GE cotton good for beneficial insects, study finds | Environment | The Guardian

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Ahem - some GM crops good for environment. To assert that GM crops are always all good is just as facile as to assert that they're always all bad. It depends on the specific application, and you can't generalise from one particular application to all others.

Reminds one of the headline lauding the economic miracles of Weimar Germany, complete disregard of the principle of primum non nocere.

Only consider benefits after exclusionary costs are known.

By Buck Field (not verified) on 14 Jun 2012 #permalink

Dunc, absolutely. Not all GE crops will benefit the environment as clearly as GE cotton. Each crop (whether GE or conventionally bred) must be looked at on a case-by-case basis. The original title on my blog post was from the Guardian article. I have changed it now to be more specific, as you suggested. Thanks

Why not say, "Round-Up proven to be more beneficial to bald eagles than DDT and shotguns !!!"

Wonders never cease.

By Douglas Watts (not verified) on 18 Jun 2012 #permalink

If GE cotton fields are not soaked with insecticides and non-GE cotton fields are soaked with insecticides, the GE cotton fields will have more living insects of all types. This is kind of obvious. The null hypothesis is what happens when you compare insect populations on GE and non-GE cotton fields without any application of any insecticides on either field. This is a classic example of the experimenter putting his 'thumb on the butcher's scale' and then getting exactly the result they predicted. It is not science; it is marketing.

By Douglas Watts (not verified) on 18 Jun 2012 #permalink