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In college, I did a deep dive into GMO safety research for journal club back when the Seralini "GMOs cause cancer in mice" paper hit (2010 or thereabouts) and f

In college, I did a deep dive into GMO safety research for journal club back when the Seralini "GMOs cause cancer in mice" paper hit (2010 or thereabouts) and found quite a counterexample to your rule: bogus (obviously p-hacked) science from Seralini and an aggressive misinformation campaign from Greenpeace to convince people that Monsanto was using terminator genes (bio-DRM) against poor farmers when the truth had been quite the opposite for some time (Monsanto patented the idea, promised not to use it, and kept the promise). Blind opposition to industrial progress -- which is what you are suggesting -- carried by the rising tide of public opinion will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid. EDIT: oh, and there's a National Toxicology Program study -- "cell phones cause cancer" would be the sensationalized headline -- working its way through the bureaucratic pipes at the moment with another round of "review" landing in a few months. Somehow it got through the first draft and review process while completely ignoring the first law of toxicology, so I suspect it will pass the second round as well, and while I trust the official document will contain sufficiently reserved wording the media circus that spins up around it will become a second excellent example of bullshit from the "little guys."

headsoup 9y ago
You're just throwing out the tu quoque fallacy for I'm not sure what reason. Hey the 'other side' does it too so let's not make a big deal here! Black and white opposition to everything with cherry-picked arguments is becoming more and more prevalent, and it doesn't help us solve (or even rationally discuss) any problems or even understand them better.
- tptacek 9y ago
  That's in fact not an instance of the tu quoque fallacy.
  - headsoup 9y ago
    It is. You're implying that the other commenter's post is invalid as 'blind opposition' because 'their side' of the argument behaves the same. * Edit on below: On re-reading you're correct, you were categorising their comment. My apologies!
    - tptacek 9y ago
      No. Tu quoque is an appeal to hypocrisy. Pointing out that other concerns with big industry have been misleading, as with Seralini's apparently fraudulent glyphosate study, is an appeal to credibility.
- cyphar 9y ago
  You're misrepresenting the chain of the conversation: A: The jury is out on [topic]. B: Whenever a jury is out, with one side having massive funding you know what the outcome will be [implying the massively funded camp is wrong and trying to hide it]. C: Here is a counter-example where the side with funding was correct. So maybe your over-generalisation is wrong. You: You're throwing out a to-quoque fallacy, blind opposition is bad. GP was opposing blind opposition, and you're arguing that they are blindly opposing skepticism. I'm not sure you read the conversation completely before you replied.
YeGoblynQueenne 9y ago
>> Blind opposition to industrial progress -- which is what you are suggesting -- carried by the rising tide of public opinion will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid. What damage will be caused by people using their phones less for fear of getting cancer? What about GMOs? What is the harm in not using them? The EU has mostly banned them and it doesn't look to be suffering any damage.
- colah3 9y ago
  With regards to GMOs, the green revolution (as I understand it[1], partly using GMOs to increase food production, especially in developing countries) is often described as saving a billion lives. On a brief glance, I can't find a detailed estimate of the Humanitarian effects, but Borlaug received a Nobel peace prize for it and that scale of impact does seem plausible. [1] See discussion below about relative importance of engineering disease resistant varieties vs fertilizers and pesticides. I only have a vague familiarity with the green revolution and could be mistaken.
  - aetherson 9y ago
    That's not what the green revolution was. It was pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. While GMOs are not harmful and banning them is overall bad, they don't have nearly the same magnitude of impact on agricultural productivity as herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers.
    - colah3 9y ago
      Thanks for the feedback - I've updated my comment to express uncertainty. As I understand it, a big part of the green revolution, especially initially, was Borlaug developing a strand of wheat that was resistant to many common diseases and had higher yields. This seems born out by a quick skim of his [wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug), although I'm sure nitrogen fertilizer, etc, also played large roles. I don't have the time to do a deep dive right now, so I've just updated my previous comment to be uncertain.
mmjaa 9y ago
"Blind opposition to industrial progress -- which is what you are suggesting -- carried by the rising tide of public opinion will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid." The OP is clearly NOT suggesting "blind opposition" to industrial progress - in fact, what is wanted, is absolutely transparent, non-blinded research. But, this is not what is on the table. You've skilfully managed to turn the argument away from the facts: companies such as Monsanto WANT BLIND FAITH in their products, and work very avidly to ensure that the public - and their representatives - do not get to see all the facts. So, what exactly is your intention here?
- lioeters 9y ago
  We could flip the original sentence as: "Blind faith in industrial progress..carried by the tide of public policy..is causing and will continue to cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid."
  - hennsen 9y ago
    Yes it will be paid back. By generations to come. While the corporations who invented/introduced/pushed the stuff and got governments to support them by adjusting laws to allow doing it keep flourishing...
    - lioeters 9y ago
      That's the sad truth, that coming generations will be paying for our short-sighted pursuit of profit and "progress". This reminds me of the Long Now Foundation [0]. At least there is hope, that there are people aware of the need for long-term sustainable thinking, and are actively promoting it. "Civilization is revving itself into a pathologically short attention span. The trend might be coming from the acceleration of technology, the short-horizon perspective of market-driven economics, the next-election perspective of democracies, or the distractions of personal multi-tasking. All are on the increase. Some sort of balancing corrective to the short-sightedness is needed - some mechanism or myth which encourages the long view and the taking of long-term responsibility, where 'long-term' is measured at least in centuries." Stewart Brand [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Now_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Now_Foundation
stfp 9y ago
"Blind opposition to industrial progress [...] will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid." Meanwhile, in reality: the exact opposite

