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Genetically-Modified Everything
BreadMan writes "The Economist has an interesting article about how the use of GM (genetically modified) plants extends well beyond the food industry. Altered trees that make better paper, insect-resistant cotton, potatoes that contain the right kinds of starches. An interesting read to see where the industry is going in light of problems with having GM foods on the dinner table. There's more industrial uses for agricultural products than you'd think of right away, so this may be a lucrative use for GM technology."
Basically, the show says that the people against genetically modified food don't know the facts and say that it isn't monitored by government agencies, while it is infact monitored by the FDA and EPA. Furthermore, genetically modified foods are solving the problem of world hunger by producing more output per area and being more resilliant in harsh climates.
Personally, I believe genetically modified plants are required to sustain life on earth with our current population.
Unfortunately, Hemp and Marijuana are not the same thing.
Hemp has many industrial uses for the oils and high strength fibers. It also contains such trivial amounts of the psychoactive chemical THC that nobody could possibly get high off of it. Thje saying goes that trying to get stoned on hemp is like trying to get drunk on non-alcoholic beer.
It also contains higher concentrations of a chemical called cannabidiol (CBD), which actually counters the effects of THC... so smoking industrial hemp would more likely get you UN-stoned (and deathly ill, I'd imagine).
Hemp can be used to make anything that's currently made of cotton or wood, perhaps of lower quality but certaintly of lower cost.
Marijuana, on the other hand, has no commercial value other than as a drug (illegal or otherwise).
=Smidge=
Nope- these trees have been around for decades. Now that I think about it, given the growth cycle of a Wyerhouser Super Tree- it's about the right time to begin harvesting the second generation (those that weren't wiped out, anyway, by that disease that ran through Eastern Oregon a while back- since all the trees were clones they had no natural defense). WSTs grow extremely fast- reaching full maturity in about 30 years, as opposed to 80-100 years for other trees of these species. But their wood is ONLY fit for paper products- it's FAR too soft for anything else.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Well, I grew up in farming country and have worked the farms, but that was in the 60's. while I am aware of the commercial chicken farms, I have never been to one (nor desire to be there).
Keep in mind, that this was an extra item added to checken feed. The chicken itself was not GM. Now, if that checken that you buy is slightly pink, then be assuered that either the algae or the daffidils were fed to the chicken. Dead Drained Chicken is pasty white.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Ummmm.... canola is a GM food. There's no such thing as a "canola" plant- it is simply GM rapeseed that was developed/patented by Canadian researchers, hence the CAN in canola.
The whole term "GM canola" is redundant- there's no such thing as natural canola.
- The Law of Unintended Consequences when (not if) genetic freaks get loose and upset global ecosystems, forcing dependence upon the outcompeting freaks and counterfreaks.
- Greedy corporations like ADM and Monsanto who aim to OWN food production by claiming "IP" rights on genes.
- Frankenfood FUDsters who would throw the golden-rice baby out with the bathwater because of fear and romantic notions about old-fashioned organic food somehow being better for you, even if it's not sustainable.
GM was inevitable, but it would be very sad if we ended up destroying our natural ecosystems, or locking it up in IP monopolies, only a few decades before we developed the molecular nanotech needed to self-sufficiently manufacture food, without depending on Mother Nature and top-down distribution.--
Power to the Peaceful
Two steps ahead of you, chief:
Budweiser Debuts Caffeinated Beer
Actually, this is a concern not only for GM crops, but for regular corn and soybean hybrids that are based upon a narrow genetic diversity.
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
DNA is not made out of amino acids, proteins are.
There is also the case of papayas in Hawaii. In the past few years, a new strain of papaya was developed to combat the papaya ringspot virus. This virus threatened to destroy Hawaii's entire commercial papaya industry. With the GM varieties, the papaya is now immune to this deadly rinspot virus. See this article from UH's student newspaper here http://www.kaleo.org/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/10/1 2/416b77d697d77
This is great news for any papaya farmer who wants to use the new GM varieties, but terrible for the organic papaya farmers. Recently, the organic farmers have found contamination in their crops. This could cause any organic farmer to lose his/her organic certification. In the world of organic farming, this is akin to a truck driver losing his CDL. In other words, all the work that went into getting certified for organic farming goes down the tube. As an aside, a large market for Hawaii's organic papaya crop is Japan, which has a zero-tolerance GM policy. Any contamination, and an organic papaya farmer would lose Japan as a market.
