that our water treatment doesn't go far enough (ie we should be adding further treatments to take care of those drugs you mention)?
And, while I'm here, you still haven't told me where this bit came from ...
"Granted GM is resistant even to animals. They actually avoid eating it. In labs when they are forced to eat it exclusively, they die. Do you really have any doubts about 'potential toxicity'?"
... which, if it is a summation of valid research, needs to be shown to the world so that gnarled old sceptics like me would be forced to shut their gobs.
Now, don't anyone get this all wrong - I am not supporting anything here except rationality. If I claim that I have bred a piglet with anti-gravity tendencies, I should be prepared to expose said piglet and his pedigree to the world (after I've patented him). I should have to prove what I claim. This applies as much to anti-GM activists as it does to Monsanto. Monsanto are, shall we say, not very forthcoming with their complete data sets. Nor, sometimes, are their opponents. I need only mention the perversely well-timed exposure of misrepresented climate data to demonstrate how much damage can be done to a cause by being economical with the truth. No description of "the truth" involves Chinese Whispers - there is a HUGE difference between saying that something is true and saying that your opinion is that something is true.
Sometimes, though, it's difficult to make out which of those things is being said. I'm as guilty as anyone - I often realise that I've spent a hour or so trying to convince someone of what I perceive to be the absolute truth (ie my opinion). But it's wrong. If anyone wants to take on the Monsantos and GSKs of this world, rule No. 1 is to make sure that every single thing you state as fact is undeniably, indefatigably, categorically provable. If you don't, you will either be sued or your argument will be publicly ripped to shreds. Either outcome is intensely damaging for the case against whatever you're complaining about.
Okay - time to shut up and let someone else have a go.
Mike