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Sunday, August 9, 2015

Scotland to issue formal ban on genetically modified crops


NassimNicholasTaleb

NassimNicholasTaleb ‏@nntaleb  
Scotland invoking the Precautionary Principle for GMOs.  
Our paper http://arxiv.org/abs/1410.5787  (Cornell University)


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@nntaleb

Flaneur, with focus on probability (philosophy), probability (mathematics), probability (logic), probability (real life) and Lebanese wine (and ancient languages).
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The Precautionary Principle (with Application to the Genetic Modification of Organisms)

We present a non-naive version of the Precautionary (PP) that allows us to avoid paranoia and paralysis by confining precaution to specific domains and problems. PP is intended to deal with uncertainty and risk in cases where the absence of evidence and the incompleteness of scientific knowledge carries profound implications and in the presence of risks of "black swans", unforeseen and unforeseable events of extreme consequence. We formalize PP, placing it within the statistical and probabilistic structure of ruin problems, in which a system is at risk of total failure, and in place of risk we use a formal fragility based approach. We make a central distinction between 1) thin and fat tails, 2) Local and systemic risks and place PP in the joint Fat Tails and systemic cases. We discuss the implications for GMOs (compared to Nuclear energy) and show that GMOs represent a public risk of global harm (while harm from nuclear energy is comparatively limited and better characterized). PP should be used to prescribe severe limits on GMOs.
Subjects:General Finance (q-fin.GN); Physics and Society (physics.soc-ph)
Cite as:arXiv:1410.5787 [q-fin.GN]
 (or arXiv:1410.5787v1 [q-fin.GN] for this version)

Submission history

From: Nassim Nicholas Taleb [view email]
[v1] Fri, 17 Oct 2014 17:30:43 GMT (482kb,D)

 Our paper http://arxiv.org/abs/1410.5787  (Cornell University)

Scotland to issue formal ban on genetically modified crops

Severin Carrell Scotland editor
Sunday 9 August 2015 

Scottish ministers are planning to formally ban genetically modified crops from being grown in Scotland, widening a policy divide with the Conservative government in London.

The move will reinforce a long-standing moratorium on planting GM crops in Scotland and allow the Scottish National party to further distance itself from the UK government.

Backed by agribusiness, scientific bodies and the National Farmers Union, ministers in London have already signalled that they plan to allow commercial cultivation of GM crops such as maize and oilseed rape in England, despite significant resistance from consumers and environmental groups. .

Scottish scientists, including those at the James Hutton Institute and the Rowett Institute of Nutrition and Health, have taken a leading role in GM research. The Scottish government’s former chief scientific officer, Dame Anne Glover, who became the European commission’s chief scientific adviser before the position was abolished, is a keen advocate of GM crops.

The spokeswoman for the Scottish government said: “These changes would not affect research as it is currently carried out in Scotland, where the contained use of GM plants is permitted for scientific purposes, for example in laboratories or sealed glasshouse facilities.

Unlike George W. Bush 'banning stem cell research' and driving scientists out of America to other countries carrying on this valuable research!!!!

Richard Lochhead, Scotland’s environment secretary, said he wanted to uphold the precautionary principle – that the potential risks to other crops and wildlife from GMOs outweighed the likely benefits of the technology – by banning the commercialisation of GM crops.





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