The Dividing Line

[blackshoe]

As I recall, the FF weren't so worried about Congress creating a standing army -- there is a specific power. So it is hard to see the NSA as an "end run."

What power would that be? And who said anything about the NSA, besides you?

[onoway]

Hillary Clinton aptly pointed out that many of her critics don't inhabit the evidence-based world. It's hard to communicate across that dividing line.

 

The March of Antireality Continues, by Phil Plait

 

 

The people in the anti-evidence, anti-science, anti-reality crowd are bound to lose out in the long run, but they sure can and do raise a lot of Cain in the meantime. It gets really tiresome...

The reason for at least some of the anti science paranoia is because too many times it has turned up that science is not actually being presented, but a selection of biased results. So how are people to trust they are getting the whole story?

 

There are probably hundreds of examples (TED Talk Dr. Ben Goldacre) in the area of prescription drugs alone. To belabor a point, Monsanto has never run any tests (that anyone can access at least) on the safety of GMO foods for longer than 90 days. When independent scientists ran one for longer and found massive health issues occurring from cancers on down, they were subjected to a massive attack on their competence and protocol, but nothing whatsoever in terms of alternate studies with different (and safer) results.

 

Science is too often becoming a sort of commercial viability issue which is touted if things work out and selectively ignored if not, it has little or nothing to do with the pursuit of knowledge. More and more Government research agencies are being replaced by commercial outfits and it's only reasonable to assume they are not disinterested parties.

 

The controversy on climate change illustrates how a scientist can select a theory and find other scientists to support it energetically, while others equally energetically dispute everything about it. So how can people expect non scientists to take science seriously when it appears that science is often a bandwagon that some scientists leap onto and other scientists mock? How are non scientists supposed to make a decision about which to believe? It turns science too often into a sort of popularity contest and it isn't surprising that a whole lot of people say "a pox on science, those guys can't even make up their minds what's what, or if they do know they wont tell us, so what's the point?"

[kenberg]

Science is a way of thinking, a way of approaching life. This can be corrupted by money, probably everyone understands that, and in my opinion ideological commitment is an even greater danger. We can follow the money trail, or we hope we can, but ideologial pre-dispostion is more difficult to uncover. And it is not confined to one ideology.

 

So Pam has a point.

 

Nonetheless, science is the best approach we have. We correct errors, we uncover carelessness and bias. Maybe not right away, maybe not as soon as we should, but the scientist will change his mind, eventually, when facts stare him down. It may not be perfect, but it's a lot better than whatever is in second place.

[Winstonm]

“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” ― John Maynard Keynes

 

I find it quaint that the greatest anti-Keynesian ballyhoo comes from the anti-evidence crowd.

[mikeh]

The reason for at least some of the anti science paranoia is because too many times it has turned up that science is not actually being presented, but a selection of biased results. So how are people to trust they are getting the whole story?

 

There are probably hundreds of examples (TED Talk Dr. Ben Goldacre) in the area of prescription drugs alone. To belabor a point, Monsanto has never run any tests (that anyone can access at least) on the safety of GMO foods for longer than 90 days. When independent scientists ran one for longer and found massive health issues occurring from cancers on down, they were subjected to a massive attack on their competence and protocol, but nothing whatsoever in terms of alternate studies with different (and safer) results.

 

Science is too often becoming a sort of commercial viability issue which is touted if things work out and selectively ignored if not, it has little or nothing to do with the pursuit of knowledge. More and more Government research agencies are being replaced by commercial outfits and it's only reasonable to assume they are not disinterested parties.

 

The controversy on climate change illustrates how a scientist can select a theory and find other scientists to support it energetically, while others equally energetically dispute everything about it. So how can people expect non scientists to take science seriously when it appears that science is often a bandwagon that some scientists leap onto and other scientists mock? How are non scientists supposed to make a decision about which to believe? It turns science too often into a sort of popularity contest and it isn't surprising that a whole lot of people say "a pox on science, those guys can't even make up their minds what's what, or if they do know they wont tell us, so what's the point?"

