They released some grain that could potentially cause a severe allergic reaction in a small portion of the people sensitive to it, but that is not poisoning. IIRC, it never reached the general population anyway, due to filter controls.
Worse accidental releases of antigen like that have happened with spills at grain processing plants. Tainted meat is more dangerous than the stuff released in those scares, and people take those in stride now.
DISCLAIMER: I don't like monsato. If you don't believe me, take a look at my posting history. I think their business practices are shady, at BEST. And that's being very nice. I just don't like it when people throw stuff out there like that to inflame people.
You SWALLOWED your bugs? That makes me feel a lot better about my lab accidents.
The thing is, though, that these blocks make that whole process a lot easier. You can make LB & agar plates with stuff in the grocery store. Incubators can be made or bought with no difficulty, electrophoresis boxes can be rigged up with stuff from the hardware store. The restriction enzymes are a bit expensive, but anyone can call up NEB or Promega and buy some with a credit card, and have it sent to their home (I've done it before, purchasing was taking too damn long).
That said, script kiddies probably won't mess with this. I doubt we have to worry about some kid in his mom's basement making uber-anthrax. The odds of finding a lethal combination randomly are pretty damn high. It also is a big jump from "I will wipe your computer's hard drive!/Deny access to your web server" to "I'm going to KILL YOU!"
I was wondering the same thing. Making an oligo is nowhere near as difficult as making weapons grade plutonium. If you have the time, patience, access to raw materials (they are not currently regulated) and training, you can literally do it in your kitchen.
Besides, it's easy to monitor a nuclear pile. If a gram is missing, then there is a gram out there. If a picogram of a plasimd is missing, it could potentially be amplified into milligrams in a matter of days.
The upside is that in order to put these together, you will need a large variety of "parts"; one or two won't help. Think about building a computer with just screws and an empty case. Furthermore, this equipment is quite expensive and bulky. We don't have to worry about script kiddies doing this just yet.
nounder is on the right track. It takes a certain load to trigger an adaptive immune response. The problems with the shotgun approach to vaccination are that
(1) you don't get an overwhelmingly higher concentraion of the effective antigens over the ineffective ones, so the system is not effectively triggered.
(2) Even if it was possible to immunize against 100s of pathogens at once, it wouldn't be desireable. Clonal selection is a great tool the body uses to keep a vast reserve library in storage until needed. Inducing a memory response for certain antigens could remove (or reduce the incidence of) memory cell sets for other antigens. So, with the shotgun, you are now immune to a few hundred antgigens that don't realy pose a threat, while you have now lost your memory cell sets to a dozen types of rhinovirus, rotavirus, and a few strains of influenza (theorectially, and my apologies for the oversimplification).
You don't necessarily have to add the 20-30% on top. Much of the expense can be deducted at the end of the year if it's a cost directly related to your job.
That said, I agree that it's BS that they yank this kind of a benefit, but still expect you to provide 24/7 access. Being salaried does lay on a good bit more expectation, but not that much more.
The point is, it's never good to set in stone what you should or should not do. Many have tried to write a "complete code of ethics" that covers every situation, but such a thing will never exist, because there are new twists to every situation, and nobody can think of every possibility.
Just wanted to interject a late, offtopic comment here. When trying top define a universal code of ethics, one thing many people overlook is the idea that there may not be an ethical response to every situation.
The classic question about stealing the medicine that will save your kid's life, provided that there is no other way to get it is an example. According to the code of ethics of most people, stealing is wrong and allowing death or suffering is wrong. The fact that you must break your code of ethics does not invalidate it. The proper response to the question (IMHO) is that it is impossible to remain ethical in that circumstance. You must sin, so to speak.
Just because you add a few new twists does not suddenly make something that was unethical become ethical. Going back to the example, stealing is still wrong. In that case, it is still unethical, but necessary.
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That's actually an interesting point. In science, you have to go through lengthy disclosures about any potential conflict of interest. If they exsist, they must be disclosed in any publication or presentation you make. It doesn't restrict what you can submit for publication, but putting it out there that AstraZeneca funded your research puts a big grain of salt into your claim that Nexium is clearly superior to Zantac.
This kind of thing is not limited to any small number of Congressmen; it's ubiquitous. They all need to have their laundry aired on a regular basis.
Sometinmes, it is though. Evolution is not about tuning and organism for the environment. It is about producing the largest number of offspring that go on to reproduce. Being finely tuned to the environment will help in this regard, but so will the ability to attract a mate. Witness, most of the avians (peacocks, any crested bird, etc).
Raw grass and leaves contain an enzyme that prevents you from extracting the protein in it.
It doesn't change the point, but as a technical issue it's that we lack an enzyme needed to extract sugar from cellulose (primary calorie source in vegetable matter). No animal has this enzyme. Herbivore animals like cattle, deer, termintes, etc have developed symbiotic relationships with bacteria to use the carbon in cellulose.
I.e., in a way, yes, the correct evolutionary course was to become a scrawny smart geek. That was the survival trait.
