ISP Lecture Summary

Summarised by Lim Li Ching

Bellamy opened his lecture by quoting the sage of ancient Greece, Tiresias, "Ah! How terrible is knowledge to the man whom knowledge profits not". This statement was made circa 500 BC, long before anyone thought of GM.

He stressed that GM technology has fantastic potential for good, but also for evil. He would only say ‘yes’ to GM crops and drugs as long as planning, evaluation, field trials etc. are carried out with due care and attention both for upstream and downstream effects on the environment and society itself. However, to date there haven’t been any examples where this appears to be true.

Bellamy speculated on a hypothetical situation - if the GM companies had started with crops important to developing countries, engineered to use less water or fertiliser, would the situation be different? Or was it that if these claimed benefits were possible, evolution would already have delivered them? He noted that the much-hyped potential of genetically engineering plants to increase nitrogen fixation has died away, perhaps because the dangers of a super-plant developing were too great.

With wide-ranging aplomb, Bellamy touched on interrelated complex issues, including intellectual property rights, access and benefit-sharing of genetic resources, and conservation. He pointed out that alternatives do exist, although these are often deemed problematic by those who stand to profit little from the alternatives. He stressed that there is much good news (and solutions for the government) around, but we don’t tend to hear that in the news.

Bellamy admitted that single issue campaigning to try to stop certain things happening has always been easier compared with science-based ethics to steer things in the right direction. He then gave examples of cautionary tales, where things don’t always turn out as expected.

For example, the shift from tobacco growing to irrigated sugar cane, mangos and bananas in Australia had unforeseen disastrous results such as widespread clearing of native vegetation and habitat to endangered species, high usage of irrigation water, eutrophication and damage to the Great Barrier Reef, overproduction and price collapse for farmers, all of which were not factored in initially. And complex economic and environmental issues have not been well dealt with through the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy and Common Fisheries Policy. Additionally, small farming and fishing are increasingly threatened.

How did we get to this sad state of affairs? Bellamy then talked about the role that education and universities play, drawing on Socrates and Plato, and the first university ‘The Academy’ to illustrate that philosophy (which is what a degree is - a teaching qualification in philosophy, in philo Sophia, in the love of the goddess of wisdom) is essentially about life. "We are discussing no small matter, but how we ought to live".

He stressed that when we speak of academic excellence we should remember that we are drawing on the translation of the Greek word arête, which means all round virtue of excellence. Social debate then was conducted within an understanding of ecological history. Contrast that with modern universities and education.

Bellamy lamented the trappings of modern universities, with knowledge commodified and subject to market forces. He illustrated just how far the prostitution of our universities is being pushed, with the example of the government’s 1993 white paper on science, technology and engineering entitled "Realising our potential", which calls fundamentally for "key cultural change" to accord academia with the needs of government and industry. It stresses wealth creation as the acid test of relevance, with market values apparently predominating over wisdom.

Bellamy called for a return to the original meanings of education and philosophy, which are essentially teaching about life in a holistic manner. He held out hope, for example, as seen in the self-sufficiency of small farmers, organic food and alternative medicine. He maintained that there are ways where agriculture could feed the world in a more caring way while stabilizing the balance of nature.

These are very complex issues we are dealing with, and Bellamy stressed that that’s why we need a Panel of Independent Scientists as part of the mix to make sustainable decisions. He ended by saying that today the world needs the ethics of ‘The Academy’ more than ever before.