Marcus Williamson wrote in message
...

Do you believe that any of these GM spin projects will succeed?:

* "Non-allergenic" peanuts
* "Golden" rice
* "Vaccine" bananas

Of course they won't.

define succeed

Looks like gm soya is something of a success story

one thing you learn in agriculture is that not everything succeeds. When
we used to go to the dairy event at Stoneleigh you would find that at
every show there would be something hyped as this miracle breakthrough.
Looking back you find that perhaps one in ten of these actually are
nearly as important as they were made out to be.
One in four or five are still there in ten years time, a useful part of
the industry. Most of the rest disappear by the wayside.


It's all so obviously hype to try to get wider acceptance for GM in a
population which doesn't want it.

if you are innocent enough to believe hype then that is your problem.
FYI, here's the position of the UK supermarkets on GM. Would any of
them dare to start including GM ingredients in their products again? I
think not...

regards
Marcus



UK Supermarkets maintain strict GM-free policy for 2003

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - News from gmfoodnews.com

6 January 2003

gmfoodnews.com has completed its annual survey of UK supermarkets for
their position on genetically modified (GM) food and ingredients for
2003.

The results show that opposition to GM foods is as strong as it was in
1999, when supermarkets removed GM foods and ingredients from their
shelves. Just as in 1999, no UK supermarket includes GM food or
ingredients in their own-brand products. Increasingly, supermarkets
are also specifying GM-free feed for animals producing their meat,
milk and eggs.

please, I stand at markets next to the supermarket buyers. I know what
they buy and where the stuff comes from,
so don't expect me to belive this rubbish

--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'

Marcus Williamson wrote:
Out of curiosity:
How many years of safe use is enough?


BSE shows, for example, that 20 years is not enough:

http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/20103102.cfm

I would suggest that a number of human generations would be the
minimum required to determine whether or not a crop/food was safe.

Fair enough. This does raise a couple of questions:

1) How would you select the humans singled out for multi-generational
testing?

2) By your definition, could we now declare the strawberry safe to eat?
After all, it only came into existence in 1766, so we now have about 9
generations of strawberry eaters.

3) How about something like kiwi? We are not past the first generation
yet. Oh, I am sure some natives somewhere ate kiwi, but surely they
were not monitoring for negative effects, so we have to start from scratch.

4) How about pharmaceuticals? Must we test those for several generations?

5) or how about novel food mixtures? I mean take something like a soda
pop? It has a combination of ingredients never mixed together before.
We just don't know what they might do locked up in a can.

Please explain-- how do you determine what gets tested multiple
generations and what does not?













regards
Marcus

Xref: 127.0.0.1 sci.agricultu58156

(wparrott) writes:

2) By your definition, could we now declare the strawberry safe to eat?
After all, it only came into existence in 1766, so we now have about 9
generations of strawberry eaters.

Not to speak of the poor health record of the strawberry. When I was a
child, up to 10% of the population had an adverse reaction to consuming
large quantities of strawberries, known as 'hives'. Even when warned,
children picking strawberries often succumbed to this disease. The
strawberry should obviously be banned.

3) How about something like kiwi? We are not past the first generation
yet. Oh, I am sure some natives somewhere ate kiwi, but surely they
were not monitoring for negative effects, so we have to start from scratch.

Now you have me worried about the boysenberries on my morning cereal.
Obviously, they are a frankenfruit just waiting to turn my toenails blue.

I can't even think about marion berries.

--
http://home.teleport.com/~larryc

"Larry Caldwell" wrote in message
...
(wparrott) writes:

2) By your definition, could we now declare the strawberry safe to eat?
After all, it only came into existence in 1766, so we now have about 9
generations of strawberry eaters.

Not to speak of the poor health record of the strawberry. When I was a
child, up to 10% of the population had an adverse reaction to consuming
large quantities of strawberries, known as 'hives'. Even when warned,
children picking strawberries often succumbed to this disease. The
strawberry should obviously be banned.

3) How about something like kiwi? We are not past the first generation
yet. Oh, I am sure some natives somewhere ate kiwi, but surely they
were not monitoring for negative effects, so we have to start from
scratch.

Now you have me worried about the boysenberries on my morning cereal.
Obviously, they are a frankenfruit just waiting to turn my toenails blue.

I can't even think about marion berries.

Or getting the seeds stuck in your appendix.

Gordon