Government makes sure your water has standards (unless it's run by those getting campaign donations from corporations). Corporations give us hexavalent chromium via PG&E and sell us tap water at grossly inflated prices in plastic bottles with no purity required (since it's from a regulated tap, usually) as "spring" water.

Fuck corporations trying to own every little damn thing. Where's my can of Perri-air?

A perfect example where the mind of corporate business can be so badly skewed from reality that it can't possibly do anything good for the world.

Also, corporations (at least in the US) are literally required by law to maximize quarterly returns for their shareholders, to the exclusion of all other concerns. Even if the price of water stayed the same after privatization, the money would be going to very different places.

Actually, there is no law that requires corporations to maximize profits. A lot of the time that fallacy stems from this case:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company#Signi ficance

Strangely enough, I also ran across an article about how even if a Director is voted out of their position in a company, they apparently don't have to leave:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/13/business/sham-shareholder-de mocracy.html?_r=0

More realistically, let's waterboard the guy with bottled Perrier. It's the Free Market Way, my son.

I would pay to see that. FREE MARKET AT WORK!

All we need is a Boston Dynamics Big Dog, a giant horse cock dildo, and fire. I don't know how many lines of python you'd have to write to make one of those fuck something, but it can't be more than it takes to make one not fall down a mountain.

The necessary code has already been developed.

http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=7032

Goddamnit Meme, the Boston Dynamics Rape Dog was _my_ idea! How did you know this? Get out of my mind!

truth

The thing that bugs me about GMO paranoia is that people are all upset about these "health risks" that are mostly unconfirmed, but completely ignore the very serious real problem: Monsanto and a few other corporations shitting all over biodiversity for the sake of monopolizing the food supply. That alone is enough to make GMOs as they are currently implemented a huge threat to human wellbeing on a golbal scale, but people would rather get all worked up over their own misunderstanding of how the body processes proteins.

GMOs are giving girls badonks at younger and younger ages. I say add more.

I thought that was growth hormones in animal feed and also that it was pretty much unsubstantiated.

Agreed Zircon. That and their monopolization basically holding food producers financially hostage based upon their intellectual property rights. They're incredibly coercive and destructive.

I've also heard puberty rates are going down more likely because of greater nutrition and calorie intake compared to past generations, which is pretty much the same reason that people are getting taller as well.

rates... I meant the age the age of puberty

GM respnsible for a loss of biodiversity? That is what agriculture sort of is.

GM as employed by Monsanto. GM doesn't HAVE to hurt biodiversity, but that's what it is being used for.

Konversekid, given the massive spike in the horrifying manchildren population over the past decade or two I'd accept "puberty rates" as a valid concept.

I think you're thinking of female hormones in the water. Earlier puberty rates for girls, fish with both genitals and the emo phenomenon can all be linked to this.

The first two are OK but that third one...

What are you talking about Old Zircon? Agriculture breeds cultivars that are good for production...the act of agriculture decreases biodiversity.

Agriculture becomes a huge problem when it becomes a monoculture. It's how famines and blights happen. Also, cultivars are strains kept going through propagation, whereas Monsanto keeps splicing in new ways for their plants to survive being dunked in Round Up. It's now unaffordable for a farmer to NOT use Monsanto or other Round Up resistant seed and make a profit (perhaps smaller-scale organic farming can work, but that's just making a 'premium' product, and that can't sustain the food supply). This, coupled with Monsanto making it illegal to save seed from year to year and dragging its feet on releasing data about its patents when they're supposed to become public pretty much gives them a monopoly.

Even without monoculturing, we've lost food species. Ever hear the song "Yes, we have no bananas?" That wasn't just about a truck tipping over or a boat not coming in.

What patent data is Monsanto withholding? If it is a patent, it's disclosed in the patent.

I still don't understand what you are a saying about biodiversity. The practice of agriculture is an exercise in lowering biodiversity for specialization and efficiency. That's the story with bananas, and what you pay for in risk you get in efficiency, it's a tradeoff. If you think it's a dumb, by all means, go breed a new banana and sell it.

They don't make it illegal to save seed, they make it literally impossible. Their seeds are genetically engineered to produce plants that will not produce viable seeds, so every growing season new seeds have to be purchased from Monsanto.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_use_restriction_technolo gy

gmol, the difference is that while biodiversity is restricted in traditional agriculture the changes happen over many generations and through the actions of many different agriculturalists and among other things that allows the cultivars to continue evolving. In the case of monsanto GMOs they are a monculture that has been engineered to not evolve at all since, you know, they can't actually reproduce.

I'm sure other, better read posters can explain it more thoroughly and clearly than I can.

OZ,
I have a good understanding of this stuff, I'm trying to show you that you need to improve yours.

You didn't tell me what patent data they are withholding (or how that statement even makes sense, since patented stuff is published). Nothing Monsanto does is preventing people from breeding new cultivars. GM on its own (even if you narrowly define "GM" as Monsanto crops) doesn't decrease biodiversity, new cultivars (as far as I know) are developed outside of production fields. I doubt anyone (Monsanto included) is thinking that agriculturalists should stop trying to find new cultivars.

