More bad science in the service of anti-GMO activism

[roseBudd]

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/once-more-bad-science-in-the-service-of-anti-gmo-activism/

As was the case for the nonexistent cell phone-cancer link, there has now been a steady drip-drip-drip of bad studies touted by anti-GMO activists as “evidence” that GMOs are the work of Satan that will corrupt or kill us all (and make us fat, to boot). Not too long ago, I came across one such study, a truly execrable excuse for science by Gilles-Eric Séralini at the University of Caen purporting to demonstrate that Roundup-resistant genetically modified maize can cause horrific tumors in rats. I looked at the methods and conclusions and what I found was some of the worst science I had ever seen, every bit as bad as the quack “science” used by the antivaccine movement. It wasn’t for nothing that I made the comparison, because the anti-GMO movement is very much like the antivaccine movement and the cranks who claim that cell phone radiation causes cancer. As if to demonstrate that very point, last week I came across an article by the all-purpose crank to rule all cranks, Mike Adams, at NaturalNews.com entitled GMO feed turns pig stomachs to mush! Shocking photos reveal severe damage caused by GM soy and corn:...

After having seen this study, I think that the editors of this open access journal have made a massive mistake and have, either wittingly or unwittingly, allowed their journal to become a tool of anti-GMO activist groups, a couple of which which gleefully announced the results of the study with press releases (for example here and here) calling the study “groundbreaking,” asserting that it was evidence of “adverse effects” due to GMO feed, and claiming that the results show “…clear evidence that regulators need to safety assess GM crops containing mixtures of GM genes, regardless of whether those genes occur in the one GM plant or in a mixture of GM plants eaten in the same meal, even if regulators have already assessed GM plants containing single GM genes in the mixture.”

Here’s a hint: It’s none of the above....

There might be questions about GMOs, but by and large they are not issues of safety. Rather, they are issues of intellectual property; i.e., how large companies developing GMOs behave. Hysteria of the like generated by the likes of Jack Heinemann and Judy Carman and parroted by useful idiots like Heidi Stevenson generate heat, but no light. Nor does the latest round of attempts to generate hysterical fear mongering based on Carman’s latest study. Both Heinemann’s speculations and Carman’s most recent bit of data mining are of a piece. They are not designed to provide a dispassionate analysis of the true potential risks and benefits of GMOs. They are designed to be propaganda to produce fear, uncertainty, and doubt about GMOs, just like Andrew Wakefield’s studies about the MMR vaccine, just like Mark and David Geier’s studies of thimerosal in vaccines, just like the studies of any variety of antivaccine cranks. It is the equivalent of shouting “fire!” in a crowded theater.

Unfortunately, the pseudoscience is metastasizing. GMO Pundit points out the next frontier of anti-GMO fear mongering.:

http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2013/06/food-democracy-now-junk-anti-gmo-un.html

[Bay Boy]

1. I'm going to grab a chair and some popcorn

and see how this turns out.

[roseBudd]

2. Confirmation bias says the hysterics will yell SHILL!

[Buzz Clik]

3. +1

[4dsc]

4. A good anti-GMO read here

GMO seeds undermine sustainability in other ways as well.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frances-moore-lappe-and-anna-lappe/choice-of-monsanto-betray_b_3499045.html

Enjoy.

[roseBudd]

5. Confirmation bias

Something you won't read. Due to confirmation bias.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/feastandfamine/2013/03/gm-crops-and-carbon-emissions

[roseBudd]

6. ...

"This year’s ISAAA report tries to calculate the effects of GM crops on the environment. It says they saved the equivalent of 473m kilograms of pesticides in 2011 (because GM makes crops resistant to pests); saved 109m hectares of new land being ploughed up (GM crops are usually higher-yielding so less land is required for the same output) and reduced greenhouse-gas emissions by 23 billion kg of carbon dioxide equivalent.

GM crops in general need fewer field operations, such as tillage. Reducing tillage allows more residue to remain in the ground, sequestering more CO2 in the soil and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Fewer field operations also means lower fuel consumption and less CO2."

