Talk:Organic food

Certified Organic Catagories

Maybe this should go under first topic: Definition. There are four different levels or categories for organic labeling. 1)‘100%’ Organic: This means that all ingredients are produced organically. It also may have the USDA seal. 2)‘Organic’: At least 95% or more of the ingredients are organic. 3)’Made With Organic Ingredients': Contains at least 70% organic ingredients. 4)‘Less Than 70. Organic Ingredients’: Three of the organic ingredients must be listed under the ingredient section of the label. “USDA organic: what qualifies as organic?" Massage Therapy Journal Spring 2011: 36+. Academic OneFile. Web. 3 Mar. 2014. Tperki10 (talk) 16:08, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Two objectsions. 1. the USA has 300 million people, it's undue to give them more weight. 2. Your source is crap, Second Quantization (talk) 10:11, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

changes made in mid-July

in series of difs, Doc James made a series of edits that I mostly reverted today. Two main issues:

1. It is not true that in the scientific literature, differences between organic and conventional produce are controversial. Every serious review, including the most recent one, acknowledges that it is very hard to draw generalizations from the data at hand, due to variability in the actual things being tested (due to a) differences in how they are grown (soil, fertilizer, weather, seed, in any given region in any given year); b) differences in what transpires between harvest and testing (how far do they travel, what is done to them in the meantime), and c) what is actually tested for. Furthermore, everybody agrees that it is nigh onto impossible to draw conclusions about health effects between eating conventional and organic, due to the difficulty and expense of designing and running a meaningful clinical trial. So - nothing is contoversial from within science.
2. I object to the 2014 meta analysis being added to the lead. It found differences in cadmium and antioxidants, but again, it drew no conclusions about health effects. Different studies are going to find different things - this nutrient or that anti-nutrient are going to be higher or lower in this or that study. The key thing, and I again emphasize this - no study, not even the 2014, draws conclusions that organic food is healthier.

It is totally fine to cite and use the 2014 meta-analysis (of course!) but I fail to see why it belongs in the lead or causes any dramatic changes to this article.Jytdog (talk) 14:42, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

It should be in the lead. It's the most definitive meta-analysis to date. There is no rule that says only health effects can be covered in the lead. It's a fact that organic food has less pesticide residue, higher anti-oxidants, and less cadmium. Fine if it's not claimed that these are health effects, but odd to completely omit. TimidGuy (talk) 09:27, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

One problem here is that none of the variables mentioned here have been unambiguously tied to health. Antioxidants have variously been found to increase or decrease the risk of cancer/mortality, or to have no effect for example here, here, and here.Formerly 98 (talk) 11:40, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

TimidGuy we don't discuss details of any of the recent reviews in the lead, nor should we (in my opinion... I don't know how we would summarize that mass of data, but i am open to suggestions). And if we are going to, it seems to me that we would have to provide detail about how they are not different as well, and deal with very recent reviews that found different things. You have provided no reason under WP:WEIGHT nor WP:NPOV to justify describing just the two positive findings for organic food from the 2014 meta review in the lead. Please do so. Also the lead does mention differences in chemical composition... Thanks! Jytdog (talk) 14:31, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Taste section

The "Taste" section of the article ironically brings up the an issue related to the somewhat arbitrary line between organic and non-organic agriculture. While the paragraph refers to artificially ripening fruits with the "chemical" ethylene, ethylene is in fact a naturally produced hormone produced by most fruit bearing plants as part of their regulation of fruit ripening. We don't call vitamin C a chemical when it is extracted from citrus and compressed into a pill for human consumption at large multiples of any possible natural exposure, but concentrating the natural product ethylene and applying to to fruit at concentrations similar to those found in nature is "chemical"? It seems like the language of the paragraph needs to be modified, but I"m not sure how to do it without wandering into WP:OR. Formerly 98 (talk) 11:57, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

addressed that. thanks! Jytdog (talk) 20:13, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

article structure

In the course of the discussion about how to handle the 2014 meta review, I just want to let new folks here know that the current structure of the article was the result of a looooong negotiation. (much of it is here but it is in other archives as well.) The crux of the conflict, was the conflation of two separate questions -- 1) is organically produced food chemically different from conventionally produced food in any generalizable way, and 2) to the extent those differences exist, do they matter for health? By separating those two topics carefully, we were able to settle the article content to the satisfaction-enough of all the parties involved at that time, which was a happy thing. If we want to revisit that consensus, let's do that consciously and carefully. Anyway, to maintain that, I moved content introduced by Formerly 98 in this dif, down into the health section. Jytdog (talk) 14:24, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

