In reply to this blog post by Torie Bosch of Slate about an advocate's change of heart toward Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) for meeting world hunger: http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2013/01/03/mark_lynas_environmentalist_who_opposed_gmos_admits_he_was_wrong.htmlBosch's post was irresponsibly framed. It misleads the public into thinking the challenges behind GMO practices are settled. Maybe* (I'm very, very skeptical but will remain open minded.) there's a case for GMO methods in genetic/medical research and such in very controlled spaces, but when it comes to claiming they're necessary for world hunger, it's like trying to justify nuclear energy for meeting global energy demand when we have yet to guarantee a safe legacy of fuel extraction and waste disposal that doesn't compromise the health of others. Alternative strategies and technologies exist that have fewer negative legacies. Granted, a lot of it can be harmless, but we're operating on a level that's so profound that it can cheat the defenses of our evolutionary protections in ways that we're incapable of knowing until we've met its consequences. It transcends our known responsibility to a point that we don't know how we're ethically accountable.
As acknowledged in the article, a fair share of anti-GMO advocates don't appreciate the monopolization of large chemical companies and their strategic business models.
Consider common approaches to Monsanto's GMO business:
1) Develop pesticide/herbicide/fungicide resistant crops so that farmers can use a lot of pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides on their plots--as a chemical company that pioneers GMO techniques and patents cultivars/dna for pesticide/herbicide/fungicide resistant crops, it wins in two ways: people buy their seeds, and people use more of their chemicals.
2) Patent genetic sequences, allow the DNA to spread into the wild/neighboring non-GMO crop farmer land (this is a kind of negligence that the every day person has yet to find legal redress for), let the crop cross-pollinate with untainted crops/wild plants, sue any cross-contaminated farmers.
3) Develop self-terminating "suicide" gene that creates infertile crops like corn, allow the DNA to spread into the wild/neighboring non-GMO crop farmer land, once it's cross-pollinated, hybridized GMO plants (including those tainted in the wild or owned by non GMO using farmers) self-terminate after a season, create absolute dependency on the supplying GMO seed company in the region.
A prevailing concern with GMO work that isn't addressed is the uncertainty of outcomes when integrated back into the environment and living systems like a person's body. If there are people willing to take the risk, fine, but it never ought to be done at the expense of those who cannot voice or choose to opt out. GMO in food gambles with our evolutionary abilities.
Other things people might want to note about this "confession":
1) An activist, while many are worthy of respect in their own right, isn't necessarily a scientist (which Mark Lymas acknowledged).
Just because an outspoken person changes stance on a complicated issue (this one's the kind that gets a technical classification as a wicked problem from complex system scientists), it doesn't mean the problems of the issue are no longer valid. In stating he was "completely wrong" about GMOs denies many ethical problems that have yet to be understood and resolved.I don't fear genetically modified food, I worry about its unintended consequences in other living things and the rest of the world. Living things are relatively resilient, but we I don't appreciate a gamble that goes against what my evolutionary background prepared me for. Most people don't even know about the things that I'd be concerned about. Unless you've had vigorous scientific environmental and biological exposure and training, the things I would add as important arguments probably aren't heard and appreciated by the lay person on a regular basis.
2) Science is different from engineering and industrialization. It's also not the same as advocacy.
Science is the process of discerning truth. Advocacy is a change-oriented political act that summons the perceived truths ("facts") found by science to champion a hypothesis/claim (i.e. GMOs are good or bad). Engineering and industrialization strive to maximize functions--productivity, efficiency. Aside from science, none of these acts that people try to champion (i.e. we need more free enterprise so that small businesses can compete with the giants)--more doesn't always mean better. What difference does it make if the majority of the small-scale GMO competitors also maintain unethical practices? Quantity does not speak to quality. Furthermore, none of these "civil virtues" (engineering and industry) are wholly accountable to comprehensive reasoning and justification for the sake of humanity. While they behoove profit for those privileged to leverage them, they don't guarantee that people will respect the dignity of other beings as ends rather a means to their end. Even people who truly adhere to Ayn Rand's notion of objectivism would find concern in that argument (there's a paradox to her definition of objectivism that I've found, so I see something bigger that's missing to her framework of objectivism).3) The world already produces enough food to feed everybody.
I don't even need to dive into academic peer review literature to back this claim, see here (worldhunger.org), here (oxfam Canada), and here (The UN Chronicle).
The world's people might not be good at figuring out how to innovate or discipline itself in living with, maintaining, and cultivating sustainable environments, but food shortage is best articulated as a local challenge. I'll dare say food sustainability is inappropriate to reduce into a singular global problem to be solved with a large international monetary fund (even the IMF/Worldbank eventually tries to consider problems at a local scale) and technological wonder crops from exotic places or chemical companies that pioneer GMO methodology. I might be lacking direct sources at the moment, but read to the bottom and you'll find a few things that give you leads into how I've come to this opinion (hint, college courses in sustainable ecology and agriculture).
4) Also, let's have the death of environmentalism now.
We don't defer all of our ethical behavior to ethicists, we let them inform us about better ways of living, but the responsibility remains our own. Environmental issues don't affect environmentalists only, they matter to everyone, and everyone needs to find ways to exercise ethical actions that contribute to making the world a better place. Nordhaus and Shellenberger have a better articulation about this in their essay called "The Death of Environmentalism", feel free to read that too. The world doesn't need to be saved. People need to save themselves in ways that don't necessitate the compromise of other living things' fundamental well-being.So what should we do?
I'm short on time to spell out answers, but in the context of this post, I'd recommend getting vigorously acquainted with the principles of sustainable agriculture, ecology, and ethics.Ask Dr. David Susko at The University of Michigan-Dearborn for his thoughts. teaches an excellent course on plant ecology. His thesis work found ways for farmers to successfully (environmentally and economically) transition from conventional agriculture to organic practices. The rest comes down to dialog.
Here's a place to start, though I'm not sure what their contents will cover yet, University of Florida's teaching it online for free:
https://www.coursera.org/course/sustainableag
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