patrick.net

donjumpsuit says

rdiovascular Institute and Complementary Medicine Program at New York-Presbyterian Hospital.[11] His research interests include heart replacement surgery, mini

That gmo pundit site is funny. So, there have been 200 articles published by people not working at gmo seed companies claiming gmo food is safe. In the grand scheme of things that's an absolutely miniscule amount of research. Also, 70 million Euros - not a lot of money to be spent on the issue.

The main reason for labeling GMOs is that people have a right to know when a major shift like this happens in their food supply. The horse is already out of the barn for sure, but people still have a right to decide for themselves what to eat.

There are legitimate reasons that people might want to avoid gmo food like: (1) concern over crop monocultures and their effect on insects, food stability, etc. (2) concern about the social impact on farmers (3) concern about eating active synthetic chemicals (inside the plant as opposed to on the surface where they can be washed off). There may be more reasons - I'm not an expert.

Crying about labels driving up the cost of food is silly. No one is asking for labels with pictures of disfigured children and warnings about consuming gmos. They simply want a label, much like one saying that a garment is made in China. People can decide how to spend their own money. Pink slime was considered safe as well, but people resent not having the option to make that choice on their own.

mell says

FWIW I don't give much about it, but I studied anatomy, physiology, biochemistry and statistics in medicine for roughly 4 years. You cannot start with "statistically significant" long term studies in humans right away, there are ethical issues and if you just randomly follow patients then there are a lot of other factors that could interfere with what you want to observe. They have to start somewhere and that is usually the animal model. It's reasonable to be worried, but not panicking, if you observe issues in short-term animal studies, even if the dosage is much higher.

I find it hard to believe you studied all those things, because your definition of "statistically significant" is completely wrong. You are conflating 3 or 4 different concepts. Statistical significance refers to whether a given result differs from what might occur from random chance. Dosage, human vs. animal test, and ethics have absolutely nothing to do with that.

If you conduct an experiment, and your results are not statistically significant, then you have proven nothing. Period.

mell says

What are your credentials? Did you ever study medicine?

My credentials are I appear to know more about science than you, since you completely failed at understanding what "statistically significant" means. That's pretty basic stuff.

Let me make this very simple. Let's say that in nature, 5 of every 100 mice get cancer (I don't know the real numbers; this is just hypothetical). If I feed GMO to 100 mice, and 5 of them get cancer, what did I prove?

Answer: Bupkis

So anyone who says, "It's not statistically significant, but...." is full of it. There is no "but".

Homeboy says

If you conduct an experiment, and your results are not statistically significant, then you have proven nothing. Period.

You are mistaken once again, statistical significance depends on the size of the cohort for example and often on the duration of the study as well, usually a combo of both. If you observe an effect in 10 out of 10 study subjects it may not be statistically significant, but it can give you a pretty damn fucking clue. Of course you need to validate that. When Fleming looked at his discarded petri dish and noted something very interesting, he gave a fuck about statistical significance. It took a long time to turn his discovery into one of the most important life saving drugs of human history, enough time that it could have been discarded by others labeling it as quackery.

Homeboy says

Let me make this very simple. Let's say that in nature, 5 of every 100 mice get cancer (I don't know the real numbers; this is just hypothetical). If I feed GMO to 100 mice, and 5 of them get cancer, what did I prove?

Answer: Bupkis

On this specific example we agree.

donjumpsuit says

There are no benefits to labeling something as GMO. The public has been trained to treat the word GMO as evil. This is a misnomer, so labeling something with a misnomer would do nothing but propagate fear, discrimination and drive up prices for food producers who would fear that a select few lawyers and troublemakers who would test every item without a GMO label to see if there was a speck of GMO in it. When it was found, they would sue the food distributor, farmer, or food manufacturer for unspecified damages.

Think of it this way. How do you think the average American would react to a food product that bore a label disclosing "This Product Contains Chemicals"?

http://www.cryptogon.com/?p=31443

Homeboy says

eastcoast guy says

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Árpád_Pusztai

http://academicsreview.org/reviewed-content/genetic-roulette/section-1/1-1-pusztais-flawed-claims/

eastcoast guy says

http://www.cryptogon.com/?p=31443

http://academicsreview.org/2012/09/scientists-smell-a-rat-in-fraudulent-study/

mell says

You are mistaken once again, statistical significance depends on the size of the cohort for example and often on the duration of the study as well, usually a combo of both.

