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Statement that glyphosate "more closely approximates to a perfect herbicide than any other"

How strange that there is an edit war going over this statement, and no one has opened a Talk section on this. Sad. If anybody reads the article from which that quote was taken, you will find plenty of support for the statement there, and elsewhere in the scientific literature. I know that plenty of folks who are opposed to Monsanto and/or GMOs think that glyphosate is just nasty stuff, but anybody familiar with herbicides (from using them, which I have not, or researching them, which I have done) knows that the contested statement is true. The statement compares glyphosate to other herbicides - it is not comparing glyphosate to, say, apples. Even if you eat all organic food and are opposed to the use of all herbicides, this should not effect your view on the validity of a statement comparing herbicides. Looking forward to the discussion! Jytdog ( talk) 11:13, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Agree that the statement, however distasteful, belongs in the article. The problem of buildup in the soil is clearly very serious, and in order to discuss it properly (which this page doesn't yet do), it will be necessary to establish the base of scientific blindness that has caused the lack of adequate regulation that currently allows enormous quantities of glyphosate to continue to be applied. That quote is an excellent reflection of that scientific blindness. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:58, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for discussing! I will be interested to see the sources with respect to the soil buildup - the cited articles and others indicate that glyphosate breaks down pretty quickly in soil. If you want to bring them now in a new section we can start discussing while we wait for the lockdown to run its course. Thanks again! Jytdog ( talk) 14:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
In the section Soil degradation, and effects on micro-organism and worms are citations that say that the glyphosate stays bound in certain types of soil. I'm not sure what the effects of breakdown products might be, and what the effects of other components of Roundup might be. If this page weren't undergoing edit warring, I'd look a bit further to see if there are citations available about any common agricultural practices that cause the soil-bound glyphosate to be released in a large quantity, and what the effects of that might be if it occurred, or whether the bound glyphosate affects plants. However, this edit war is so silly that any effort to produce a properly researched and written article may be pointless. On the other hand, perhaps the animosity and unthinking edits here are due to someone who has a vested interest in Monsanto, and the rest of us giving up is what they want to achieve. The silliness here, I think, goes beyond the general level of thoughtless stupidity that is typical of wikipedia. I'd be interested to know if administrators are able to look into a possible conflict-of-interest of certain editors. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Hi, and thanks for responding! This article is generally pretty stable; I have been working on it for over a year and we have never an edit war/content dispute like what just happened. The folks involved in that have not been active here much in the past. They may of course be in the future! Also, please, please, don't make vague COI accusations. If you identify an editor you are concerned about there are venues to bring that up; such accusations on Talk are not appropriate and just create an icky (yes, icky) environment for everybody to work in. Let's focus on the content, if we may. I do hope you look into the soil retention issue further! Based on what you wrote above I thought you already had sources and were informed on that point. But in any case the article can always use improved NPOV content based on reliable sources. Thanks again. Jytdog ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
References 62 and 63 would be an excellent start to the needed research on soil buildup, but I now see that there are two sections with almost the same title, Soil degradation, and effects on micro-organism and worms, which was probably confusing. So if there were a deliberate attempt to derail the discussion here, we wouldn't be able to discuss that. Anyway, I'll leave this "icky" environment, there's something seriously wrong here, and there seems to be no real hope of me managing to bring a scientific view to the article. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 23:55, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Please don't go it would be great if you would help improve the article! Jytdog ( talk) 00:48, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
The recent deletion would have to be undone first, if consensus can ever be reached ... Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:45, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
I have no idea what this means. Scientific blindness? And what does soil buildup have to do with the the perfection of glyphosate? II | ( t - c) 15:23, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Hi II... a truly perfect herbicide would be extremely toxic to undesirable plants, nontoxic to everything else, and after killing the undesirable plant, would break down immediately into products that are harmless to everything. If glyphosate is retained intact, for a long time in the soil, it would fail that third leg, right? Jytdog ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
I have great trouble with such a sweeping assertion. This is an encyclopaedia not an advertising brochure. How can anyone argue that it is better than ALL others without providing real evidence? And opinion articles in farming journals are not evidence. I use glyphosate myself and consider it to be a useful tool, but not a divine invention. We need to be objective here. Djapa Owen ( talk) 15:33, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
That's what scientists do, they study all the alternatives and come up with a conclusion that product A is better than all of the other products tested. When a spectacular invention comes on the scene, scientists can call it a spectacular invention. A scientific statement that something is a spectacular invention can be picked up and repeated in a farming journal as advice to farmers. It isn't necessarily a partisan opinion. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
OK my marsupial friend, if this is a "scientific opinion", can you point us to the scientific study which has compared glyphosate to ALL alternative herbicides? That would be a huge study to do, and I doubt if even Monsanto would fund it. Djapa Owen ( talk) 01:26, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
Quick question Djapa84 - have you read the source from which the quote is taken? (real question, not rhetorical). Jytdog ( talk) 03:59, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
Indeed, that "mini-review" is a fine source. When glyphosate was developed, people knew what the previously available herbicides were like; it was much less toxic and broke down much faster under the conditions in which it was tested, and was hailed as a great advance. Now this article needs to be updated with information that other test conditions, the results of long-term application to soil and animal-feed crops, and the long-term effects on weeds, may not give such a rosy picture. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:45, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

User:Mark Marathon, User:ImperfectlyInformed, and User:Jusdafax I hope you come and discuss the reasons for the edits you made during edit war you conducted, so when the lockdown is over we can go back to editing productively and collaboratively. I am copying this note to your Talk pages. Thanks! Jytdog ( talk) 14:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

  • Regardless of whether a sophisticated argument can be brought behind the opinion, it is ultimately an opinion, similar to something like 'math is beautiful'. In addition, it is not fleshed out in the body and it is stylistically problematic because we don't write Wikipedia articles as a conglomeration of quotations. II | ( t - c) 15:23, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
    • Well, although arguing with someone who calls themselves Imperfectly Informed might be pointless, here's a couple of points. An opinion can encapsulate a reason for doing something, in this case, a scientific opinion is used to support using glyphosate rather than other herbicides. Using a quote, particularly a short quote such as this one is not a problem, please see Wikipedia:Quotations#General guidelines. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
      "A scientific opinion" is a strange phrase. "A scientist's opinion" is irrelevant when they are doing science - it is their results, their data and their theoretical work that counts. " Scientific opinion" is like 'medical opinion', it is what you get when academies of science or other overarching bodies survey all the available literature and publish a definitive statement about 'settled science'. There is no such thing as "a scientific opinion" and "a scientist's opinion" (e.g. on the weather or on the election) is worth no more than "a journalist's opinion" or "an advertising executive's opinion". -- Nigelj ( talk) 18:27, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Actually, no, the page that you point to about scientific opinion was quite wide of the mark (I've edited it now). Scientific bodies such as the Entomological Society of America exist to help the process of science. To do that, they collect membership fees from scientists and use the money to publish scientific journals, and organize conferences. They rarely, if ever, issue "scientific opinion" statements. Individual scientists offer scientific opinion, and sometimes a scientist who is interviewed might be said to be "the president of the Entomological Society of America", but that is just their credentials, some evidence that other scientists think they are reasonably competent. Believe me, if scientific societies were in the business of offering scientific opinion, no scientist would join the societies (science is about doubting and checking, and never trusting someone else's opinion until you've independently verified that they are probably correct; no scientist would ever trust their society to speak for them!). Scientific papers have several sections, one of which is usually called "Results", and a later one is usually called "Discussion" or "Conclusions". Opinion is often expressed in those later sections. There is also a special type of scientific paper called a review paper. Reference 63 on this page is such a paper, it is written by a single scientist (Ole K. Borggaard), and attempts to find the best possible answer to a scientific question, the title is "Does Phosphate Affect Soil Sorption and Degradation of Glyphosate? - A Review". It contains statements such as "it is an efficient weed killer with favorable environmental and toxicological properties such as very low human and animal toxicity" and (page 23) "However, this conclusion seems not very convincing as it was simply based on significant correlations between the concentrations of glyphosate and dissolved phosphate as well as total phosphorus in the surface runnoff (not leachates) but glyphosate was also correlated with the sediment load (Laitinen et al. 2009)." Those sound like opinions to me, and they are scientific. Also, I'd say that medical opinion is what you get from your doctor; you don't wait for the College of Physicians and Surgeons to review your medical history and decide whether a particular medication is a good choice for you. Individual doctors and individual scientists make up their own minds and advise others according to what they personally think. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 23:55, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Since this quote is clearly attributable to a couple of scientists, could we include something like. "According to Stephen O Duke a notable scientist with the USDA said..." this makes it so the information is still included but more encyclopedic. VViking Talk Edits 00:42, 8 August 2013 (UTC)
(responding to Sminthopsis84 above) I'm happy to hear from someone who is more perfectly informed than I am. ;) You may feel offended that I was confused by your statement above about scientific blindness, and I'm sorry that it was dismissive but I'm still confused by your position. What I'm really looking at here is encyclopedic style and substance. The quotation policy page referred to says this pretty well: "Attribution should be provided in the text of the article, not exclusively in a footnote or citation. A reader should not have to follow a footnote to learn whose words a quote is". Wikipedia policy probably allows for unattributed quotes (despite the language above) but I very rarely see unattributed quotes in technical writing and I know they are fairly rare in Wikipedia. This also reflects my experience when I learned to write in college and was taught not to use unattributed quotes in most cases. The more important point is that saying that a substance is perfect is not substantially informative. If glyphosate has characteristics which make it a particularly good herbicide, say that rather than something which leaves most people scratching their head a bit. If this quote is used (which I continue to strongly oppose), it should only be used in conjunction with a prefacing statement which allows people to understand what it means. II | ( t - c) 00:58, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Since productive discussion is underway, I have removed the protection ahead of time. Please reach consensus before making any likely controversial edits. Thanks! — EncMstr ( talk) 01:55, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Glyphosate v. Roundup

In the course of researching claims of a "broad scientific consensus" on the comparative safety of genetically modified foods, I came across a substantial range of sources that discuss Roundup. These are compiled here. Please see in particular that there are numerous studies distinguishing between Roundup and glyphosate. Indeed, it is other ingredients in Roundup (particularly the surfactant TN-20) which give Roundup its particular toxicity. At minimum this should be discussed at this page. However, I think it warrants an undoing of the merge between Roundup and Glyphosate. Roundup is a substantially different chemical formulation, and furthermore is notable unto itself due to associated media coverage and marketing. I have seen past discussions on the issue and I do agree that care should be taken to avoid editing "Roundup" as if it were "Glyphosate". Aloha, groupuscule ( talk) 19:54, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

  • Support Products should not feature so prominently in an chemical article, at best they are to be discussed in a general fashion. It would be like discussing low-carbon steel, hex-nuts in the iron article. Moreover, there is an abundance of information on Roundup to warrant a separate article. Plasmic Physics ( talk) 23:59, 20 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Support undue of merge, given the above this merge is grossly unencyclopedic. petrarchan47 t c 20:05, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
  • Addendum. Allow me to add that although I disagree with the way that Séralini's work and the Entropy article have been portrayed, those who wish to disregard these studies will find (in the linked report) additional literature reviews and and research that confirm Roundup's toxicity. In particular I would point to
  • Koller VJ, Fürhacker M, Nersesyan A, Mišík M, Eisenbauer M, Knasmueller S., "Cytotoxic and DNA-damaging properties of glyphosate and Roundup in human-derived buccal epithelial cells", Archives of Toxicology (2012).
  • Ho-Yeon Song, Young-Hee Kim, Su-Jin Seok, Hyo-Wook Gil, and Sae-Yong Hong, "In Vitro Cytotoxic Effect of Glyphosate Mixture Containing Surfactants", Journal of Korean Medical Science (2012).
Excerpts from these and still sources available at the report. groupuscule ( talk) 20:12, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Question - you say that "there are numerous studies distinguishing between Roundup and glyphosate". This is comparing apples to oranges. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in dozens of formulations, including several Roundup variations (there is not one "Roundup" either). Do you have data on any of "Accord, Aquaneat, Aquamaster, Bronco, Buccaneer, Campain, Clearout 41 Plus, Clear-up, Expedite, Fallow Master, Genesis Extra I, Glyfos Induce, Glypro, GlyStar Induce, GlyphoMax Induce, Honcho, JuryR, Landmaster, MirageR, Pondmaster, Protocol, Prosecutor, Ranger, Rascal, Rattler, Razor Pro, Rodeo, Roundup, I, Roundup Pro Concentrate, Roundup UltraMax, Roundup WeatherMax, Silhouette, Touchdown" as is cited in the article? These are the things to compare to one another. Glyphosate is never used alone - always in a formulation as listed above. Glyphosate itself is a member of the class of herbicides called EPSPS inhibitors; other classes include ACCase inhibitors, ALS inhibitors, etc etc. It is relevant to compare active ingredients to one another - see Herbicide#Classification for more information on that. Jytdog ( talk) 22:43, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Also, this article makes it very very clear that glyphosate is the active ingredient in many formulations, and that Roundup is one of them. There are separate sections already for toxicity due to glyphosate alone, and for glyphosate in formulation (the way it is actually used). It is unclear to me what big surprise you are finding here.. can you explain a bit more? Thanks Jytdog ( talk) 23:05, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Numerous studies find that Roundup is more toxic than glyphosate alone. This and other reasons suggest a separate article on Roundup. Some of these other glyphosate-based herbicides may also deserve their own articles. I have read elsewhere that DynCorp routinely sprays a product called "Roundup Ultra" on the Colombian countryside via helicopter. I can only speculate on whether "Roundup Ultra" is more or less toxic than "Roundup". groupuscule ( talk) 00:04, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
It is absolutely true that glyphosate in formulation is more toxic than glyphosate alone! No news there, and the article says this already. There used to be an article on Roundup, and it was about 80% overlapping with the article on glyphosate. When I did the merge, I brought over all the information, including all the negative information that was sourced as per Wiki policies and guidelines. You can check that. It makes no sense to have a separate Roundup article. What would be truly awesome and helpful to Wikipedia's readers, is more content in this article on the various adjuvants and other surfactants that are used to create formulations of glyphosate so that Wikipedia reflects how glyphosate is used in the real world. I created specific tags asking for help with that. Jytdog ( talk) 00:11, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

One way this could be done, and it'd be my preference, would be to start to develop the product-specific information in this article and see if the content for any one product does need to be broken off into its own article. I'd guess that there might be enough non-glyphosate-specific information available about Roundup in particular, like society and culture information, sales history, Roundup and Roundup-ready crops, critical reaction, and the various formulations available, that might warrant having a separate article for that product. In breaking off Roundup to its own article, there should be a brief summary of the glyphosate ingredient with a link back here. The important thing would be to avoid having too much duplication about the details of glyphosate between the two articles. It might be the case that all the other knock-off brands would not warrant their own articles. Another way to do this would be to leave glyphosate to focus on just that one ingredient and then to create a new article, something along the lines of Glyphosate-based herbicides, and put all the products there. Just some suggestions. Zad 68 03:09, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

This is a reasonable suggestion to me. The way I tried to struture this article's toxicity discussion is in three sections: 1) glyphosate alone; 2) additives alone; 3) formulations. It takes careful reading of the sources to tease this all out.. and the work as it stands is still imperfect. Jytdog ( talk) 10:50, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Split / Unmerge proposal pending on old Roundup talk page.

hey folks an unmerge proposal has opened on the former Roundup page, with no notice placed here.. here is the discussion Talk:Roundup_(herbicide)#RfC:_Un-merge_from_Glyphosate.3F Jytdog ( talk) 00:17, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Issue with the Toxicity section

The Toxicity section is divided into Glyphosate toxicity, Additive toxicity and Formulation toxicity; a reasonable division at first sight. However, I'm not clear that it works. For example, the Glyphosate toxicity section says "Acute fatal toxicity has been reported in deliberate overdose.[2 refs] Epidemiological studies have not found associations between long term low level exposure to glyphosate and any disease.[3 refs]" However, the two sources used for deliberate overdose both specify that it's a formulation that has been taken. Also it's hard to see that any epidemiological study can distinguish between exposure to glyphosate alone, the added agent(s) in the formulation, and the combination. Thus the Mink et al. (2012) paper used as a source explicitly notes the need for better recording of the formulation. Are there studies which relate to glyphosate-only toxicity in humans? If not, this subsection should be merged into Formulation toxicity. Peter coxhead ( talk) 15:27, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

