NYT front page + 2 full pages inside: A Lonely Quest for Facts on Genetically Modified Crops

[proverbialwisdom]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/05/us/on-hawaii-a-lonely-quest-for-facts-about-gmos.html?_r=0

A Lonely Quest for Facts on Genetically Modified Crops
By AMY HARMON
Published: January 4, 2014

KONA, Hawaii — From the moment the bill to ban genetically engineered crops on the island of Hawaii was introduced in May 2013, it garnered more vocal support than any the County Council here had ever considered, even the perennially popular bids to decriminalize marijuana.

Public hearings were dominated by recitations of the ills often attributed to genetically modified organisms, or G.M.O.s: cancer in rats, a rise in childhood allergies, out-of-control superweeds, genetic contamination, overuse of pesticides, the disappearance of butterflies and bees.

Like some others on the nine-member Council, Greggor Ilagan was not even sure at the outset of the debate exactly what genetically modified organisms were: living things whose DNA has been altered, often with the addition of a gene from a distant species, to produce a desired trait. But he could see why almost all of his colleagues had been persuaded of the virtue of turning the island into what the bill’s proponents called a “G.M.O.-free oasis.”

“You just type ‘G.M.O.’ and everything you see is negative,” he told his staff. Opposing the ban also seemed likely to ruin anyone’s re-election prospects.

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Locked (13 replies): http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014689693

[proverbialwisdom]

1. RECOMMENDED: 1,417 comments at NYT website. (nt)

[proverbialwisdom]

2. Googled Martha Herbert and this popped up on apraxia + food allergies or sensitivities, not autism.

http://www.specialneeds.com/children-and-parents/speech-or-communication-impairment/apraxia-path

The Apraxia Path
(undated)

I just finished reading “The Autism Revolution” by Dr. Martha Herbert. As I neared the end of this book, I read a few simple words that struck a chord with me. The author said,

“One of the most frustrating things about battling autism is having to forge your own path.”

My child does not have autism, but he has an equally mysterious speech disorder called Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS). And forging my own path is what I feel like I do day in and day out as I persevere to try and find solutions.

Every day I feel like I am walking through a heavily wooded forest, down a path that has taken decades to become so overgrown that I cannot see more than two feet ahead of me. I have to wade through the brush that blocks my trail. I am lost, but I have hope that someone will find me. I know without a shadow of a doubt that I will make it out. It may take time, hard work, and I may be exhausted in the end, but I know the restraints of this disorder will not beat me.

Pediatricians shrug their shoulders, speech therapists work hard to try and make the words come out, but ultimately it’s me ... establishing my own course and trying to find answers that will unlock my almost four-year-old son’s voice.

All parents whose children have apraxia share the same plot, a story that begins with quiet babies, many who have food allergies or sensitivities, asthma, or eczema. By the time the child turns two, there are no words, or at least none that stick around on a regular basis. The page titled “Milestones” in the baby book that says “first word,” “spoke a sentence,” and “makes a new friend” remain blank.

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Written by: Tori Starling See other articles by Tori Starling

About the Author: Tori Starling lives in Atlanta with her husband and three sons (ages 14, 8, and 3). She graduated in 1996 with a Journalism degree and left an I.T. career five years ago to be a stay-at-home mom. Her youngest child, Jake, has Childhood Apraxia of Speech and she blogs at www.jakes-journey-apraxia.com.

http://jakes-journey-apraxia.com/2013/11/25/healing-jake/

NOVEMBER 25, 2013 BY TSTARMOM

Healing Jake

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I have big news to share.

My little Jake, at age 5.2 years old, has tested out of speech therapy. In December of 2010 at age 2.3, we began work with a SLP and three years later the battle to speak is essentially over.

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Also, encompassing this news was the reality that Jake’s journey to wellness is not over. I was appreciative that I made it out of the apraxia hurricane alive and I am so, so grateful to hear that beautiful voice, but I just can’t fully celebrate when I know another storm is out there in the seas brewing.

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So, now we are up to eight allergies, one intolerance, and who knows how many seasonal/environmental allergies. Considering that each year we add more allergens to our list, the naiveness of thinking that he is just going to outgrow his allergies is starting to feel pretty far-fetched.

The reality is starting to feel like if his allergies continue to increase it is going to seriously affect the quality of both of our lives. And here’s the thing … I cannot keep band-aiding this problem by taking things out of his life. It is all getting to be too much and it is not a realistic solution. I am tired of his immune system bullying us; I am going to stand up to it.

The same week Jake tested out of speech, I found out that my older son LD has minor food allergies. For the past two years he has had itchy skin, regular nose bleeds, random rashes on his face, and a chronic belly ache. Turns out there is a reason for it. He is slightly allergic to peanut, almond, egg, and soy. Yes, I am pretty blown away at this news.

