121–130 of 193 posts
Fun banana facts: Bananas are the most-sold item at most grocery stores and, notably, Wal-Mart. Bananas also have the highest standard deviation in terms of predicting if a given (known) consumer will purchase bananas in a given store run. (At least as compared to other food products and consumables.) When predicting a consumer's shop, it's generally pretty easy to make a highly educated guess about their purchasing…
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I think part of the problem is with what people are assuming. There is in fact a large, obvious population of people who are emotionally scared of GMOs. Unfortunately, that group has given anybody who question GMOs a bad name. This kind of thing is unfortunately true for many things in life. And ironically, if what I am saying is true, it is the grandparent who, while accusing of irrational reasoning, has not reasone…
Whenever I see anyone attempt to defend their anti-GMO positions, they inevitably devolve into vague "well, it might be bad". Since this is literally true of ANYTHING new, the focus on GMOs is being driven by some irrational subtext.
Just because it is convenient and it works well in the areas that we can measure well does not mean it is actually safe or that we should embrace it uncritically.
Fun banana facts: Bananas are the most-sold item at most grocery stores and, notably, Wal-Mart. Bananas also have the highest standard deviation in terms of predicting if a given (known) consumer will purchase bananas in a given store run. (At least as compared to other food products and consumables.) When predicting a consumer's shop, it's generally pretty easy to make a highly educated guess about their purchasing…
Are you a data scientist?
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Whenever I see anyone attempt to defend their anti-GMO positions, they inevitably devolve into vague "well, it might be bad". Since this is literally true of ANYTHING new, the focus on GMOs is being driven by some irrational subtext.
The point I outlined in my post is one that I have seen people who are not vocal advocates of GMO utter. It's a perfectly regular piece of reasoning and not "irrational subtext". I'd go so far as to say the irrational subtext here might be the fact that it is seen as some sort of personal failing to question something which would be very convenient if it was entirely safe (and was known to be safe). Just because it i…
The sly move is to try to apply this "don't do it" principle to only GMOs (or some limited set of hot button topics that includes GMOs). This selective application is where the unreason slips in.
> Other scientists—most notably, James Dale of the Queensland University of Technology in Australia—are testing genetically modified disease-resistant Cavendish bananas, but public acceptance of GMOs could prove a significant obstacle to their widespread adoption. This is the problem right here. The lack of science education. A banana modified in a lab and one that is bred through selective breeding are both "GMO", i…
I'm pretty up to date on the science myself, and I still consider myself anti-GMO for a host of reasons, little to do with the science. My objections are more philosophical. two primary reasons: hubris and greed. The hubris to think we know which varietals are the best and will continue to be the best. We may go all in on one species or variant and then turns out an unknown bacteria we have previously no clue about w…
Fun banana facts: Bananas are the most-sold item at most grocery stores and, notably, Wal-Mart. Bananas also have the highest standard deviation in terms of predicting if a given (known) consumer will purchase bananas in a given store run. (At least as compared to other food products and consumables.) When predicting a consumer's shop, it's generally pretty easy to make a highly educated guess about their purchasing…
> Bananas are the most-sold item at most grocery stores and, notably, Wal-Mart. In which country? The US? This can't be globally true..
Cavendish banana are monoculture clones from the same original banana. That means that any disease that attacks one can attack all since the banana share the same dna and protective mechanism. The solution is not to clone with the same dna. also not to use pesticides which kills bees and insects. Pesticide will not only kill bugs they will kill all insects a like. “Cavendish bananas were named after William Cavendish…
And by the way https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/monkeys-bann... [Monkeys banned from eating bananas at Devon zoo]. I assume those were all Cavendish bananas.
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> Patents are stopping variety from happening. Just like with corn, except things are worse with bananas. How can the patents not have already expired? Bananas have been the same roughly all of my life, unless I'm wildly misremembering. Surely there is no way the Cavendish is still protected by patents.
Mostly the damage is already done. But at least there are new cultivars coming out sooner or later. Here's one: https://patents.justia.com/patent/PP28625 But how new is it? As I've alluded (it would take a full article to really get into this), even this new cultivar is... Cavendish. And it's patented. Just like all the other Cavendish bananas that comprise the only bananas you can ever find unless you happen to live…
Sure, they're more expensive than cavendish so i only take them when regular bananas are unavailable. But they're functionally non-cavendish bananas available in a place they aren't native.
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> Bananas are the most-sold item at most grocery stores and, notably, Wal-Mart. In which country? The US? This can't be globally true..
I've heard this about Dutch stores as well. Supermarkets sell banana's at 0% margin or even a loss simply because it lures customers in.
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There's definitely a few different strains of bananas in asia, it's not uncommon to see 2-3 different types of bananas being sold right next to each other in the markets. The most obvious indicator to me is the size of the individual bananas, the smaller ones taste pretty weird to me. OH, and also I assume there's a bit of a taste difference with the bananas we're used to because they weren't dosed in Ethlyene to has…
2-3 doesn't sound like much, even in australia we have that
In fact I don't think I've ever seen a second variety since i've started looking... (probably in the wrong markets, but that's kind of my point)