As science is becoming increasingly more politicized, as it was demonstrated in the debates about GMOs and global climate change (greenhouse effect), the demand for conceptual accuracy becomes even more necessary. It has been known since Francis Bacon and more recently it was reiterated by the understanding that “knowledge is power”. In spite of not having reached a consensus in the scientific community, with regards to the treatment that should be given to this complex relationship, the fact remains that, recent history has forced us to dedicate more attention to the theme. Since 1945, with the use of the atomic bomb, science has become a matter too serious to be left in the hands of scientists. Allow me to appropriate Clausewitz, the war theorist, in the case of the atomic bomb, the relationship between scientific knowledge and power, through war, was all too clear. However, more recently this relationship between scientific knowledge and power, has become more ordinary, getting closer to our everyday life through issues such as our food, medicine and climate change (in spite of being global, it reaches unevenly the various regions and social groups in the world. Refer to islands in the Pacific and Indian ocean).

To consider the relationship between science and power is a demand of the actual scientific ethic, to the extent that this relationship is implied in the very nature of the scientific production, above all but not exclusively, with regards to material and financial conditions. Increasingly, common partnerships between state and companies, have introduced new and complex questions such as, the public character of scientific knowledge which is translated in the demand for publication (to publish, is to make it public) and the private character of the entrepreneurial institution demands the confidential protection of knowledge. Seminars, colloquiums, symposiums, congresses and scientific meetings do not see the open communication of knowledge, which can be noticed in the increasing concern with patents.

Aiming to contribute for the debate on GMO – Genetically Modified Organisms, and the so called TMO - Transgenically Modified Organisms, and for conceptual precision; I suggest a refusal of the GMO concept, which strictly speaking, means that everything in the evolution of the species. The process of speciation always occurs in nature by genetic modification, as an intentional process. However, cultivares have always been human creations co-evolving with natural processes for long periods of time. Portuguese language has, especially among peasants, a rich expression that reflects an understanding of the success or failure of a seed, which says that the seed vingou or not vingou, By doing that, a seed is launched in nature and then awaits for it to ‘give its opinion’, in other words, nature will assimilate a dialogic relation and not a unilateral one.

The debate today is not about GMO or TMO, but rather, TMOs are organisms which process creation and does not occur accidentally in the relation between society and nature, but from laboratories which have been increasingly connected to the financial, industrial, media world. We are no longer before agro-CULTURE, but BUSINESS, as the complex technician-scientific-entrepreneurial likes to call itself (I respect here the good anthropological norm to respect self –determination).

The place for the production of knowledge changes with TMOs in a fundamental sector of human existence, since it has to do with the energetic-food place of our species, agriculture and animal breading. Knowledge, as well as the necessary condition for social reproduction – actually, all means for producing food are a way to produce knowledge – what we are witnessing with the transference from the production of cultivares to TMOs, is the transference of the locus of power from fields and peasants and various native peoples to large laboratories from the entrepreneurial-scientific-technical complex. Finally, more than technological revolution, we are before a change in social relations and power through technology.

In the rise of the recent expansion wave of plant species monoculture, aiming at producing fuel (ethanol and diesel from vegetable origin) a new complex of technical-scientific-industrial-financial-mediatic power has been configured with the merging of car companies being associated to biotechnology companies, industrializing agriculture and increasingly subjugating the future of crops and native peoples and peasants, but also humanity as whole, to the decisions of half a dozen companies. DuPont de Nemurs has merged with Pioneer Hibred (seeds) and British Petroleum. Toyota has merged with British Petroleum in Canada to produce ethanol. Volkswagen has merged with ADM (foods). Royal Dutch Shell has launched its production carburetor oil and Cargill has started to produce diesel. The best example of that is the alliance of the Brazilian agro-traders with the US fossil fuel sector which was consecrated recently with the creation of the Ethanol Interamerican Association where Mr. Jeb Bush and Mr. Roberto Rodrigues (former minister in Lula’s administration and member of the Brazilian Association of the Agro-Traders) are its main leaders(1) .The consequences of what is on course are quite serious. Since the 20th century, above all, fossil fuels have been used in the production of food (steam engines in tractors and harvesters, for instance) and now, it is agriculture (or the business of agro?) that is at service of the steam engine to give an extra life to a life style that is known to be ecologically unsustainable and that tends to deepen social injustices..

Cultural diversity tends to be threatened. Everything suggests that the fate of humanity and the planet will depend on the solution of this struggle which is increasingly demanding the attention of everyone.

Carlos Walter Porto-Gonçalves is a Geography Doctor from UFRJ and Coordinator of the Post Graduste Programme in geography in the Universidade Federal Fluminense and former President of the Association of Brazilian Geographers (1998-2000).He has published several articles in s national and international scientific magazines, being the most recent: - “Geographies: social movements, new territorialities and sustainability” [“Geo-grafías: movimientos sociales, nuevas territorialidades y sustentablidad”], ed. Siglo XXI, México, 2001; “Amazônia, Amazônias”, ed. Contexto, São Paulo, 2001; “From Geography to Geographies: a world seeking new territorialities” in “The Infinite war: hegemony and world terror” [“La guerra Infinita: hegemonía y terror mundial” Sader, E and Ceceña, Ana Esther (orgs.), Clacso, Buenos Aires 2002. “The geography of the Social” in “Social Movements and Conflicts in Latin America” Seoane, José (org). Clacso, Buenos Aires, 2003; “Geografando – nos varadouros do mundo”, edições Ibama, Brasília, 2004.

Notas:
(1) É do Sr. Jeb Bush a frase “da Alca ao álcool”, com isso explicitando os objetivos geopolíticos da Associação Interamericana de Etanol.