I’ve been in work and personal overload lately, and I apologize for not annoying people here nearly as frequently as I’d like. The work overload, at least, will likely lift soon. In the meantime, I wanted to pass something along about an opportunity for biodiversity-oriented bloggers. It’s below the fold. For you non-fold-looking-under Hordelings, here are some cuddly cacti:
Hey, I was only joking when I said fishing rule breakers ought to be chopped up for shark chum, but some days…this story about fisherman bragging about killing a record 1300 lb mako shark gives me second thoughts. There’s nothing praiseworthy about exterminating a top predator, especially one that doesn’t threaten your terrestrial butt at all.
There is a poll, if you’d like to express your opinion.
Should sharks be protected from fishing?
Yes 86%
No 14%
It’s been a busy, productive, tiring day. I’ve been working hard, leading and administering, while my student Josh has been working hard working working. We’re building a benchtop fish system and I seem to have spent a lot of the day in local hardware stores gathering stuff that Josh then assembles and cuts and hauls and scrubs and cleans. It’s a rough life.
Anyway, here’s the work in progress. On the left is the fish system…well, the shelves in place. On the right is the bulk of the fish system, in pieces and boxes and on the floor. We’ll be plumbing things together tomorrow, at least the stuff we’ve got — more bits will be trickling in as the week goes on. By this time next week I expect to see water cascading everywhere and fish frolicking and mating! And mermaids! And sirens! Manatees, even!
Josh just started work yesterday. I think we’re making wonderful progress already.
I have no problem with slugs, adorable creatures. Twenty centimeter long slugs, great, I grew up with those. But hot pink twenty centimeter slugs is going a little far.
I don’t get it.
I really don’t get the opposition to genetically modified organisms (GMOs). We’re all genetically modified organisms — the only difference between us and the ‘objectionable’ ones is the mechanism, whether the molecular novelty was inserted by intent or inserted by chance. Much of the dissent with GMOs is based either on ignorance, or is misdirected.
From Biofortified, an excellent blog on agriculture, genetics, and molecular biology, here is a good video on the subject.
Watch Next Meal: Engineering Food on PBS. See more from QUEST.
Yet there is established policy in many countries and states to prohibit use of GMO crops. When a small patch of GMO wheat was found in Oregon, Japan responded by shutting down all wheat imports from Oregon. That’s nothing but fear based in ignorance. All of our crops, everyone’s crops, are heavily modified genetically. Wild strawberries are tiny little things. Corn is a hybrid monster shaped by centuries of selection, twisted from a seedy little grass into this weird elaborate conglomeration. Wheat and barley and rye are the product of thousands of years of genetic reshuffling and selection. Walk into the produce section of your grocery store — do you really think all those fruits and vegetables are unshaped by human hands?
This strange unfounded fear of GMOs is unfortunately most strongly expressed in the political left. It’s embarrassing that political progressives are being made to look bad by raging superstition and unscientific claims.
I was interested to see in the link above that this fear is traced back to the magic word “natural”, and specifically that awful website full of woo, Natural News. “Natural” is nonsense: everything is natural. “Natural” is a non-specific modifier attached to anything a crackpot things is good, in opposition to new-fangled technology that is different from what their grandparents did. If it helps, modern genetic modification techniques are simply directed versions of horizontal gene transfer, a process that happens “naturally”, without human assistance. We’re just doing it faster and more efficiently and selecting the genes we want to move around. The current controversial crop of genetically modified wheat simply takes a natural enzyme from a natural bacterium and transfers it to the genome of a natural grass. There’s nothing supernatural about any of it.
You want to complain about something, aim a little more accurately and target real problems in modern agribusiness.
The ongoing concentration of control of agricultural products into the hands of just a few corporations. These corporations lock up their products and are intent on retaining control…and this isn’t just GMOs. Hybrid seed produced by standard genetic techniques has also been a tool.
The corporatization of farms. The family farm is fading, it’s all giant conglomerates — and the economies of scale depend on ignoring the environmental costs of the megafarm.
The blandness of monocultures. Try driving through my part of the world — the old, biologically diverse prairie has been almost totally replaced by endless fields of corn and soybeans, nothing but corn and soybeans.
The industrialization of food. What’s being done with most of that corn? It’s being processed into high fructose corn syrup and ethanol. We take food which is rich and complex and process the heck out of it to reduce it to something more convenient for industry.
Sometimes I wonder if the GMO controversy isn’t just a giant red herring thrown into the debate about the future of agriculture just to distract us from what should be real concerns.
And maybe, Oklahomans be nuts, too. How do you live in that state? This video convinces me I’d be safer living atop a volcano in an earthquake zone near the sea, where the tsunamis could reach me. Why am I living in the midwest, anyway?
Hint for the videographer: The footage of what’s going on outside the car is dramatic and terrifying, but the camera turned inside is boring and annoying. In particular, the guy yelling non-stop from the passenger seat made me want to club him and make him stop distracting the guy who was actually driving.
The UK needs some help from us. One of their ministers has got some weird ideas about climate change.
The chairman of the Commons Energy and Climate Change committee said he accepts the earth’s temperature is increasing but said “natural phases” may be to blame.
Such a suggestion sits at odds with the scientific consensus. One recent survey of 12,000 academic papers on climate change found 97 per cent agree human activities are causing the planet to warm.
So they’re trying to settle it with a poll.
Are humans responsible for global warming?
Yes – completely 17.46%
Yes – but only partially 28.4%
No – it’s a natural phenomenon 54.14%
You know, that’s a really stupid set of answers that looks like it was intentionally designed to split the vote. “Completely” or “partially”? That makes no sense. If we have an equilibrium situation where heat inputs and losses are balanced, and humans come along and tip that balance, are you just going to say they’re only partially at fault, because the sun is pumping all that energy into the system? It’s silly phrasing.
If Mr Bean visits the grocery store and pulls out the bottom can in a neatly stacked pyramid of canned goods, causing the whole thing to tumble down in a mess, are you going to say he was only partly to blame for the chaos?
I’m not even going to think about the ignorance of the 54%.