[4dsc]

11. GM Industry Called to Account: ISAAA's report mischievous and erroneous

In fact South Africa has witnessed an increase in non-GM maize cultivation. Between the 2010/11 and 2011/12 growing seasons, the area of non GM maize cultivation increased by 38% (or 210,000 ha). "It is likely that the issue of insect pests developing resistance to the toxins produced by GM maize is a major factor behind this shift away from GM maize in South Africa." Said Mayet.

The ISAAA further claims that developing countries planted 52% more GM crops than industrial countries and small farmers were the main beneficiaries. However, this includes the extensive mono-crops planted in Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina and Uruguay. "GM production particularly in Latin America occurs on vast industrial estates. The industry has always promised that GM crops would help small farmers, but the soya barons in Brazil and Argentina are not our idea of 'small'" said Gareth Jones from the ACB.

http://www.acbio.org.za/index.php/media/64-media-releases/418

There's always the other side of the coin.

[roseBudd]

12. So you are for more pesticide & herbicide use, more fuel (CO2) for mechanical cultivation...

AntiGMO hysteria helps the agriculture giants, and hurts the upstarts

An actual agriculture scientist, who works at University of Florida, world-class land-grant university, a SCIENTIST, who does not deserve the venom of the antiGMO hysterics.

http://kfolta.blogspot.com/2012/12/six-degrees-of-monsanto.html?showComment=1356895808374&m=1#c7261513286093739605

For the record, I've never worked for Monsanto. I never got a dime from them. Even if I did, there is no company that could affect my thinking or scientific integrity. In fact, I’m more valuable to a company because I can’t be bent to data or interpretations that are not based on evidence from good experiments.

But that’s not the interest of the anti-GMO, anti-Folta forces. This guy posted a link between Monsanto and the University of Florida, my employer. He claimed that UF was in cahoots with Monsanto and therefore I receive research money from them. Actually it was a collaboration between someone in the Agronomy Department (not even my department) and Monsanto to develop computer software.

Not to be deterred, he finds the “Vasil-Monsanto Endowment” a position that funds a professorship in our department. A friend of mine is in that position, but he doesn’t even work on generating products or data that Monsanto would care about. He gets a few sheckels from the fellowship, but most of his funding comes from NSF, USDA, etc. The funny part is, if you told him that Monsanto influenced his research or results, he’d laugh you out of the room.

This has happened before. Others itchy to connect me to Monsanto posted about the ASHS conference in Hawaii. I headed the Biotechnology Working Group and there were two people from Monsanto in attendance. I didn’t even know that, but for this stooge it was again concrete evidence that I was in their back pocket.

They discovered that at the SIVB meeting in Seattle in 2012, I led a session on transgenic crops that was attended by two people from Monsanto. I was at a meeting in March to discuss food flavor and quality that was attended by a former Monsanto higher-up. One of my colleagues used to work for Monsanto in the 80’s and early 90’s. Another colleague has a licensing agreement with Monsanto, as they have rights to a gene if they ever care to use it. My former boss in 1990 worked for Monsanto before he took a job at Cargill. One scientist that co-authored the strawberry genome paper with me when he was at Rutgers, now is at Monsanto-- There's all the proof the needs-- gotcha! Facts out the window!

These are the points of evidence anti-science lunatics use to connect me to a company I have no connections with. None have any impact on me, my funding, or research program whatsoever.

It always breaks my heart to see discussion break down and focus shift to discrediting me, rather than talking to me about science. I can teach them if they were teachable. They know that in the eyes of other true believers that if they can even remotely link me to the company they hate, that all of my evidence carries less weight and is less likely to sway anyone to the truth. After all, to the anti-GMO true believers it is critical to hide from the truth that does not support the conclusion that transgenic technologies are deadly practices from the loins of satan himself.

I’ve been down this path before. Because I work for a world-class land-grant university we have agreements and licensing with many companies. I’ve been told that Pepsico must approve all of my work before it can be published. People are insane."

[xtraxritical]

7. I would prefer to eat GMO foods that do not need pesticides

sprayed all over them, I would rather eat GMO foods that require much less fertilizers to grow them. I am not the least bit afraid to eat the product, my stomach is full of hydrochloric acid to digest them. I will say that I do not like the way the corporate giants are patenting and monopolizing the use of GMOs.

