Exploding watermelons

[xiaocai]

Yes. get ready to blow up...

No, not really. According to Sohu, the name is 日本全能冠军. It also mentioned about the safety of forchlorfenuron, but I think not too many people here will be interested.

Here is another article about forchlorfenuron from 科学松鼠会, which I personally think is a bit more neutral and objective. Well, it all up to your own judgement. Most of the time, people will only hear what they want to hear, and believe what they want to believe...

BTW, have fun reading, if you are ever going to read the links.

[rezaf]

If scientists who are messing with nature knew everything about lets say watermelon's cells then I could eat their watermelon but these so called 專家 don't know everything and and have no way of knowing it until they do more research for a few more decades to see the long-term results and who knows which part of their opinions is based on science and which part is based on what big companies (that finance these researches and at the same time sell these things) behind them tell them to say. The truth is that China has a big population. Feeding all the population needs these magical tricks and like many other countries that have the same problem, people are gonna be used as guinea pigs to see which tricks are healthy and which tricks are harmful. Personally I don't want to be a part of this science project and I try to buy my organic veggies from a farm I know. They are not very delicious but at least I'm sure they are healthy.

[xiaocai]

As I said it's all up to your own judgement. Your concerns are very real and scientists are normal human beings who also make mistakes, and non of them dares to say that they know "everything" about their subjects. I just gave my points - it is legal to use certain growth regulators in China and other countries and the exploding watermelons are not necessarily "poisonous"- rather than trying to persuade anyone to buy things they don't trust. But we have being "messing with nature" all the time haven't we? Fire, iron, medicine, electricity, you name it, they all used to be "tricks" in the past. But there has always been human guinea pigs who try new things, so now we don't have to live in caves, eat everything raw, have the life expectancy around 30 years and do nothing but struggling to collect enough food just to survive...

[carlo]

I have lived in my in-laws’ home for a few months in the Jiangsu countryside. As we have a two-year old child, we are careful about what we eat (of course I’m the paranoid in the family). Frankly I’m amazed by the opposite phenomenon: there are people here that I have come to know that grow/raise very healthy“organic” food. A guy very close to here keeps fish that eat only vegetables from his own garden (or other fish). Yet he can only sell them wholesale to restaurants etc. for a ridiculously low price — as nobody believes that he really raises them that way. The business half of my brain hurts when I think about all the lost value.

On the other hand, while picking watermelons in a neighbour’s field the other day my wife got bitten by the dog — there’s such a thing as being too organic.

[crazy-meiguoren]

I think that there's a limit to how far nature can get pushed. Whether by chemicals or breeding, something compromised these plants' ability to resist the elements.

There is also no way that I'd eat ANYTHING that was nibbled on by insects. The only thing worse than finding a worm in your apple is finding half a worm.

[Kenny同志]

There is also no way that I'd eat ANYTHING that was nibbled on by insects. The only thing worse than finding a worm in your apple is finding half a worm.

In fact, fruits that have been nibbled by insects are safer than that have not in China. Shining, intact fruits are often those that have received the most of chemicals (mostly insectides) .

[rezaf]

But we have being "messing with nature" all the time haven't we? Fire, iron, medicine, electricity, you name it, they all used to be "tricks" in the past.

And I didn't say that I am against new things but I don't want to be part of the guinea pigs as long as their consequences are very unknown. In terms of complexity the few things that you mentioned above can not be compared to the level of complexity in messing with organic life forms. Organic life forms are the result of billions of years of evolution and messing with them is not as simple as making some fire. I mean if there was really something wrong with them I could understand the need but these fruits have been our healthy food for millions of years and changing their basic structure and their metabolism just to make more money from a crazy consumer society is not something that I really like to be a part of. I don't know much about plants but I know that one of the biggest problems about stimulating cell reproduction is that it affects the quality of the new cells and many of them can not become healthy mature cells. Maybe the consequence of eating that kind of watermelon is not very visible and measurable but in TCM there is a very big concern about using these new agricultural methods in growing Chinese herbs. As many of our teachers who have been using herbs for decades tell us the quality of herbs has dropped significantly in the last few decades and nowadays doctors have to use a lot more herbs to get some of the results that were mentioned in similar case histories written in the old TCM books.

But there has always been human guinea pigs who try new things, so now we don't have to live in caves, eat everything raw, have the life expectancy around 30 years

Nothing comes without paying the price. We don't live in caves anymore but many of us who live inside big cities haven't ever seen the sky full of stars in our life. We have no idea how it feels like to breathe unpolluted air and as a result of getting away from nature many humans are suffering from lots of new chronic mental and physiological diseases. Maybe we can live longer but it doesn't mean that the quality of our life is better and as the global warming, pollution, overusing natural resources, ... get piled up who know how long humans can continue enjoying the modern technology. Even about medicine, as a result of overusing antibiotics now we have created forms of superbacteria which are far beyond any kind of medicine. Maybe you haven't realized yet but if we push too hard the world always finds a way to neutralize our force by pushing us back. I am not against advancing but I am against pushing too hard. If people learn to stop wasting food and correct their life-styles, by using more normal agricultural methods there will be enough healthy and natural food for everyone.

and do nothing but struggling to collect enough food just to survive...

Yes at that time looking for food was a natural way of doing physical exercise and we didn't have to pay lots of money to a gym for running on a dead machine and breathing artificial air inside a closed room. Also as we could just find enough food for survival we couldn't eat too much and get fat or get diseases like cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, diabetes,...

Funny how the nature always finds a way to push us back.

I'm sure you are familiar with 塞翁失马。 The hardship of those days when we were close to nature were not necessarily bad and the pleasure of the modern technology is not necessarily good. We have increased the life expectancy for 30 years but by overpopulating the world and the other problems that I mentioned above someday we might even cause the extinction of our race. If people could understand how to keep balance in their lives and control their desire we wouldn't have to have these problems but the problem with humans is that we always push too hard blindly and it's only when it's too late that we realize how stupid we have been.

[xiaocai]

Another article about exploding watermelons from 科学松鼠会. Don't know if anyone is still interested in this topic but I think this is the only report that I have come across which provided some scientific background and reference to back up its claims.

This is from 方舟子.

Now I'm pretty sure that eating those watermelons is not going to kill you any time soon.

[xiaocai]

An informative article about 植物激素 from 科学松鼠会, hope you enjoy. BTW, the comments are fun to read too.