And what is the cause of the contamination? It looks like there are two possibilities. The first is contaminiation from a nearby farmer's pollen (if the neighbor uses GM papayas). The other is from buying contaminated seeds. When an organic farmer buys seeds that are labelled "non-GM", there should be absolutely no trace of GM in those seeds. This however is not the case - the quality control in keeping GM seeds and non-GM seeds is obviously not good enough and needs to be improved. Until these types of problems are worked out, I still see GM crops as dangerous. Not in the sense that the crop is necessarily unhealthy or dangerous to eat but, as in this case, could cost an organic farmer his livelihood.
Most articles list contamination as only a possibility, and rarely talk about the effects that GM contamination can have on a farmer. These effects are real and should not be ignored.
I've got an even better one: GM housecats to look like tigers, cheetas and leopoards. How much would you pay for a housecat that looked exactly like a bengal tiger?
:) ). Of course they cost a fortune right now, expecially for a first generation cross, but maybe in a few years.
Actually you can already get pets like this through traditional breeding. There's a wild cat species called the Serval, which is considerably larger (and smarter) than a house cat but much smaller than the big cats. In the last few years, they have successfully bred Servals with housecats to produce what they call a Savannah cat. The Savannah cats are much larger and smarter than a housecat, have a leopoard-like fur pattern, and several other very exotic characteristics. IMHO they're a gorgeous animal and are supposed to make great pets (if you can proof your home/yard to an animal with the curiousity of a cat coupled with greatly increased intelligence and size
There's also a fairly recent hybrid between housecats and another wild cat species, but I can't remember what it's called, a small relative of the leopard I think.
..is that the wind will blow the GM plants pollen and/or seeds around and pretty soon these things show up everywhere.
There was already a case where Monsanto was growing plants across the road from a farmer and the farmer had to pay Monsanto thousands of dollars because their seeds blew over into his planting area. Seems to me that Monsanto should have been sued for polluting the farmer's planting area. Or to put that another way - GM plants should be treated like toxic waste sites. If the toxic waste contaminates the area around the site - it is the responsibility of the owner of the site to clean up their mess. Not the other way around.
Someone put a black hole in my pocket and now I'm broke.
Some anthopologists speculate that the cats hung around the graineries, because that's where the rodents were. Gradually people and cats got used to each other. I, for one, don't think cats are particularly domesticated.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
Actually, Canola is differentiated from Rapeseed by having 2% Erucic Acid content, thus being safe for human consumption. Also, it stands for "CANadian Oil, Low Acid". Dammned yanks get the credit for everything...
GM plants are dangerous for many reasons.
Nature is a balance, and GM plants threaten that balance. One example is the so called insect resistant cotton. In a few generations, they expect the now insect resistant cotton to not be so insect resistant anymore. Why. Because they manage to kill all the weak pests, and leave the strong ones. Then the strong ones multiply rapidly, and you have a whole breed of pests which are more resistant to whatever schemes you concoct in the future. Us humans are making a pretty good job of accelerating the 'evolution' of new species of pests that give us trouble later.
Trouble also is, this stupid notion that a company can own IP on something people grow in their fields. Think the Microsoft of farms. Imagine a world where all the seed you have cannot be used again next season because it is someone's IP. It is easy for them to say, 'this is an opt in technology', but when they have succeeded in removing all 'natural' seed from the market, (Trust me, they can), this will not be a choice anymore. You will be forced to use what they give you.
I for one, think we are far from needing GM foods. Look at Europe. They routinely throw away food because they do not want to depress prices for farmers. We can produce more than enough to go round, and in some places especially like Africa, we could produce even more. We could produce less tobacco if need be to produce more food. There is no real argument in favour of GM plants from the perspective of adequacy for feeding the planet. Let us face the facts, the real reason some people are motivated to do this is to make more money, and that counts before anything else. I can take people competing to sell cars, but I think this might be an example of a failure of the free market system. In free markets, when abnormal profits have been wiped, people tend to try to unbalance the market by introducing an unneeded dependency, and that is one we can do without.
You're incorrect. Try this link.
Hemp and Marijuana belong to the same species of plant, but just like there are several different types of Oak and Maple, there's a distinction between Hemp and Pot.
not only are you wrong, but you're way wrong- industrial hemp and marijuana are completely different products, and one does not require the other. in fact, if you were to grow marijuana in a field of hemp, it would ruin the marijuana.