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Just to be clear: if you don't like this situation, patent law is the target. Monsanto, like many other companies, are operating within the legal framework the USA provides them. Reduce patent terms and you'll diversify control of the food supply.

Second, just to pre-empt, please don't confuse Monsanto with GM crops. Monsanto are a real pain in my ass as a plant scientist because they're nucleating an all-out war on rationality. The original Monsanto, a chemical manufacturer, were hated because of their US government contracts for Agent Orange, and their massive environmental abuses in the 1950s. In the 90s they developed some nice genetic technology. In 2000 that company was bought out by Pharmacia. Then, in possibly the biggest PR fuckup ever, a newly formed company taking only the agricultural IP from the old Monsanto decided to keep the name. The name carries so many associations with the evil things they did in the 50s-70s that it has utterly polluted the public discourse on GM crops.

It's also very tiresome to have Percy Schmeiser trotted out over and over again. What's not mentioned here is that it came out in the trial that Schmeiser had very deliberately infringed the patent by using Roundup to select the Roundup-Ready plants, saving their seed and planting them separately. Schmeiser made a very good job of rousing the media in his support, but he definitively broke the law.

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> It's also very tiresome to have Percy Schmeiser trotted out over and over again. What's not mentioned here is that it came out in the trial that Schmeiser had very deliberately infringed the patent by using Roundup to select the Roundup-Ready plants, saving their seed and planting them separately. Schmeiser made a very good job of rousing the media in his support, but he definitively broke the law.

I'm sorry you find his story inconvenient to your Monsanto cheerleading, but I (and I feel many others) don't think this should have violated any law. Someone contaminated his property with Roundup-Ready canola. He chose to take advantage of that, isolate it, and replant it. He never agreed with anybody to not do this, or signed contracts to control what he does with what ends up on his property.

The idea that a patent can exist on a lifeform is utter nonsense to me; I think a lot of the outrage comes in discovering that Monsanto's patent is on the actual lifeforms themselves, not on the process for turning a regular seed into a roundup-ready seed.

Just to be clear: glyphosphate pesticides (Roundup) kill normal crops. Roundup-Ready plants resist Roundup. If you treat a normal crop with Roundup, you kill the crop. You would only do that knowing that the crop germinated from patented, Roundup-Ready seeds. You can't do it by accident.

That's what Schmeiser did: he was sued by Monsanto not for planting unlicensed Roundup-Ready seeds, but for using Roundup on them.

It's also worth mentioning that the court did not find credible Schmeiser's claim that his original run of Roundup-Ready seeds were the product of accidental contamination --- upon determining that he was germinating Roundup-Ready plants, Schmeiser applied Roundup to the whole field, and 60% of the field survived. Furthermore, upon learning that he had a field consisting entirely of Roundup-Ready plants, he proceeded preserve and reuse the whole crop for future plantings.

We've actually discussed this on here before and I still don't understand how you've concluded that he was sued for using Roundup. From Wikipedia [0]:

"The court heard the question of whether Schmeiser's intentionally growing genetically modified plants constituted "use" of Monsanto's patented genetically modified plant cells."

And:

"Monsanto said that because they hold a patent on the gene, and on canola cells containing the gene, they have a legal right to control its use, including the intentional replanting of seed collected from plants with the gene which grew accidentally"

He was sued for using their seeds. It has nothing to do with whether or not he applied Roundup.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_Canada_Inc._v._Schmeis...

Just to preempt, I acknowledge that this language is odd:

"Thus a farmer whose field contains seed or plants originating from seed spilled into them, or blown as seed, in swaths from a neighbour's land or even growing from germination by pollen carried into his field from elsewhere by insects, birds, or by the wind, may own the seed or plants on his land even if he did not set about to plant them. He does not, however, own the right to the use of the patented gene, or of the seed or plant containing the patented gene or cell."

However, I don't think you can conclude that "use" arises when Roundup is applied. "Use" in this context is broader than that.

I can't find the citation right now, but last time I looked into this case I found that the court intended to set an explicit precedent that accidentally planting Roundup-ready plants does not constitute "use" of the patented gene ("use" happens when you use Roundup to select for Roundup-resistant plants). The language is not odd when considered in the context of setting such a precedent.