 

What you write about what is known as Big Pharma has some validity. I don't know enough about GMO foods to comment, other than to suggest that a lot of what I've seen argued against GMP products, in general, seems to be credulous nonsense, based on ignorance. That is not to say that there may not be very real reasons to be concerned, but it is to say that most of those who are vocally opposed, in my experience, don't have a clue.

 

As for climate science, some 98% of accredited experts, that is those who have legitimate credentials, seem to agree on the broad strokes. That there are differences between experts, even on important details, is a good thing, since it is in the differences that topics for theses and for research grants lie. When a topic is considered to be fully understood, no-one has much chance of getting grant money to do research.

 

Edit: it also occurs to me that much of the perception problem to which you refer is because of the absymal level of basic scientific education afforded students. Such exposure as most get seems to be rote learning rather than learning how to think...how to question and how to test answers. Throw in the scientific illiteracy of most media editors, and the trash that is put out on the television screen and it is no wonder that so many people are so profoundly ignorant and distrustful.

[onoway]

What you write about what is known as Big Pharma has some validity. I don't know enough about GMO foods to comment, other than to suggest that a lot of what I've seen argued against GMP products, in general, seems to be credulous nonsense, based on ignorance. That is not to say that there may not be very real reasons to be concerned, but it is to say that most of those who are vocally opposed, in my experience, don't have a clue.

 

That idea is precisely what Monsanto works tirelessly to promote and they have the funds to do so.

 

Yet- why are they so adamantly opposed to letting independent scientists do long term studies on their products? Why are people like Dr. Vandana Shiva, eminently qualified AND experienced with what happened over a number of years when large tracts of land were transferred into GMO crops, still voices in the wilderness? Why have some scientists who worked for Monsanto for a number of years, quit saying they could no longer in good conscience continue?

 

Most products destined for market for internal use are required to be demonstrably safe before they are released. GMO foods have this reversed..it appears to be the responsibility of others to prove they aren't. How and why should this be the case?

 

Most of all, why, when the possible ramifications of GMO seeds could be devastating, are they being given carte blanche to preempt the world's food supply WITHOUT any independent science to support the technology? We don't allow drugs for pimples onto the market without scientific studies but our food supply isn't important?

 

If GMO products were so wonderful and had no downsides then surely farmers would embrace them without duress. They've had no problem with hybrid seed. If people have to be starved, threatened, bullied and legislated into GMO seed then of course people who watch this wonder why.

 

I listened to an interview the other day with a man who supposedly had seen the light and gone over to supporting GMO products. He offered nothing more than the unbelievably arrogant opinion that anyone who was concerned about them was basically an anti science Neanderthal deliberately ignoring the evidence. He had nothing to offer as to exactly what the science or evidence was he was talking about, but did a sort of verbal wave of the hand suggesting anyone who wasn't a mentally deficient yahoo would know. Unfortunately the interviewer apparently had no background in the topic so he couldn't (or didn't) challenge him at all about exactly what science he was referring to so the interview was extraordinarilly frustrating to listen to.

 

As far as people thinking science is unimportant, I wish politicians cared (a lot) more about it.

[mikeh]

That idea is precisely what Monsanto works tirelessly to promote and they have the funds to do so.

 

Yet- why are they so adamantly opposed to letting independent scientists do long term studies on their products? Why are people like Dr. Vandana Shiva, eminently qualified AND experienced with what happened over a number of years when large tracts of land were transferred into GMO crops, still voices in the wilderness? Why have some scientists who worked for Monsanto for a number of years, quit saying they could no longer in good conscience continue?

 

Most products destined for market for internal use are required to be demonstrably safe before they are released. GMO foods have this reversed..it appears to be the responsibility of others to prove they aren't. How and why should this be the case?

 

Most of all, why, when the possible ramifications of GMO seeds could be devastating, are they being given carte blanche to preempt the world's food supply WITHOUT any independent science to support the technology? We don't allow drugs for pimples onto the market without scientific studies but our food supply isn't important?

 

If GMO products were so wonderful and had no downsides then surely farmers would embrace them without duress. They've had no problem with hybrid seed. If people have to be starved, threatened, bullied and legislated into GMO seed then of course people who watch this wonder why.

