Sure, “little” and “wearing latex gloves”, I’ll grant you that. Oh, and “men” too. Definitely. But sniggering? Sniggering?! Puh-lease. I've always considered myself a cackler, don'cha know. ;)
FWIW, the previous rant was intended as a dashed off comment rather than a post, and should be read as a reply rather than a proper assertion of position post per se (I'd've changed the wording a bit, specifically attacking the methodology of the Chapela paper, rather than the researchers, as an uncharitable reading might have it, & the 20 seconds of googling would've gone into 5-6 minutes or so to find a tastier refutation, and a few richer links), as is this rant. Still, if I'm served, it's on! Time permitting, I'll post something a bit more substantial than this when I have the time (though this week is a bear!).
It's always entertaining to hear what people in the alternative universe (outside of biotech labs) think about what goes on IN THEM, but I assure you I'm under no particular illusions in that regard (I'm soaking in it right now, actually). Richard seems to be under the delusion that I'm under no regulatory burden, and contends that my relative inexperience with law/policy is causing me to hallucinate the preposterously large stacks of mandatory documention/accreditation paperwork littering my desk (for example, the last NIH grant that went out was, as I recall, a 90 pager x 30 copies, & it needed approval from 3 different committees, not counting peer review). This regulatory burden wastes my time, my productivity, and your money, at a real cost of human lives lost, due to the drag on the introduction of new discoveries & treatments that proof of regulatory compliance compels. Who am I to believe? Richard, or my weary, lying eyes?
Richard has strong opinions and interesting quotes, which apparently he's not into supplying links for (this may be a simple stylistic difference, but in science, on line, and at most of the wonk-blogs I frequent, citations are linked to rather than invoked. Since we haven't really developed a deep, caring relation based on trust at this point, I'd prefer to read supporting evidence for Richard's claims than take his word on it. No one's fault there - I'm (purposefully) anonymous, he's a stranger. Go fig. Welcome to the internet.
In a touchingly fleeting allusion to reality, Richard concedes that regulation (including the coordinated framework) exists - after all there must be something that those Bush rogues intend to deregulate, right? Why else would Russ be forwarding the PIRG's cries for action? Richard's main complaint seems to be that biotech regulation doesn't function well enough for HIS purposes, and isn't adequate to HIS purposes. Biotech exists; ergo, it hasn't been regulated enough. But most of his arguments seem unconvincing to my tired, also biased (and alas, not yet multifaceted) eyes. He voices strong opinions, but on further analysis they don't appear to be any more than that. Just opinions.
We're unlikely to convince each other on this, if only because we're institutionally and morally committed to opposing views. So let me address this next bit to you, Dear Reader(s?). I use science to, among other things, develop new strategies to diagnose/treat cancer (using...wait for it.... G...M...Os! {cue thunder, cheesy ghost constume, strobe lights}), assist murder/sexual assault/false conviction investigations, and help people identify their birth parents/surviving relatives through DNA testing, while it's Richard's job, among other things, to convince people that what I do is Chaotic and Evil, and Must Be Stopped. This will force him to generalize broadly, since of course, most people actually want better disease treatments, less injustice/crime, etc., etc. Hence the yammering about Policy and Corporations, two words practically designed to reflexively turn people's brains into pudding. Richard & I're just going to have to agree to disagree on that one, but the battle (as with any debate) is for you. Your opinion, your support, your Delicious, Human Brain. So bear with me for a mo’…
Richard quotes a few reports that I'll have to
track down (grr!) to properly refute and examine the context of, but prima facie, they fall short of what I'd consider a convincing argument, though they may flatter the personal prejudices of the misinformed. For example, he quotes a report by the Center for Science in the Public Interest that "makers of genetically modified crops have avoided answering questions and submitted erroneous data" to argue that there is no federal regulation. But if that's the case, who were the "makers" submitting data to? Who were asking the questions? Something stinks in this argument. Try this analogous argument: Crime exists, therefore there is no justice system. Did I just convince anybody? It’s an imperfect world, populated by self-interested people. If GMO spokespeople have “avoided answering questions fully and submitted erroneous data" and are called out on it, I'd say it's a good thing. Further, there may be reasons for less than full disclosure (the need to protect heavy investments in intellectual property/company secrets from disclosure, for example) that are entirely understandable. He sees failure where I see a common enough conflict between public accountability and competitive self interest- but of course, he has to. It’s his job to
scare you into supporting more power for the federal government. I wonder how he feels about the WMD rationale as a strategy for invading Iraq? Hate the player, love the game?
If we're going to cherry pick quotes from the Center for Public Interest report, how 'bout this one? "GE crops have the potential to provide enormous benefits to both consumers and the environment". A potential that Richard and his ilk would prefer to strangle in its infancy - an odd position coming from nominal environmentalists. Guess he must've skimmed that part.
