The problem with the term "organic" is it's broad and not well defined. It's like "agile" in our space. There are some standards varying by country some government enforced some not, and those standards have changed over time. This data seems to encompass data from many countries over a long period of time. This means how something is classified in the organic bin or not in highly inconsistent in the data set. The pa…
> The problem with the term "organic" is it's broad and not well defined. It's like "agile" in our space.
...and this if further complicated by the fact that this paper is based on combining data from almost 150 other studies.
People in this thread seem to be under the misapprehension that organic farming doesn't use pesticides or 'chemicals'. Everything is a chemical, and organic farming in particular uses some nasty ones (rotenone, copper sulfate, pyrethrins). Pesticides are not automatically bad - in fact some of them are almost unbelievably benign to humans and/or to the environment.
> Pesticides are not automatically bad - in fact some of them are almost unbelievably benign to humans and/or to the environment. I'm curious to know which pesticides fit this description.
herbicides: pelargonic acid (Scythe) and acetic acid are famous examples, but glyphosate (Roundup) and imazaquin (Image) have higher LD50s than table salt.
insecticides: Bacillus thuringiensis Cry proteins (used both in organic agriculture and in Monsanto's Bt lines), RNAi
Vinegar is a herbicide. Concentrated urine as well.
Thanks. That's an interesting response. However, the statement in question was explicitly regarding pesticides, not herbicides. And, implicitly, the context is those pesticides which are in use at scale on non-organic crops.
Keep in mind that even if a compound is suitable for use at scale it might cost slightly more than current methods and therefore see almost no use.
> anyone who's worried about pesticides having residual effects on them (and doesn't get in direct contact with the stuff) has never tried to make pesticides stay on those god damned plants long enough to work. Well, if we're going to be fair about it, the fact that it washes off the surface of plants so easily doesn't mean it's just gone and not causing residual effects elsewhere .
> doesn't mean it's just gone and not causing residual effects elsewhere True, but I have better things to worry about than this health food craze americans seem to be going through. I've been living here for several months and I honestly think most people here are insane. So much worrying about everything! Live a little, sheesh.[1] Maybe SF is especially bad. In my country we have a saying: "You keep the nice apples…
> my main gripe with the organic anti-chemical food craze is that we simply don't have enough arable land to feed everyone
I think the same people who prefer organic food might also be wise enough not to eat three large servings of beef every day, which is what is killing the rain forests right now. And how many % of good food are being thrown away nowadays? Something like 30%? Simply because supermarkets want to have everything on the shelves all the time, and people buy without planning. There is still a lot of room for experimentation before we starve.
You might choose not to eat the non-organic food but you can't avoid the Atrazine [1] in the rain, which is enough to turn the male northern leopard frog tadpoles to turn into hermaphrodites. The families of the people who work in the factory farm system are also affected. You can see talks [2] on both these subjects in the Edible Education course from Berkeley [3], hosted by Michael Pollan and Raj Patel. I can recom…
> The families of the people who work in the factory farm system are also affected. That is the exact reason I've often chosen organic for years. People used to say "Its no better for you" and I'd reply "Maybe, but its better for them, the workers"
As someone who comes from a family of small farmers, this is not really true. Organic pesticides are on-average more harmful to the people who use them than modern pesticides. Simply put, organic pesticides attack animal/fungal life indiscriminately. Including human life. Most organic pesticides will kill you at fairly low quantities. Most man-made ones won't, they are tailored to a task. And organic farmers need to use a lot more pesticides than non-organic farmers to achieve the same results, making human toxicity even more likely.
> If people don't want organic food, I could generally care less except for one thing: efforts to put legal roadblocks in the way of locally grown food. How do you know that locally grown food is organic unless someone checks? Local grown and sold food doesn't necessarily mean "organic" it just means locally grown. Pesticides and chemicals are available for local growers too. Unless you grow it or personally know whe…
> The pesticide the shit out of one they sell. As a farmer myself, I find something intriguing in your comment. I take away visions of someone using way more chemical than necessary when reading this, but that stuff is expensive . There is no reason to use more. It's always considered a blessing when you don't have to use any, even if we assume the environmental/health impact is zero. Judicious use of pesticides can…
I am generally pleased with the good availability of locally grown organic food where we live in the mountains of Central Arizona. If people don't want organic food, I could generally care less except for one thing: efforts to put legal roadblocks in the way of locally grown food. For example: A few years ago our Senator Jon Kyle, after taking large campaign contributions from Monsanto, submitted the American Food Sa…
Off topic but just in case you didn't know, the expression is "I could NOT care less."
Businesses don't do everything possible to minimize absolute production costs, they try to minimize relative production costs. All else being equal, if my business and all my competitors are forced to pay twice as much for components, we will all raise prices, we will probably keep similar margins, and we will all make more profit. "All else being equal" is the hard part but it's not too far from reality in some situ…
> if my business and all my competitors are forced to pay twice as much for components, we will all raise prices, we will probably keep similar margins No, the organic food fight has always been about should we reap the (positive) economies of scale that are so abundant in agriculture? That's the cost structure of concern here and it only applies to one side - those currently taking advantage of those efficiencies. W…
> We were able to feed society with family farms
98% of farms in the US are still considered family farms by the USDA.
> The families of the people who work in the factory farm system are also affected. That is the exact reason I've often chosen organic for years. People used to say "Its no better for you" and I'd reply "Maybe, but its better for them, the workers"
As someone who comes from a family of small farmers, this is not really true. Organic pesticides are on-average more harmful to the people who use them than modern pesticides. Simply put, organic pesticides attack animal/fungal life indiscriminately. Including human life. Most organic pesticides will kill you at fairly low quantities. Most man-made ones won't, they are tailored to a task. And organic farmers need to…
I've never heard of this. Do you have an actual source?
I am generally pleased with the good availability of locally grown organic food where we live in the mountains of Central Arizona. If people don't want organic food, I could generally care less except for one thing: efforts to put legal roadblocks in the way of locally grown food. For example: A few years ago our Senator Jon Kyle, after taking large campaign contributions from Monsanto, submitted the American Food Sa…
Off topic but just in case you didn't know, the expression is "I could NOT care less."
You might not be aware that the idom "I could care less" is in common usage, espechally in American english, and has the same meaning as "I could not care less".