Perhaps the truth is somewhere in the middle? As I understand it, he was sued after purposefully isolating cross-poniated plants (presumably by using roundup) and using them to regrow his crop the following season.

The court determined that he sprayed the crop with Roundup, and also determined that Monsanto's patent applied regardless of whether Roundup was used, mooting one argument in the trial. If you have a record of Monsanto suing someone who didn't productively use the Roundup system, I'd like to see it.

If you have a record of Monsanto suing someone who didn't productively use the Roundup system, I'd like to see it.

I doubt such a case exists, but that doubt is based on my belief that Monsanto isn't as aggressive as they're often characterized, not on the necessity of that component in the case.

> I'm sorry you find his story inconvenient to your Monsanto cheerleading

It's hardly "inconvenient." Not only was he guilty of A) acknowledging Monsanto's value-addition by isolating the seeds and B) using but not paying for that value-addition, but he then went on a media tour to cash in on the Monsanto hate by lying repeatedly about the case to cast himself in a positive light. And then he used the media attention as a springboard for his political career. He's a scumbag, which is hardly "inconvenient" for people who don't hate Monsanto.

> I (and I feel many others) don't think this should have violated any law.

How do you propose to allow those who engineered the value-addition to capture a share of the societal benefit they created?

> The idea that a patent can exist on a lifeform is utter nonsense

They didn't patent the lifeform, they patented value-adding modifications to the life-form. If you spent the time and effort to remove Monsanto's additions, the life-form would no longer be patent-encumbered. The idea that they were patenting a lifeform is utter nonsense.

> They didn't patent the lifeform, they patented value-adding modifications to the life-form. If you spent the time and effort to remove Monsanto's additions, the life-form would no longer be patent-encumbered. The idea that they were patenting a lifeform is utter nonsense.

They still enforced that patent on the lifeform itself, not just on the modification.

The point of a patent is to restrict the reproduction of your invention. The point of a lifeform is that it reproduces itself. Putting your patented thing in something that reproduces itself, means you are releasing control over the reproduction of the thing you patented.

As far as I'm concerned, the only thing a gene patent should protect is taking the patented genes and putting them in a lifeform. Not the reproduction of the lifeform itself, since that is an automatic thing, inherent to life itself.

We certainly need a better system than patents on genes to allow people to pursue genetic engineering for the sake of money.

This is not about "societal benefit". Nobody but Monsanto benefits from Roundup Ready products: in fact they are a net detriment to society since the continual use of glyphosate will select for Roundup resistant weeds. Then there's the issue of residual glyphosate in our food supply.

You can put away your pom-poms and the "all Monstanto haters are liars" cheer line, and come join the rational debate.

If GMOs cause my non-GM crops to be contaminated with GM genes, who owns my crops? More importantly, who pays for the cleanup when the value I offer to my customers is crops free of GMOs?

If a GM wind- or bee-pollinated crop is planted within a few kilometres of my crop without my permission, who owns the genes that get transferred to my crops due to cross-pollination?

Don't trot out the canard of "societal benefit" when the only people who actually benefit from GMOs are the companies who own the patents and manufacture the herbicides, pesticides and fertilisers that the GMO crops depend on.

> This is not about "societal benefit". Nobody but Monsanto benefits from Roundup Ready products

That's just not true. Society benefits because we can avoid applying much more toxic and environmentally damaging herbicides and pesticides by using engineered resistance to pests or to harmless herbicides.

> They are a net detriment to society since the continual use of glyphosate will select for Roundup resistant weeds

This is a fallacy. All herbicide use selects for herbicide resistance. Herbicide resistance is a problem completely independent of GMOs, and is in no way exacerbated by using GMOs. Farmers have to use a huge quantity of herbicide regardless of whether they are growing GMOs cotton or organic quinoa.

> Then there's the issue of residual glyphosate in our food supply.

