tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post455750652402554112..comments2024-03-04T05:51:28.885-08:00Comments on Applied Mythology: What We Have NOT Recently Learned About Pesticide RiskSteve Savagehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-27376508945026436202012-07-05T19:20:34.664-07:002012-07-05T19:20:34.664-07:00Well, I could engage critique of big, corporate ag...Well, I could engage critique of big, corporate ag, and present points and arguments that promote the idea that humans don't need big ag or synthetic chemicals to survive ( to the point that allows us humans to become more intelligent and thrive)--but this is actually well known.<br /><br />What we are facing are oppressive political tyrannies that increase ecological and human squalor so as to protect and project status quo patters of wealth and power. <br /><br />If these forces actually repaired significant amounts of their damage as our common reality unfolds--then my primary criticism of this system would be undermined by dint of ample example, and, unfortunately for all life and human society, this is not the reality we must face at this moment with courage, empathy, and applied <br />reasoning.<br /><br />How do these ecocide systems reproduce--with respect to education, the flow of information, through the dynamic of institutions, the culture industry, etc. How do patterns of ignorance spread and reproduce? We don't educate and form citizens that can develop sound lines of argument--and, thus, they are manipulated and coerced by undemocratic and corrupt patters that hold sway over our collective course.<br /><br />There exists a corruption in our basic cultural coding that sustains what is clearly a pathology and threat to our long-term survival. <br /><br />These matters are dire, and not reducible to feces flinging.<br /><br />Peace.SwampNiggerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723681245912506066noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-76893140981014250892012-07-02T00:11:57.309-07:002012-07-02T00:11:57.309-07:00Swamp...
Your language is rather convoluted, but ...Swamp...<br /><br />Your language is rather convoluted, but do I hear you saying that the study was an example of "hack science?" I guess I wouldn't be quite that harsh, but some of the author's public comments have crossed a line.<br /><br />In this post I was only addressing this one example of data that should not be over-interpreted because it was generated with a dosage that it completely out of range for reality. <br /><br />As for the general issue of chemical toxicity, I fully recognize that there are many real historical examples of real, and even tragic problems. Fortunately, we have been in a continuous learning process over the last 30+ years and lots of "bad actor" chemicals are now off the market. We now have lots of really good choices for pest control chemicals and those are critical to making good use of all the other resources (land, water, fuel, labor...) that go into feeding us. <br /><br />I have no interest in poisoning anyone, but I do have a strong interest in enabling farmers to feed us.Steve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-27221892885843105112012-07-01T21:10:51.264-07:002012-07-01T21:10:51.264-07:00Critique the ideas and major points presented, as ...Critique the ideas and major points presented, as such communication would be logical, and possibly cogent.<br /><br />However, instead, your strategy I'd to impunge my person, my ability to engage and present ideas in a civilized, honorable fashion. <br /><br />Corrupt logic.. Though I haven't enough experience with your ideas, as a whole, to present a psycho-ideological analysis in the form of argument to confidently present the roots and ligatures that can be helpful to significantly expose your motives and goals.<br /><br />"Follow the money" is too easy and trite--as thie scope of such explanation doesn't bring to the fore the deeper social and familial influences that come to bear on your presenting such grotesque, fallacious, and reductive reasoning as standard given the weight of the issues you seek to influence the perception of other humans. <br /><br />Talk radio squalor. SwampNiggerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723681245912506066noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-35177192796681624332012-07-01T21:09:51.855-07:002012-07-01T21:09:51.855-07:00Given that I have the capacity to offer a semblanc...Given that I have the capacity to offer a semblance of coherent comment, with rhyme schema, I would say that I am swimmingly sober.<br /><br />I divide my reply to your response to my first post on your site, with respect to the tread you have developed herein, focusing on pesticides and food safety. My main criticism is that you erect a caricature of the trend of thinking that strives to avoid food produced with pesticides to maximize production. The weak oppositional anecdotes you highlight generalize way too broadly with respect to the myriad and cogent criticisms that exist in the public sphere. Your selected anecdotes are from cherry-picking so as to present the most sloppy presentations that function to inform and warn the population. This presentation and your critique develops a.caricature--to the point that your loyal guests are ready to burn tree-buggers at the stake. (ok, I exaggerate--but not far off the mark.). This selective presentation of hack science shown( pesticides influencing epigenetic Alteration that influences the genetic coding of subsequent generations of humans exposed to pesticides) and the subsequent line of argument that smacks down the facile target, lacks cogency--is unscrupulous, thus unscientific, and suffers the taint of being pesticide industry aligned propaganda.<br /><br />I divide my response into two sections because of the constraints of this format.SwampNiggerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723681245912506066noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-50172858024626050772012-06-30T22:10:55.115-07:002012-06-30T22:10:55.115-07:00Swamp...