 

I listened to an interview the other day with a man who supposedly had seen the light and gone over to supporting GMO products. He offered nothing more than the unbelievably arrogant opinion that anyone who was concerned about them was basically an anti science Neanderthal deliberately ignoring the evidence. He had nothing to offer as to exactly what the science or evidence was he was talking about, but did a sort of verbal wave of the hand suggesting anyone who wasn't a mentally deficient yahoo would know. Unfortunately the interviewer apparently had no background in the topic so he couldn't (or didn't) challenge him at all about exactly what science he was referring to so the interview was extraordinarilly frustrating to listen to.

 

As far as people thinking science is unimportant, I wish politicians cared (a lot) more about it.

It seems to me that there are two different, but related, aspects to gmo foods.

 

I am completely with you on the dubious ethics of certain large corporations, monsanto being perhaps the exemplar, in terms of such things as creating dependencies upon them, and promoting the use of mono-cultures. Big Agro is as bad as Big Pharma.

 

But GMO foods, as a concept, are actually a pretty good idea if used with an awareness of the need to maintain biodiversity and to not put all of our eggs in a single metaphorical basket.

 

Plants (and animals as well) are constantly seeing their genome altered by viruses, mutations and so on. Look at bacteria than develope resistance to antibiotics. There is in theory nothing inherently sinister in deliberate modification and, indeed, done properly it should be far safer than, say, the natural mutation of an avian flu virus.

 

It seems to me that those who protest against the 'unnatural' aspect of GMO are ignorami. Those who protest against the business practices of the mega corps are fighting, I hope, a different fight and one I would support.

[Vampyr]

Plants (and animals as well) are constantly seeing their genome altered by viruses, mutations and so on. Look at bacteria than develope resistance to antibiotics. There is in theory nothing inherently sinister in deliberate modification and, indeed, done properly it should be far safer than, say, the natural mutation of an avian flu virus.

Well, maybe and maybe not.

 

Even without the developments discussed in the link, I have never thought that herbicide-resistant crops were a good idea, allowing, as they do, more liberal use of herbicides than before. It is time to stop polluting the planet with these poisons. Organic farming is the only morally acceptable option.

[blackshoe]

Organic farming is the only morally acceptable option.

Trying to get my head around the concept of inorganic farming.

[Vampyr]

Trying to get my head around the concept of inorganic farming.

 

Work on it some more. You'll get there.

 

EDIT: In case it's a terminology thing, this is what is understood by the term "organic farming" in the UK.

[onoway]

It seems to me that there are two different, but related, aspects to gmo foods.

 

I am completely with you on the dubious ethics of certain large corporations, monsanto being perhaps the exemplar, in terms of such things as creating dependencies upon them, and promoting the use of mono-cultures. Big Agro is as bad as Big Pharma.

 

But GMO foods, as a concept, are actually a pretty good idea if used with an awareness of the need to maintain biodiversity and to not put all of our eggs in a single metaphorical basket.

 

Plants (and animals as well) are constantly seeing their genome altered by viruses, mutations and so on. Look at bacteria than develope resistance to antibiotics. There is in theory nothing inherently sinister in deliberate modification and, indeed, done properly it should be far safer than, say, the natural mutation of an avian flu virus.

 

It seems to me that those who protest against the 'unnatural' aspect of GMO are ignorami. Those who protest against the business practices of the mega corps are fighting, I hope, a different fight and one I would support.

 

As a concept they can be a good idea. The problem is that the concept has been given free expression to overwhelm food production without any long term studies or safeguards just in case we are not quite as clever as we think we are. It has happened before from time to time such as the escape of bees now known for good reason as killer bees, or the use of thalidomide for morning sickness. Good intentions and great concept. A bit of a problem in reality.

 

There is also a very real possibility that SOME GMO combinations would be just fine and others not so much. We have no ideas which are which nor controls to manage the not so good ones.

