One of my readers shared this video with me last week:
I hesitated to share because, goodness knows, some crazy is going to come on here, find it, and share it with all of their friends. But, quite frankly, it’s so ridiculous and a perfect example of how anyone, even the looniest among us, can be portrayed as legitimate.
First, the two individuals in this video are not reliable experts.
The guy on the left is Jeffrey Smith. If you’re a regular reader of the blog, you’ll remember that “Dr.” Oz likes to trot Smith out whenever he wants an “expert” on GMOs. In fact, his last appearance on that show prompted this letter, which asks “Dr.” Oz to stop lying to the American public.
According to Academics Review:
He’s [Smith] particularly adept at getting his message out via the latest online methods, which he uses to spread his misinformation about biotechnology, in particular, to an ever-widening audience. In his most recent self-published book, Genetic Roulette, Smith claims to show 65 different “documented health risks” associated with biotech foods. Not one of them has been found to be scientifically valid by Academics Review.
Honestly, props to the anti-GMOers. They’re able to make a ton of cash, support their cause, and get their message out….and not have one shred of evidence for any of it. (Which makes it all the more special when a commenter on one of my articles claims I don’t have any support for what I report…)
Anyway, Smith is an expert. He lacks credibility in the scientific community, or any community that isn’t hell bent on being against science. He’s made a living making false claims to people about GMOs and making other ridiculous claims.
Seated at the right of Smith is Stephanie Seneff, who known for her more outlandish theories. She’s on the whole anti-vaccine bandwagon — with all the others that completely discredit science. In fact, in her article, where she mulls over the causes of Alzheimer’s, she ends up blaming vaccines, flu shots, sugar, and sunscreen.
Her advice is to forego all other (more credible) scientific advice and simply rely on her words of wisdom:
The good news is that all of these factors are easy to correct, so the individual can become empowered to lead a lifestyle that will minimize the likelihood of having to face Alzheimer’s as they age. The only challenge is to convince yourself that the misguided advice widely espoused by the medical establishment is dead wrong.
Can we contemplate any type of scare tactics that are better than this? Follow my ridiculous advice or you’ll end up with this horrible disease!!! Meanwhile, Seneff is also largely discredited in the scientific community and known, much like Smith, as a unreliable.
Second, there is no science to support their positions.
Derek Lowe, an organic chemist, said this: “After spending some time reading this paper over, and looking through the literature, I’ve come to a conclusion: it is, unfortunately, a load of crap.”
I won’t pretend that I can even half explain what Dr. Lowe does on his site, but he surmises the reason this video has gone viral is simply because mot people can’t tell the difference between real science and a bunch of gibberish. He says:
But the evidence given for these assertions, and their connection with disease, while it might look alarming and convincing to someone who has never done research or read a scientific paper, is a spiderweb of “might”, “could”, “is possibly”, “associated with”, and so on. The minute you look at the actual evidence, things disappear.
I encourage you to check out his reaction to the video and paper here.
He also points out that the “scientific” journal Entropy is a bunch of garbage — they’ll let anyone publish anything.
Let me finish by saying that glyphosate has been repeatedly shown safe. I know the anti-GMOers don’t trust Monsanto, but the company lists a ton of research that has been done on the subject here. If that doesn’t convince you, check this synopsis out:
The genotoxicity data for glyphosate and Roundup were assessed using a weight-of-evidence approach and standard evaluation criteria. There was no convincing evidence for direct DNA damage in vitro or in vivo, and it was concluded that Roundup and its components do not pose a risk for the production of heritable/somatic mutations in humans. Multiple lifetime feeding studies have failed to demonstrate any tumorigenic potential for glyphosate. Accordingly, it was concluded that glyphosate is noncarcinogenic.
The conclusion? “It was concluded that, under present and expected conditions of use, Roundup herbicide does not pose a health risk to humans.”
For an easy guide to glyphosates (and a great one to share with your friends!), click here.
This whole, terrible video is just a reminder that we should check our sources — and completely ignore unreliable science touted by the likes of Seneff and Smith.
