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that won't work in the EU which have have a much more sceptic view on these things. Their principle is the direct opposite of the US. If there is just the slig

that won't work in the EU which have have a much more sceptic view on these things. Their principle is the direct opposite of the US. If there is just the slightest risk that something is dangerous they forbid it. In the US they only forbid things if there is overwhelmingly evidence that points towards it being dangerous.

triangleman 10y ago
Then how do you explain the ban on ephedra? Something like 2 people die and it's off the market. Meanwhile, Tylenol kills hundreds of people annually and it's still allowed. I was going to use Thalidomide as another counterexample, but I don't know how things are in Europe compared to the 60's.
- ThomPete 10y ago
  Anomalies
deleted 10y ago
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Houshalter 10y ago
This discussion is about whether GMOs will naturally be phased out of the market because of a minority that refuses to eat them. Just like it's hard to find non kosher food, because there's a minority that won't eat it. If the government just outright mandates how food has to be produced, then no one has a choice, and of course that won't work. That's a different situation entirely. Anyway your generalization is overly broad. The US also is restrictive of new things. Especially in e.g. the medical world. See all the startups running into trouble with the FDA. But also things like drones were banned commercially until recently. Even GMOs did have to get FDA approval, so your statement is simply wrong. You can't just go out and make your own GMOs and sell them. I think it's just a general trend, that richer countries become more conservative, and more afraid of new things (and able to afford such policies.) Many technologies we take for granted would never be legally viable if they were invented today. Early automakers would have been sued out of existence for all the traffic accidents they caused. Or, speaking of GMOs, traditional crop breeding literally involves letting the crops randomly mutate in unknown ways (sometimes artificially through irradiation!) No way that would have been approved by modern regulators.

triangleman 10y ago

Then how do you explain the ban on ephedra? Something like 2 people die and it's off the market. Meanwhile, Tylenol kills hundreds of people annually and it's still allowed. I was going to use Thalidomide as another counterexample, but I don't know how things are in Europe compared to the 60's.

ThomPete 10y ago
Anomalies

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

Houshalter 10y ago

This discussion is about whether GMOs will naturally be phased out of the market because of a minority that refuses to eat them. Just like it's hard to find non kosher food, because there's a minority that won't eat it. If the government just outright mandates how food has to be produced, then no one has a choice, and of course that won't work. That's a different situation entirely. Anyway your generalization is overly broad. The US also is restrictive of new things. Especially in e.g. the medical world. See all the startups running into trouble with the FDA. But also things like drones were banned commercially until recently. Even GMOs did have to get FDA approval, so your statement is simply wrong. You can't just go out and make your own GMOs and sell them. I think it's just a general trend, that richer countries become more conservative, and more afraid of new things (and able to afford such policies.) Many technologies we take for granted would never be legally viable if they were invented today. Early automakers would have been sued out of existence for all the traffic accidents they caused. Or, speaking of GMOs, traditional crop breeding literally involves letting the crops randomly mutate in unknown ways (sometimes artificially through irradiation!) No way that would have been approved by modern regulators.