No worries, sorry to intrude. Formerly 98 (talk) 15:51, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

the content was great, thank you! just thought i should let everybody know about the structure thing - your edit just prompted it. Jytdog (talk) 16:25, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Perceptions

I had my edits to perceptions reversed apparently due to the claim it is original research. Actually the paragraph contains much original research and doesn't address where the perceptions came from at all.I was fixing that. To accuse me of original research when I claim that the source of the perception of organic food being healthier comes from The likes of Sir Albert Howard, Lady Eve Balfore and Rodale press etc.. is ridiculous actually. They are the principle reason we even have an organic movement. But if you want more. Why not read this:http://books.google.com/books?id=Qh7dkdVsbDkC&pg=PA145&lpg=PA145&dq=sir+Albert+Howard+Knighted&source=bl&ots=w9euvIx-85&sig=XHLtq-Ql7sz506GMlnzCf8Z2On8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Wfv0U6GfBOGejAL24YHQBg&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=sir%20Albert%20Howard%20Knighted&f=false "Redddbaron (talk) 19:59, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

actually just the first sentence was unsourced. everything else is sourced. Thanks for pointing that out. Very grateful you are working to expand the article - please just follow WP:VERIFY. Thanks! Jytdog (talk) 20:03, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

To explain, what needs sourcing is the claim that " This perception originated in the early days of the organic movement as a result of publications like The Living Soil, Gardening and Farming for Health or Disease, and later Silent spring and periodicals like Mother Earth News and Prevention Magazine." How do I verify that it is true that the perception originated from those publications? That is what you need a source for. Without a source, the content is indeed WP:OR. Thanks.Jytdog (talk) 20:10, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

<cynical>And I guess that source must be WP:MEDRS approved?</cynical> The Banner talk 20:26, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Redbaron, really, I am glad you are improving the article. The section is public perception. lan's book makes it clear that "the living soil" Blafore, etc are important for organic movement "geeks", as it were but are not what made organic Important to the Public. Pollan talks about the Alar scare, about silent spring, and other stuff. Not Howard/Balfore/Rodale. Do you see what I mean? Jytdog (talk) 20:32, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

and Banner, don't be a dick. You already made a pointy revert. Jytdog (talk) 20:32, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

My friend, you removed sources without good reason. The Banner talk 20:38, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

There was no source given for the actual statement. Please see above. Jytdog (talk) 20:45, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Right, and the first sentence I didn't write, nor do I have any knowledge or belief it is even true or could even be backed up. I left it so as to "tread lightly" on other editors work. However, the public perception of the health benefits of organic food precedes the existence of an "organic industry" by many decades. In fact it is the perception that was already well established that marketers for the organic industry are attempting to exploit! The marketing wouldn't even exist if the perception wasn't there already! Marketing of organic by industry is simply filling a demand in the marketplace that already existed. As far as what I wrote, I just added a citation to Pollan's book where it explains the influence of early writers like Howard and Rodale. Is that enough? Shall I go find more?Redddbaron (talk) 20:40, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Redbaron, I mentioned the first sentence to acknowledge that you were correct that the rest of the paragraph was lacking in sourcing. What are you objecting to? As for the rest of what you write, I have been trying to tell you for a while now, that content needs sourcing. What is the support for the rest of what you added? The idea of WP:VERIFY is that a reader can go read the footnote you provide, to verify that what you added is true. (along those lines, if you cite a book, you should give a page number or reasonable range of numbers.) Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 20:45, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Redbaron, I want to go back to Pollan. Again, this section is about public perception. The "laity", not the "priesthood". Reading from the page you linked to above, it is really clear that there is "birth of the modern organic movement" around Alar (see pp 152ff). The "pure folk" Howard, Rodale, etc, and their ideology didn't really hit the public perception. It was Alar that made the public aware.. that made this boom. Do you see what I mean? Jytdog (talk) 21:10, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

The idea of WP:VERIFY is to make reasonable requests for sources. Asking for a source for every sentence and/or word is not reasonable. The Banner talk 20:57, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

banner, you are just being pointy and you are not actually engaged in the discussion of content and sources, just disrupting it. please join, or go away. 21:05, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Jytdog, I have all the right to be here and to be critical how you treat/strangle this article. You are clearly not here to improve the article but to prevent that something positive is coming into the article. So stop disrupting the article. The Banner talk 21:09, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

