Hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen are natural. But this arrangement of the atoms does not occur unless humans want it to. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramadol
Yes that's what I'm saying, "unless humans want it to" still qualifies as natural. Humans are natural and a part of nature and so anything they create is as well.
If a beehive or beaver dam is considered natural then so is the empire state building, all three were created by animals native to this planet.
Sure, you can redefine the word in a way that makes it meaningless. Or you can use it the way the rest of the world does - where "natural" means "not the result of human intervention". By that definition, it's obvious why a beehive and beaver dam are "natural" and the Empire State Building is not. There is a degree to which this focus is arbitrary, but given that we are humans, it's sometimes a worthwhile focus to have. That in turn, of course, does not mean it's correct to care about it everywhere we seem to.
“'What do you mean,' pursued the earl, 'by the Heavenly, and by the Human?' Ruo replied, 'Oxen and horses have four feet - that is what I call their Heavenly (constitution). When horses' heads are haltered, and the noses of oxen are pierced, that is what I call (the doing of) Man. Hence it is said, "Do not by the Human (doing) extinguish the Heavenly (constitution); do not for your (Human) purpose extinguish the appointment (of Heaven); do not bury your (proper) fame in (such) a pursuit of it; carefully guard (the Way) and do not lose it: this is what I call reverting to your True (Nature)."'”
No. The way most people use the term it has a meaning. It's the redefinition that is meaningless, and should thus be rejected as useless. That doesn't mean that people always reason correctly about it, but that should be confronted directly not by playing semantic games.
Have you heard of the very natural Oxygen Catastrophe[1] that wiped out much of the life on Earth? Some organisms began dumping a toxic chemical (oxygen) into the atmosphere in such large quantities that it practically killed off everyone except for those weird mutants that evolved to actually breathe that dangerous toxin synthesized by the killers!
Right. Oxygen was very bad for life when it appeared. Oxygen is good for life now, that evolved in its wake. I don't want massive quantities of stuff appearing that is bad for life now.
Yeah yeah it's not 100% but it's still reasonably strong evidence. If you find something in a plant that's eaten by many things then it's probably not very toxic.
Maybe that's some evidence, but it's certainly not reasonably strong (in fact, it's very weak evidence). First, some of those "many things" would need to have a metabolism that's close to ours. Secondly, even if those unaffected organisms are similar to us, we would need to consume that molecule at similar concentrations. Most toxins have adverse effect only beyond a certain dosage. Something can be harmless (like cyanide) in it's "naturally occurring" concentrations, and positively lethal in higher doses. Besides, synthetic molecules are tested before they're approved for human consumption, and they are usually tested on animals with similar metabolism to us, and at the appropriate dose. So actually, FDA approval is a much, much, much stronger evidence for a drug's safety than it being extracted from "nature".
That idea might make you feel better, but it's not grounded in reality at all. Chemicals appearing in nature do batshit crazy things to life all the time.
If by "batshit crazy" you meant toxicity, then yes that's clearly incorrect, as others have repeatedly pointed out. Perhaps you meant chemical affinity in some general way --eg homochirality, or presence of commonly targeted functional groups?
If so, note this is the exact opposite of 'biocompatible' in the usual sense (as in 'inert'): biosynthesized molecules evolved precisely to be exceedingly good at reacting/interfering with biological processes, not the other way around. So if anything, it would be evidence they could well do batshit crazy, unintended things to life --as they often do.
Crude oil is [primarily] organic if your context is [petro]chemistry. It's not an organic foodstuff however.
Shock, horror, words have contexts which cause them to mean different things.
Why is it that you don't wish people to know where their food has come from and how it has been produced. What is the problem with that for you? If you don't care that your children's food is saturated with growth hormones, fungicides, hormones and pesticides or that the farmers you buy from use so much Tramadol that the environment tests positively for it [as in the current case], fine, but why does it matter so much if other people want to know the conditions their food has been grown in? Say, by looking for organic food certifications. [There see I included "food" in case it confused you, words can be so hard, huh.]
There's no great logic to the insistence that words can't be used for multiple well defined meanings - yes even in associated fields like chemistry and food science/agriculture - and AFAICT there's no detriment to you in others choosing to care more about the rearing or growing conditions of their food (which you don't have to eat).
"Shock, horror, words have contexts which cause them to mean different things."
Dunno what his problem is, but my problem is the context in which "organic" gets used with respect to foods: a massively expensive, misleading, anti-science marketing campaign by huge corporations intent on profiting from people's mistaken belief that "organic" products are--by virtue of being "organic"--healthier or better for the environment.
Since the people behind this huge corporate marketing campaign are also promulgating lies about GMOs in an attempt to force labeling on them and prevent their development, your claim "there's no detriment" to others from those who support them is false.
>an attempt to force labeling on them and prevent their development //
Labelling only provides people with the ability to chose. Against choice? Consumers can make uninformed choices, sure, but that choice is central to a democratic system.
Who are the corporations that you're referring to? The majority of organic stuff we get in the UK is from small corporations or local farms, it is the bigger corps that stand to lose most from a desire from the public to have organic (and similar ethos) production of food. For example factory farming chicken relies on being able to pump them full of antibiotics.
You say it's a mistaken belief that organic food is better - the meta-studies I've seen seem to flip between the two positions pretty rapidly. Can you cite maybe one or two studies that you would say show incontrovertibly that organic production is no better for people, animal welfare and/or the environment? Thanks.
I'm not the parent (I'm GP), but my position is that organic certification is good, but the universal association of "natural = good, synthetic = bad" is only harmful.
Yes, farmers pump animals full of chemicals and this should be documented and, if you are concerned about this, it's a good thing that there are organic food certs out there. However, whole industries fuelled by bullshit have sprung up off the back of this very common fallacy. There are people out there who don't take scientifically-proven medicine because it's "not natural" and lean towards quackery like homeopathy, and this is what I'm opposed to.
To reiterate, IMO organic or free-range farm produce is a good thing and I'm sure most people would agree with that. That's not what I was talking about so don't get rude with people based on a misinterpretation of the subject, it's unnecessarily disruptive.
Can't speak for the GP, but in my case, I object to laws requiring labels on GMO, etc. foodstuffs simply because I don't want to live in California, where literally everything has one or more dire warning labels attached to it. When everything is dangerous, nothing is. The labels end up not being taken seriously, and the consumer ends up less-informed than they otherwise would have been.
"Literally" applies, by the way, when the whole building you're in has a sign in the lobby that reads "This building contains substances known to the State of California to cause cancer, birth defects, and itchy rashes."
I'm worried that this is where the slippery slope of GMO labeling will lead.
No, you label things when there is scientific evidence, of the peer-reviewed and -reproduced kind, that there is a non-obvious risk associated with a given foodstuff or other item. GMO labeling falls well short of that standard.
The idea, I think, is that humans have been sharing the planet with everything else for so long that anything especially dangerous that occurs "naturally" is likely to have been already tested- ie "artificial" drugs should be more unpredictable, and therefore potentially more dangerous, than whatever stuff some exotic culture has been fucking with for hundreds of generations (which is pretty much any interesting compound you can find "naturally").
Of course, unscrupulous-types will lean on whatever marketing stunt they feel will sell some short-term product, with little respect for the long-term dangers/benefits, so naturally words like "natural" and "organic" get abused.