Add "that can run marathons" and you've got it precisely, according to some theories. Look at the hunter-gatherer cultures in Africa today. Our ancient predecessors probably hunted in a smiliar manner; wounding prey and tracking them until they dropped.
Evolving into something more muscular and slower was _not_ an option.
To nitpick to death, it was an option. Just not a good one:).
The big jaws in apes were not primarily for combat. They were for crushing nuts (Please don't take the obvious joke...). The strong upper body was from the ancestors aboreal nature. Once we became upright and savannah-dwelling, we didn't need massive upper body strength. We needed long bones in the legs, and powerful leg muscles. So jocks were selected for. At least, the track & field type.
the biological equivalent of a programmer slapping some code together, testing it a couple of times to make sure it doesn't crash and then installing it on the fly-by-wire system of every airliner in the world.
Not really. This is not the wholesale production of a new life form, de novo. What you see in GM crops is more like a patch. It is a couple of genes. To extend the analogy, it's a few lines of code added to an OS. To keep the perspective clear, the wheat genome is roughly the same size as ours, if not bigger (the number isn't firm yet). So it's about 35,000 genes, give or take. Compared to 3M lines in the linux kernel, it's like adding 85 lines to it, at most. In that case, all you really need to do is a few tests and ship it.
However, the tests on GM crops have been a lot more extensive. I linked in another post a set of articles from Nature that go over the studies.
In short, these are not new species. They are variant forms of existing species.
Most anti-GM's argue that selective breeding is not genetic engineering. If selective breeding is genetic engineering, then we have been engaged in genetic engineering for thousands of years.
You claim that the foreseeing is not done past next week/year/whatever. What is the basis of this claim? I have seen computer model studies investigating the impact of introduced genes and species spreading over dozens of generations. You claim simply that it is not done. I have seen it done, and I have read the reports that came out of those studies. Have you done the same?
Have you read the studies done over the past decade on the effects of GM crops? In case you haven't, here's the rundown: The primary impact is on biodiversity inside the farmland itself (and not always a reduction, it depends on the crop type). The studies independently concluded that the same effect would result from an advance in conventional herbicide technology. Basically, the species that have begun to thrive secondary to agriculture no longer get the benefit of that agriculture, while other species do get a benefit. But even that is only is some cases. Corn and wheat crops have no significant effect on supplementary populations. The overall impact is about the same as introducing agriculture into an area.
Carefully controlled and contained research? Like the stuff we've been doing in labs and experimental farms for the past 20 years? Read the research, not the propaganda. Go to PubMed, not the Drudge report.
You still have not proposed one mechanism. Not one scenario. Not even one gene. Show that you speak about GM technology from anything other than ignorance. People tend to fear what they do not understand. It's not that hard to understand, either. Go read about it. And read the real science. Start with Mendel and work up from there. Read the case studies that have been done, but no one seems to notice.
History is littered with failed biological experiments that were going to work "just fine".
I note a distinct lack of examples. Don't just shoot me an experiment that gave an unexpected result, give me one that had a detrimental result of the scale you speak of here.
So what are these "biological weapons" thingamajigs I keep hearing about on the news ?
Dig in the ground. Find some Anthrax spores. Do a little selection for the most virulent strain. Grow it, mill it, put it in a good delivery vehicle. No genetic engineering needed. Same with smallpox or any other bug. These are natural bugs that are delivered in a particularly harmful way. It's engineering, but not the genetic variety. Besides, the original argument was that someone would do this accidentally, not intentionally.
So is whispering "it's all right" without really knowing what's going to happen.
No, that would be patronizing.
Within all reasonable consideration, there is no foreseeable problem. The arguement that "we need to know more" is kind of pointless, as that the only way to know more is to do more. I have yet to see a single proposed mechanism by which this could cause the kind of wholesale destruction that people keep talking about. Name one specific consequence of the science that is detrimental (science, not the policy of its application, but the science). Describe the mechanism by which this would take place. Deomstrate that you at least know the science you are denouncing. Then I'll listen.
Although I would never argue that the US is perfect, I have to take issue with your logic:
f it was "the best place" we'd all have free medicine when we need it, a job, food free from chemicals, food period, less violence in the streets, and so on
Lacking these things does not preclude a place from being "the best" if no other place provides all of these things. It may preclude it from being "perfect", but it certainly does not rule out "the best". The best there is can still suck ass.
I doubt the uptopia you describe has ever or will ever exsist outside of fiction. I do agree that the US (and the rest of the world) needs a lot of work. I disagree, however, with your claim that the US is not a great place to live. I've been to other countries, and work with people from all over the world (less than half of my coworkers are American). Most of the ones that get here are overjoyed to be here. Even our European friends wind up admitting before too long that the US is not nearly as bad as it is made out to be, and the majority of the ones that I know like it here (never met a Canadian who did like it here, though....maybe it's the heat). If you think the US is a horrid place, talk to someone from India, China, Indonesia, or many parts of Africa and South America. Personally, I even prefer the problems the US has to the problems that Europe, Canada, and the Aussies have. The devil you know, I suppose....
