Genetic's!!

[Shane Costello]

Originally psoted by PygmyPlaidGiraffe:

Context is important.
I would like to know what motivated these societies to cross breed species to get the desirable traits they wanted (in wheat or in livestock).

Retention of desireable traits such as increased muscle bulk in cattle.

What are the motivations to genetically modify species today?

Increased yields, introduction of new desireable traits, amplification of existing desireable traits, inbuilt pesticide resistance etc.

I would find it difficult to accept that human accomplishments are done independent of the contexts of survival, economy, beliefs/values, culture, community, and any others.

Your point being? I would have thought this goes without being said.

If we are comparing the accomplishments of a past society and how it applies to an argument of "it was done in the past so why make a fuss now" then I would like to determine the historical context and motivations of that society before drawing on an example of a past accomplishment.

What matters is that genetic modification has been occuring for millenia now, in a less precise and controlled fashion than we're now capable of doing, yet none of the doomsday hypotheses of the anti-GM movement were ever realised. Historical context and motivations are irrelevant.

 

[PygmyPlaidGiraffe]

Originally psoted by PygmyPlaidGiraffe:


Retention of desireable traits such as increased muscle bulk in cattle.



Increased yields, introduction of new desireable traits, amplification of existing desireable traits, inbuilt pesticide resistance etc.






What matters is that genetic modification has been occuring for millenia now, in a less precise and controlled fashion than we're now capable of doing, yet none of the doomsday hypotheses of the anti-GM movement were ever realised. Historical context and motivations are irrelevant.

Thankyou Shane, that helps.

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"Doom on you! Doom on you!" - Dodo's from IceAge movie and individuals in anti-GM movement

 

[Shane Costello]

Originally posted by PygmyPlaidGiraffe:

Thankyou Shane, that helps.

You're welcome!

For more on GM food:

www.fumento.com/subiotech.html

Michael Fumento is a very strident opponent of the anti-GM lobby. FWIW I agree with him, but then I am one of the converted.

www.newscientist.com/hottopics/gm/

New Scientist has a wealth of articles on GM food as well, which are less opinion driven than Michael Fumento's.

 

[LillyThePink]

I worry about people being grown for spare parts (I read Michael Marshall Smith's "Spares" this week) - People being genetically made to match others, in order that transplants are exact matches and stuff. I just don't like this idea. Growing spare parts is ok. Growing people to chop up and use for spare parts is not.

And I worry about people getting their kids filtered for stuff like brown eyes and homosexuality.

I'm optimistic about stemcell research and disease irradication.

 

[BlackBetta]

I think it's a great idea, with minimal dangers and a huge potential.

People being grown for organs is a nice sci-fi topic but I think it's unlikely. Practically, it would be easier to just go to some poor country and harvest organs there. In fact using your own children for organs would also be a good solution, as well as the moral equivalent of using a clone. But these things don't happen because in reality people are generally morally above doing that. And by the time technology exists to grow someone to adulthood in a tank, we will probably be able to grow the organ directly or use an animal, e.g. pigs, to grow it.

And I think the blue eyed, blond, hetero baby is over played. If it's posible and people want to control those things, so be it. But homosexuality, like any human behavior is a combination of genes and upbringing. I don't think it's something that could be filtered out of DNA.

Hey, if behaviors could be filtered out I'd start with the tendency to believe in the supernatural.

I think the potential to control our future evolution is an exciting prospect. Sometimes I wish I was born 300 years in the future to see how it turns out.

BB