Comments on: An Interview with Caroline Lucas

By: Sarah

Sarah — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 00:08:46 +0000

Haha, Ben I agree, who are we to vote for?! Spoiled ballot anyone? (I’m gonna get shot for saying that!).

As for GM being in the right hands – is anything ever in the right hands? I don’t think fear of who’s going to do better with the technology should affect the independent research that takes place. Though I agree that differences in implementation strategy are a concern.

Apologies if I have shunned Lucas’ philosophical musings here…

By: Salman Shaheen

Salman Shaheen — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 08:55:33 +0000

Greg, you Tory traitor, the Conservatives may be many things, but one thing they are not is resurgent. Their current success is not due to popular support for the party, but popular dissatisfaction with Labour. Their vote in the Euro elections barely increased over 2004. They are the beneficiaries by simple fact of being, in most areas, the strongest opposition party. In Brighton it is quite clear, however, that they are not the strongest opposition party. And come on, I didn’t raise you to be such a moron. Giving an optimistic appriasal of one’s electoral chances is hardly in the same league of dishonesty as claiming Iraq can deploy chemical weapons in 45 minutes, or that 75% of our laws come from Europe, or neglecting to mention that duckpond, or launching a Back to Basics campaign on morality after having a secret affair with your Secretary of State for Health.

By: Greg

Greg — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 08:07:15 +0000

I find it ironic that the Greens complain about the dishonesty etc of the ‘grey parties’ when Lucas states they may have a few MPs elected at the next general.

There is no way in hell they stand in any chance of winning any seat other than Pavilion and even that will be a hard slog for them with a resurgent Conservative party in Brighton. Lucas is either deluded or, at best, overhyping their chances of getting lots of MPs. If she is deluded she doesn’t deserve to be elected, if she is overstating their chances she is acting in an incredibly hypocritical way. Which is it Caroline?

By: Salman Shaheen

Salman Shaheen — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 01:47:05 +0000

That’s a good point, Ben, but I was never going by the assumption the Greens would ever be in such a position of power. In any case, I would not be in favour (with the obvious list of caveats) of banning any kind of research. Ease of research is essential to determine what applications are safe and sensible. Again, though, I don’t see this as a reason not to vote Green when taking into account that firstly, they aren’t going to be in any position of power and secondly, the net impact of a large Green vote. When people, and most importantly, politicians, see a million votes for the Greens, the first thing they think isn’t that the people are concerned about GM or stem cell research. It’s climate change and social justice.

By: Ben Towse

Ben Towse — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 01:34:08 +0000

“But where I think Caroline Lucas is right, is where she asks when it will ever be in the right hands?”

Salman, I would think when the Greens are actually in a place to take action against the legality of GM tech, they would also be in a position to rein in the likes of Monsanto. So their opposition cannot be justified on these grounds.

Also, they advocate a blanket ban on GM organisms. Not just for agriculture. This would basically destroy what little biological research was left after they banned animal experimentation.

By: Salman Shaheen

Salman Shaheen — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 13:19:56 +0000

I’m not against GM where it is used in the right hands for the good of the poorest people in the world. But where I think Caroline Lucas is right, is where she asks when it will ever be in the right hands? Massive corporations like Monsanto are not the saviours of the developing world and they never will be. It is giant multinational corporations who are responsible for poverty and hunger in the first place. I think it comes down to the progress vs. application debate. I’m in favour of nuclear fission. I’m against governments turning it into weapons.

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 01:59:57 +0000

Sarah has this one right. GM itself should not be rejected – certain applications of the technology ought to be embraced and others abandoned on a case-by-case basis. For instance, it should never have been a surprise that creating herbicide-resistant crops and then slathering fields with near-illegal-strength weedkillers did no favours to the local flora and fauna, but that’s a case against those herbcides, not GM tech in general. Nonetheless, the media leapt up eagerly with sensationalist headlines along the lines of “Tests prove GM harmful to environment”. So the spin spins both ways…

Of course the whole thing would be better out of the hands of Monsanto et al, but so would most technologies. Again, this is not an argument against GM but one against our economic system.

Sarah, who are we lefty scientists and friends of science to vote for? It’s bloody impossible out here. (Apologies if assuming a fellow poster here is a lefty is overly presumptuous!)

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:04:47 +0000

Fair point, Adrian, and I agree, portraying green movements as anti-science is wrong: I myself am a Conservation Scientist through and through. My concern is that many green movements are uninformed scientifically; it’s very easy for people to jump on the environmentalist bandwagon when they don’t know what they’re talking about, especially if emotive scientific issues are used to get people on board. I think the most important approach to any evironmental issue is to test the theories behind the movement. One way in which we can do this is GM research. As you correctly point out, regulation is definitely an issue, but it’s a corporate one, and not a fault with the underlying science.

As for the mix of GM genes into the “natural” genepool, it’s already happened, being damn near impossible to prevent. Perhaps in some instances this is a weakness of GM research, although it is unlikely that many (if any) of these already integrated GM genes would persist over evolutionary time in the natural environment, them having been designed for a controlled agricultural setting. I suppose it’s a case of costs and benefits though, and I feel that the potential benefits of GM research far outweight the potential costs.

By: Adrian

Adrian — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:44:16 +0000

I support the Green Party’s anti-GM stance. There is a huge amount of money being spent quietly and indirectly by multinationals to promote a postive view of GM, manipulate press coverage and research findings, bribe countries into undergoing large scale GM experiments and suppress any negative news about GM failures. GM is potentially a highly dangerous technology because once man-made genes enter the gene pool the results are both irreversible and unpredictable. It is not the same as traditional plant breeding and it should not be in the hands of the current multinationals who are concerned about profits, patents and not about sustainable agriculture or biodiversity. There are many real, practical and safer alternative approaches to increasing food production utilising existing growing techniques and genetic diversity. That is where more scientific research and investment in field trials should be going. So the Green Party position on this is not “anti-science” – they are simple keeping a healthy scepticism about the over-blown claims that GM is a safe solution to world-hunger. Remember trying to portray all green movements as anti-science is one of the goals of the GM-multinationals.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 11:44:19 +0000

I wouldn’t touch a party with such backwards views on science with a bargepole. Such anti GM/embryonic stem cell policies indicate either that the policy makers are malinformed about such issues, or that they are trying to gain support from voters who are malinformed on such issues! Resounding no thank you from me!

As an aside, personally I agree with James Lovelock on nuclear power. There’s a lovely interview with him by Nature, here:

http://www.nature.com/nature/videoarchive/lovelock/