Another empty generalisation to go with the article.

In the midst of the Anthropocene, academics on the public purse theorise on the motives of pro environmentalists and have the cheek to label them "the lunatics on the left". We have one of the worst record of mammal species loss in the world over the past 200 years and several more species are on the edge. And the response from governments? Reduce green tape, reduce monitoring of endangered species, slash budgets of threatened species programs, ramp up development, etc.

Perhaps the authors would like to hear some of my generalisations on the motives of academics advising governments and critique their performance or lack thereof.

Tim, I would like for you to post some specific examples of "certain environmental groups, and these aren't necessarily fringe groups either,.... that ... have a very large anti-science bent."

In my experience environmental groups are acting entirely on environmental science. It is the science alone that has alerted environmentalists to the threats to the natural world. Without science there would be no environmentalists.

The anti-science bent, as I see it, comes mostly from the conservative side of politics and by extension the capitalist and some of the religious mob. This mob are variously either in denial, delusion or outright deception about the Human race's destruction of the environment which has been discovered and confirmed by science.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that there isn't anti-science rife throughout all parts of government and organisations, I'm just saying that green groups are usually ideology driven, just like other groups, and don't make their opinions based upon facts.
Some quick examples:
The Greens and their stance on GM - ideology based and unscientific.
Greenpeace and their stance on GM - ideology and agenda driven, wholly unscientific.
The Greens and their claims in the media about climate change, which were actually just weather cycles, well understood and well documented. This was particularly harmful to getting action on climate change because they confounded climate and weather, tried to use scare tactics that were unnecessary and just caused pushback.
The WWF have been accused of all sorts of different exaggerations and lies whilst chasing donations.

No need for the negative comment Chris, I'm quite happy to elaborate, and have done so below.

My point is that green groups, like most organisations, are ideology driven and don't need facts. They cherry pick the facts to suit their world view.

To quote one liberal party science adviser: "Isn't it great when science agrees with our policies." I'm sure the labor party science adviser has said similar things as well.

Tim, I don't accept that the Greens stance on GM is anti-science. It could be said that it is anti-big business and their attempts to control food production, or anti-dangerous side effects of that particular branch of science of which their have been a few instances.
Science has produced some horrors for life on this planet but you don't need to be anti-science to recognise this fact and advocate a very cautious approach in some areas, GM being only one of many. I would add also that the blame for those horrors should probably be sheeted home to the profit motive rather than the science itself.

Big call Tim Scanlon - anti-GM is ideology driven? Pretty sure you'd find many scientists around the world to gainsay you there.

Tell me how the promotion of monocultural farming practices and the use of a seed - Roundup Ready - that is self-defeating in its purpose (super weeds are rendering it useless) and that promotes the profligate use of a chemical that is being proven extremely dangerous - glyphosate - is good science - let along good sense?

The Greens are the only party that base their decisions on evidence and science. I watched parliament question time yesterday, the Greens stated their case and cited facts and figures. Meanwhile Labor and Liberal spent the whole time avoiding the issue at hand and taking potshots at each other. If you don't believe me just read the transcript yourself: http://www.openaustralia.org/senate/?id=2012-09-18.82.2

Tim, I'm sure Lord Monckton and Alan Jones would completely agree ......

That is incorrect and is not supported by science. I also don't appreciate the illogical statements (appeals to nature, non-sequiters, burden of proof, the slippery slope, etc). None of your statements are rational, but rather emotive, which is exactly what the Greens appeal to with their rhetoric.

Genetic manipulation of plants and animals has been occurring in agriculture for ~10,000 years. The techniques used in modern breeding have included all sorts of manipulations in the lab, including radiation mutations, bacterial introduction of genes, viral introduction of genes, etc, etc, most of these being just adaptations of natural mechanisms that already occur. GM is actually a more specific and scientific mechanism for gene identification and introduction.

Hence, GM in and of itself is not a bad thing. The individual things produced are what needs to be tested to make sure they are safe. But that isn't what is ever discussed, it is always the Greens are anti-GM, no discussion of the technology at all. That isn't a rational or scientific discussion.

Appeal to authority statements are also unscientific John.

How can you be against an entire field of agricultural and genetic science? That is irrational. You can be against the introduction of specific breeds and cultivars that are produced, but to be against the entire concept of breeding is just anti-science.

