How many other advances in agriculture are we going to sacrifice to appease these superstitions? (Not to mention similar superstitions of anti-vaccine activists, who are probably the same people in many cases.)
from the wiki article [1]:
In 2006, the US Government sponsored an assessment of the scientific
literature on BPA. Thirty-eight experts in fields involved with bisphenol A
gathered in Chapel Hill, North Carolina to review several hundred studies on
BPA, many conducted by members of the group. At the end of the meeting, the
group issued the Chapel Hill Consensus Statement,[100] which stated BPA at
concentrations found in the human body is associated with organizational
changes in the prostate, breast, testis, mammary glands, body size, brain
structure and chemistry, and behavior of laboratory animals.[101]
The Chapel Hill Consensus Statement found that average levels in people are
above those that cause harm to many animals in laboratory experiments. They
noted that while BPA is not persistent in the environment or in humans,
biomonitoring surveys indicate that exposure is continuous, which is
problematic because acute animal exposure studies are used to estimate daily
human exposure to BPA, and no studies that had examined BPA pharmacokinetics
in animal models had followed continuous low-level exposures. They added
that measurement of BPA levels in serum and other body fluids suggests the
possibilities that BPA intake is much higher than accounted for, and/or that
BPA can bioaccumulate in some conditions (such as pregnancy).[100]
A 2008 report by the Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human
Reproduction within the U.S. National Toxicology Program (NTP), which is
within the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, reported the
results of its exhaustive review of the literature. Its conclusions,
expressed relative to current estimates of general population exposure
levels in the U.S., were the following:
Not to mention the freakout about labeling foods; if they weren't knowingly poisoning us, why exactly would corporations be so very afraid of properly labeling foods? Any reasonable adult should have his or her bullshit detector going off when they are told gmo is absolutely safe, but it's the end of the world if we tell people which foods have gmo ingredients so that they can choose what to eat.
Anyway, I agree it's hard to argue with "label the product and let the consumer decide." But I think the case could be made that it plays on people's unscientific views of what is and isn't healthy. As with "organic" or "locally sourced" there's nothing stopping companies that don't use GMOs from putting a "No GMO" label on their food. Some already do.
What was actually said was:
For adults, the Expert Panel has negligible concern for adverse reproductive
effects following exposures in the general population to Bisphenol A
And you know what was never studied? General safety for adults under actual dosing as experienced in reality. Further on down the same wiki article, just one of many concerns:
The authors found that higher bisphenol A levels were significantly
associated with heart disease, diabetes, and abnormally high levels of
certain liver enzymesAnyway, I think you nail the exact point I was trying to make: no studies have shown BPA to be dangerous in adults at the levels that are actually encountered in the environment. (There's little doubt that BPA is bad for you at doses orders of magnitude higher than those normally encountered, but that's true of a great many things.)
For the same reason that measles infections are on the rise? Because the public is largely ignorant and doesn't understand much about Science or genetic engineering and thus is easily influenced by Hollywood and celebrities who in their ignorance push their favorite environmental/medical causes (Jenny McCarthy).
See the wiki article for evidence published in medical journals that bpa harms human beings. There's plenty of evidence to say it should be banned, at bare minimum until long term studies at actual dosing levels have been performed.
Because when you label something consumers assume it is bad for them. That's why we don't force companies to label things that aren't actually dangerous. See study from MIT on GMO labels: http://courantblogs.com/capitol-watch/gmo-labels-send-a-mess...
We know that human health can be damaged by all sorts of different chemicals. That being established, the task at hand is identifying which are harmful (or usually in what quantities do they become harmful).
Meanwhile there is no persuasive evidence that any foods become harmful simple because they have been genetically modified. Completely different.
> if they weren't knowingly poisoning us, why exactly would corporations be so very afraid of properly labeling foods?
Perhaps precisely because of this hysteria surrounding GMO?
If almost every product was labelled as GMO then after a while consumers would not care. They would be able to make their own choices about "regular" versus GMO. Instead the fight has been to "trust us" and to keep GMO secret.
"Known to the State of California to cause cancer" is everywhere. No one bats an eyelid any more.
The fact that people will become apathetic to GMO labeling eventually doesn't mean that the industry won't fight to avoid the unwanted (and undeserved) stigma for now.
There is that paternalism again. It is not up to the producers of any product to decide if attention is undeserved. Consumers get to decide that. And yes some will be wrong etc. Shining a light and being truthful is the right way of doing things.
The hysteria is not against science - it is against paternalism hiding itself as "trust us because science". Science requires being open and honest.
You do not foster understanding, science, progress or freedom by hiding things.
Species have been disappearing long before humans existed, there is nothing new here. We have always developed close cultural ties to what we eat, this made changes expensive. Hard to imagine a world without orange juice, bananas, plum fruit or a tasty tomato. Our ancestors lacked the tools to prevent losses. We have it and this only makes the loss more painful.