As an aside, this sort of argument by invoking unrealistic standards is similar to Russ's citing of Enron as an example of how corporations behave pathologically, showing how broke "the system" is. Sure, Enron had severe problems... and as a consequence, Enron was bankrupted, it's public value destroyed and it's CEO (Bush's bestest golf pal right?) jailed and liable for tens of millions in civil lawsuits. Both public and private mechanisms aggressively held it accountable for fraud - a multibillion dollar company (on paper anyway) was publicly vivisected. Enron was stopped.
Way stopped. How exactly is this an example of a failed, unregulated system? False assumptions, erroneous conclusions...
How 'bout this quote? "Biotech companies, despite the groundless assertion in this post, are self-regulated. They have been self-regulated, and they remain self-regulated" Wow. Richard's "groundless assertions", repeated three times, just kicked
my "groundless assertions" 's ass! Did he click his heels three times and make a wish while he did this? On what basis is he making this claim? The fact that some (mandatory) biotech reports are insufficiently forthcoming or submit erroneous (though oddly, not "fraudulent") data? That the framework for regulation is imperfect? I guess the real world has failed to live up to Richard's high expectations, and imperfect regulation = no regulation, deviation from full transparent compliance = anarchy (okay, that last bit’s way ranty. Mea culpa). Try this out - my day job company's accredited by, among other agencies,
NYDHS,
AABB (according to federal
SWGDAM guidelines),
NFSTC/ISO,
ASCLAD/LAB,
CLIA,
CAP etc., etc., not counting vendor accreditation, licenses, permits, product approval, etc., etc.... and those're just for the projects that I can actually discuss. It's actually far worse. Are these regulations voluntary? Well, we only really need accreditation if we want to perform work. Am I self-regulated? Blow me.
> Perhaps the article "Biotech Food: From the Lab to a Debacle," would be of use to GeneThug…
Perhaps Richard would care to refrain from arrogant appeals to the mystical, neutral "authority" represented by a NYT journalist (!) who specializes in hatchet jobs against businesses, and make a substantive argument. I may be misreading Richard's tone on this, but it sounds like he's insulting my intelligence, & I don't think he's earned the benefit of the doubt on that. Get to know me - then you can insult my intelligence. Perhaps I need to do my homework, but in the absence of links, contradictory arguments and cherry-picked quotes, it seems I need to do
his homework, too.
Perhaps Richard ought to find a more convincing argument than his strong opinion, dubious sophistry, and some hack beloved by Marxists. To date, no illnesses have been reported from transgenic food, making it safer than, well, food, actually. This is a fact Rich may have failed to respond to in his reply because he can't, which sort of makes the rationale for more regulation a bit, ah, pre-emptive, and possibly baseless. Where's that "Debacle", Rich?
Look. My personal experience
directly contradicts Richard's assertions.
I deal with local, international, and private regulatory agencies (who base their standards on federally approved guidelines) regularly in the course of my work(s). He's either ignorant of my personal experiences, or deliberately deceiving others. Based on my previous experience with advocacy types, I'll assume the former. You, Dear Reader(s?) are entitled to your own opinion.
Perhaps the third google link down from this search
term, "Responses to: Biotechnology Food: From the Lab to a Debacle" would be of use to Richard, as it's far more balanced and nuanced than his (unlinked) citation... but not this quote! "Re "Biotechnology Food: From the Lab to a Debacle" (front page, Jan. 25): The opposition to genetically modified food involves the same mentality — emotional and ill informed, antiscientific and anticorporate — as the opposition to nuclear power. Will we have to wait until people begin to starve in the United States before the benefits of technology will be recognized by the majority?" That's in the NYT, so it must be true, right? Gee, Rich, thanks for the homework assignment! I'm learning already! (/snarkiness) So there's a quote that flatters
my personal prejudices. So we're even.
On a slightly more mature note, perhaps Richard (and you, Dear Reader(s) ) might profitably take a few deep breaths and peruse Jane Brody's
article "Facing Biotech Foods Without the Fear Factor" (NYT free password
required).