The whole point of using glyphosate is that it's one of the least harmful herbicides ever discovered. There is very little evidence of harm to humans even at much high doses than you would get in a lifetime of eating glyphosate-soaked food. Contrast that to every other broad action herbicide, which have various levels of toxicity but invariably higher than none.

>This is a fallacy. All herbicide use selects for herbicide resistance. Herbicide resistance is a problem completely independent of GMOs, and is in no way exacerbated by using GMOs

Actually, it's your comment there that contains the fallacy. Roundup-Ready GM crops are designed to survive Roundup dosing (obviously). This leads to an overall increase in Roundup use and a corresponding increase in Roundup resistance.

You may say that herbicide resistance can be found to exist with non-GMOs, but you cannot say that "resistance is in no way exacerbated by using GMOs". The latter is positively and obviously false.

> Roundup-Ready GM crops are designed to survive Roundup dosing (obviously). This leads to an overall increase in Roundup use and a corresponding increase in Roundup resistance.

Right, but without roundup farmers have to use at least as much of a different set of herbicides, at different times in the crop cycle. Using roundup leads to an increase in the overall resistance to roundup and a decrease in the resistance to 2,4-D, paraquat, etc. The problem exists independently of GMOs.

>you cannot say that "resistance is in no way exacerbated by using GMOs"

Yes, I can. Resistance to Roundup is exacerbated by using Roundup-Ready GMOs, while resistance to other herbicides is decreased.

>Yes, I can. Resistance to Roundup is exacerbated by using Roundup-Ready GMOs, while resistance to other herbicides is decreased.

No, you can't. Well, you can...in the same way that you can say up is down and down is up. That's literally what you're doing.

You previously stated that resistance is no way exacerbated by using GMOs. Now you're saying that it is for one GMO, but trying to qualify it with a "but". Too late. You've already conceded the point. Now you're trying to lawyer it.

With your initial claim refuted, we can move on to your qualifier. That is, whether there is some secondary effect whereby resistance to other herbicides is decreased in direct proportion would be another question. But, you fail on that point as well. Resistance is dose dependent. GMOs allow higher dosing. It's the entire point.

The more herbicide-resistant GMOs we use, the more herbicides we'll use and the more resistance we'll see. It's really as simple as that.

It's no use trying to be clever with words when you aren't being clever with facts. You are simply wrong, empirically and logically.

> You previously stated that resistance is no way exacerbated by using GMOs. Now you're saying that it is for one GMO, but trying to qualify it with a "but". Too late. You've already conceded the point. Now you're trying to lawyer it.

Total rates of herbicide resistance have not increased since the introduction of herbicide resistant GMOs. The rate of glyphosate resistance has increased, while the rate of resistance to many other herbicides (e.g. ureas, dinitroanilines, atrazine) has slowed by a greater total rate.

> Resistance is dose dependent. GMOs allow higher dosing. It's the entire point.

1. Dose dependence of resistance doesn't mean what you think it means. When we say resistance is dose dependent, that means the plant is resistant only up to a threshold dose, beyond which it will suffer the normal symptoms of toxicity. It does not mean "the more herbicide we apply the more resistance there will be".

2. Glyphosate resistance does not allow higher dosing, it allows lower dosing after the crop has been planted (non-resistant crops in general have the land treated with extreme doses several weeks before sowing).

3. Herbicides select for resistance with different strengths, related to how easily mutations can lead to resistance. Glyphosate is a relatively low selector for resistance. Atrazine is an example of a very strongly resistance-selecting herbicide. By reducing the use of strongly-selecting herbicides like atrazine, Roundup-ready decreases the aggregate strength of selection for resistance.

> The more herbicide-resistant GMOs we use, the more herbicides we'll use and the more resistance we'll see.

No. The introduction of herbicide resistant GMOs has led to a reduction in the rate of herbicides applied for most crops, or approximately similar rates of less harmful herbicides applied in other crops.

>It's no use trying to be clever with words when you aren't being clever with facts.

Funny that you're bringing up cleverness with words. You're engaging in wordplay to avoid the obvious inferences ascribable to the very facts you're acknowledging.

That is, you're using "facts" to mislead in very much the same way that Monsanto does. What's your affiliation with them or related companies?

