Highly Controversial Are GMOs good or bad?

[PA Engineering]

I don't want to start a fight. But do you think GMOs are good or bad and please explain.

[kStrout]

Good, there is no reason why they would be bad. The corn we use has been a special species of corn for decades, so technically it is a GMO. I find nothing wrong with eating food that is specifically designed by humans for humans.

[Superfluous J]

Neither. Asking this is like asking if rain is good or bad. If you're trying to grow crops, it's good. If you're trying to vacation on the beach, it's bad.

But GMO is not *inherently* bad. We've been breeding things for centuries to have what we want in them and nobody minds that. This is just taking the time and randomness out of it.

[Majorjim!]

Yup, another thing the media has hyped beyond reason..

I even saw an article that said GMOs contained DNA and that certain people where disgusted by that..

GMOs have the possibility of solving world hunger that makes them 'good' in my book.

Edited March 27, 2015 by Majorjim

[xXIndestructibleEVAXx]

While business men and naturalists might not like them because they're good business or not natural, I think they are good because they could solve hunger. Healthier, better, quicker-growing food.

[Brotoro]

I do unnatural things all day long. "Unnatural" food does not frighten me.

[PA Engineering]

I say I have to agree that every one has said so far. The forums here are a lot different than where I live and I like that, where I live here if you say GMOs are good every one gets mad at you.

Edited March 27, 2015 by PA Engineering

[ZedNova]

Neither. As you know GMO stands for "Genetically modified organism". Which can apply to anything organic that has had it's genes modified, whether it's for good (Higher food yields) or bad (triffids).

[Bill Phil]

Considering how much food is processed, and then consumed on so regular a basis, GMO food is not bad.

[Kryten]

Anybody who moans about unnatural food should have to live off natural grass seeds and wild onions. Most of our crops are already practically unrecognisable as part of their parent species, and many have particularly freaky genetics already. Common wheat contains three otherwise compete genomes, one not even from the same genus, and you want to worry about a few genes?

[vger]

The big stink isn't specifically GMO's. It's GMO's that were altered to withstand mega-pesticides. When do we get our genes altered to resist Roundup?

[GreenWolf]

Allow me to present a Genetically Modified Organism:

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Obviously, this kind of terrible monster must be destroyed at all costs.

Selective breeding is a way of modifying the genes of an organism, so yes, chihuahuas are totally GMOs.

[vger]

Allow me to present a Genetically Modified Organism:Obviously, this kind of terrible monster must be destroyed at all costs.

I dunno... I once heard a Pug singing along to "I Will Survive." These shenanigans have gotta be stopped.

[Kibble]

The crime is having a patent on GMOs. So when cross-pollination of certain produce (naturally, and practically unavoidably) happens to adjacent farms, Monsanto can claim theft.

[Trann]

GMOs themselves aren't bad or good but they are changing the business model that used to be basic farming. A very simplified perspective from the ag world: until GMOs came around, no one owned a patent on a seed variety. Farmers could buy seed from a company, produce a yield, sell what they wanted to whomever wanted to buy it or keep some for reseeding. With patents on some varieties, buying seed from a company becomes a contract to not only receive the seed but to buy back all yields without retaining any for reseeding. Each year is a new contract of buy, seed, reap, sell because they own the product they sell to farmers and the yields it produces. Doing this protects the patents (among other things) but it's a different world than it used to be.

Ninja edit: what Kibble said

[vger]

The last two posts are practically reason enough to let the myth survive. If only to kill revenue enough that the lobbyists can't prevent the idea of "patentable life" from being repealed. Most people only know how to react to direct threats to their life.

[StrandedonEarth]

Generally good, but I can understand the concern when genes from completely different species are inserted.

[Dunbaratu]

"GMO" is too open-ended of a generic term to make a positive or negative judgement call.

It's a bit like saying "is water dangerous" well, that would depend. Drinking it is healthy, but breathing it isn't. Rivers are necessary for life... but a temporary river running where one normally doesn't is called a flood, and that's not so good for life.

There are some people who complain about GMO's for utterly ridiculous luddite reasons, akin to the stupidity of people using the word "chemical" as a generic scare word ("OMG this has chemicals in it!") forgetting that ANY molecular structure is a chemical, including water. They're wrong. But there are others who raise concerns over the legal issues surrounding trying to make self-replicating life organisms fall under intellectual property law, and some of those legal concerns are quite valid.

One legal concern is how some weed killers work in conjunction with GMO crops. The hard thing about a weed killer is that you want it to kill everything that is NOT the crop plant, but leave the crop untouched. One solution is to make GMO crops that are resistant to the specific brand of weed killer, and then sell that weed killer and that crop seed together. The problem comes from the fact that the weed killer can spread to neighbors' farms, thus forcing them to also be customers of the same company, buying the same seed, to keep their own crops from getting killed.

Being forced to use the same product that your neighbor is using is a monopoly problem.

To summarize - there is no scientific problem with GMO food. There is, however, a lot of legal concerns. It centralizes control in the hands of a few.

[Nibb31]

What's bad about GMOs are the business models behind them and the fact that they are proprietary, patented, and sterile.

GMO crops are engineered to be sterile, because the business model behind them is to make farmers dependant on yearly subscription supply contracts with GMO companies (Monsanto et al...). Instead of using the traditionally fertile seeds from the previous year's harvest, they have to buy new GMO seed every year from the GMO industry. These contracts are typically paired with exclusivity deals on specially-engineered fertilizers, pesticides, and weed-killers that go with the GMO seed, which prevents farmers from using alternative products from other sources. Without those extra chemicals, GMOs are more fragile than traditional crops.