But there are things that are great about this country. They aren't gone yet, we just have to make sure we hold on to them tightly.
I agree and disagree with your post so much, my brain hurts.
This kind of thing can help NASA. As mentioned before, they will buy copies of your ship from you. The overall cost will be less for them, because they don't have to pay R&D, just compensate you for manufacturing. It also makes sense if NASA is going to start going about exploration in a serious manner.
I do agree that NASA is not the best way to go. We need private enterprise in space that is sustainable and profitable. These kinds of prizes will stimulate private enterprise in space. Once it is demostrated as feasible, and the launch costs are brought down, any space enterprise becomes more feasible.
The last thing I wanted to say is to your last comment. Is there such a thing? Does anyone else like the idea of a grass-root X-Prize II? I could be naive and say let's take up donations on/., but we all know that won't happen. What could happen, though, is something like this could be organized on/. We could band together and start promoting it. There are smart people on here, with plenty of skills and contacts. We could take advantage of the splash from this current X-prize media attention and ride it. Imagine that you put half of the effort of posting on/. into organizing something like this.
We could do it, start something up. It's possible. I can dream, dammit. You can't stop me. YOU CAN'T STOP ME FROM DREAMING!!!!
Really, though, is there an effort like this out there that anyone knows about? If not, would anybody be interested in giving it a shot?
So just because it hasn't happened means that it can't happen? Sorry, that's not a good argument.
No, but because it hasn't happened in a long time is a good argument that it is unlikely. Simply replying "Just because it hasn't happened doesn't mean it won't!" doesn't hold much water with me; monkeys just might fly out of my butt. Just because it hasn't happened.....
As for the SUV quote, I think the satire was obvious. It did detract from the point, but I like to intersperse a little humor here and there, even if it's not all that good. It keeps discussions more friendly. If you didn't get the joke, sorry. I like to intersperse humor, but I'm not very skilled.
If you didn't mean to imply that there were natural rules in place for transfer of genetic material, then what did you mean when you said:
Genetic engineering removes the guardrails and lets the SUVs into the living rooms.
What are the gaurdrails that were removed?
I don't doubt that many are motivated by profit. I never said that there aren't unscrupulous firms, I just said that in this case, the science is good. Their profit mongering has reared its head in other areas. I have looked at what much of what has been done, and I do understand it all (IAAMB). Yes, the activity is motivated by profit, and the morals are a bit lacking in the implementation of the technology. However, the science is quite good. The danger has been minimized from every angle. You seemed to avoid that point. And the one about lateral transfer. And about new genes arising spontaneously. I would also like to hear why scores of generations of GM organisms without severe consequences is not bolstering to the safety of GM.
As for motive, nature is "motivated" (quotes to denote humanizing) by profit. Survival of the fittest means that the one with most kids, wins. Wealth is measured differently in different systems. I don't have faith in the companies. I have faith in data and observation. I know the tools they used, and recognize the technologies they used. Any good molecular biologist could recognize what they did (and so can I). Like I said, I looked at the science, understood it, and I agree that they have done a good faith job.
What specific risk do you foresee? What gene that they introduced will interact with another to cause a detrimental effect? No wild speculation, what gene lacks the proper safegaurds? Do you even know what the safegaurds are? Do you even know what the genes might be? Do you know how they are introduced, what they do, and how they do it? It is known. It's not a mystery.
I hate to break it to you, but we have been doing genetic engineering in the lab for quite some time now. No one has made plague. No one has made either Pinky or the Brain. No one has made a sqaudron of atomic mutant basketball players to challenge the Globetrotters. The most we have managed is a few things that are resistant to certain diseases, and a lot of things that get funky diseases. And we know that's all it is in many cases, because these animals, plants, and bugs have been monitored for nearly 100 generations in some cases.
It is on the shoulders of this research that groups like Monsato stand. I may disagree with their politics and economics, but I can find little fault in their science. It's nothing revolutionary.
Saying things like "Oops! Plague!" is simply inflammatory and only serves to reveal (and attempt to instill) a visceral fear of the subject. The invocation of the feared demon, Suv the Unimaginable, further demonstrates a need for a visceral reaction ("SUV's and GM are joining forces to destroy Gaia! Come to her aid!"). If you are going to oppose GM, at least use logical arguments and not absurd analogies that try to tie GM with something you may consider the Epitome of Evil.
And by the way, there no rules about interbreeding except the laws of genetics and physics. You can read that as, if it's possible for two species to swap genes, they will. Genes can even flow accross species (Google for lateral or horizontal transfer). Furthermore, there have been thousands of times that a wholly new gene was introduced into an animal, done by nature. Subtract the number of genes in the human genome from the number in a bacillus. That's a tiny fraction of the number of brand new genes that have been introduced. Or do you think that the thing that popped out of the primordial ooze had billions of genes in it, that were divided up amongst its progeny?
This is an interesting debate, and I don't really know what side I come down on, but I guess I'd better decide....IAAMB.
If you look at genetic code as falling from the sky, which it at least metaphorically did, you should consider the original as open. But on the other hand, someone had to reverse engineer and modify it, and that takes work.
