Scientists, Fluoride Loonies, and the Evidence
by Donella Meadows
— October 12, 2000 —
Back when I was a chemistry major, my professors told me in no uncertain terms that water fluoridation is a boon. It prevents millions of children from getting cavities. People who oppose it are hysterical know-nothings.
We budding chemists absorbed both the specific and the general lesson. Fluoride is good. Scientists know best.
At just that [...]
Taking Over From God On The Seventh Day
by Donella Meadows
— August 24, 2000 —
“If I gamble, I usually gamble at high-stakes, high-payoff games.” That’s a boast not from James Bond, but from a chemist speaking to the prestigious journal Science (the July 14 issue, from which all quotes but the last one in this column are taken). His name is Peter Schultz. He works at Scripps Research [...]
How It Happened That We Don’t Regulate Biotech
by Donella Meadows
— August 17, 2000 —
Back in the 1970s scientists got their first inkling that they might actually be able to redesign genes. That awesome possibility started an ethical and regulatory flurry. Distinguished panels of scientists met to ask imponderable questions. Could some human-created form of life get loose and carry self-multiplying havoc into the world? How could we [...]
If the Government Says It’s Safe, It’s Safe. Right?
by Donella Meadows
— September 16, 1999 —
The folks who bring us gene-spliced soybeans, corn, potatoes, and other foods like to make a point of the U.S. government’s approval of their products. The feds OK’d it. That must mean biotech foods are safe, right?
Right. Sure. This is the government that declared DDT safe and thalidomide and DES and dozens of other [...]
The Latest News From the Ozone Layer
by Donella Meadows
— September 2, 1999 —
Twenty-five years ago there appeared two obscure scientific papers that rocked the industrial world. One of them, by Richard Stolarski and Ralph Cicerone, said that if chlorine atoms ever got wafted high up into the stratosphere, they could eat up the ozone layer. The second, by Mario Molina and Sherwood Rowland (who got the [...]
