March Against Monsanto

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Why was the study to which he linked sent to a European publication, if it is known that the EU is against strongly against GMOs, RoundUp and RR plants? Do you expect anyone to believe the article could get an unbiased review in Europe? Would the same article sent to an equivalent publication in the US have gotten the same review and resultant publication?

There is as much reason to scrutinize research, the reasons for the research etc., from educational institutions as there are from corporations.

I don't completely trust either but I don't condemn them either. I am skeptical of both and they both deserve to be scrutinized.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

(My emphasis added.)

Ken,

Peer reviewers do not work for journals. They are asked by the editorial board to review the article -- for no remuneration. You have been talking about "following the money." Peer review has no money to follow. They do this for the sake of ensuring research is as accurate as possible.



Chris

Kindly point out anywhere I have accused reviewing groups of being paid. I said they can have a bias, a joint professional opinion that will effect the reviews they give and thus taints their "publicly stated intent". When I mention "follow the money" I am referring to the money educational institutions and their researchers receive for performing the studies.

[Chris Kennedy]

Ken,

Again -- you are showing you don't know how peer review works. What is this "reviewing group" you speak of? At first it was the "reviewing organization" but the referee has no connection to the journal. The whole point of peer review is to bring an outsider, with no connections to the research and the publishing body to give an informed and non-influenced opinion. Peer reviewers are anonymous and volunteers. The reviewer can reject the research with no ill effect to them, and if you have looked at acceptance rates for journal publications, you would see how much research gets rejected.

Out of curiosity, have you ever gone through peer review? Do you have any experience with this process?

Chris

[Jason Roehl]

Chris, so are those peer reviewers just some average Joe off the street? Doubtful. While they may not get paid directly to review, they're still making or have made an income somewhere in the scientific community, and hold some level of personal and/or professional bias. True impartiality is a unicorn.

[Chris Kennedy]

Kindly point out anywhere I have accused reviewing groups of being paid. I said they can have a bias, a joint professional opinion that will effect the reviews they give and thus taints their "publicly stated intent". When I mention "follow the money" I am referring to the money educational institutions and their researchers receive for performing the studies.

As you say, "follow the money for the educational institutions and researchers receive for performing the studies." They perform the studies, which then go through anonymous, non-renumerated peer review. Peer review breaks the money chain. You haven't accused them of being paid -- the important thing is that they aren't paid. It is that reviewers are outside of the grant chain and that they are not beholden to the instigators of the grant. That is what you are missing about peer review. Getting a grant does not guarantee publication. Research journal publishers have to remain independent of corporate sponsorship otherwise they become known to be a tool. The research community knows this.

Again -- have you ever been through peer review?

Chris

[Steve Rozmiarek]

If the science is proven inaccurate or flat out wrong, then it can be said due diligence was done. If the science is proven accurate or at least partly accurate, then Monsanto and others can begin work on a solution before we put our food supply in jeopardy.

As for GMO's, I'm reminded of those margarine commercials in the 70's. "It's not nice to fool mother nature!".

Greg, I get the impression that you want the due diligence to last long enough that it obstructs the use of GMO.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Steve,

There is a huge amount of food waste in this country, a really shocking amount. FWIW, I don't consider it wasted if the food is re-purposed, fed to animals, composted, etc. I mean waste as in thrown in the trash, mostly at the end-user location.

I'm pretty much agnostic on the GMO issue; I don't know enough about the science to have an informed position. But in this highly surprising thread (for this board), Greg, Pat, David and some others have kept their cool and calmly argued their respective positions, while a few posters have thrown around such seemingly pejorative (and political) terms as left leaning, radicals, enviros, etc.

Just my observation.

Frank, if there is food waste, it's not happening on the farm or in the manufacturing processes. Probably is at the kitchen table, I guess my kids contribute to that. What are you thinking of?

[Steve Rozmiarek]

I will also state, I doubt seriously anybody who has posted in this thread so far, is honestly qualified with the knowledge to intelligently explain, discuss or debate the subject.