 

I think people who worry about the "unnatural" aspect think somewhat like this. There is a world of difference between GMOs and mutations or hybrids or the results of virus and bacterial activity. First of all none of those happen on the scale that GMOs are being introduced, and secondly the ones that don't work well within natural systems don't survive and reproduce. The GMOs are being supported artificially with chemicals, fertilizers, pesticides, cultivation. When any of these aren't adequate, at least some GMO species won't thrive and yield (reproduce), witness Monsanto's own admission after the major corn crop failure in Africa. I doubt you will ever find anyone who would maintain that fish and tomatoes might somehow naturally ever host each other's genetic material.

 

Natural systems have evolved over the centuries to interact and are interconnected and intertwined. It may be problematic to introduce organisms which are alien. We can and have flooded GMOs into the systems without any idea what - if any- affect this might have over time.

 

For example:

We do know that most people lose the ability to a greater or lesser degree to manage milk as they get older. The body stops producing the enzyme required to digest it. If over millennia the body cannot maintain the ability to digest milk, how is it going to handle totally unknown genetic material? The patents are granted on the concept of the material being unique, unknown in nature.

 

A few years ago I read a study done in Scotland looking at the result of feeding rats GMO feed. The research showed that GMO foods caused a change in the bacteria of the gut. They found this interesting but had no speculation as to whether this might be important and if so in what way. Recently other researchers found that certain changes in the bacteria of the gut are precursors to diabetes. Is there a connection? (I tried to find the Scottish study again but the link was on a now defunct computer and I was unable to find it again to see if the type of changes were the same.) It's something that needs to be looked into.

 

It particularly becomes important when there has been an independent study showing severe health issues connected to the GMO feed being fed to lab animals. We need to know if this is replicable and if it's a result which shows up with other GMO material.

 

Perhaps the most scary possibility is that GMO plants might be associated with bee colony collapse. If bees are unable to cope with the pollen from GMO plants then a diabetes epidemic is a very minor problem. Perhaps it isn't the GMO plants, perhaps it's a chemical required by those plants, or perhaps there's no connection at all. We should KNOW, is the point.

 

There is also the problem that the GMOs are actually causing some problems to become worse, as in what has happened with the corn borer. It has already developed a degree of immunity to the poisons embedded in the genetic material so now scientists are scrambling to find a more lethal poison to regain control. That's the path we have taken with antibiotics and it has not been a particularly successful path to follow.

 

The main problems I see with GMOs :We are allowing GMOs to become the basis of food production without a backup in case an unsuspected weakness suddenly shows up, such as the blight which caused the potato famine in Ireland because almost all the potatoes grown were genetically similar and they all happened to be susceptible. We know as they are at present, GMOs are not sustainable over time because of their heavy reliance on chemical fertilizers etc. We simply don't know enough about what if anything they are doing to us and/or the environment over time. The predatory and thuggish behaviour of the companies, Monsanto in particular, is doing their best not only to obstruct any effort to find out the truth but to restrict options to reverse things if any or all GMOs turn out to be a disaster.

 

It's not science, it's lobbying, marketing and media manipulation that got them where they are.

[onoway]

Trying to get my head around the concept of inorganic farming.

Try thinking about what heroin, or better example, methamphetamine, does to the human system. That's sort of the equivalent of inorganic fertilizer. Farmers dose the fields with artificially concentrated or manufactured chemicals which boost the growth of the plants. Too much will kill them. It literally kills or at least makes the earth highly inhospitable to the organisms found in healthy soil. Because of that, plants become more and more dependent on the artificial fertilizers to yield at all, so what you end up doing is really a sort of hydroponics with the soil mostly just holding the plants in place.

 

Just as addiction in people, it takes a while for the soil to recover. The Rodale institute found that once the artificial dosing was stopped, it took an average of three years for conventionally farmed land.

Incidentally they also found over a 30 year study, organic farming was also both more productive and more lucrative than conventional farming. The transition period is a real barrier for farmers to change though.

[Winstonm]

Curious correlations

 

Study finds connections with science denial.

[mikeh]

Well, maybe and maybe not.

 

Even without the developments discussed in the link, I have never thought that herbicide-resistant crops were a good idea, allowing, as they do, more liberal use of herbicides than before. It is time to stop polluting the planet with these poisons. Organic farming is the only morally acceptable option.

