Film maker Scott Hamilton Kennedy made Food Evolution, which discusses GMOs, science, politics and their intersection. The film is narrated by Neil deGrasse Tyson and travels to several countries in Africa, England and the US. For their part, the filmmakers do a rather decent job of presenting pros and cons of the GMO battle. As Kennedy notes in this interview with Futurism, we, all of us, suffer from confirmation bias. So the question is how to get beyond that and ask relevant questions and hear the answers.
Mark Lynas, author of God Species: How The Planet Can Survive The Age of Humans, was against GMOs and has since changed his mind said, “It’s much easier to scare people than it is to reassure them. The misinformation originates in the rich world and it’s damaging the poor world.” Lynas has a book due out in April, 2018 called Seeds Of Science: How We Got It So Wrong On GMOs .
For many libertarian minded viewers there will be moments of angst as the filmmakers present corporations as evil and I felt sure I knew what was next. To my surprise, and the surprise of some people in the film, Monsanto was made to be the good guy. Not at all a popular position.
Kennedy does, in the interview and not in the movie, at least not that I saw, confuses corporations with government and sponsored research as independent:
People distrust big corporations, which is valid. We’ve seen over and over again that money can lead to power, corruption, and manipulation. We have checks and balances — do we need better checks and balances for that? Of course we do. But in some people’s minds, it’s gotten tied up that big money influences science, so we can’t trust science.
The good news with science is, I don’t actually care who funds the science. I want to see more independent science, but anybody who’s crying out to see more independent science has to remember that it’s going to come from our tax dollars.
I think he misses the mark there. Much government sponsored science seems, in the court of public opinion, to be dubious at best. True independent science is necessary and needed to find answer, and keep looking after, for the problems we face. Food certainly is among those areas in need of help.
The big business that is Monsanto needs not government to help them. There is a massive history of involvement which is the topic of another day. If government was to be removed and the farmers deal directly with the seed companies and the scientific community, those private farmers would likely see a turn around in their corps, sales, and life styles. Getting there requires, as Kennedy and several of the people in the film, noted an ability to remove confirmation bias.
In a somewhat Bastiat-esque moment, one South African farmer tell the producers that when America decides no GMOs, South Africans pay the price. The seen and unseen. Emotions run high on food issues which makes sense, but can they blind us to what is really best for all not just the few?
Read my article about a food fight Congressional style here.
Motor City is my background. A grandfather and his eldest son and two of my uncle’s sons work in the auto industry in and around Detroit. They each paid their bills and raised their families but none had cash hiding in the couch cushions. I ate with my grandparents and aunt and uncle and cousins often as a kid. We never wanted for food and the cooking was a mix of Polish and German, my side, and Portuguese, my aunt’s side. Pressures of assimilation had removed most of the family cultural culinary signatures but even if it had not, saffron was not an ingredient on the radar of any of my ancestors.