I was reading about Vitamin A deficiency in children. Night blindness can be one of the earlier symptoms followed by complete blindness. Half of those children eventually die. Immune systems can be effected. That this happens to millions of children should be the impetus for all sides to work together to fix this problem quickly (psst customer not costumer unless you mean the ones in the picture).

"Half of those children eventually die."

Pretty sure they all eventually die.

well, if they don't die those children eventually turn into adults, who then die

Here is the problem with golden rice in children that are deficient in Vitamin A it does nothing due to golden rices vitamin a passes right through the person.

So in short corn rice is far better due to its vitamins stay in the body, and corn rice in all reality is still gmo due to roughly 90% of all corn grown is genetically modified.

Cheers

Wow I guess all the experts missed that. Thankfully you were here to pick it up.

There is no such thing as 'corn rice' you dufus.

Studies prove that golden rice 2 works very well, 50 to 60% of a full adult serving of Vitamin A in an 8 ounce bowl of it.

Can we just officially say Greenpeace has lost its mind and treat them like a crazy person screaming in the street asking for money. The organization needs go though detox, rehab and mental health counseling - followed by life long professionally monitored medication.

."Agricultural Research
Service plant physiologist Michael A. Grusak, carotenoids researcher
Guangwen Tang, and colleagues reported, for the first time, their findings
that one 8-ounce cup of cooked Golden Rice-2 provides about 450
micrograms of retinol. That’s 50 to 60 percent of the adult Recommended
Dietary Allowance of vitamin A."

http://www.goldenrice.org/P...

The rice project has gone through several phases. The original golden rice was abandoned due to insufficient vit A content. Golden Rice 2 is a success and is now being offered to governments of countries with struggling populations suffering from malnutrition and blindness. This is patented for one reason only - to prevent commercial profiteering of this new strain which is strictly only offered free of charge.

The Gates Foundation is developing 6 other crop varieties as well to provide enhanced drought resistance or more vitamins. In each case the best way to help these farmers is to give them what they ask for - more hardy or more nutritious seed. Trying to get these people to grow other vegetables, or getting vitamin supplements to them has already been tried and it fails to get the job done. That's why NGO experts are so sold on providing the right modified seed to address specific problems.

As we all know golden rice has been a total failure due to the vitamins pass right through the deficient bodies.

Look at the nations in south east asia that are using golden rice and corn rice those that consume only golden rice perish while those that eat corn rice not only live but get healthy again.

It is wise to note corn rice is gmo too so I am not cutting gmos but promoting one that is known to work.

I see this every year when my wife and I go to South East Asia or my wife's home country that being the Philippines.

Also remember all of the astroturfing by scientists paid for the biotech industry. =)

Citation from New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015...

Cheers

"that consume only golden rice perish while those that eat corn rice not only live but get healthy again."
Flat out lie.

As we all know that is a blatant lie. Nutrition is exactly as I posted below.

There is no such thing as 'corn rice'.

From your link:
"The New York Times separately requested some of these documents, then made additional requests in several states for email records of academics with ties to the organics industry. There is no evidence that academic work was compromised"

Golden rice yes, golden snow no.

The idea behind golden rice makes a lot of sense from a scientific point of view. However, it is naïve to introduce golden rice into societies accustomed to eating white rice. White rice, after all, has been processed to remove the bran, husk, and germ, so white rice is not very ‘natural’ – it has been modified by humans. In addition, white rice lacks important vitamins found in unprocessed brown rice. It could be argued that white rice is about as ‘natural’ as GMO golden rice. None of this matters, however, to people who view white rice as ‘natural’ and ‘healthy’. In order to be successfully implemented at a societal level, even the most sound and ethical scientific advances must take into account local norms and customs.

GMOs have genes put into them by humans. Where is the evidence that those genes ever hurt anyone?

Nature also creates new genes in organisms. Many natural plants do harm or kill if you eat them, i.e., some of those natural genes will harm you.

Here's a good starting point if you're interested in the consensus evidence that GMO's marketed today are safe for human consumption:

http://www.scientificameric...

Excuse the article title, which may come off a little gruff.

While appreciating this essay greatly as food for thought (and not reason for comment) I am stuck on one sentence:

"The overall suspicion of corporations as the good guys does not emerge from a vacuum."

that accords with an observation that the hinge of the broad debate is commercial use of scientific development and not the development itself. The two are horribly mixed in the Punch & Judy contests that emerge whenever the subject arises.

