Consumers and their impact on food and farming systems in North America and Germany – Examples relating to GMO issues

Consumers in North America and Germany tried in different ways to impact their regional farmers, supermarkets, regional as well as national politicians, food related laws as well as food based land use systems in order to be able to continue consuming ge-free foods and to get sufficient information on all levels of the food chain enabling them to do so. As much success as consumers in the US and Germany had with the initiation and establishment of ge-free regions, US consumers did not succeed with their ge-food labelling campaigns. Only in Vermont a ge-seed Labelling law could be passed. In Germany ge-food, ge-feed and ge-seed have to be labelled by law. German Consumers and low input farmers tried to get also products derived from ge-feed included in ge-labelling laws. It seems a consumer influenced compromise that a new German legislation is about to be adopted which would allow for an easier Non-GMO-Labelling of food. Yet consumer opportunities to make informed choices about the food they eat seem to be still limited, especially in North America with the practical absence of federal ge-food, feed and seed labelling laws. Thus a few years ago, actors of the organic and natural food Industry teamed up to launch the so called Non-GMO Project, which shall soon open its Verification Program to the North American natural and organic food industry, offering a standard for ge-free or Non-GMO verification

Turning to Animals Between Love and Law

Publisher has granted permission for the published version of this article to be archived. Publisher's website: http://www.lwbooks.co.ukAs an alternative to Utilitarianism, animal ethics turned to the Continental philosophies of Levinas and Derrida that welcome and revere Otherness. While Utilitarianism relies on a ‘closed’ system of ethical calculations, the Levinasian model remains open-ended. This essay argues for a revised approach to animal ethics that combines Levinasian immeasurability, what Matthew Calarco called ‘ethical agnosticism’, with a closed approach that sees ethics as issuing from particular modes of practice. Highlighting some of the problems inherent in the Levinasian ethics of love as well as Agamben’s biopolitical critique of law, I propose a corrective, ‘between love and law’, that avoids predetermining the limits of moral consideration yet insists on the social and normative dimensions of ethical responsiveness. I take the practice of veganism - broadly conceived beyond the strictly dietary - as the heart of animal ethics and consider some of the philosophical and theological dimensions of veganism as neither naïve nor as utopian but on the contrary, as a worldly mode of engagement that acknowledges the realities of violence

Some Small Discrepancy: Jean-Christophe-Bailly's Creaturely Ontology

From Journal of Animal Ethics. Copyright 2013 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. Used with permission of the University of Illinois Press. This material cannot be reprinted, photocopied, posted online or distributed in any way without the written permission of the copyright holder.The final version of this text will be available (as pdf.) by September-October 2013.The final version of this text will be available (as pdf.) on 20 September, 2013.The final version of this text will be available (as pdf.) on 20 September, 2013.The final version of this text will be available (as pdf.) on 20 September, 2013.The final version of this text will be available (as pdf.) on 20 September, 2013.This extended review essay on Bailly's first major work in English translation, The Animal Side, situates Bailly in the continuum of Continental philosophy on the topics of animality and animal ontology, from Rilke to Heidegger, Derrida and Deleuze. Exploring Bailly's linking of thought and vision and his insistence on the pivotal role of animals in the emergence of European art and image-making, the essay argues that the political dimension, implicit in Bailly's text, nevertheless remains underdeveloped. This points to a broader concern within Continental theory: the need to connect new human and animal ontologies with ethical and political normative models for the effective articulation of post-anthropocentric collectivities

A Future Linear Collider with polarised beams: Searches for New Physics

There exists a world--wide consensus for a future $e^+e^-$ Linear Collider in the energy range between $\sqrt{s}=500--1000$ GeV as the next large facility in HEP. The Linear Collider has a large physics potential for the discovery of new physics beyond the Standard Model and for precision studies of the Standard Model itself. It is well suited to complement and extend the physics program of the LHC. The use of polarised beams at a Linear Collider will be one of the powerful tools. In this paper some highlights of searches for physics beyond the Standard Model at a future Linear Collider with polarised $e^-$ and $e^+$ beams are summarised.Comment: 15 pages, 10 eps figures, Invited plenary talk given at 15th International Spin Physics Symposium, September 2002, BNL, Brookhaven, US

Physics aspects of polarized e+ at the linear collider

Polarized e- and e+ at the International Linear Collider play an important role for discovering physics beyond the Standard Model and for precisely unravelling the structure of the underlying physics. The physics programme at the first energy stage at sqrt{s}=500 GeV benefits strongly from the polarization of both beams. But also at 1 TeV as well as at a possible multi-TeV design of a linear collider, CLIC, the physics output is greatly enriched by beam polarization. An overview is given of the impact of providing polarized e+ at the linear collider in addition to polarized e- for physics studies in top, Higgs, supersymmetry and further models of physics beyond the Standard Model.Comment: 14 pages, 16 eps figures Talk given at the Polarized Positrons Workshop `POSIPOL', CERN, 26-28 April 200

News from polarized e- and e+ at the ILC

The proposed International Linear Collider (ILC) is well-suited for discovering physics beyond the Standard Model and for precisely unravelling the structure of the underlying physics. The physics return of the ILC can be maximized by the use of polarized beams, in particular the simultaneous polarization of the e- and the e+ beam. Ongoing physics studies are accompanied by active R&D on the machine part for generating polarized beams and for measuring the polarization with high precision at the ILC. Some new results on the physics case and on the technical aspects of the polarization of both beams are briefly summarized.Comment: 6 pages, 12 eps figures, style files; Contribution to '2005 International Linear Collider Workshop -Stanford, U.S.A.