While allergies are never good news, this situation has made me more aware of soy and the reality that it is in nearly everything kids eat. Eighty to 90 percent of soy is genetically modified and it may not be healthy for boys because it is a phytoestrogen. Jake is a big soy eater because of his many allergies. Because of LD’s allergy, I am also now trying to significantly reduce the amount of soy in Jake’s diet.

Over the course of the past two weeks, I have made some major changes. I went off the deep end as they say, and my family is now on a Paleo-type diet that includes all non-GMO and organic foods.

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[proverbialwisdom]

3. GMWATCH link: Fakethrough! GMOs and the capitulation of science journalism.

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/01/03/food-genes-and-the-feeling-of-risk/

GENETICS
January 3, 2014, 11:12 am

Food, Genes and the Feeling of Risk
By ANDREW C. REVKIN

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2013/08/the-psychology-of-distrusting-gmos.html

AUGUST 8, 2013

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF DISTRUSTING G.M.O.S
POSTED BY MARIA KONNIKOVA

http://gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2014/15240-fakethrough-gmos-and-the-capitulation-of-science-journalism

Fakethrough! GMOs and the capitulation of science journalism

Jonathan Latham, PhD
Independent Science News, 7 Jan 2014

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But the main point, besides that New York Times readers may be the world’s most misinformed, is that golden rice is not alone, it is just one example among many of preliminary or doubtful research projects being inflated into positive global GMO news stories.

The ingredients missing from science journalism

These five "humanitarian" GMO stories, often presented without doubts or caveats, are to be found literally by the thousands in the global news media. To adequately understand the full extent of this journalistic problem, however, it is necessary to briefly consider the specific intellectual and journalistic deficiencies they contain.

Firstly, these news stories offer robust evidence that science reporting is plagued by the same fundamental problem that pervades the rest of commercial journalism. It is the problem summed up by newspaper man Lord Northcliffe as:

“News is what people do not want you to print. All the rest is advertising.”

In biotech reporting, this defect is characterised firstly by missing context. Science journalism could at any point over the lifetime of biotechnology have asked some foundational public interest questions: Is the technology ready? Are the regulators competent? Why is it considered appropriate for industry to fund and conduct its own safety studies? What are the views of dissenting scientists? And many others. Yet only a tiny handful of professional science journalists have ever escaped the standard narrow framing around a specific product, which therefore leaves the reader imagining there are good answers to these questions. Michael Pollan’s excellent Playing God in the Garden is almost unique in this respect.

The second failing is that fakethrough reporting is simple old-time boosterism, whose art largely consists of leaving information out. Except it isn’t quite that innocuous. Because these products are not just the latest cell phone, the quantity of information left out is enormously large and hugely significant. As a non-technical example: when the reader is expected to believe that the agribusiness industry is operating a humanitarian enterprise, is it appropriate to leave out (or deny) the same industry’s historical record of intimidating farmers or manufacturing dangerous agricultural products and then denying and evading responsibility?

The authors of these articles may reasonably argue that in a short space some assumptions have to be made; but readers can hardly note omissions for themselves when the contradictory facts or viewpoints have never been reported, either in their own newspaper, or even in any commercial media.

For example, when the UN published a major report by hundreds of scientists proposing that industrial agriculture and GMOs were inappropriate solutions for agriculture and poverty, the New York Times never once mentioned it. Only years later did guest writers ever reference the IAASTD at “the paper of record”.

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[proverbialwisdom]

8. nntaleb: "Adding a section on risk-ignorant psychologists pathologizing people skeptical about GMOs"

Nassim N. Taleb ?@nntaleb 22h
Statisticians understand the risks of roulette better than carpenters; probabilists understand the risks of GMOs better than biologists.

Nassim N. Taleb ?@nntaleb Feb 14
Adding a section on risk-ignorant psychologists pathologizing people skeptical about GMOs http://fooledbyrandomness.com/nudge.pdf cc:@freakonomics

Nassim N. Taleb ?@nntaleb Feb 11
EU ministers meeting today to discuss GM corn. Here is our warning http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/pp2.pdf

Nassim N. Taleb ?@nntaleb Feb 10
The reason we put this PP sheet is avoid answering every imbecile who says "we take risks when crossing the street"

Nassim N. Taleb ?@nntaleb Feb 7
Gave the first negative review in ~ a decade. Idiotic researchers pathologizing people for skepticism about GMOs.
http://www.amazon.com/review/R3PV8EN44Z23B2/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0465032427&linkCode=&nodeID=&tag=

https://twitter.com/nntaleb
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nassim_Nicholas_Taleb

[proverbialwisdom]

4. NYT's Amy Harmon slammed over pro-GMO article.

http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2014/15244-nyt-s-amy-harmon-slammed-over-pro-gmo-article

NYT's Amy Harmon slammed over pro-GMO article
on 10 January 2014.

Prof David Schubert points out that there is no scientific consensus that GMOs are safe and that many animal feeding studies show toxicity from GM crops

There's been plenty of kickback against the pro-GMO article in the New York Times by Amy Harmon, "A Lonely Quest for Facts on Genetically Modified Crops".