Irrelevant. That does not change the definition of statistical significance.

mell says

If you observe an effect in 10 out of 10 study subjects it may not be statistically significant, but it can give you a pretty damn fucking clue.

This is gibberish. It is either statistically significant or it isn't. A "clue" is not proof. If you claim something is a scientific fact based on a study that showed no statistical significance, that's just junk science. That's why these so-called GMO "studies" get blasted when they actually come up for peer review. There isn't a single valid study showing that ANY GMO products currently on the market are harmful to humans in any way. You can try to spin it any way you like, but if there are no valid scientific conclusions to be drawn from a study, then you CAN'T FUCKING SAY IT MEANS ANYTHING.

mell says

Of course you need to validate that. When Fleming looked at his discarded petri dish and noted something very interesting, he gave a fuck about statistical significance. It took a long time to turn his discovery into one of the most important life saving drugs of human history, enough time that it could have been discarded by others labeling it as quackery.

More gibberish. Of course that is how discoveries are made. But for every discovery that turned out to be a miracle drug, there were probably a million that turned out to be complete bullshit. Laetrile, anyone?

Like you said, you need to validate it. And that's what science does. So again, when a substance is PROVEN to have usefulness, it becomes mainstream. Garbage that isn't proven to be useful remains in the "alternative" camp, for Art Bell listening suckers who believe everything they're told, to be separated from their money. A mainstream remedy is nothing more than a formerly "alternative" remedy that was shown to have merit.

donjumpsuit says

People gave up this right when they decided to move from the farm to the city.

That's bullshit.
donjumpsuit says

The public has a right to make informed choices about the products they purcahse, but it is the responsiblity of the CONSUMER to find trusted sources of these products.

Again, bullshit. We live in a democracy and vote on rules for disclosure of information on consumer producs. Caveat emptor applies to buying a used car on Craigslist. The same cannot be said for food. We are having this debate, because many states have put this disclosure up for a vote. The majority of people think GMOs should be labled. Companies have spent millions scaring people into thinking that it would drive food prices too high. Again, this is bullshit. Most of food prices to into marketing, packaging, distribution, and waste. Forcing GMO labels would have a minor impact. Earlier you linked a web site claiming that 70 milliion euros or something have been spent testing GMOs. Nearly as much as been spent scaring the public about the price of labels. That's pretty shameful.

You are correct in my misuse of the word synthetic. However, genetic engineering of plants has blurred the distinction that was more clear over the preceding 100 years of chemistry.

It was sloppy writing, as was this...

donjumpsuit says

is that GMO's main goal is to reduce the environmental impact of growing

GMOs do not have goals. Many people who worked on developing GMOs have goals.

and this...
donjumpsuit says

which is toxically relevant (harmful) in a toxicology study (MSDS)

An MSDS is a material safety data sheet. It is not a toxicology study.

donjumpsuit says

For most of those items, there is a toxicology report (it's called and MSDS in Science)

A material safety data sheet is called an MSDS period. In Science has nothing to do with it.

donjumpsuit says

It's only silly because you don't own a food company, or a seed distribution business.

Exactly. To everybody else, it is silly. The people who stand to take a slight haircut are the ones selling gmo seeds.

I'm not even against gmo foods. I do think that people have the right to make their own decisions and be informed. Labeling would let people know what is and is not gmo. It would also bring the debate forward in the media, and people would become educated. Insisting that people are not smart enough to understand and should be kept in the dark is ridiculous and it is a short-sighted strategy for food companies.

donjumpsuit says

There are no benefits to labeling something as GMO. The public has been trained to treat the word GMO as evil. This is a misnomer, so labeling something with a misnomer would do nothing but propagate fear, discrimination and drive up prices for food producers who would fear that a select few lawyers and troublemakers who would test every item without a GMO label to see if there was a speck of GMO in it.

Labeling GMO food as GMO is not a misnomer. Labeling it evil would be a misnomer, but no-one is asking for that. If the public is misinformed, then companies should strive to educate. Attempting to pull one over on people, because you think that they are stupid or incapable of understanding what is good for them is evil. This strategy may already be backfiring. We will see how people react when Whole Foods starts to require labels.

donjumpsuit says

Labeling something 'GMO' has no signifigance since it is such a broad term, nobody knows what anybody is talking about.