Imagine one day it starts raining computer-looking devices. Along with everyone else in the world, you simply pick one up that looks undamaged and take it home to tinker with it. Soon, you discover a bunch of software binaries on the machine that were written in a completely unknown language. They will only run on that machine, and you have no idea how that machine works. Now reverse engineer the software to its original code. After years of effort, and a substantial investment, you get the code out. You find a buffer overflow error and fix it. You notice a few ways to improve its performance, and change those, too. Recalling that you do not own the original machine nor the original software, do you own the modified software?
It gets even more complictaed though. A bunch of other people reverse engineered it, and you just found a way to slap a few parts from program A into program B to make it better. Do you own that?
Or, to take it to the extreme, say you learned the new language and wrote a new program. Do you own that?
Remember: there is no EULA (GPL, Microsoft, BSD, or otherwise) signed for this stuff. It literally fell in your lap at the same time it fell into everyone else's.
Again, I don't know. I'm still forming an opinion here as to where the line should be drawn. Some things are clearly wrong, but others are clearly right. Where is the line?
Not likely. The FA was kind sketchy, but I would surmise that it is antibody or ligand targeted. Either way, the process is developed once, and then fabrication begins on a large scale. The only place where the error could be introduced is in the development phase, especially if it's ligand targeted. Genetics (and therefore antibodies) have the remote potential to change, but chemistry doesn't change.
It is possible for something like this to go rampant, but it would not kill every cell in your body; not even close.
The whole point to this is to be able to deliver very small quantities of drug to precisely where it needs to be. The current strategy with chemotherapeutics is that you deliver drug to the whole body, trying to keep a steady-state level in the tissues that will be lethal to the tumor, but only minimally impact normal cells. You play on the increased susceptibility of cancer cells to the drug. This is often not universally effective; which is why cancer patients can be killed by the treatment, lose their hair and often develop GI problems, among other things. The point was made before, and it is accurate: Chemotherapeutics are poisons.
With this technology, instead of just giving the drug systemically, you chemically tie it up until it gets to the right location. It then dumps the drug payload locally, increasing the concentration right on top of the cancer cell, and only on top of the cancer cell. Even if these did just bind to random cells in the body and activate, there would be a diffuse and random population of cells that died or are even affected. Effects would most likely be minimal, if even noticeable.
Think nuke and hand grenade. Ignoring morale and morality, a few hand grenades going off in random places in a city won't do any real damage. But, it they go off in just the right place during an attack, they can do a lot of good.
If they are killing cancer in animals with the technique then the wording in the submission is completely acceptable
The only problem is that we've been able to cure cancer in mice for over a decade. There aren't many cancers (except the wacky ones we give by knockout/transgenic technology) that we can't cure in mice. The trouble is that when you do the same thing in humans, people either balk at it (viral delivery) or develop serious comlications when you try it (most cytokine therapies) or simply don't work (p53 adenosviral selection therapies, so far). This could be great, but it may just be another way to cure cancer.....in mice.
Firstly, this was adressed primarily to US residents. My apologies if that sentiment wasn't fully expressed. Secondly, people in the US did notice. At least, I did. I think anyone in the US with a brain connected to functioning eyes noticed the sentiment of the rest of the world. Thirdly, the second phase of the war in Iraq was visible to anyone who was willing to look since about 1993 or 1994. It was probably inevitable even in 1992. The only question was how long it would take to come to fruition, and exaclty what form that thorny fruit would take. By the actions of the US, the entire world was finally forced to take notice of a problem we had all been ignoring for a long time.
Now, that said, I must say that I don't think it's being handled well right now. Ideally, it should have been handled a decade ago (the 1991-2 operation should have removed the government then, or at least aided the Kurds in their efforts in a more substantial way). After 1998, it was bound to have a bad end; Things had progressed too far. Still, it didn't have to be this bad. The world response to US action now was too little, too late. The US reaction was too much, too late.
Where were your protests in the 90s? Where was global military action in the 90s? Where was US comitment to government change in Iraq in 1992? This was predictable. It was forseeable. It was avoidable. I'm not blaming any one nation, just about everyone screwed up on Iraq. The UN went in to do a job in 1991, and only did it halfway. It was a recipe for disaster.
The only part of your post I disagree with is the notion that this is new.
The media has whored for ratings for decades, it's just that most of us were not watching the nightly news or reading the paper in a daily basis in the 70s.
Most people don't care until it directly impacts them today. The media knows this, and they only report on what is impacting people that day. Agreed, it erodes journalistic integrity and it is not a good thing, but there is a reason.
The average person concentrates more on what affects them today than what will affect them next year. Weather, traffic, daily stocks, crime. These warrant attention, but we need to look ahead as well. That way, a year from now you can continue to concern yourself with humdrum daily problems, like the daily commute and if you should wear a coat today. Instead of worrying about how you're going to eat or pay the rent, or if you can speak your mind anymore.
