GMO crops are safe and promote a better environment (via less land use and less pesticide and herbicide use). There is almost no research out there to confirm any of the outrageous claims of opponents. The best opponents can do is link to fancy, slick, flyers from anti-"E"nviornmental organizations (that's my new name for them) that just claim it is bad.
I think many GM opponents have had to face this reality. But rather than be persuaded by the lack of evidence of the harm of GMOs, they simply continue in their hunt for another reason to shut them down. I'll ask a question first and then make a comment.
The question:
The comment:
The entire thing is sickening. I'll take any of it seriously when logic and reason are the standards for which "arguments' take place. I'll take any of it seriously when anti-everythings can point to relevant externalities and violations of property rights from the things they are against. I'll take any of it seriously when anti-everythings provide any evidence that there is something up for discussion here? Is it only me that has to offer up the idea that I'll oppose something if the research suggests it is harmful? But "they" don't have a similar intellectual and moral obligation?
The whole thing is a joke. People keep telling me that we can keep "politics" out of most things. I think that is a joke and it is a joke because of the cancer that politics has become. When you want a world where everything is done by the government, then we have a world where politics MUST become part of every discussion we have. But that discussion is to be left for another post – the contents of which will have me removed again from polite company.
thank you for the shout out to Raytheon missile systems. I worked there ten years in Tucson. I am proud of the work we do striving for accuracy. When I watch shows on wwii and see how many bombers had to be sent to hit one target, our missiles are a true bargain. They didn’t just happen, somebody had to build them.
I ask this seriously, not at all sarcastically and with no snark. Aren't pretty much all organisms at this point, plant and animal, genetically modified, via random mutations over millions of years?
I'm surprised to see you highlight the Raytheon paragraph. I consider it the weakest point in a weak op-ed.
Developing more targeted missiles or using drones instead of bombers decreases the moral and tactical cost of taking down suspected terrorists. So we can expect more frequent attempts. And that's exactly what we've seen. In four years Obama has ordered five times as many drones strikes than in Bush's eight. Deciding on who to kill has been institutionalized in the White House: say a prayer for the Terror Tuesday victims tomorrow.
Is it clear that more targeted weapons are making us safer on net? Or are they radicalizing the men of Northern Waziristan, who are afraid to go outside because of the drones that fly over them 24 hours a day? Or the children, who are dropping out of school because of the psychological of impact of witnessing spontaneous liquadations? Or the women, who are afraid to recover bodies because drone operators target rescuers? How many more terrorists have "better weapons" begotten?
(WINTERCOW UPDATE: My editor will not let me comment on my own posts! In any case, Dan, I am not analyzing the Raytheon point at all, it is only brought up to illustrate the more general, totally ignored, point that no evidence or thought experiments are part of the arguments given. Ever. I could be talking about Big Bird, the environment, drones, anything.
i dont see at all how inserting a bacterial plasmid containing a gene from deep sea fish for cold resistance (so proteins keep their function at lower temperatures) into tomatoes can do any harm at all. but feed more people, prevent crop losses of millions of dollars during cold spells PREPOSTEROUS! EVIL!
and of course you need a larger corporation like monsanto to do this, would you trust a mom pop farmer to have an intricate knowledge of transgenetics? there would be a lot more potential for danger if they did, you need to invest a lot of resources perfecting these techniques and making sure they actually work with little or no harmful effect
Since around 1986 Lilly and Novartis have manufactured genetically-modified human insulin, a hormone vastly better than the bovine and pork varieties available previously (and then only since the thirties). Novolog and Humalog are expensive, about $125 per vial. Those drugs were not developed by command-and-control governments.
By the way, the Roundup-Ready soybeans in our fields have been harvested.
i'm with you up until you argue against labeling. as one who promotes individual choice and responsibility, i am nearly always in favor of labeling requirements. The graphics on cigarette packages and some hazard warnings being exceptions. i live in philadelphia, and the one regulation that our overbearing city gov't has put into place that i like is the calorie content being posted at chain restaurants.
Did I miss the parallel with school choice?
Yes, JB, I missed that one, too. Sometimes Wintercow goes far afield, as cows often do, but not in winter, unless the electric fence is shorted out.