You are dead on accurate with respect to background, but I don't agree with your solution. I set up the sections logically, and went looking for sources for each. And I had a very hard time. Mink is dead on - many of the academic papers are fatally sloppy with respect to naming what formulation of glyphosate they use, when they use one (they often say "Roundup" but that is all, and there are many versions of Roundup), and they often sloppily switch between discussing glyphosate per se and discussing whatever formulation they used. I think the subsesction division should stay. I agree with you that content should be moved around (e.g. the statement you quote about fatal poisoning with glyphosate formulations, should not be in the glyphosate-alone section - that is a great call). But the article should have separate tox sections for each thing (active agent, additives, and formulations). This is something I have been meaning to get back to and put more work into, which I think is going to require a bunch of library work. Finally, I don't understand why you are focusing on epidemiological studies -- those are useful, but tox studies are typically done in vitro, by toxicologists, using toxicological experimental designs, methods, and standards. Right? Those are the studies we really need for these sections. Jytdog ( talk) 15:55, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
Note that I said if in my last sentence above. I agree entirely as to what is needed; I'm just not sure whether enough will be left if you move the acute fatal toxicity and the epidemiological material. Peter coxhead ( talk) 17:29, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
Sounds like we are on the same page - lots of work to do on these section! Thanks for talking. Jytdog ( talk) 17:46, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

just went source hunting - leaving here for content-building tomorrow or thereafter:

deletion of content about worms

Hi User:Gandydancer - nice set of edits you are making, thanks. Only objection I have is that you deleted the content about worms. People who study soils, and the "health" of soil, care a lot about the ecosystem in soils; this is one of the big concerns of the organic movement, too. Worms are a key player in those ecosystems; hence the content about the effect of glyphosate and formulations on worms. I thought it was worthwhile to include; you've taken it out.... Jytdog ( talk) 19:43, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Sorry--I guess I missed the mention of worms. I didn't see it and deleted it from the heading. I'll revert my edit. Gandydancer ( talk) 20:37, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
The worms content, that had been in that section, was deleted in one of your edits yesterday. this one i think.. Jytdog ( talk) 20:53, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
OK, I fixed it. Now I remember why I ended up just deleting the whole thing. For one thing it was so old and a single study and for another, as written it is hard to follow. I can't find the studies that refute the earlier worm study. Could you please give links? Thanks. Gandydancer ( talk) 22:07, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
Just briefly, I had no special issues with you deleting the worm content - I did want to make sure you understood why it was there. The link you request is right there in the article. The current paragraph says:

A laboratory study published in 1992 indicated that glyphosate formulations could harm earthworms(ref) 1992 Springett JA, Gray RAJ (/ref) and beneficial insects.(ref)omitted(/ref) However, the reported effect of glyphosate on earthworms has been criticized.(ref name=Giesy2000 /) The results conflict with results from field studies where no effects were noted for the number of nematodes, mites, or springtails after treatment with Roundup at 2 kilograms active ingredient per hectare.(ref)1989 Preston & Trofymow(/ref)

The key source is the very excellent Giesy 2000 book. If you look at it page 77] (I have added the page ref to the article) you will see that they criticize the 1992 study by Springett and Gray for too small an N to mean anything, and for not characterizing what they did. Jytdog ( talk) 22:27, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

OK, I am well aware of the importance of healthy soil and I am aware that others are as well... I removed the studies because they were old, they were poorly done, and they were single studies (and one was in French...). It seems odd to me that we would spend so much article space on refuting two lone, old studies. ...I will not be reading the 25-year old Caranation Creek book-length report. That said, I don't mind including the info if you believe it to be important. Gandydancer ( talk) 23:00, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
It is one page in the carnation book, as I mentioned. Glad that you aware of why worms matter; sorry for telling you something you already knew. If you want to delete the content, have at it, but I just wanted to note why it was there and why people might want to see it. Jytdog ( talk) 23:13, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

tox reviews

User:Gandydancer requested I list " reviews on toxicity of glyphosate per se; some reviews on adjuvants/additives, and some on formulations... Specifically, I meant effects on fish and amphibians". When I agreed, I didn't especially have fish and amphibians in mind. But here is a list

Glyphosate alone:

specific additives (pretty much just POEA

formulations

still underway.. Jytdog ( talk) 23:26, 6 September 2013 (UTC) (added more Jytdog ( talk) 15:52, 7 September 2013 (UTC))

Newer health study

http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/15/4/1416/pdf This newer study seems to list human health effects that should be included.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 20:32, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

This source was discussed in the MEDRS board, and was rejected as being not reliable for any health-related content: here. Jytdog ( talk) 21:05, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
MEDRS looks like another crap excuse to censor negative material from our readers. We should include if for our readers but could qualify the inclusion with counter points.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 09:25, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

NYT article and study

New York Times, another study.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 20:40, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

MIT studies

http://people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/

Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 22:41, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Discussed and dismissed here and elsewhere. Jytdog ( talk) 00:45, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. I didn't know. I encountered the study via an Unwelcome Guests episode. The remark at that page which says "...Witness, for example, the fact that the Wikipedia glyphosate is actively policed...." prompted me to post here. Many thanks. Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 08:26, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
You are welcome! oo that sitepage is looney birds. Jytdog ( talk) 23:55, 10 November 2013 (UTC) (restricting comment to page; i know nothing about the site in general Jytdog ( talk) 01:19, 11 November 2013 (UTC))
I appreciate your view. It will make me seriously question the credibility of other episodes. Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 03:20, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Split

A proposal was made to undo the merge of Roundup and Glyphosate and split them; the discussion is here; Talk:Roundup_(herbicide)#RfC:_Un-merge_from_Glyphosate.3F. It was closed in early October 2013; the closer indicated that a split is appropriate. Nobody has done it yet. I removed the split tag since the discussion is long over. Jytdog ( talk) 13:54, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

cereal bars content

today User:Jfortier added the following content in this dif, with edit note " add recent information": "New evidence, however, suggests that Glyphosate residues persist into the food chain. Cereal bars tested in 2012 were found to contain glyphosate at levels approaching 100% "Harmful weedkiller in your bread and cereal bars \ author = Andrew Wasley I". Backgrounder. The Ecologist. 2013-31-12. {{ cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= ( help); Missing pipe in: |title= ( help)" (ref markup removed)

I reverted in this dif with edit note "revert content based on source noncompliant with WP:MEDRS (even the scientific study is a primary source; not valid to generate content from it)" That is enough a basis, but I also wanted to note that the content itself doesn't reflect the source nor does it make sense, where it says "were found to contain glyphosate at levels approaching 100%". I don't know what that means. The source says "According to GM Freeze, 100% of the Jordans cereal bars tested were found to contain glyphosate. The group also says that at least 85% of tested products made by Warburtons – the well known bread company – contained traces of the herbicide." So if the "at levels approaching 100%" is referring to what percentage of samples tested contained glyphosate residues, the proposed wikipedia content is not accurate. (it could also be read to mean, bizarrely, that each sample was composed of 100% glyphosate, which really makes no sense) More importantly, the source says "The weedkiller residues were present in small quantities - between 0.1 and 0.8 mg/kg. This is well below the permitted EU maximum residue levels (MRLs) for cereal crops, which currently span 10 - 20 mg/kg." Everybody knows that food contains glyphosate residues; that is the reason that regulators establish legal limits for trace amounts in food, in the first place. And indeed the amounts found are below the legal limits. So this study says nothing that is new or interesting, in any case. But it does provide the opportunity for the authors of the Ecologist to bring up the already discredited Seneff publications, once again. argh. Jytdog ( talk) 15:55, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Alternative herbicides

Two points:

1) Why does this section exist in an article about Glyphosate? Do we have sections on alternative treatments in drug articles? Or alternatives to household electricity in that article? What is the reader who is interested in Glyphosate expected to glean from this material? It seems completely inappropriate.

2) In what sense are these alternatives. Glyphosate is a broad spectrum, highly translocatable systemic. Both 2,4-D and Dicamba only work on broad leaf plants and both, but especially 2,4-D, have limited translocation ability. I find it hard to believe that anybody has ever suggested them as alternatives to glyphosate. Of the references given, one does not use the word Glyphosate anywhere that I can find, and the other notes specifically that "These additional practices add cost to the production system. Often, there are no effective herbicides that are easily available..." and that "This provides “unique” tools for managing our current list of herbicide-resistant weeds". It then goes on to list a host problems associated with Dicamba and not Glyphosate, including off-site movement and the need for application during early season growth periods, specific spray patterns and so forth. IOW these are not alternatives to Glyphosate, but unique treatment regimes used where Glyphosate is not an option. It's only an alternative in the sense that amputation is an alternative to penicillin. Sure, they both cure infection, but nobody considers one an alternative to the other.

So, can anyone find reliable sources touting these substances as alternatives to Glyphosate, rather than herbicides to be sued where Glyphosate is specifically not an option? IF not I'm inclined to remove the section as original research and for a lack of notability. Mark Marathon ( talk) 22:55, 13 January 2014 (UTC)


To answer your first question, I don't know (although if we searched the archives we could probably find out). I think the following questions are not real questions, but rather are rhetorical, so I will ignore them. I don't know that we need to rely on OR or notability to exclude this section; I think we can just say that the section is outside the scope of the article. I am fine with deleting it. Jytdog ( talk) 23:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I suggest we give it 24 hours for others to respond, then turf it. Mark Marathon ( talk) 23:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Weed resistance

<< A 2012 study found that over the 16 year period since genetically modified crops were introduced, "herbicide-resistant crop technology has led to a 239 million kilogram (527 million pound) increase in herbicide use in the United States between 1996 and 2011, while Bt crops have reduced insecticide applications by 56 million kilograms (123 million pounds)"[124] Bt crops have been genetically engineered to express a protein from Bacillus thuringiensis, which kills certain insects. This study's results, however, are contradicted by another study published in 2013, which reported that the adoption of GM technology "has reduced pesticide spraying by 474 million kg..."[125] >>

Seems that "increase in herbicide use" in one research is compared to "reduced pesticide spraying" in another research. Herbicides and pesticides are two different things, am I right? This section should be improved with more facts and more references to research. I am not specialist in this, please help!

87.110.179.146 ( talk) 11:12, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

fixed Jytdog ( talk) 13:14, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

CKDu - Chronic Kidney Disease unknown cause

It looks like there's a reasonably persuasive argument that glyphosate when used in paddy fields and similar situations causes fatal kidney disease:

http://rt.com/news/monsanto-roundup-kidney-disease-921/

Basically, the farmers are splashing it around and standing up to their knees in it, and drinking the run-off into aquifers as well. It's not immediately toxic, but it looks like the chemical is reacting with metal ions and eventually taking out the kidneys.

There's been huge number of deaths.

I'm somewhat reluctant to add it right now though, RT is not the most unbiased source (similar reliability to Fox news I guess). There were earlier stories on the BBC website about this disease, but they didn't mention glyphosate by name.

What do other people think? GliderMaven ( talk) 16:21, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Seems legitimate. I found some other sources [1] [2] as well. GliderMaven ( talk) 17:16, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
Need a MEDRS compliant source. Primary research findings are not sufficient. Despite its name, the description of the GMAO and its activities on its website indicates that it is an advocacy group. Formerly 98 ( talk) 17:25, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Here is the article that the press is writing about. The authors write "Here, we have hypothesized the association of using glyphosate, the most widely used herbicide in the disease endemic area and its unique metal chelating properties" There is no data in the paper nor is there a review of other papers with data. This is noodling - armchair biology. we do not include such things in wikipedia at all as per WP:CRYSTALBALL. definitely does not pass WP:MEDRS. sheesh. Jytdog ( talk) 19:09, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Weed captions

I was trying to tie the captions in to the article because Some readers look at the pictures and captions first before diving into an intimidating amount of text. Formerly 98 reverted this work because I had also added a new picture and that was considered WP:UNDUE. No argument with that but if 5 of 9 pictures is undue, perhaps 4 of 9 is also?

How about we take the sub-headings out of the section and discuss different plants in different paragraphs and include a gallery of the plants somewhere in the section? ~ KvnG 14:54, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

it is important that we don't misrepresent anything. if you have no information that the actual picture is of an actual glyphosate-resistant plant, it is bogus to insert that information into the caption. way out of bounds. Jytdog ( talk) 15:04, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
If you read carefully, you'll see that my captions did not actually say the resistant variants were pictured. I appreciate that a reader might assume that they are but it is an exaggeration to say this is "way out of bounds" as it is my understanding that the resistant varieties are not visually distinguished from the normal ones. ~ KvnG 15:46, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
the caption said "A glyphosate resistant variant of Palmer amaranth, commonly known as pigweed, is now widespread in the southeastern United States." yep. you are right, it was an exaggeration. sorry about that. Jytdog ( talk) 16:11, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
I don't mind the captions per se, I just don't think we should make this article redundant with the existing "Pesticide Resistance" article. Of course there is glyphosate resistance, just as there is resistance to every other widely used pesticide.
If there were some aspect of glyphosate resistance that was uniquely harmful or rapidly developing relative to resistance to other pesticides, I could understand the emphasis. But we don't have pictures of methoprene-resistant mosquitos on the methoprene page, nor is it easy for me to see how such pictures add anything. As user:Jytdog has pointed out, you can't look at these pictures and tell whether the plant is glyphosate resistant or not. So why add them other than to create the impression that this product is not useful or that resistance to this pesticide develops in a uniquely rapid manner? It wouldn't be the most widely used pesticide in the US if it were not considered useful by farmers, and if resistance development is unusually rapid, it would be better to find a reference that states that.
With respect to breaking this out into subsections by resistant species, my question would be: What additional value does a comprehensive listing of observations of geographies and types of weeds in which resistance development has been observed add other than implying without a suitable reference that resistance to this particular pesticide is unusually insidious or rapidly developing? And if the ramifications of glyphosate resistance are not substantially different from those of other pesticides, isn't a deep dive into resistance in this article just a WP:REDUNDANTFORK? Wikipedia articles are supposed to be summaries and not comprehensive reviews. If the article briefly summarizes the benefits, and then gives a comprehensive listing of every observation of resistance, the result is unbalanced.
I'm not saying that resistance should not be discussed in the article, but there is a happy medium and I think we are moving beyond it. Thanks Formerly 98 ( talk) 16:14, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
My proposal included removal of the subsection headings. This would allow us to make the section shorter and would give it more appropriate weighting when you read the TOC. I'm OK with removing the pictures entirely if that's the consensus; they're only one click away in the linked articles about each weed. My modest edits were an attempt to improve what was already there. I seem to have stepped into something larger. ~ KvnG 21:18, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

expansion tags

glyphosate is the active ingredient in many formulations. it has been off-patent in the US for 14 years now (and even longer outside the US), and there are many many formulations on the market. Chinese companies produce the majority of glyphosate today; the market place is very complex (sees this for some flavor). We have almost no information about these other formulations. Another issue is the additives that are in all these different formulations. Glyphosate formulations are much more toxic than glyphosate itself, and it is the formulations that are actually used in the real world, and are the actual source of toxic effects. This article is incomplete without discussion of the various additives that are used and what their toxicities are. so, that is why the tags are there. Jytdog ( talk) 17:05, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

