Live data from Hacker News

Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

nytimes.com

121–130 of 261 posts

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#121

It's not legal for sale in New York, mostly because of false advertising the company previously did touting it's biodegradability, even going so far as to say that it's "practically non-toxic". In fact, they continue to be the subject of a class action lawsuit in NY: https://www.law360.com/articles/849367/monsanto-trims-but-ca... Unfortunately all that may come of that lawsuit is a small label change... It pains me t…

Being a "hacker" also means looking at nitty gritty details and looking past shitty coverage by non-experts written for non-experts.

Monsanto has its fair share of ethical concerns but the ones that people always accuse it of are generally absolute BS. It's as if someone said "oh obviously never use insertion sort because it's n^2" - no, there's a reason timsort cuts over to insertion sort at n=5.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You don't immediately keel over and die when you smoke a cigarette, My all-time favorite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpwcF3Malj8 To play devils advocate.. we will never prove if smoking truly cause cancer, unless we go back in time and look at the same person in the same circumstances only that he/she never smoked. And in all seriousness, my grandmother smoked all her life, from age of 16 all the way till she…

Did they autopsy her lungs? Also gold lung sounds like a pretty bad condition. You sure that didn't kill her?

She lived to be 103 and has Alzheimer's. Does it matter? Plus, at that age and frailty, lots of things could have killed her that a younger person would survive.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#123
post #103
post #44

One important reasons for robotics is to reduce/eliminate the use of pesticides. After all we use weed killed because it's cheaper than weeding by hand. Regardless of whether Glyphosate is toxic to humans or not, it kills the rhizome (fungi and other ecology around the roots), drying the soil and making it less productive. Robots will not only avoid this problem but support the planting of complementary crops.

While I'm not against robots per se, I do wonder why "working the fields" cannot be made a good job for humans? Without this job I foresee several potential problems: large unemployment, people leaving the countryside, many low paying jobs that feel meaningless to the workers.

> I do wonder why "working the fields" cannot be made a good job for humans

It would make food expensive again. As of 2010, 1.6% of American and 14% of the world's workers worked in agriculture [1]. As recently as 1870, that figure for the United States was almost 50% [2]. Most of us prefer today's standard of living.

[1] http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.AGR.EMPL.ZS

[2] https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/1981/11/art2full.pdf page 12

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#124
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In France we had this wonderful scandal about donated blood that was provided by aids infected patients... but declared safe. It's been used to make transfusion to other people that were already plagued with hemophilia, so that they could really enjoy the benefit of having both diseases at the same time. I'm wondering what will be the next stuff like that. Will we learn in 30 years that milk is actually unhealthy and…

I get to angry even thinking about it. Imagine your day job is to convince the public spreading poison globally is not dangerous only to make a marginal profit. And to give decision makers some excuse with some bullshit "proofs" that lets them stay "ignorant". Alot of enviormental issues comes to mind where this is happening today.

I've been astonished that so many people think it's okay. I think it's related to the tribal mindset, how cheering for your team has been more important in evolution than critical thinking.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#125
post #8

"Monsanto Advocate Says Roundup Is Safe Enough To Drink, Then Refuses To Drink It" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/27/monsanto-roundup-pa...

But this guy did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8sgEhpHM4k

It was another glass. It's stupid either way.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#126
post #53

"Monsanto Advocate Says Roundup Is Safe Enough To Drink, Then Refuses To Drink It" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/27/monsanto-roundup-pa...

Caffeine is a part of many drinks yet its LD50 is lower than that of Roundup. The dosage matters too.

Neem OIL is an biological pesticide that is organic approved. Vastly more likely to kill you than roundup use.

Neem OIL LD50 = 31.95g/kg Caffeine LD50 = 175 g/kg (150-200 estimate in humans) Glycosate LD50 = > 2000 g/kg

i.e. the "Biological&organic and traditional" alternative used is two orders magnitude more dangerous.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ockham's razor reasoning is that a gigantic profit driven structure with a huge lobbying activity, and high financial stakes should probably not be trusted with making the right choice between their business and our health. History tells it didn't work very well for us when the big guys said tobacco, asbestos, the Chernobyl cloud and PCBs were all safe and good. Given Monsanto's pretty poor moral track record (improp…

I'm not asking you to believe anything from Monsanto. There is a vast field of researchers that care deeply about what causes cancer and what can be done to prevent and treat it. Most of us aren't for sale. There are sensitive, objective and simple tests for determining whether or not a compound causes genetic mutations in cells (Ames test). There are tests for whether or not a compound induces chromosome abnormaliti…

I'm not arguing against the science, I'm arguing against the people.