It's not new. Even the most recent example of massive protests in the US, those against Vietnam, didn't get big until the draft was enacted. When was the last time you saw something like that for something that wasn't happening yet? What if those same people had protested the (then coming) war just as loudly in 1961?
These are weapons entirely designed to be used by a government on their own citizens! That's absolutely detestable.
By that logic:
Police batons = detestable
Cops with guns/any other weapon = detestable
Take it out of the physical realm:
Fines (e.g., traffic fines) = detestable
"Sin" tax = detestable (well, maybe)
The point many of you are missing is that people will notice. It is a known device, and it's effects are public knowledge (obviously). When a protest starts, and thousands of peaceful protestors writhe in agony on the ground, there are enough intelilgent people in the nation to point these facts out to the rest. Those in charge are aware of this as well, and will act in a career-preserving manner. After using such a device, the only way someone could stay in power is to use it on every member of the media, and at the polls. Or just take over entirely. And anyone willing to do such a thing would do it wether this type of weapon exsists or not.
Although some may not have been tempted to actually falsify data, bias comes in quites frequently. "If I throw out this point, it all becomes significant" or "It doesn't work in this model, but it does work in this model...."
The temptation for me, though, has never been more than fleeting. Any scientist that denies even the most fleeting temptation, IMHO, is either lying or quite inexperienced. Anyone who gives in to the temptation, however, is someone I can't understand. Isn't he at all curious about what he's doing? If you falsify the data, everyone else may have their curiosities satisfied, but you still know it's incorrect. So what's the point?
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They released some grain that could potentially cause a severe allergic reaction in a small portion of the people sensitive to it, but that is not poisoning. IIRC, it never reached the general population anyway, due to filter controls.
Worse accidental releases of antigen like that have happened with spills at grain processing plants. Tainted meat is more dangerous than the stuff released in those scares, and people take those in stride now.
DISCLAIMER: I don't like monsato. If you don't believe me, take a look at my posting history. I think their business practices are shady, at BEST. And that's being very nice. I just don't like it when people throw stuff out there like that to inflame people.
The thing is, though, that these blocks make that whole process a lot easier. You can make LB & agar plates with stuff in the grocery store. Incubators can be made or bought with no difficulty, electrophoresis boxes can be rigged up with stuff from the hardware store. The restriction enzymes are a bit expensive, but anyone can call up NEB or Promega and buy some with a credit card, and have it sent to their home (I've done it before, purchasing was taking too damn long).
That said, script kiddies probably won't mess with this. I doubt we have to worry about some kid in his mom's basement making uber-anthrax. The odds of finding a lethal combination randomly are pretty damn high. It also is a big jump from "I will wipe your computer's hard drive!/Deny access to your web server" to "I'm going to KILL YOU!"
Besides, it's easy to monitor a nuclear pile. If a gram is missing, then there is a gram out there. If a picogram of a plasimd is missing, it could potentially be amplified into milligrams in a matter of days.
The upside is that in order to put these together, you will need a large variety of "parts"; one or two won't help. Think about building a computer with just screws and an empty case. Furthermore, this equipment is quite expensive and bulky. We don't have to worry about script kiddies doing this just yet.
(1) you don't get an overwhelmingly higher concentraion of the effective antigens over the ineffective ones, so the system is not effectively triggered.
(2) Even if it was possible to immunize against 100s of pathogens at once, it wouldn't be desireable. Clonal selection is a great tool the body uses to keep a vast reserve library in storage until needed. Inducing a memory response for certain antigens could remove (or reduce the incidence of) memory cell sets for other antigens. So, with the shotgun, you are now immune to a few hundred antgigens that don't realy pose a threat, while you have now lost your memory cell sets to a dozen types of rhinovirus, rotavirus, and a few strains of influenza (theorectially, and my apologies for the oversimplification).
That said, I agree that it's BS that they yank this kind of a benefit, but still expect you to provide 24/7 access. Being salaried does lay on a good bit more expectation, but not that much more.
Still a train wreck. The media loves train wrecks. Makes for great copy.
Just wanted to interject a late, offtopic comment here. When trying top define a universal code of ethics, one thing many people overlook is the idea that there may not be an ethical response to every situation.
The classic question about stealing the medicine that will save your kid's life, provided that there is no other way to get it is an example. According to the code of ethics of most people, stealing is wrong and allowing death or suffering is wrong. The fact that you must break your code of ethics does not invalidate it. The proper response to the question (IMHO) is that it is impossible to remain ethical in that circumstance. You must sin, so to speak.
Just because you add a few new twists does not suddenly make something that was unethical become ethical. Going back to the example, stealing is still wrong. In that case, it is still unethical, but necessary.
This kind of thing is not limited to any small number of Congressmen; it's ubiquitous. They all need to have their laundry aired on a regular basis.
Good point. How about I revise my statement to "that evolutionary path was an option, just not a viable one"
Sometinmes, it is though. Evolution is not about tuning and organism for the environment. It is about producing the largest number of offspring that go on to reproduce. Being finely tuned to the environment will help in this regard, but so will the ability to attract a mate. Witness, most of the avians (peacocks, any crested bird, etc).