What references exactly state that the toxicity of glyphosate formulations is much greater than glyphosate itself? If these references exist and meet MEDRS standards, the discussion on this page should be limited to the formulations and not to the additives themselves as the article is about glyphosate, not Roundup. POEA, for example, has its own article.
The only MEDRS compliant reference of POEA I am aware of are here, and it states the opposite of what you are asserting. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122, http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/glyphotech.pdf. None appear to reach the conclusion you have stated.
Lastly, by my count, about 20% of the articles is already dedicated to formulation toxicity. What would you consider appropriate weighting? 50%? I would regard any claim that the EPA and its European equivalent have approved highly toxic mixtures that are harmful to human health as an extraordinary claim requiring very strong references. Strong indeed if we are going to dedicate half of the article to the claim.
There are not "hundreds" of adjuvants for glyphosate as stated in the current version of the article. The link takes you to a page that shows manufacturers, and if you order the list alphabetically, you will see that many of these "adjuvants" are mixtures, and that the exact same mixture or very similar mixtures are made by multiple companies. The Pesticide Action Network lists the most commonly used ones here, calling compounds like glycerin (a component of most skin lotions with an LD50 of several grams per kg) "toxic". As a chemist, I am familiar with most of the compounds on the list, and if you take the time and trouble to go look them up, you'll find that the toxicities that PAN refers to are at superhuman doses. http://www.panap.net/sites/default/files/monograph_glyphosate.pdf. There is a simple reason to stick with a limited set of adjuvants: inert ingredients are regulated by both the EPA and the FDA. http://www2.epa.gov/pesticide-registration/pesticide-registration-manual-chapter-8-inert-ingredients#regulation. Formerly 98 ( talk) 18:31, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
This is a little exhausting as these issues have been discussed extensively on this page and others. Glyphosate itself has no known targets in humans - it hits an enzyme found in some plants and lower organisms. (there is some discussion of it as an "endocrine disruptor" but there is no known mechanism or target by which it could do that). Formulations, on the other hand, contain surfactants (for example), and as anybody familiar with biology knows, if you dump detergent on a cell, you will kill it. So formulations are generally much more toxic than glyphosate itself. I will dig up the refs tonight. btw, there used to be a separate article on Roundup but I merged them, with consensus at the time, something like a year ago. Some folks opened an RfC to unmerge them a few months ago, which ended with a determination to do an unmerge. However, no one has done it yet. I don't intend to do it, as keeping them merged makes the most sense to me. Two reasons: a) the articles overlapped about 80%, and b) i don't see a reason why there should be an article on roundup and not on the other formulations. Maybe an article on glyphosate formulations would make sense, but that should grow organically out of this one, and right now sections on formulations are thin and need expansion even here. Jytdog ( talk) 19:52, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
but please update the article to fix any flaws! your chemistry knowledge is super valuable. thx Jytdog ( talk) 19:55, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
You had the misfortune to catch me on a cranky day, but if this has been discussed extensively already I will defer to the decision already made. Formerly 98 ( talk) 20:02, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
sorry i am a little cranky too and i didn't intend at all to wave you off. does what i wrote above make sense? i really do think the article could use your expertise. Jytdog ( talk) 20:29, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
I thought what you said was fine. And I'm still a little exhausted by the paracetamol discussion where we went on for 8000 words to craft 2 sentences. So right now I'm just not real anxious to take on something that has stirred a lot of discussion in the past. Maybe next month. For now I'll continue to look at other aspects of the article where any disagreements that come up can hopefully be rapidly resolved on the MEDRS board. Formerly 98 ( talk) 21:02, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

 :) Jytdog ( talk) 21:26, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Concerns regarding some recent edits

I am concerned that some recent edits appear to delete information that may be seen as negative and replace it with more positive information. For instance this recently added information related to a recent review:

According to the authors, the use of glyphosate-based pesticides cannot be considered the major cause of amphibian decline, the bulk of which occurred prior to the widespread use of glyphosate or in pristine tropical areas with minimal glyphosate exposure. The authors recommended further study of species- and development-stage chronic toxicity, of environmental glyphosate levels, and ongoing analysis of data relevant to determining what if any role glyphosate might be playing in worldwide amphibian decline, and suggest including amphibians in standardized test batteries.[87]

Using this summary: " Solomon article - pulled more representative quotes from paper". All of the previous information was deleted. I'll quote the previous information.

According to the authors, because little is known about environmental concentrations of glyphosate in amphibian habitats and virtually nothing is known about environmental concentrations of the substances added to the herbicide formulations, if and how glyphosate-based herbicides contribute to amphibian decline is not yet answerable due to missing data on how natural populations are affected. They concluded that the impact on amphibians depends on the herbicide formulation with different sensitivity of taxa and life stages while effects on development of larvae are seen as the most sensitive endpoints to study. The authors recommend "better monitoring of both amphibian populations and contamination of habitats with glyphosate-based herbicides, not just glyphosate," and suggest including amphibians in standardized test batteries.

I am wondering why the editor would suggest that his/her edit was superior to the previous information. In suggesting that his/her decision to include information from the article that they thought was a good summation rather than the abstract of the researchers that wrote the review, couldn't it be reasonable to conclude that this editor rather than the researchers had done the review, or in other words, OR?

Gandy, you are correct. I completely blew this, seeing it through the lens of other material in which I had checked the statements made in the article against the cited source and found that the sources violated WP:MEDRS or simply mischaracterized the content of the cited reference For example:
* POEA is highly toxic to humans" - supported only by reference to in vitro studies, which is a violation of MEDRS. If its really "highly toxic", how is it that people routinely survive drinking 50 mL of or more of the undiluted product?
* "Research has shown that Roundup is teratogenic in animals" - supported only by two papers that describe the teratogenic properties of a completely different compound. Seriously.
* As you can see from my edits, there was a lot of other material that I found very questionable, mostly due to sourcing, but in some cases due to notability. Is it really notable that 5 years ago a French environmentalist group accused Monsanto of lying to regulatory authorities about the ingredients in its formulation given that no confirmation of this allegation has come to light in the ensuring 5 years? Surely regulatory authorities in France have access to a modern analytical chemistry laboratory and can follow up on such allegations.
But as for the amphibians article, you are completely correct. I looked up the rather lengthy article and read it for myself, but my interpretation of the author's intentions in this particular case was so far off that I failed to recognize that the text I replaced was a nearly verbatim quote of the article abstract. As such, it is a copyright violation, and cannot be restored. Let's work on finding some language that captures the authors intent better than I did without violating the copyright. Formerly 98 ( talk) 18:37, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
Yes, it is an obvious copyvio--the editor just copied the abstract. In the same section, in this sentence, "Glyphosate formulations are much more toxic for amphibians...", you removed the word "much"--why did you do that? Gandydancer ( talk) 11:53, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
The statement was originally supported by four references, three of which were primary and of dubious relevance. The fourth was to a book, and cited a 90 page section in which I could not find support for the word "much". I believe this is the point at which I deleted the adjective. The current version of the article supports the statement with a better reference that I added on March 10 as the result of a search for better references on the issue of formulation toxicity. The new reference clearly does support the adjective, which is something that I did not notice at the time, so I've re-added the word "much". Formerly 98 ( talk) 13:35, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/06/14/groundbreaking-study-links-monsantos-glyphosate-to-cancer/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.157.147.2 ( talk) 20:00, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Nope, that's exactly the sort of primary, in vitro research that MEDRS forbids, because so much primary research is not reproducible, especially primary research published in politically contentious fields. Formerly 98 ( talk) 00:09, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Entropy article (again)

Today in these edits, User:Timpo added content based on the Entropy article. As mentioned above, this article has been examined on the MEDRS board and found not acceptable for use in supporting any content in Wikipedia. See Wikipedia_talk:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)/Archive_7#Review_of_Monsanto.27s_Roundup_herbicide. Jytdog ( talk) 14:03, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

This is not simply a newspaper article, and Entropy (journal) I think is is a respected scientific publisher- unless someone knows different? My insertion deliberately fudged the claim thus Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff argue that...may be implicated... My second reference is to that complete scientific paper which has been peer reviewed ( Open access PDF 48 pages with 286 references]) Monsanto is a Big Pharma American corporation and Roundup is one of their big successes - so they might be be alarmed if a Wikipedia article were to suggest a speculative line of enquiry which could at some later time become reliable?
Unfortunately many universities in the USA rely heavily on sponsorship, so academics working in the field of Genetically modified organisms may be implicitly subject to profound commercial information management forces even though there may not have an explicit and personal Conflict of Interest or any direct connection with associated corporate entities
Regrettably, because Lobbying in the United States is mature and effective in exploiting the rather weak (one year - eludable) revolving door (politics) it is becoming increasingly hard (for me, and seemingly for many outside the US) to trust in the impartiality of US based science or scientists. Were that it was not so, but I think we have a duty to insult our friends? Timpo ( talk) 16:31, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
If you have concerns about COI, please bring them to COIN. Talk is not the place for that. Nor is it the place for WP:SOAPBOX either. Let's use the Talk page as it is intended discuss content and sources. Would you please review the discussion of the source at the MEDRS Talk page and respond. Thanks. 16:44, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Would like to know more about this citing article which seems confirmatory. I am unwilling to exclude the possibility that there is a negative reputation influence which makes publishing in off-topic journals more likely for this work. I would ask for the opinion of @ Jmh649: as a trusted generalist (and also ask him how the the request for pre-registered studies from Medline/Pubmed approval went when he visited NIH?) 109.70.142.36 ( talk) 02:59, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

With respect to the "confirmatory" article, it is a primary source. We do not base any Wikipedia content on primary sources as per WP:PSTS and especially with regard to health-related content, we do not generate content based on primary sources communicating results of in vitro studies as per WP:MEDRS. I cannot imagine that DocJames would say differently. Jytdog ( talk) 07:52, 27 December 2013 (UTC)
Does the statement that "Glyphosate has an antimicrobial effect on intestinal microorganisms" appear in the literature review section of that article, and if so, is it secondary? EllenCT ( talk) 15:44, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
The intro says "Recently, it has been proposed that glyphosate may be a significant factor in the observed increased risk to Clostridium botulinum infection in cattle in Germany over the past 10–15 years (Krüger et al., 2013). Glyphosates toxicity to Enterococcus spp. leads to an imbalance in the gut favoring overgrowth of Clostridium spp. ( Krüger et al., 2013 and Shehata et al., 2013a) because common beneficial bacterium, Enterococcus spp. suppresses Clostridium (Shehata et al., 2013b)." In my opinion information that we present about health in Wikipedia should be based on secondary sources that are established opinion; it is very dangerous to put health information into articles based on primary studies as many primary studies turn out not to be replicable. Jytdog ( talk) 18:23, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
I see. Thank you. How long does it usually take MEDRS sources to appear when multiple primaries agree? EllenCT ( talk) 23:59, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
Not predictable... science sometimes leaps and sometimes it crawls. And I hope you are not leaping from the paragraph I quoted above to a belief that glyphosate is affecting the bacteria in your intestines! (toxicology is much more complex than that) Jytdog ( talk) 00:35, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
Indeed, feedlot cattle have fewer diseases than free-range pasture-fed. I would love to know why you think that is? The extent to which we depend on antibiotics is a monoculture risk, just like the extent on which we depend on a lack of diversity in pesticides. I'm not seeing much clear leadership on monoculture issues from multinational conglomerates borne in the modern mergers-and-acquisitions quarterly balance sheet shortsightedness, especially in terms of willingness to abuse monopoly positions, which we are often reminded of in the press. EllenCT ( talk) 04:03, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

You lost me. Jytdog ( talk) 07:04, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I'll explain later. I am upset about a political lynching on WP:ANI at the moment. EllenCT ( talk) 07:30, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Further reading:

Cheers, 193.5.216.100 ( talk) 15:09, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Three relevant papers worth looking at

I do not have time right now to dissect these papers and work out what might be worth adding to this article. Perhaps another editor might? Djapa Owen ( talk) 13:23, 18 May 2014 (UTC) Major Pesticides Are More Toxic to Human Cells Than Their Declared Active Principles Glyphosate induces human breast cancer cells growth via estrogen receptors. [http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/roundup-herbicide-125-times-more-toxic-regulators-say Roundup Herbicide 125 Times More Toxic Than Regulators Say]

Please review WP:MEDRS None of these are reliable sources for medical information. MEDRS requires secondary sources (non-news media), and emphasizes that cell culture data is insufficient to make direct or implied claims about human health effects. Formerly 98 ( talk) 13:47, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
Are you suggesting National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine is a news media organisation?
We should not make direct or implied claims based on cell culture data then. Maybe just report the cell culture data? Djapa Owen ( talk) 14:21, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
No, NCBI is not a news source, but it isn't the article source either. Its just a government site that indexes and provides free access to certain published scientific papers. The public library that provides online access to NYTimes articles isn't the source for news stories either. Its just a distribution node. The source is the journal or newspaper the article was published in.
The first two articles deal with cell culture results and are primary research citations. MEDRS explicitly states that "Primary sources should generally not be used for medical content." and "A reason to avoid primary sources in the biomedical field—especially papers reporting results of in vitro experiments—is that they are often not replicable[2] and are therefore unsuitable for use in generating encyclopedic, reliable content about health."
The third article is from an quasi new site that does not even meet the standards of mainstream news media. Regarding the latter, MEDRS states "The popular press is generally not a reliable source for scientific and medical information in articles. Most medical news articles fail to discuss important issues such as evidence quality,[18] costs, and risks versus benefits,[19] and news articles too often convey wrong or misleading information about health care." This site contains almost exclusively articles that are far outside medical mainstream thinking, with titles like "Why the Press shouldn't discount vaccine skeptics", "Should Wheat be reclassified as a pathogen?", and "28 signs that the Western US is being absolutely fried with nuclear radiation from Fukushima".
The only possible purpose for quoting cell culture data in this article (if you found a secondary source) would be to make implied statements about human health, as obviously very few of our readers are concerned with the well-being of cultured cells. If this were an article on maintaining cell culture specimens, the cell culture data would be of interest in its own right irrespective of any implied statements about effects on human health. But its clearly not.

Formerly 98 ( talk) 14:43, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

Hi Djapa, you are clearly well intentioned, but you also clearly don't understand biomedical literature. None of these are published by "National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine" - that is just an indexing service. The key message of MEDRS is that any health-related information in Wikipedia needs to come from a) a review article published in the biomedical literature (ideally a critical review, something like what Cochrane puts out; or b) statements by major medical or scientific bodies. The first two sources you brought are primary sources, and everything in Wikipedia should be based on secondary sources (see WP:OR and WP:RS), and this is even more important for health related information (see WP:MEDRS, please do read MEDRS). The third source is just a news report, from a partisan source at that, about the first one. And MEDRS is clear that news reports that come out when primary sources are published are not reliable either. I hope that makes sense. Jytdog ( talk) 14:46, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

New article in HuffPo

New article in HuffPo: [3]. Leaving it here for anyone's use in the article. Softlavender ( talk) 00:10, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

so sad. Jytdog ( talk) 00:20, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Controversy missing

The use of GMO roundup ready crops is hotly debated in societies worldwide ie: labeling laws, yet this article fails to mention any debate. Anyone against adding the social side? Dougmcdonell ( talk) 14:26, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Not missing. See the bottom section on GM crops and the link there to Genetically modified food controversies. The topic is very well covered in that article! Jytdog ( talk) 14:48, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Use

I would like us to explain how best to use it. Roundup says to apply when weeds are "actively growing". This, in my experience is not just not-dormant-in-winter. This means that, say stinging nettles are green and nominally growing in the summer, but you have to cut them down and let them regrow if you want them to be "actively growing" enough to die from Glyphosate- hence Roundup's reference to Spring. Can't find any references to this but the proffesionals know this.

IceDragon64 ( talk) 10:34, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Rio Cuarto Studies

There are several studies relating the use of Glyphosate to cancer and other deceases, which should be mentioned in the article. The latest coming from Argentina, a 8 year study strongly relating its use with genetic damage. [4] [5] [6] Mariano( t/ c) 11:10, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

thanks for wanting to improve the article! however we don't use news media reports to source anything health-related in Wikipedia, nor do we use original scientific publications. This is explained in our guideline for health related content, WP:MEDRS. There are no acceptable sources that say that glyphosate causes cancer; that is why it is not discussed in this article. I do know that there are a lot of sensational websites out there that make all kinds of scary claims; we are careful to include only reliable information in Wikipedia. btw, here is the most recent review on glyphosate toxicity: PMID  23480780. Jytdog ( talk) 12:09, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Jytdog. Added that to the toxicity section. Appreciate any feedback. Lfstevens ( talk) 06:52, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

History: Invention by Henry Martin in Switzerland

Glyhosate was invented by Swiss chemist Henry Martin for Swiss compnay Cilag. In 1959, Swiss company Cilag was sold to American company Johnson & Johnson. Only in 1970, the herbicidal activity was discovered by American chemist Franz, who worked for Monsanto. 47.64.143.232 ( talk) 01:23, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

added a source and copyedited accordingly. Jytdog ( talk) 01:44, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Monsanto

Under the Formulations and Tradenames → Monsanto section, the article states that "their(Monsanto's) Roundup products (which include GM seeds) represented about half of Monsanto's yearly revenue;" however, the cited reference, an article from Forbes [1] states that "...the seed producer improved gross margins from 55.6% to 58% last quarter..." This refers to Monsanto's overall gross profit margin, and not the percentage of their profit which comes from the sale of seeds. 76.199.147.212 ( talk) 06:19, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

  1. ^ http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/29/monsanto-potash-fertilizer-personal-finance-investing-ideas-agrium-mosaic.html
fixed, thanks. Jytdog ( talk) 13:29, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

Here is why we don't use popular press to report science

Calh077 introduced the following text in this dif: " Monsanto discovered the genes for glyphosphate tolerance by studying a bacteria growing on the waste at a Roundup factory." The source provided was this newspaper article which says: "This pesticide-resistant enzyme was taken from a bacteria growing on the waste at a Roundup factory."

