The Future of GM Technology...

Sounds good, but the facts don't support the oft repeated lie that DDT was the cause of the deline.

Indeed in the early 18th century, the Bald Eagle population was 300,000–500,000, but by the 1950s there were only 412 nesting pairs in the 48 contiguous states of the US, but DDT wasn't widely used in the US until after WW2, so given how long it takes for quantities to accumulate in the environment the decimation of the Bald Eagle PREDATES the widespread use of DDT.

What saved the Bald Eagle started with the 1940 Bald Eagle Protection Act which prohibited commercial trapping and killing of the birds and provided stiff fines for doing so. Just consider that more than 100,000 bald eagles were killed in Alaska from 1917 to 1953 just because Alaskan salmon fisherman feared they were a threat to the salmon population. This level of decimation caused public awareness of their plight to increase and many states placed the bald eagle on their lists of endangered species in the 1960s.
Bald eagles were officially declared an endangered species in 1967 in all areas of the United States south of the 40th parallel, under a law that preceded the Endangered Species Act of 1973.

The POINT is that Bald Eagles don't normally nest near human populations and thus effects of DDT used in agriculture were not responsible for this massive decline in their numbers. These acts, and the enforcement of these acts predated any widespread use agricultural use of DDT in the US and indeed because of these acts the population of Bald Eagles increased at the same time usage of DDT also increased.

Which of course makes blaiming their entire decline on DDT total BS

http://www.canadafreepress.com/2006/milloy071006.htm

But let's not turn this tread into a debate about DDT.

Stick to issues about GM because so far zip has been provided.

Arthur

 

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DDT is concentrated in the fat. Small birds eat bugs full of DDT and the poison gets stored, not flushed out. After eating a fair few bugs a bird like a blackbird will contain some fairly concentrated poison. So when a bird of prey eats the blackbirds it gets a concentrated dose. DDT is a very persistent poison and does not break down naturally on its own. This is why it had to be abandoned. Everything was getting poisoned by it from fish to birds to amphibians. As you go up the food-chain the concentration of the poison is increased. The way DDT works is well known, and is not in scientific doubt.

Edit* It's one of the things i studied at Uni. This link explains it better.. http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/D/DDTandTrophicLevels.html
Note also that only levels measured in ppm are necessary to have a detrimental effect.

 

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T0 Chimpkin

OK. I read your point about "Silent Spring" and then re-read iceaura's comment. I realised I had misread what he was trying to say. The phrasing he used made it look superficially as if environmentalists were claiming credit for the fact that DDT was still permitted to be used. So that was my error.

In fact I probably read "Silent Spring" long before you did. I first read it in the 1960's and was immensely impressed. I have since broadened my reading and now realise that Rachel Carson actually made a lot of mistakes in that book. The decline of the bald eagle vs DDT, as described so well by adoucette, is one example of her mistakes.

To leopold

I for one, am not arguing against more testing for GM. In one sense, you can never have too much testing. The final amount that is required is, really, a subjective decision for which there are no right or wrong answers, but an infinity of opinions. You have one opinion and the powers that decide these things have another.

The thing, though, is that after 16 years, there is still no harm of any significance. I wonder how long the anti-GM enthusiasts will continue to oppose this technology. If, after 100 years, there is still no harm, will they, like Don Quixote, still tilt at the windmill?

To Ultra

There is a flaw in your reasoning about DDT.
DDT in fat is largely harmless. It is stored in almost inert form. It is only when it is in the blood and contacts non fat tissues that it becomes toxic. When a bird of prey eats a smaller animal with DDT in its fat, the amount from one animal is too small to cause any significant harm to the bird of prey. Before it can be concentrated, that DDT (at least, the portion that is not excreted) ends up in inert form in the fat of the bird of prey.

While DDT is definitely toxic, it is only toxic above a threshold, and only if in active form - not stored in fat. The no effect limit for DDT is about 1 ppm of body weight per day. That is way less than anything a bird of prey is ever likely to consume. http://www.epa.gov/iris/subst/0147.htm

I read many years ago about a case of DDT poisoning. This guy had been a spray operator, spraying DDT on pastures and getting drenched in the stuff - even breathing it. In the mean time he was growing very obese (from over-eating, not from DDT). You can guess where the DDT he absorbed ended up. Then he contracted a very nasty infection, and the fever caused him to lose weight at a horrendous rate. He died of DDT poisoning. The point is that his health was good until he burned off all that fat. He had a toxic dose in his fat cells, but it had no effect on him, till the infection.

I am not, though, aware of any bird of prey suffering this way!