It's the same way pharmacos are "evergreening" the patents on drugs that should be generic:

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130405/09003022593/how-big- agribusiness-is-heading-off-threat-generics-failing-to-keep-patent -bargain.shtml

As for diversity in crops, a few people have listened, and if you actually eat fresh produce, go to the apple section. Eat a Red Delicious. After you've endured a bland (and often bitter) tasting apple that's the product of years of breeding for visual appeal, go try just about any other kind: Braeburn, Fuji, Gala, Honeycrisp, etc. You'll get a better tasting apple, often sweeter and juicier with a longer shelf life than its poorly named Red Delicious cousin who suffers from inbreeding. Thankfully, I don't think Monsanto has patented a line of fruit trees.

What's stopping cultivars? The mass market's appetite. The requirements of crop-to-yield ratios for profitability require Roundup Ready genes in staple crops. We've come to expect such high yields that no naturally-bred varieties can compete. Short of something wiping out the seed crop, it's Monsanto forever for the majority of the foods you and I eat, and their lawyers are going to make sure it stays that way. You could breed a magical soybean that fights cancer and re-grows hair, but without RR in its DNA, the costs to produce enough for the mass market are so prohibitive, it's the specialty market or nothing; it wouldn't see cultivation in most large farms.

But we do have lots of different cultivars, and it works just fine. Our tomatoes are prettier (just less tasty), no GM there, just plain 'ol breeding. Here is a whole list of new ones:

http://www.lsuagcenter.com/en/lawn_garden/home_gardening/veget ables/home_garden_crops/Newest+Cultivars+of++Vegetable+Crops.htm
None of our wheat is GM. It's really just corn and soy so the meat eaters out there can have cheap and tasty bacon. So where do you get the idea that no one is making new cultivars, or why consumers wouldn't want innovation? They do, and new cultivars are happening all the time. Look at the diversity in your grocery store, you didn't have kiwis before about 20 years ago. Tangelos? Pomelos? Broccoflour? Purple carrots? Texmati rice? No one in the west ate tofu until very long ago...Seriously, we have it pretty good; and GM isn't really part of the story here.

The fact is we have production fields which are essentially monocultures, an efficient way to produce food. That doesn't prevent us from keeping diverse reserves...


I can't wait until we get mangosteens....

Because we are primates who, through a combination of gross overpopulation and all sorts of other factors, are living in an environment of limited resources. without the (entirely human constructed) concept of "rights" we would revert back to murdering and exploiting each other to maximize our share of those resources jsut like what happened when Jane Goodall unintentionally created a banana economy in the group of chimps she was studying and caused warfare between chimp factions that has never been observed before or since.

Oh wait, too late.

What human invented water?

Because a civilized society recognizes the basic human right to life, for which water is essential. This is the same reason you have the right not to be murdered, for example.

Even from a purely utilitarian perspective, a society that doesn't provide the fundamental necessities for survival to its populace is doing more harm than good and will inevitably collapse. It's literally the primary function of society.

Social darwinism demands that in order to ensure the survival of the most humans, social darwinists must be exterminated.

Now you're talkin'!

I'm not sold unless you can find a way to work the evolutionary psychologists into the equation too.

Memedumpster, humans didn't invent water, but it can take effort to dig a well or desalinate sea water.

Ragamuffin, the fact that water is essential to life is irrelevant. I could have a rare cancer that, without expensive medical treatment, will kill me. That doesn't mean that I have a right to have that medical treatment.

Water is a physical resource. The only way to deliver it is with labor. If you have a right to it, then you have a right to other people's labor.

You guys are a bunch of fuckin' commies.

Is not a man entitled to the bottled water of his own brow?

You can be a con artist on this scale without convincing yourself first.

Now they need to release a position statement on words meaning things.

It doesn't matter. Europeans are just naturally predisposed to becoming tyrants. You murder this guy, and three more Europeans will rise to take his place.

Xbox is more fun than defending fundamental human rights.

this guy is shit incarnate, but when I think of angry mobs in a historical context, the first thing that comes to mind isn't exactly "defending fundamental human rights"

I actually thought of Frankenstein's monster burning to death in the windmill.

Starving villagers burning their source of food production to kill the wrong monster. To kill the most victimized by the real monster they will never see or know.

Touche

Wait for the PSAs to start: You wouldn't steal a car! You wouldn't rob a bank! Why would you distill your own water?!

HOME RAINWATER COLLECTION IS KILLING DRINKING

Every time a poor person drinks naturally collected water, it drives up the costs on everyone else.

Fuck you, poors, you fucking ruin all of life.

The sound quality on your water is inferior, due to file compression. Throw your water out and return to vinyl.

You can store more positive vibe data in pulse encoded square waves.

Of course that should be illegal. It's a public resource, belonging to all, not just you!

Until it belongs to HIM, then fuck you and the public.

See how that works? It can be applied to a whole lot of other "commodities," but few seem to make the effort.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjK5d0_Yd8Y

Good God, this scares me.

Water is one of our most precious resources and corporations are ruining our water supply faster than it can be replenished.