Since current levels of production by organic methods seem to be significantly lower than with herbicided, and the cost per unit far higher, the only morally acceptable solution would appear likely to cause the death of quite a few humans, not to mention massive economic and social upheaval.

 

Btw, I do think that the 'only morally acceptable solution' ought to involve a significantly reduced human population, but I wouldn't advocate getting there by killing existing people (not that you do, of course, but if we were to impose organic farming, that would be the result).

[barmar]

Btw, I do think that the 'only morally acceptable solution' ought to involve a significantly reduced human population, but I wouldn't advocate getting there by killing existing people (not that you do, of course, but if we were to impose organic farming, that would be the result).

We could reduce gun control world-wide, and let human nature take its course.

[Vampyr]

Since current levels of production by organic methods seem to be significantly lower than with herbicided, and the cost per unit far higher, the only morally acceptable solution would appear likely to cause the death of quite a few humans, not to mention massive economic and social upheaval.

 

Btw, I do think that the 'only morally acceptable solution' ought to involve a significantly reduced human population, but I wouldn't advocate getting there by killing existing people (not that you do, of course, but if we were to impose organic farming, that would be the result).

 

It's a pity, yes, but if there is ever a transition to a more sustainable and healthy condition for the planet, the transition period will not be easy.

[onoway]

Since current levels of production by organic methods seem to be significantly lower than with herbicided, and the cost per unit far higher, the only morally acceptable solution would appear likely to cause the death of quite a few humans, not to mention massive economic and social upheaval.

 

Btw, I do think that the 'only morally acceptable solution' ought to involve a significantly reduced human population, but I wouldn't advocate getting there by killing existing people (not that you do, of course, but if we were to impose organic farming, that would be the result).

Source, please? This is another myth which is disseminated and promoted by big ag. Rodale Institute has been running a study for 30 years and found that organic production is not only more profitable but also more productive, after the initial 3 years. Aside from that, the price in the stores is artificially low for big ag products. You and I are paying for the cheaper prices of unsustainably grown product in the stores through massive subsidies supporting industrial agriculture. The other thing is that sterilizing the soil with chemicals cannot in the long run be a good thing; any production at ALL then rests on continuing and ever increasing amounts of petrochemicals which is not sustainable by any definition I'm aware off.

 

Aside from that the runoff of agricultural chemicals from fields ending up in lakes and rivers is leading to massive costs trying to stop the pollution from killing the waterways and lakes. In Canada you can look at Lake Winnipeg as a prime example; the States has been worrying about the amount of agricultural runoff chemicals entering the Gulf of Mexico from runoff for some years, but so far have been largely unable to figure out how to deal with it.

 

Things do not work in isolation, they are interconnected and ignoring that leads to problems.

 

I have cited other farmers who are leaders in showing what can be done through permaculture techniques, which once set up will basically run themselves to a large degree, with almost no input at all from the farmer, and produce enormous quantities of food. One person I have mentioned before is Will Allen http://www.jhsph.edu/news/stories/2012/willallen.html who is raising an amount of food per acre on three acres of land, without chemicals or GMOs, that commercial ag farmers can only dream of. Admittedly his projects are labour intensive but he has deliberately designed it that way to involve kids who otherwise had nothing to do and nowhere to go, so it is a multipurpose endeavour.

 

Geoff Lawton has been travelling the world teaching permaculture now for years as well as heading up successful reclamation work on soils too depleted/saline even for chemicals to work profitably as there was no structure left in the soil. Using permaculture techniques he demonstrated how the soil became LESS saline, something some scientists have maintained was impossible aside from using massive quantities of water to wash the salts through the soil, which he didn't do. (Couldn't have even if he had wanted to, not much water around the Dead Sea.)

 

So has Shep Holtzer and Joel Salatin, all farmers who haven't used chemicals or GMOs on their land ever, and all of them are highly successful farmers by any standard. Between the names I have mentioned they cover all climates (Sepp is from the Austrian Alps, Lawton is from Australia and is best known for his work greening the desert, and Salatin is from the eastern US.)