Seems to be a good match! Right?

The source links to its source - an article in PNAS, where you find: "The Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4, isolated from a waste-fed column at a glyphosate production facility, yielded a glyphosate-resistant, kinetically efficient EPSP synthase suitable for the production of transgenic, glyphosate-tolerant crops."

The newspaper reporter read too fast or doesn't have a clue what a "column" is, or what the scientific effort looks like to try to drive evolution. Here is the patent application cited in the PNAS paper, about CP4 was found: "The Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4 was initially identified by its ability to grow on glyphosate as a carbon source (10 mM) in the presence of 1 mM phosphate. The strain CP4 was identified from a collection obtained from a fixed-bed immobilized cell column that employed Mannville R-635 diatomaceous earth beads. The column had been run for three months on a waste-water feed from a glyphosate production plant. The column contained 50 mg/ml glyphosate and NH3 as NH4CI. Total organic carbon was 300 mg/ml and BOD's (Biological Oxygen Demand - a measure of "soft" carbon availability) were less than 30 mg/ml. This treatment column has been described (Heitkamp et al., 1990). Dworkin-Foster minimal salts medium containing glyphosate at 10 mM and with phosphate at 1 mM was used to select for microbes from a wash of this column that were capable of growing on glyphosate as sole carbon source" and blah blah blah.

Does that sound even a little bit like the bullshit that was in the newspaper article and that was introduced into WP? Hell no. Jytdog ( talk) 05:15, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

I hate to say it, but that's a fairly accurate representation of the facts. The bacterium was found in waste water from a glyphosate factory. Monsanto went to a lot of effort to isolate it from all the other microbes in that water, but the patent says in plain English that the bacterium was isolated from a column that was run using waste water from the Roundup factory. The column played a major role in allowing the bacterium to be detected and isolated, but the bacterium did come, originally, from the waste water form the factory. By any normal reading, the genes came from a bacterium that came from the waste water that came from a Roundup factory. That shouldn't be surprising. If you are looking for a microbe that has evolved to digest a chemical, you start looking at the place where the most microbes have been exposed to that chemical for the longest time: the waste water form the production plant. At this stage, I vote that we include this information. It's interesting, it's pertinent, it's factual. It may need to be slightly reworded, but all sources seem to agree that the bacterium was isolated from waste water at the glyphosate factory. Mark Marathon ( talk) 05:44, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
Agreed that this information should be included. The source is reliable, secondary, and essentially correct. Although it is possible that the mutation that lead to the CP4 strain first occurred on the column, I think it is far more likely that it already existed in the production facility's waste stream where bacteria had been exposed to glyphosate for several years on a much larger scale. The purpose of the column was likely to isolate and replicate a pre-existing CP4 strain. However we cannot say that with 100% certainty. Hence it would be safer to say "isolated from a waste-fed column at a glyphosate production facility" as this secondary source does. Boghog ( talk) 07:07, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
wtf? boghog I am at surprised at you, making things up this way. what we know from the PNAS paper is that Monsanto scientists did work to drive bacteria to be resistant to glyphosate, isolated them, then clone the gene. they did fucking science. we should do the standard move here, and find a review that describes how the resistance gene was discovered. i have to go to an all-day meeting now, will come back to this tomorrow. Jytdog ( talk) 12:33, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
I am equally surprised at you Jytdog. No one is disputing that the Monsanto scientists isolated the CP4 strain or cloned the gene. However no where in the patent application nor in the PNAS article is it claimed that the scientists drove the evolution the CP4 strain. That evolution was likely to have begun in the waste stream long before the scientists started their experiments. Regardless, to argue where the CP4 strain originally evolved (in the waste stream or in the column) is rather pointless. The scientists themselves don't know nor do they probably care. The only important fact is they were able to isolate this glyphosate resistant strain and no one disputes this fact. I have already suggested a suitable secondary source above that simply states where the strain was isolated without speculation as to where it originally evolved. Boghog ( talk) 14:29, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
The main issue here seems to be spin. It appears the source Jytdog questioned is trying to imply imagery of the bacteria was found in some toxic sludge (cue maniacal Monsanto exec laughter). We do need to be careful of how information is presented to prevent undue weight in a case like that. If the scientists were purposely driving the evolution of the bacteria and it wasn't just happenstance, then the use of waste-water is a more minor detail in the whole process. If it was more happenstance, then we need to be sure to describe it in a neutral way. For a scientist, waste-water can invoke very different imagery than for a general reader, almost to the point of being a WP:JARGON issue. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 14:39, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
In this instance i can't see any evidence that "waste water" doesn't mean exactly what it means to the general reader. It refers to the water that is expelled from the factory as waste. Water that was contaminated with whatever was washed from the floor and equipment. That's what waste water means to the general reader, and there is no reason to believe that's not what it means in the patent. Can you present any evidence that this is not the case? If not, then why should we assume that it is some form of jargon? I've worked in a lot of fields in my time. and I have never heard "waste water" used as jargon. I always just means "water that is waste because it is too contaminated/hot to be reused"; exactly what it means to the general reader. Mark Marathon ( talk) 21:28, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
I don't think the term "waste water" means anything here. Water running down the drain of your shower is waste water, and unless you use PCBs as a skin moisturizer, it is not "too toxic to be reused". In fact San Diego is recycling its wastewater and sending it back to our taps.
This paper describes Monsanto's development of the fixed bed bioreactor for tertiary scrubbing of wastewater that had already been through two cycles of treatment. They had already been using bacterial treatment of their waste stream for years to remove chemicals from the water used in production prior to release, and they took bacterial sludge from that reactor, loaded it into diatomaceous earth columns, and used them as a more efficient treatment process. The Agrobacterium used as a source for the gene was isolated from this reactor, and its ancestors grew up in the prior version of the Monsanto treatment facility. The ancestors of these bacteria cannot be presumed to have evolved in response to glyphosate in Monsanto's waste stream as the existence of bacterial enzymes that cleave carbon-phosophorus bonds has been known since 1963, many years before the discovery of glyphosate. (see the references in this paper) and were present at the time of Monsanto's original studies of the biodegradation of glyphosate (see refs in same paper).
So I don't think we need to bring to the reader's mind images of bizarre new life forms evolving in toxic Monsanto waste streams, that's all WP:COATRACK. They isolated the gene from a bacteria that they had readily at hand. With a little more effort, they could have pulled it out of the soil in backwoods Minnesota, where it would have been hungrily devouring the natural substance 2-aminoethanephosphonic acid. The source of the bacteria is a trivial experimental detail. Formerly 98 ( talk) 00:23, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

thanks everybody for the discussion. i replaced the current content about the discovery of ESPS CP4 with new content based on the discussion above, with Boghog's source and an additional one i found. Jytdog ( talk) 02:38, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Likewise, thanks to everyone for the discussion and to Jytdog for revising the content. Just one minor point for clarification. As Jytdog has made clear in the revision, the Agrobacterium CP4 EPSP synthase doesn't break down glyphosate, rather it is resistant to it while still retaining high efficiency for the reaction it normally catalyzes. The most closely related EPSP synthases which have been sequenced are from Rhizobium (it has been proposed that Agrobacterium and Rhizobium genera be merged, but this is controversial, see Agrobacterium or Rhizobium, which name to use?):
EPSP synthase sequence alignment
SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           MSHGASSRPATARKSSGLSGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLKGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLRGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLAAGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLKGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
                               ****.: :** : **: * **********************:******************

                                        7         8         9         0         1
                               123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           KAMQAMGARIRKEGDTWIIDGVGNGGLLAPEAPLDFGNAATGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ KAMQAMGAKIEKVGAEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         KAMHAMGARIEKVGDEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFESTFI 120
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ KAMQAMGAKIEKVGAEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
                               ***:****:*.* *  ***:*.***.*************.***************:****

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           GDASLTKRPMGRVLNPLREMGVQVKSEDGDRLPVTLRGPKTPTPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ GDASLSKRPMGRVLAPLREMGVQVTAAEGDRLPVTLRGPATPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         GDASLTKRPMGRVLNPLREMGVQVKAAEGDRLPVTLRGPSIPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ GDASLSKRPMGRVLAPLREMGVQVTAAEGDRLPVTLRGPATPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
                               *****:******** *********.: :***********  *.*****************

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           LLAGLNTPGITTVIEPIMTRDHTEKMLQGFGANLTVETDADGVRTIRLEGRGKLTGQVID 240
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ LLAGLNTPGTTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGADLTVETDADGVRTIRLQGRGRLTGQVID 240
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         LLAGLNTPGVTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGANLMVELDADGVRTIRLEGRGQLIGQVID 240
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ LLAGLNTPGTTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGADLTVETDADGVRTIRLQGRGRLTGQVID 240
                               ********* ******:***************:* ** **********:***:* *****

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSDVTILNVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVINPRLAGGED 300
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSEVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVLNARLAGGED 300
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSDVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVINPRLAGGED 300
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSEVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVLNARLAGGED 300
                               *********************:*** ************************:* *******

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VADLRVRSSTLKGVTVPEDRAPSMIDEYPILAVAAAFAEGATVMNGLEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VADLRVRHSQLKGVTVPAERAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGTTTMLGVEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VADLRVRHSELKGVTVPADRAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGATTMLGLEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VADLRVRHSQLKGVTVPAERAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGTTTMLGVEELRVKESDRLSA 360
                               ******* * ******* :**********:**********:*.* *:*************

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VANGLKLNGVDCDEGETSLVVRGRPDGKGLGNASGAAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVMGLVSENP 420
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ TAAGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLTVRGRPGGKGYGNAAGEAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVLGLVSEHP 420
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VADGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLVVRGRPGGKGYGNATGSSVVTHLDHRIAMSFLVMGLVSEHA 420
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ TAAGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLTVRGRPGGKGYGNAAGEAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVLGLVSEHP 420
                               .* ************* :*.***** *** ***:* :*.*************:*****. 

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VTVDDATMIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGAKIELSDTKAA 455
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGARIEAVESRAA 455
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMTGLGARIEPVESRAA 455
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGARIEAVESRAA 455
                               ****** :************:****:**  :::**
As pointed out in PMID  16916934, a single Ala-100-Gly mutation restores glyphosate sensitivity. The most closely related EPSP synthases which have been sequenced all have Gly at position-100. This suggests that this mutation that results in glyphosate resistance may have been a relatively recent evolutionary event. Without additional sequences of synthases from other strains of Agrobacterium, it is impossible to say where and when this mutation first arose. Boghog ( talk) 10:14, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
thanks for that detail... i take it you are not suggesting any content change or addition.... or are you? (btw, I added the same content to the EPSP synthase article) Jytdog ( talk) 13:09, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
Those details at the moment are only WP:OR ;-) We would of course need a published reliable source that talks about the evolution of Agrobacterium EPSP synthases and so far I have not found any. Boghog ( talk) 15:23, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Pesticide resistance

Ponydepression has reverted this content [7] a couple times now, but the issue isn't particularly clear. The wikilink goes to the pesticide resistance article, which is exactly what glyphosate resistance plants are. Given, the article itself does need an addition for non-pest resistance, but we still call it pesticide resistance regardless of what is resistant. Could you explain what you're seeing as the issue is here? Thanks. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 03:26, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

while the initial reason given was wrong (statement that "herbicide is not a pesticide" is incorrect) the wikilinked article Pesticide resistance is about the development of resistance by weeds (e.g. "superweeds"), not the genetically engineered resistance of crops to pesticide. wrong reason, but correct edit. I removed the wikilink. Jytdog ( talk) 04:10, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
I can see why you made the change reading over it a bit now. I was mainly going by the first sentence, "Pesticide resistance describes the decreased susceptibility of a pest population to a pesticide that was previously effective at controlling the pest." That was close to what we should have for a general definition that I thought could be tweaked relatively easily, but it looks like the rest of the page needs to be generalized a bit when I read the rest of it. It doesn't need to be a pest in question, but obviously that's the predominant example. If we are just going by the article name, the article would need to be generalized to include crop glyphosate resistance, but that's not a discussion for here. I'll try tackling that reorganizing at some point, and readd the wikilink once things mesh up better. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 04:42, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
we're on same page :) Jytdog ( talk) 11:17, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

B-cell lymphoma?

Came across this review: [8] whose abstract includes " B cell lymphoma was positively associated with phenoxy herbicides and the organophosphorus herbicide glyphosate." Should this go in? Lfstevens ( talk) 20:56, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

oh god it is another article in an MDPI journal which also published that bad Seneff article. i'll have a look! Jytdog ( talk) 21:38, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
OK, I looked at this closely, and looked for commentary on it. Seems OK. It is about occupational exposures and was a meta-anlysis of epidemiological studies. So correlative. It found that workers exposed to glyphosate are twice as likely to get a subtype of Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, namely B cell lymphoma. B cell lymphomas account for almost all NHL. That's twice as likely, with a 95% confidence interval of 1.1–3.6. Overall, according to the NCI, around 2.1 percent of adults are diagnosed with NHL at some point during their lifetime - that includes everybody. I'll add some content to our article. Nice find! Jytdog ( talk) 01:51, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
Here's a contrary, earlier review: [9]
actually not necessarily contrary. the 2012 review you cite is not limited to occupational exposure. There is no signal in that population. I'll add this too. Thanks. Jytdog ( talk) 20:58, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

seneff source again

please see Wikipedia_talk:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)/Archive_7#Review_of_Monsanto.27s_Roundup_herbicide Jytdog ( talk) 01:47, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Deletion of Sentence " The classification mainly pertains to industrial use of the compound rather than use in gardens."

