Kimmo

Yes. Tell me. Along with the 90%+ that also want to know. Maybe you don't care? That's cool. Don't try to keep the 90% that do prisoner of your desire for ignorance. The whole thing is pretty simple really. With a whole lot of obfuscation thrown in by the oh 5 corporations fighting the thing. Just put a label on the foods and be done with it!

what I'm seeing as the weird logic here is not requiring someone to say what's in the food they produce. Meaning: you put gmo into the food you made? Tell us.

That's fine that any product can be labeled GMO Free, and we are certainly seeing more of this, but should the onus be on these producers? For me there is no question as to who should bear this onus: the one that puts the ingredient in the product. Meaning, if I put gm ingredients into a product, I should damn well have to say so.

Sorry, not there. Not that I could find. And, it's not a warning label. It simply says what's in the package. Genetically modified soy beans, for example. Which are not the same as non-modified soy beans (isn't there even a test that can test if an oil is from GM soybeans?).

tell me how this would play out in this particular case (gmo). what policies would address the broader issues, and what do you see as the broader issues? what is the "whole range of technologies" you speak of? are we not speaking of laboratory-based modification of plant and animal genes? and what is your best guess of the costs? what i hear is around a million for enforcement for the first year: 20C per washingtonian? and what it would do is show americans if the food they are buying has lab-modified genetic material, right? is this a trick question? what would be your guess about where this would go? what would be next?

In the face of what you posted above, what do you make of concerns expressed by other scientists, perhaps most notedly by the Union of Concerned Scientists? Here's a link to an interview by someone involved with the organization (please don't let her photo scare you off): scary face I'd like to hear your honest thoughts on the interview. And, while I certainly have concerns myself over a technology quite in its infancy being promoted and applied across the board by corporations inherently driven by the profit motive, I'm also interested in the heuristics of this, and any, situation, especially when quotes such as this are used: If an overwhelming majority of experts say something is true, then any sensible non-expert should assume that they are probably right. (from the poster you pinned up.) Who is behind that poster btw? I googled www.axismundionline.com (credit on lower right of poster) and got decent design ideas for our yard, but I couldn't find who is behind it.

Off: I don't have the time to hyperlink to the vast compendium of publications issued by institutions ranging from the NSF to the European Food Safety authority that have surveyed the known universe of credible scientific literature on the specific risks that arise from inserting DNA from one plant or animal into another plant or animal that humans eat and haven't found anything even remotely worrisome and/or plausible enough in terms of risks to warrant prohibiting the practice - but hopefully it will suffice to say that they have issued their judgments and determined that the risks to humans, the greater biosphere, etc fall somewhere between infinitessimal and zero for the set of actual food crops that actual companies have generated for that purpose. The science simply doesn't support imposing significant (in the aggregate) costs on everyone who consumes or produces food in the state of Washington or anywhere else on the basis of any scientific standard of safety. It just doesn't. If you have other objections - such as disliking Monsanto, modern agriculture, large farms, etc, etc, etc that's all perfectly fine, but those are all objections rooted in philosophical/ideological grounds - not science. I have no problem with anyone who has ideological, spiritual, or other reasons restricting their diet in any fashion they like as long as they're willing to do so without imposing the costs on people who don't share their particular ideological commitments. Folks who want to restrict their diet to kosher/hallal foods - which is a set of beliefs about food safety and purity that has equal scientific standing with the concerns that you are raising about GMO crops (sorry man, but it's true) - have every right to do so. What they don't have the right to do is force everyone who chooses not to abide by their taboos to slap a "Non Kosher" "Non Hallal" or "Non Whatever" label on every food product that they grow, buy, sell, or eat. Anyone who wants to confine their diet to non-GMO crops for political/ideological/philosophical/spiritual reasons should do the same. I don't see you addressing anything specific that offwhite wrote, since he wasn't addressing gm safety per se, But: out of the vast compendium of publications issued, can you link to one that you have found to be the most rigorous in its methodology for ascertaining GMO safety?

Start like this: "My name is Rob."

"There's another issue here with corporate control of the food supply. . . . We're headed toward a time when there will be just a few corporations that control the food supply from the farm to the plate. And that is not in the best interest of a strong world economy. It's not in the best interests ultimately of healthy food and healthy people. . . . " Knowing what's in our food is necessary for making decisions regarding the above scenario.

Oleg's defiance about getting his butt whipped regarding his monkey face camp fire is pretty juvenile. I think the best way for him to regain his manhood is to go climb it again, have a camp fire, and post another trip report.

a humanoid might find this interesting regarding some salient issues surrounding GM foods: link oh and by the way, YES on 522. Vote once, vote often!