[roseBudd]

9. I am not an agronomist, so I look to the experts...

Dr. Kevin Folta told me in an email: ..."I think many people would find it curious that the anti-GM movement helps keep the power of Big Ag in a few hands."

I also have a friend who is an agronomist. She confirmed that Dr. Folta, is an "aggy"

http://randomrationality.com/2013/03/18/qa-the-lowdown-on-gmos-with-kevin-folta/

Why are GMO’s are so misunderstood? Kevin Folta, a plant geneticist at the University of Florida, explains the misconceptions that animate anti-GMO campaigners. As Folta has it, the “debate” is entirely in the minds of campaigners; the science is settled as to the safety of GM crops.

Fourat (Me) - What is the main thing (or is it general) about GMO’s that the public routinely confuse, or get wrong, when discussing and debating their impact?
Kevin Folta - There are so many misconceptions. The first is a fundamental one, that being that there is a debate at all. There is no debate among scientists in the discipline of plant molecular biology and crop science. Sure you can find someone here and there that disagrees, but there is no active debate in the literature driven by data. There are no hard reproducible data that indicate that transgenics are dangerous or more potentially dangerous than traditionally bred plant products.

Kevin Folta: If I had to nail down the most annoying misconceptions they would include that all scientists are just dupes of big multinational ag companies. Anyone that presents the consensus of scientific interpretation of the literature is immediately discounted as some corporate pawn. There’s nothing further from the truth. Most of us are hanging on by a thread in the days of dwinding federal, state and local support for research. The attacks on the credibility of good scientists hurts our chances to stay in academic labs and consider the cushy salaries and job security with the big ag corporate monstrosities we chose not to work for when we took jobs working for the public good. That’s pretty sad.

There is this allegation that we hide data or don’t publish work that is inconsistent with corporate desires. They need to get one thing straight. We’re not in the public sector because we are excited about listening to some corporate mandates. No thanks. We’re here for scientific freedom and to discover the exceptions to the rules and define new paradigms.
If my lab had a slight hint that GMOs were dangerous, I’d do my best to repeat that study, get a collaborator to repeat it independently, and then publish the data on the covers of Science, Nature and every news outlet that would take it. It would rock the world. Showing that 70-some percent of our food was poisonous? That would be a HUGE story — we’re talking Nobel Prize and free Amy’s Organic Pot Pies for life! Finding the rule breakers is what we’re in it for, but to break rules takes massive, rigorous data. So far, we don’t even have a good thread of evidence to start with.

Me - In what ways might GMO’s be most beneficial to our biosphere, and why might organic’s not be as good as to get us there?

Kevin Folta - There is no doubt that transgenic plants can be designed to limit pest damage with lower pesticide applications. That is well documented by the National Academies of Science, the best unbiased brains in our nation. Most data is for cotton and maize, and show substantial reductions (like 60%). Transgenic potatoes were amazingly successful in Romania until they joined the EU and had to go back to insecticide-intensive agriculture. Even glyphosate resistance traits, for all of their drawbacks in creating new resistant weeds, replace toxic alternatives.

Conventional farming takes fuel, labor, fungicides, pesticides, nematicides and many other inputs. Water and fertilizer are in there too. There are genes out there in the literature that address most of these issues. Scientists in academic labs discover these genes and define their function in lab-based GMOs that never are used outside the lab. The regulatory hoops are too difficult and expensive. Only the big companies can play in that space. Even little companies like Okanagan Specialty Fruits have to deal with the nonsense from those that hate the technology. Opposition to the science keeps the big guys in business, because nobody else can compete.

[Doctor_J]

15. You can find "experts" to argue for any issue, regardless of its absurdity

there are "experts" that will tell you that climate change is fake, fracking is perfectly safe, more guns = less gun crime, and so on. Quoting one highly paid liar proves nothing

[BillyRibs]

8. As a student,

Of the Potato Blight of 1840-1850, and it's use as a tool of Genocide, I prefer the world keep it's natural diversification. and corporations keep their hands off of the food chain. Nothing good came of it.

