On 8 Sep 2003 21:11:30 GMT, (Bill Oliver) wrote:

In article ,
Siberian Husky wrote:

I do care but I am not a chemist nor a biochemist, and I do not know
how to test Roundup and see whether it affects sperm production -- for
instance, even if Roundup is proved to affect sperm production in
salmons or dogs, it does not prove its effects on Homo sapiens. We
know its effect only when one day, say, Mr. William Olive accidentally
got Roundup on his body and the medical results show us Roundup effect
on humans.

How about your strategy? You emphasize only the part you support,
that no peer scientific journals have found Roundup dangerous, and you
disregard the part not in line with your view.



Let me tell you a few stories.

Not too many years ago, there were lots of people who loved to quote
incomplete and inconclusive anecdotal research as evidence that giving
postmenopausal women estrogens protected them from heart disease.
Then, after a controlled large study was done, it was demonstrated that
the opposite was true. Lots of women who took estrogen in the belief
they were protecting themselves from heart disease were instead
*increasing* their risk of heart disease.


Until a few months ago, there was a religious conviction that passive
exposure to smoke caused coronary heart disease and lung cancer. An
entire political agenda has been devoted to this, and health nazis have
made great hay waxing hysterical on it. Legislation has been built
around it, to the point that in my county the County board passed a
bill that made it illegal to smoke in your own home if a neighbor found
it offensive. It was only vetoed because the County Executive decided
it would be nothing more than a tool for bickering neighbors. Now, of
course, a large definitive study *has* been done that concludes that
there is no causal relation between environmental tobacco smoke and
tobacco-related mortality. But do you think the smoking nazis are
changing the way they want to enforce their views? Of course not.

That's what comes from drawing conclusions from inconclusive studies.
It's what comes from taking a limited study and pretending that
it is definitive. Early results are commonly reversed by
definitive studies. It's as common as dirt. But people who
use these early results as if they were definitive do it
because they have an agenda.

The bottom line is that people use these studies to
create legislation, to force people to act in certain
ways, and to impose their world view and their agenda.
That's why these people are so insistent that articles
state things they do not state. That's why they trot
out articles that they claim show that Roundup causes
infertility -- even when the author says the article
doesn't address it. That's why they trot out articles
that they claim shows that Roundup causes abortions
in Ontario -- even though the authors state they
aren't even *testing* it.

It's because the truth is secondary to the agenda.

And I am evil because I bother to ask them to stop
lying in order to advance that agenda. I am bad
because I ask them to admit that early and inconclusive
studies are early and inconclusive. I am outrageous
because I challenge them to show that the studies they
tout actually say what they claim they say.


So while you again and again emphasize how safe Roundup is, may I ask
you when did scientists find DDT dangerous since it was made?
Thalidomide?



When they had evidence. I gather it is your belief that *everything*
should be considered dangerous until proven safe? Or just *certain*
things? If so, then you had better start clearing out your home -- and
forget about your garden.


Better correct "a lie" into "an unproven claim". At least, I myself
as of now never claimed anything about Roundup based on a lie. If you
have problems with lies, deal with them, but don't deal with me :P

No, "a lie." Henry, Paghat, et al. trot out articles that explicitly
do not claim what they say they claim. It's one thing to state one's
belief. That's fine. It's another to outright lie about what an
article states.

I do not care what they claim.


Exactly.



billo

A whole lot of us use Roundup. We know the folks you are engaging
post a lot of lies to support their non scientific conclusions. We
don't really care what they have to say on the subject. They always
spout the same old crap, and will continue to do so as long as the
term "genetically nodified" strikes terror in their hearts. Why care?
If they manage to legislate against GM and useful chemicals
fertilizers etc, the dumb ones will starve off first eh?