Raw grass and leaves contain an enzyme that prevents you from extracting the protein in it.
It doesn't change the point, but as a technical issue it's that we lack an enzyme needed to extract sugar from cellulose (primary calorie source in vegetable matter). No animal has this enzyme. Herbivore animals like cattle, deer, termintes, etc have developed symbiotic relationships with bacteria to use the carbon in cellulose.
I.e., in a way, yes, the correct evolutionary course was to become a scrawny smart geek. That was the survival trait.
Add "that can run marathons" and you've got it precisely, according to some theories. Look at the hunter-gatherer cultures in Africa today. Our ancient predecessors probably hunted in a smiliar manner; wounding prey and tracking them until they dropped.
Evolving into something more muscular and slower was _not_ an option.
To nitpick to death, it was an option. Just not a good one :).
The big jaws in apes were not primarily for combat. They were for crushing nuts (Please don't take the obvious joke...). The strong upper body was from the ancestors aboreal nature. Once we became upright and savannah-dwelling, we didn't need massive upper body strength. We needed long bones in the legs, and powerful leg muscles. So jocks were selected for. At least, the track & field type.
Not really. This is not the wholesale production of a new life form, de novo. What you see in GM crops is more like a patch. It is a couple of genes. To extend the analogy, it's a few lines of code added to an OS. To keep the perspective clear, the wheat genome is roughly the same size as ours, if not bigger (the number isn't firm yet). So it's about 35,000 genes, give or take. Compared to 3M lines in the linux kernel, it's like adding 85 lines to it, at most. In that case, all you really need to do is a few tests and ship it.
However, the tests on GM crops have been a lot more extensive. I linked in another post a set of articles from Nature that go over the studies.
In short, these are not new species. They are variant forms of existing species.
You claim that the foreseeing is not done past next week/year/whatever. What is the basis of this claim? I have seen computer model studies investigating the impact of introduced genes and species spreading over dozens of generations. You claim simply that it is not done. I have seen it done, and I have read the reports that came out of those studies. Have you done the same?
Have you read the studies done over the past decade on the effects of GM crops? In case you haven't, here's the rundown: The primary impact is on biodiversity inside the farmland itself (and not always a reduction, it depends on the crop type). The studies independently concluded that the same effect would result from an advance in conventional herbicide technology. Basically, the species that have begun to thrive secondary to agriculture no longer get the benefit of that agriculture, while other species do get a benefit. But even that is only is some cases. Corn and wheat crops have no significant effect on supplementary populations. The overall impact is about the same as introducing agriculture into an area.
Carefully controlled and contained research? Like the stuff we've been doing in labs and experimental farms for the past 20 years? Read the research, not the propaganda. Go to PubMed, not the Drudge report.
You still have not proposed one mechanism. Not one scenario. Not even one gene. Show that you speak about GM technology from anything other than ignorance. People tend to fear what they do not understand. It's not that hard to understand, either. Go read about it. And read the real science. Start with Mendel and work up from there. Read the case studies that have been done, but no one seems to notice.
History is littered with failed biological experiments that were going to work "just fine".
I note a distinct lack of examples. Don't just shoot me an experiment that gave an unexpected result, give me one that had a detrimental result of the scale you speak of here.
Good set of links from a research journal on the subject of GM. It has links to some of the studies I mentioned.
Dig in the ground. Find some Anthrax spores. Do a little selection for the most virulent strain. Grow it, mill it, put it in a good delivery vehicle. No genetic engineering needed. Same with smallpox or any other bug. These are natural bugs that are delivered in a particularly harmful way. It's engineering, but not the genetic variety. Besides, the original argument was that someone would do this accidentally, not intentionally.
So is whispering "it's all right" without really knowing what's going to happen.
No, that would be patronizing.
Within all reasonable consideration, there is no foreseeable problem. The arguement that "we need to know more" is kind of pointless, as that the only way to know more is to do more. I have yet to see a single proposed mechanism by which this could cause the kind of wholesale destruction that people keep talking about. Name one specific consequence of the science that is detrimental (science, not the policy of its application, but the science). Describe the mechanism by which this would take place. Deomstrate that you at least know the science you are denouncing. Then I'll listen.
f it was "the best place" we'd all have free medicine when we need it, a job, food free from chemicals, food period, less violence in the streets, and so on
Lacking these things does not preclude a place from being "the best" if no other place provides all of these things. It may preclude it from being "perfect", but it certainly does not rule out "the best". The best there is can still suck ass.
I doubt the uptopia you describe has ever or will ever exsist outside of fiction. I do agree that the US (and the rest of the world) needs a lot of work. I disagree, however, with your claim that the US is not a great place to live. I've been to other countries, and work with people from all over the world (less than half of my coworkers are American). Most of the ones that get here are overjoyed to be here. Even our European friends wind up admitting before too long that the US is not nearly as bad as it is made out to be, and the majority of the ones that I know like it here (never met a Canadian who did like it here, though....maybe it's the heat). If you think the US is a horrid place, talk to someone from India, China, Indonesia, or many parts of Africa and South America. Personally, I even prefer the problems the US has to the problems that Europe, Canada, and the Aussies have. The devil you know, I suppose....
