QED conference talks notes, part three

Brief comments and notes on QEDCON day 1 (sat 13 Apr 2013)

Talks:

5) The God Species - How The Planet can survive the age of Humans (Mark Lynas)

It is worth mentioning before briefly reviewing the content of this talk that the speaker, Mark Lynas is a convert to science from the ideological green lobby. About 3 years ago, he still criticised Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) technology and earlier had taken part in some extreme activism such as cutting or burning down GM crops. However he started to realise that something was amiss in the Green lobby. Things just didn't add up. So he researched and learned about the scientific consensus on such issues as climate change, renewable and nuclear power, and GMOs.

Mark Lynas was brought up in Peru as a child and there witnessed much social inequality and industrial pollution by uncaring mining companies. Back in the UK as a young man he took part in direct environmental activism. He attacked GM crop harvests and protested against Monsanto's drive to obtain Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) for the strains of crops that they had developed by artificial selection. He wrote an important early book on climate change around the world including the huge problems in Alaska. Such endeavours gave him an appreciation for the scientific method. The scientific consensus on global warming is now for temperature rises of up to 6 degrees Celcius by 2100.

The threats to publicly funded GM crop research from organisations like Greenpeace were mentioned. In this example, their ire cannot even be explained away as the familiar anti-corporate rage, as the state is sponsoring the study. We saw a video from the scientists behind the project, who gave an impassioned but polite appeal to the activists to not attack their crops. They were not for sale or consumption and were being grown for research purposes only. You'd think that Greenpeace would actually support such research, since it goea towards the evidence base of GMO foods. If the crops gave no significant benefits then their position would be validated. But to not even allow scienctific studies to take place is nothing more than a knowledge prevention exercise, and a shocking blow to their intellectual credibility. In the end a counter-protest was organised which ensured that the activists did not harm the GM crops.

The fact is that GMOs are no different than the same organisms which have been genetically modified in traditional ways, but can be developed more quickly and can have additional benefits (such as pesticide resistance, increasing yields) engineered into their DNA. Actually, as I have stated before, genetic modification is ethically preferable to artifical selection in the main (assuming you dislike what is effectively Eugenics).

GMOs have tremendous potential to solve many of our food needs, increasing the yields per hectare we can achieve, growing in a larger range of climates and reducing use of dangerous pesticides to name but a few. GM crops such as Vitamin A enriched rice and orange sweet potatos could save lives and improve health in less developed countries. A GM egg plant in India offers reduced use of pesticides which are currently being applied by children to the non-GM variant, causing them many health problems over their lives. And the scientific consensus on crop improvement by GM shows that it is as safe as traditional methods like artificial selection.

Organisations like Greenpeace do have admirable goals, but the reason I don't openly support them is that they too often do not use logic in their methods or their reasoning. They seem to have ideological opposition to ideas like GMOs and nuclear power even though the evidence clearly suggests that these technologies are vital in meeting our environmental and power/resource goals. It is possible to use them more safely than ever before with a little research and investment, but Greenpeace will always oppose such notions. Their commitment to a fully "organic" future is not compatible with the available evidence on the potential of organic food. This is an unscientific and intellectually dishonest approach.

The fact is that by their irrational opposition to nuclear power, Greenpeace have subverted their own goals by forcing the installation of many dirty, carbon-doxide belching coal-fired power stations all around the world. Nuclear power is an important part of the answer to the energy problem which is espoused by the power companies and rears its ugly head, threatening power cuts as the demand for electicity can't be met in the environmentally friendly ways they are contracted into following.

The conclusion was that we really need a new Green Movement! Overall this was a superb talk. I am very interested in this subject and have bought his book, and after reading it I will write a review on this blog.