 

They all have highly integrated systems which largely run themselves, and which focus on growing soil and avoiding monocropping. Their places are prime examples of the terms sustainable and highly profitable.

 

BTW as far as starvation is concerned, there are any number of people raising enormous quantities of food even in back yards and the "OH MY GOD WE ARE ALL GOING TO STARVE NEXT YEAR UNLESS WE (xyz)" is a fearmongering myth and a truly big crock of B.S. It's not even a matter of a lot of money. It's a matter of education and paying attention to the bloody science outside the self serving pap being fed to media and governments by big ag. and which belongs if anywhere only in the National Enquirer with stories of people being impregnated by aliens on their saucer.

 

OMG our sun is going to die... well yes but not in any sense of the word is it foreseeably imminent or even within a few generations. So it's somewhat premature to panic. Same with food production.

 

OTOH if we do throw all our resources into promoting big ag then that scenario could indeed come true through increasing costs and inaccessibility of chemicals combined with the chemical sterilization/ salination of soils.

And possibly even sooner, through increased reliance on GMO seed which fails for some reason. There have already been instances of crop failures in both the US and Africa of GMO crops, to say nothing of India where the result of changing over to GMO crops led to massive numbers of farmer suicide and a resulting ban on any sort of GMO seed anywhere in one of India's major food producing areas.

[dwar0123]

It's a pity, yes, but if there is ever a transition to a more sustainable and healthy condition for the planet, the transition period will not be easy.

I'd find it scary that the righteous moral crusader refers to the death of billions as a necessary pity except of course it's a cliché. The self-righteous are always willing to sacrifice the world for its own good.

[mikeh]

@onoway, #42

 

Joel Salatin isn't necessarily a good role model. He uses a great deal of land per unit of food produced, and I suspect he has pretty good land to start with. In addition, he won't sell to customers who live any distance away, which means, if applied globally, a reversion to the diets of 150 years ago, with such things as oranges, mangos and bananas reserved for the rich, and fresh produce of any kind becoming a strictly seasonal treat for those of us who live in temperate zones.

 

The urban farming (Will Allen) is wonderful, but it is unrealistic to scale that up to replace industrial farming. I actually know a lot about composting, since I have litigated on behalf of farmers wishing to compost, who ran afoul of local government rules. No farm will ever produce sufficient feedstock to replenish the soil: all it has is the waste it creates, and even with 100% recycling, the farm loses the nutrients that are inside the foodstuffs it sells off farm. So all farms that compost as the major or sole source of soil creation or enhancement recruit feedstock from other sources. Various manures are useful and so is yard waste from municipalities that offer drop-off sites. Getting contracts to dispose of supermarket wastes can help. But the reality is that in an urban enviroment, it is not going to be possible to grow sufficient soil to grow sufficient food to become self-sufficient, even excluding seasonal considerations that impact growing seasons and the crops that can be grown.

 

I agree 100% that we should encourage organic farming. I agree 100% that we should be skeptical about creating mono-cultures of GMO foods. I agree 100% that there are practices that ought to be discouraged: for example, in all cities in Canada one can buy fresh roses 12 months of the year: all grown in Mexico. They have no fragrance, and they don't last long. They are, I understand, flown into Canada, creating huge pollution in the skies, and using valuable land in Mexico for a product that is largely a creation of marketing, and I suspect are subjected to a lot of herbicide/pesticide.

 

But it is naive to expect that we can feed the world, or give us in the developed world the kinds of choices we demand, by going to just organic farming.

 

Fortunately, it seems likely that we'll be able to 'grow' various meats without growing animals from which to harvest them, and I suspect that such meats will prove far less costly, from an ecological standpoint, than the traditional methods, whether organic or not.

 

Since meat production, for the Western palate, is probably the most damaging form of agriculture, this development should be welcomed. I hope they learn to do it for fish as well, to save the oceans.

 

Btw, this research is being carried out by scientists, not organic farmers :P

[billw55]

Source, please? This is another myth which is disseminated and promoted by big ag. Rodale Institute has been running a study for 30 years and found that organic production is not only more profitable but also more productive, after the initial 3 years.