But there are things that are great about this country. They aren't gone yet, we just have to make sure we hold on to them tightly.
This kind of thing can help NASA. As mentioned before, they will buy copies of your ship from you. The overall cost will be less for them, because they don't have to pay R&D, just compensate you for manufacturing. It also makes sense if NASA is going to start going about exploration in a serious manner.
I do agree that NASA is not the best way to go. We need private enterprise in space that is sustainable and profitable. These kinds of prizes will stimulate private enterprise in space. Once it is demostrated as feasible, and the launch costs are brought down, any space enterprise becomes more feasible.
The last thing I wanted to say is to your last comment. Is there such a thing? Does anyone else like the idea of a grass-root X-Prize II? I could be naive and say let's take up donations on /., but we all know that won't happen. What could happen, though, is something like this could be organized on /. We could band together and start promoting it. There are smart people on here, with plenty of skills and contacts. We could take advantage of the splash from this current X-prize media attention and ride it. Imagine that you put half of the effort of posting on /. into organizing something like this.
We could do it, start something up. It's possible. I can dream, dammit. You can't stop me. YOU CAN'T STOP ME FROM DREAMING!!!!
Really, though, is there an effort like this out there that anyone knows about? If not, would anybody be interested in giving it a shot?
No, but because it hasn't happened in a long time is a good argument that it is unlikely. Simply replying "Just because it hasn't happened doesn't mean it won't!" doesn't hold much water with me; monkeys just might fly out of my butt. Just because it hasn't happened.....
As for the SUV quote, I think the satire was obvious. It did detract from the point, but I like to intersperse a little humor here and there, even if it's not all that good. It keeps discussions more friendly. If you didn't get the joke, sorry. I like to intersperse humor, but I'm not very skilled.
If you didn't mean to imply that there were natural rules in place for transfer of genetic material, then what did you mean when you said:
Genetic engineering removes the guardrails and lets the SUVs into the living rooms.
What are the gaurdrails that were removed?
I don't doubt that many are motivated by profit. I never said that there aren't unscrupulous firms, I just said that in this case, the science is good. Their profit mongering has reared its head in other areas. I have looked at what much of what has been done, and I do understand it all (IAAMB). Yes, the activity is motivated by profit, and the morals are a bit lacking in the implementation of the technology. However, the science is quite good. The danger has been minimized from every angle. You seemed to avoid that point. And the one about lateral transfer. And about new genes arising spontaneously. I would also like to hear why scores of generations of GM organisms without severe consequences is not bolstering to the safety of GM.
As for motive, nature is "motivated" (quotes to denote humanizing) by profit. Survival of the fittest means that the one with most kids, wins. Wealth is measured differently in different systems. I don't have faith in the companies. I have faith in data and observation. I know the tools they used, and recognize the technologies they used. Any good molecular biologist could recognize what they did (and so can I). Like I said, I looked at the science, understood it, and I agree that they have done a good faith job.
What specific risk do you foresee? What gene that they introduced will interact with another to cause a detrimental effect? No wild speculation, what gene lacks the proper safegaurds? Do you even know what the safegaurds are? Do you even know what the genes might be? Do you know how they are introduced, what they do, and how they do it? It is known. It's not a mystery.
It is on the shoulders of this research that groups like Monsato stand. I may disagree with their politics and economics, but I can find little fault in their science. It's nothing revolutionary.
Saying things like "Oops! Plague!" is simply inflammatory and only serves to reveal (and attempt to instill) a visceral fear of the subject. The invocation of the feared demon, Suv the Unimaginable, further demonstrates a need for a visceral reaction ("SUV's and GM are joining forces to destroy Gaia! Come to her aid!"). If you are going to oppose GM, at least use logical arguments and not absurd analogies that try to tie GM with something you may consider the Epitome of Evil.
And by the way, there no rules about interbreeding except the laws of genetics and physics. You can read that as, if it's possible for two species to swap genes, they will. Genes can even flow accross species (Google for lateral or horizontal transfer). Furthermore, there have been thousands of times that a wholly new gene was introduced into an animal, done by nature. Subtract the number of genes in the human genome from the number in a bacillus. That's a tiny fraction of the number of brand new genes that have been introduced. Or do you think that the thing that popped out of the primordial ooze had billions of genes in it, that were divided up amongst its progeny?
If you look at genetic code as falling from the sky, which it at least metaphorically did, you should consider the original as open. But on the other hand, someone had to reverse engineer and modify it, and that takes work.
Imagine one day it starts raining computer-looking devices. Along with everyone else in the world, you simply pick one up that looks undamaged and take it home to tinker with it. Soon, you discover a bunch of software binaries on the machine that were written in a completely unknown language. They will only run on that machine, and you have no idea how that machine works. Now reverse engineer the software to its original code. After years of effort, and a substantial investment, you get the code out. You find a buffer overflow error and fix it. You notice a few ways to improve its performance, and change those, too. Recalling that you do not own the original machine nor the original software, do you own the modified software?