Are you actually sober when writing these...Swamp...<br />Are you actually sober when writing these comments?Steve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-81454787056054490872012-06-30T21:17:14.862-07:002012-06-30T21:17:14.862-07:00Lol, you will love my reply to your lack of cogenc...Lol, you will love my reply to your lack of cogency and smear..<br /><br />Stay tuned, and drop that bottle of pesticide--that is not beer.<br /><br />Just saved your life..SwampNiggerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723681245912506066noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-11034104009678347092012-06-30T13:08:59.076-07:002012-06-30T13:08:59.076-07:00Swamp,
I suspect that you are so deep into conspi...Swamp,<br /><br />I suspect that you are so deep into conspiracy theory thinking about these topics that there is no reason to discuss it. I've posted your diatribe - let readers judge for themselvesSteve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-79514938404689811382012-06-29T22:36:57.706-07:002012-06-29T22:36:57.706-07:00Hmm...well, I believe the author frames this subje...Hmm...well, I believe the author frames this subject in a very unintelligent perspective, massively.<br /><br />Is agriculture, promoted on massive, corporatized, corrupt, and polluting scale by the most violent and criminal organizations on the planet improve the health and beauty of the Earth?<br /><br />The answer is no--and the fact that these forces promoting oppression, ignorance and greed don't clean up their damage as they create it points up that the system is diseased. We see this in the collapsing health of the Earth.<br /><br />More, you make huge generalizations as you sneer at intelligent behavior by some to avoid exposure to pesticides--these are not compelling, and only reinforce the naïveté, or, will to believe, on the part of the readers that enable the profit feed-back loops that provide income for this portal.<br /><br />Current ideologies and violent tyrannies are making our planet less healing--as has been the undeniable trend.<br /><br />But you appear to support this trend--and that shows your core thinking and believe as ecocidal and diseased.<br /><br />Indeed, I am eager to review your replies to my core point on the part of your readership here. There actually is no argument that the system and ideology you have internalized is not irreparably harming the health of our planet--and that the major players have never been successful in any significant repair.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the pathological egoists stuff the gains in their pocket--and we all have to pay for any cleanup of the toxic messes created. What a brazen scam. <br /><br />When you die of cancer--the pesticide promoters will rest assured that their hands are clean--and everyone is safe.<br /><br />You are insane, and will leave this life supporting the trend toward decreased long-term survival--and the evisceration of ecosystems and beautiful species.<br /><br />All you know is the ugly--and we see the evidence everywhere you lay your hands.<br /><br />Deep, through layers of denial and paroxysms of fallacious and weak argument--you know this, of course.SwampNiggerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723681245912506066noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-21443411290859574972012-06-15T14:37:24.914-07:002012-06-15T14:37:24.914-07:00Anonymous,
I don't disagree with the idea that...Anonymous,<br />I don't disagree with the idea that we have to proceed with caution. At this point for any new agricultural chemical there the process of being careful is already up to seven years of testing and ~250 million dollars spent to do it. We always have to be open to phenomena we have not seen before, but the point of this article is that epigenetic effects has not been demonstrated to be one of those new things in an ag chem context. It might be for some far higher exposure scenarioSteve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-64762703976933527952012-06-15T14:22:51.164-07:002012-06-15T14:22:51.164-07:00I am sorry to see that you miss my point. What I b...I am sorry to see that you miss my point. What I believe is that humans learn much slower than we care to consider. That due to economic pressures, vanity or simply greed, changes to natural processes that are not fully understood have and are being made overnight and we only realize that years, decades or even centuries latter. By now, what we should be learning from our past mistakes is how to make no further mistakes. Instead we are making some new mistakes and then waiting for them to reveal themselves. Do you really think there is anything still "organic" nowadays ? Any pathogens still not exposed to man made chemichals ? Have you seen the New York Times article on how babies are being born experiencing opiate drugs withdrawal symptoms ? That is about 1.5 babies every hour in the US. That is the kind of thing I'm talking about ... I am not saying that we should not study, try, experience, learn, but that we should be more responsible and refrain from going large scale too quickly. I think that we are pushing the limits of nature that is all, and it might be that the means to correct any future consequences could be out of our reach. Well, that is about all the philosophical reasoning I dare to put forward. Thank you for the discussion.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-17836225743028501782012-06-15T10:45:09.287-07:002012-06-15T10:45:09.287-07:00Anonymous,