I am a slower typer than you. :P Your reply came between me posting for the previous post! Sometimes you are getting in 2 or 3 posts while I am still replying to the first! :D Anyway, shall I cite a reference that prevention magazine has a readership of over 10 million a month and is a health magazine by Rodale press promoting that public perception? The influence of these publications is well documented on their respective wiki pages or they wouldn't have a wiki page of their own. I thought that same principle you talked about in the Organic farming page applied here as well? Any issues of notability should be addressed on their respective pages? The pages in Pollan's book that reference Howard's book and it's influence are above. (pp 145,146....) Oh and BTW "organic movement "geeks" is kind of uncalled for on a wikipage about Organic food don't you think? If that isn't biased language, I don't know what is. I am trying to show that the perception in the organic movement that organic food is healthier comes from the published literature produced by the organic movement and have been making that claim from the very beginnings of "organic" and provided references to some of the most influential of those publications. Actually Pollan makes similar claims about health too, as he is influenced by the earlier works himself. But his influence IMO is simply building on public perception that already existed, so I have to cut it off somewhere or we will end up with a whole dissertation on what influences public perception 10 paragraphs long.;)Redddbaron (talk) 21:19, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

thanks for continuing to talk, redbaron. prevention, mother jones, etc, talk about a lot of stuff, not just organic. the statement you wrote (which appears more and more to be based on your perception of the world, and not on any source at all!) says that those magazines drove public perception of the benefits of organic. I think the question of what drives public perception of organic is important, interesting, and not trivial. Why do people buy Mother Jones and Prevention at all? Are those magazines actually driving perception of organic, or (what i think is more likely) are there underlying forces that are driving consumption of both? ( is it really correlation, not causation? ... like the example of a survey finding that college kids who sleep in their clothes wake up with headaches. are the clothes causing the headaches? NO - the kids are getting drunk before they go to bed!). anyway, again, this is what I mean - what you added to the article appears to be your perception of what drives public perception. as far as I can tell, the content is not based on published work by people who have studied this. do you see what i mean now? we are supposed to find great sources, absorb them, and add content based on them. not write content, and then go find content that supports it..... thanks for continuing to talk! (and on the "geeks" thing, I am using that in a friendly way. (we live in an age where technology is driving change - "geek" is a good thing - geeks are the ones holding the reins and creating the stuff that we all consume; this is what i meant by "geeks" of the organic movement -- the ones driving change, not just the consumers). Jytdog (talk) 21:57, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

redbaron, the citations you are adding, do not support the statement -- you are just adding references to the very things you are discussing, not to their importance. Here is an example: "Jytdog (ref:User:Jytdog) is one of the worst editors on Wikipedia" What I did there, was provide a source that says who Jytdog is.... but there is no source supporting the actual statement about Jytdog. Do you see what I mean? Jytdog (talk) 22:15, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

It's not just my perception Jytdog. I have been adding more sources. For example, the "silent spring" reference I added wasn't to silent spring itself, but rather an link that states, "Environment, conservation, green, and kindred movements look back to Rachel Carson’s 1962 book Silent Spring as a milestone. The impact of the book, including on government, industry, and civil society, was immediate and substantial, and has been extensively described" Now this particular source I used to cite the public perception as it applies to pesticides. I also added a citation after "the living soil", but not to the living soil, instead to a PUBLIC speech made by Lady Eve Balfour about the results found in the haughley experiment (published in The Living Soil) including "the purpose being to assess what effect, if any, the different soil treatments had on the biological quality of the produce grown thereon, including its nutritive value as revealed through its animal consumers. This had never been done before.". So the citation isn't the actual book the living soil, but the influence. Oh and the omnivores dilemma itself is a good history of "organic" confirming these influences...not on me..but on others perceptions. I am trying very hard to stay out of it. MY perceptions are very different, with completely different origins, trust me.Redddbaron (talk) 22:29, 20 August 2014 (UTC)PS remember, I am not writing NOR placing citations to support the first line of the paragraph, only what I wrote. Someone else, whoever wrote it, will have to support the perception is widespread beyond us "organic geeks".Redddbaron (talk) 22:33, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

