• ChicoSuave@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Golden Rice is the most obvious example of how wrong you are on all your points. Golden Rice is GMO to be easier to grow in bad locations and provides a lot more nutrients than non-GMO rice. It is cheap and easy to grow, intended to bring food nutrition to parts of the world that suffer from nutritional deficiency.

        This one GMO food solved blindness, diabetes, and death from lack of vitamin A. Many MANY more foods are modified for our benefit that don’t attract people who are scared of the words Genetically Modified. Do you even know how things are genetically modified? Breeding programs that specifically target for traits. No one is going into the DNA to make 5G tracking chips or Super COVID.

        Did you know corn was genetically modified in the early 1900s to increase yield per acre?

        Did you know the other staple grains like wheat and soy are also GMO? You can eat food without eating GMO and you are absolutely fine.

        Stop spreading baseless fear.

        • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          GMO + Capitalism = Plants modified to be resistant to specific pesticies and herbicides, increasing their use; farmers being sued due to their plants being polinized by GMO plants and so on.

          The problem is not GMO, it’s GMO under low or no regulation Capitalism: it’s guaranteed that it’s going to be used in all the wrong ways even if a handful of examples are actually not (and even Golden Rice is patented, which opens the door to abuse if its use becomes widespread).

          Most distrust of some powerful new tools of Science is due to how the political and economic environment we live in tends to shape the use of such tools, much more than of the tools themselves.

          • Flummoxed@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            You remember a tomato? That is what you are basing your stance on? You got any sauce for that anecdote?

            • GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca
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              6 months ago

              Come on. A lot of foods were bred for shipping, not flavor or nutrition. Some used GMO, others used selective breeding. Here’s an article talking about it 20 years ago. The short answer is people want to make money, and most foods aren’t priced based on their nutritional value.

              • Flummoxed@lemmy.world
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                6 months ago

                Q. Is today’s food less nutritious than it was in the past because agricultural soil is being depleted of minerals?>

                A. Several studies of fruits, vegetables and grains have suggested a decline in nutritional value over time, but the reasons may not be as simple as soil depletion. There is considerable evidence that such problems may be related to changes in cultivated varieties, with some high-yielding plants being less nutritious than historical varieties. Several other issues are involved, like changes in farming methods, including the extensive use of chemical fertilizers, as well as food processing and preparation. A 2004 study evaluated Department of Agriculture data for 43 garden crops from 1950 to 1999. The researchers found statistically reliable declines for six nutrients — protein, calcium, potassium, iron and vitamins B2 and C — but no change for seven others.

                The researchers suggested that “any real declines are generally most easily explained by changes in cultivated varieties,” like possible trade-offs between yield and nutrient content.

                They also pointed out that modern fruits and vegetables were still nutritionally valuable and suggested the remedy was to eat more vegetables, fruits, whole grains, nuts and beans and less refined sugars, separated fats and oils and white flour and rice, which they said “have all suffered losses much greater and broader than the potential losses suggested here for garden crops.”

                Donald R. Davis, the lead author of the 2004 study, wrote a review of evidence of nutrition loss in fruits and vegetables in 2009. He concluded that the broad evidence of nutritional decline seemed difficult to dismiss, though more study was needed, he said, especially of inverse relationships between yield and nutrient concentration.>

                Paywalled and says nothing about GMO, let alone a tomato. Nice try, tho.

                ETA: Here’s the archive.org link to article.

      • The_v@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        A. They have no significant difference in nutrition than non-GMO. In fact many GMO’s have been created to improve nutrition but sadly not used because of dumbfucks like Greenpeace who would rather have people go blind or die than accept GMO food. For example, rice that produces vitamin A and folic acid have been created but never used.

        B. The “Terminator” GMO gene was created by the USDA-ARS and was NEVER released. No seed on the market has ever had a GMO sterility gene. Contrary to public opinion, it was designed to be integrated with other GMO genes to prevent the outcrossing and spread into the environment, not as an IP control mechanism.

        • ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          Also don’t forget the elite side of the food industry (gourmet chefs, etc.), that needs to demonize the more cost-effective things in order to make their own alternatives look more appealing.

          Speaking of it, one anti-GMO organization actually shown expensive gourmet food as an allternative to the golden rice.

      • niucllos@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        Not to beat a dead horse but do you know how we get/got novel variation in crops before targeted DNA technology? It mostly wasn’t wild germpasm unless you happen to work with a crop with large amounts of historically documented pools, e.g. corn and wheat. No, most historical breeding programs use mutagens, either chemical or sometimes radioactive, to cause novel variation, grow the seed, see what looks interesting and not too weird, and cross it back into your gene pool. GMOs are significantly less mad science-y than what they replace.

          • Dontfearthereaper123@lemm.ee
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            6 months ago

            First off source for GMO tomato? Still havent given one that article had no mention of it 2nd why is it a bad thing if not every use of GMOs involves making food better? uve mentioned one example I can name one in the opposite direction, so what it seems is, theyre used for both and I’m wondering why thats a bad thing? Is painting bad unless painting something with functional use like heat dissipating paint onto something that needs it dissipated or is it okay to paint for both artistic and functional purposes

      • saigot@lemmy.ca
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        6 months ago

        Modern farmers generally generally don’t replant their seeds for a variety of non-gmo reasons.

        P.s seedless watermelons are not gmo