Narrowly conceived biotech “solutions” to complex agricultural, food, and health issues will breed ever more problems because they ignore how life plays itself out in rich and varied contexts that defy single-target solutions. Only by taking the contextual and interrelated character of life seriously can we hope to address real problems in a fruitful way.

In this talk Holdrege will illustrate through various examples the shortcomings of one-sided, biotech approaches and will show the need for a contextual perspective that takes the qualities of life into account.

Introduced by Michael Pollan, Knight Professor at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.