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| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 12:12 PM EDT |
The holy grail of high-yeild, high hardiness, pest-resistant crops?
Which is probably just that, a holy grail that will never be found.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 12:57 PM EDT |
A long time ago, a scientist working on GMO crops gave a
presentation. I believe the title was something like:
'An ethical basis for GMO, or why anti-GMO activists are
evil.' Of course, my memory isn't great.
He put up a graph estimating worldwide calorie output,
correcting for normal increases in efficiency owing to
conventional methods of increasing yield (breeding, better
cultivation, blah blah blah...).
Then he added a second plot, showing reasonable estimates of
required calorie input assuming known population trends.
The graphs crossed during my lifetime. He included a
conversion factor for the number of people who'd need to
starve to death, and some 'lovely' images. He also
mentioned that governments tend to function poorly in times
of starvation, which increases the problem.
Finally, he showed estimates of increases in efficiency
following modification of the rice genome.
The graphs didn't cross. The calculations looked
reasonable.
His argument was that, even though some people would die of
allergic reactions and that there was the potential for
significant abuses and real problems, avoiding or reducing
the predictable calorie-cap-related starvation was a
reasonable justification for working on GMO. I do buy that
argument. I can't swear that his graph was or remains
factually accurate - but it did look pretty reasonable.
So, yep, that's what is great about GMO, the hope that we'll
reduce the number of starving babies in the future. Of
course, there's always this difference between theory and
implementation - in particular - commercializing GMO tends
to result in problems with stability (if Monsanto stopped
producing seeds for rice X or selling them to country Y**,
yields might drop by 50%, then everyone starves...)
--Erwin
*As an aside, for the ethical vegetarians, bugs are an
excellent, surprisingly calorie-efficient source of protein.
Turns out that warm-blooded animals are inefficient - bugs -
not so much. They even compensate for virtually every
dietary deficiency that a strict vegan is at risk of
encountering. Shame about the ick factor.
**And it isn't like Monsanto is an unusually evil US
company...so of course there's nothing to worry about here.
I'm in favor of GMO, but I wouldn't accept free seeds from
Monsanto. For crop yields, I think a dual source
requirement and maintaining seed stocks in the host
countries should be a strict requirement.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 01:04 PM EDT |
The ability to GM crops will be critical as we move into colonizing space.
As others have noted, its who controls and/or abuses the technology that makes
or breaks the results.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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- Looking ahead... - Authored by: PJ on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 02:25 PM EDT
- no - Authored by: designerfx on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 04:36 PM EDT
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| Authored by: albert on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 01:30 PM EDT |
It's a shortcut to creating pest resistant crops. This is ONLY a theory.
Scientists have NO IDEA what the long term effects on humans (or animals) would
be. As far as crop yields are concerned, again, science is taking an economic
approach: more is better. They confuse quantity with nutritive value, because
they don't understand nutrition. Calorie counting is so simplistic as to be
meaningless. High-calorie diets meet the MDR for calorie intake, but will kill
you in the long run. Low fat and no salt diets are killers as well. We NEED
salt and good fats. Try a low carb diet, no grains, especially wheat products,
no refined sugars. You can get all your calories and sugars from vegetables,
and your protein from meats. Avoid processed 'foods'. Corn syrup is put in
EVERYTHING today. Read labels. This is the 'paleo diet' and it works.
Instead of increasing yields, why not decrease population growth? It's gonna
have to be done some day. It's _absolutely ridiculous_ to talk about colonizing
space. Why?
What possible reasons could there be to leave Earth? [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, September 21 2012 @ 01:33 PM EDT |
Or maybe another objection to GMO that I haven't encountered before. (But
chemistry and religion usually cover it.)
What I'm calling "chemistry" is concern over the unknown (or, known,
in some cases) unhealthy effects that eating GMO may have.
What I'm calling "religion" is the tampering-with-the-divine objection
that comes from religious collectives that often stand to lose influence as
science advances.
Just wondering where you stand, so as to allow tailoring an appropriate
response.
As a generic response regarding what's so great about GM, I'd say it is a tool
that allows humans to better adapt their environment to their needs.
(Anticipating the "it can be used for evil, too" response: yeah, so
can everything else.)[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, September 22 2012 @ 06:42 PM EDT |
If you should recall not that many years ago it was held that Scrapie* a disease
of sheep could/would not jump species barrier to other animals. So meatmeal from
sheep carcases which did not show signs of disease were fed to Cattle as a
protein boost. Then along comes "Mad Cow" disease. Eventually traced
back to Scrapie from sheep.
No way "Mad Cow" can/will jump species barrier to Humans. OOPS!!!. New
varient C-J D anybody?
Now there were good scientific reasons for believing that the species barrier
would not be crossed, so with that in mind I fail to see how anybody can now,
with absolute certainty, say GM is not harmful.
In both cases it was the desire to make the last cent/penny from the carcases
that was the problem.
* Scrapie takes years to develop and the symptoms don't show until several years
after infection but in the intervening period it is infectious itself.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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- Mad Cow. - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, September 23 2012 @ 02:25 PM EDT
- Mad Cow. - Authored by: Wol on Sunday, September 23 2012 @ 05:48 PM EDT
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