User talk:Geraldatyrrell: Difference between revisions

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Welcome!

Hello, Geraldatyrrell, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

Please remember to sign your messages on talk pages by typing four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place {{help me}} before the question. Again, welcome! Vsmith (talk) 01:24, 19 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've fixed a ref tag error for you at biodiversity. You have added considerable content with citation needed tags, please continue and provide references for those. Thanks, Vsmith (talk) 01:24, 19 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Vsmith, I'll keep an eye out for those Geraldatyrrell (talk) 13:32, 19 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

GMO stuff

Hi Geraldatyrrell - you are pretty new here. Please be aware that there is a community of editors who have been working on GMO-related articles for a long time. You are surely aware that there is some controversy around them.

I hope you are aware of WP:BRD - it is great to be Bold and edit an article, but if you are Reverted, Discuss. And do not edit war. Please come and Talk on the pages where you are working! Writing long edit notes is not the same as joining or starting a discussion on Talk - please see the article on tendentious editing]. I don't believe you have looked at the talk pages, but please know that we had a recent Rfc (if you don't know what that is, please see WP:RFC) about the consensus statement on the relative safety of GM food vis a vis conventional food, and the current statement and sourcing were accepted by the community. Editing against the conclusion of an RfC is another form of tendentious editing - the record of the RfC is here. I am writing to you here to try to help you not go down the wrong road - you are a newish editor and jumping into a controversial article and edit warring is not a great way to begin. More voices in the conversation are great - but please do join the conversation. Thanks. 14:30, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

I am curious about one of your edits in particular - this one - am asking you about on the relevant Talk page... Jytdog (talk) 17:33, 22 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi - thanks for your note on my Talk page! I am happy you are willing to talk - very grateful. Your Talk page is on my watch list, so if you reply here, I will see it. Likewise if you reply on the Talk pages of the relevant articles, or start a new section, I will see it too - those pages are also on my watchlist. Thanks again! Jytdog (talk) 02:00, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

by the way, when you go through the Talk pages, you will find others who feel these pages are somehow not Neutral, and who have nasty things to say about me and other editors. That is what it is; the main thing is that we talk through it. My wish is that you will assume good faith. If you want to understand more about me and where I am coming from, please see my user page, here where I tell my story. Jytdog (talk) 02:08, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Above all, I don't mean to be nasty, I appreciate the talk too. I do treat alternative ideas with care. What annoys me most is that there is clearly a body of literature in for but still sources in opposition. That makes for a nasty time of consolidating these topics. I see that you've been in the throws of this debate for quite some time so I am looking forward to your perspective. I do admit that I won't be able to read everything on this topic right away, but I will get to it. I'm not sure how to get this across in the article, but regardless of how safe/unsafe GMO foods are to eat, I still think they are bad for society. I think the distinction is important and one of my main concerns is that that isn't being represented in the articles fairly. Any thoughts on this (written now or sources from the past?)Geraldatyrrell (talk) 02:27, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

