pbs special on gmo potatoes from monsanto

I thought since you were complaining about GMO fruits, you'd at least have some particular ones in mind.

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ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Nutrients don't simply equate calories!
Food deficient in minerals and vitamins cannot sustain us in the long run!

To me, China looks like the place where bad people go when they die.

I wasnt referring to GMO fruits, if you look back, my original comment on quality of fruit was in response to arabian knight's comment that GMO was for benefit of customer taste, texture, and shelf life. I then explained that GMO was only for increasing production, the middlemen already had strategies for storage and they didnt give a fig about taste. Its all about making fruit look like plastic perfection and only taste they are concerned about is that the fruit be vaguely sweet. I went on to say I thought all fruit now sold in super markets is low quality crap.

Not apparently understanding the word "ALL", you then asked me which fruit I had a problem with. I repeated whatever super market fruit you care to mention. My comment had nothing to do with GMO fruit, but with the horrible quality of ALL super market fruit.

Now is that enough clarification for you? GMO isnt for consumers benefit, its for higher production of low quality produce for MORE PROFIT.

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"What would you do with a brain if you had one?" -Dorothy

"Well, then ignore what I have to say and go with what works for you." -Eliot Coleman

A calorie is a unit of energy, it is not a unit of nutrition. Thus the term empty calories. A bag of sugar contains a lot of calories, but little to no nutrition. If you honestly believe calories are be all and end all, then I take it you will be willing to try living off nothing but bags of sugar??? Like to see what you look like after a year on a nothing but sugar diet.

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"What would you do with a brain if you had one?" -Dorothy

"Well, then ignore what I have to say and go with what works for you." -Eliot Coleman

Used to be in the old days, we all worked at physically exhausting jobs therefore we kept thin. Fat people were wealthy people who paid others to do the work they didn't want to do and they ate what they wanted. Now, the most exercise we usually get is walking to and from our cars and maybe a hour's worth of walking the dog without even sweating. Ideally, you should be sweating EVERY day in order to be using up calories. Look at the Biggest Loser shows, they all say the same...exercise has become less and less of a requirement and people don't really watch what they eat therefore they gain weight. I also consider corn syrup to be partially at fault since it seems to be in almost every thing.

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Ted H

You may all go to Hell, and I will go to Texas.
-Davy Crockett

It seems just because a plant is GMO shouldn't mean it's bad. On the other hand it also doesn't mean it's good. I suppose it depends on what it was modified for. If corn is modified to withstand drought I really don't see how there could be a problem with that. However if it is modified so that all it's offspring are sterile that could be a problem if it happens to pollinate with another farmers OP crop. There is a real liability there which someone should have to answer for. Just because one farmer has 1000 acres of GMO corn doesn't mean he has the right to damage another farmers 10 acres of OP corn. Also I've heard some farmers saying they have problems feeding BT corn to some animals. The BT is a bacteria that the plant produces which when ingested by the corn borer worm or root worms kills the worm. Some veterinarians have told the farmers not to feed it to some animals as it disturbs their digestive system. Well if it kills the worms when they eat it I can see some animals having a problem with it when they eat it. They say the BT is killed when the corn is cooked though. Also the fact that Monsanto can bring suit against a farmer saving OP seed when his seed is accidentally pollinated by the Monsanto crops down the road is unjust but that is the way of the world. Also the patenting of genes so that farmers can't save seed seems unjust. The big and powerful in collusion with government often times take advantage of or oppress the small and weak for financial gain. That to me seems the way Monsanto and other large seed companies work and for that reason I generally dislike GMOs and the large companies that produce them.

We have moved from blaming GMO and Monsanto, for obesity and are now blaming lack of nutrition?


I don't understand what you mean anyway, since fat, sodium and (all) sugars are indeed nutrients. Processed foods often lack certain vitamins (unless fortified), but there are no tests, that confirm vitamin deficiancies increase hunger. People wanting to eat more, is why they eat more.

Besides, anyone hungry, can have the choice of either picking up a bag of carrots, or a bag of Dorritos. They can't even use the "cheaper processed foods" excuse any more, since a bag of Dorritos is near $4 and carrots are $2.

Lack of nutrition, is not the cause of obesity, because Americans are getting plenty of fat, salt and sugar. Excess calories, from excess eating and stored in human body fat cells, coupled with little or no physical excercise, is, what is causing obesity.

That is not my theory, it is scientific fact.

Exactly on the fat syndrome. I look at old pictures from homesteading days, and not a soul has excess weight,excess fat, or excess tummys. They had to actually work for a living, and burn as many calories to make food as too eat. In my farming area, as farmers have gotten lazier relatively, due to going from mixed farmes to only grain, they have gotten heavier. The thinnest guys are the cattlemen. They are busy on a more year round basis, and do more physical stuff in the winter. everything almost is done with big machinery, and so the need to be physical on the farm is diminished. I must keep a few animals around. It is my weight maintenance program!

I was thinking this too.

Stumbling behind a plow horse, from sunup to sundown, had to be the ultimate, "cardiovascular workout".

Even with the old tractors, you had to start them by hand-cranking, no power steering, hand clutches, mechanical brakes, no cabs, to protect from the cold.

