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What astounds me after reading all the above replies, is; how was produce from the beginning of time on earth ever able to survive until present ? It surely did inspite of the pests and obstacles.
There are a couple of key factors at work here and now... in the tropics it's always a constant battle, without seasonal dieback to help control pests, and ecological balance is delicate and easy to disrupt. Case in point, the Cavendish banana, the one we all grew up with... the one with the tint black seeds down the middle... it used to account for 99% of the commercial banana cultivation in the world, now virtually extinct. Wiped out by a virus.
And global air travel and commerce means that new pests can be introduced accidentally in places where they have no natural enemies or controls. The coquis being a recent example.
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Originally Posted by nullgeo
Time will tell whether the ultimate pest to emerge is the "eco-terrorist" or Monsanto, ADM, DuPont, and all the other GMO chemists ... my bet is the latter group will "own", lock, stock, and barrel, the legal rights to all your food production in fairly short order ... and thus, regardless of the safety or not of their actual FrankenFoods, they will control the planet by controlling all rights to foods via agricultural patents. Don't call that the penultimate terrorist scenario?
Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
It's not all this monster scenario the alarmists always portray. In fact, in this case the situation is at the opposite end of the scale, and I think politicizing it is a huge mistake, because it completely obscures the truth. All thinking stops when you start using loaded rhetoric like "frankenfoods." This is no huge corporation trying to squeeze immoral profits out of hapless peasants, it's a small group of dedicated scientists at the University trying to save a significant crop on the Big Island from total eradication. Papayas currently represent, IIRC, 50% by weight of all the fresh fruit grown on the island. And there is no viable choice besides going to ring-spot resistant GMO papayas, except for having NO local papayas. Unless we just want to abandon papaya cultivation completely, and resort to shipping them all in from other countries, we must adopt GMO technology. And there is nothing inherently wrong with doing that.
And in these cases of food vandalism the only ones hurt were the individual farmers, who lost a year's work and investment and a year's crop each time. And the attack makes no logical or tactical sense, because the majority of what is being grown today is already GMO. This was just a piece of meaningless radical reaction that cost a couple of innocent small farmers their livelihood.
It's not all this monster scenario the alarmists always portray. In fact, in this case the situation is at the opposite end of the scale, and I think politicizing it is a huge mistake, because it completely obscures the truth. All thinking stops when you start using loaded rhetoric like "frankenfoods." This is no huge corporation trying to squeeze immoral profits out of hapless peasants, it's a small group of dedicated scientists at the University trying to save a significant crop on the Big Island from total eradication. Papayas currently represent, IIRC, 50% by weight of all the fresh fruit grown on the island. And there is no viable choice besides going to ring-spot resistant GMO papayas, except for having NO local papayas. Unless we just want to abandon papaya cultivation completely, and resort to shipping them all in from other countries, we must adopt GMO technology. And there is nothing inherently wrong with doing that.
And in these cases of food vandalism the only ones hurt were the individual farmers, who lost a year's work and investment and a year's crop each time. And the attack makes no logical or tactical sense, because the majority of what is being grown today is already GMO. This was just a piece of meaningless radical reaction that cost a couple of innocent small farmers their livelihood.
First let me point out that I didn't support or condemn GMO science in my comments -- nor did I support the actions of the "eco-terrorists" ... I merely pointed out the dangers of GMO patents to world economics -- otherwise known as "power and control".
That said, I will now go further to disagree that protesting GMO is equivalent to propagating ( pun intended, thank you for the applause ) a "monster scenario" -- nor is it accurate to identify the folks who object to GMO as "alarmists". To do so one would be including a very substantial number of the world's scientists and world governments: What countries have banned GMO crops? - Mankato Green Culture | Examiner.com. And, in fact, the U.S. is one of the only industrialized nations in the world not yet requiring labeling of GMO foods.
There are many reasons for concern. I will not cite studies. Anyone interested in the issue can find a lifetime of research and reading on both sides of the topic just by Googling.
My point is, however, that (and without supporting the actions of vandals) local protectionism -- in this case of our BI papaya crop and farmers -- is certainly understandable ... but potentially sacrificing the long-term health of consumers is of far greater importance. I don't know if GMO's are safe. But neither does anyone else, however much claims are made.
What I DO know is that man has a nasty habit of trying to "fix" nature and ending up with unintended consequences. Nature doesn't need "fixing" to make it "better". Nature doesn't need to be "better" to accommodate people.