respectfully, how does the speech by lady balfour, describing the science they were doing, tell the reader anything about her influence on public perception, in her time or ours? Jytdog (talk) 23:11, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember, I am not the one who claimed this is a widespread public perception. What I did is trace back to where the idea came from originally. That's easy with pesticides and "Silent spring" because it was immediate and and significant. However, personally I don't even know if the nutritional benefits derived from organic soils is nearly as well known or perceived by the "widespread general public". What I do know is that idea came from the Haughley experiment, which was the first scientific study on the health effects derived from healthy organic soils, and they were positive. But just because there was a study doesn't place that information in the minds of others or show it's influence. The Rodale Press largely did that. However, a speech to the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements 34 years after publication does show some things. The experimental evidence did show health benefits and at least with the "organic geeks" the book is, was and remained influential, or she wouldn't be invited to speak about it 34 years later. Still need to prove the "organic geeks" at IFOAM have any influence at all on the public, and/or reflect "widespread public perceptions", or both. The wikipage says "The Living Soil (1943) by Lady Eve Balfour is considered a seminal classic in organic agriculture and the organic movement. The book is based on Balfour's agricultural and medical research, and the initial findings of the first three years of the Haughley Experiment, the first scientific, side-by-side farm trial to compare organic and chemical-based farming." but it isn't referenced well either. But again, I never claimed there is a widespread public perception(positive or negative). We still need some citations for that. Maybe an opinion poll? What I did do though is document where the idea that organic soil effects plant nutrition which in turn ultimately effects human health started. How, if, and/or how much that idea entered into the public mind, I can't say with certainty. I would love to see a reference for that first sentence, which I didn't write myself. That might help a lot. However, what I wrote is well referenced IMHORedddbaron (talk) 00:20, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

you do know that you added text to the section of the article called "public perceptions", right? sorry to ask. but how does the first scientific experiment matter, for public perception? thanks Jytdog (talk) 00:54, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

You still need sources that connect what happened in the past with organic foods. I suppose Silent Spring made people aware of pesticides and that is one reason some people buy organic food, but you need a source that connects the two, otherwise it is original research. Note too as a result of Silent Spring environmental and pesticide regulations were introduced that arguably could have eliminated the need for organic food, so you cannot just assume the connection. And you also need to explain why organic food suddenly exploded decades after Silent Spring was published. TFD (talk) 00:55, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

OK I made a subtle change in my original edit that should put this to rest. (hopefully) I changed "perception" to "idea". This way it is up to the original editor to provide a citation backing how, when, if, and/or to what degree, the "idea" became widespread enough to be considered a "widespread public perception". All I did was show where the idea came from. Keep in mind though, this is NOT my opinion. My opinion on the public perception is there is no difference and I base my opinion on the fact that I grow and sell organic produce. Even the vast majority my loyal customers think there is little difference in taste, nutritional quality or safety between organic and conventional. They think my produce tastes better, is more nutritious and is safer, not because it is organic, but because it is fresh. This is nearly universal in my experience. The ONLY ones I personally have ever seen that say differently are professional chefs, not the public. But the wiki article has claimed the general public's perception is the opposite. So I have traced where the idea came from, without taking sides to whether the first sentence is even true or not.Redddbaron (talk) 01:33, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

I've been stalking the conversation for awhile, but haven't really seen a source that's really concretely showing how public perception has been shaped. Since public perception here specifically is a fringe topic, having strong reliable sources directly commenting on public perception are even more important. Echoing TFD's comment about, the sources I've seen brought up seem to be used for borderline original research where we are connecting the dots here at Wikipedia rather than relying on a reliable source that connects the dots for us. Either way, my 2 cents is to be mindful of WP:Fringe for any additional conversation on this topic. That guideline does help inform how this topic should be addressed, and can explain why Redddbaron has encountered some difficulty in using certain sources or adding content here. It's difficult to comment on fringe topics while properly weighting and sourcing them, so that's all the more reason for really strong sources in this case. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:52, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

According to this source "The cost of this solution to the demand for plentiful cheap food has

been several major and minor food scares. The arrival of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in the UK during the late 1980s was a turning point in the relationship between the consumer and the food industry. The link between BSE and new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) a few years later was merely confirmation of what the majority of consumers already suspected." http://bmb.oxfordjournals.org/content/56/1/254.full.pdf+html Which would explain why the jump in organic demand exploded long after the initial root idea was in the public perception.(That The Four Deuces asked) It also claims "The food industry is no longer able to move in the direction it would like without meeting stiff resistance from environmental pressure groups. This has led to some well-publicised clashes, where both parties have attempted to gain the support of consumers by manipulating" The environmental awareness factor I can also confirm in my experience. More consumers are concerned over the environment and how environmental degradation ultimately is the risk and safety factor behind industrial and organic food. So that media manipulation may have more to do with the perceptions than organic marketers. That of course goes back to silent spring. How we handle this (if at all) in the text I am not sure.Redddbaron (talk) 18:10, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

What you quoted isn't discussing organic (BSE isn't particularly relevant to organic). The rest of your reply sounds like speculation and original research. Again, you'll need to bring a source that directly addresses the question rather than synthesizing information yourself. You're bringing a lot of information to this talk page, but a lot of it is tangential at best to the question of how public perception has been shaped. That's where you've been running into trouble in the above conversations. You need a reliable source that specifically addresses perception of organic food, not just food in general or other related topics. Kingofaces43 (talk) 21:22, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