We all aspire to convenience. It's built into our DNA. We wish to be comfortable and have things go our way. Even in an activity like climbing, which by its nature places us into uncomfortable situations, we still want these discomforts mitigated by a variety of strategies. Of course we do: climbing is after all a past-time, a hobby, a game in the end. How trivial do we want this game to be? Based on the responses in this thread, it's evident this question is answered very differently by different people. Some want the game to be very easy and convenient. Why fiddle around with nuts and cams in cracks, and then have to climb 4th class, when a couple of bolts would allow one to descend right away after the "money shot"? I mean, isn't Brass Balls really about the 40 feet of climbing where you leave the ledge, ascend more or less vertically with certain subjective difficulties encountered, and arrive at a "comfortable" stance? This is where, after fucking the whore, I should get to smoke a cigarette and enjoy. Brass Balls, be my whore. I'll pay you, with my soul, if you'll simply let me have my way with you. Don't give me this bullshit about having to fuck 4th class ledges after I come. You are my aim, and after I am done with you, I need to leave quickly to get back to my wife and children. But when I want you, be my whore. I'll pay you, with my soul. The first ascensionists of Brass Balls had the audacity, sure, to give it a name. A silly name at that. But they didn't have the audacity to slap stainless steel into the flank of the rock because they couldn't be "inconvenienced" by an additional 40 feet of no-glory 4th class scrambling. Climbing is continually distilled into whatever most people think is its essence. With these bolts, which I think everyone agrees are about "convenience", this distillation is towards a mind set that sees nothing deeper in climbing than "getting off".

i know you don't care what the sherpas might say, but that's to be expected. to look at this as some disjointed one-off is to probably miss a whole hell of a lot that's been going on for a while now, but that's my opinion. now back to your regular bile.

It'd be nice to get a first hand account, from the sherpas.

In the original context of my use of the word "stressor", I meant something that negatively impacts an organism's overall health or survival. Since it's been pretty conclusively shown in now a variety of organisms that even severe caloric restrictions can improve overall lifespan, sometimes dramatically, then obviously, using my original meaning, caloric restriction would not be a "stressor". Your definition obviously works, within its context. But it doesn't identify healthy stress vs unhealthy stress, which seems to be somewhat the point of the discussion. After all, everything that is happening anywhere in what we call a universe is "stress" (because there are no closed systems, as far as I can tell).

I thought juice fasting was your area of expertise?

not sure whether or not caloric restriction is a "stressor", but it certainly seems to promote health and longevity. but I've read starvation can be a peaceful way to die.

personal antagonism and not sticking to subject. offwhite!

ha that's rad! an iconic take-down, to be sure!

actually feck, that doesn't address portion size, only the total caloric intake. what's interesting to me in these studies is that the non-exercising calorically restricted mice lived longer than the exercising mice. which means to me that exercise is a stressor, not inherently good for the body?

Astrov, oh my, i'm getting a little done with this thread, but i'll try to answer your question. so... -3 oz meat rule: silly, not necessary, and probably impossible for most to adhere to. lean meat is, well, lean, with a pretty low calorie count (especially grass fed), so i'm damn well gonna enjoy my steak when i decide to have one. am i gonna eat this every day? no, but there are paleo folks out there who are very lean, seemingly healthy, and eat a lot of meat, every day. -no cheese as main course: another one of those vague generalizations without any context. should people be gorging on cheese? it'd be pretty damn tough to stay within one's energy in/energy out equation if this was a regular habit. but damn, some decent fondue sounds pretty good right about now. -eat at home: huh? not sure what this is about. i'm pretty sure some friends of mine who eat almost every meal out are healthier and thinner than homeslice here. -portion sizes. i'd go crazy if i tried to limit my portion sizes all the time. hey, it's one way to go, and if it's working for him, great, but certainly NOT necessary for weight loss. -buy good food. what's that? kale's pretty good, and so is a pint of ben and jerry's dulce de leche. made with non-rbgh milk too. hey, how about a pint? -dietary supplements. not sure what these might have to do with losing weight, per se. maybe for general health and athletic performance? depending on what one's goals are, i think creatine and beta-alanine have some compelling research showing performance improvements. so, my problem is with his wording, "dietary supplements are a scam" (except for the ones he lists), since it seems other supplements have research supporting their value. and the most glaring omission is the old energy in/energy out part of the "losing weight" formula. i think his prescriptions allude to the fact that one needs to limit what they eat, but do so in a vague way without spelling it out. because, really, in the end, that is THE aspect of diet that HAS to be addressed, much much more so than what supplements one is taking, or how much cheese is one eating at a particular meal, or whether or not one exceeded 3 oz's of meat in a sitting . it's not entirely germane to the discussion at hand, but it would also be interesting to know how well his diet prescriptions are working for him. i mean, is he lean??

"Dear Tvashtarkatena, some of your above prescriptions for "leaning out" might have merit, some, not so much. Perhaps it was not your intention to present your above opinions as "facts", and if this was the case, my apologies for misinterpreting your tone. With Love, Kimmo" Is this better, offwhite?

hah, pretty funny, and relevant. i think a decent take on the whole fructose alarmism: linky

I think the Lustig video not only decontextualizes the hfcs "problem", but also makes various incorrect assertions. Without going into all of these, i think it's important to note that the average humanoid's caloric intake in the US has gone from what, 2,100 a day, to around 2,700 a day. At the same time, the average US humanoid has become much more sedentary. So a perfect storm, really: people stuffing their faces more (yes, with shitty foods), and exercising less. So what's gonna happen? You feed a humanoid excess calories in whatever form, and it's gonna store the stuff. now it does happen that fructose consumption has increased dramatically, and overconsumption is a problem, but i think it's a gross oversimplification to simply say "americans are fat fucks, and fructose is the reason."