These GMO seed contracts replace the traditional fertile crops that farmers have been using for centuries, especially in developing countries. Once the farmers have switched to GMOs, they are hooked and become dependant on the system with no turning back, because they can't switch back to the naturally fertile seeds from the previous year's harvest because they don't have them any more.

Not only is it bad for biodiversity, it simply puts humanity's food chain into the hands of these corporations. If farmers want to opt out or if the corporations refuse to sell seed, then entire areas can be hit by famine. Stop shipping the GMO seeds and nothing grows. Those who don't buy into the GMO scheme are bullied and forced out of the market. And if a farmer gets caught with GMO crops from his neighbor's field, he can get sued by Monsanto for licensing, because of illegal use of a patented product.

Also, replacing the huge variety of difference species of corn or wheat with the one or two standardized GMO crops is a huge loss in terms of food variety. In countries like France or Germany, there are hundreds of different types of traditional breads based on mixes of various cereals. If those traditional cereals disappear, you end up with a limited offering of US-style plastic-wrapped bread that all tastes the same. Yuck.

The same is true for Africa for example, where industrial GMO corn is replacing tradional mil. Not only this forces populations to change their eating habits, it also forces farmers to use crops that aren't necessarily the best for the climate or for local irrigation systems or water supplies. It also means that they are giving up their food production independence and their money flows out of the country and into the pockets of GMO corporations, causing more poverty.

The whole scheme is evil to the bone. It only serves interests of Monsanto et al, and the short term interests of some farmers who don't look at the big picture. In the long-term, we all submit to the GMO industry and we all lose.

Edited March 27, 2015 by Nibb31

[Leszek]

Anther GMO: Humans.

Every human has on average about 100 random genetic mutations. Other life forms have their own rates of genetic mutation. Somehow if the genetic change isn't random, it is dangerous? Why is that? The assumption that it is, is the only thing the anti-gmo crowd has.

The term unnatural bugs me, by definition anything unnatural would be supernatural. You show me a ghost fruit, and I will change my mind about GMO's. (And lots of other things besides.) In the pseudo science community there is a lot of words and concepts that are used incorrectly. I like to ridicule each one without mercy. It isn't being picky, not knowing what these words mean and not thinking about what they imply is how these things continue to live. A very many pseudo science claims become absurd at a glance if you know what the charlatan is actually saying. </cut-off-rant-before-pages-long-essay-off-topic>

[Superfluous J]

I do unnatural things all day long. "Unnatural" food does not frighten me.

"Natural" is another one of those words that is neither good nor bad. Would you rather eat a bag of "Unnatural" Cheetos, or "Natural" hemlock?

[vger]

"anything unnatural would be supernatural. You show me a ghost fruit, and I will change my mind about GMO's.

Isn't what we commonly refer to as supernatural actually para-natural/paranormal?

[-Velocity-]

Well, we keep loosing honey bees to colony collapse disorder, and every year, the threat to them and all flowering plants keeps increasing. Isn't there ever-accumulating evidence that is at least partially linking colony collapse disorder to GMO, "round-up ready" crops? We're drowning massive amounts of acreage in various pesticides and herbicides... how would it be surprising that this would be bad for bees? Whatever is going on with them sure does seem unnatural. I'm noticing that I'm even seeing fewer and fewer of them myself. Used to be you couldn't walk across a patch of clover without hearing the buzzing of busy little bees at work. Now those same patches seem pretty silent, at least around here.

So really, just like ANY technology, genetically modifying organisms is not good or bad. It's how we use them that is good or bad.

Edited March 27, 2015 by |Velocity|

[vger]

Well, we keep loosing honey bees to colony collapse disorder, and every year, the threat to them and all flowering plants keeps increasing. Isn't there ever-accumulating evidence that is at least partially linking colony collapse disorder to GMO, "round-up ready" crops?

Don't worry, Monsanto can engineer a Roundup resistant bee, and after all other species die, they can become a hybrid government entity and institute a "pollination tax."

[-Velocity-]

The term unnatural bugs me, by definition anything unnatural would be supernatural. You show me a ghost fruit, and I will change my mind about GMO's. (And lots of other things besides.) In the pseudo science community there is a lot of words and concepts that are used incorrectly. I like to ridicule each one without mercy. It isn't being picky, not knowing what these words mean and not thinking about what they imply is how these things continue to live. A very many pseudo science claims become absurd at a glance if you know what the charlatan is actually saying. </cut-off-rant-before-pages-long-essay-off-topic>

Wrong. The people who claim that "humans are part of nature!!" fail to even grasp what the word nature means. Nature has multiple meanings, and the most common of which is the natural world with the exception of humans.

So "unnatural" things are things that are caused or created by humans, in this context.

And you don't have to believe me, just query dictionary.com-

Nature-

noun

1.

the material world, especially as surrounding humankind and existing independently of human activities.

2.

the natural world as it exists without human beings or civilization.

3.

the elements of the natural world, as mountains, trees, animals, or rivers.

4.

natural scenery.

5.

the universe, with all its phenomena.

6.

the sum total of the forces at work throughout the universe.

7.

reality, as distinguished from any effect of art.

It's only when you get to definition #5 that "nature" includes humans. The most common definitions of the word make a big point about excluding them.

Wanna know what word is truly used incorrectly all the time by people that should know better?

"Sentient", which just means the ability to feel or be conscious or aware. Your dog is sentient. Hell, a lizard is sentient. A tapeworm is even sentient to a small degree. (You could even argue that plants, bacteria, and even our present computers are sentient to a tiny degree.) And yet, in science fiction, you keep seeing people refer to "sentient computers" or "sentient races" when they actually should be saying "sapient computers" or "sapient races" (the word "sapient" means "intelligent").

Edited March 27, 2015 by |Velocity|