You said, "BSE isn't particularly relevant to organic" and that is factually incorrect. There has never ever been a single case of BSE in organic animal husbandry. Two reasons, one is the pasture rule, second is the ban by organic in feeding animal proteins to herbivores. These rules existed before the first case of BSE was ever reported, so BSE was never a problem in organic. "There have been no recorded cases of BSE confirmed in any organic cattle reared and raised on fully-converted organic farms." http://www.soilassociation.org/aboutus/ourhistory/ourachievements BSE is caused by feeding dead cow scraps etc.. to cows. Grass and hay doesn't and can't transmit BSE. The general public knows this, why don't you?Redddbaron (talk) 02:40, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Again, you're going on a tangent. You aren't addressing public perception with any sources or content at this point. Also keep in mind you are crossing the civility line with your last sentence (this isn't the place for editor behavior issues, so I'll leave it at that for now). The more important issue is that like in your last sentence, you are making claims that the general public knows or thinks something, but you aren't providing sourcing for that. We need reliable sources that document public perception specifically for this discussion. Kingofaces43 (talk) 03:26, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Did you read the link I proposed?"Research has shown that there are many factors that modulate the

consumers perception of risk (adapted from Covello & Merkhofer1 ): • Trust (did this person tell the truth the last time?) • Receptivity (it happens to other people but not to me!) • Familiarity (the risk of Escherichta colt 0157 infection versus the risk of slipping on ice) • Understanding (the risk of genetically modified foods versus the risk of sunburn) • Scientific uncertainty (the risk of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease from beef versus the risk of crashing the car) • Controllability (exposure to antibiotic residues in meat versus the risk of flying) • How voluntary (exposure to pesticides in food versus contracting cancer from smoking) • Impact on children (risk perceived greater if children affected) • Dread (a slow death from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease versus a quick death from a plane crash) • Media (source of popular understanding influences risk perception) • Benefits (risk versus benefit: the risks mvolved with taking the contraceptive pill versus the benefit of preventing unwanted pregnancy)" CJD is listed twice in specifically in the Perceptions of risk section and detailed discussion of the reasons discussed after. Including how that perception is causing the size of the niche market for organic produce to grow.Redddbaron (talk) 04:05, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

It's not apparent where you're taking this content from (no link was given that has this information that I see), but now you're discussing consumer risk, not organic perception specifically. Again, we need to stay on topic for the specific content being discussed here. Given the amount of discussion that's gone on here, and no source that is supporting the sentence in question yet even after this amount of discussion, it's looking like the sentence should just be removed until it can be sourced properly. The question Jytdog posed at the beginning of this discussion about how we actually verify the sentence hasn't been answered yet. It seems like you're trying to answer a different question with the sources you are posting here since they don't really fit towards any answer. Do you understand that the sentence, "This idea originated in the early days of the organic movement as a result of publications like The Living Soil, Gardening and Farming for Health or Disease,and later Silent spring and periodicals like Mother Earth News and Prevention Magazine" is currently original research and that we need sources that document when the idea originated and that the publications listed are an origin of the idea in the context of public perception? That is the key question that needs to be addressed to move this conversation forward. Kingofaces43 (talk

Don't be confused Kingofaces43. The link to the source for the BSE was in answering a question here in talk. That source is not in the article. (and won't be put here unless it is approved here in talk) The most important link IMHO in the article showing the link between public perception of food quality and safety and organic and where that general perception originated is the Oxford paper. http://orgprints.org/22934/7/22934.pdf. Maybe if you kind of understand the structure a bit it would help. First the idea had to enter organic. That is establish by the sources from the early organic and biodynamic and other "green" movements. Then Silent spring came along and propelled that idea into the general public consciousness. Periodicals reinforced that perception. Later a few blunders made by the food industry like BSE reinforced this perception further and organic advocates taking advantage. (with soil society and periodicals like Prevention claiming "told you so"). The point is it is not original research or a synthesis by me to tie these together because the citations do explain each part of the chain of events in greater detail and the linkage for each step.Redddbaron (talk) 13:04, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

