I noticed a month or two ago that huge counter claim on the safety of gmo was issued by Monsanto.
The same safety claims were made of thalidomide and feeding sheep brain to cows.

I did not blame the scientists. And the word "sacred" refers to people's attitude toward that word when they don't look behind the use of that word which can be bandied about. I certainly agree with you about business executives. That's exactly what I was saying. So we are in agreement.

Of course poisoning the ground, water, and air will poison people and all of nature. A big push to stop poisoning and lying about each new chemical used could bring farmers (corporations) to using natural means. Tough if it's harder. You're alive and healthy. Oh, and not making money on those unnatural things. Sorry.

Selective breeding is not the same as splicing genes from an animal or fish to those of a plant. Furthermore there is now emerging evidence that GMO does not outperform organically grown crops. Glyphosate is grossly harmful to the pollinators but of course they want to sell drone bees don't they. Man's greed resulted in the industrial revolution which in turn resulted in people moving away from the food production. Food production became equally industrialized. Perhaps it is time for the human lemmings to jump off the cliffs?

@FrayedBear if your solution is population reduction then why are you concerned for the safety of our food supply?

@Rufus_Maximus I love explaining sarcasm. Have I introduced you to the 5 laws of Human Stupidity espoused by the late Professor Cippolla?
[qz.com]

• A recommended read along with Edwin Abbott's Flatland: A Romance in Many Dimensions - Wikipedia [en.m.wikipedia.org] I'm sure that even Leicester library will be able to get a copy for you if they don't still have it in their stacks.
  

Lab Study Establishes Glyphosate Link to Birth Defects [i-sis.org.uk]

[theecologist.org]

Maybe all that fallow land in the countries westerners have decimated could be made farmland to the world. But, train and hire the locals for sure.

Thank you very much for your enquiry. I have permission to invite you to access "Stephen Franz" on Facebook. He is a scientist devoting himself to this subject. Did you know that workers in the field where these pesticides are used are suing because they have contracted these cancers?

@think-beyond Thanks for that. I would prefer to read a published paper or similar. Can you help me with that. ?

@BanjoTango You will find all of that on Stephen Franz' site. He is a scientist doing tons of research and is in touch with congress. Please consider following my suggestion.

@BanjoTango I have tried to find peer reviewed work by Stephen Franz on GMOs, pesticides, and agricultural practices, and I have failed. Perhaps @think-beyond could provide us with direct links to his publications rather than bumping his Facebook page.

@Rufus_Maximus Yes, I got the same result. In fact there are a lot of peer reviewed studies of Glyphosate that don't agree with the reported effects. Naturally, its hard to evaluate things third hand, and it often takes a long time for effective studies to be published.

I am so sorry for your difficulty. I will work on getting all of you good reference material. First off, The Huffington Post has a good article on this subject. You might like to tap into: baumhedlundlaw.com - A word of caution: I wouldn't use ROUNDUP on your lawns, etc. It is pure GLYPHOSATE.

@Fanburger I sat in on a lecture given by Dr Andrew Wakefield, the doctor who has opened up this whole matter. He is a devoted scientist with lots of data. The problem is that the news doesn't go into detail. The truth is in the details. He is not against vaccinations. He is ardently against the way these vaccinations are prepared. The measles vaccines used to be given separately. Now they are included in a multi cocktail that is too much for a child to handle. Give these cocktails to a very young infant and some will develop serious side effects - like autism - some have died. Why not make the single vaccines available? Why have they been taken off the market? Then, to make it cheaper, preservatives like formaldehyde and mercury are included. Baaaaad! So it is not a simple matter like they try to make it. Why don't you Google Dr. Andrew Wakefield and get the whole story?

The Huffington Post article is "12 Reasons to avoid GMO's"

@think-beyond Andrew Wakefield is a disgraced fraudster, and certainly not a respectable member of the medical, or scientific communities. As a matter of fact he isn't even allowed to practice medicine in the UK because of the harm his malpractice caused.

@Rufus_Maximus When you use the word "disgraceful" you offend me because I have met the man and know he is sincere, has devoted himself to research and has suffered greatly at the hands of the other side. You can disagree with him - hopefully, you have done some research of your own - but please understand this man had nothing to gain and has lost much and has been made to suffer along with his family. Please don't jump to conclusions. However, you are entitled to your thinking and I am entitled to mine. Let us not be sharp with each other.

@think-beyond the truth is not a democracy. Andrew Wakefield was disgraced, was banned from practicing medicine in the UK. These are all facts.

Unless you have some personal gains to make by supporting him then I suggest you consider that he may have been lying to you.

@Rufus_Maximus the result of white anting by the large companies?
Have you carefully studied the history of thalidomide which your mother, fortunately for you, never consumed?

@FrayedBear that is not a rebuttal of the discussion at hand. And yes, I am well aware of thalidomide and it's consequences, but that has nothing to do with Andrew Wakefield and his false information. I am beginning to form the opinion that you are intentionally promoting bad science for your own gratification.

@Rufus_Maximus the Australian who identified the link back to thalidomide eventually admitted that he fudged his results to do what he wanted. The only good thing to come out of that debacle was to prove that the large companies had also been untruthful in their findings, that the accepted belief that chemicals ingested by the mother will not pass over into the developing foetus was erroneous and as usual regulatory bodies and governments had been hoodwinked by avaricious business. Sounds familiar doesnt it? Monsanto have been practicing such deceit on humanity for more than 100years.

@FrayedBear what does that have to do with Andrew Wakefield? Are you suggesting that one liar is more worthy of your support than another; wouldn't you rather just look for the truth and not follow the liar that has the nicest smile? When you talk about "the Australian" I assume you mean McBride? He was actually the doctor that started recommending pregnant women to take thalidomide for morning sickness in the first place, a use for which it had never been tested. What a hero [sarcasm].

@Rufus_Maximus I have no problem with your sarcasm over McBride. I have a problem with your inability to acknoweldge the dishonesty lying and harm done by such companies as the producers of thalidomide or glyphosate ... lol, you don't have vested interest, like employment in the Beyer PR department, do you?

@Rufus_Maximus Sorry for the glitch. It is STEPHEN FRANTZ Facebook timeline if you are still interested.I had misspelled his name.

@BanjoTango A belated follow-up. I had misspelled the name. It is STEPHEN FRANTZ whose face book timeline is filled with info about GMO's, etc. Hope you are still interested in this.

@FrayedBear no I am an academic scientist. I am here to represent rationalism, it is sorely needed.

@Rufus_Maximus Is that like the rationalism that saw asbestos used for more than 100 years after governments around the world had been notified of its dangers?
Perhaps I should have rephrased my comment to point out that if McBride had not started his rumour mongering against thalidomide and it continued to be sold for a 100 years then the probability is that you would not be alive now.

And just returning to the mention of asbestos and to lighten this post here is Alistair Hulett a man well known for his testing of strange chemicals with one of two songs inspired by the mining of blue asbestos in Western Australia. To this day there are people who claim there was no harm in living amongst the dust. Equally there are a lot of people believe someone called dog built the earth in 6 days and that it is only 6000 years old. Enjoy the song