DDT was used as a de-lousing material on returning veterans from WWII. About half of all such soldiers were sprinkled head to foot with DDT powder. Records were kept of who was treated and who was not, and there have been a number of attempts since to check on cancer rates of the two groups. Even today, no difference has been seen.

The biggest problem with DDT is that it has a long half life. It takes about 50 years for half the DDT released into the environment to break down. It is also bioaccumulative, as Ultra noted, but that is of little significance as long as it is stored harmlessly in fat tissues.

 

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The FACT is that the Eagles were decimated by HUNTING, not by DDT.

That's why they passed the 1940 Bald Eagle Protection Act even though DDT wasn't used in the US until after WW2.

That doesn't mean DDT wasn't overly applied, it was, but it wasn't the reason that the Eagle population was down to a tiny few by the 40s, that was because of over hunting. Indeed, the Eagle population hit it's low around 1960 and had begun it's slow climb from near extinction well before the banning of DDT use more than a decade later in 1972.

Arthur

 

The whole reason I raised the whole DDT business was not to debate the scientifically undisputed toxisity of DDT, but to show what sort of a company Monsanto is. They have never shown any regard for the envionment. They have a track history of litigating against farmers whose crops have been contaminated by thier own GM strains that were supposed to be sterile. Nobody in thier right mind would accuse Monsanto of being ethical, yet supporters expect people to accept thier claims of safety on good faith!
You've gotta be pretty darn gulliable to trust Monsanto.
Pfizer have just lost a court case, look up Becky McCloud. She got infected with a GM virus, and Pfizer were found guilty of intimidation and unfair dismissal after she couldn't work due to being paralyzed. She was one of thier own people! Do you really think they give a damn about you? They don't even care about thier own scientists!

 

DDT is estimated to have saved over 500 million lives.
Seems that's caring for humanity.

According to Wiki: In the U.S DDT was manufactured by Ciba, Montrose Chemical Company, Pennwalt and Velsicol Chemical Corporation

Becky McCloud Pfizer search on Google turns up nothing of interest.

Arthur

 

Sorry my mistake, it was McLain.. Had to check that! I'd almost forgotten about her case!

http://www.theday.com/article/20100401/BIZ02/100409959/1047 article

http://i.bnet.com/blogs/mcclain-complaint.pdf specific complaint

Pfizer, of course deny everything as you'd expect!

 

Ultra

How many damn times do I have to say it. I do not trust Monsanto. I am not an apologist for Monsanto, and I bet adoucette is not either.

The corruption inside Monsanto and their lack of trustworthiness has absolutely nothing to do with this debate.

So how about switching tack? You are like a record stuck in a groove.

 

apparently monsanto and other GM industries have succeeded in completely absolving themselves of all responsibility in this matter.
they are not required to do ANY type of independent testing, human or otherwise.
they have also succeeded in making it legal to introduce new strains and labeling those strains as safe unless testing, which they aren't required to do, proves otherwise.
the fact i can find no such testing at the research arm of the USDA implies either the testing isn't being done or the results are being suppressed.
i know this, if i were a world renown scientist i would think twice before i jeopardized my career by giving GM foods a negative result.
even NCBI can find very little data on test results.

 

Monsanto is responsible for Agent Orange though, that's undisputed.

And this:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A54914-2002Feb22?language=printer

Probably this:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-435737/Monsanto-investigation-illegal-dumping.html
And this:
http://www.wvhighlands.org/VoicePast/VoiceJun00/Dioxin.OVEC.June00Voice.htm

And Monsanto did this:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Monsanto,_Agent_Orange_and_Dioxins

In fact, I found a factsheet on Monsanto here: http://www.monsantowatch.org/index.php?page=none

...And what I've been saying all along is that because there's not good monitoring practices, we're not going to find out that GM causes problems until it REALLY causes a big problem...something too large to be glossed over.

So we should be far more diligent in monitoring and far more cautious in implementation.
Since the US maize crop is 80% GM, I would hardly call that cautious.

 

chimpkin
according to WHO it is up to the importing countries to do the independent tests.
i can find exactly zero at USDA.

 

Skeptic, I was not specifically aiming that at you. It was just an aside really that snowballed for some reason. I think, as you know, that where there is a clear benefit to be had y'know, medicines or vitamins or minerals whatever, I'm happy for GM to be used. If it saves lives, I'm for it.
But I don't want unlabelled unregulated cloned meat in my fridge. If you want it, fine, go right ahead - I've no problem with what you eat. I'd like to have the choice, and I choose to avoid it. I don't need any cloned meat, I'm happy as I am. I don't particularly want any GM foods, and I don't want people trying to sneak it into my diet surreptitiously either. I have the right to choose exactly what I want to eat, and I don't have to justify it to anybody.