You can repeat this a million times, it won't change the fact that a genetically modified organism is an organism that has had it's RNA/DNA altered in the LAB (as opposed to crossbred). How fucking hard is that to understand? It is so simple that even the - in this thread - so called "dumbed down" American public broadly understands the concept and that's why you get so many calls for labeling as they have a right to know. It has been narrowly defeated here in CA, no reason to go apeshit and panic as you pointed out one can buy organic, but I predict it will pass in Vermont and more states will follow, rightfully so. But who knows, will be interesting to see..

mell says

a genetically modified organism is an organism that has had it's RNA/DNA altered in the LAB (as opposed to crossbred). How fucking hard is that to understand?

You seem to be making an implication that DNA altered in a lab is inherently bad, whereas DNA altered by selective breeding is inherently good. What is your scientific basis for this belief??

Homeboy says

mell says

a genetically modified organism is an organism that has had it's RNA/DNA altered in the LAB (as opposed to crossbred). How fucking hard is that to understand?

You seem to be making an implication that DNA altered in a lab is inherently bad, whereas DNA altered by selective breeding is inherently good. What is your scientific basis for this belief??

It carries greater risks and unknowns. The principle of familiarity which means that selective breeding can only work in organisms close enough to each other, so for example you won't have any luck selectively breeding/crossing species, e.g. animals or insects with plants, but it has been done in the labs.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1046/j.0960-7412.2002.001607.x/full

"The transfer of antibiotic resistance gene to unrelated microorganisms such as Aspergillus niger has also been demonstrated [34]. Biotechnology scientists, however, are of the opinion that the Npt II gene used to develop GM plants currently in the market is safe for use because there is no evidence of allergenicity or toxicity related to it."

It's nice that they are of the "opinion" that aspergillus niger cannot cause any problems. Well, quite a few don't share this opinion. But I guess as long as the resistance doesn't reach Stachybotrys it's only a problem for immunocompromised and otherwise weak/allergic people. Also, I'd contend that "not reputable" is also an opinion ;) But thanks, interesting article, I will completely read through it when I have more time.

mell says

It carries greater risks and unknowns. The principle of familiarity which means that selective breeding can only work in organisms close enough to each other, so for example you won't have any luck selectively breeding/crossing species, e.g. animals or insects with plants, but it has been done in the labs.

I haven't heard of this "principle of familiarity". There is a "familiarity principle" in psychology, but that doesn't pertain to genetics. Perhaps you could explain to us what makes this "principle of familiarity" valid.

I'm not sure what this "close enough to each other" concept is supposed to mean. Quite obviously, humans have succeeded in cross-breeding species that do not breed together in nature. We have done this for thousands of years. Most of the food we eat is a result of this process. We have already interfered with whatever evolution would have occurred were humans not present on the earth. Your objection seems merely to be that this is a "different" method of changing genetics. I'm still not seeing any scientific basis for your fear. How is a random gene mutation inherently less "risky" than a carefully selected gene insertion?

Check out this (expert) debate between Vrain and Horgen if you are really interested, it will give you more insight and you can then form (or keep) your own opinion:

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?id=252908071394905&story_fbid=567786546573721#_=_

mell says

Check out this (expert) debate between Vrain and Horgen if you are really interested, it will give you more insight and you can then form (or keep) your own opinion:

I am interested, but I feel that I wasted my time reading that. Vrain cites the same flawed and totally discredited "studies" that you and the other anti-GMO zealots have already talked about ad nauseam on this forum. Then he admits that nobody has ever gotten sick from eating GMO food, but makes the ridiculous argument: "it sure adds up, and we did not know that in the 1950s before we started our wave of epidemics of cancer." I'm sorry, but he is not being scientific in the least. Is he trying to say that GMO food has caused a cancer epidemic starting in the 1960s? Where's the evidence?

It honestly seems to me that you have a pre-ordained conclusion and you are just cherry-picking whatever bits and pieces you can find on the internet that seem to fit what you have already decided in your mind.

I am generally a consumer of organic food, but it is not always possible to get organic depending on where you are and even non-GMO label is only partially applied so far. I personally know microbiologists and researchers from Europe (Germany, Ukraine etc.) who would neither consume GMOs themselves nor feed it to their family or friends, and we have had many talks about it, so it's not an "internet-only" affair ;) Let's close this as nobody will be convinced on patnet and wait and see how this continues to play out.

mell says

Let's close this as nobody will be convinced on patnet and wait and see how this continues to play out.

I agree. Nobody will be convinced, because you have failed to provide any convincing evidence.