I support this diff by @ 49.184.30.180:. I have been meaning to come back and delete that sentence. There is nothing in the study that says anything about "industrial formulations." David Tornheim ( talk) 06:28, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Originally I deleted the sentence above for the reasons I struck out above, namely that it was not in the study. Now, I see it is in the other article mainstream article from U.S. News & World Report about the study, rather than from the study itself. That makes me reconsider my opposition to the sentence. I am happy to support adding it back, as long as we are clear about this: Is it indeed okay for material written about scientific studies in sources that are neither written by scientists nor published in a scientific journals when they report on that study? If so, the sentence would be acceptable. I am adding another sentence from the same article, assuming the answer is yes. David Tornheim ( talk) 06:46, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Strangely, articles about reports are considered more reliable than the reports themselves. As long as the source is reliable, it should overrule the (potentially self-serving) original. Lfstevens ( talk) 07:19, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
^Is this from WIki-Policy, -Guideline, or -Essay? Or from outside Wikipedia? Are you saying this is true of scientific studies, in particular? That non-scientists writing about scientific work from the mainstream press (if deemed "reliable") are more reliable than the work published by scientists in a peer reviewed journal? David Tornheim ( talk) 07:38, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
It's about the preference for secondary sources. Lfstevens ( talk) 07:45, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Fails WP:MEDPOP and thus should be excluded. Formerly 98 ( talk) 14:00, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Talk:Glyphosate/Archive_3&oldid=1136768431"
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3 Archive 4 Archive 5 → Archive 10

Statement that glyphosate "more closely approximates to a perfect herbicide than any other"

How strange that there is an edit war going over this statement, and no one has opened a Talk section on this. Sad. If anybody reads the article from which that quote was taken, you will find plenty of support for the statement there, and elsewhere in the scientific literature. I know that plenty of folks who are opposed to Monsanto and/or GMOs think that glyphosate is just nasty stuff, but anybody familiar with herbicides (from using them, which I have not, or researching them, which I have done) knows that the contested statement is true. The statement compares glyphosate to other herbicides - it is not comparing glyphosate to, say, apples. Even if you eat all organic food and are opposed to the use of all herbicides, this should not effect your view on the validity of a statement comparing herbicides. Looking forward to the discussion! Jytdog ( talk) 11:13, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Agree that the statement, however distasteful, belongs in the article. The problem of buildup in the soil is clearly very serious, and in order to discuss it properly (which this page doesn't yet do), it will be necessary to establish the base of scientific blindness that has caused the lack of adequate regulation that currently allows enormous quantities of glyphosate to continue to be applied. That quote is an excellent reflection of that scientific blindness. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:58, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for discussing! I will be interested to see the sources with respect to the soil buildup - the cited articles and others indicate that glyphosate breaks down pretty quickly in soil. If you want to bring them now in a new section we can start discussing while we wait for the lockdown to run its course. Thanks again! Jytdog ( talk) 14:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
In the section Soil degradation, and effects on micro-organism and worms are citations that say that the glyphosate stays bound in certain types of soil. I'm not sure what the effects of breakdown products might be, and what the effects of other components of Roundup might be. If this page weren't undergoing edit warring, I'd look a bit further to see if there are citations available about any common agricultural practices that cause the soil-bound glyphosate to be released in a large quantity, and what the effects of that might be if it occurred, or whether the bound glyphosate affects plants. However, this edit war is so silly that any effort to produce a properly researched and written article may be pointless. On the other hand, perhaps the animosity and unthinking edits here are due to someone who has a vested interest in Monsanto, and the rest of us giving up is what they want to achieve. The silliness here, I think, goes beyond the general level of thoughtless stupidity that is typical of wikipedia. I'd be interested to know if administrators are able to look into a possible conflict-of-interest of certain editors. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Hi, and thanks for responding! This article is generally pretty stable; I have been working on it for over a year and we have never an edit war/content dispute like what just happened. The folks involved in that have not been active here much in the past. They may of course be in the future! Also, please, please, don't make vague COI accusations. If you identify an editor you are concerned about there are venues to bring that up; such accusations on Talk are not appropriate and just create an icky (yes, icky) environment for everybody to work in. Let's focus on the content, if we may. I do hope you look into the soil retention issue further! Based on what you wrote above I thought you already had sources and were informed on that point. But in any case the article can always use improved NPOV content based on reliable sources. Thanks again. Jytdog ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
References 62 and 63 would be an excellent start to the needed research on soil buildup, but I now see that there are two sections with almost the same title, Soil degradation, and effects on micro-organism and worms, which was probably confusing. So if there were a deliberate attempt to derail the discussion here, we wouldn't be able to discuss that. Anyway, I'll leave this "icky" environment, there's something seriously wrong here, and there seems to be no real hope of me managing to bring a scientific view to the article. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 23:55, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Please don't go it would be great if you would help improve the article! Jytdog ( talk) 00:48, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
The recent deletion would have to be undone first, if consensus can ever be reached ... Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:45, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
I have no idea what this means. Scientific blindness? And what does soil buildup have to do with the the perfection of glyphosate? II | ( t - c) 15:23, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Hi II... a truly perfect herbicide would be extremely toxic to undesirable plants, nontoxic to everything else, and after killing the undesirable plant, would break down immediately into products that are harmless to everything. If glyphosate is retained intact, for a long time in the soil, it would fail that third leg, right? Jytdog ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
I have great trouble with such a sweeping assertion. This is an encyclopaedia not an advertising brochure. How can anyone argue that it is better than ALL others without providing real evidence? And opinion articles in farming journals are not evidence. I use glyphosate myself and consider it to be a useful tool, but not a divine invention. We need to be objective here. Djapa Owen ( talk) 15:33, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
That's what scientists do, they study all the alternatives and come up with a conclusion that product A is better than all of the other products tested. When a spectacular invention comes on the scene, scientists can call it a spectacular invention. A scientific statement that something is a spectacular invention can be picked up and repeated in a farming journal as advice to farmers. It isn't necessarily a partisan opinion. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
OK my marsupial friend, if this is a "scientific opinion", can you point us to the scientific study which has compared glyphosate to ALL alternative herbicides? That would be a huge study to do, and I doubt if even Monsanto would fund it. Djapa Owen ( talk) 01:26, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
Quick question Djapa84 - have you read the source from which the quote is taken? (real question, not rhetorical). Jytdog ( talk) 03:59, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
Indeed, that "mini-review" is a fine source. When glyphosate was developed, people knew what the previously available herbicides were like; it was much less toxic and broke down much faster under the conditions in which it was tested, and was hailed as a great advance. Now this article needs to be updated with information that other test conditions, the results of long-term application to soil and animal-feed crops, and the long-term effects on weeds, may not give such a rosy picture. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 13:45, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

User:Mark Marathon, User:ImperfectlyInformed, and User:Jusdafax I hope you come and discuss the reasons for the edits you made during edit war you conducted, so when the lockdown is over we can go back to editing productively and collaboratively. I am copying this note to your Talk pages. Thanks! Jytdog ( talk) 14:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

  • Regardless of whether a sophisticated argument can be brought behind the opinion, it is ultimately an opinion, similar to something like 'math is beautiful'. In addition, it is not fleshed out in the body and it is stylistically problematic because we don't write Wikipedia articles as a conglomeration of quotations. II | ( t - c) 15:23, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
    • Well, although arguing with someone who calls themselves Imperfectly Informed might be pointless, here's a couple of points. An opinion can encapsulate a reason for doing something, in this case, a scientific opinion is used to support using glyphosate rather than other herbicides. Using a quote, particularly a short quote such as this one is not a problem, please see Wikipedia:Quotations#General guidelines. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 16:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
      "A scientific opinion" is a strange phrase. "A scientist's opinion" is irrelevant when they are doing science - it is their results, their data and their theoretical work that counts. " Scientific opinion" is like 'medical opinion', it is what you get when academies of science or other overarching bodies survey all the available literature and publish a definitive statement about 'settled science'. There is no such thing as "a scientific opinion" and "a scientist's opinion" (e.g. on the weather or on the election) is worth no more than "a journalist's opinion" or "an advertising executive's opinion". -- Nigelj ( talk) 18:27, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Actually, no, the page that you point to about scientific opinion was quite wide of the mark (I've edited it now). Scientific bodies such as the Entomological Society of America exist to help the process of science. To do that, they collect membership fees from scientists and use the money to publish scientific journals, and organize conferences. They rarely, if ever, issue "scientific opinion" statements. Individual scientists offer scientific opinion, and sometimes a scientist who is interviewed might be said to be "the president of the Entomological Society of America", but that is just their credentials, some evidence that other scientists think they are reasonably competent. Believe me, if scientific societies were in the business of offering scientific opinion, no scientist would join the societies (science is about doubting and checking, and never trusting someone else's opinion until you've independently verified that they are probably correct; no scientist would ever trust their society to speak for them!). Scientific papers have several sections, one of which is usually called "Results", and a later one is usually called "Discussion" or "Conclusions". Opinion is often expressed in those later sections. There is also a special type of scientific paper called a review paper. Reference 63 on this page is such a paper, it is written by a single scientist (Ole K. Borggaard), and attempts to find the best possible answer to a scientific question, the title is "Does Phosphate Affect Soil Sorption and Degradation of Glyphosate? - A Review". It contains statements such as "it is an efficient weed killer with favorable environmental and toxicological properties such as very low human and animal toxicity" and (page 23) "However, this conclusion seems not very convincing as it was simply based on significant correlations between the concentrations of glyphosate and dissolved phosphate as well as total phosphorus in the surface runnoff (not leachates) but glyphosate was also correlated with the sediment load (Laitinen et al. 2009)." Those sound like opinions to me, and they are scientific. Also, I'd say that medical opinion is what you get from your doctor; you don't wait for the College of Physicians and Surgeons to review your medical history and decide whether a particular medication is a good choice for you. Individual doctors and individual scientists make up their own minds and advise others according to what they personally think. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 23:55, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
Since this quote is clearly attributable to a couple of scientists, could we include something like. "According to Stephen O Duke a notable scientist with the USDA said..." this makes it so the information is still included but more encyclopedic. VViking Talk Edits 00:42, 8 August 2013 (UTC)
(responding to Sminthopsis84 above) I'm happy to hear from someone who is more perfectly informed than I am. ;) You may feel offended that I was confused by your statement above about scientific blindness, and I'm sorry that it was dismissive but I'm still confused by your position. What I'm really looking at here is encyclopedic style and substance. The quotation policy page referred to says this pretty well: "Attribution should be provided in the text of the article, not exclusively in a footnote or citation. A reader should not have to follow a footnote to learn whose words a quote is". Wikipedia policy probably allows for unattributed quotes (despite the language above) but I very rarely see unattributed quotes in technical writing and I know they are fairly rare in Wikipedia. This also reflects my experience when I learned to write in college and was taught not to use unattributed quotes in most cases. The more important point is that saying that a substance is perfect is not substantially informative. If glyphosate has characteristics which make it a particularly good herbicide, say that rather than something which leaves most people scratching their head a bit. If this quote is used (which I continue to strongly oppose), it should only be used in conjunction with a prefacing statement which allows people to understand what it means. II | ( t - c) 00:58, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Since productive discussion is underway, I have removed the protection ahead of time. Please reach consensus before making any likely controversial edits. Thanks! — EncMstr ( talk) 01:55, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Glyphosate v. Roundup

In the course of researching claims of a "broad scientific consensus" on the comparative safety of genetically modified foods, I came across a substantial range of sources that discuss Roundup. These are compiled here. Please see in particular that there are numerous studies distinguishing between Roundup and glyphosate. Indeed, it is other ingredients in Roundup (particularly the surfactant TN-20) which give Roundup its particular toxicity. At minimum this should be discussed at this page. However, I think it warrants an undoing of the merge between Roundup and Glyphosate. Roundup is a substantially different chemical formulation, and furthermore is notable unto itself due to associated media coverage and marketing. I have seen past discussions on the issue and I do agree that care should be taken to avoid editing "Roundup" as if it were "Glyphosate". Aloha, groupuscule ( talk) 19:54, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

  • Support Products should not feature so prominently in an chemical article, at best they are to be discussed in a general fashion. It would be like discussing low-carbon steel, hex-nuts in the iron article. Moreover, there is an abundance of information on Roundup to warrant a separate article. Plasmic Physics ( talk) 23:59, 20 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Support undue of merge, given the above this merge is grossly unencyclopedic. petrarchan47 t c 20:05, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
  • Addendum. Allow me to add that although I disagree with the way that Séralini's work and the Entropy article have been portrayed, those who wish to disregard these studies will find (in the linked report) additional literature reviews and and research that confirm Roundup's toxicity. In particular I would point to
  • Koller VJ, Fürhacker M, Nersesyan A, Mišík M, Eisenbauer M, Knasmueller S., "Cytotoxic and DNA-damaging properties of glyphosate and Roundup in human-derived buccal epithelial cells", Archives of Toxicology (2012).
  • Ho-Yeon Song, Young-Hee Kim, Su-Jin Seok, Hyo-Wook Gil, and Sae-Yong Hong, "In Vitro Cytotoxic Effect of Glyphosate Mixture Containing Surfactants", Journal of Korean Medical Science (2012).
Excerpts from these and still sources available at the report. groupuscule ( talk) 20:12, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Question - you say that "there are numerous studies distinguishing between Roundup and glyphosate". This is comparing apples to oranges. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in dozens of formulations, including several Roundup variations (there is not one "Roundup" either). Do you have data on any of "Accord, Aquaneat, Aquamaster, Bronco, Buccaneer, Campain, Clearout 41 Plus, Clear-up, Expedite, Fallow Master, Genesis Extra I, Glyfos Induce, Glypro, GlyStar Induce, GlyphoMax Induce, Honcho, JuryR, Landmaster, MirageR, Pondmaster, Protocol, Prosecutor, Ranger, Rascal, Rattler, Razor Pro, Rodeo, Roundup, I, Roundup Pro Concentrate, Roundup UltraMax, Roundup WeatherMax, Silhouette, Touchdown" as is cited in the article? These are the things to compare to one another. Glyphosate is never used alone - always in a formulation as listed above. Glyphosate itself is a member of the class of herbicides called EPSPS inhibitors; other classes include ACCase inhibitors, ALS inhibitors, etc etc. It is relevant to compare active ingredients to one another - see Herbicide#Classification for more information on that. Jytdog ( talk) 22:43, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Also, this article makes it very very clear that glyphosate is the active ingredient in many formulations, and that Roundup is one of them. There are separate sections already for toxicity due to glyphosate alone, and for glyphosate in formulation (the way it is actually used). It is unclear to me what big surprise you are finding here.. can you explain a bit more? Thanks Jytdog ( talk) 23:05, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
Numerous studies find that Roundup is more toxic than glyphosate alone. This and other reasons suggest a separate article on Roundup. Some of these other glyphosate-based herbicides may also deserve their own articles. I have read elsewhere that DynCorp routinely sprays a product called "Roundup Ultra" on the Colombian countryside via helicopter. I can only speculate on whether "Roundup Ultra" is more or less toxic than "Roundup". groupuscule ( talk) 00:04, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
It is absolutely true that glyphosate in formulation is more toxic than glyphosate alone! No news there, and the article says this already. There used to be an article on Roundup, and it was about 80% overlapping with the article on glyphosate. When I did the merge, I brought over all the information, including all the negative information that was sourced as per Wiki policies and guidelines. You can check that. It makes no sense to have a separate Roundup article. What would be truly awesome and helpful to Wikipedia's readers, is more content in this article on the various adjuvants and other surfactants that are used to create formulations of glyphosate so that Wikipedia reflects how glyphosate is used in the real world. I created specific tags asking for help with that. Jytdog ( talk) 00:11, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

One way this could be done, and it'd be my preference, would be to start to develop the product-specific information in this article and see if the content for any one product does need to be broken off into its own article. I'd guess that there might be enough non-glyphosate-specific information available about Roundup in particular, like society and culture information, sales history, Roundup and Roundup-ready crops, critical reaction, and the various formulations available, that might warrant having a separate article for that product. In breaking off Roundup to its own article, there should be a brief summary of the glyphosate ingredient with a link back here. The important thing would be to avoid having too much duplication about the details of glyphosate between the two articles. It might be the case that all the other knock-off brands would not warrant their own articles. Another way to do this would be to leave glyphosate to focus on just that one ingredient and then to create a new article, something along the lines of Glyphosate-based herbicides, and put all the products there. Just some suggestions. Zad 68 03:09, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

This is a reasonable suggestion to me. The way I tried to struture this article's toxicity discussion is in three sections: 1) glyphosate alone; 2) additives alone; 3) formulations. It takes careful reading of the sources to tease this all out.. and the work as it stands is still imperfect. Jytdog ( talk) 10:50, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Split / Unmerge proposal pending on old Roundup talk page.

hey folks an unmerge proposal has opened on the former Roundup page, with no notice placed here.. here is the discussion Talk:Roundup_(herbicide)#RfC:_Un-merge_from_Glyphosate.3F Jytdog ( talk) 00:17, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Issue with the Toxicity section

The Toxicity section is divided into Glyphosate toxicity, Additive toxicity and Formulation toxicity; a reasonable division at first sight. However, I'm not clear that it works. For example, the Glyphosate toxicity section says "Acute fatal toxicity has been reported in deliberate overdose.[2 refs] Epidemiological studies have not found associations between long term low level exposure to glyphosate and any disease.[3 refs]" However, the two sources used for deliberate overdose both specify that it's a formulation that has been taken. Also it's hard to see that any epidemiological study can distinguish between exposure to glyphosate alone, the added agent(s) in the formulation, and the combination. Thus the Mink et al. (2012) paper used as a source explicitly notes the need for better recording of the formulation. Are there studies which relate to glyphosate-only toxicity in humans? If not, this subsection should be merged into Formulation toxicity. Peter coxhead ( talk) 15:27, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