The problem is that the source you just listed does not discuss what you are proposing. It primarily discusses Carson, but not quite in the context of the first two sentences of the Public Perception section. It isn't appropriate as a secondary source for the entire second sentence because it is not intended as a review of the history of the organic movement in this particular context. With that, there is no source for saying that the idea originated in the early days of the organic movement, or where it originated from. That's what we need in order to have such a sentence. Your last sentence just described WP:SYNTHESIS. We don't tie things together at Wikipedia. We rely on sources to give an overview of the topic in this case and summarize what the specific source says. I'm definitely open to the content in general, but we need a source that actually supports it without synthesis on our part, and also explicitly makes such a statement rather than loose associations that are currently being pulled together. Kingofaces43 (talk) 21:28, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Maybe you didn't read or understand what this means: "The impact of the book, including on government, industry, and civil society, was immediate and substantial, and has been extensively described; however, the provenance of the book has been less thoroughly examined." with a whole paper explaining the provenance and how it relates to the Organic movement. It is not a synthesis on my part. It is documented with a scholarly paper that has connected the dots. BTW The reason I DIDN'T add the citation to the BSE reference (though true) is I felt adding that might be construed as a synthesis until a better citation could be found connecting it. I simply posted it here for discussion in talk.Redddbaron (talk) 15:22, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I read that line, and that's exactly the issue I'm bringing up. That source is particularly discussing one book. It's not discussing the overall history of public perception of organic and most of the other content in the sentence, but instead is addressing a much narrower context with Carson (i.e. not connecting the dots, not an comprehensive review of public peception). If that's the best source we have (even if added to the content), we don't particularly have grounds for keeping the content. That is the issue multiple users have brought up so far that does need to be addressed to include the sentence as is. Normally we find an appropriate source first, and then add content summarizing the source here, not the other way around. The whole key issue is that the sentence isn't appropriately sourced, and after all this discussion, it doesn't appear anyone is bringing a source in that actually summarizes the topic. Until we get such such a source, there doesn't really seem to be much room for this conversation to go. Again, I'm entirely open to including content that documents public perception in general, but we need a source that's actually giving an overview on that topic rather than individual pieces like Carson, early pioneers in organic, etc. The former results in summarizing a statement or two directly from the source that gives a good general overview, while the latter results in piecing things together. Do you see the difference now? Kingofaces43 (talk) 14:09, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Could you stop the edit war, mr. Kingofaces43. It is quite annoying to see everything positive removed in this article with every time other rather poor excuses. The Banner talk 14:41, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

The Banner, the edits I've made so far have been in line with what we are discussing here. I'm quite aware you don't like to the removal of the content, but we are at the discussion portion of BRD, not the revert stage when you came in with reverts. You are more than welcome to join the conversation as I have suggested multiple times now. As I stated on your talk page, this has nothing to do with positive or negative content. If you do want to constructively join the conversation, can you bring a source that appropriately summarizes public perception of organic and what has influenced it? That's what we've been trying to do this entire time. If we don't find a source, then it's extremely hard to suggest the content stays. If we find a source, then we'll edit the currently removed sentence to reflect that source. Simple as that. This discussion has been relatively civil so far (and hopefully we'll get some progress), but we shouldn't be doing things to inflame the issue. The sentence is removed to take a step back and look at it. Either we'll keep discussing the removed content for awhile, not find a source, and the discussion fizzles out, or we do find a source and we edit the article appropriately. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:01, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

It is okay that you are in complete denial over this, but the fact is that you are on the brink of breaking the 3RR-rule, not me. So stop telling me to go away. It is better that you step back from this instead of continuing the edit war. The Banner talk 15:10, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

I'm asking you to join the conversation if you feel strongly, not go away. This isn't the place for discussing editor behavior. If you join the conversation about the content we are discussing, you are more than welcome. That's what I've been asking you to do all along with the rest of us.Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:18, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

On Jytdog's edit, I'd say it's definitely an improvement in that section since those statements deal with history more than anything. It'll still be good to find a good overview source as suggested above, so if anyone finds one, let's talk about public perception content a bit more. For now it seems like we'd be stalled out in that topic with our current sources. Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:02, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

as i had suggested above, i moved the contested content to History, where it fits better. Hopefully it can live peacefully there. Jytdog (talk) 16:11, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Hopefully it should. It's a lot easier to say something was notable from a historical context in general as the content sits now than to specify how public perception was formed. Out of the two different directions this could have gone, I like this low hanging fruit approach while leaving the public perception question open until we get better sources. Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:42, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

I too feel very strongly that you are obfuscating Kingofaces. There is no evidence what so ever that you have contributed anything positive to improve the article. Jytdog at least has a goal of improving the article as evidenced by his edits. I still feel that the article needs much work, and his compromise is not exactly sufficient to remove the inherent bias found here. Certainly it didn't remove the bias from the perceptions section. I will be nibbling away at the article as I find time. Unfortunately I do have my own work and any agriculturalist's busy season is the growing season. So I might not be able to do a whole lot until winter.Redddbaron (talk) 14:07, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

please comment on content, not contributors, redbaron. thanks. Jytdog (talk) 15:26, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Echoing Jytdog above, it's better not to cast aspersions. It typically inflames civility issues. I've been trying to address sourcing concerns and discussion about that. Nothing more. Best to let things be here for this conversation as it doesn't appear any new content or sources are being proposed at this point. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:50, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

concerns about bias....