Butter is bad for you and margarine is good for you. No wait butter is good for you and margarine is bad. Fat is bad for you, eat low fat. Sorry low fat is bad and higher fat is okay. Do not eat cholesterol rich floods like eggs, wait eggs are okay. So please tell me how we are so sure GMO's are safe.

All the conflicting examples you gave were due to a single error made in, I think, the '60s - the faulty conclusion that dietary fat and cholesterol were primary drivers of obesity and heart disease. We now understand that carbs, particularly refined carbs, are causing those epidemics, because we have a much better understanding of how food is metabolized.

The question of GMO safety is of roughly the same complexity as the issue I just described so it's reasonable to trust the science. You don't hear people saying, Well, we used to think the earth was flat and now we think it's round, so how can we really know for sure if the earth goes around the sun?

What would be really cool is if the earth were flat but it still went around the sun - why do I always picture a flat earth as being square? - so you have this flat square circling 'round the sun with water sloshing off the edges - and the moon was a flat circular disk too but still went around the earth, but appearing to have the same circular shape from every vantage point at every second of every day. And Mars and Venus were really only about a quarter of a millimeter across but very bright and with no particular shape.

that would be cool.

The water wouldn't slosh over the edges, because that would have it running "uphill." Gravity would force all the water to the middle on each side, which is also where everyone would want to live.

"demonstrating quantitatively and conclusively — to the extent that it's scientifically possible — the long-term safety of their practices. " It is apparent, even from a superficial study, that "science", while laudable in it's systematic approach to studying things and uncovering a deeper understanding of what happens in creation and coming up with ideas that predict what will happen in relative creation....."screws up", but accepts their perspective for many years, while being wrong. Then, after objecting to opposition to some established idea for many years finally gives in to the notion that they were wrong. Scientists are people, albeit with developed intellects and a systematic approach to applying their intellects. However...they are human with the foibles of people with less developed intellects. Scientists invest their lives in a certain perspective...studying hard and applying whatever knowledge they have gained in coming up with a particular mind set about how things work. Genetic Engineering is a fascinating result of a great deal of hard work and ingenious invention. Now....many, many people rely on the products of this technology, the economic viability of these products for their livelihood....for the dollars that fund their labs and research and their corporate profits, etc. Steve Druker, ion his book, "Altered Genes, Twisted Truth......" shows in great detail, in an excellently researched book that GMOs were foisted on the public before they were reasonably tested through the collusion of corporate interests and government agencies responsible for regulating such things.....even though many, many government agency scientists warned in no uncertain terms that this was dangerous...that GMOs could have unanticipated toxic effects, and that very long term studies would be necessary to responsibly deal with GMOs. The FDA ignored these warnings and approved GMOs. Druker establishes this fraud as a "fact" through his research. Ignore the disingenuous criticisms of this book by GMO industry spokesmen, who inhabit these blogs as paid bloggers. The book is an excellent investigation into this....a chilling read which has been endorsed by many scientists and other responsible people. If you haven't read it....do so if you are interested in this topic.

Druker? Really? He makes the same irrelevant arguments and logical fallacies that Jeffrey Smith made years before. They didn't work for him either.

Lets see... who should I believe? Every national academy of sciences from across the globe or some lawyer who needs a trumped up conspiracy to sell his book??

I'll think about that one a while and get back to you.

There's no need to "believe" anyone regarding GMOs. There have been ample tests showing unequivocally that GMO are not harmful. All that you have to believe is that the tests were conducted in good faith and reported accurately.

The title of Druker's book is totally appropriate since he talks about altered genes, and then twists the truth mightily about them. Druker is from the same group that produced Jeffery Smith, namely the Marahishi Institute of Management, or whatever they are calling it now. Overall it is a sham group that is wantonly fear-mongering and soliciting people to donate to their "cause." I keep thinking of that saying..."a fool and his money are soon parted"

And 20 years of safe use have proven that Druker was wrong.

Nobody has ever been hurt by any GMO crop.

To claim that they aren't tested and tested again and again is simply displaying your ignorance of the many studies that have been done.

The most recent, being the GRACE study, a 1 year feeding trial, performed openly and transparently in the EU, which once again proves that consuming GMO corn has no ill effects.

http://www.grace-fp7.eu/en/...

A one year study. What would a one year study of cigarette smoking prove. It would show that they are completely safe. A one year study is worthless when considering the life time of a human

OK there have been twenty years of consumption of food with ingredients derived from GE crops . That equals over 6 trillion meals and after all that time the critics of this technology can not demonstrate a single documented case of harm. If this is not enough evidence for you. How long and how many meals do you think will convince you of the safety?

how many years did it take for scientists to discover that artificial sweeteners are a leading cause of diabetes? At least that long.

