Skeptics Ask Monsanto

At Boston Skeptics "Skeptics in the Pub" on June 22, 2015, skeptics' questions for a Monsanto scientist provided a productive discussion. Larry Gilbertson of Monsanto answered.

Transcript

1. Skeptics Ask Monsanto MARY MANGAN, PHD @MEM_SOMERVILLE Delivered at the Boston Skeptics Skeptics in the Pub (SiTP) June 22, 2015
2. Skeptics ask Questions  Posted on discussion forums:  Reddit: http://redd.it/37lorb  SGU: http://sguforums.com/index.php/topic,44431.0.html  Boston Skeptics Facebook, Meetup, etc
3. Themes Biodiversity Patents/Legal/Monopoly Tech Agreement with Farmers Safety testing, transparency New crops, new tech Academic Research License Reputation
4. Biodiversity  Is all the corn out there one kind of corn? What’s different?  Risk of susceptibility to a single pathogen? What do you do about that?
5. Patents and Legal Issues  Patents  ELI5: “explain like I’m 5 years old”  Patents on life; seed saving, open source seeds or other off-patented stuff
6. Patents claiming Nucleic Acid Sequences  DOI: 10.1038/nbt.2568  http://bit.ly/BFpatent  Top 25 assignees
7. Nucleic Acid Patent Holders, US Number granted, total, US gene patents. Top 25 holders. via doi: 10.1038/nbt.2568 DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred GlaxoSmithKline Roche Incyte Pfizer Univ of California Isis Pharmaceuticals Merck Novarits US Dept Health & Human Services Takeda Pharmaceuticals Monsanto Bristol-Myers Squibb Sanofi-Aventis Amgen Human Genome Sciences Bayer BASF Univ of Washington Life Technologies Institut Pasteur Number of plant gene patents via doi: 10.1038/nbt.2568 DuPont/Pioneer Monsanto BASF Univ of CA Bayer Univ of WA Novartis Pfizer Sanofi-Aventis Johns Hopkins US DHHS Univ CA US HHS
8. Technology Agreement  Tech agreement, seed saving  Farmer shared his tech agreement:  thefarmerslife.com/biotechnology/i-occupy-our-food-supply-everyday  Suing farmers, affecting neighbors, co-existence, off-patent seeds
9. Monopoly and Reputation
10. Academic Research License  Academic research agreements  Is this posted somewhere?  Stories in 2009 like this SciAM one
11. New crops, new technologies  Other types of tech  Consumer traits  Allergen removal
12. Safety Testing, Transparency www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/food-safety-science.aspx www.monsanto.com/products/pages/safety-technical-information.aspx
13. Shill Shirts?  Highest rated question at the r/skeptic thread
14. Other questions?