Redbaron and Banner, you have each said that you feel the article is biased. Would you please point out specific language or content in the article that you feel is biased? If the bias is from lack of something, would you please identify what is lacking? For now, am just looking for concise identification, so the concerns are named... thanks. Jytdog (talk) 15:14, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

In general, the article is far too negative. There is far more positive news available, like about health effects, but the MEDRS-guys rejects everything what is not conform their strict medical guidelines, even reliable sources from well known and reliable agricultural institutes/universities. The Banner talk 17:55, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Banner. On MEDRS, that is a general issue that has been discussed here before. I would be happy (really I would) to discuss it further in a different section, or on your Talk page or mine, if you are open to talking. But here, I am trying to get specific things listed for consideration that could be actionable now. It would be most useful if you could hold off on listing issues related to your interpretation of MEDRS, pending another round of discussion on that elswhere... thanks. Jytdog (talk) 18:10, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

And protection mode switches on... The Banner talk 19:01, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I opened this section to get specific issues raised. Your issues with MEDRS are general and I explicitly offered to discuss them - just in a different section. You can throw out cynical commetns, or you can actually discuss things. IF, that is, you are open to actually discussing things (I have asked you several direct questions about this in the past, which you didn't answer, and I would be happy to ask again). However if you are just going to be sarcastic, I will not have much to say. Your call. Look, I will even open a section for you.....Jytdog (talk) 19:22, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

The article reads like an anti-organic blog. The perceptions section that I am working on is a great example. A claim (not properly referenced) that states the public perception is that organic is "safer, more nutritious, and tastes better than conventional food", but instead of discussing why organic food actually is "safer, more nutritious, and tastes better than conventional food" and/or why the public knows this, it is just used as an excuse to post the industrial food counter argument. Nearly every paragraph in the whole article has similar structure and flaws. It's almost as if the whole wikipage is a criticism section on organic food. Just look at the first sentence under Health and safety, "There is no scientific evidence of benefit or harm to human health from a diet high in organic food..." They don't even bother making the claim that it is safer and more healthy and already tearing down that unstated claim! further on same thing. "With regard to the possibility that some organic food may have higher levels of certain anti-oxidants, evidence regarding whether increased anti-oxidant consumption improves health is conflicting." here again, no discussion of why the research indicates health benefits, but a claim they are wrong!" It's like the article is structured in a way that prevents any positive claims for organic food, yet does allow every criticism of those claims without even making the case in the first place. A very similar logic fallacy as the strawman fallacy (though not exactly). Another example is the earlier section I edited. By not including the pasture rule, the article avoids hundreds if not thousands of scientific studies showing the health and safety benefits of pastured animal products. So I changed that first. Later when I have time I will deal with the "meat" of the article ;P including well documented references. Then any dispute over that science will at least be in context. We have already discussed how the bias in this wiki page is spreading and has caused the organic farming page to be biased as well, and unfixable until this page is fixed first. Right now the vast majority of the article has no context, just criticism.Redddbaron (talk) 19:42, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

This is impossible to respond to. I am trying to open a way to communicate, but if you are going to present wall of text/general arguments, there is no where to go. With your permission, I can try to break down what you write above, into discreet, actionable points to discuss... Jytdog (talk) 19:47, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Try this first. Use your sandbox if you need to. Take out every critical statement or statement there is no difference between organic food and food produced by our conventional agricultural models and take them out of the article and place them in a discreet "criticism section". See what you have left. That should make the bias very very clear, very specific, and point at ways to fix it.Redddbaron (talk) 20:01, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

sigh. i give up on this effort. I am going to see if banner or anybody else wants to discuss MEDRS. If that doesn't go any where, I have a third idea about how to go forward, and will try that. Jytdog (talk) 20:12, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

The point is more that you guys focus so much on details, that you completely fail to see the bottom line. The article is fundamentally flawed and, as Reddddbaron calls it, an anti-organic blog. The agricultural viewpoint is nowhere in the article. And it are farmers and growers who produce organic food, not medical scientists. The Banner talk 21:28, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

