This genetic modifiying is just changing a couple of nucleotides in the host DNA in order to develop specialized proteins . This could really benefit humankind. If you don't like it fine don't support it, but the government has no right to stop it. I thought this place supported free market capitalism.
The answer would not be for the government to stop it, but for private consumer organizations to inform the public about the dangers of it and for people to stop buying it, therefore the market could take care of it. The problem is 90% of what is in grocery stores contains GMO products and even fresh vegetables that are not grown according to organic standards are full of radio mimetic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides that have been directly linked to a wide range of diseases and disorders. These are not responsible companies and scientists doing this stuff and the government helps them to do it and encourages it through massive mono-crop subsides of your tax payer dollars. It is profit driven, not for the benefit of humankind, as the tax payer is literally paying them to make them sick so the pharmaceutical complex can also profit from them.
Its one big circle, the same companies that produce the antibiotics you are forced to buy and use due to sickness are the same ones that are 70% of the feed of the same animals you buy in the form of meat to keep you alive, that have been raised in unsanitary, and abusive conditions.
Admittedly some of this stuff could be used for good but there is plenty of evidence that its use in agriculture and the food system is very dangerous. At the very least there should be labeling mandates for the companies that sell this stuff so that consumers can make informed decisions. Do some reading on the effects of horizontal gene transfer, there is a great book by a world renown genetic scientist, Mae-Wan Ho,
Genetic Engineering: Dream or Nightmare? I can quote from it if you'd like? It is not widely available here in the US, due to the academic and governmental protections these companies receive. Here is a direct quote:
"A scientist from the Center for Complex Infectious Diseases in Rosemead, Ca, isolated an unusual virus from patients with various chronic fatigue syndrome that has more than fifty bacterial genes. He regards the hybrid virus-bacterium as a new organism and has coined the name 'viteria' for it. Viteria most closely resemble a cytomegalovirus, one of the first viruses to be exploited as a vector for the genetic manipulation of animals. And top of the list of bacteria from which it has captured genes Escherichia coli and Bacillus subtilis, the two most commonly used bacteria in genetic engineering. Could viteria be a pathogenicity island in viral clothing?
As the many virulence genes required for causing disease are all clustered together on mobile, infectious units, non-pathogens could be converted into pathogens in a single horizontal gene transfer event. This emphasizes the dander of releasing transgenic micro-organisms into the environment, even those that are not known to be pathogenic. This has been routinely done since genetic engineering began.
The evidence is now overwhelming that horizontal gene transfer has been responsible for both the rapid spread of antibiotic resistance and the emergence of virulent strains of pathogens...."
I could go on? The problem is not necessarily that they are doing this stuff it is that they are not being responsible about it because it is largely profit driven and this is an area where the ideas of free market capitalism has no experience because it is so intertwined with our own cellular biology and that of the nature we live within. The ideas of freedom are changing in this context. Why do you think there is such an increase in diseases such as diabetes, cancer, super viruses, etc. in the past 50 years? Explain that?
Irresponsible science is surly at the helm, it would be better to be fully informed than advocating this stuff. If you were the grocery store would be a scary place. I raely go in one anymore and when I do I am very selective about what I buy.
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You endorse Pharma-Crops, then. People are going to be force to be medicated--and you see nothing wrong with this, or a possibility for abuse? Do you realize when farmers buy GMO seeds, they are then beholden to the company for next years crop? The GMO crops will not reproduce seeds to save for the next years crop. A farmer who is growing GMO Corn will contaminate the other farmers in the area.
