Would you be behind a movement to label all foods that contain "Chemicals" with a label that says "Contains Chemicals"?

No, "contains chemicals" doesn't tell me what's in the food.

You may not realize this, but there's already a law that requires food to be labeled for the chemicals that are in it. It's been in place for decades, and somehow, the world hasn't ended and the food companies are still making food and people are still eating.

Have you looked at a package of potato chips recently? Do you think the words "BUTYLATED HYDROXYANISOLE" on the label just got there by magic? Do you think consumers have a right to know that PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED VEGETABLE OIL is in the food they eat? People know that shit is bad for you, but they still eat potato chips. So what exactly is the harm in people knowing whether or not that styrofoam package contains corn that is from a genetically modified organism? What are you so afraid of?

Brother, that's the truth.

Even worse, is that we have works that have been in the public domain, sometimes for decades, and all of a sudden are protected under copyright again. It's a total scam and it's absolutely doing damage to future generations and to culture generally.

Personally, I wan organic food labeled as having been grown in 400-700 nm radiation.

You have the right to make your consumer decisions based on any criterion you want.

But there's no valid decision a consumer could make with a GMO label

You still don't get it. Consumer decisions don't need to be based on "valid information", they just need to be based on true information. It why someone picks a Chevy over a Ford or Kleenex tissue over Puffs. It's preference. If you're selling a product, you don't get to decide for your customers. They get to decide based on whatever criteria they choose. If they think the Kleenex label is better for their needs than a Puffs label, then the only thing that matters is that when they order Kleenex, they get Kleenex and not Puffs. Because they're the ones paying.

If I decide to buy a product made locally instead of a nearly identical one made somewhere else, there might be a whole host of reasons for that decision. But what can't happen in a "free market" is for something to be sold as made in Chicago when it's really made in Dallas, just because the producer believes that the Dallas product is just as good as the one made in Chicago.

It's not GMO-free food (or I guess food with GMOs) that people want, it's the labeling. Since consumers can see what foods are labeled with, they have the information to make a buying decision.

Now you've appointed yourself the person who decides what people want?

We're done here. You don't believe in "free markets" or in people's ability to have agency over the way they spend their money. You've become such a zealot for GMOs that you're prepared to take away that agency in the name of...something.

I cannot have a meaningful discussion with someone who believes people must not have certain information because you don't believe they "need" it. That's not "pro-Science", that's anti-Science.

YMMV, but that's one of the reasons I really like google. For example converting units, what's 53F in C again? I could get a thousand hits that could give me the formula or a conversion table or whatnot but just "searching" for it saves me a step or two. I often use it instead of the built-in calculator just because it's already up. I suppose it could go overboard with Clippy-isms but I haven't felt that has been the case.

Outside. I know particularly the firefighters have complained about poorer coverage inside buildings, which is usually where their life-saving work is done. Details...

Today it's a mix but towards the transition they'll all convert to DAB+, of course that's ditching a couple hundred thousand early adopters of DAB (no plus) radios but hey.. we're a monopoly.

It's rare to find an objective measure where being stupid is a good thing, unless you're the cop who figured out the criminal mastermind's plan and got assassinated or similar corner cases. Even if you're not in a position to excel you're not going fail and I'd argue it's just as much your objective successes like a steady job and organized life that puts you ahead of the deadbeat drifters when it comes to finding a mate, tests show your EQ can suck despite a high IQ.

Obviously the lack of material goods can cause unhappiness, but most of us have the basic needs covered. The rest is pretty much a state of mind, are you happy? I'd be happier eating junk food if I didn't know all the crap it does to my body. I'd enjoy T&A more if I knew it wasn't a biological preference to easy child birth and ample breast feeding. And it certainly doesn't get better if you end up where it doesn't matter because you and everyone you knew will be dead and building a pyramid for a tomb is just stroking your ego.

I generally find my happiest moments are when I'm too preoccupied or suitably intoxicated not to think too much. Just existing in the moment, feeling good, having fun, enjoying the ride, savoring the taste. If you "pierce the veil" more or less and realize you're playing an RPG to get level+1, skills+1, armor+1, weapons+1 to fight monsters+1 or lather, rinse, repeat what used to be fun just loses all interest. I guess you can call it a more general form of suspension of disbelief, the suspension of further intellectual inquiry. If you're happy, stop thinking. You're only going to ruin it.