[roseBudd]

10. The genocide card....

Because that makes perfect sense. If Monsanto kills the people they will make more money selling seeds!</sarcasm>

What other conspiracies do you indulge in?

http://randomrationality.com/2013/03/18/qa-the-lowdown-on-gmos-with-kevin-folta/

Millions of lives depend on the future of our food production, that means they depend on scientific experimentation and information untainted by ideology. The science is settled, and has been for some time. And as Dr. Folta above, and others, have elucidated, the intense opposition to the GMO technology has only intensified Monsanto’s grip upon the market. Facebook it, tweet it, re-blog it, or Google Plus it. Give my blog credit, don’t give it credit; I don’t really care. Good science matters more than pageviews (though pageviews are still nice), and more scientists like Dr. Folta should have their voices heard instead of the fear-based, fake-facts groups out there shouting from the rooftops who don’t know the first thing about genomics, evolution, or reality.

http://thefarmerslife.com/biotechnology/i-occupy-our-food-supply-everyday/

[BillyRibs]

13. You're Not serious are you!?

You Don't Know!? 140,000 British troops were Posted in around Ireland from 1840-1850, That means after the blight hit the Isle of White in 1840, the Brits were expecting it. The Port records for all incoming shipments of food from Ireland Have gone missing for the years 1845 to 1850, from the British port records at the Admiralty. This was done to Hide the FACT that the British Gov. was complicit in a genocide. This Missing Records B.S, is from the same people who can tell you how much tea, what ship it came from, where it was pick up at and how it was Packaged, that was dumped in Boston Harbor almost 75 years earlier. However records for the missing years are available as export records in Ireland in a port by port basis, Ireland didn't starve for potatoes, It starved for food. Yes My friend it WAS Genocide!

[roseBudd]

14. I am referring to your unfounded speculation that transgenic crops purpose is to kill humans....

rather than insectivore. You aren't the only GMO hysteric to claim extinction is in the future.

Typing slowly now. We are Mammalian, our guts have nothing in common with insectivore.

http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/consumer/gmfood/Pages/Response-to-Dr-Carman's-study.aspx

http://www.inexactchange.org/blog/2013/06/19/gmo-pig-study/

http://www.marklynas.org/2013/06/gmo-pigs-study-more-junk-science/

I thought liberals were rational, that they go where the preponderance of data points. If I was wrong, we are no better than climate change deniers who flock to embrace bad science.

http://www.biofortified.org/genera/studies-for-genera/

I look forward to your response after you read the articles linked above.

[BillyRibs]

16. You Actually Think,

If the Opportunity presented itself, (Much Like in 1840) Someone or Someones Would not Take advantage of it? for a rather Large Profit? If so e-mail me, I have a Bridge in Brooklyn for Sale, Cheep!

[Bill USA]

17. I thought the major thrust of the GMO critique was that there has not been enough longitudinal

studies to establish confidence that genetically modified foods won't in time (as in 'some generations') produce unforeseen effects in those who consume the crops or those who consume the animals that eat the crops. Are there studies done by the producers of GMOs exploring the effects of consuming them on populations over many generations?... that can be extrapolated with confidence to human populations?

Also, GMOs will interact with the environment in innumerable and unanticipated ways. Have studies been done to ascertain how given GMOs with new properties, never before seen in nature (in that organism), will interact with the environment? Have such studies been done for every GMO being prepared for release/sale? How does one conduct an experiment to track all the ways a GMO might interact with and affect the environment - including those who would consume it?


What the critics of GMO marketing are saying is that by going ahead with selling and consuming GMOs without such research, we are conducting an experiment on ourselves.

Regarding scientists who do conduct research that points out possible problems with GMOs:

" Scientists who discover problems with GMOs have been attacked, gagged, fired, threatened, and denied funding. The journal Nature acknowledged that a [font color="red"]"large block of scientists . . . denigrate research by other legitimate scientists in a knee-jerk, partisan, emotional way that is not helpful in advancing knowledge." Attempts by media to expose problems are also often censored.[/font] "

http://www.responsibletechnology.org/10-Reasons-to-Avoid-GMOs