Science, Technology, and Public Policy

"Farmers in developing countries, however, are bridging the 'biotechnology divide.' According to a new report by Clive James of the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA), 'For the first time, developing countries grew more, 52% of global biotech crops in 2012 than industrialized countries at 48%.'"

In today's interconnected world, the Internet is no longer a tool. Rather, it is a service that helps generate income and employment, provides access to business and information, enables e-learning, and facilitates government activities. It is an essential service that has been integrated into every part of our society. Our experience begins when an Internet Service Provider (ISP) uses fixed telephony (plain old telephone service), mobile-cellular telephony, or fixed fiber-optic or broadband service to connect us to the global network. From that moment on, the ISP shoulders the responsibility for the instantaneous, reliable, and secure movement of our data over the Internet.

"The conventional wisdom among those who looked at the Middle East used to be that you had a choice either of supporting the autocrat or being stuck with the religious extremists. The extraordinary diffusion of information created in Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries reveals a strong middle that we weren't fully aware of. What is more, new technologies allow this new middle to coordinate in ways unseen before Twitter, Facebook, and so forth, and this could lead to a very different politics of the Middle East. This introduces a new complexity to our government's dealings with the region."

"The states should add an amendment to their constitutions for a general right of privacy, as is now included in the state constitution of California; Congress should create a federal Privacy Commission, whose role would be to investigate violations of privacy laws and bring cases to the Department of Justice for prosecution, modeled after the Privacy Commission of Canada; Congress should also strengthen existing federal privacy laws."

To the casual observer, French farmers might seem to have little in common with Californian vine growers. They operate on different continents and in different political and, arguably, moral environments. But both groups exist in societies that have benefited from rapid advances in technology in the last century. And despite this, both are united in scepticism of the benefits that the biotechnology industry can offer.