Forget about the term "dose dependence". I misused it in an effort to be concise. I should have used "volume-dependence". The point is that it is patently true that the more of a pesticide we use in aggregate, the higher the rate of resistance to that pesticide and the more we have to use. You seem to have acknowledged that, but now you are attempting to obfuscate it.

Obviously, this does not mean that if we use X volume of any given pesticide, then we will get Y resistance to that pesticide. Nowhere did I state that. Actual resistance rates are obviously dependent on the properties of the specific herbicide. But, for each pesticide, the more we use, the higher the risk of resistance. Again, you seem to be acknowledging this at least tacitly via your acknowledgment where Roundup is concerned.

But, you are flailing about between arguments and contradicting each. On the one hand, you're saying that GMOs such as Roundup Ready do lead to higher resistance. OTOH, this is OK because we are decreasing use of other herbicides and thus decreasing resistance there. So you are arguing both sides. To see this, answer the following: what happens when we have herbicide-resistant GMOs for every herbicide in significant use?

And, BTW, beyond resistance, we are using more roundup because GMOs allow the crops to tolerate more.

>The introduction of herbicide resistant GMOs has led to a reduction in the rate of herbicides applied for most crops, or approximately similar rates of less harmful herbicides applied in other crops.

Again, this is misleading because you are vascillating between discrete herbicides/GMOs and aggregate. Bottom line is that humans are consuming more glyphosate than in pre-Roundup Ready times because more of it is being used. You keep calling it safe but, as is often the case with chemicals meant to kill, the independent research is calling these safety claims into serious question. When the dose we receive from any given herbicide keeps going up, we eventually cross a threshold wherein even the industry-sponsored research is little more than a wild guess. The result is that we just don't know when we've reached a tipping point until it's too late.

It boggles my mind when scientists, of all people, show little regard for the complexity of the human organism and make such cavalier statements about the safety of consuming chemicals that are intended to kill. If their presumably increased understanding of the delicate balance and complex chemical processes within the human body isn't enough to warrant a bit more respect, it seems that history should be.

This is going nowhere - you're being deliberately obtuse, clearly don't know what you're talking about, and I think the comments so far stand for themselves. Last post, because there are some points I have to answer.

> That is, you're using "facts" to mislead in very much the same way that Monsanto does. What's your affiliation with them or related companies?

I have no affiliation with Monsanto or any related company. I've never, to my knowledge, met or corresponded with anyone who works for them. I've very deliberately avoided doing so because I want to remain impartial in my role as a plant scientist. My research is funded by the Millennium Seed Bank, a conservation organisation.

>...you are flailing about between arguments...you are arguing both sides...

I'm just presenting the facts, there are no sides, there is just the simple fact that the total rate of herbicide resistance has decreased. If you're incapable of seeing that it is possible for all the things I've said to be true then I don't know what to suggest.

>what happens when we have herbicide-resistant GMOs for every herbicide in significant use?

Then we need to use less herbicide to achieve the same effect, because we can apply it directly to the crop after planting, killing the emerged weeds. With other herbicides, they have to be applied pre-emergence, sterilising the soil, which requires larger doses. Secondarily, there's no way we will have GMOs resistant to every herbicide that are currently in significant use because many of the older, more harmful ones will soon be illegal.

>You keep calling it safe but, as is often the case with chemicals meant to kill, the independent research is calling these safety claims into serious question.

I'm calling it safe relative to other herbicides. To feed everyone, herbicides have to be used. These chemicals are meant to kill plants, although some of the older ones has non-specific modes of action that might also harm animals. Glyphosate in particular targets a protein, ESPS synthase, that only exists in plants and microorganisms. It's been extensively tested and, you are wrong, there is not research calling the safety claims into question - the safety rating of glyphosate accurately reflects the state of knowledge. If you're seriously interested, just read the literature. Everything you're saying just demonstrates that you're not taking your information from the literature. A good start is the GENERA database of independently-funded studies on GMOs[0].

>The result is that we just don't know when we've reached a tipping point until it's too late.