 

That's the thing-it's not required to be labeled here. Food companies-the big ones, fought for that to be the case.

I can't afford organic, and while GM crops aren't technically supposed to be fed to people? the cross-pollination pretty much assures I'm eating it.

The USDA can pretty much be regarded as a product-promotion agency more than it can a food safety agency, so that does not surprise me in the slightest.

Basically if there's a benefit to be had for the environment, for the people eating it, and if it can be clearly shown to not disrupt other things in the environment that are also important...then I do not have a problem.

But when chemical pesticides were introduced, we treated them as innocent-until-proven-harmful...and we still do in many ways. We don't test to see how they interact with each other in people's bodies-adipose sample studies, for instance.
I'd love to have a pre-chemo sample of adipose tissue from every person with cancer taken, and spectral analysis done to see what they're toting around.
I think we need to monitor GM crops far better than we do...or we will find out that we should have later. As it stands we don't know which threats are empty and which ones are legitimate.

Third-world malnutrition seems to be as much or more political as it is about food crops, and if you want me to go rummage out that post-with-links I did before on said subject, I will.

 

As I understand it, GM soya has almost eradicated normal varieties over there. I saw some figures somewhere saying 98% of US soya was transgenic. I will not eat any soya products except for soy sauce made from non-GM soy beans. The fermentation process would reduce any contamination anyway. Luckily I live in the country and have a good farm-shop just 2 miles down the road.
Here, there was a ban on meat that had just been fed on GM feed - as far as I know, this is still the case. I don't think I've ever met anybody here that wants GM food of any kind.
Though the US threatened a trade war if we labelled thier imports, so I'm not sure how things stand, but My butcher won't stock it anyway. People here treat it like it's diseased!

 

I know...and I eat a lot of textured soy protein, it's cheap...

Quite frankly, I don't think it would be okayed if put to a referendum.
But I've said in other threads we're not really in control of our government anymore, so we eat GM food, breathe polluted air and drink bad water, in the name of Progress.

 

Except according to Wiki Monsanto didn't make DDT.

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

Except the lawsuit she won had NOTHING to do with being infected by a virus as you claim.

The jury ruled that Pfizer had violated laws protecting free speech and whistle-blowers by retaliating against Ms. McClain.

The judge dismissed the claim of being infected before the trial even began.

Isn't it odd that every case you think supports your claim turns out to be FALSE?

When are you going to concede that you have formed your opinion based on facts which when examined turned out NOT to be true?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/03/business/03pfizer.html

Arthur

 

Ultra and Chimpkin

You seem to be terribly worried about eating GM foods. Why?

There has not been, in 16 years, a single case where someone has suffered any ill effect, no matter how minor, because their food was GM.

Frankly, to get your knickers in a twist because some of your food is GM is just plain irrational. The genetic modifications affecting your food are totally, absolutely, 100% harmless. The fact that people have been eating this stuff for 16 years, and that is hundreds of millions of people, without the slightest skerrick of harm to anyone, actually means a hell of a lot. Can you not see that?

 

odd indeed.
every case is a fraud, hoax, uninformed, misleading, quakery, etc, etc.

anyway:
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/newPathogenInRoundupReadyGMCrops.php

from the above link:

maybe you and sceptical can point me to these peer reviewed tests.

 

leopold

This is where you need to be very careful with your references. The one you just posted is by Dr. Mae Wan Ho. She has a long history of publishing total bulldust, including support for biodynamics - which I pointed out earlier to Ultra.

If you use discredited 'experts', then your references are discredited before you begin.

Here is a reference to Mae Wan Ho on acupuncture.
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/acupunc.php

I quote :

"The organism is thus a system in which energy is stored in a coherent form, the energy remaining coherent as it is mobilized throughout the system. Notice that I have substituted ‘coherent energy’ for the usual concept of ‘free energy’. Coherent energy, as I shall explain presently, is stored in a range of space-times in which it remains coherent, and is tied to the characteristic space-times of natural processes. I say ‘characteristic space-time’ instead of the usual ‘characteristic time’ because in the new physics since Einstein's relativity theory, space and time are no longer separable. (Indeed, organic space-time is very different from the linear, homogeneous, space and time of Newtonian physics (see Ho, 1998).) ‘Free energy’, on the other hand, has no relationship to space or time, and is a notoriously vague concept. "

Technobabble used in lieu of science.

 

Some progress. I have seen a hell of a lot of anecdotal evidence of stuff going wrong with GMOs. There is plenty of stuff on the web relating to abnormal and unwanted gene expression in cloned animals. The people that first cloned Dolly the sheep went out of business, and killed the sheep.