It gets even more complictaed though. A bunch of other people reverse engineered it, and you just found a way to slap a few parts from program A into program B to make it better. Do you own that?
Or, to take it to the extreme, say you learned the new language and wrote a new program. Do you own that?
Remember: there is no EULA (GPL, Microsoft, BSD, or otherwise) signed for this stuff. It literally fell in your lap at the same time it fell into everyone else's.
Again, I don't know. I'm still forming an opinion here as to where the line should be drawn. Some things are clearly wrong, but others are clearly right. Where is the line?
It is possible for something like this to go rampant, but it would not kill every cell in your body; not even close.
The whole point to this is to be able to deliver very small quantities of drug to precisely where it needs to be. The current strategy with chemotherapeutics is that you deliver drug to the whole body, trying to keep a steady-state level in the tissues that will be lethal to the tumor, but only minimally impact normal cells. You play on the increased susceptibility of cancer cells to the drug. This is often not universally effective; which is why cancer patients can be killed by the treatment, lose their hair and often develop GI problems, among other things. The point was made before, and it is accurate: Chemotherapeutics are poisons.
With this technology, instead of just giving the drug systemically, you chemically tie it up until it gets to the right location. It then dumps the drug payload locally, increasing the concentration right on top of the cancer cell, and only on top of the cancer cell. Even if these did just bind to random cells in the body and activate, there would be a diffuse and random population of cells that died or are even affected. Effects would most likely be minimal, if even noticeable.
Think nuke and hand grenade. Ignoring morale and morality, a few hand grenades going off in random places in a city won't do any real damage. But, it they go off in just the right place during an attack, they can do a lot of good.
The only problem is that we've been able to cure cancer in mice for over a decade. There aren't many cancers (except the wacky ones we give by knockout/transgenic technology) that we can't cure in mice. The trouble is that when you do the same thing in humans, people either balk at it (viral delivery) or develop serious comlications when you try it (most cytokine therapies) or simply don't work (p53 adenosviral selection therapies, so far). This could be great, but it may just be another way to cure cancer.....in mice.
Now, that said, I must say that I don't think it's being handled well right now. Ideally, it should have been handled a decade ago (the 1991-2 operation should have removed the government then, or at least aided the Kurds in their efforts in a more substantial way). After 1998, it was bound to have a bad end; Things had progressed too far. Still, it didn't have to be this bad. The world response to US action now was too little, too late. The US reaction was too much, too late.
Where were your protests in the 90s? Where was global military action in the 90s? Where was US comitment to government change in Iraq in 1992? This was predictable. It was forseeable. It was avoidable. I'm not blaming any one nation, just about everyone screwed up on Iraq. The UN went in to do a job in 1991, and only did it halfway. It was a recipe for disaster.
The media has whored for ratings for decades, it's just that most of us were not watching the nightly news or reading the paper in a daily basis in the 70s.
Most people don't care until it directly impacts them today. The media knows this, and they only report on what is impacting people that day. Agreed, it erodes journalistic integrity and it is not a good thing, but there is a reason.
The average person concentrates more on what affects them today than what will affect them next year. Weather, traffic, daily stocks, crime. These warrant attention, but we need to look ahead as well. That way, a year from now you can continue to concern yourself with humdrum daily problems, like the daily commute and if you should wear a coat today. Instead of worrying about how you're going to eat or pay the rent, or if you can speak your mind anymore.
It's not new. Even the most recent example of massive protests in the US, those against Vietnam, didn't get big until the draft was enacted. When was the last time you saw something like that for something that wasn't happening yet? What if those same people had protested the (then coming) war just as loudly in 1961?
Is canada allowing emigration from the US yet?
How is a desire to leave your country jingoistic? It kinda goes against the whole "extreme nationalism" idea.
Or are you just stereotyping Americans? We enjoy it when people lump us all together like that, and then call us narrow minded. Irony is fun.
By that logic:
Police batons = detestable
Cops with guns/any other weapon = detestable
Take it out of the physical realm:
Fines (e.g., traffic fines) = detestable
"Sin" tax = detestable (well, maybe)
The point many of you are missing is that people will notice. It is a known device, and it's effects are public knowledge (obviously). When a protest starts, and thousands of peaceful protestors writhe in agony on the ground, there are enough intelilgent people in the nation to point these facts out to the rest. Those in charge are aware of this as well, and will act in a career-preserving manner. After using such a device, the only way someone could stay in power is to use it on every member of the media, and at the polls. Or just take over entirely. And anyone willing to do such a thing would do it wether this type of weapon exsists or not.
The temptation for me, though, has never been more than fleeting. Any scientist that denies even the most fleeting temptation, IMHO, is either lying or quite inexperienced. Anyone who gives in to the temptation, however, is someone I can't understand. Isn't he at all curious about what he's doing? If you falsify the data, everyone else may have their curiosities satisfied, but you still know it's incorrect. So what's the point?