Posted on 01/13/2010 8:56:07 AM PST by Fractal Trader
The last line of your post #30 seems self explanatory enough.
That was very well put!
If it helps us, we could envision a situation in which Microsoft licenses its Windows operating systems on a year-to-year basis, and then one year decides to get out of the business altogether, causing all licenses to expire and all Windows computers to cease functioning, crippling much of the nation’s infrastructure and endangering our very security.
In such circumstances, neither an individual’s nor a corporation’s patent right can be reasonably construed as trumping the rights of our nation. This is the same reasoning behind the (admittedly-distatesful) doctrine of eminent domain. For when the protection of individual rights endangers the very society created for such protection, things have really gotten out-of-whack.
We present for the first time a comparative analysis of blood and organ system data from trials with rats fed three main commercialized genetically modified (GM) maize (NK 603, MON 810, MON 863), which are present in food and feed in the world. NK 603 has been modified to be tolerant to the broad spectrum herbicide Roundup and thus contains residues of this formulation. MON 810 and MON 863 are engineered to synthesize two different Bt toxins used as insecticides. Approximately 60 different biochemical parameters were classified per organ and measured in serum and urine after 5 and 14 weeks of feeding. GM maize-fed rats were compared first to their respective isogenic or parental non-GM equivalent control groups. This was followed by comparison to six reference groups, which had consumed various other non-GM maize varieties. We applied nonparametric methods, including multiple pairwise comparisons with a False Discovery Rate approach. Principal Component Analysis allowed the investigation of scattering of different factors (sex, weeks of feeding, diet, dose and group). Our analysis clearly reveals for the 3 GMOs new side effects linked with GM maize consumption, which were sex- and often dose-dependent. Effects were mostly associated with the kidney and liver, the dietary detoxifying organs, although different between the 3 GMOs. Other effects were also noticed in the heart, adrenal glands, spleen and haematopoietic system. We conclude that these data highlight signs of hepatorenal toxicity, possibly due to the new pesticides specific to each GM corn. In addition, unintended direct or indirect metabolic consequences of the genetic modification cannot be excluded.
--snip--
The two other types of GM maize studied produce two different new insecticides namely modified versions of Cry1Ab (MON 810) and Cry3Bb1 (MON 863) Bacillus thuringiensis-derived proteins.
I don't know. I haven't read the whole article.
To you both very well written. Great examples.
I tend to refer to the dark side of human nature, that Bastiat refers to as the ‘common tendency’ of ‘mankind’ to ‘live and prosper at the expense of others’.
To me the conundrum is how to keep ‘things from getting out of whack’.
I don’t know how to keep things from getting out of whack. But I do know that if we ever do figure out how, it’ll seriously curtail the production of science fiction. :-)
But seriously...For as long as mankind has progressed technologically, we have faced this very conundrum. From Icarus to Dr. Frankenstein, from bronze to gunpowder to the atomic bomb, we have had to address the perils inherent in our technological discoveries.
The balancing of individual and community concerns is a delicate one. Toss a big lump of technology on one side or the other, and things are liable to get out of whack for a bit. Sorting it all out is, well, like an occasional test of a people’s ability to govern themselves - natural selection on a national scale, you might say.
FOrtunately, I don’t think MS works that way, but that was my big objection to DRM-protected music.
In fact, I did by a few DRM-protected songs, and I can no longer use them because Walmart’s server stopped working to provide DRM authentication.
Watermelons...capital 'W'. Green on the outside, red on the inside.
Otherwise known as Enviro-whackos.
They went on a campaign to get BT engineered crops banned because they say they are harmful to humans. They spread the fear and let the market and the gubmint do the rest.
Ahh ... sorta like ‘Global Warming’ and CO2.
Thanks.
When did the server stop working ? I haven’t heard any news on this recently.
Did you manage to burn it to CD ?
Oh yes, I burned a CD long ago, and I’ve made an mp3 from it.
At one point Walmart sent e-mail out telling us they were terminating the DRM, and that we should burn everything.
Then they sent e-mail out saying that they had changed their minds.
So I don’t know what happened, I only know that after my computer crashed and I had to restore from backup disk, the DRM license I restored from the backup disk would not grant me rights to the songs anymore.
So my two guesses were that Walmart’s servers stopped working, or more likely at some point they replaced my DRM codes and I didn’t get them backed up, although I have no knowledge or belief that they would ever do so.
Since I don’t really care, I have the songs in the form I want them, I haven’t written to Walmart to get it fixed.
I just use it as an example of something where your rights are tied to the good graces of someone who could stop being good to you at any time.
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