Your run-on sentence of anti-agriculture statements is lacking in understanding of farming and science. First off, the term super-weeds is a term you don't seem to understand. Weed chemical resistance does not make the weed a super-weed, that would be multiple resistance traits and inbred hardiness, which is not always the case. You are also ignoring the fact that glyphosate resistance is already occurring, regardless of RR crops. Secondly you fail to understand what the RR gene does, it provides an alternate pathway early in plant development when most plants are susceptible to herbicides and would normally damage crops. Thirdly, show me a staple food production system in the last 10,000 years that has been more productive than monocultures, assuming a rotation system. Finally, glyphosate has been shown to be the safest herbicide ever developed. One of the examples I gave of anti-science was about Greenpeace contacting a weeds and chemical expert for information on the safety of glyphosate. They did not appreciate her telling them it was safe when they had already made up their minds it wasn't. http://www.apvma.gov.au/products/review/docs/glyphosate.pdf "...glyphosate is recognised as a low risk active ingredient..."

I'm afraid that is just an example of what I stated previously. They only use the figures that they like. Watch re-runs of Yes Minister to see what I mean about quoting "facts and figures" not necessarily meaning that they are being scientific.

Don't forget the classic dihydrogenmonoxide scandal. You can come up with all sorts of dangerous sounding figures as long as they have no context. It can sound really bad that we have had several flood events in Queensland in the space of 18 months, but the Greens come out saying it was evidence of climate change, when there was no study linking the two. Weather isn't climate, and climate change would be what drives those events, not the events themselves. Just for one example.

Tim, environmentalists are a broad group with widely differing views. If you vote Labor or Liberal, it doesn't mean you agree with all of their policies. In many cases they have the same policies that the majority disagree with. Some policies of all political parties are populist. Your Greens anti-science generalisation does not reflect the environmental community I know. Most have a tertiary qualification and many incorporating a science discipline.

Environmentalists could say the agriculture industry has introduced hundreds of environmental weeds (mostly grasses) which are invading virtually every national park and area of native vegetation in Australia displacing indigenous species and resulting in local extinctions and major management issues. However it is unlikely these naive introductions are representative of the current AG industry.

Most weeds are introduced via backyards and nurseries. So it would be factually incorrect regardless of who said it.

My point still stands, and I have qualified my statement above. I'm not having a shot at the environmental groups who are involved directly on ground, I've found them to be great (in general). But the political and lobby groups that are in the media daily are not involved on ground. They are largely ignorant of reality. Put another way, I spent several years in Landcare/Catchment groups and never met a Greenpeace, Greens, etc, representative or member. Met heaps of scientists, plenty of government agency bods, few local MPs, but not one of these supposed champions of the environment.

Tim, you're probably well aware of the excellent work on apricot breeding being done by SARDI of which I am a beneficiary being an orchardist. This is all conventional breeding but which has produced some amazing results. Conventional breeding is slow compared to GM but gives time to discover unintended consequences.
But even conventional breeding can produce some alarming results as the E. Nitens genetic improvement program has shown in it's poisoning of oyster farms in Tasmania.
I agree with you in saying that "it is the individual things produced that need to be tested to make sure they are safe". as it is the same thing that I am saying and the Greens and other green groups are saying,
The opposition to GM has come about by the knowledge that the profit motive often seeks to avoid such testing and hides unfavourable results where such testing actually occurs.
From this point on, as I see it, the science has done it's job and the discussion has moved on to socio-political efforts.
I sympathise with you as you are a scientist who can see the potential of the technology for the good of humanity but there are those who mostly see the potential of this technology to gain control of the worlds food production and so become rich and powerful.

I was talking about grasses. The grasses in most cases were introductions for agricultural/livestock industry looking for superior features such as growth characteristics, higher stocking rates, etc. In the north Buffel and gamba are typical examples. See what Catalyst had to say about Gamba: http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s1199756.htm

Firstly, is productivity all we're after with food systems? Secondly super-weed is a simple - lay - term for - a weed resistant to an overused herbicide.

and thirdly, please read this http://tinyurl.com/98zot94

Actually, conventional breeding doesn't really test the same way GM does. Think about how many fruits and nuts cause allergic reactions in the wider population, they weren't tested to make sure they were safe.

And the Greens are not saying that at all. They do not want any GM, at all, ever! The opposition also has nothing to do with the "profit motive" that is a red herring thrown about all the time. No one stops Pfizer or Bayer from making a profit on their drugs, or from selling drugs with harsh side effects that they sell treatments for the side effects. Why? Because it is unrelated to the GM technology and is a distraction from the actual discussion of GM breeding and the products it produces.

Next point is that yes I see this as a science argument. I don't like the misleading statements that many make about how businesses are trying to take over the world in agriculture. E.g. you alluded to the control of food, and the oft stated "they'll make farmers buy seed". Well farmers already buy seed. They pay end point royalties. Farmers in poorer nations often can't access modern cultivars for love nor money due to trade deals. We only have to look at some GM programs to see that 3rd world countries will actually be exempt from certain imposts of seed buying and storage.