MEDRS and food

Banner has general issues with the application of MEDRS to discussions of food. Banner, here is your red carpet to start things off...Jytdog (talk) 19:22, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I'll start off. I think that even if we accept studies that say organic food on average has more nutrients and fewer pesticides, we cannot use that information to claim it is healthier or that people would be healthier by eating only organic food. In comparison we can say that lemon juice has more vitamin C than lime juice, but we cannot say it is healthier or preferable because the incremental amount of vitamin C received may have no benefit if one receives adequate vitamin C. AFAIK no evidence suggests that there is a benefit to a person eating a balanced diet switching to organic food. TFD (talk) 21:02, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Actually there is evidence, the problem is that the evidence also has so many confounding factors that it is far from conclusive evidence. Eliminate the confounding factors, and you loose the emergent properties. So it is a very very very difficult thing to come to consensus, or even develop a proper study on. Therefore the consensus is there is no consensus on the health benefits of most organic foods. Like you said, there is consensus organic fruits and vegetables in general have more vitamin C, and there is consensus vitamin C is necessary for good health, but there is no way to say one particular apple that has more vitamin C because it is organic...... because it doesn't take into account the rest of the diet and whether vitamin C is even an issue for the apple eater. That's not even taking into account many other confounding factors like cultivar, soil health, ripeness when picked etc.... that often could affect the vitamin C content (and other things) even more than if the item is organic or not.Redddbaron (talk) 21:54, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I don't think you are following my point. There is of course an issue about what causes differences in measurements of nutritional quality of organic and conventional food. The milk study for example showed that organic milk was mostly more nutritious, but it was because organic cattle are more likely to graze in pastures. So the conventional milk in your store may be more nutritious than organic milk. But that is not the issue I was raising. Even if all organic products were more nutritious than conventional food, that would not make consuming them healthier, because so long as one has a balanced diet, there is no benefit in consuming more nutrients. For example, if one already consumes 100 mg per day of vitamin C, switching to apples higher in vitamin C provides no additional benefit as one's body will merely excrete any vitamin C it does not require.

The point of MEDRS in the discussion is that we do not want to tell readers that if they switch to organic food they will be healthier. The ethical issue is that unhealthy people will see a switch to organic food as a possible remedy for whatever illness they may have instead of seeking medical treatment. I do not see however that that means we cannot report comparative findings on nutrtional and pesticide content that have been published in peer-reviewed nutritional and agricultural journals, and can only report studies in medical journals. To me it is similar to reporting the alcohol content in articles about brands of beer. Alcohol is both a source of calories and a toxin. There are a vast number of studies on its effects on humans, but it is unlikely that sources could be found in medical literature for the alcohol content of each brand and it seems reasonable to provide this information provided we do not tell people for example that light beer is healthier than strong beer.

TFD (talk) 01:37, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Tying into that, it's also rather difficult to separate MEDRS and food topics in this venue (much to the chagrin of folks who aren't overly fond of MEDRS at the moment I acknowledge). Take pesticides for example. We can report that system A has X amount less pesticide than system B. What if X is a biologically irrelevant amount for that pesticide though? We do need to assign weight to content, and at least in this context, we'd need toxicological information to do that (i.e. medical related information). It's a very slippery slope trying to include one without the other. It can be done, but it takes some very carefully crafted wording, and it some cases it may not be feasible without unintentionally implying medical information. Even with agricultural, nutritional, toxicological, etc. journals, we'd still need to be wary about some of the main things MEDRS points out like issues with primary literature. Either way, since we're talking about food (which affects health in various ways) content about organic food is almost always going to be weighted by medical information to varying degrees, or at the very least scientific research in the other fields we're mentioning. With all that, I guess the general question is if there is something in this topic that is distinct from medical content? I'm not seeing anything too distinct unless we're talking about certain historical information or ecological information (which can lead into toxicology again), but when it gets down the nuts and bolts, I'm not seeing what the specific issue is with MEDRS in this topic. Is that the main question we should be addressing here? What specific parts of MEDRS that we don't already have in WP:SCIRS or WP:RS are at issue here? Kingofaces43 (talk) 02:24, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

The slippery slope is that MEDRS is abused here to keep all kinds of perceived health claims out of the article. To the point that even chemical comparisons have been removed as being health claims. Sometimes it gives me the eerie feeling that when Monsanto claims that Agent Orange is perfectly safe, it is believed straight away. But a claim that Agents Orange is dangerous, should be backed up with thousands of sources but 95% is rejected immediately as unreliable, for instance because the sources are Vietnamese. The Banner talk 07:36, 29 August 2014 (UTC)