Ken, there are several involved with this thread who do actually have a strong grasp of the original subject, but it keeps wandering all over the place and the ends up getting led off topic. No one could be fully educated on all the ground we've covered.

[Frank Drew]

peer reviewers... [are] still making or have made an income somewhere in the scientific community, and hold some level of personal and/or professional bias. True impartiality is a unicorn.

The perfect is the enemy of the good; if you're going to implicitly reject all scientific findings or opinions then we'll never get anywhere. I might have a bias towards an acceptance of the theory of gravity, but I'm ok with that.

Also, there actually are people in the scientific community who simply want to find the best answers to a question, whose egos are divorced from what they consider "facts", who really believe that there are no failures in their work, just more data.

[Frank Drew]

Frank, if there is food waste, it's not happening on the farm or in the manufacturing processes. Probably is at the kitchen table, I guess my kids contribute to that. What are you thinking of?

Steve,

Most but not all of the waste occurs at or near the end user -- at homes, grocery stores, schools, other food purveyors. It would probably break a farmer's heart to see how much of his fruits and vegetables ends up in school cafeteria garbage cans. A lot of perfectly good food is thrown away due to confusing or unrealistic sell-by dating, particularly on dairy products. Google "food waste in the U.S." for more links, but here are just a few:

http://www.businessweek.com/articles...-of-food-waste

http://www.fresnobee.com/2013/06/16/...d-at-home.html

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/wan...ost-2013-06-18

[Mike Henderson]

Steve,

Most but not all of the waste occurs at or near the end user -- at homes, grocery stores, schools, other food purveyors. It would probably break a farmer's heart to see how much of his fruits and vegetables ends up in school cafeteria garbage cans. A lot of perfectly good food is thrown away due to confusing or unrealistic sell-by dating, particularly on dairy products. Google "food waste in the U.S." for more links, but here are just a few:

http://www.businessweek.com/articles...-of-food-waste

http://www.fresnobee.com/2013/06/16/...d-at-home.html

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/wan...ost-2013-06-18

For certain crops, a lot of "waste" occurs at the farm. Ever see the picking of tomatoes? A LOT of tomatoes that are not "perfect" wind up between the rows. Also, ones that are too ripe to make it through the supply chain. And then they rip out the plants while they still have quite a few tomatoes on the vine.

I guess the picking is just too costly to do more than a few times per planting.

I would guess that peaches are similar - a lot of less than perfect, or too ripe, wind up on the ground. Probably other fruit crops, also.

Mike

[Frank Drew]

I would guess that peaches are similar - a lot of less than perfect, or too ripe, wind up on the ground. Probably other fruit crops, also.

Mike,

A huge amount of ripe, sound peaches fall to the ground and are never used unless the grower has some system in place for gleaners to come through and pick them up; if done daily, the fruit would at least be ideal for value-added products like peach jam, but that would require processing facilities, etc. A local grower said his dad use to pile hay under the trees to cushion the peaches as they fell, but he (the current guy) doesn't want to deal with all the hay after the crop is in. Seems like a perfect job for a york rake, but what do I know.

We've got a great system of farm to market roads in the U.S.; in some underdeveloped countries, the road systems and overall infrastructure are so poor that lots of crops rot in the fields because they can't be transported.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

The fruit and veggies growers are all about timing markets. Everything is time sensitive orders with those, they grow more than an order to ensure it gets filled on time. The fruit that stays in the orchard to rot does turn back into nutrients and back to fruit eventually.

I get what you are saying about that being edible food that could be consumed, and agree, but the reason it isn't is the reality of shipping. I like having peaches here where I can't grow them, so I don't know what the solution is.

[Dave Sheldrake]

The title of doctor and peer reviewed studies used to denote some degree of authority on the subject at hand.

I hold a Ph.D, Masters and BsC from two of the most well respected universities on the planet, the qualifications don't make me right, being right makes me right when it occurs

It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong

cheers

Dave

[Dan Hintz]

I hold a Ph.D, Masters and BsC from two of the most well respected universities on the planet

You went to DeVry and University of Phoenix, too?