Item — HN Reader

>even though the scientific consensus is that GMO crops are no more dangerous than non-GMO crops.

* "The State of the Science : Most of the evidence for the safety of genetically modified food crops comes from studies that only look at short-term effects … and from information provided by the same companies who sell those seeds." http://www.nymc.edu/sanewman/PDFs/GeneWatch_State_of_the%20S...

* Taleb: ''Wrong to say "the scientific method is based on evidence"; it is based on knowing how to deal with absence of evidence.'' ( https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/528646752124297216 )

* The Physics arXiv Blog: https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/genetically-modifi...

* "The Precautionary Principle (with Application to the Genetic Modification of Organisms)" http://arxiv.org/abs/1410.5787

1 comments

About your sources:

1. GeneWatch is an NGO. They don't have any scientific credibility.

2. Taleb is an economist of sorts, he has no scientific publications or credentials in biosciences. Also, twitter is not a very scientific reference.

3. and 4. Blogs and arXiv publications are not peer-reviewed, and they are not generally considered scientific publications. (Of course when an arXiv manuscript is submitted and accepted to a scientific journal, then it will be.)

Also about Taleb, he actually says "I, for my part, resist eating fruits not found in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean" [1], so his level of conservativeness seems to be to avoid any crop & food innovations younger than 1000 years.

[1] Quoted in: http://livepaola.wordpress.com/2013/07/22/nassim-nicholas-ta...

This is my point: In these matters people don't listen to the opinions of the actual scientists, but all kind of activists and preachers. Just like Randi said. You just demonstrated this.