Comments on: Book review – Tomorrow’s Table: Organic Farming, Genetics, and the Future of Food (Second Edition)

By: Book review – Techno-Fix: Why Technology Won’t Save Us or the Environment | The Inquisitive Biologist

Sun, 10 Jan 2021 21:29:37 +0000

[…] There were a further three issues raised here that I mildly to strongly disagree with. First, they are justifiedly very critical of the corruption of medicine by the so-called medico-industrial complex, specifically pharmaceutical companies. Rather, we should focus on prevention and lifestyle changes (sure), accept the inevitability of death (agreed), and embrace holistic medicine (hmmm). Once they start talking of the power of placebo effects and the body’s innate ability to heal itself I become a bit uneasy. There is a kernel of truth in there but, in my opinion, you are at the top of the slide that reads “pseudoscience this way”. Second, they appear to contradict themselves by stressing the importance of efficiency in saving precious resources but also wanting things to go small-scale and local again, holding up organic agriculture as a shining example (something of which I am sceptical). You cannot have it both ways, we scale up production processes for more than just profitability. Third, they surprisingly really have it in for genetic engineering. Other than completely ignoring the pervasiveness of horizontal gene transfer (one could say nature invented genetic modification billions of years before we did), they are unwilling to acknowledge it will be one of the necessary tools to keep feeding the world, deal with the impact of climate change on crops, or that we can take the best of both approaches. […]

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By: Book review – A Matter of Taste: A Farmers’ Market Devotee’s Semi-Reluctant Argument for Inviting Scientific Innovation to the Dinner Table | The Inquisitive Biologist

Tue, 12 Mar 2019 12:20:35 +0000

[…] duo of organic farmer Raoul W. Adamchak and plant geneticist Pamela C. Ronald (see my review of Tomorrow’s Table: Organic Farming, Genetics, and the Future of Food). Like them, she argues that to tackle the complex problem of feeding a burgeoning world […]

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By: Book review – The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet | The Inquisitive Biologist

Mon, 01 Oct 2018 08:29:38 +0000

[…] A Comprehensive Review through the Lens of Agricultural Science to back myself up with more data, Tomorrow’s Table: Organic Farming, Genetics, and the Future of Food offers a rapprochement of sorts, while my review of Seeds of Science: Why We Got It So Wrong on […]

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