Biotech and the Environment

John Holkeboer writes: "Is biotech all that bad? The scourge celebre of environmentalists is gaining supporters right and left for nothing less than its environmental soundness. Genetically engineered corn requires less pesticide spray and is a renewable resource that could replace petroleum. For example, Dupont is developing "Sonora"- a stretch resistant fiber that can compete with polyester but isn't 100% petroleum-based. As one industry chemist points out, "Clearly, for the chemical industry, sustainable development is the future."" The Village Voice also has a good biotech article this week, talking about the genetically engineered bollworms that we mentioned a few months ago.

Comments

Just use hemp?

[Pope]

I still don't understand why there's so much cash spent on bio-engineering new strains of plants when hemp is a perfectly good as-is solution!

(well other than anti-drug hysteria, that is :)

The main worry I and many others have is the effect of bio-engineered foodstuffs: we DO NOT have any long-term data as to their effects on humans. For industrial usage? Hey, go for it, if you can ABSOLUTLEY MAKE SURE that the products will not make it into the foodstream, of either animals or humans. Until then proceed with extreme caution.

Re:Just use hemp?

[SeraphtheSilver]

Yes, but we don't need much more than cursory testing of most genetically engineered products for the simple reason that you don't eat genes.

What happens in your stomach is that the organic material of what you eat is broken down by the acids into chunks of protein and other organic molecules, where it is then sorted and used as necessary. The actual genetic structure of what you eat doesn't matter, since you aren't absorbing genes.

Now, what _can_ make you sick are certain chemicals that those genetically engineered foods produce. For example, if we have a plant that makes petroleum distillates, then eating that will make you sick - just like drinking gasoline would. On the other hand, whether or not a particular strain of wheat lasts longer, or is more resistant to disease doesn't affect you genetically at all. And since most GMOs _don't_ do things like produce petroleum distillates or deadly poison, there's no serious risk of getting sick from them.

-Seraph

Re:Caveat Lector

[OmegaDan]

this is exactly right! I saw a show about this corn, it requires less pesticides because it has genes that generate a pesticide thats been in use for over 2000 years ... Problem is, used sparingly the pesticide is fairly effective, but now that ALL the corn has it, theres no choice about how "much" pesticide to use or where to use it -- so the bugs are becoming resistant (because only the resistant ones are survivng).

Essentially, the company who made the corn took a pesticide thats been in use for two centuries (It was discovered by the ancient chinese), and have robbed the "value" from it, because all these bugs the pesticide was effective against will develope a resistance, and the pesticide used for 2000 years will be worthless ...

Re:Caveat Lector

[rgmoore]

The problem with this argument is that the farm on which the plants are growing is nothing like a natural ecosystem anymore. We've already trashed the ecosystem by cutting down all of the plants and driving away most of the animals that would naturally live there and replacing them with a synthetic monoculture. Switching from a conventional strain of a plant to a GMO strain is a minor change compared to switching to a whole new species of plant. But people switch from growing, say, corn to sunflowers all the time without anyone bleating about how it's going to disrupt the fragile ecosystem.

Re:Sitting on the fence is damned uncomfortable.

[dasmegabyte]

If it turns into something you can't eat, you'll find out the first time you eat it. Duh. Jesus, my cousin was thirty two before he discovered he was allergic to cashew nuts. You see, cashew nuts are pretty expensive and their taste isn't good enough in many people's books (not mine, mind you, i love a good handful of cashews) to include them in common foods. We go to an expensive chinese place, my cousin says "hey, let me chow on this badass 'cashew chicken'" and nearly chokes fifteen minutes later when his throat swells up.

That wasn't a genetically engineered cashew, mind you...it wasn't even a salted one! So your argument is, you might have to be wary of new foods...my reply is, you need to be wary now!

My cousin's story isn't all that uncommon...I was 21 before I discovered I was violently allergic to loperamide, an ingredient in many medicines that cure diarrhea. You see, I ate an entire box of Lucky Charms in a college dare, took an Immodium the next morning and got so dizzy and halucinigenic I had to be carried to the hospital. It'd make a cheap high if it wasn't for the chills and three days of fever afterwards.

Re:When plants make pesitcides, not corn...

[jbuhler]

> Oh, and the "natural" pesticide is still in the
> corn when you harvest it. Bummer.

The kinds of pesticides we engineer into plants are unlikely to be harmful to humans, unless they happen to cause allergies. Example: StarLink corn (which recently caused a scandal when it was accidentally used to make taco shells) contains the protein Cry9p, which is only active in the alkaline environment of an insect's stomach (vs the acid environment of ours).

The reason StarLink isn't approved for human consumption is that Cry9p is not broken down by stomach acid. Proteins with that property include many known allergens, though I'm not sure if Cry9p itself has ever been observed to cause an allergic reaction.

This isn't to say that engineering food organisms doesn't entail various risks, but do give the poor biologists *some* credit for thinking of obvious potentials for toxicity.

Another good example of caution in this regard is the Flavr-Savr tomato, which was not approved until its developers showed (among other things) that the modified fruit does not contain more naturally occuring toxins than regular tomatoes. Heck, even non-GMO food can be problematic in this respect -- new potato varieties are now tested for levels of toxic, naturally occurring solanin (the reason you shouldn't eat the green bits!).

Caveat Lector

[mshomphe]

Okay, IANAB(iologist), but neither side of the biotech debate seems to be getting things quite right. Reactionaries against GMOs use ignorant slogans like "Get your DNA out of my food". Biotech pushers use questionable logic like "Well, you've eaten it for this long, it can't be bad for you!" Here's the thing: Mutated DNA is not going to screw you up if you eat it. Short-term effects are negligable, unless you start introducting pesticide-producing capabilities, which we'll leave aside for the moment.

The problem with bio-engineering is this: The action of changing an organism in an ecosystem affects the entire ecosystem. It's the same as the analogy of the ol' butterfly flapping its wings in SoCal and causing tsunamis in Japan. Genetically modifying a plant that has natural predators will induce the predators to adapt or die. If they die, then their predators are forced to adapt or die, and so on.

In short (too late!), we must take the long view on this issue, not be afraid of the progress of science, nor over-confident in her abilities to predict the future.