This is true for absolutely anything. Wearing clothes, watching TV, fluorescent lighting, using a toilet, eating organic food, eating GMOs, and so on. We have to use short-term studies to infer safety.

>It boggles my mind when scientists, of all people, show little regard for the complexity of the human organism and make such cavalier statements about the safety of consuming chemicals that are intended to kill.

Nothing is more important to me than human wellbeing. It's what I've dedicated my life to, for very low pay, and I work incredibly hard to a) develop the technology to allow us to alleviate hunger and b) maintain a thorough understanding of the working of the agricultural system and its implications. The reason your mind seems to be boggled is because you're leaping to conclusions without understanding the system you're talking about.

I'm out.

0. http://www.biofortified.org/genera/guide/

Well, we agree that this has been exhausting.

And I suppose that, like you, I have trouble letting your last bit stand. So, I will just summarize and be done with it.

You started by making a blanket statement that was categorically false and misleading. Then, rather than acknowlege that you misspoke, you dug in and defended it to the end. You never even acknowledged that you were now qualifying your initial statement. But, it's me who is being deliberately obtuse? OK.

And, here, you are making still more claims that are simply untrue or misleading, as well as making trite arguments. Comparing wearing clothes, using a toilet, etc. to consuming herbicides? Come on, man.

You are also deliberately taking examples meant to illustrate points to extremes to set up strawmen. Attempting an earnest discussion is frustrating. Perhaps consider that you may be so passionate that you are dismissive of any ideas (and possibly some facts) that contradict your beliefs.

And, if you are truly interested in educating people, then perhaps, at a minimum, you might also consider how you present facts and draw conclusions. For instance, as just one example, you might reconsider how making unqualified statements, such as your initial one here declaring that GMOs are completely independent of the resistance problem might be misleading, especially to laymen. Then, you might consider how making such glaring and apparently apologetic misstatements in a charged environment might lead to questions about your motives (of which you seem to get many) or, at the least, diminish the effectiveness of your efforts to educate.

In short, maybe it's not everyone else. Maybe it's you.

Take care. I'm out.

You're confusing yourself, because there're two interpretations of the phrase "exacerbating resistance" in play here.

In your interpretation, any use of a product which results in increased resistance to that product "exacerbates resistance."

In his interpretation, he compares the use of Roundup + Roundup-ready crops to a non-Roundup situation, and notes that indeed in both situations products must be used which will result in increase resistance, but notes however that the former scenario does not increase resistance relative to the latter, and may in fact increase it less. So he finds that the problem of resistance is not "exacerbated."

It's similar to noting that people riding bicycles to work does not "exacerbate" road-use, even though roads are busier than they would be if the people riding bikes just stayed at home (which obviously they won't because they have to work.)

>You're confusing yourself, because there're two interpretations of the phrase "exacerbating resistance" in play here.

No, I completely understand what he is saying, and I am suggesting that, in saying it, he is being disingenuous and misleading. It's industry sponsored double-speak. Judging by your response, it appears to be working.

His initial statements that GMOs don't exacerbate the problem and that resistance is completely independent of GMOs are false. Full-stop. When challenged, he goes on to admit as much by acknowledging the well-known fact that resistance has increased where the Roundup Ready case is concerned.

But, he then tries to qualify and obfuscate that acknowledgment by saying that overall resistance is decreased by a corresponding amount for other herbicides which are subsequently used less.

The problem with this is that it is misleading and seeks to let GMOs off the hook. It even applauds them. The reality is that humans are now using and consuming more glyphosate. He tries to dismiss this effect by cheerleading their safety (which is anything but assured when independent research is considered).

The other pernicious bit of his argument is due to the fact that, in the future, we are likely to use more and more herbicide-resistant GMOs. By declaring GMOs "competely independent" of the resistance problem, he is implying that overall resistance would continue to remain the same (or be reduced), even with more GMOs. But, the fact is, the more we use any herbicide-resistant GMOs, the more we will dump those herbicides on crops, and the more resistance we'll see to those (and, hence, overall).

At the end of the day, our crops will be soaked in more of whatever herbicide we're using. But, you certainly don't get that potential scenario from statements like "herbicide resistance is a problem completely independent of GMOs".

