Mark Bittman, the popular NYT food writer, has offered up a column chock full of biotech scare mongering. It’s such a half-baked concoction that I can’t imagine he’d ever serve a meal based on such flimsy ingredients. Let’s inspect just a few of the numerous questionable assertions. He writes (my emphasis): G.E. [genetically engineered] products…Continue Reading…
Budiansky writes a killer blog lede: In the geography of politics, there is a strange and shadowy place far, far down the narrowing alleys of the left, where one turns a final corner and is suddenly face to face with like-minded wanderers who arrived at the same spot from exactly the opposite direction, via equally…Continue Reading…
I have no idea what an editor does over at ScienceBlogs. I doubt they do any actual editing of blogs. But evidently they get to choose their favorite posts, the way a clerk advertises his top ten flicks at your local movie rental store. So my eye drifted to a recent number one “editor’s pick”…Continue Reading…
Earlier this year, Slate ran a biotechnology-related story with this catchy headline and subhead: The Green Monster: Could Frankenfoods be good for the Environment? The once fractious public debate over GMOs (genetically modified organisms) appears to have exhausted itself (no one bothered to comment on the Slate story). Some think the debate is over, you…Continue Reading…
At some point, there’s going to be a vigorous, public debate over adaptation to climate change. How, for example, will we make agriculture more drought resistant? Cue the scary music for biotechnology, since genetically modified organisms will inevitably assume a greater role. But as Yael Borasky argues, If we acknowledge the potential pitfalls and benefits…Continue Reading…