I admit to not being knowedgable in this area. But this bit seems suspicious to me. If growing organic was cheaper and more productive, wouldn't more farmers be doing it?

[mikeh]

onoway referenced several sources for the proposition that organic farming can compete with agri-business, including the 30 year rodale institute study.

 

I am unable to critique that work, in part because it appears that the only entity to actually publish anything about it is the rodale institute: blindly accepting that it is telling the truth appears to me to be akin to blindly accepting what Monsanto says about its proprietary methods :P

 

When an organization sets out to prove that its point of view is true, then one should be careful about accepting that organization's later claim that it's point of view really is true.

 

I noted that they claim, for example, that going organic, as they did, would 'create more jobs'.

 

Hmmm, that suggests that they need to spend a lot more labour to produce the same yields as agri-business can produce.

 

That means that the cost of food will go up. One of the major factors in the relatively low cost of food in Western society is the mechanization of the farming process. Organic farming may require a reversal of that.

 

As it is, current projections in the US are for increasing difficulty securing farm labour. Most of it comes from areas in rural Mexico, where improving economic conditions in recent years are causing a reduction in the number of Mexicans willing to commit to the problems of trying to work in the US, whether legally or illegally. I listened to a program on NPR recently in which this issue was raised and seemed to be generally accepted as real.

 

So: are we going to have to return to the classic farming way of life where every family had 10-12 kids so as to have a workforce? Or are we going to find food prices increasing by 50-100% so as to be able to make farming economical without the charitable donations that I assume keep rodale alive?

[FM75]

Concerning a Republican bill, co-sponsored by 10 others, to prevent the US Census Bureau from collecting economic data, I am beginning to think the current polarization of U.S. politics is something more than differences of opinion and stems from a fundamental difference in the way people think the world reacts to them. For example:

 

 

Funny - The quoted example is full of examples of the differences between facts and opinion.

"They simply wouldn't exist. We won't have an unemployment rate," said Ken Prewitt....

No, professor. We would still have an unemployment rate. What we would not have is an official government measurement of it.

 

If you counted a tail as a leg, how many legs would a cow have? (Most people will answer "4", but in fact, the cow would still be standing on the only 4 legs that it had.)

[Vampyr]

I admit to not being knowedgable in this area. But this bit seems suspicious to me. If growing organic was cheaper and more productive, wouldn't more farmers be doing it?

 

I don't know really, but I would guess that it is more labour-intensive, and requires rotating crops and having livestock along with crops. Also harvesting is probably more difficult if your crops are grown in a natural, wildlife friendly environment rather than in an orderly monoculture.

 

The problem is that we are not paying the "real" cost of the food we buy. If we started doing that, more farms would consider switching to organic.

 

EDIT: Crossed several posts while cooking, including...

Or are we going to find food prices increasing by 50-100% so as to be able to make farming economical without the charitable donations that I assume keep rodale alive?

 

See above; the answer is "yes" -- or at least I hope so. And the sooner the better.

[FM75]

I admit to not being knowedgable in this area. But this bit seems suspicious to me. If growing organic was cheaper and more productive, wouldn't more farmers be doing it?

Or the corollary, if growing organic food were cheaper and more productive, wouldn't we be paying less for it - given that the "informed" farmers were doing so. http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif

[hrothgar]

Or the corollary, if growing organic food were cheaper and more productive, wouldn't we be paying less for it - given that the "informed" farmers were doing so. http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif

 

FWIW, I'm a member of a CSA here in Massachusetts.

 

It costs $625 for 20 weeks worth of veggies. From what I can tell, it works out to be a pretty good deal.

Each week I get a box of picked veggies, plus I get to supplement things by collecting my own out in the fields.

(Come tomato season, I'll be making a lot of sauce)

 

However, in order to take full advantage of the food, it does require some changes in eating patterns.

Dinner gets dictated by what's available rather than what I want.

I've also end up pickling a lot of stuff

(This weekend I made a pick batch of dill carrots. Last weekend it was sauerkraut)

 

Finally, I ended up buying a vitaxis so I could make smoothies out of whatever I don't feel like dealing with immediately