"Nobody but Monsanto benefits from Roundup Ready products"

Not even the farmers who grow the seeds with Monsanto's traits? Thousands of Monsanto's happy customers would beg to differ. You benefit, too, because GM crops are cheaper to grow, so the products they end up in are also (marginally) cheaper.

You can certainly have a "rational debate" over the individual and societal costs of GM crops, but it is absurd to pretend that Monsanto is the only party that derives any benefit from their products. If that were true, nobody would buy them.

Disclaimer: I work for a Monsanto subsidiary.

> They didn't patent the lifeform, they patented value-adding modifications to the life-form.

Then they should pay the rest of society royalties for all other value-adding modifications that were introduced in those same lifeforms since the dawn of agriculture.

They wan't to sell their value added seed for 100$? Sure but to do that they should pay 99.99$ of royalty to scientists and farmers that intoduced previous genetic modifiactions to those same seeds with selective breeding and mixing species.

If you want to sell IP you need to buy IP for the things you are basing your work on.

>they should pay the rest of society royalties for all other value-adding modifications that were introduced in those same lifeforms since the dawn of agriculture.

What a stupid, facile thing to say. Should we call authors leeches and sue them for profiting from the common linguistic heritage of humanity?

Do you come on to Hacker News just to derail conversations with garbage like that?

Only if they dictate what readers are allowed to do with their books (how many times they can read it, in what setting, can they lend a book to a friend, can they give it to their children and such), books that were written by copying Shakespeare's works but changing few words to make it more awesome.

"How do you propose to allow those who engineered the value-addition to capture a share of the societal benefit they created?"

How about the fact that their kids are more likely to be able to eat some fucking food?

Or not to be lynched by the starving, unwashed masses?

I am in no way a Monsanto cheerleader, I would very much like them to disappear completely so I could get on with my career. As it is, they are so thoroughly hated that every plant biologist is tarnished if they so much as attend a conference where Monsanto have a stall. I have to be extremely careful not to interact with Monsanto, and it's really quite annoying. If they could just handle their own PR properly I could spend more time doing my job and less time correcting poor genetics education on the internet.

> He never agreed with anybody to not do this, or signed contracts to control what he does with what ends up on his property.

That's not how the law works. I never agreed with anyone not to commit murder or (more relevant) not to pirate music. But I can still be prosecuted for it. And if I have a problem with that, it's the law that I have a problem with, not the people who made the music.

Murder doesn't commit itself, copyright violation doesn't commit itself. Plants to seed and grow by themselves, without any outside help.

Whether or not a farmer encourages a particular seed to grow, the seeds would have sprouted and grown of their own accord. That is the fundamental difference between copyright violation and gene patent violation.

That is not the difference.

If a farmer doesn't knowingly violate, he will not be prosecuted. Having read a large number of court summaries from Monsanto cases, I haven't yet found one where they brought a case against someone who was simply dealing with accidental contamination.

If copyright infringing files were to end up on my computer by genuine accident, I would not be prosecuted for copyright infringement. For example, if I downloaded a zip file that was supposed to contain an album that I had paid for, but also accidentally contained an extra mp3 of a file I hadn't paid for, no court would find me in violation of copyright law.

There has to be intent, which nullifies the argument that it matters that seed self-replicates.

> Murder doesn't commit itself, copyright violation doesn't commit itself. Plants to seed and grow by themselves, without any outside help.

Plants may grow, but fields of plants don't spray Roundup all over themselves either.

> Someone contaminated his property with Roundup-Ready canola. He chose to take advantage of that, isolate it, and replant it. He never agreed with anybody to not do this, or signed contracts to control what he does with what ends up on his property.

An analogous situation is someone tosses a movie DVD on your yard. You take that DVD, make thousands of copies, and then profit from them.

Someone tosses a patented DVD seed into your patch of DVD plants, and it grows there. You see that it's a good DVD plant, so you replant it. Someone claims you can't do that, even though it's a DVD seed that grew from a DVD plant that grew on your land, and you never signed any kind of agreement not to do that.