You are dead on accurate with respect to background, but I don't agree with your solution. I set up the sections logically, and went looking for sources for each. And I had a very hard time. Mink is dead on - many of the academic papers are fatally sloppy with respect to naming what formulation of glyphosate they use, when they use one (they often say "Roundup" but that is all, and there are many versions of Roundup), and they often sloppily switch between discussing glyphosate per se and discussing whatever formulation they used. I think the subsesction division should stay. I agree with you that content should be moved around (e.g. the statement you quote about fatal poisoning with glyphosate formulations, should not be in the glyphosate-alone section - that is a great call). But the article should have separate tox sections for each thing (active agent, additives, and formulations). This is something I have been meaning to get back to and put more work into, which I think is going to require a bunch of library work. Finally, I don't understand why you are focusing on epidemiological studies -- those are useful, but tox studies are typically done in vitro, by toxicologists, using toxicological experimental designs, methods, and standards. Right? Those are the studies we really need for these sections. Jytdog ( talk) 15:55, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
Note that I said if in my last sentence above. I agree entirely as to what is needed; I'm just not sure whether enough will be left if you move the acute fatal toxicity and the epidemiological material. Peter coxhead ( talk) 17:29, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
Sounds like we are on the same page - lots of work to do on these section! Thanks for talking. Jytdog ( talk) 17:46, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

just went source hunting - leaving here for content-building tomorrow or thereafter:

deletion of content about worms

Hi User:Gandydancer - nice set of edits you are making, thanks. Only objection I have is that you deleted the content about worms. People who study soils, and the "health" of soil, care a lot about the ecosystem in soils; this is one of the big concerns of the organic movement, too. Worms are a key player in those ecosystems; hence the content about the effect of glyphosate and formulations on worms. I thought it was worthwhile to include; you've taken it out.... Jytdog ( talk) 19:43, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Sorry--I guess I missed the mention of worms. I didn't see it and deleted it from the heading. I'll revert my edit. Gandydancer ( talk) 20:37, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
The worms content, that had been in that section, was deleted in one of your edits yesterday. this one i think.. Jytdog ( talk) 20:53, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
OK, I fixed it. Now I remember why I ended up just deleting the whole thing. For one thing it was so old and a single study and for another, as written it is hard to follow. I can't find the studies that refute the earlier worm study. Could you please give links? Thanks. Gandydancer ( talk) 22:07, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
Just briefly, I had no special issues with you deleting the worm content - I did want to make sure you understood why it was there. The link you request is right there in the article. The current paragraph says:

A laboratory study published in 1992 indicated that glyphosate formulations could harm earthworms(ref) 1992 Springett JA, Gray RAJ (/ref) and beneficial insects.(ref)omitted(/ref) However, the reported effect of glyphosate on earthworms has been criticized.(ref name=Giesy2000 /) The results conflict with results from field studies where no effects were noted for the number of nematodes, mites, or springtails after treatment with Roundup at 2 kilograms active ingredient per hectare.(ref)1989 Preston & Trofymow(/ref)

The key source is the very excellent Giesy 2000 book. If you look at it page 77] (I have added the page ref to the article) you will see that they criticize the 1992 study by Springett and Gray for too small an N to mean anything, and for not characterizing what they did. Jytdog ( talk) 22:27, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

OK, I am well aware of the importance of healthy soil and I am aware that others are as well... I removed the studies because they were old, they were poorly done, and they were single studies (and one was in French...). It seems odd to me that we would spend so much article space on refuting two lone, old studies. ...I will not be reading the 25-year old Caranation Creek book-length report. That said, I don't mind including the info if you believe it to be important. Gandydancer ( talk) 23:00, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
It is one page in the carnation book, as I mentioned. Glad that you aware of why worms matter; sorry for telling you something you already knew. If you want to delete the content, have at it, but I just wanted to note why it was there and why people might want to see it. Jytdog ( talk) 23:13, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

tox reviews

User:Gandydancer requested I list " reviews on toxicity of glyphosate per se; some reviews on adjuvants/additives, and some on formulations... Specifically, I meant effects on fish and amphibians". When I agreed, I didn't especially have fish and amphibians in mind. But here is a list

Glyphosate alone:

specific additives (pretty much just POEA

formulations

still underway.. Jytdog ( talk) 23:26, 6 September 2013 (UTC) (added more Jytdog ( talk) 15:52, 7 September 2013 (UTC))

Newer health study

http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/15/4/1416/pdf This newer study seems to list human health effects that should be included.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 20:32, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

This source was discussed in the MEDRS board, and was rejected as being not reliable for any health-related content: here. Jytdog ( talk) 21:05, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
MEDRS looks like another crap excuse to censor negative material from our readers. We should include if for our readers but could qualify the inclusion with counter points.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 09:25, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

NYT article and study

New York Times, another study.-- Canoe1967 ( talk) 20:40, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

MIT studies

http://people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/

Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 22:41, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Discussed and dismissed here and elsewhere. Jytdog ( talk) 00:45, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. I didn't know. I encountered the study via an Unwelcome Guests episode. The remark at that page which says "...Witness, for example, the fact that the Wikipedia glyphosate is actively policed...." prompted me to post here. Many thanks. Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 08:26, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
You are welcome! oo that sitepage is looney birds. Jytdog ( talk) 23:55, 10 November 2013 (UTC) (restricting comment to page; i know nothing about the site in general Jytdog ( talk) 01:19, 11 November 2013 (UTC))
I appreciate your view. It will make me seriously question the credibility of other episodes. Anna Frodesiak ( talk) 03:20, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Split

A proposal was made to undo the merge of Roundup and Glyphosate and split them; the discussion is here; Talk:Roundup_(herbicide)#RfC:_Un-merge_from_Glyphosate.3F. It was closed in early October 2013; the closer indicated that a split is appropriate. Nobody has done it yet. I removed the split tag since the discussion is long over. Jytdog ( talk) 13:54, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

cereal bars content

today User:Jfortier added the following content in this dif, with edit note " add recent information": "New evidence, however, suggests that Glyphosate residues persist into the food chain. Cereal bars tested in 2012 were found to contain glyphosate at levels approaching 100% "Harmful weedkiller in your bread and cereal bars \ author = Andrew Wasley I". Backgrounder. The Ecologist. 2013-31-12. {{ cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= ( help); Missing pipe in: |title= ( help)" (ref markup removed)

I reverted in this dif with edit note "revert content based on source noncompliant with WP:MEDRS (even the scientific study is a primary source; not valid to generate content from it)" That is enough a basis, but I also wanted to note that the content itself doesn't reflect the source nor does it make sense, where it says "were found to contain glyphosate at levels approaching 100%". I don't know what that means. The source says "According to GM Freeze, 100% of the Jordans cereal bars tested were found to contain glyphosate. The group also says that at least 85% of tested products made by Warburtons – the well known bread company – contained traces of the herbicide." So if the "at levels approaching 100%" is referring to what percentage of samples tested contained glyphosate residues, the proposed wikipedia content is not accurate. (it could also be read to mean, bizarrely, that each sample was composed of 100% glyphosate, which really makes no sense) More importantly, the source says "The weedkiller residues were present in small quantities - between 0.1 and 0.8 mg/kg. This is well below the permitted EU maximum residue levels (MRLs) for cereal crops, which currently span 10 - 20 mg/kg." Everybody knows that food contains glyphosate residues; that is the reason that regulators establish legal limits for trace amounts in food, in the first place. And indeed the amounts found are below the legal limits. So this study says nothing that is new or interesting, in any case. But it does provide the opportunity for the authors of the Ecologist to bring up the already discredited Seneff publications, once again. argh. Jytdog ( talk) 15:55, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Alternative herbicides

Two points:

1) Why does this section exist in an article about Glyphosate? Do we have sections on alternative treatments in drug articles? Or alternatives to household electricity in that article? What is the reader who is interested in Glyphosate expected to glean from this material? It seems completely inappropriate.

2) In what sense are these alternatives. Glyphosate is a broad spectrum, highly translocatable systemic. Both 2,4-D and Dicamba only work on broad leaf plants and both, but especially 2,4-D, have limited translocation ability. I find it hard to believe that anybody has ever suggested them as alternatives to glyphosate. Of the references given, one does not use the word Glyphosate anywhere that I can find, and the other notes specifically that "These additional practices add cost to the production system. Often, there are no effective herbicides that are easily available..." and that "This provides “unique” tools for managing our current list of herbicide-resistant weeds". It then goes on to list a host problems associated with Dicamba and not Glyphosate, including off-site movement and the need for application during early season growth periods, specific spray patterns and so forth. IOW these are not alternatives to Glyphosate, but unique treatment regimes used where Glyphosate is not an option. It's only an alternative in the sense that amputation is an alternative to penicillin. Sure, they both cure infection, but nobody considers one an alternative to the other.

So, can anyone find reliable sources touting these substances as alternatives to Glyphosate, rather than herbicides to be sued where Glyphosate is specifically not an option? IF not I'm inclined to remove the section as original research and for a lack of notability. Mark Marathon ( talk) 22:55, 13 January 2014 (UTC)


To answer your first question, I don't know (although if we searched the archives we could probably find out). I think the following questions are not real questions, but rather are rhetorical, so I will ignore them. I don't know that we need to rely on OR or notability to exclude this section; I think we can just say that the section is outside the scope of the article. I am fine with deleting it. Jytdog ( talk) 23:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I suggest we give it 24 hours for others to respond, then turf it. Mark Marathon ( talk) 23:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Weed resistance

<< A 2012 study found that over the 16 year period since genetically modified crops were introduced, "herbicide-resistant crop technology has led to a 239 million kilogram (527 million pound) increase in herbicide use in the United States between 1996 and 2011, while Bt crops have reduced insecticide applications by 56 million kilograms (123 million pounds)"[124] Bt crops have been genetically engineered to express a protein from Bacillus thuringiensis, which kills certain insects. This study's results, however, are contradicted by another study published in 2013, which reported that the adoption of GM technology "has reduced pesticide spraying by 474 million kg..."[125] >>

Seems that "increase in herbicide use" in one research is compared to "reduced pesticide spraying" in another research. Herbicides and pesticides are two different things, am I right? This section should be improved with more facts and more references to research. I am not specialist in this, please help!

87.110.179.146 ( talk) 11:12, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

fixed Jytdog ( talk) 13:14, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

CKDu - Chronic Kidney Disease unknown cause

It looks like there's a reasonably persuasive argument that glyphosate when used in paddy fields and similar situations causes fatal kidney disease:

http://rt.com/news/monsanto-roundup-kidney-disease-921/

Basically, the farmers are splashing it around and standing up to their knees in it, and drinking the run-off into aquifers as well. It's not immediately toxic, but it looks like the chemical is reacting with metal ions and eventually taking out the kidneys.

There's been huge number of deaths.

I'm somewhat reluctant to add it right now though, RT is not the most unbiased source (similar reliability to Fox news I guess). There were earlier stories on the BBC website about this disease, but they didn't mention glyphosate by name.

What do other people think? GliderMaven ( talk) 16:21, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Seems legitimate. I found some other sources [1] [2] as well. GliderMaven ( talk) 17:16, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
Need a MEDRS compliant source. Primary research findings are not sufficient. Despite its name, the description of the GMAO and its activities on its website indicates that it is an advocacy group. Formerly 98 ( talk) 17:25, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Here is the article that the press is writing about. The authors write "Here, we have hypothesized the association of using glyphosate, the most widely used herbicide in the disease endemic area and its unique metal chelating properties" There is no data in the paper nor is there a review of other papers with data. This is noodling - armchair biology. we do not include such things in wikipedia at all as per WP:CRYSTALBALL. definitely does not pass WP:MEDRS. sheesh. Jytdog ( talk) 19:09, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Weed captions

I was trying to tie the captions in to the article because Some readers look at the pictures and captions first before diving into an intimidating amount of text. Formerly 98 reverted this work because I had also added a new picture and that was considered WP:UNDUE. No argument with that but if 5 of 9 pictures is undue, perhaps 4 of 9 is also?

How about we take the sub-headings out of the section and discuss different plants in different paragraphs and include a gallery of the plants somewhere in the section? ~ KvnG 14:54, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

it is important that we don't misrepresent anything. if you have no information that the actual picture is of an actual glyphosate-resistant plant, it is bogus to insert that information into the caption. way out of bounds. Jytdog ( talk) 15:04, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
If you read carefully, you'll see that my captions did not actually say the resistant variants were pictured. I appreciate that a reader might assume that they are but it is an exaggeration to say this is "way out of bounds" as it is my understanding that the resistant varieties are not visually distinguished from the normal ones. ~ KvnG 15:46, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
the caption said "A glyphosate resistant variant of Palmer amaranth, commonly known as pigweed, is now widespread in the southeastern United States." yep. you are right, it was an exaggeration. sorry about that. Jytdog ( talk) 16:11, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
I don't mind the captions per se, I just don't think we should make this article redundant with the existing "Pesticide Resistance" article. Of course there is glyphosate resistance, just as there is resistance to every other widely used pesticide.
If there were some aspect of glyphosate resistance that was uniquely harmful or rapidly developing relative to resistance to other pesticides, I could understand the emphasis. But we don't have pictures of methoprene-resistant mosquitos on the methoprene page, nor is it easy for me to see how such pictures add anything. As user:Jytdog has pointed out, you can't look at these pictures and tell whether the plant is glyphosate resistant or not. So why add them other than to create the impression that this product is not useful or that resistance to this pesticide develops in a uniquely rapid manner? It wouldn't be the most widely used pesticide in the US if it were not considered useful by farmers, and if resistance development is unusually rapid, it would be better to find a reference that states that.
With respect to breaking this out into subsections by resistant species, my question would be: What additional value does a comprehensive listing of observations of geographies and types of weeds in which resistance development has been observed add other than implying without a suitable reference that resistance to this particular pesticide is unusually insidious or rapidly developing? And if the ramifications of glyphosate resistance are not substantially different from those of other pesticides, isn't a deep dive into resistance in this article just a WP:REDUNDANTFORK? Wikipedia articles are supposed to be summaries and not comprehensive reviews. If the article briefly summarizes the benefits, and then gives a comprehensive listing of every observation of resistance, the result is unbalanced.
I'm not saying that resistance should not be discussed in the article, but there is a happy medium and I think we are moving beyond it. Thanks Formerly 98 ( talk) 16:14, 3 March 2014 (UTC)
My proposal included removal of the subsection headings. This would allow us to make the section shorter and would give it more appropriate weighting when you read the TOC. I'm OK with removing the pictures entirely if that's the consensus; they're only one click away in the linked articles about each weed. My modest edits were an attempt to improve what was already there. I seem to have stepped into something larger. ~ KvnG 21:18, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

expansion tags

glyphosate is the active ingredient in many formulations. it has been off-patent in the US for 14 years now (and even longer outside the US), and there are many many formulations on the market. Chinese companies produce the majority of glyphosate today; the market place is very complex (sees this for some flavor). We have almost no information about these other formulations. Another issue is the additives that are in all these different formulations. Glyphosate formulations are much more toxic than glyphosate itself, and it is the formulations that are actually used in the real world, and are the actual source of toxic effects. This article is incomplete without discussion of the various additives that are used and what their toxicities are. so, that is why the tags are there. Jytdog ( talk) 17:05, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