E.G: I think GMO have a fantastic potential. It's a powerful technology. And like any powerful technology, it has a huge potential of destruction as well.

And I don't trust the people making money with it to take the necessary precautions to avoid a catastrophy. There are so many past and present events where money won over the benefit of the human specie.

I trust people like you, that are dedicated to analyze things and share conclusions.

But between you and the public, there is an army of people whose job is to hide/distort informations that will make them loose money, and show off informations that will make them win money. And they are better are it that the public is at critical thinking.

You talk about climat skepticism, and it's a good example of a generalized propaganda that entities with an interest in fossil fuel and live stock keep pushing. And it works. There are people that doubt climate change. There are leaders that act on it.

When there is an obvious conflict of interest in an entity of huge influence, one should ALWAYS be suspicious by default. The entity has to prove, over, and over again that it's doing the right thing.

Right now entities are usually, as they grow, turning into systems that buy PR campaign to tell you they are doing the right things instead of doing it.

Let me pull out this little gem from the WHO archives: http://www.who.int/tobacco/media/en/TobaccoExplained.pdf

In there you can read the statment from the tobacco industry:

1. That medical research of recent years indicates many possible causes of lung cancer.

2. That there is no agreement among the authorities regarding what the cause is.

3. That there is no proof that cigarette smoking is one of the causes.

4. That statistics purporting to link smoking with the disease could apply with equal force to any one of many other aspects of modern life. Indeed the validity of the statistics themselves are questioned by numerous scientists.

Like I said, they are very good at controlling the story.

Defending them because that's the intellectually moral thing to do - while I understand that's something intelligent reasonable people wants to do - is not working in our favor.

Now you tell me that up to now, nothing is hinting that N-(phosphonomethyl)glycine is dangerous. But Monsanto still decided to have research about it ghostwritten. Such behavior is an alarm signal to me, and should trigger new investigations and tests for the next 10 years.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many conflicts of interest in the world - organic farming is an industry too. e.g. at least one of those 14 experts is an active member of the organic industry and has long had a beef with the GMO industry: https://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/glp-facts/charles-ben... As to the science: the original highly-questionable IARC determination has since been contested by both the European Chemical Agency and th…

As Nicholas Taleb put it - stuff that is natural is time-tested. Food we've grown + consumed has a multi-millennium history of being safe to consume. The burden of proof is on the synthetic. And health issues can materialize with a time gap of a decade or so - essentially you can ruin a couple of generations with a mistake you didn't catch in time. It doesn't help when those who have to prove their validity have to r…

Is it really (time-)tested? How do we know what is safe to consume, especially long-term? We don't really have proper data to support most claims. We did not track and log the causes of death throughout the vast majority of our history.

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#129
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get to angry even thinking about it. Imagine your day job is to convince the public spreading poison globally is not dangerous only to make a marginal profit. And to give decision makers some excuse with some bullshit "proofs" that lets them stay "ignorant". Alot of enviormental issues comes to mind where this is happening today.

I've been astonished that so many people think it's okay. I think it's related to the tribal mindset, how cheering for your team has been more important in evolution than critical thinking.

http://extrafabulouscomics.com/comic/200/

Re: Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ockham's razor reasoning is that a gigantic profit driven structure with a huge lobbying activity, and high financial stakes should probably not be trusted with making the right choice between their business and our health. History tells it didn't work very well for us when the big guys said tobacco, asbestos, the Chernobyl cloud and PCBs were all safe and good. Given Monsanto's pretty poor moral track record (improp…

You can't trust charities either. They have a vested interest in maintaining their world view in spite of contrary evidence. For instance, the banning of DDT in Africa despite the fact that using it to control malaria saves lives.

I actually have very little faith in charities. I did missions for find, the earth institute, the gates foundation, MVP and WHO. Money is wasted/stolen, politics everywhere, ego, incompetence... It's business as usual, except the people I worked with a the bottom of the pyramid were awesome.
Post reply on HN