How long did it take the tobacco industry to admit that their product was addictive and cancer-causing?

Scientists knew it long before the tobacco industry admitted it.

The fact that the tobacco industry hired their own "scientists" to produce conflicting data muddied the waters quite a bit.

Refs? Went to American Diabetes Association website. They don't mention that "fact" in their article on Low Calorie Sweeteners. Went to WebMD. In discussions of diabetes and low calories sweeteners, I find no mention of that "fact".

well, keep lookin' then

I already chased that wild-goose enough. If you have evidence to support your claim, then provide it.

i care not to convince others of what I know, that is not my place in life, whether it comes to facts or beliefs, but since you asked:

"By Dr. Mercola

Both artificial sweeteners and certain gut microbes have previously
been linked to obesity, and according to the latest research, artificial
sweeteners may raise your risk of diabetes by disrupting your
intestinal microflora. According to the authors of the widely publicized
study:1

"[W]e demonstrate that consumption of commonly used non-caloric
artificial sweeteners formulations drives the development of glucose
intolerance through induction of compositional and functional
alterations to the intestinal microbiota."

The researchers found that artificial sweeteners alter certain
metabolic pathways associated with metabolic disease, and that it can
induce gut dysbiosis and glucose intolerance in otherwise healthy people.

Glucose intolerance is a condition in which your body loses its ability
to cope with high amounts of sugar, and it's a well-known precursor to
type 2 diabetes. It also plays a role in obesity, because the excess
sugar in your blood ends up being stored in your fat cells."

"i care not to convince others of what I know"

That's odd. So you post on discussion boards and make claims without support and expect people to treat it as gospel?

Are you going to be around after I look at your source so we can discuss this further? At first glance, I'm not optimistic about the truth of your claim, based on the fact that Dr. Mercola is apparently anti-vaccination, into homeopathy, and likely has ulterior motives (profit from his website) for his claims.

there are other sources, that was just the first one I found, you just need to know what to look for, and I don't expect people to read my comments at all... regardless, I'm still around, find a source refuting it and I'll be all eyes.

Yep, scientists do become attached to the conclusions of their own work and move from scientific analysis to advocacy.

But your contentions about GMOs are ridiculous. GMO are clearly not a significant risk to either human health or the environment - certainly they're no greater risk than traditional forms of breeding or techniques used for generating useful mutations.

We didn't spend 25 years testing the effects of cell phones before allowing them to be used by the general population.

I posted a comment with a source cited, but it seems the folks at NPR deleted it. Perhaps use of words like Monsanto or sham research studies offended someone. Perhaps NPR receives funding from big AG.

THis column would not bother me if "public" radio would live up to its name and claims of "independent journalism"by offering a counterpoint to the ususal pro corporate pro nuke agenda,offered here by Mr. Gleiser.

Maybe the corporations should have thought about the importance of public trust before they so blithely tossed it in the bin in exchange for a profit. And trust the government to oversee this? How? With all that funding the current Congress keeps throwing at EPA & FDA? Sure, they'll get right on that.

The golden rice 2 project is not government, corporate, congressional, EPA or FDA. Other than that you got it right.

This is an NGO project funded by charities and donations.

Eat your rice, culinary flagellants, I'd rather enjoy pommes de terre sarladaise.

I ask the author what tests not already done would he like to see added to the evaluation of GRII and why?

There is a yellow rice that won't accept the black rice
That won't accept the red rice that won't accept the white rice
And different strokes for different folks
And so on and so on and scooby dooby doo

I've always found it amusing that most conservatives don't think "mixing races" is good and that you should stick to your "own kind" yet this is a no brainer... No science here just an amusing observation.

I've always found it depressing that so many liberals constantly demonstrate how little they know about what conservatives believe.

I find conservative ignorance depressing. If so many aren't actually racist xenophobes why do they continue to vote for the party that proves it time and again? You can't have your cake and eat it too. Well I suppose YOU can while claiming your values aren't what you vote for.

Excellent and thoughtful article that suggests a Way forward but does not offer any dogmatic prescriptions. Perhaps underlying this controversy is a need to shift our focus from being consumers of an entire planetary biosphere to being symbionts with an entire planetary biosphere... there are a huge number of levels that need to be synthesized thoughtfully, using the evidence. Sustainable human flourishing and well-being is the vision.