Analogies are hard!

They aren't 'just operating within the law'. They are actively lobbying to strengthen it, and to create legal precedents.

Yup, and that's completely part of the legal framework of the USA. They take advantage just like every other IP-owning company, including basically every tech company in Silicon Valley.

But it is morally completely different. If you only "work with the hand you are dealt", you can claim some innocence if that means you do something slightly bad. If you actively work to expand a harmful framework you deserve rough treatment the other way.

Sort of like copyright holders that have actively lobbied to lengthen (retroactively) terms. They have no moral standing against being stripped (retroactively) of their copyrights.

If the law creates artificial scarcity to enable certain types of enterprise (like technology and media), it is creating an incentive for companies in those industries to exploit the legal situation as much as possible. Not only that, but publicly traded companies have a legal obligation to maximise profit for their shareholders[0]. Together these things mean that a successful company in these industries is one that tries to extend the artificial scarcity of their medium.

In other words, it's the law, not the companies, that are to blame. Change the law.

0: http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/8146/are-u-s-com...

I think we agree that the law should be changed - the point I'm making is that companies that have lobbied are in no (moral) position to complain if the law is changed harshly in their disfavor.

Well I agree with that :)

Really? You think people hate Monsanto now because of stuff that happened 50 years ago? Everything bad I've heard about Monsanto has been from the past 5-10 years.

Also:

1) I don't think "GM food" per se is bad, however if I had a choice, and knew ahead of time what I'm eating, I probably wouldn't choose GM food, whether from Monsanto or others, because I see GM food as "beta food", and I don't want to be the beta tester. Come back to me after 30-50 years of research for that type of GM product.

2) I do think Monsanto is bad as a company

3) I do think patenting lifeforms, like others have said is bad.

If you look through the comments here, you'll see several people specifically mentioning agent orange as what's wrong with Monsanto.

A lot of the current activism against monsanto is due to pressure groups who have hated them for a very long time. Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (both of which I used to be a member of until I realised what anti-science crap they were spouting about GMOs) have both had long-running campaigns which have strongly affected the public mood about GMOs. The 'Frankenfoods' Greenpeace campaign set the UK down a particularly crippling path.

I get extremely suspicious when I see super informed commenters defending a controversial corporation like Mosanto.

If you look into them, common sense will tell you Greenpeace and the modern environment movement in general are full of shit. So you don't need to take the word of internet commenters on that one.

Blahah, after reading this for a few hours it's pretty easy to conclude, you are oblivious, as well as uneducated to this beautiful thing call self education and peer to peer sharing. AKA, The internet. Countless studies have been released stating the dangers of GMO's, glyphosate, agrobacterium, prions, and everything that has to do with MONSANTO..... Short of being shocked at your ignorance it's people like you holding back this movement.

Do you use any medicines invented in the past 30 years?

I'll wager GM foods are a hell of a lot safer than most of the pharmaceuticals that pass FDA review.

Personally, I think drawing the line at genetic manipulation is arbitrary and not really backed up by science. Given a few years, there are plenty of everyday foods that you can breed into something poisonous.

In a sense, all food is "beta food" since the precise combination of genes that made up that plant may not have been tested before. ( I guess clones like bananas are safe. )

I agree with you. The amount of pro-Monsanto sock-puppets [1] in this HN thread just goes to show that Monsanto's evil extends far beyond what the general public should be 'allowed' to discuss freely. I really recommend watching the documentary about Monsanto's evil [2].

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/libertycentral/2010... [2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6_DbVdVo-k

I know, it's alarming how they even have the internet monopolized in a way....these quacks are everywhere

> Come back to me after 30-50 years of research for that type of GM product.

The roundup ready trait has been available to consumers for 18 years[1] now. Do you mean we need 30-50 more years of research, 48-68 total, or do you mean we only need 12-32 more years of research? (We'll ignore any research done before releasing the product to the public)

Also, while I understand your point, it seems funny to still call something that has been around for eighteen years, and already released a version 2.0, a beta product. Imagine if we treated software lifecycles like that.

[1] http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/roundup-ready-patent...

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