headsoup 9y ago

You're just throwing out the tu quoque fallacy for I'm not sure what reason. Hey the 'other side' does it too so let's not make a big deal here! Black and white opposition to everything with cherry-picked arguments is becoming more and more prevalent, and it doesn't help us solve (or even rationally discuss) any problems or even understand them better.

tptacek 9y ago
That's in fact not an instance of the tu quoque fallacy.
- headsoup 9y ago
  It is. You're implying that the other commenter's post is invalid as 'blind opposition' because 'their side' of the argument behaves the same. * Edit on below: On re-reading you're correct, you were categorising their comment. My apologies!
  - tptacek 9y ago
    No. Tu quoque is an appeal to hypocrisy. Pointing out that other concerns with big industry have been misleading, as with Seralini's apparently fraudulent glyphosate study, is an appeal to credibility.
cyphar 9y ago
You're misrepresenting the chain of the conversation: A: The jury is out on [topic]. B: Whenever a jury is out, with one side having massive funding you know what the outcome will be [implying the massively funded camp is wrong and trying to hide it]. C: Here is a counter-example where the side with funding was correct. So maybe your over-generalisation is wrong. You: You're throwing out a to-quoque fallacy, blind opposition is bad. GP was opposing blind opposition, and you're arguing that they are blindly opposing skepticism. I'm not sure you read the conversation completely before you replied.

YeGoblynQueenne 9y ago

>> Blind opposition to industrial progress -- which is what you are suggesting -- carried by the rising tide of public opinion will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid. What damage will be caused by people using their phones less for fear of getting cancer? What about GMOs? What is the harm in not using them? The EU has mostly banned them and it doesn't look to be suffering any damage.

colah3 9y ago
With regards to GMOs, the green revolution (as I understand it[1], partly using GMOs to increase food production, especially in developing countries) is often described as saving a billion lives. On a brief glance, I can't find a detailed estimate of the Humanitarian effects, but Borlaug received a Nobel peace prize for it and that scale of impact does seem plausible. [1] See discussion below about relative importance of engineering disease resistant varieties vs fertilizers and pesticides. I only have a vague familiarity with the green revolution and could be mistaken.
- aetherson 9y ago
  That's not what the green revolution was. It was pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers. While GMOs are not harmful and banning them is overall bad, they don't have nearly the same magnitude of impact on agricultural productivity as herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers.
  - colah3 9y ago
    Thanks for the feedback - I've updated my comment to express uncertainty. As I understand it, a big part of the green revolution, especially initially, was Borlaug developing a strand of wheat that was resistant to many common diseases and had higher yields. This seems born out by a quick skim of his [wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug), although I'm sure nitrogen fertilizer, etc, also played large roles. I don't have the time to do a deep dive right now, so I've just updated my previous comment to be uncertain.

mmjaa 9y ago

"Blind opposition to industrial progress -- which is what you are suggesting -- carried by the rising tide of public opinion will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid." The OP is clearly NOT suggesting "blind opposition" to industrial progress - in fact, what is wanted, is absolutely transparent, non-blinded research. But, this is not what is on the table. You've skilfully managed to turn the argument away from the facts: companies such as Monsanto WANT BLIND FAITH in their products, and work very avidly to ensure that the public - and their representatives - do not get to see all the facts. So, what exactly is your intention here?

lioeters 9y ago
We could flip the original sentence as: "Blind faith in industrial progress..carried by the tide of public policy..is causing and will continue to cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid."
- hennsen 9y ago
  Yes it will be paid back. By generations to come. While the corporations who invented/introduced/pushed the stuff and got governments to support them by adjusting laws to allow doing it keep flourishing...
  - lioeters 9y ago
    That's the sad truth, that coming generations will be paying for our short-sighted pursuit of profit and "progress". This reminds me of the Long Now Foundation [0]. At least there is hope, that there are people aware of the need for long-term sustainable thinking, and are actively promoting it. "Civilization is revving itself into a pathologically short attention span. The trend might be coming from the acceleration of technology, the short-horizon perspective of market-driven economics, the next-election perspective of democracies, or the distractions of personal multi-tasking. All are on the increase. Some sort of balancing corrective to the short-sightedness is needed - some mechanism or myth which encourages the long view and the taking of long-term responsibility, where 'long-term' is measured at least in centuries." Stewart Brand [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Now_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Now_Foundation

stfp 9y ago

"Blind opposition to industrial progress [...] will cause a ton of damage in the century to come, and the damage will never be repaid." Meanwhile, in reality: the exact opposite