EUROPEAN-SEED.COM I EUROPEAN SEED I 31 an article online for the mere purpose of then pushing their message through campaign networks. And if an article is retracted, as in the famous Séralini rat study, then he would simply put it up on a pay-to-play journal and his anti-GMO campaigners would continue to promote it without skipping a heartbeat. The decline in the respect for the peer review process and the rapid rise of online predatory journals have diminished the means for good scientific research jour- nals to serve as an objective benchmark. 5. Post-Modernist denial of expertise Marcel Kunst identified how activists and NGOs demand a type of certainty that science cannot deliver. And since a scientific paradigm may shift or laws may be proven false, then nothing science says can be trusted as “truth”. Therefore, within this post-modernist perspective, scientific expertise is relative and dimin- ished. Add to that the widely propagated narrative that all regulatory science has been influenced by industry and we can understand why risk assessments that approve pesticides or seeds are so easily and systematically ignored by NGOs and civil society stakeholders. The time was ripe then for a school of leftish sociologists to postulate a new, “post-normal science” driven not by the sciences but by societal concerns. This group, based mainly in Bergen, Norway, feel that scientific knowledge is not the most important “form of knowledge” and that pedagogic reform (retraining) of scientists is necessary. This approach to certainty management puts more requirements and handcuffs on innova- tive research, demands more involvement from “citizen scientists” and less trust in the scientific method. HOW TO PROTECT THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD When activist scientists produce ques- tionable papers, the first thing the sci- entific community does is assess the methodology (and usually reject the con- clusions). The problem here is that the scientist (and the organisation with an interest in the research) is already push- ing the conclusions in the policy arena – pointless uncertainty. Crying “methodol- ogy foul” in a world where everyone feels like a potential victim is, well, practically pointless. Wakefield was excommunicated for his research malpractice. That would not happen in today’s social media tribalism. Portier has responded to the publication of his admissions by getting several anti-GMO activists in Le Monde to deflect the basic facts and question the motivation of the sci- entific community (and myself personally). Argumentum ad hominem. He played to his base but further ridiculed himself. There is so much that needs to be done to ensure that the scientific method does not get highjacked by opportunists and irrational idealists as we have seen with the Portier Papers. Scientific com- munities need to have this conversation, particularly on the following ideas: •  stronger codes of ethical conduct enforced, •  better communications practices pro- moted (especially around the benefits from emerging technologies), •  more stringency for funding transpar- ency, •  more institutional courage and respect for decisions from scientific agencies, •  quality control on journals and clear guidelines for peer review processes, •  and, importantly, an outright rejection of the ridiculous hazard-based approach to regulations. If Wakefield’s malpractice had hap- pened today, in a social media world, he would have divided society much like Portier’s polarisation has done. The sci- entific method would have been under- mined as interest groups took over the political theatre. Portier’s malfeasance leaves us with a question: Can the method be saved in today’s anti-science arena, and if so, how? This is my contribution. Scientist need to openly start talking about it. David Zaruk is a professor based in Brussels writing on environmental-health risk policy within the EU Bubble. He writes a blog under the name: The Risk-Monger. The comments in the Risk Corner are his own and does not necessarily represent the views of European Seed. in other words: the interest groups are declaring a scientific victory in the media while the scientists are still deciding the rules of the game. The Portier affair is the best avail- able case study here. IARC produced a worthless hazard-based monograph on glyphosate, but the anti-GMO campaign- ers in the US, with law firms seeking opportunity in Monsanto cancer lawsuits and the organic lobby seeking further means to handicap conventional farm- ers, took this bad science and fabricated emotional campaigns, attracted potential victims and relentlessly carpet-bombed vulnerable individuals with fear and Advertisement by a predatory law firm.