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Genetic Engineers Barking Up the Wrong Trees?
Rick the Red writes "In a commentary titled 'Genetic engineering for better suburbia', Vincent Barnes says, 'Cures for diseases and feeding the world with genetically modified foods is well and good but the real money is in solving the problems of homeowners, the vast silent majority of Americans who toil away every spring and summer fighting pests and every fall injuring their backs and falling off ladders.' Should Monsanto bring us designer maples that don't shed leaves? Would you buy designer grass that grows two inches and stops? Even if you won't eat GM food?"
....I think the above posters (and probably most readers) are missing the point that the article is clearly meant as satire - not very well-executed satire, but satire nonetheless.
I think you miss the irony of the column. The last paragraph says it all:
Surely it would not be difficult to shift this gene here and that gene there and come up with permanently blooming azaleas, rhodies, and camellias. Then, the only difference between winter and spring would be the temperature. But not to worry. Global warming will take care of that, too
This was a subtle satire of the suburbinite mentality about technology. It was not ment as a serious set of ideas.
See all of the above. As a geneticist, I'm actually an avid proponent of genetic engineering. Hell, we should engineer anything we can get our hands on as long as it is for something that we can profit from: plants producing enzymes that cure otherwise incurable disorders, plants that do not need pesticides, animals that carry humanized organs... People who fear genetic engineering do so out of ignorance mostly. They do not realize that our efforts are piss-poor compared to what Nature is doing to all genetic material of all living organisms every day.
That said, I do not believe for a single second that genetic engineering will reach the home owner any time soon. Having to do something in the garden can actually be enjoyable, you know. But seriously, however useful it may be, you can betcher sweet *ss that green activists (Greenpeace comes to mind) will sow such fear and hate that GE organisms will not be available for common use for a long time to come. Who do you think came up with the term "Frankenfood"? Go tell to the poor kids who eat Golden Rice that genetic engineering is bad. And, to any fanatic who might be reading this post, before you embark on yet another hate-trip, please check here for a well-balanced discussion of the issue. Hunger is caused in large part by issues other than innate defects in Nature's gifts, but many of those are issues that are not going to be solved any time soon. You can be fundamentalistic about this or you can be realistic. Poor people loose in the first case.
----- One learns to itch where one can scratch.
Do you want more info? If so, just google for "Starlink", the marketing name for Monstanto's chemical resistant crops.
They could have created a crop that would have reduced the amount of poisons we dump into the environment. Instead, they created one that allows us to use more poisons. Why? Well, you don't expect a chemical company to help us reduce the need for chemicals, do you?
"Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative" - Miyamoto Musashi
I think that goes for OS's too
Don't need genetic engineering here. Already got that by breeding in the conventional manner.
Buffalo grass varietal called "Tatanka". Great grass for lawns. Left to its own, it will grow about 3 inches in a season, so it usually gets mowed once or twice a year.
Alternatively, we could always get the good folks in Ca, Nev, AZ, and NM to realize that they are living in Deserts and blue grass just doesn't belong there.