What references exactly state that the toxicity of glyphosate formulations is much greater than glyphosate itself? If these references exist and meet MEDRS standards, the discussion on this page should be limited to the formulations and not to the additives themselves as the article is about glyphosate, not Roundup. POEA, for example, has its own article.
The only MEDRS compliant reference of POEA I am aware of are here, and it states the opposite of what you are asserting. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122, http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/glyphotech.pdf. None appear to reach the conclusion you have stated.
Lastly, by my count, about 20% of the articles is already dedicated to formulation toxicity. What would you consider appropriate weighting? 50%? I would regard any claim that the EPA and its European equivalent have approved highly toxic mixtures that are harmful to human health as an extraordinary claim requiring very strong references. Strong indeed if we are going to dedicate half of the article to the claim.
There are not "hundreds" of adjuvants for glyphosate as stated in the current version of the article. The link takes you to a page that shows manufacturers, and if you order the list alphabetically, you will see that many of these "adjuvants" are mixtures, and that the exact same mixture or very similar mixtures are made by multiple companies. The Pesticide Action Network lists the most commonly used ones here, calling compounds like glycerin (a component of most skin lotions with an LD50 of several grams per kg) "toxic". As a chemist, I am familiar with most of the compounds on the list, and if you take the time and trouble to go look them up, you'll find that the toxicities that PAN refers to are at superhuman doses. http://www.panap.net/sites/default/files/monograph_glyphosate.pdf. There is a simple reason to stick with a limited set of adjuvants: inert ingredients are regulated by both the EPA and the FDA. http://www2.epa.gov/pesticide-registration/pesticide-registration-manual-chapter-8-inert-ingredients#regulation. Formerly 98 ( talk) 18:31, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
This is a little exhausting as these issues have been discussed extensively on this page and others. Glyphosate itself has no known targets in humans - it hits an enzyme found in some plants and lower organisms. (there is some discussion of it as an "endocrine disruptor" but there is no known mechanism or target by which it could do that). Formulations, on the other hand, contain surfactants (for example), and as anybody familiar with biology knows, if you dump detergent on a cell, you will kill it. So formulations are generally much more toxic than glyphosate itself. I will dig up the refs tonight. btw, there used to be a separate article on Roundup but I merged them, with consensus at the time, something like a year ago. Some folks opened an RfC to unmerge them a few months ago, which ended with a determination to do an unmerge. However, no one has done it yet. I don't intend to do it, as keeping them merged makes the most sense to me. Two reasons: a) the articles overlapped about 80%, and b) i don't see a reason why there should be an article on roundup and not on the other formulations. Maybe an article on glyphosate formulations would make sense, but that should grow organically out of this one, and right now sections on formulations are thin and need expansion even here. Jytdog ( talk) 19:52, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
but please update the article to fix any flaws! your chemistry knowledge is super valuable. thx Jytdog ( talk) 19:55, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
You had the misfortune to catch me on a cranky day, but if this has been discussed extensively already I will defer to the decision already made. Formerly 98 ( talk) 20:02, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
sorry i am a little cranky too and i didn't intend at all to wave you off. does what i wrote above make sense? i really do think the article could use your expertise. Jytdog ( talk) 20:29, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
I thought what you said was fine. And I'm still a little exhausted by the paracetamol discussion where we went on for 8000 words to craft 2 sentences. So right now I'm just not real anxious to take on something that has stirred a lot of discussion in the past. Maybe next month. For now I'll continue to look at other aspects of the article where any disagreements that come up can hopefully be rapidly resolved on the MEDRS board. Formerly 98 ( talk) 21:02, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

 :) Jytdog ( talk) 21:26, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Concerns regarding some recent edits

I am concerned that some recent edits appear to delete information that may be seen as negative and replace it with more positive information. For instance this recently added information related to a recent review:

According to the authors, the use of glyphosate-based pesticides cannot be considered the major cause of amphibian decline, the bulk of which occurred prior to the widespread use of glyphosate or in pristine tropical areas with minimal glyphosate exposure. The authors recommended further study of species- and development-stage chronic toxicity, of environmental glyphosate levels, and ongoing analysis of data relevant to determining what if any role glyphosate might be playing in worldwide amphibian decline, and suggest including amphibians in standardized test batteries.[87]

Using this summary: " Solomon article - pulled more representative quotes from paper". All of the previous information was deleted. I'll quote the previous information.

According to the authors, because little is known about environmental concentrations of glyphosate in amphibian habitats and virtually nothing is known about environmental concentrations of the substances added to the herbicide formulations, if and how glyphosate-based herbicides contribute to amphibian decline is not yet answerable due to missing data on how natural populations are affected. They concluded that the impact on amphibians depends on the herbicide formulation with different sensitivity of taxa and life stages while effects on development of larvae are seen as the most sensitive endpoints to study. The authors recommend "better monitoring of both amphibian populations and contamination of habitats with glyphosate-based herbicides, not just glyphosate," and suggest including amphibians in standardized test batteries.

I am wondering why the editor would suggest that his/her edit was superior to the previous information. In suggesting that his/her decision to include information from the article that they thought was a good summation rather than the abstract of the researchers that wrote the review, couldn't it be reasonable to conclude that this editor rather than the researchers had done the review, or in other words, OR?

Gandy, you are correct. I completely blew this, seeing it through the lens of other material in which I had checked the statements made in the article against the cited source and found that the sources violated WP:MEDRS or simply mischaracterized the content of the cited reference For example:
* POEA is highly toxic to humans" - supported only by reference to in vitro studies, which is a violation of MEDRS. If its really "highly toxic", how is it that people routinely survive drinking 50 mL of or more of the undiluted product?
* "Research has shown that Roundup is teratogenic in animals" - supported only by two papers that describe the teratogenic properties of a completely different compound. Seriously.
* As you can see from my edits, there was a lot of other material that I found very questionable, mostly due to sourcing, but in some cases due to notability. Is it really notable that 5 years ago a French environmentalist group accused Monsanto of lying to regulatory authorities about the ingredients in its formulation given that no confirmation of this allegation has come to light in the ensuring 5 years? Surely regulatory authorities in France have access to a modern analytical chemistry laboratory and can follow up on such allegations.
But as for the amphibians article, you are completely correct. I looked up the rather lengthy article and read it for myself, but my interpretation of the author's intentions in this particular case was so far off that I failed to recognize that the text I replaced was a nearly verbatim quote of the article abstract. As such, it is a copyright violation, and cannot be restored. Let's work on finding some language that captures the authors intent better than I did without violating the copyright. Formerly 98 ( talk) 18:37, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
Yes, it is an obvious copyvio--the editor just copied the abstract. In the same section, in this sentence, "Glyphosate formulations are much more toxic for amphibians...", you removed the word "much"--why did you do that? Gandydancer ( talk) 11:53, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
The statement was originally supported by four references, three of which were primary and of dubious relevance. The fourth was to a book, and cited a 90 page section in which I could not find support for the word "much". I believe this is the point at which I deleted the adjective. The current version of the article supports the statement with a better reference that I added on March 10 as the result of a search for better references on the issue of formulation toxicity. The new reference clearly does support the adjective, which is something that I did not notice at the time, so I've re-added the word "much". Formerly 98 ( talk) 13:35, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/06/14/groundbreaking-study-links-monsantos-glyphosate-to-cancer/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.157.147.2 ( talk) 20:00, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Nope, that's exactly the sort of primary, in vitro research that MEDRS forbids, because so much primary research is not reproducible, especially primary research published in politically contentious fields. Formerly 98 ( talk) 00:09, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Entropy article (again)

Today in these edits, User:Timpo added content based on the Entropy article. As mentioned above, this article has been examined on the MEDRS board and found not acceptable for use in supporting any content in Wikipedia. See Wikipedia_talk:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)/Archive_7#Review_of_Monsanto.27s_Roundup_herbicide. Jytdog ( talk) 14:03, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

This is not simply a newspaper article, and Entropy (journal) I think is is a respected scientific publisher- unless someone knows different? My insertion deliberately fudged the claim thus Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff argue that...may be implicated... My second reference is to that complete scientific paper which has been peer reviewed ( Open access PDF 48 pages with 286 references]) Monsanto is a Big Pharma American corporation and Roundup is one of their big successes - so they might be be alarmed if a Wikipedia article were to suggest a speculative line of enquiry which could at some later time become reliable?
Unfortunately many universities in the USA rely heavily on sponsorship, so academics working in the field of Genetically modified organisms may be implicitly subject to profound commercial information management forces even though there may not have an explicit and personal Conflict of Interest or any direct connection with associated corporate entities
Regrettably, because Lobbying in the United States is mature and effective in exploiting the rather weak (one year - eludable) revolving door (politics) it is becoming increasingly hard (for me, and seemingly for many outside the US) to trust in the impartiality of US based science or scientists. Were that it was not so, but I think we have a duty to insult our friends? Timpo ( talk) 16:31, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
If you have concerns about COI, please bring them to COIN. Talk is not the place for that. Nor is it the place for WP:SOAPBOX either. Let's use the Talk page as it is intended discuss content and sources. Would you please review the discussion of the source at the MEDRS Talk page and respond. Thanks. 16:44, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Would like to know more about this citing article which seems confirmatory. I am unwilling to exclude the possibility that there is a negative reputation influence which makes publishing in off-topic journals more likely for this work. I would ask for the opinion of @ Jmh649: as a trusted generalist (and also ask him how the the request for pre-registered studies from Medline/Pubmed approval went when he visited NIH?) 109.70.142.36 ( talk) 02:59, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

With respect to the "confirmatory" article, it is a primary source. We do not base any Wikipedia content on primary sources as per WP:PSTS and especially with regard to health-related content, we do not generate content based on primary sources communicating results of in vitro studies as per WP:MEDRS. I cannot imagine that DocJames would say differently. Jytdog ( talk) 07:52, 27 December 2013 (UTC)
Does the statement that "Glyphosate has an antimicrobial effect on intestinal microorganisms" appear in the literature review section of that article, and if so, is it secondary? EllenCT ( talk) 15:44, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
The intro says "Recently, it has been proposed that glyphosate may be a significant factor in the observed increased risk to Clostridium botulinum infection in cattle in Germany over the past 10–15 years (Krüger et al., 2013). Glyphosates toxicity to Enterococcus spp. leads to an imbalance in the gut favoring overgrowth of Clostridium spp. ( Krüger et al., 2013 and Shehata et al., 2013a) because common beneficial bacterium, Enterococcus spp. suppresses Clostridium (Shehata et al., 2013b)." In my opinion information that we present about health in Wikipedia should be based on secondary sources that are established opinion; it is very dangerous to put health information into articles based on primary studies as many primary studies turn out not to be replicable. Jytdog ( talk) 18:23, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
I see. Thank you. How long does it usually take MEDRS sources to appear when multiple primaries agree? EllenCT ( talk) 23:59, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
Not predictable... science sometimes leaps and sometimes it crawls. And I hope you are not leaping from the paragraph I quoted above to a belief that glyphosate is affecting the bacteria in your intestines! (toxicology is much more complex than that) Jytdog ( talk) 00:35, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
Indeed, feedlot cattle have fewer diseases than free-range pasture-fed. I would love to know why you think that is? The extent to which we depend on antibiotics is a monoculture risk, just like the extent on which we depend on a lack of diversity in pesticides. I'm not seeing much clear leadership on monoculture issues from multinational conglomerates borne in the modern mergers-and-acquisitions quarterly balance sheet shortsightedness, especially in terms of willingness to abuse monopoly positions, which we are often reminded of in the press. EllenCT ( talk) 04:03, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

You lost me. Jytdog ( talk) 07:04, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I'll explain later. I am upset about a political lynching on WP:ANI at the moment. EllenCT ( talk) 07:30, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Further reading:

Cheers, 193.5.216.100 ( talk) 15:09, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Three relevant papers worth looking at

I do not have time right now to dissect these papers and work out what might be worth adding to this article. Perhaps another editor might? Djapa Owen ( talk) 13:23, 18 May 2014 (UTC) Major Pesticides Are More Toxic to Human Cells Than Their Declared Active Principles Glyphosate induces human breast cancer cells growth via estrogen receptors. [http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/roundup-herbicide-125-times-more-toxic-regulators-say Roundup Herbicide 125 Times More Toxic Than Regulators Say]

Please review WP:MEDRS None of these are reliable sources for medical information. MEDRS requires secondary sources (non-news media), and emphasizes that cell culture data is insufficient to make direct or implied claims about human health effects. Formerly 98 ( talk) 13:47, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
Are you suggesting National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine is a news media organisation?
We should not make direct or implied claims based on cell culture data then. Maybe just report the cell culture data? Djapa Owen ( talk) 14:21, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
No, NCBI is not a news source, but it isn't the article source either. Its just a government site that indexes and provides free access to certain published scientific papers. The public library that provides online access to NYTimes articles isn't the source for news stories either. Its just a distribution node. The source is the journal or newspaper the article was published in.
The first two articles deal with cell culture results and are primary research citations. MEDRS explicitly states that "Primary sources should generally not be used for medical content." and "A reason to avoid primary sources in the biomedical field—especially papers reporting results of in vitro experiments—is that they are often not replicable[2] and are therefore unsuitable for use in generating encyclopedic, reliable content about health."
The third article is from an quasi new site that does not even meet the standards of mainstream news media. Regarding the latter, MEDRS states "The popular press is generally not a reliable source for scientific and medical information in articles. Most medical news articles fail to discuss important issues such as evidence quality,[18] costs, and risks versus benefits,[19] and news articles too often convey wrong or misleading information about health care." This site contains almost exclusively articles that are far outside medical mainstream thinking, with titles like "Why the Press shouldn't discount vaccine skeptics", "Should Wheat be reclassified as a pathogen?", and "28 signs that the Western US is being absolutely fried with nuclear radiation from Fukushima".
The only possible purpose for quoting cell culture data in this article (if you found a secondary source) would be to make implied statements about human health, as obviously very few of our readers are concerned with the well-being of cultured cells. If this were an article on maintaining cell culture specimens, the cell culture data would be of interest in its own right irrespective of any implied statements about effects on human health. But its clearly not.

Formerly 98 ( talk) 14:43, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

Hi Djapa, you are clearly well intentioned, but you also clearly don't understand biomedical literature. None of these are published by "National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine" - that is just an indexing service. The key message of MEDRS is that any health-related information in Wikipedia needs to come from a) a review article published in the biomedical literature (ideally a critical review, something like what Cochrane puts out; or b) statements by major medical or scientific bodies. The first two sources you brought are primary sources, and everything in Wikipedia should be based on secondary sources (see WP:OR and WP:RS), and this is even more important for health related information (see WP:MEDRS, please do read MEDRS). The third source is just a news report, from a partisan source at that, about the first one. And MEDRS is clear that news reports that come out when primary sources are published are not reliable either. I hope that makes sense. Jytdog ( talk) 14:46, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

New article in HuffPo

New article in HuffPo: [3]. Leaving it here for anyone's use in the article. Softlavender ( talk) 00:10, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

so sad. Jytdog ( talk) 00:20, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Controversy missing

The use of GMO roundup ready crops is hotly debated in societies worldwide ie: labeling laws, yet this article fails to mention any debate. Anyone against adding the social side? Dougmcdonell ( talk) 14:26, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Not missing. See the bottom section on GM crops and the link there to Genetically modified food controversies. The topic is very well covered in that article! Jytdog ( talk) 14:48, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Use

I would like us to explain how best to use it. Roundup says to apply when weeds are "actively growing". This, in my experience is not just not-dormant-in-winter. This means that, say stinging nettles are green and nominally growing in the summer, but you have to cut them down and let them regrow if you want them to be "actively growing" enough to die from Glyphosate- hence Roundup's reference to Spring. Can't find any references to this but the proffesionals know this.

IceDragon64 ( talk) 10:34, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Rio Cuarto Studies

There are several studies relating the use of Glyphosate to cancer and other deceases, which should be mentioned in the article. The latest coming from Argentina, a 8 year study strongly relating its use with genetic damage. [4] [5] [6] Mariano( t/ c) 11:10, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

thanks for wanting to improve the article! however we don't use news media reports to source anything health-related in Wikipedia, nor do we use original scientific publications. This is explained in our guideline for health related content, WP:MEDRS. There are no acceptable sources that say that glyphosate causes cancer; that is why it is not discussed in this article. I do know that there are a lot of sensational websites out there that make all kinds of scary claims; we are careful to include only reliable information in Wikipedia. btw, here is the most recent review on glyphosate toxicity: PMID  23480780. Jytdog ( talk) 12:09, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Jytdog. Added that to the toxicity section. Appreciate any feedback. Lfstevens ( talk) 06:52, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

History: Invention by Henry Martin in Switzerland

Glyhosate was invented by Swiss chemist Henry Martin for Swiss compnay Cilag. In 1959, Swiss company Cilag was sold to American company Johnson & Johnson. Only in 1970, the herbicidal activity was discovered by American chemist Franz, who worked for Monsanto. 47.64.143.232 ( talk) 01:23, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

added a source and copyedited accordingly. Jytdog ( talk) 01:44, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Monsanto

Under the Formulations and Tradenames → Monsanto section, the article states that "their(Monsanto's) Roundup products (which include GM seeds) represented about half of Monsanto's yearly revenue;" however, the cited reference, an article from Forbes [1] states that "...the seed producer improved gross margins from 55.6% to 58% last quarter..." This refers to Monsanto's overall gross profit margin, and not the percentage of their profit which comes from the sale of seeds. 76.199.147.212 ( talk) 06:19, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

  1. ^ http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/29/monsanto-potash-fertilizer-personal-finance-investing-ideas-agrium-mosaic.html
fixed, thanks. Jytdog ( talk) 13:29, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

Here is why we don't use popular press to report science

Calh077 introduced the following text in this dif: " Monsanto discovered the genes for glyphosphate tolerance by studying a bacteria growing on the waste at a Roundup factory." The source provided was this newspaper article which says: "This pesticide-resistant enzyme was taken from a bacteria growing on the waste at a Roundup factory."

