Comments on: San Francisco supported Proposition 37!

By: Warren Roberts

Warren Roberts — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 03:01:39 +0000

And if interested, displayed in GIS. Thanks for posting the data Razib http://goo.gl/hANM3

By: Anthony

Anthony — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 05:01:22 +0000

There was, of course, lots of facebook debate on Prop 37. Almost my entire f-list are liberal Democrats. The arguments for Prop 37 were almost entirely emotional appeals to the evils of Monsanto, with a little bit of the “everywhere else does it, even China”, and “right to know” arguments thrown in. Besides myself, the people I saw arguing against Prop 37 were mostly appealing to the science of the matter – that GMOs aren’t in any substantial way different (or less safe than) non-GMOs.

The appeal of the anti-Monsanto argument was very strong – even pointing out that Monsanto would be the corporation *least* affected by Prop 37, and that independent growers and grocers the ones most likely to be hurt by it wasn’t enough to convince anyone.

A few people may have changed/made up their minds against Prop 37 because of the argument that all it would do is result in labels which nobody would pay attention to, like the Prop 62 signs one ignores everywhere. Those were mostly people who were balancing between the argument from the science versus the “right to know” argument, I think.

By: Douglas Knight

Douglas Knight — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 03:39:13 +0000

Here's the data as a table. Here is a loess, weighted by vote total, which is also the opacity of the scatterplot.

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 01:29:27 +0000

#5, please see the link to the previous discussion. no need to repeat.

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 01:28:50 +0000

the blue vote is pro-37?

yes.

By: Education Realist

Education Realist — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 01:05:59 +0000

I assume the question is, do Prop 37 results show that the left is anti-science in its own way, just as the right is, or are they actually anti-corporate? As someone familiar with leftists in both SF and SC, I’m going with “they don’t see the difference”. So it’s hard to argue that they’re not “anti-science” when they will vote that way if a corporation is involved. The right has similar biases, I’m sure, and they don’t get a pass.

To clarify: the blue vote is pro-37?

By: peter

peter — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 22:55:49 +0000

Is the question here the pros and cons of GMO foods or is it the labeling of them? We include on food labels all sorts of things like sucrose, salt, sodium bicarbonate, agar etc. in, I would hope, an enlightened effort to let people know what is in the foodstuffs they are spending their money on. I know many people (I am not one of them) who would not purchase tofu made from GMO soy beans just as I prefer not to buy salted butter. Salt. GMO soybeans. Our motivations are different but why should that matter? GMO soy beans. Salt. Just put it on the label.

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 19:14:17 +0000

#3, see link above to the original discussion. it’s all be said.

By: iron0037

iron0037 — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 18:26:26 +0000

I find this debate kind of silly. The genome of a crop is different than its wild counterpart the second it becomes domesticated. Should we label all dogs as “genetically modified wolves?” What’s wrong with using modern technology to extend the progress we’ve made manipulating genes for the past 10,000 years? Is there some specific modification procedure that people get uppity about?

While I’m on my soapbox, I am frustrated by the label “organic” attached to certain produce. Are the tomatoes inorganic?

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 17:47:19 +0000

#1, stop regurgitating, and add some value (declaration, not request, so no response is invited).

By: Dwight E. Howell

Dwight E. Howell — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 17:28:05 +0000

When one addresses the issue honestly the assumption is that you have fewer health risks with non GMO foods and that may not be true. The GMO crop may be much more nutritious. On the other hand when you start putting genes for toxins in plants people eat you need to do some serious long range studies before you claim they are safe and that hasn’t been done to my satisfaction. Companies also want to punish others because their genes ended up in other people’s crops when as often as not the other people didn’t want them there. They have also tried including genes that cause seed to be non viable and you clearly don’t want crap like that getting into food crops or I don’t. When your GMO crops cause my heirloom seeds to fail I tend to think you should be hanged because you are a threat to the foundations of civilization: food production.