That doesn't even begin to cover it, many people have an FM radio that they occasionally use for example at cabins or whatever, more than 80% will probably have to replace some radio. And note that they asked for "digital listeners" not "DAB listeners" meaning if you use your smartphone or tablet or PC to listen to radio, you get counted in favor of DAB even though you don't use DAB.

Actually this (Norwegian) is the truth, in 2014 about 64% of the population listened to radio daily and only 19% on DAB. There's no numbers for it but even less exclusively used DAB. I don't have a DAB radio. It sucks for any kind of battery-driven device, meaning just the kind of remote places and mobile appliances where you'd want radio. We'd do better just upgrading so we'd get 3G/4G coverage everywhere rather than DAB.

Nobody else is phasing out FM or even planning to phase out FM. This is just Norway going off on its own crusade urged on by commercial interests of 10+ new channels, fuck whether it makes sense to throw out millions of radios. On the bright side, I expect this to lead to a massive interest in building out 3G/4G coverage as ex-FMers give DAB the middle finger. Streaming with Spotify + offline playlists is likely to be the new "radio".

If you're saying it's a market decision, then the market will work it out, right?

Markets are only efficient when all the parties have good information. And "markets" and "marketing" do not refer to the same thing.

Withholding a specific bit of information that consumers say they want is a sure way to make sure "the market" won't function efficiently.

Do you understand?

It's not like a label "Contains Asbestos" that would signify a clear ingredient with a clear health disadvantage.

I already said that for me, it's not an issue of health. It's a simple consumer decision that includes whether or not I like a company or industry's business practices. In your brave new world, am I allowed to make a decision based on that information or not? Am I allowed to make consumer decisions based on whatever I want or must I stick to your prescribed set of approved parameters?

Putting "GMO" on food would just confuse people even more

Then it's an issue of marketing and consumer education. Not of science, There is no "scientific" reason to withhold a piece of information from a consumer. Maybe it doesn't matter to you, but it matters to upwards of 90% of consumers who are demanding GMO labeling (and over 65% of those people want those labels to be mandated by law).

When did you get appointed the steward of what information people are allowed or not allowed to have?

Does this mean that there will be an influx of unemployed Norwegians with deep voices?

My question is why you're trying to use a legal argument on a topic that should be decided on the scientific basis of the things;

No, no, no. It's not a legal argument, it's not a scientific argument, it's a consumer argument.

Consumers are the ones paying for the product and the label, and they overwhelmingly want to know if there are GMOs in them. If you and the chemical industry believe that GMOs are getting a bad rap, then that's a marketing issue. But strangely, instead of spending the money on marketing, they're spending the money on doing everything they can to keep people from finding out the ineluctable fact that there are GMOs in their food.

GMOs are not the first product that consumers have been skeptical of. But they're the first ones that the industry decided the solution was not better marketing, but rather obfuscation, misdirection and hiding the provenance of their product. Don't you think that's an interesting development?

Mandatory labeling of GMO's is not realy different to what happened during the second world war, when Jews were forced to wear a yellow hand band.

Mister Godwin, I see you raising your hand there in the back. Do you have something to add?

Should we label every scary thing in the future?

You're not paying attention. GMOs should be labeled not because they're scary, but because consumers want to know.

Consumers are the ones paying for every bit of research, every step in the production process. They're the ones paying for the lawyers, they're the ones paying for the lobbyists and they're the ones paying for the labels that are put on the product.

Do you get that? GMOs should be labeled because the people who are paying for them want them to be labeled. Why is that so hard for the waves of GMO supporters who mobilize whenever there is this discussion to understand?

That's the question of a chemical designed to have a pharmacological effect that they didn't know how to properly test at the time.

Oh, I see. That was back when Science didn't know what they were doing, unlike today, when Science never errs (except the thousands of pharmaceutical products that have been taken off the market within a few years of studies showing they were completely safe).

So tell me, what was the year when Science figured everything out?

There is nowhere "Listen and Believe" is used more than in the argument over GMOs.