Seems to be a good match! Right?

The source links to its source - an article in PNAS, where you find: "The Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4, isolated from a waste-fed column at a glyphosate production facility, yielded a glyphosate-resistant, kinetically efficient EPSP synthase suitable for the production of transgenic, glyphosate-tolerant crops."

The newspaper reporter read too fast or doesn't have a clue what a "column" is, or what the scientific effort looks like to try to drive evolution. Here is the patent application cited in the PNAS paper, about CP4 was found: "The Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4 was initially identified by its ability to grow on glyphosate as a carbon source (10 mM) in the presence of 1 mM phosphate. The strain CP4 was identified from a collection obtained from a fixed-bed immobilized cell column that employed Mannville R-635 diatomaceous earth beads. The column had been run for three months on a waste-water feed from a glyphosate production plant. The column contained 50 mg/ml glyphosate and NH3 as NH4CI. Total organic carbon was 300 mg/ml and BOD's (Biological Oxygen Demand - a measure of "soft" carbon availability) were less than 30 mg/ml. This treatment column has been described (Heitkamp et al., 1990). Dworkin-Foster minimal salts medium containing glyphosate at 10 mM and with phosphate at 1 mM was used to select for microbes from a wash of this column that were capable of growing on glyphosate as sole carbon source" and blah blah blah.

Does that sound even a little bit like the bullshit that was in the newspaper article and that was introduced into WP? Hell no. Jytdog ( talk) 05:15, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

I hate to say it, but that's a fairly accurate representation of the facts. The bacterium was found in waste water from a glyphosate factory. Monsanto went to a lot of effort to isolate it from all the other microbes in that water, but the patent says in plain English that the bacterium was isolated from a column that was run using waste water from the Roundup factory. The column played a major role in allowing the bacterium to be detected and isolated, but the bacterium did come, originally, from the waste water form the factory. By any normal reading, the genes came from a bacterium that came from the waste water that came from a Roundup factory. That shouldn't be surprising. If you are looking for a microbe that has evolved to digest a chemical, you start looking at the place where the most microbes have been exposed to that chemical for the longest time: the waste water form the production plant. At this stage, I vote that we include this information. It's interesting, it's pertinent, it's factual. It may need to be slightly reworded, but all sources seem to agree that the bacterium was isolated from waste water at the glyphosate factory. Mark Marathon ( talk) 05:44, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
Agreed that this information should be included. The source is reliable, secondary, and essentially correct. Although it is possible that the mutation that lead to the CP4 strain first occurred on the column, I think it is far more likely that it already existed in the production facility's waste stream where bacteria had been exposed to glyphosate for several years on a much larger scale. The purpose of the column was likely to isolate and replicate a pre-existing CP4 strain. However we cannot say that with 100% certainty. Hence it would be safer to say "isolated from a waste-fed column at a glyphosate production facility" as this secondary source does. Boghog ( talk) 07:07, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
wtf? boghog I am at surprised at you, making things up this way. what we know from the PNAS paper is that Monsanto scientists did work to drive bacteria to be resistant to glyphosate, isolated them, then clone the gene. they did fucking science. we should do the standard move here, and find a review that describes how the resistance gene was discovered. i have to go to an all-day meeting now, will come back to this tomorrow. Jytdog ( talk) 12:33, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
I am equally surprised at you Jytdog. No one is disputing that the Monsanto scientists isolated the CP4 strain or cloned the gene. However no where in the patent application nor in the PNAS article is it claimed that the scientists drove the evolution the CP4 strain. That evolution was likely to have begun in the waste stream long before the scientists started their experiments. Regardless, to argue where the CP4 strain originally evolved (in the waste stream or in the column) is rather pointless. The scientists themselves don't know nor do they probably care. The only important fact is they were able to isolate this glyphosate resistant strain and no one disputes this fact. I have already suggested a suitable secondary source above that simply states where the strain was isolated without speculation as to where it originally evolved. Boghog ( talk) 14:29, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
The main issue here seems to be spin. It appears the source Jytdog questioned is trying to imply imagery of the bacteria was found in some toxic sludge (cue maniacal Monsanto exec laughter). We do need to be careful of how information is presented to prevent undue weight in a case like that. If the scientists were purposely driving the evolution of the bacteria and it wasn't just happenstance, then the use of waste-water is a more minor detail in the whole process. If it was more happenstance, then we need to be sure to describe it in a neutral way. For a scientist, waste-water can invoke very different imagery than for a general reader, almost to the point of being a WP:JARGON issue. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 14:39, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
In this instance i can't see any evidence that "waste water" doesn't mean exactly what it means to the general reader. It refers to the water that is expelled from the factory as waste. Water that was contaminated with whatever was washed from the floor and equipment. That's what waste water means to the general reader, and there is no reason to believe that's not what it means in the patent. Can you present any evidence that this is not the case? If not, then why should we assume that it is some form of jargon? I've worked in a lot of fields in my time. and I have never heard "waste water" used as jargon. I always just means "water that is waste because it is too contaminated/hot to be reused"; exactly what it means to the general reader. Mark Marathon ( talk) 21:28, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
I don't think the term "waste water" means anything here. Water running down the drain of your shower is waste water, and unless you use PCBs as a skin moisturizer, it is not "too toxic to be reused". In fact San Diego is recycling its wastewater and sending it back to our taps.
This paper describes Monsanto's development of the fixed bed bioreactor for tertiary scrubbing of wastewater that had already been through two cycles of treatment. They had already been using bacterial treatment of their waste stream for years to remove chemicals from the water used in production prior to release, and they took bacterial sludge from that reactor, loaded it into diatomaceous earth columns, and used them as a more efficient treatment process. The Agrobacterium used as a source for the gene was isolated from this reactor, and its ancestors grew up in the prior version of the Monsanto treatment facility. The ancestors of these bacteria cannot be presumed to have evolved in response to glyphosate in Monsanto's waste stream as the existence of bacterial enzymes that cleave carbon-phosophorus bonds has been known since 1963, many years before the discovery of glyphosate. (see the references in this paper) and were present at the time of Monsanto's original studies of the biodegradation of glyphosate (see refs in same paper).
So I don't think we need to bring to the reader's mind images of bizarre new life forms evolving in toxic Monsanto waste streams, that's all WP:COATRACK. They isolated the gene from a bacteria that they had readily at hand. With a little more effort, they could have pulled it out of the soil in backwoods Minnesota, where it would have been hungrily devouring the natural substance 2-aminoethanephosphonic acid. The source of the bacteria is a trivial experimental detail. Formerly 98 ( talk) 00:23, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

thanks everybody for the discussion. i replaced the current content about the discovery of ESPS CP4 with new content based on the discussion above, with Boghog's source and an additional one i found. Jytdog ( talk) 02:38, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Likewise, thanks to everyone for the discussion and to Jytdog for revising the content. Just one minor point for clarification. As Jytdog has made clear in the revision, the Agrobacterium CP4 EPSP synthase doesn't break down glyphosate, rather it is resistant to it while still retaining high efficiency for the reaction it normally catalyzes. The most closely related EPSP synthases which have been sequenced are from Rhizobium (it has been proposed that Agrobacterium and Rhizobium genera be merged, but this is controversial, see Agrobacterium or Rhizobium, which name to use?):
EPSP synthase sequence alignment
SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           MSHGASSRPATARKSSGLSGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLKGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLRGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLAAGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ MSHGVALKPARSLKSADLKGTVRIPGDKSISHRSFMFGGLASGETRITGLLEGEDVINTG 60
                               ****.: :** : **: * **********************:******************

                                        7         8         9         0         1
                               123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           KAMQAMGARIRKEGDTWIIDGVGNGGLLAPEAPLDFGNAATGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ KAMQAMGAKIEKVGAEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         KAMHAMGARIEKVGDEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFESTFI 120
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ KAMQAMGAKIEKVGAEWIIQGTGNGALLAPEAPLDFGNAGTGCRLTMGLVGVYDFDSTFI 120
                               ***:****:*.* *  ***:*.***.*************.***************:****

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           GDASLTKRPMGRVLNPLREMGVQVKSEDGDRLPVTLRGPKTPTPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ GDASLSKRPMGRVLAPLREMGVQVTAAEGDRLPVTLRGPATPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         GDASLTKRPMGRVLNPLREMGVQVKAAEGDRLPVTLRGPSIPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ GDASLSKRPMGRVLAPLREMGVQVTAAEGDRLPVTLRGPATPNPITYRVPMASAQVKSAV 180
                               *****:******** *********.: :***********  *.*****************

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           LLAGLNTPGITTVIEPIMTRDHTEKMLQGFGANLTVETDADGVRTIRLEGRGKLTGQVID 240
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ LLAGLNTPGTTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGADLTVETDADGVRTIRLQGRGRLTGQVID 240
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         LLAGLNTPGVTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGANLMVELDADGVRTIRLEGRGQLIGQVID 240
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ LLAGLNTPGTTTVIEPVMTRDHTEKMLQGFGADLTVETDADGVRTIRLQGRGRLTGQVID 240
                               ********* ******:***************:* ** **********:***:* *****

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSDVTILNVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVINPRLAGGED 300
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSEVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVLNARLAGGED 300
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSDVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVINPRLAGGED 300
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VPGDPSSTAFPLVAALLVPGSEVTIENVLMNPTRTGLILTLQEMGADIEVLNARLAGGED 300
                               *********************:*** ************************:* *******

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VADLRVRSSTLKGVTVPEDRAPSMIDEYPILAVAAAFAEGATVMNGLEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VADLRVRHSQLKGVTVPAERAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGTTTMLGVEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VADLRVRHSELKGVTVPADRAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGATTMLGLEELRVKESDRLSA 360
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VADLRVRHSQLKGVTVPAERAPSMIDEYPVLAVAAAFAEGTTTMLGVEELRVKESDRLSA 360
                               ******* * ******* :**********:**********:*.* *:*************

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VANGLKLNGVDCDEGETSLVVRGRPDGKGLGNASGAAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVMGLVSENP 420
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ TAAGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLTVRGRPGGKGYGNAAGEAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVLGLVSEHP 420
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VADGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLVVRGRPGGKGYGNATGSSVVTHLDHRIAMSFLVMGLVSEHA 420
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ TAAGLKLNGVDCDEGEDTLTVRGRPGGKGYGNAAGEAVATHLDHRIAMSFLVLGLVSEHP 420
                               .* ************* :*.***** *** ***:* :*.*************:*****. 

SP|Q9R4E4|AROA_AGRSC           VTVDDATMIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGAKIELSDTKAA 455
TR|A0A081MDT9|A0A081MDT9_9RHIZ VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGARIEAVESRAA 455
TR|L0NN29|L0NN29_RHISP         VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMTGLGARIEPVESRAA 455
TR|A0A081MM49|A0A081MM49_9RHIZ VTVDDAGIIATSFPEFMDLMAGLGARIEAVESRAA 455
                               ****** :************:****:**  :::**
As pointed out in PMID  16916934, a single Ala-100-Gly mutation restores glyphosate sensitivity. The most closely related EPSP synthases which have been sequenced all have Gly at position-100. This suggests that this mutation that results in glyphosate resistance may have been a relatively recent evolutionary event. Without additional sequences of synthases from other strains of Agrobacterium, it is impossible to say where and when this mutation first arose. Boghog ( talk) 10:14, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
thanks for that detail... i take it you are not suggesting any content change or addition.... or are you? (btw, I added the same content to the EPSP synthase article) Jytdog ( talk) 13:09, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
Those details at the moment are only WP:OR ;-) We would of course need a published reliable source that talks about the evolution of Agrobacterium EPSP synthases and so far I have not found any. Boghog ( talk) 15:23, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Pesticide resistance

Ponydepression has reverted this content [7] a couple times now, but the issue isn't particularly clear. The wikilink goes to the pesticide resistance article, which is exactly what glyphosate resistance plants are. Given, the article itself does need an addition for non-pest resistance, but we still call it pesticide resistance regardless of what is resistant. Could you explain what you're seeing as the issue is here? Thanks. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 03:26, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

while the initial reason given was wrong (statement that "herbicide is not a pesticide" is incorrect) the wikilinked article Pesticide resistance is about the development of resistance by weeds (e.g. "superweeds"), not the genetically engineered resistance of crops to pesticide. wrong reason, but correct edit. I removed the wikilink. Jytdog ( talk) 04:10, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
I can see why you made the change reading over it a bit now. I was mainly going by the first sentence, "Pesticide resistance describes the decreased susceptibility of a pest population to a pesticide that was previously effective at controlling the pest." That was close to what we should have for a general definition that I thought could be tweaked relatively easily, but it looks like the rest of the page needs to be generalized a bit when I read the rest of it. It doesn't need to be a pest in question, but obviously that's the predominant example. If we are just going by the article name, the article would need to be generalized to include crop glyphosate resistance, but that's not a discussion for here. I'll try tackling that reorganizing at some point, and readd the wikilink once things mesh up better. Kingofaces43 ( talk) 04:42, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
we're on same page :) Jytdog ( talk) 11:17, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

B-cell lymphoma?

Came across this review: [8] whose abstract includes " B cell lymphoma was positively associated with phenoxy herbicides and the organophosphorus herbicide glyphosate." Should this go in? Lfstevens ( talk) 20:56, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

oh god it is another article in an MDPI journal which also published that bad Seneff article. i'll have a look! Jytdog ( talk) 21:38, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
OK, I looked at this closely, and looked for commentary on it. Seems OK. It is about occupational exposures and was a meta-anlysis of epidemiological studies. So correlative. It found that workers exposed to glyphosate are twice as likely to get a subtype of Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, namely B cell lymphoma. B cell lymphomas account for almost all NHL. That's twice as likely, with a 95% confidence interval of 1.1–3.6. Overall, according to the NCI, around 2.1 percent of adults are diagnosed with NHL at some point during their lifetime - that includes everybody. I'll add some content to our article. Nice find! Jytdog ( talk) 01:51, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
Here's a contrary, earlier review: [9]
actually not necessarily contrary. the 2012 review you cite is not limited to occupational exposure. There is no signal in that population. I'll add this too. Thanks. Jytdog ( talk) 20:58, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

seneff source again

please see Wikipedia_talk:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)/Archive_7#Review_of_Monsanto.27s_Roundup_herbicide Jytdog ( talk) 01:47, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Deletion of Sentence " The classification mainly pertains to industrial use of the compound rather than use in gardens."

I support this diff by @ 49.184.30.180:. I have been meaning to come back and delete that sentence. There is nothing in the study that says anything about "industrial formulations." David Tornheim ( talk) 06:28, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Originally I deleted the sentence above for the reasons I struck out above, namely that it was not in the study. Now, I see it is in the other article mainstream article from U.S. News & World Report about the study, rather than from the study itself. That makes me reconsider my opposition to the sentence. I am happy to support adding it back, as long as we are clear about this: Is it indeed okay for material written about scientific studies in sources that are neither written by scientists nor published in a scientific journals when they report on that study? If so, the sentence would be acceptable. I am adding another sentence from the same article, assuming the answer is yes. David Tornheim ( talk) 06:46, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Strangely, articles about reports are considered more reliable than the reports themselves. As long as the source is reliable, it should overrule the (potentially self-serving) original. Lfstevens ( talk) 07:19, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
^Is this from WIki-Policy, -Guideline, or -Essay? Or from outside Wikipedia? Are you saying this is true of scientific studies, in particular? That non-scientists writing about scientific work from the mainstream press (if deemed "reliable") are more reliable than the work published by scientists in a peer reviewed journal? David Tornheim ( talk) 07:38, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
It's about the preference for secondary sources. Lfstevens ( talk) 07:45, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Fails WP:MEDPOP and thus should be excluded. Formerly 98 ( talk) 14:00, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Talk:Glyphosate/Archive_3&oldid=1136768431"

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