What makes you think Stephanie Seneff is a quack? She is extremely intellegent, she has all the credentials to perform state-of-the -art research. She explains all her theories with pure science. I think you would do well to listen and read what she has to say. If you live in an area where crops are grown using Roundup and you drink local or well water you better do some in-depth research and not just take Monsanto's word for it. Bob
Hey – I’m late to the party, but I have to respond to “Anonymous”‘s claim that Seneff does “pure science.” Puh-leez. She’s not doing any actual biological research. She inputs dozens or hundreds of articles into her Natural Language Program in order to detect trends in the language. She then correlates the various findings. It’s not science. It’s not enough to correlate data, you have to demonstrate an actual relationship. For example, I could write a “science” article that claims that sunburn is caused by eating ice cream. How? Well, “my child” ate ice cream today and later got sunburn. My neighbor’s child ate ice cream today and later got sunburn. Et cetera et cetera. Therefore – eating ice cream causes sunburn. Now – the correlation is definitely there. Out of 100 children who ate ice cream that day, 63 of them developed sunburn later. Sooooooooo, were the confounding variables examined? Was it disclosed that of the 63/100 children who ate ice cream and later developed sunburn forgot to put on sunblock and that the sun was particularly strong that day? CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION, AND NEITHER IS SCANNING A BUNCH OF UNRELATED ARTICLES AND PROGRAMMING A COMPUTER TO DETECT SIMILARITIES. Pardon my language, but “pure science,” my ass.
Hi Amanda! Great article. I completely agree that Jeffrey Smith is a quack. He promotes the false and never published research of people like Ermakova and Surov. They promote their findings in the media before they are published, promising they will be published, but lo and behold no respectable journal will even touch them! One question, if you take enough of anything it eventually becomes toxic. There are real studies out there showing a drastic increase in the use of Roundup as weeds become resistant. Do you think it's a legitimate concern to wonder or worry about elevated rates and accumulation in crops? Bohn et al. 2014 has a good article establishing the increased accumulation. ___________________________Other notes: ErmakovaHere's the fascinating story of how Ermakova's work was shredded into pieces (rightly so) by the scientific community. She had data showing a 50% mortality rate in mice fed GMO corn. (Like you say, common sense should be kicking in at this point and say to us "what the heck??")http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n9/full/nbt0907-981.html (the original article…Ermakova's description of what she did, and 4 scientists' discussion of flaws and problems)http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n12/full/nbt1207-1359.html (Editor's response to criticism of how it was handled)http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n12/extref/nbt1207-1359-S1.pdf (Editor supplies original email and other correspondence between himself and Ermakova)http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n12/full/nbt1207-1351.html (A response from Ermakova)http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n12/full/nbt1207-1356b.html (another? response just by the 4 scientists)http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v25/n12/full/nbt1207-1354.html (A GMO activist's critique of the handling of the situation)http://www.i-sis.org.uk/LetterToNatureReErmakova.php?printing=yes (Another GMO activist's critique of the handling of the situation) http://academicsreview.org/reviewed-content/genetic-roulette/section-1/1-14-roundup-ready-soy-is-safe-5/ (A website that is reviewing and critiquing Genetic Roulette. This particular page focuses on Ermakova) ____________________Surov and Jeff Smith:http://www.responsibletechnology.org/article-gmo-soy-linked-to-sterility http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-smith/genetically-modified-soy_b_544575.html (Basically the same thing as the above, but published in HuffPost. Note the claim that Surov's article will be published in a "few months"…Huffpost article was dated April 2010)Fastforward to Nov 2013…Surov STILL not published… <a href="https://www.thefarmersdaughterusa.com/2013/11/russian-scientists-create-bad-biotech.html?m=1https://www.thefarmersdaughterusa.com/2013/11/russ… /> (hehe this is you! farmers daughter)
Stephanie Seneff has NEVER done any research on glyphosate All she does is review published research and provide her own, often very uninformed and skewed, interpretation of the results. In addition, Seneff's graduate degrees are in engineering and computer science, and her BS degree is in biophysics. She has no expertise in biology, chemistry, or physiology, so she is just wrong in many of her statements – such as where she states that the activity of glyphosate is the same in the plant as in the human gut. Ridiculous!
Amanda, are you a paid shill of Monsanto?
Yep, I'm just a paid shill of Monsanto. *eye roll* https://www.thefarmersdaughterusa.com/2014/02/no-i…
I am not a scientist–but simply stating my opinion. Seems to me that the rise in cases of autism stared going up when GMO’s were introduced. Coincidence? I think not.
Well, you probably didn’t need to say you’re not a scientist because your conclusion pretty much proved that. Correlation does NOT equal causation: https://www.thefarmersdaughterusa.com/2014/07/spurious-correlations.html
So how much does Monsanto pay you?
Oh, how original, Betty! Accusing me of being a shill because you you don’t like what I have to say. Try again.