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Has GMO ever been confirmed to have harmed anybody? Confusion between real and imagined threats could be part of the problem. Nuclear accidents will kill you, a

Has GMO ever been confirmed to have harmed anybody? Confusion between real and imagined threats could be part of the problem. Nuclear accidents will kill you, as in -- dead.

specialist 13y ago
GMO is like hammering. It can be used for good or evil. The informed opposition to GMO covers two types of modifications. #1 Making plants more resistant to herbicides, so that more herbicides can be used. #2 Giving plants new abilities to create their own insecticides. Both are terrible ideas. Mostly because they're pumping the biological arms race as well as the side effects. GMO for increased yield, durability, flavor, whatever are totally okay (depending on ones esthetics). We've been doing that for millennia thru breeding, artificial selection, and hybridization.
- mtdewcmu 13y ago
  "Both are terrible ideas. Mostly because they're pumping the biological arms race as well as the side effects." The notion that the genes spliced into crops could spark an evolutionary feedback loop that spirals out of control -- the evidence doesn't indicate any great cause for alarm, afaik. And the toxic side effects are unlikely to be of greater concern than from chemicals made in labs. I think the amount of public alarm about GMO is way out of proportion to the actual risk. This technology holds the promise of making agriculture less damaging and more efficient. I think the fixation on this issue is related to traits that make it a good a viral meme, and have nothing to do with rational risk-assessment.
coldtea 13y ago
>Has GMO ever been confirmed to have harmed anybody? There are sereval of studies that show that those examined can be harmful -- but it's a whole field, one cannot speak for all of them as harmful, can only examine them one by one. The general practice is harmful to me, because profit motives and patents are involved. I don't think just because they found out how to genetically modify plants that they also can understand the long term effects of their creations (to other plants, insects, animal life, the consumer, etc). Nor do I believe that they have the scientific rigor and patience to study those with the timeframes needed. It's more: "fuck it, let's sell these things". Plus it's a huge industry, with trillions to be made, that dwarfs smoke -- not many research labs get the funds to examine it critically. It's like pre-eighties, when tons of smoke studies were sponsored by tobacco companies, and found "little or no evidence" of it causing cancer.
sesqu 13y ago
> Nuclear accidents will kill you, as in -- dead. They have been markedly less successful at that than other industrial accidents. edit: Wikipedia suggests a total of about 9250 accidental deaths worldwide over the past 56 years related to nuclear research, power, weapons and therapy, of which some 126 died of radiation while the rest died from explosions and cancer (estimates vary; except for the 9000 deaths attributed to Chernobyl, the numbers likely discount some terminal cancers).
- mtdewcmu 13y ago
  This probably has a lot to do with the high level of vigilance that nuclear power receives, notwithstanding the occasional failure.

Has GMO ever been confirmed to have harmed anybody? Confusion between real and imagined threats could be part of the problem. Nuclear accidents will kill you, as in -- dead.

specialist 13y ago

GMO is like hammering. It can be used for good or evil. The informed opposition to GMO covers two types of modifications. #1 Making plants more resistant to herbicides, so that more herbicides can be used. #2 Giving plants new abilities to create their own insecticides. Both are terrible ideas. Mostly because they're pumping the biological arms race as well as the side effects. GMO for increased yield, durability, flavor, whatever are totally okay (depending on ones esthetics). We've been doing that for millennia thru breeding, artificial selection, and hybridization.

mtdewcmu 13y ago
"Both are terrible ideas. Mostly because they're pumping the biological arms race as well as the side effects." The notion that the genes spliced into crops could spark an evolutionary feedback loop that spirals out of control -- the evidence doesn't indicate any great cause for alarm, afaik. And the toxic side effects are unlikely to be of greater concern than from chemicals made in labs. I think the amount of public alarm about GMO is way out of proportion to the actual risk. This technology holds the promise of making agriculture less damaging and more efficient. I think the fixation on this issue is related to traits that make it a good a viral meme, and have nothing to do with rational risk-assessment.

coldtea 13y ago

>Has GMO ever been confirmed to have harmed anybody? There are sereval of studies that show that those examined can be harmful -- but it's a whole field, one cannot speak for all of them as harmful, can only examine them one by one. The general practice is harmful to me, because profit motives and patents are involved. I don't think just because they found out how to genetically modify plants that they also can understand the long term effects of their creations (to other plants, insects, animal life, the consumer, etc). Nor do I believe that they have the scientific rigor and patience to study those with the timeframes needed. It's more: "fuck it, let's sell these things". Plus it's a huge industry, with trillions to be made, that dwarfs smoke -- not many research labs get the funds to examine it critically. It's like pre-eighties, when tons of smoke studies were sponsored by tobacco companies, and found "little or no evidence" of it causing cancer.

sesqu 13y ago

> Nuclear accidents will kill you, as in -- dead. They have been markedly less successful at that than other industrial accidents. edit: Wikipedia suggests a total of about 9250 accidental deaths worldwide over the past 56 years related to nuclear research, power, weapons and therapy, of which some 126 died of radiation while the rest died from explosions and cancer (estimates vary; except for the 9000 deaths attributed to Chernobyl, the numbers likely discount some terminal cancers).

mtdewcmu 13y ago
This probably has a lot to do with the high level of vigilance that nuclear power receives, notwithstanding the occasional failure.