hi, great. Thank you! I really appreciate that you are willing to do homework. Thank you. There are a couple different conversations here. One conversation is about stuff that actually belongs in Wikipedia. For that conversation, what we have to do, is describe the world as it is. Wikipedia is not a place to right great wrongs (see WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. This is probably the #1 driver of the really dark fights that have happened on the Talk pages. Wikipedia describes the world as it is. And in America today, over 90% of corn, soybean, and sugarbeet is GM. Entire bodies of law and regulations, and scientists and bureaucrats who implement them, and companies that work to create them, exist. And farmers who willingly buy them and make more money doing so, exist. That is the world as it is. So the article on GM food, describes actual GM food; the article on GM crops, describes actual GM crops, etc. There is page for Controversies, and that opens up pretty wide. However, mainstream science and regulators agree that currently marketed food from GMOs is safe. If you intend to try to get equal weight (see WP:WEIGHT) for a perspective that says they are not, you are making what is called in Wikipedia a WP:FRINGE argument, and that will not go far. But there is a place for that perspective, in the Controversies article. So that is one conversation. Another conversation, is whether it would be better if GM crops were banned, how we could possibly and sanely transition from industrial ag to some other kind of agriculture without the price of food worldwide going through the roof; it is a global economy -- when the Russian and Chinese wheat harvests fail, people starve in Egypt because they cannot afford bread. All kinds of stuff that is interesting and important, and we could do that in email or on the phone, or here on User talk pages too... but it has no place in Wikipedia article space (actual articles and their Talk pages), except in an article describing the visions of organizations that are trying to do that. Does that make sense? But let me ask you three user Talk page questions: a) on what basis do you make such a very broad statement that "they are bad for society"? (you must know a lot about very many things, to make such a broad statement!); b) what exactly do you mean by "bad for society?" c) when you say "the distinction is important," what distinction are you making exactly (I am guessing between whether eating a GM papaya would harm you individually, and on the other hand, some other aspect(s) that affect all of us (maybe concerns about glyphosate or formulation additives in the water supply, maybe what industrial ag in general does to the ecosystem, maybe concerns about "corporate control of the food supply".. maybe all that or none - I have no idea what you, gerald, actually mean. but i would like to know) Jytdog (talk) 02:53, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, just checking in. I remain interested in the questions above, if you care to answer (if you don't, then fine!) but with regard to content in article space... I had asked you in the Talk page of the GMO article the following: "I don't know if you understand what the main 2 genetic modifications actually are (Bt and glyphosate resistance) - do you? real question." I asked you that, because the literature written on the food safety issue, is written by people who understand what was done and how it works, and how it is the same/different from a) the "parent" plant and b) other things we eat everyday. I suspect that one reason the scientific community has formed the consensus, while the public remains so divided - a key part of the whole "seeing different worlds" issue - is that scientists do know, and the most of the public doesn't. I can explain them to you, if you don't know what they are.... hope you are having a good weekend! Jytdog (talk) 12:38, 27 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 24: / Line 24: @@
 :::Above all, I don't mean to be nasty, I appreciate the talk too. I do treat alternative ideas with care. What annoys me most is that there is clearly a body of literature in for but still sources in opposition. That makes for a nasty time of consolidating these topics. I see that you've been in the throws of this debate for quite some time so I am looking forward to your perspective. I do admit that I won't be able to read everything on this topic right away, but I will get to it. I'm not sure how to get this across in the article, but regardless of how safe/unsafe GMO foods are to eat, I still think they are bad for society. I think the distinction is important and one of my main concerns is that ''that'' isn't being represented in the articles fairly. Any thoughts on this (written now or sources from the past?)[[User:Geraldatyrrell|Geraldatyrrell]] ([[User talk:Geraldatyrrell#top|talk]]) 02:27, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
 :::::hi, great.  Thank you!  I really appreciate that you are willing to do homework.   Thank you.   There are a couple different conversations here.  One conversation is about stuff that actually belongs in Wikipedia.  For that conversation, what we ''have'' to do, is describe the world as it is.  Wikipedia is not a place to right great wrongs (see [[WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS]].  This is probably the #1 driver of the really dark fights that have happened on the Talk pages.  Wikipedia describes the world as it is.  And in America today, over 90% of corn, soybean, and sugarbeet is GM.   Entire bodies of law and regulations, and scientists and bureaucrats who implement them, and companies that work to create them, exist.  And farmers who willingly buy them and make more money doing so, exist.  That is the world as it is.  So the article on GM food, describes actual GM food; the article on GM crops, describes actual GM crops, etc.   There is page for Controversies, and that opens up pretty wide.   However, mainstream science and regulators agree that currently marketed food from GMOs is ''safe.''  If you intend to try to get equal weight (see [[WP:WEIGHT]]) for a perspective that says they are not, you are making what is called in Wikipedia a [[WP:FRINGE]] argument, and that will not go far.  But there is a place for that perspective, in the Controversies article.   So that is one conversation.   Another conversation, is whether it would be better if GM crops were banned, how we could possibly and sanely transition from industrial ag to some other kind of agriculture without the price of food worldwide going through the roof;  it is a global economy -- when the Russian and Chinese wheat harvests fail, people starve in Egypt because they cannot afford bread.  All kinds of stuff that is interesting and important, and we could do that in email or on the phone, or here on User talk pages too... but it has no place in Wikipedia article space (actual articles and their Talk pages), except in an article describing the visions of organizations that are trying to do that.  Does that make sense?   But let me ask you three user Talk page questions: a) on what basis do you make such a very broad statement that "they are bad for society"? (you must know a lot about very many things, to make such a broad statement!);  b) what exactly do you mean by "bad for society?" c) when you say "the distinction is important," what distinction are you making exactly (I am guessing between whether eating a GM papaya would harm you individually, and on the other hand, some other aspect(s) that affect all of us  (maybe concerns about glyphosate or formulation additives in the water supply, maybe what industrial ag in general does to the ecosystem, maybe concerns about "corporate control of the food supply".. maybe all that or none  - I have no idea what you, gerald, actually mean.  but i would like to know) [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 02:53, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
+Hi, just checking in.  I remain interested in the questions above, if you care to answer (if you don't, then fine!) but with regard to content in article space... I had asked you in the Talk page of the GMO article the following: "I don't know if you understand what the main 2 genetic modifications actually are (Bt and glyphosate resistance) - do you? real question."  I asked you that, because the literature written on the food safety issue, is written by people who understand what was done and how it works, and how it is the same/different from a) the "parent" plant and b) other things we eat everyday.   I suspect that one reason the scientific community has formed the consensus, while the public remains so divided - a key part of the whole "seeing different worlds" issue  - is that scientists do know, and the most of the public doesn't.  I can explain them to you, if you don't know what they are.... hope you are having a good weekend! [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 12:38, 27 October 2013 (UTC)