I was wondering if most of you step up and spend the extra money for organic procucts? Reading about Strawberries with 13 pesticides is crazy.
11 things you should buy organic on Shine
11 things you should buy organic on Shine
I do because I think many organic fruits and vegetables taste more like the veggies my parents and grandparents used to grow on the farm back home. I don't know what factors the difference in taste can be attributed to.
You might very well be getting fresher, tree/vine ripened produce that is of a variety that was not bred for shipping over flavor. But I doubt that 'organic' affected the taste.
-ERD50
In the 1970s, Bruce Ames was a hero to environmentalists--the inventor of the Ames Test, which allows scientists to test chemicals to see whether they cause mutations in bacteria and perhaps cancer in humans. His research and testimony led to bans on such synthetic chemicals as Tris, the flame-retardant used in children's pajamas. A world renowned cancer researcher with a calm, reasoned manner, Ames was an ideal witness in the case against man-made chemicals. .....
But it's a scientist's imperative to change his mind when the data change-- and recent data have made Ames deeply suspicious of high dosage chemical testing and especially of the notion that man-made chemicals are uniquely dangerous. We are, he has discovered, surrounded by mutagens--not only synthetic chemicals but also natural ones--and blindly banning suspicious modern substances can do more harm than good.
Today, Ames, a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of California at Berkeley, stands on the other side of the chemical-ban debate. In 1990, he spoke out against California's Proposition 128, which would have banned many pesticides, and he has been highly critical of the ban on Alar. The best way to prevent cancer, Ames now believes, is to "eat your veggies." Any government action that makes fruits and vegetables more expensive ultimately causes cancer. In recent years, Ames has added a dollop of the economist's sense of trade-offs to the cancer researcher's zeal for prevention.
Ames discussed cancer research and environmental politics with Editor Virginia Postrel at his Office in Berkeley.
Ames:
But the control. which people should have thought of but they didn't, is what about all the chemicals in the natural world? People got in their head, well, if it's man-made somehow it's potentially dangerous, but if it's natural, it isn't. That doesn't really fit with anything we know about toxicology. When we understand how animals are resistant to chemicals, the mechanisms are all independent of whether it's natural or synthetic. And in fact, when you look at natural chemicals, half of those tested came out positive.
Of course. almost all the world is natural chemicals, so it really makes you rethink everything. A cup of coffee is filled with chemicals. They've identified a thousand chemicals in a cup of coffee. But we only found 22 that have been tested in animal cancer tests out of this thousand. And of those, 17 are carcinogens. There are 10 milligrams of known carcinogens in a cup of coffee and that's more carcinogens than you're likely to get from pesticide residues for a year!
Ames: ... The point isn't to worry so much about cups of coffee, but to rethink what we're doing with animal cancer testing We're eating natural pesticides, which are natural chemicals that plants use to try to kill off insects that try to eat them. And we eat roughly 1,500 milligrams of them per day. We eat 0.09 milligrams of synthetic pesticide residues. So we're talking about incredibly tiny amounts of synthetic pesticides, and yet the same percentage of natural chemicals come out positive.
Yet, outside of a few specific instances of identified issues, there doesn't seem to be trend of farmers falling over dead as they sprouted a third head.
Farmers (and migrant workers) don't fall over dead but they are more likely to get cancer such as myeloma. Farmers who use the pesticide 2,4-D have a much higher rate of lymphoma.
How much more likely? How much of a higher rate?
And apples are known to contain carcinogens - should we stop eating apples (see my links to Dr Ames).
Somebody should tell the NIH about the "much higher" rate in these farmers. They think:Farmers who use the pesticide 2,4-D have a much higher rate of lymphoma.
Others thinkThe toxicological data do not provide a strong basis for predicting that 2,4-D is a human carcinogen.
I stopped checking after that. So, maybe there's been newer work, or a salacious magazine interview with an ill farmer.Epidemiologic studies provide scant evidence that exposure to 2,4-D is associated with soft tissue sarcoma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Hodgkin's disease, or any other cancer. Overall, the available evidence from epidemiologic studies is not adequate to conclude that any form of cancer is causally associated with 2,4-D exposure.
Why do you suggest we should (stop) eating apples?
Somebody should tell the NIH about the "much higher" rate in these farmers.
Look at the data that Ames provided. If you are want to avoid .09mg of synthetic pesticides, shouldn't you be absolutely terrified of 1500mg of natural pesticides, half of which are probably carcinogenic?
Just stop eating altogether, I guess.
Eh? We should stop eating altogether?!?
Please explain again to me, slowly. You're going to stop eating veggies and fruits because...?
The point that Ames makes (and he developed these tests), is that everything we eat contains naturally occurring carcinogens. You don't avoid them by eating organic. He says you might eliminate 0.09mg out of 1500mg. Just don't eat .09/1500ths of that commercial apple and you'll cut your intake down to the 'organic' version. Cheaper to throw that tiny bit away than to pay a premium for organic.
It's all about scale.
Yes, and I didn't disagree with that.
This is a weird "conversation."
I recommend a very good movie called "Food Matters" See the below link.
Welcome | FOODMATTERS®
Enjoy and eat well.
I like genetically modified foods. Notice, no smiley there.