It doesn't go far enough, and it's a sop to those concerned about civil rights in a sea of announcements flowing in the opposite direction.

This was the worst day for civil liberties in Britain in half a Century - probably more.

Icing on the Cake: The Leveson Inquiry may act as a brake on the proposed Act being passed.

Pass me a bucket.

In response to Comment 3 by Jos Gibbons.

Hi Jos,

You ask:

Why are the "unintended consequences" of GM liable to be any greater a threat than the unintended consequences of the ordinary artificial selection that agriculture has used throughout recorded history?

Well, according to Rothamsted Research:

We have identified a way of getting the plant to repel aphids, using a natural process that has evolved in mint and many other plants – and simply adding this into the wheat genome to enable it to do the same thing.

I know of no unintended consequences to other species as great as that - produced by Traditional GM (a.k.a. inter-breeding). The threat is that the unintended consequences of modern GM will affect eco-systems.

When using Traditional GM, we give other species time to adapt - up to a point. We come out on top (what would be the point otherwise), but the overall ecosystem remains stable and speciation isn't crashed into reverse gear.

A good, real life, parallel to this is the importing of species from other parts of the Globe. Removed from the checks and balances of their native lands, they run riot. In Britain we are battling several plagues of invasive species right now. Actually, surrendering is probably the better verb. The best example of this is Japanese Knot Weed - but it is not alone, by any means.

US Citizens check here.

When you say:

At least with GM you know which genes you end up with, which gives you a good idea what phenotypes will result.

That's true, and it doesn't help. The whole idea behind GM is that you strengthen one species against another. By doing so you do the same as European and US gardeners did - as an unintended consequence - when they imported Japanese Knot Weed. You remove checks and balances. To quote this expert Site:

... the controlling influence of the many insects and fungi that attack the plant in its native range has been removed. Our native species have not taken a shine to Knotweed and very few if any insects or fungi can be found on the plant even after almost 200 years.

No doubt, many people will say: "Aha, we could produce a variety of food that ruins riot. Hang on, where's the fire?"

The problem is that by simply building places to live, turning over more land to agriculture, making roads, and growing in numbers - year on year - we're already pushing the Global eco-system to the brink.

When you say:

So far, literally the only bad thing that's happened with GM is that an allergy to Brazil nuts has proven applicable also to the meat of some animals with the relevant nut genes inserted.

... that seems to me to lack any critical thinking of any kind. I will be happy to be proved wrong.

Clearly, there is another recent example to which we can look when we consider unintended consequences of human intervention in agriculture: Bees.

I will be happier when the development and licensing of all agricultural products includes environmental and eco-system studies.

However, the group threatening Rothamstead Research are clearly nuttier than a Bertholletia excelsa. We won't get anywhere without research. I signed the Sense About Science petition, and I urge all RDFRS / richarddawkins.net visitors to do the same.

As Simon Singh so righhtly says:

Destroying research is worse than burning books. These protesters appear to want a return to the Garden of Eden, but in reality they are taking a step towards the Dark Ages.

Peace.

Is it really true that parents must have a choice in the education of their children?

As a parent I have the unenviable job of choosing between state schools that have open admission policies - and trying to work out which is the best fit for my child.

But other than that:

It may be that we will never get a level playing field between schools - but we can try.

In the meantime isn't this choice thing a sideshow? It seems to me that it is. What's really needed is that we decide, together, what we are supplying and paying for when we talk about education. Are we getting the best bang for our buck?

What do we want to achieve with education, and what are we giving the next generation? What are the challenges we are preparing them to address, and what do we need to teach - as opposed to simply letting them learn? What mistakes have we seen that we don't want to repeat?

What is education for ... ?

Humbug! One does not need to be an inveterate sufferer of verbal diarrhea to make a point succinct, articulate, incisive and sound.

QED!

Peace.

Hi Bob,

Anvil gives good advice. Just to add a little to that; John Locke was one of three (philosophers even call them 'the triumvirate of British empiricists'), the others being David Hume and Francis Bacon.

I'm not necessarily advising that you read Bacon, and Hume had little to say about politics specifically, but both put religion into it's social context.

John Stuart Mill is worth every waking moment of study and contemplation.

In order to understand why religions are not needed as moral guides in politics you could try reading Herbert Spencer and his various writings on natural law - though much of his writing is very disappointing.

Niccolò Machiavelli has much wisdom to impart on religion and power. It is instructive rather than modelled. He is very easy to read - his writing almost literally drips with a biting satire that is as relevant today as it has always been. Politics has not come far in the last half millennium, and so too religion.

One cannot mention political philosophy without mentioning Karl Marx. Marx's ideas have been tested - literally - to destruction several times over. Although his ideas were coherent, detailed and uncompromising that doesn't make them true - as hundreds of millions of ghosts, and the histories of so many failed states, testify. On the other hand, the very fact that his ideas were so coherent and thorough makes Kapital worth a look as an example of systematic political philosophy. It's a tough call. Don't worry - just like reading the Bible, reading Kapital will not convert you - if anything rather the opposite.

I'm only an amateur philosopher, so I may easily have missed several important political philosophers who have studied or considered religions in their main works.

It seems to me that the numbers of philosophers who consider the contemplation of religion and politics to be relevant, or even interesting, drops off dramatically after the early 20th Century. Indeed, I cannot think of a truly modern and well-referenced philosopher who mentions religion in anything more than the intellectual equivalent of a dismissive, foppish, wave of a hand.

The positivists were totally dismissive of religion, but many other modern philosophical models treat religion far worse - they simply ignore it all together. It seems to me that the philosophers' implicit message is that religion has no place in modern politics?

I stand ready to be corrected.

That's my advised reading list, for what it's worth.

Peace.