Changing the Nature of Nature : Corporate , Legal , and Ethical Fundamentals ( Description of the Presentation by Ralph Nader )

optimistic. He found the theme of that statement — of what “will” happen in the future — to be troubling in that, in the 1920s, a radical change in technology, with similarities to biotechnology, was championed by luminaries such as Thomas Edison and Henry Ford: to replace hydrocarbons with carbohydrates. Despite broad support, including deans of MIT and Harvard, for the concept of manufactured products from plants as raw materials rather than minerals, it did not come to fruition. Why not? Was the science faulty or the technology inadequate? In fact, major industries, e.g. petrochemical, paper and auto, resisted the change to carbohydrates. The petrochemical industry expanded enormously in size, and products therefrom came to occupy all major market niches. Carbohydrate-based products could not compete, and the global repercussions include hazards in the workplace, environmental pollution, and waste-disposal costs. How much is learned from history’s lessons? Industrial hemp, for example, preceded petrochemicals by thousands of years, yet, despite this long lead time, it fell out of favor in the 1920s along with many other carbohydrate-based materials. The role of power in deciding directions — corporate power and the governmental power it reflects — should be probed at conferences such as this and not avoided as is usual. For example, over the past seven decades, little of USDA’s research budget has been invested in carbohydrate development, whereas subsidies for the oil, gas, nuclear power and forest industries have been enormous. In the 1960s and 1970s, discussions of auto safety, albeit few, camouflaged the fact that executives in Detroit emphasized style while progress in engineering stagnated and never surfaced as a topic of debate. And we must learn history’s lessons in terms of the corporate personality. The Greek sculptor Changing the Nature of Nature: Corporate, Legal, and Ethical Fundamentals (Description of the Presentation by Ralph Nader)