You want to free up the world, let them use GM. I know of three cereal GM developments and one conventional development that has come from GM identifiers, that will be nothing but great for supplying food. We have already seen threats against these breeders and research stations.

John, an article in an online newspaper is not peer reviewed science. But of course, peer reviewed science has shown various GM products to be safe.

Secondly, super-weed was being misused as a term. Resistance does not arise from overuse, that is just plain wrong. Resistance arises when applications don't result in 100% kill of weeds. The survivors usually have some immunity which is then passed on and thus selection pressures can result in those survivors passing on their genes.

Finally, are you actually proposing that food isn't meant to be eaten and that the population isn't growing? Because without productivity we won't feed a growing population, in fact we have a decreasing agricultural base due to climate change, salinity, acidity, etc, etc, and we need to improve productivity just to maintain current levels of food. And please don't make the non-sequiter about "we have heaps of food, just not well distributed" because geopolitical problems and market access problems aren't going away either.

A little ingenuous Tim - the article in the Nouvelle Observateur points to an article in "Food and Chemical Toxicology" which is peer-reviewed.

And as for a growing population, please tell me how gm helps feed them -assuming that there isn't enough food to feed the world already - distribution is the problem, not volume.

And none of the problems you have mentioned - salinity, acidity et cetera asre hrlped by allowing a farmer to pour shit loads of glyphosate on his crops.

The biotechs have been trumpeting their ability to feed the world for years - and come up with nothing. Good farming practices will solve those problems, putting back into the soil, not stripping it.

One of my standard practices when dealing with adent supporters of gm is to put their names into a search engine next to words like Monsanto and Syngenta - and there you are. Case closed. No point in continuing any factual discussion

Your last statement is nothing more than a pathetic ad-homenim, especially considering I have never worked for any chemical companies. Please retract your statement and apologise.

John, you assume that RR and Bt don't help with rotation management and productivity. You also assume that they don't allow for management of those issues. But mostly you are assuming that there is no current GM work looking into salt, drought, frost, etc, tolerance. Please don't assume this, because they are already in development. If we don't have GM allowed, or we have Greenpeace protesters destroying research trials, then none of this beneficial research can be done.

You comment about biotechs is sorely misplaced and naive of modern agriculture. You also don't seem to understand the reality of agriculture. For every piece of food that comes off of a farm you are removing nutrients, alkalinity (generally) and energy. So you are mining the soils very gradually. This does not change in any farming system, anywhere, ever! The only noted closed system is in subsistence farming where villagers perform ablutions in the fields. Natural alluvial deposits also do this. My point being that there is no such thing as not stripping the soil, the organic matter, fertiliser, lime, etc, etc has to come from somewhere else. Even if we did have a more closed system with effluent returns, you would still have issues surrounding weeds, frost, soil ameilorants, and issues with soil structure.

Firstly, I support Tim's request for an apology.

His views are consistent with those of many agricultural scientists. I disagree with some of his ideas but that does not make him an agent of multinational agribusiness.

That said, the replenishment of soils can be done in different ways. Some involve mining and a lot of energy use, others involve more recycling. The present-day economics of each relative to the other should not be the end of the discussion. Economics is a social and political construct, not a physical absolute or a measure of th ecological health of agricultural systems.

As well, there is a clear difference between a classical free market in agricultural supplies and the creation of cycles of dependency by companies with majority control of segments of the market

I'd like to see recycling of effluent as a fertiliser. Early work with biosolids here in WA is showing they aren't up to scratch. Also the economics of it just doesn't work unless you are running a horticulture farm right next door to the ponds.

Someone linked me to some work being done in SA that looks promising. I'm still not convinced that they have dealt with the heavy metal contamination, but creating a dry granule fertiliser is what needs to happen. If it can't integrate with modern machinery it just won't happen. Spreaders are costly to run when you are spreading wet product, and covering the land several times to fertilise and seed is not feasible in large operations.

There has been a deal of development of separation techniques over recent decades. It may become economical to separate out nutrients in forms that are east to transport and easy to apply with availble technologies. Also to remove contaminants and even, perhaps, to reecycle them.

Again, economics are tied in with politics and both development of techniques and adjusting the relative economies of each are politically feasible.

It is a goal worth keeping our eye on.

My apology submitted - but what you call modern agriculture is destroying the planet. There are better ways.

Is it just "modern agriculture", or is it population and economic pressures that require thrashing the land to a degree that leaves many farmers and agricultural scientists, as well as greenies, uneasy?