Homo sapiens have existed on this planet for hundreds of thousands of years ... and other homo-species for millions before that ... all without the benefit of GMO food engineering. If the ring-spot virus wipes out a crop, that is a hardship for sure. But nothing compared to what GMO crop engineering may be doing to our natural biology ... and definitely nothing compared to what ADM, Monsanto, DuPont and cadre' are doing to take control of the world economy by patenting crops and livestock ... if our biology is safe from FrankenFoods -- our socio-economics are NOT.
If the ring-spot virus wipes out a crop, that is a hardship for sure. But nothing compared to what GMO crop engineering may be doing to our natural biology ... and definitely nothing compared to what ADM, Monsanto, DuPont and cadre' are doing to take control of the world economy by patenting crops and livestock ... if our biology is safe from FrankenFoods -- our socio-economics are NOT.
I agree there are issues around plant patents and fair use, seed saving, etc. But again, by using biased rhetoric like the term FrankenFoods, I think open thinking is blocked. A new and unbiased look might reveal an avenue to a solution. What will not happen is to roll back the technology. That genie is out of the bottle for good.
As a matter of fact, the rollbacks in this matter are starting to occur, but they're against the anti-GMO efforts to date as science begins to make the case that the fears have been overstated. Anti-GMO laws are being rolled back and overturned as being overly restrictive.
Here's an interesting piece showing how the anti-GMO effort is not wearing well:
I agree there are issues around plant patents and fair use, seed saving, etc. But again, by using biased rhetoric like the term FrankenFoods, I think open thinking is blocked. A new and unbiased look might reveal an avenue to a solution. What will not happen is to roll back the technology. That genie is out of the bottle for good.
As a matter of fact, the rollbacks in this matter are starting to occur, but they're against the anti-GMO efforts to date as science begins to make the case that the fears have been overstated. Anti-GMO laws are being rolled back and overturned as being overly restrictive.
Here's an interesting piece showing how the anti-GMO effort is not wearing well:
I agree that the genie is out of the bottle ... too much money behind GMO to put it back in.
That said, I am in a very lot of pretty good (and highly credible) company of international journalists who coined the term "FrankenFoods" ... I didn't start it ... it has become a common-usage term.
I also don't agree with any inference that "science" is beginning to "make the case that the fears have been overstated." I enjoy a lot of your posts, D, and most always am in agreement .. in this case it seems you are using biased rhetoric yourself in the sentence I just quoted above by inferring / co-opting science as being on the side of GMO ... it isn't. Science is being used on both sides of the controversy. We can each link endless articles to demonstrate this. But I think that is missing my point: Nature doesn't need to be improved on. It will take its own course ... sometimes we humans benefit and sometimes we suffer and are forced to adapt.
In any case, the very definition of life is opportunism. And allowing GMO crops to be developed allows them to be patented and thus controlled. And so we see the ring-spot virus opportunistically targeting a host: the papaya ... and then scientists try to invent a biology to thwart the virus ... and then individuals opportunistically seize the new inventions (GMO's) to infect the planet's socio-economics. It's all parasitic ... Be careful what you wish for by "improving" nature.
Or, alternatively, people can turn their attention to not constantly trying to get more production to feed more people -- and, rather, control their own growth: "Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell" -- Edward Abbey
And feral pigs will eat your crop, too. That is, if the fruit flies haven't gotten there first.
Fruit flies make it tough to grow larger sized varieties of tomatoes as well. Not sure how they handle them up in Waimea, but what ever they are doing its working fine. However it is a different story for the home gardener if they are going the organic route.
What astounds me after reading all the above replies, is; how was produce from the beginning of time on earth ever able to survive until present ? It surely did inspite of the pests and obstacles.
And people routinely starved to death over the winter, all over the world.
I agree that the genie is out of the bottle ... too much money behind GMO to put it back in.
That said, I am in a very lot of pretty good (and highly credible) company of international journalists who coined the term "FrankenFoods" ... I didn't start it ... it has become a common-usage term.
The problem is, it's a distorted term that co-opts the discussion. It presumes a conclusion to the debate before we even start talking. It's prejudicial, and thus unfair.
Quote:
I also don't agree with any inference that "science" is beginning to "make the case that the fears have been overstated."