So you don't believe that humans ev...Anonymous,<br />So you don't believe that humans ever learn? There have been some big mistakes in Pharma like thalidomide (sic?). Does that mean we should never develop any new drugs? There were certain car designs that rendered them "death traps." Does that mean we should never develop new, safer cars based on what was learned? There have been some big mistakes in organic farming with human pathogens (e.g. the sprouts in Europe). Does that mean we should never grow sprouts? <br /><br />In all these cases, we have learned from mistakes and made progress on things that matter.Steve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-83039743073957514272012-06-15T09:46:05.930-07:002012-06-15T09:46:05.930-07:00Ok, I just cited lead to make a philosophical argu...Ok, I just cited lead to make a philosophical argument. When you recognize that mistakes were made decades ago, it sounds like something you're likely to continue to say decades from now. Just to keep the philosophical line of thinking, every time we make a mistake we are less like Prometheus and more like his brother Epimetheus. Just now, are we evolving towards Prometheus or Epimetheus ?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-84236282661773929032012-06-14T19:39:49.409-07:002012-06-14T19:39:49.409-07:00Anonymous (I accidently deleted your comment but r...Anonymous (I accidently deleted your comment but rescued it from the email notification)<br /><br />Actually the vinclozolin story is an excellent example of how far we have come since 1980. There is no comparison between the lead exposure back in the day and what ever happened with vinclozolin (as the data here demonstrates). I certainly won't deny that mistakes were made decades ago, but you could say that about all sorts of things from politics to race relations to women's rights. We have come a long way on many of those dimensions - particularly on pesticide safetySteve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-31519915292991568742012-06-14T19:34:34.188-07:002012-06-14T19:34:34.188-07:00It has been circa 1200 years since Nicander descri...It has been circa 1200 years since Nicander described the consequences of lead poisoning, and mankind has not yet learned the lesson. It was not until 1980 that leaded gasoline began to be seen as a real health problem. Still we dispose of wasted batteries inapproprietely in parts of the world today. I think it should also take us many decades to start to realize the wrongs we are doing with all the chemichals in use today (not only vinclozolin). Sure we can benefit from science and the artificial interference over natural processes. This has been proven over and over. But it also seems clear to me that we have lost respect by going large scale too fast. There will probably be a price to be paid for it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-75376742051362952802012-06-13T21:04:21.038-07:002012-06-13T21:04:21.038-07:00Thanks BobThanks BobSteve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-27855132863428908942012-06-13T20:04:54.160-07:002012-06-13T20:04:54.160-07:00Nice post and thanks for the analysis of the PNAS ...Nice post and thanks for the analysis of the PNAS publication !silent bobhttp://boblesilencieux.wordpress.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-59798730516487783822012-06-13T14:19:21.271-07:002012-06-13T14:19:21.271-07:00Thanks Eleanor,
Good point about smoking. I hope...Thanks Eleanor,<br /><br />Good point about smoking. I hope that this does not become something like the vaccine-autism thing because no amount of information can ever convince some people. Of course in that case, many people have ended up endangering their communities by not having their kids vaccinated.Steve Savagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04408822620071396633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4541703279082624205.post-10124720147292873682012-06-13T13:28:18.366-07:002012-06-13T13:28:18.366-07:00Great article, as usual.
It sure was poor form of...Great article, as usual.<br /><br />It sure was poor form of Crews to speculate that DDT exposure of parents could cause autism, obesity and depression in later generations. There is always someone waiting to pounce on unfounded comments like that, who then uses the sound bites to inflame the public for their his gain. This reminds me of the vaccine-autism problem.<br />Also, why not look at the epigenetic effects of smoking. There is a lot more exposure of mothers and their fetuses to tobacco toxins than there is to most agriculturally-used compounds. And there aren't too many people up in arms over that.<br />Keep up the good fight!Eleanorhttp://plannedresilience.net/noreply@blogger.com