In her article, Harmon criticises the ban on growing new GMOs on Hawaii's Big Island. Harmon appears to have homed in on one Council member who didn't agree with the ban and used him as the authority to attack it.

Harmon's article contains a number of myths, including the claim that there is a "global scientific consensus" that GMOs are safe. It's hard to believe that Harmon wasn't aware of the public statement, "No scientific consensus on GMO safety" which has now been signed by nearly 300 well qualified scientists.

Published responses to Harmon's article in the NYT's letters page (below) include one from Prof David Schubert of the Salk Institute, who points to the lack of mandatory safety testing of GMOs in the US.

GMO foods and the trust issue
New York Times, January 9, 2014
The Opinion Pages|Letters

To the Editor:
Re “On Hawaii, a Lonely Quest for Fact” (front page, Jan. 5):

Your article about genetically modified crops says that there is a “global scientific consensus” that they are safe, and suggests that opponents are driven by emotion, not fact.

As a medical research scientist, I disagree that there is any such consensus, and there is no evidence that any genetically modified product is safe. There is no required safety testing, no epidemiological study relating consumption to health.

Although the industry aggressively tries to discredit all studies showing potential harm, there are many showing toxicity in animals that predict serious medical consequences in humans from long-term exposure. Finally, contrary to industry claims, genetically modified crops have produced no increase in yield, have elevated the use of herbicides tenfold, and have resulted in no social or economic benefit except for the reduction of factory farm labor costs.

The public has every right to distrust what it is told about genetically modified food safety.

DAVID SCHUBERT
La Jolla, Calif., Jan. 6, 2014

The writer is a professor at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.

[proverbialwisdom]

5. ISIS Report 15/01/14: Chorus of Condemnation on Seralini Retraction Worldwide

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/condemnation_of_Serallini_Retraction.php

Chorus of Condemnation on Seralini Retraction Worldwide
Institute of Science in Society, January 15, 2013

Read what some of those who signed on are saying; add your name and forward widely to get the retraction reversed, and to show your support for science and scientists working for the public good.

Lee Artz (signed scientist) Outstanding Scholar Award, Prof at Purdue University Calumet Social Science, USA: "John Dewey once said that our quality of life depends on "improving the methods of debate and discussion." Arguing, contesting, refuting the study's findings are in order. Censorship burns humanity, trashes truth, and postpones knowledge."

Nnimmo Bassey (signed non-scientist), environmental activist and poet, Director, Health of Mother Earth Foundation, Times magazine's Heroes of the Environment, 2009, Right Livelihood award 2010, Rafto Prize 2012, Nigeria: "One sure way to subvert progress and hinder the defense of people and planet is to block knowledge. The retraction of peer reviewed scientific papers is a corporate suppression of our freedom of expression - a fundamental human right. If this trend is allowed to continue we can be sure that only corporate interests will be served at the expense of people and planet. It is unconscionable and immoral."

Henry Becker (signed scientist) BE MSc ScD FCIC Killam Laureate 1992 Engineering Medal 1990 Prof Emeritus Queen s university, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

"The suppression of research when findings threaten commercial interests is toxic to science in particular and truth in general. Such acts must be vigorously opposed and roundly condemned. In the words of Edmund Burke, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

Adolpho Boy (signed non-scientist) Professor of Horticulture (retired) Argentina, and Grupo de Reflexion rural, Argentina: "I have used glyphosate since 1983, when we applied it only very sparingly. During the past 30 years, glyphosate use has shot up, and toxicity is everywhere; every day new cancer and malformations come to light, but are largely ignored by public officials and silenced in the hospitals, on tv and in newspapers.

"I do not need peer review of Seralini's research to be convinced that their findings are correct, and I dare say the unpublished reality of Argentina's people is worse.

During all my professional career I had Elsevier publications as reference to my experimental work, but right now I am suspicious not only about this publisher, but of all scientific research funded by "joint ventures" with chemical companies."

Mingyu Chen (signed scientist) Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China: "I do know scientific journals are not always equal to science. But this time they have broken some bottom line."

Ann Clark (signed scientist) Prof of Plant Agriculture (retired), Guelph University, Canada:

"Has science fallen off the tracks? What drives government and academia to tirelessly promote a single, proprietary technology - genetic modification - as the solution to the world's food needs? Whose interests are served by aggressively suppressing those who dare to ask the necessary and largely unaddressed questions of safety and efficacy of a technology that has been prematurely released into commerce?

"Society needs to protect its own interests and defend science in the public good. Stand up and show your support for the work of Gilles-Eric Seralini and others working in the public interest."

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Link from: http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_29070.cfm

[El_Johns]

6. For me, that the GMO industry operates in the interest of further monopolization of agriculture

& food production is at least as important as possible health risks.

But much less is written on that important topic.

[Brother Buzz]

7. Here is THE benchmark video for everything GMO - I sat through the 90 minute video...three times