I may not have stated it well, but what I meant was that when I read an "anti" article, it typically implies that all of the science is against GMOs, when it clearly isn't. What I see... as in the Slate article... is that the other side is starting to gain some traction in 'the press." The side that says "Hey, we think the fears have been overstated. We're just not seeing the huge problems that were predicted by y'all."
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But I think that is missing my point: Nature doesn't need to be improved on. It will take its own course ... sometimes we humans benefit and sometimes we suffer and are forced to adapt.
No, I get it. I just don't think it's accurate. For good or for ill, mankind has been bending Nature to our will since the first time Ugg carried a lightning-ignited firebrand into a cave and used it to keep the family little bit warmer overnight. And the entire history of agriculture... and with it the societies and cultures that agriculture made possible... has been built on improving on what we found in nature. Have you ever seen what maize was like, or wheat, or apples, or dogs, before we started mixing and blending genetic material using the primitive technologies of the day? Those natural precursors are all nearly unrecognizable when we compare them with what we shaped them into.
Quote:
In any case, the very definition of life is opportunism. And allowing GMO crops to be developed allows them to be patented and thus controlled. And so we see the ring-spot virus opportunistically targeting a host: the papaya ... and then scientists try to invent a biology to thwart the virus ... and then individuals opportunistically seize the new inventions (GMO's) to infect the planet's socio-economics. It's all parasitic ... Be careful what you wish for by "improving" nature.
Except that is not what is happening in the vast majority of cases. You keep citing cases from the economic horror end of the scale... the Monsantos et al... while ignoring the whole rest of the spectrum of what GMO technology has accomplished, which includes the miracle end of the scale, where devastation and starvation can be reversed by thoughtful and clever engineering of genetic material.
Quote:
Or, alternatively, people can turn their attention to not constantly trying to get more production to feed more people -- and, rather, control their own growth: "Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell" -- Edward Abbey
And in fact the birth rate has been plummeting in many parts of the world as various individuals and various cultures embrace birth control and it becomes the stuff of everyday conversation and government policy. Notice that the once-scary "Population Bomb" never went off? Sure, there's more to go to solve all the issues, but that's a future that was neatly averted when we used science to modify what Nature seemed to have in store for us.
Bottom line for me... and then perhaps we should return to the programming previously scheduled in this channel... is that although I sincerely wish that Genetically Engineered papayas were not necessary, I would far rather have them grown locally and readily available for purchase at the farmers market at 5 for a buck than I would for them to disappear from my table. And I think I should have that choice.
You don't like them? Don't buy them. To me it's that simple.
Now how about we move along and discuss the danged Mediterranean fruit fly? Or maybe banana blossom end rot?
And people routinely starved to death over the winter, all over the world.
Here is a fun little science history lesson for those interested in the subject:
Depends on what time period you are referring to ... prior to the Neolithic [advent of agriculture] what you write was not true ... starvation was not a significant occurrence in the Paleolithic period (the stone age).
Why is that significant? Because, contrary to contemporary opinion, most of the problems that beset mankind are a result of agriculture. In the Paleolithic there were only small hunter-gather bands operating over large territories with sufficient game, fish, edible plants, roots and tubers to feed all. Life in these small bands was egalitarian -- including women as equal decision-makers. There were very few communicable diseases spread. There were nearly no non-communicable diseases of any kind, such as: heart disease, cancers, diabetes, and so forth ... all the major killers of today.
When the Little Ice Age occurred, the bands that had begun to spread north from the cradles of homo sapiens development, pulled back and, slightly concentrated in overlapping ranges, they began to nurture certain plants and animals in an attempt to control nature to benefit their food supplies. Almost overnight, in terms of evolutionary history, the Neolithic period began and non-communicable diseases made their debut with the adaptation to grain-based diet. Even tooth decay, found with a prevalence of only about 5% in the Paleolithic, instantly jumped to 25% with the dawn of agriculture.
One more issue to consider before I tie this to modernity and GMOs: as soon as mankind began to control agriculture, he required a great deal of disciplined work and scheduling, management, rule by managers, and so forth. Band members previously had a great deal of leisure time with lots of socializing, story-telling, laughter and such. Agriculture? Whoops, not so much. And the bands grew to tribes with ruler leadership. The tribes grew to states with government. And those best suited to control were -- as today -- rather ruthless types ... pretty much the 2% - 3% of population known as psycho/sociopaths. These sorts are present in higher concentration in corporate and financial business than in other professions.