Now, with GPS steering technology, farmers don't even have to drive their tractors. Just sit there in a climated controlled cab and keep an eye on the automated processes/controls.

Strange you should say that.

Many people on this site would wish we in the USA return to living like many of the Chineese. On a small 5 acre substinance farm, eating what we grow, with a couple hogs and couple fowl.

That is exactly Chineese agriculture.

That is not a put-down of homesteaders, it's a wonderful life! But, most in the USA don't want that life, and most homesteaders here end up having a 'town job' to support their lifestyles, as they operate their 5 acre homestead.

I just find your comment ironic. Not trying to make too much of it.

--->Paul

I've heard more than one farmer complain they put on weight since they got the GPS - sit in the cab and eat chips, don't do any physical work like they used to.

That kinda sums up several of the ideas in this thread, doesn't it?

Somewhat related, a friend was saying, someone he knows lost 10 lbs when the Wii first came out, as he got some exersize using the controller.... Someone said that was good? and my friend said, well yea, but the problem is his friend would have another 100 to 150 lbs to lose to really get somewhere, unfortunately....

--->Paul

Seems like a lot of people are remembering things different than what people were like before Big Macs. There were obese people in the 1940s but there weren't as many of them as now. But, there also weren't as many skinny people then as now, either. When I was in 4th grade, we had an 8th grader who probably weighed more than any 3 kids in the school combined and we were all farm kids. My first wife topped at 280 when she was 21, lost 90 and still out-weighed me when we were married and she was a farm girl. I've got a photo taken of a huge threshing crew on our home farm in the 20s. There's quite a few who definitely didn't miss many meals. It was due to genetics back then, not potato chips.

Martin

Show me where I said GMO caused obesity?


Ok, then you do the year long experiment, you eat nothing but bags of sugar, cans of Crisco, salt tablets, and bottles generic multi-vitamin pills, and all the tap water you want. If you are still alive please let us know your condition at the end of the year experiment. Cause you are saying this is all a person needs in their diet.

By way low vitamin D and vitamin B12 have been shown to be related to obesity. But you being a nutritional scientist probably were probably already aware of this. If not then please feel free to use the google search engine. There is loads of info on this. Yes, even SCIENTIFIC info.


Uh, I suspect somebody on limited budget is more likely to buy 20cent pkt of generic raman noodles, 69cent loaf generic whiteboy bread, or 99cent pkg generic cookies, than Doritos. Doritos dont give you as much degerminated low fiber grain for your dollar. And an all carrot diet you propose seems bit limited. Plus we can go back to quality of super market produce.... Or do you buy those govt approved fortified carrots? Cause if the govt says fortified carrots meet all your daily nutritional requirements then who am I to question....

Ok, afraid my google search didnt find the official government approved list of incontrovertible "scientific facts" that includes 'lack of nutrition is not related to obesity'. You must post your extensive research for the elucidation of us all.

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"What would you do with a brain if you had one?" -Dorothy

"Well, then ignore what I have to say and go with what works for you." -Eliot Coleman

From what I am reading from your post, Obesity can be cured, simply by taking daily multivitamins and increasing fiber.

I did not find any specific research projects (too lazy to search longer that 2 minutes), but John Hopkins and Mayo Clinic both state that obesity is caused, by inactivity and improper eating, something that has been common knowlege, for at least the 45 years I have known it.

I realize people really want to blame it all on consuming non-wholesome foods, but I really don't buy it.

One can live on grass fed beef/poultry, organic grain breads, all natural eggs. wholesome vegatables.

But, if they consume 5000 calories per day, of these wholesome foods and sit on the couch all day and watch TV, They will be just as fat, as those who wolf down 5000 calories of dorritos and big macs, with the same level of inactivity.

If people don't want to be overweight (and weightgain is not caused by real medical conditions), they have to burn more food calories than they take in.

It has always been this way.

They manipulate the appearance and ripeness of fruit with hormones. There are hormones which will make unripe fruit ripen on demand or at least look like it is.

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...to be a rock and not to roll...

Bt is the bacteria. It produces a toxin. That toxin kills the larvae by disrupting their digestive system. It does this by binding to sites on worm guts. Any animal that does not have those same binding sites, is not affected by the toxin. Vertebrates do not have those binding sites, thus vertebrates are immune to the Bt toxin.

You can't "kill" it by cooking because there is nothing to kill. The plants produce the same toxin as the bacteria, but don't produce the bacteria itself. You can't kill a toxin.

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...to be a rock and not to roll...

I've never heard of that. I'd be most interested in seeing more facts on that inasmuch as fruit and vegetable storage has been an issue for thousands of years in temperate zones where such foods would be otherwise only seasonal.

Martin

You assume that the toxin created to the corn is exactly the same as the one produced by the bacteria. That's a big assumption there, one that you can't support any more than your fake anti-AGW propaganda.
And also, yes, there is something to kill. If you had even minimal knowledge of chemistry, you'd know that some molecules are destroyed by heat and others are more resistant to high temperatures. So is the Bt toxin destroyed by heat or not is a better question.

I consider you a troll and I don't feed trolls.

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...to be a rock and not to roll...