Convinced by either of our straw man arguments and cheap shots? Me neither. I publish articles too (not under this pseudonym, though). Big deal. We can cross-post New York Times articles and throw biased quotes at each other, and/or talk past each other 'til the
Singularity arrives but it won't help me try to cure cancer using GMOs, and it won't help Richard and his ilk stop me from doing so. I distrust faceless, unaccountable federal bureaucrats far more than I distrust corporate greedcreeps (who at the very least can be sued/bankrupted/fired/arrested and, as corporate entities, are publicly traded – and are therefore at least accountable to market forces and public perception - unlike federal agencies). And I don't trust
advocacy types at all - not on their hot button issues, anyhow (& that includes me. Really. Go compare both NYT articles, if that sort of thing works for you. I'll wait). Others may feel contrariwise. I can understand that. It’s an easy mistake to make, especially among direct beneficiaries of government largesse, or people who don't know much about running a business, or where Government resources come from, or what 'monopoly of force' really means, or that passion may not equal understanding. Still, when a government program fails or is insufficient, there’s a curious reflex among some authoritarian elitists to want to give the federal government more. More power, more authority, more money, and somehow, things’ll work. Just wait… you’ll see…. War on Drugs, War on Terror, No Child Left Behind (to the extent that it federalizes education), War on Progress...
Oh great. Now I'm in libertarian rant mode. This
is tedious. By way of contrast, let me conclude with what I consider actual biotech threats, instead of my predictable blathering, as charming as it is.
Interleukin-4 is a gene that aims the entire secondary immune system towards a very specific target, effectively disabling the immune system to all other threats. If over-expressed in a pox virus, the host is more or less completely immunocomprised, and in animal models, the fatality rates hover around 100%. Government researchers in Australia have released rabbit specific
viruses into the wild, in order to control the wild rabbit population, and they're discussing releasing an IL-4 mousepox. Since viruses are highly promiscuous, and occasionally cross species (cf. SARs, swine flu, siv, etc.), there is a small, but non-insignificant possibility that this sort of thing might effect ALL MAMMALS (Yeah, you there. The one with the nipples and warm blood. You. You too.). This is an official government project, not a private biotech firm. We can’t sue them. They aren't accountable to private/market forces. They're developing other
projects , like airborne
mouse/
rabbit sterilizing viruses. These anti-pest projects are wildly popular among Aussie farmers, so don't expect any democratic accountability on this.
Similarly, the sort of bioweapons that modern biotech enables virtually guarantee that unspeakable horrors, specifically designed for lethality, are sitting in various Government labs (according to some
reports). These are potentially catastrophic problems worth being concerned with, not some vague handwringing over the
precautionary principle to scare middle aged Humanities majors and annoy middle aged Science majors, not the possibility, as yet unrealized, of some hypothetical transgenic allergy afflicting an unfortunate few or some accidental food poisoning through unpredictable combinatorial genetics by a publicly liable business (who’d likely be sued into oblivion in response), but the
DELIBERATE ENGINEERING of weaponized biological agents of
death and plague, stored in secrecy, their safeguards almost guaranteed to
eventually fail through lack of transparency/oversight, by unaccountable wings of Governments, the very same people Richard would like to give more power/authority to. Ignorance of institutional logic won't save anybody.
It blows my mind that people waste their lives opposing flavr savr tomatoes, sterile (thus environmentally safer) biotech seeds, or publicly owned companies like Monsanto (don't like it? Don't buy it), given the fact of government atrocities like Australia’s IL-4 souped up leptoviridae/mousepox, or weaponized smallpox/ebola/anthrax, etc., all of which are greater threats to humanity/the environment by several orders of magnitude . In fact, I view the antibiotechies' concerns as irrelevant-at-best by comparison, their hatred of corporations being stronger than their
love of humanity, or more charitably, stronger than their ability to perform non-partisan, rational risk assessment or
cost/benefit calculations. At worst, they represent a distraction from real issues, and a hindrance to progress towards a
sustainable,
healthier future, with all the attendant costs of that delay (in lives lost from
starvation/poverty and at present uncurable diseases). I’d like to think they’d disagree, and they'll certainly HATE the reference sources if they bother to read them (it’s late, and there’s still so much to do here – pardon me if this went back into meta-rant mode. Ranting about ranting). Well, it takes all kinds, I guess.
Does anyone still reading this believe that concerns about the FDA/NIH/NIA's power (cry me a frickin' river), are more important than the worries of this mis-informed, insular, lyin’ eyed, Chaotic Evil, breast cancer researchin’/crime fightin’ Lab Gnome’s? That the possibility of accidental genetic food poisoning by the private sector comes anywhere near the threat of purpose-designed lethal government bioweapons?
What do you think?
“When people think, we win.” Bill Clinton on the Daily Show.
And on that rabid note… I’d better get back to work. There’s a lot, a lot to do. Cancer doesn’t sleep either. Oh, & if you made it this far, sorry for the acrimony, Layli - I promise from here on out it'll be nothing but happy rainbows and snuggly unicorns (well, I'll try my best, anyhow). My next screed is, as a nod to Mooker's latest, on the Logos (& probably the intersection of Buddhism and Empiricism). Kizzums!