Readers may find my little blog here bizarre. But I am not a conspiratorialist. I can back every bit of the above with hard anthropological and archeological science. It is fact.
Here's the kicker: Dunbar's number - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dunbar's Number is a proven physiological limitation of all primates which defines the maximum number of individuals that can naturally function with true and empathetic concern for one another. The number is relative to the size of an individual species' neocortex. Exceed the group size -- which for humans is about 150 people -- and the group will begin to fray in numerous ways and require forcible, non-egalitarian management.
Now then: keep screwing with nature ... controlling it (you think) to improve your sense of security. Convert our world's food supplies to GMO patented crops -- because you want to save Big Island papaya. The more we allow these "advancements" -- the further we stray from our essential nature and invite control by people who are incapable of social concern. That is the lesson.
To many, the researchers at university are noble saviors ... they are not the denizens of social destruction. And I agree that is how they see themselves in many cases. But they are tools. And we who accept this path -- are suckers. Another of us born every minute.
The problem is, it's a distorted term that co-opts the discussion. It presumes a conclusion to the debate before we even start talking. It's prejudicial, and thus unfair.
I may not have stated it well, but what I meant was that when I read an "anti" article, it typically implies that all of the science is against GMOs, when it clearly isn't. What I see... as in the Slate article... is that the other side is starting to gain some traction in 'the press." The side that says "Hey, we think the fears have been overstated. We're just not seeing the huge problems that were predicted by y'all."
No, I get it. I just don't think it's accurate. For good or for ill, mankind has been bending Nature to our will since the first time Ugg carried a lightning-ignited firebrand into a cave and used it to keep the family little bit warmer overnight. And the entire history of agriculture... and with it the societies and cultures that agriculture made possible... has been built on improving on what we found in nature. Have you ever seen what maize was like, or wheat, or apples, or dogs, before we started mixing and blending genetic material using the primitive technologies of the day? Those natural precursors are all nearly unrecognizable when we compare them with what we shaped them into.
Except that is not what is happening in the vast majority of cases. You keep citing cases from the economic horror end of the scale... the Monsantos et al... while ignoring the whole rest of the spectrum of what GMO technology has accomplished, which includes the miracle end of the scale, where devastation and starvation can be reversed by thoughtful and clever engineering of genetic material.
And in fact the birth rate has been plummeting in many parts of the world as various individuals and various cultures embrace birth control and it becomes the stuff of everyday conversation and government policy. Notice that the once-scary "Population Bomb" never went off? Sure, there's more to go to solve all the issues, but that's a future that was neatly averted when we used science to modify what Nature seemed to have in store for us.
Bottom line for me... and then perhaps we should return to the programming previously scheduled in this channel... is that although I sincerely wish that Genetically Engineered papayas were not necessary, I would far rather have them grown locally and readily available for purchase at the farmers market at 5 for a buck than I would for them to disappear from my table. And I think I should have that choice.
You don't like them? Don't buy them. To me it's that simple.
Now how about we move along and discuss the danged Mediterranean fruit fly? Or maybe banana blossom end rot?
In answer to all your comments above: what I wrote in the previous post.
And, as for "don't like them don't buy them": nonsense ... GMO's are not labeled in America ... we are one of the few industrialized countries in the world not requiring such labels. But, again, if we allow such science to "save" one crop here , and then another there , and then another and another ... we will end up with every crop modified and patented. And there go the individuals' rights to choice, availability, selection, and -- *trumpet* -- P R I C I N G.
I'm really ready to move on, but here are two low hanging fruit that I simply must pick before the flies carry them off...
Quote:
Originally Posted by nullgeo
Life in these small bands was egalitarian -- including women as equal decision-makers.
And we know that because... ?
Quote:
There were very few communicable diseases spread. There were nearly no non-communicable diseases of any kind, such as: heart disease, cancers, diabetes, and so forth ... all the major killers of today.
I have followed with great interest the story of Ötzi, the mummified stone age murder victim from 5,000 years ago who was found frozen in the Italian alps. His detailed autopsy, as documented on this PBS special, revealed that he had arthritis of the knee, atherosclerosis, and Lyme disease, among other health issues formerly thought to be "modern."
Now, about those Naio thrips... quite the shocker, isn't it?
Last edited by OpenD; 10-20-2012 at 09:19 PM..
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pun intended, thank you for the applause 
